The Connecticut labor news., 1922-06-23
SHIP SUBSIDY COUNTIES WILL BE PERPETUAL DRAIN ON PUBLIC THROUGH UNITED STATES TREASURY
Once Grasping and All Powerful Marine In- tereStS Get Hooks In- to Public Purse, They Will Stay There.
LAST OF THREE ARTICLES By Representative Ewin L. Davis.

One of the provisions of the bill pro- vides that 50@o of the immigrants to this country shall be transported in American vessels. Mr. Thos. H. Ross bottom, representative of the Shipping Board who testified at the hearings, es- tinated that under the 3@o quota law, This traffic would give the transporting companies a gross income of $l7,o00,- GOO per year, of which one-half. or s. 800,000, should come to American owr- CTS" He further stated that one-half of this sum would be net profit.
 There are various other indirect aids carried in the bill which I shall not now discuss.
 An extraordinary feature of the bill IS that all of the direct and indirect aids are so arranged by the provisions of the bill as to avoid the necessity of any Congressional appropriations. This was done deliberately. There was published as an appendix to a study prepared and distributed by the Shipping Board, which was inserted in the hearings of the Ship ping Board statement of recommen- dations by the Council of American Ship Builders (Inc.), New York, which has been filed with the Shipping Board, and the seven recommendations of said or ganizations were in part as follows:
 
 measure passed at this time should either avoid appropriations or if this is neces- sary, promise continuance" This bill not only avoids appropriations, but also insures continuance.
 Another important and extraordinary feature of the bill IS that if 1t is enacted 1t cannot be repealed or be materially changed by a subsequent Congress, by reason of the various contract periods authorized in the bill The direct charges upon the Public Treasury car ried in this bill. even if they amount to no more than the figure conceded by Chairman Las<er, will be greater than the combined subsidies. subventions, and tion paid by all of the other nations on earth combined. And yet, the shipping ! interests are not satisfied and say that l these subsidies are not large enough and will have to be either increased now or !! later, in order for them to be able to successfully compete with foreign ships.
 Some of them say the subsidies should be doubled, and one leading ship oper- ator stated that they should be at least trebled. Some of them stated that the contract periods should be increased to
 15 years and some to 20 years. One ship operator stated that 1t would prob ably take 50 years to establish an Amer i ican merchant marine. Another propon- ! ent of the bill testified that in his opinion ]! these subsidies and aids would have to be maintained in perpetuity
 Judging from the history of such leg l is1ation in other countries where 1t has been enacted. if this vicious policy IS once erafted into our institutions 1t will not only be perpetual. but the drain on ! the Public Treasury will increase, be- i cause the powerful and influential ship ping interests will be continually return 1 ing to Congress with the claim that the
 bountieS paid them are insucient and must be increased