526 



MERCHANT MARINE OF THE UNITED STATES. 



problem of sailing American vessels that it is incum- 

 bent on Congress to exercise the power of regulating 

 commerce, which it possesses under the Constitution, 

 to the extent of prohibiting State and municipal taxa- 

 tion of vessels engaged in the foreign trade. 



The following recommendation concerning 

 compensation for mail service has no bearing 

 on the provisions of the bill reported : 



The law as it exists (section 3,976, Revised Statutes) 

 compels the master of every American vessel engaged 

 hi the foreign trade to carry such United States mails 

 as may be tendered him by the Post-Office Depart- 

 ment, and allows him as compensation for such service 

 a sum not exceeding 2 cents per letter carried. In no 

 case is this an adequate compensation, and in some in- 

 stances it does not pay the cost to the vessel of deliv- 

 ering the mails at the post-office or the port of arrival. 

 The pay to United States vessels in the foreign trade 

 for transporting the mails in 1880 was only 2i cents 

 per mile, while at the same time the steamers on our 

 coast which contracted to carry the mails received 57 

 cents per mile for mail service. The contrast between 

 pur inadequate mail pay to American vessels engaged 

 in the foreign trade and the very liberal mail pay 

 given by Great Britain to her steamship lines only 

 serves to show more clearly the injustice and unwis- 

 dom of our policy. Since 1840 England has paid 

 more than $250,000,000 for mail service, with the de- 

 liberate purpose of establishing and maintaining 

 steamship lines to connect the United Kingdom with 

 all parts of the world. Even in one year she paid 

 about $3,000,000 to her steamship lines for mail 

 service, which was $1,641,300 more than she received 

 from mail matter transported by them. As this sub- 

 ject is before the postal committees of both the Senate 

 and the House, we refrain from reporting any legisla- 

 tion, but unanimously recommend such a modification 

 of our laws as will give fair compensation to Anerican 

 vessels in the foreign trade which may carry our 

 mails, and adequate pay for mail service to American 

 steamship lines that are already or may be hereafter 

 established. 



In conclusion, the committee said : 



It is unnecessary for your committee to dwell on the 

 great importance of any and all legislative measures 

 that will tend to a revival of the American foreign 

 carrying-trade, and a restoration of the American flag 

 to a position on the ocean commensurate with our 

 population, wealth, and rank in the family of nations. 

 The problem presented to Congress involves interests 

 of exceptional importance. The great agricultural 

 interests of the West and South are especially con- 

 cerned. To-day at least 85 per cent of their products 

 exported to other countries depend on foreign vessels, 

 mainly English, for transportation, and, unless some- 

 thing is speedily done to relieve American shipping 

 engaged in the foreign trade, our dependence on Eng- 

 lish ocean-steamers will be complete. This places 

 our commerce at the mercy of England. In case of 

 war between that country and another power able to 

 put cruisers on the ocean, American farmers and the 

 American people aa a whole would suffer nearly as 

 much as the belligerents, by having their exports and 

 imports hi British bottoms liable to capture and con- 

 fiscation. . . . While some of the members of your 

 committee do not concur in all the statements and 

 reasoning of the foregoing report, and would recom- 

 mend additional legislation, yet all concur in recom- 

 mending the passage of the accompanying bill. 



A minority of the committee, composed of 

 its Democratic members, made a separate re- 

 port, in which a free admission of foreign-built 

 ships and of foreign materials for ship-building 

 was advocated. Its main suggestions were 

 presented in the following form : 



1. Let us use, and then we will have cause to repair, 

 and then build. Then the native inventive faculty of 

 America will be aroused, and something will be the 

 result, and that something can not but be better than 

 our present forlorn condition. 



2. If .we are to build ships in the United States in 

 competition with other nations and unless we can do 

 so, the ships we may build will never be voluntarily 

 bought or used by our own citizens or any others our 

 ship-builders must have their materials for construc- 

 tion as cheap as the builders with whom they are to 

 compete. Either allow the importation free of duty 

 of all the material and stores that enter into construc- 

 tion and equipment of ships, or reduce the tariff. So 

 long as the business of constructing iron steamships 

 has to bear the burden of high prices consequent on 

 protective duties, averaging 40 per cent, it can not 

 compete with like industries in free-trade countries. 

 There is no possibility of evading this conclusion. It 

 will be seen by the majority report that our committee, 

 in dealing with the desperate straits of our shipping 

 interests, do recommend a rebate on articles for do- 

 mestic and foreign account which enter into the mak- 

 ing of ships. 



3. If foreign competing maritime nations do not sub- 

 ject their ships to local taxation, the United States evi- 

 dently can not afford to do so. If Congress under the 

 Constitution has the power, it should exempt as in- 

 strumentalities to commerce all vessels engaged in for- 

 eign or interstate commerce from every form of local, 

 State, or municipal taxation. Concede to the States 

 the right to tax the instrumentalities of interstate or 

 foreign commerce in any degree, and you concede to 

 the States the right to say there shall be no interstate 

 or foreign commerce, for the right to impose 1 per cent 

 of taxation involves the right to impose 100 per cent, 

 or, in other words, the right to destroy. 



The report then quotes from opinions ren- 

 dered by the United States Supreme Court in 

 the case of Weston against the State of Missouri 

 and the Western Union Telegraph Company 

 against the State of Texas, to show that the 

 court has decided the question unequivocally 

 that foreign and interstate commerce are un- 

 der the taxing control of the Federal Govern- 

 ment. It continues as follows : 



Therefore, the full committee, confident of this Fed- 

 eral power over commerce, do not hesitate to present 

 a section of a general nature which overrides all State 

 and Federal taxation. We thus would relieve ships 

 and shipping from these burdens. 



4. Reduce all the expenses, taxes, and other burdens 

 on shipping. There can be no objection to the pro- 

 posed changes of the laws relating to the payment of 

 extra wages to seamen, with some exceptions, or when 

 a vessel is sold, or the voyage improperly continued 

 beyond the port to which the sailors shipped ; when 

 the vessel is found to be insufficiently provisioned, and 

 when the master refuses to correct the same. When, 

 by reason of injury to the seamen in the line of duty, 

 or of disease contracted because of want of proper 

 food on shipboard, is it not proper to hold the ship 

 responsible for the expenses incidental to the sickness ? 

 The amendments of the Revised Statutes as to trans- 

 portation of disabled sailors ; as to the remission of 

 consul fees; as to the importation in bond, free of 

 duty, of ship supplies for vessels in the foreign trade ; 

 as to the reduction of the Marine Hospital tax on sea- 

 men from forty to twenty cents ; as to the abrogation 

 of the tonnage tax on vessels engaged in trade with 

 Canada ; as to the limitation of the part owner of a 

 vessel proportionate to his share, and in case of death 

 and disability by one of the mates of a vessel on a for- 

 eign voyage ; of the employment of a foreign seaman 



these are proper reforms, and in the interest of ship- 

 ping revival. 



5. There is no reason why we should not add to 

 this catalogue the repeal of the United States shipping 



