CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. (AMEKICAN SHIPPING.) 



231 



trade. Prof. Sumner agrees substantially with 

 this view, and I may add that even Mr. Wells, 

 in his work on the American merchant marine, 

 concedes that these were the real, substantial, 

 and efficient difficulties which came upon us 

 and changed the current of our foreign carry- 

 ing-trade. 



" So long as wooden sailing-vessels con- 

 trolled the foreign carrying-trade of the world 

 we had an advantage in the construction of 

 vessels over any other nation in the world. 

 We had the cheaper material, and this superior 

 cheapness of material enabled us to bridge over 

 the difference in labor; for it must be remem- 

 bered that in the construction of a wooden 

 vessel, as compared with the construction of 

 an iron vessel, the wood or timber when it is 

 cut from a tree is further advanced toward the 

 completion of a vessel than is the iron when 

 the ore has been dug from the mines, smelted, 

 and rolled or hammered into bars, angles, and 

 plates. The amount of labor to be put upon 

 the wooden vessel after the tree has been 

 felled is less than one half of the amount of 

 labor that is required to build the iron vessel 

 after the ore is taken from its bed. 



"Therefore, Mr. Speaker, so long,as we oc- 

 cupied the vantage-ground, possessed when 

 wooden sailing-vessels ruled the sea, no nation 

 could cope with us. 



"At that time, also, all our laws relating to 

 our merchant marine were precisely the same, 

 with the same difficulties, with the same dis- 

 criminations as the English laws. But in 1852, 

 1853, and 1854 the Parliament of England be- 

 gan the revision of her merchant shipping laws, 

 and removed every burden from her vessels 

 engaged in the foreign trade ; while we looked 

 on, too confident in the position we occupied. 

 And there, Mr. Speaker, was the fatal error in 

 the policy of this country. From 1855 to 1861 

 there was a steady decline year by year, as 

 rapidly as at any time since the war, in our 

 foreign carrying-trade. If the American Con- 

 gress at that time had come forward and lifted 

 all the burdens, and amended the shipping 

 laws so as to give the same advantages to our 

 vessels as the English Government gave to 

 their vessels, and if in addition to that the 

 American Government had given such generous 

 mail contracts for the establishment of mail 

 steamship lines as the English Government i 

 giving, then we should not have to-day 

 lament over so humiliating a decadence of 

 American shipping. 



"But more than that, Mr. Speaker. In 1861 

 came the terrible conflict of arms, the civil 

 war, which engrossed the energies and the 

 capital of this country for four long years. 

 Instead of building up our shipping and our 

 resources, we were tearing down; instead of 

 constructing vessels, we were destroying them 

 with powder and shot and shell. But what 

 was England doing all that time? She looked 

 on and laughed at our. discomfiture. She let 

 the Alabama sail out of her ports without bin- 



was 

 to 



drance, and more than one third of all our 

 tonnage engaged in the foreign carrying- trade 

 was swept from the ocean, either by capture, 

 or by sale to avoid capture. 



" During this time England was intrenching 

 herself in the position she occupied. She was 

 building up great iron ship-yards, and getting 

 an advantage difficult to overcome. 



" If our hands had not been tied during that 

 time, unquestionably we should have adopted 

 some policy that would have met the advances 

 of England in this race on the ocean. But we 

 could do nothing, and when the war closed we 

 saw not only one third of our ships swept from 

 the ocean, but also the iron ship-yards of Great 

 Britain firmly established, and built up, too, by 

 every possible encouragement. We saw dock- 

 yards built from tonnage taxes exacted in part 

 from American vessels that entered British 

 ports, with all the ingenuity that could possi- 

 bly be devised, even going so far in order to 

 establish steamship lines that she made con- 

 tracts with various navigation companies to 

 put on steamship lines, engaging that the Gov- 

 ernment would secure to the proprietors of the 

 lines 8 per cent, dividend. 



" This was the course of England at the time 

 when our hands were tied. And then, when 

 we came out of the war, Mr. Speaker, our 

 hands were again tied tied because of the in- 

 direct results of the war. Bear in mind that 

 we came out of the conflict with a depreciated 

 currency and inflated prices. *We came out 

 with speculation raging over the land, and the 

 result was that, with the engrossment of the 

 public mind in the problems of reconstruction, 

 it was practically impossible until the resump- 

 tion of specie payments, and until the large 

 profits that arose from the opening of the far 

 West and from the building of railroads had 

 passed away, and until the rate of interest on 

 capital came back to the normal figure, and 

 even below it was impossible, I say, until 

 about the year 1878 or 1879, for us to adopt 

 any efficient measures that could have built up 

 the American foreign carrying-trade. 



" It seems to me, Mr. Speaker, that instead 

 of being amazed at the rapid decline of the 

 American foreign carrying-trade under these 

 circumstances, we should almost wonder that 

 it has stood the trial so well. 



" Now, Mr. Speaker, having discussed what 

 seems to me to be the causes of the difficulty in 

 which we are placed, I wish to approach next 

 the question of remedies. The foreign carry- 

 ing-trade, unlike the coastwise trade, and un- 

 like any other business we have in this coun- 

 try, is an unprotected trade. 'It must be car- 

 ried on on the highway of the ocean, where 

 competition from all nations meets it on a com- 

 mon platform. No possible device that we can 

 make, no possible legislation that is open to us 

 after our maritime reciprocity treaties have 

 been entered into for it must be remembered 

 that while formerly there was a 10 per cent, 

 discriminating duty in favor of imports in 



