On the contrary, our own government had done little for its navy since the war, and what little it had done had been carried out entirely in navy-yards.
This not only deprived private ship-building of the kind of aid and encouragement which England lavished upon her private shipyards and engine-shops, but the navy-yards themselves were a constant menace to the good order and content of mechanics working in private shipyards.
Moreover, he said that the same class of mechanics who, immediately prior to the war, worked for $1.75 a day, now (1870) demanded and received $3.00 to $3.50 a day; whereas ship-building wages remained the same in England as in 1860.
He warned the committee that the day of wooden ships, particularly steamships, was past, and that the iron ship had come to stay, not only in England but everywhere else in the world.
He said that to enable the business of building iron ships and heavy marine machinery to become firmly established in this country, a very large amount of manufacturing machinery must be supplied, and in view of the present outlook no one would invest any considerable amount of capital in that direction without assurance of some aid and encouragement from the government similar to that which England rendered to her ship-building industry.
He then dwelt at considerable length upon the demoralization among mechanics produced by the government’s policy in confining its naval construction to the navy-yards.
He reviewed briefly the struggle between the Cunard and Collins Lines prior to 1858, and showed conclusively that the downfall of the American Collins Line was due to the persistent and constantly increasing subsidies lavished by the British government upon the Cunard Line, which our government in 1858 met by withdrawing the Collins subsidy and giving them instead the sea and inland postage on mail matter actually carried. In this respect he said Congress indirectly came to the aid of the Cunard Line and helped it to overthrow the Collins Line. He hoped that the committee would give these particular facts their earnest attention. He said that they did not require deep or intricate investigation, because they were matters of common notoriety, known to everybody who was at all conversant with the commercial history of the country.
The admission of material for building iron ships free of duty, he said, would be an advantage, of course, and many believed that if our ship-builders could be relieved from the tariff and get their material free they could compete successfully with foreign builders; but the difference in wages was too great to be entirely overcome by the mere admission of materials duty free. As for materials, he would always prefer American iron for the construction of ships to foreign iron, provided it could be got at the same, or very nearly the same, price. There were many inconveniences, he said, attendant upon sending abroad for iron plates. He informed the committee that it was necessary to get the form of every plate and have it sketched before it was ordered, and if, after doing that, we must send abroad to have them made, very great inconvenience and delay would result.
This statement of Mr. Cramp before the Lynch Committee, of which the foregoing is only a synopsis, was really the key-note to all subsequent argument in favor of government aid to American ship-building and ship-owning. It presented the matter in a new light, or a light which was new in 1870.
