HOW CORN IS GROUND
Foreign ships, no less than foreign banks and the excellence of foreign commercial schools, are and will continue to be a factor in the building up of foreign trade via the Canal. Just as the German banks report to their home commercial organizations the transactions of other countries in lands whose trade is sought, so foreign ships naturally work for the advantage of the country whose flag they fly. Surprising as it may seem to many, and disappointing as it must be to all, it is the unfortunate fact that within a year of the time set for opening the Panama Canal to commerce there is not the slightest evidence that that great work is going to have any influence whatsoever toward the creation of a United States fleet in foreign trade. England, Germany, Italy and Japan are all establishing new lines, the last three with the aid of heavy subsidies. But in April, 1913, a recognized authority on the American merchant marine published this statement: “So far as international commerce via Panama is concerned not one new keel is being laid in the United States and not one new ship has even been projected. The Panama Canal act of last August reversed our former policy and granted free American registry to foreign-built ships for international commerce through the Panama Canal or elsewhere. But this ‘free-ship’ policy has utterly failed. Not one foreign ship has hoisted the American flag, not one request for the flag has reached the Bureau of Navigation”.
THEY USED TO DO THIS IN NEW ENGLAND
The reason for this is the archaic condition of our navigation laws. The first cost of a ship, even though somewhat greater when built in American yards, becomes a negligible factor in comparison with a law which makes every expense incurred in operating it 10 to 20 per cent higher than like charges on foreign vessels. James J. Hill, the great railroad builder, who planned a line of steamships to the Orient and built the two greatest ships that ever came from an American yard, said once to the writer, “I can build ships in the United States as advantageously as on the Clyde and operate them without a subsidy. But neither I nor any other man can maintain a line of American ships at a profit while the navigation laws put us at a disadvantage in competition with those of every other nation”. Those mainly responsible for the enactment and maintenance of the navigation laws declare them to be essential to secure proper wages and treatment of the American sailor, but the effect has been to deprive the sailor of the ships necessary to earn his livelihood.
Photo by Brown Bros.
PILE-DRIVER AND DREDGE AT BALBOA DOCK
However, coastwise shipping will be greatly stimulated by the Canal. In the midst of the lamentation about the disappearance of the American flag from the high seas it is gratifying to reflect that the merchant marine of the United States is really the second in the world, though our share in international shipping is almost negligible. That we rank second as a whole is due to the phenomenal development of our shipping on the great lakes where with a season barely eight months long a shipping business is done that dwarfs the Mediterranean or the German Ocean into insignificance. This has built up a great shipbuilding business on the lakes, and steel ships are even now being built on the Detroit River to engage in Panama trade. There are not wanting those who hold that if the money which has been spent at Panama for the good of the whole world, had been expended in making a thirty-foot ship canal from Lake Erie to tide-water on the Hudson, the benefit to the people of the United States, and to American shipping would have been vastly greater.