REPORT OF AMERICAN MERCHANT MARINE COMMISSION. 74

Pacific coast, is doubtless as large now as is required by this section.
The total number of men required to man fully all the American seagoing
 vessels which go out of sight of land is estimated by the Commissioner
 of Navigation, on page 26 of his report for 1903, to be not
more than 50,000. This includes sail and steam, deep-sea fisheries,
foreign and coast trade ships. Of the half million gross tons of steainships
 registered for foreign trade in 1904, the 4 large ships of the
International Mercantile Marine Company, the 3 largest ships of the
Oceanic Company, 6 at least of the ships of the New York and Cuba
Mail Steamship Company, 3 of the Red D Line, and the 4 of the
Admiral Line are under contracts to carry mails under the postal acts
oo and are in no way affected by this or any other section of this
ill.
Further, under section 6 of this proposed bill there will be a considerable
 tonnage to enter upon the mail contracts proposed under that
section. The remaining registered steam tonnage, after these contracts
 have been made of steamships engaged in foreign trade, six
months or more each year is less than 800,000. For the fiscal year
ending June 30, 1904, on both steamers and square-rigged sailing
vessels there were shipped only 42,000 Americans (native and naturalized).
 This includes all the men shipped before United States
commissioners, and by no means. was this namber of men, or anything
like it, employed at any one time. Since there are, all told, engaged
in trade out of sight of land, steam and sail, less than 50,000 men;
since from 160,000 to 200,000 tons of the total of 500,000 registered
tons do not come under this section at all; since officers are counted
as a part of the crew; since several of the steamships registered are
under 1,000 tons, it necessarily follows that the increase in the number
 of American citizens to be employed will be best represented by
Zero.
In other words, this part of this section effects nothing, does
nothing. It is verbiage put in to fill our eyes and blind us to the
real purpose of the bill. ~ The other items of this section are of equal
value. The enrollment of one-fourth of the crew in the naval volunteers
 after 1916 is either more dust thrown in our eyes or else the
number of ships drawing subventions will be so large and the subventions
 amount to so enormous a sum that we shrink from even an
attempt to estimate. *
Section 4. This section provides that the contracts shall be for a
period of one year, and may be renewed from time to time. The rebuted
 purpose of this bill, so far as subventions go, is, as we have
already said, “To promote the national defence and create a force of
naval volunteers,” but according to this section the contract is to be
for a period of but one year, leaving the shipowner at pertect liberty
to decline to renew the contract for a second year if he sees signs of
war.
_ The Government, then, will be in no better condition so far as secaring
 vessels for transport service or for naval volunteers than if this
act were not in existence. Of course, if the shipowners think that it
will be more profitable to them to turn their vessels over to the Government
 than to continue in trade, they will renew the contract and
receive pay for the use of their ships by the United States. But this
they would do in any event, subvention or no subvention. It is clear,
then. that with this limit of one year attached to the contract the