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Leader (1850-1860), 11th December 1858, Edition 2 of 2, Page 26, m————i——^^—i ^ ^ ^™ ^ i. ¦ -- - j362 THE...

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      M————I——^^—I ^ ^ ^™ ^ I. ¦ -- - J362 The...

      ¦ j 362 THE LEADER . [ JS o . 45 . 5 ,. December 11 . iftss

      M————I——^^—I ^ ^^^™ I. -- - ¦ Q O.M M ' E-K C I A L.

      m————i——^^—i ^ ^ ^™ ^ i . -- - ¦ Q O . M M ' E-K C I A L .

      The Shipping Interest. Great Complaints ...

      THE SHIPPING INTEREST . Great complaints have of late been made by our shipowners , and they are next week to have a meeting iu London to memorialise the Government for some kind of relief . Several of our contemporaries have discussed the subject , and those who are adverse to the view taken by the shipowners have shown that since the abolition of our navigation laws our mei * cantile marine has increased in a manner quite unexampled . More ships have been built in a yearand more employed , than ever known

      , before . At the same time it is admitted , that from opening a trade which had before been restricted to our own ships , as was to be expected , foreign tonnage has increased somewhat more than our own tonnage . This , however , is the case in almost all countries—it is a necessary consequence of increased trade—and in some countries where restrictions are continued on navigation the increase of foreign tonnage has actually been greater in proportion than here , and in them there has been a positive decrease of native tonnage .

      The statistics of our shipping supply unanswerable arguments against those who refer the present condition of the" shipping interest to the abolition of the navigation laws , and who complain of free trade , which has permitted such a large increase in the quantities of goods to be carried , as depriving our shipping of employment . It is only doing our shipowners scant justice to say tha £ what they complain of is less the free navigation which our laws permit than the restricted navigation which some other States yet maintain . What they chiefly appeal to the Government for is that this restricted navigation shall be made free like our own , and they are only to be censured because they ask for the renewal of restrictions here as a means of

      coercing foreign Governments to grant freedom . They are not opponents of free trade so much as the advocates of & peculiar and very faulty means at variance with the principles Of free trade of procuring free trade with other countries . The sentiments of other nations we can influence by our opinions and our example ; we have no power to coerce their Governments ; and the suffering shipowners are led astray by a remnant of old restrictive legislation , when they propose a . further recurrence to it to compel other Governments to adopt our freedom . "We have no expectation that we shall succeed in convincing them of their error , but we call their attention to some facts which arc not

      merely statistical . They complain of being excluded from the coasting trade of the United States , botween . Portland in Maine , and San Francisco round Cape Horn , this being classed by our very ambitious cousins as -a coasting trade . £ Vom the complaints of our shipowners it might be supposed that the shipping of the Americans was flourishing , and that our shipping had been excluded from some great benefit . The latest arrival from the States , however , speaks of a general depression in the shipping interest . " " Ship-building , " says the Neto York Times , " has Viften Huknended on this side of the water . " After 0 h # rw \ l Wm W f vv r 0 ** m w rmw ^ mm ^ rm F » -w — — —» - ^ »» — ' — — — t— - ¦ — - -r ^ —»

      ^ 1 ^^^^^ ^ r ^ ww ^^ " ^^~ the panic of last year " freights went down absurdly low . " " A great many ships were thea laid up , many have remained laid up / ' and the persons most experienced " see little or no immediate hope of revival / ' The American shipowners , then , who nave a monopoly of their own coasting trado , arc worse off than our shipowners , who have no such monopoly : and clearly , therefore , a similar monopoly , which some of oxir shipowners ask for , would not give them prosperity . Xet us try to oxplain how such monopolies injure thorn , and that to grant their prayer would bo to continue and inoroaae their distress .

      There is a general depression of the shipping interest in Europe as well as in America , We near complaints from France , Russia , and Norway , as well as from New York . This general depression has a cause as general—what is it P Mveh of the hipping of the . world meets with equal favour tn third markets . English , Amerioan , and IVenoh vessels , for example , enter the ports of Peru and the Bnurila on equal terms . Shipping , thon , is that portion of the capital of different communities in which the competition , is most equal and certain

      The shipping of all countries carries indiscriminately for all , and thus makes the rate of carriage and the profit to be obtained on it about the same for all . Whatever , consequently , affects the shipping of one country , aflects in some degree the shipping of all other countries . It all shares a similar fate . " The Russian war , " says our American contemporary , " by removing for a considerable time from mercantile pursuits a large number of steaming and sailing vessels , enhanced the value of merchant ships , and created an active competition for the tonnaere of all countries at extremely profitable

      rates . " It stimulated ship-building iu 1 S 55 and 1 S 56 , and gave no employment to ships in 1 S 57 and 1 S 5 S . The consequence of this unity of the shipping of the world is , that it is all affected by the monopolies and restrictions and bounties bestowed on shipping in each or any one state . But an invariable consequence of bounties to one class of shipping and restrictions on another class , is to increase the supply of . the favoured shipping beyond the real demand for them , or beyond the quantity of goods to be carried ; and as several , indeed almost all , Governments : have g iven and yet

      give bounties on native , by restrictions on loreign , shipping , the natural and general consequence is that shipping is everywhere on the average greater in amount than , the goods to be carried , and like the once highly protected agriculture , is almost everywhere , and almost at all times , in a condition of suffering and complaint . Great prosperity , however rapidly trade increase , is with shipping as it was with agriculture , the exception , not the rule . '' In the U nited States , about seven or eight years ago , " says the authority already quoted , " and powerful steamers were -being' built which

      would speedily drive the British boats from the ocean . These prophecies have been signally refuted by experience . The steamers which have been driven out of the trade have not been British b \ it American . " In fact , these great steamers were built in the expectation th ; it Congress would hire them or pay for them , as our Government hacl sot the bad example of giving large sums , to mail packets . Congress did for a season grant a subsidy to some lines , and it was to get hold of these expected Government bounties that the

      monstrated that legislative meddling with if with all business , was always an evi ? Far than their predecessors , those insincere men- ^!? tectiomsts m spirit and in heart-acted onX erroneous prmcmlc they had condemned . AfW the public had become enlightened , and they £ 5 professedly adopted the enlightenment , theyVcnJ bock , clog like , to their vomit . They persisted ia spite of alt teaching , in regulating navigation To this hour , the shipping interest is in al | respects i highly protected and regulated interest . Nominally , it has been made free , and exposed to the inevitable competition of foreign shipping while it is placed in the fetters of very presuming dabblers in mercantile marine legislation . In SnitP nf ik , >

      lessons of two centuries the triflcrs of our day have thought themselves superior to Cromwell , and that they , , by a Navigation Act , could bestow care and skill on seamen , and greatness on the . nation . Thirdly , they did more than regulate the shipping : they patronised it . Somewliere about 1 S 3 S that profoundest of profound statesmen , Sir Charles Wood , then Secretary to the Admiralty , be ? an the plan of giving largo sums to our mail packets . At present not less than hOO , OUO / . a year , is devoted to this purpose . It is not a fair reward for services done under competition . It is a sum given to keep certain companies going and doim ? certain

      work in a certain manner , which , under perfectly free competition , could be done , much , cheaper and belter , though then " riiy lords , "' cither of the Treasury or the Admiralty , would have no control over the packets . Without dwelling on the unfairness to other interests of an application of lite public money to subserve the purposes of one class , we say that this kind of remuneration , more than necessary to procure required services , is an artificial stimulus to ship-ljuildintr , and , like the

      bounties referred , to in othrr ' countries , helps to bring into existence more shipping than can at all limes- find employment . Shipowners arc guided by a desire to get the public money rather than by the quantities of goods and passengers to be carried . The rule is a false one , and they accordingly suffer ; Shipping is now , as agriculture was , the chief protected , regulated , and favoured interest , and as no legislation can prevent it being exposed to perfect competition abroad , it is now , as agriculture was , the suffering interest .

      steamers were built in excess in the- States , and contributed everywhere to lower freights and lower the profit of shipping . The Government of the United States , then , likothc Governments of France , Spain , and other besotted Governments of Europe , have secured monopolies and granted bounties to their own shipping , and so have contributed to increase shipping unnecessarily and to bring on it its present distress . Has England done nothing of the same kind ? Since ^ our farming interest was relieved from pro

      tection it has become steadily prosperous , ihe shipping interest , supposed to be also relieved from protection , is now groaning and lamenting as much as ever the farmers did when , under the corn-law , the price of wheat went down to 30 s . per quarter . The contrast is curious nnd might bo an alarming anomaly for free trado , wcro it not the fact that our shipping has not been relieved from protection , but , like the shipping of the other countries referred to , is still cockered and pampered into excess . First , the act for repealing the Navigation Laws ^ reserved in the Reciprocity Clause , repeated

      iu the Customs Consolidation Act , which now constitutes a navigation law , the prinoijph of protection , and made the shipowners rely , as they have rohed , on this clause being called into activity for their bohoof , and they now requiro it to bo acted on , They have never in consequence roalisod tho notion of perfectly free competition . Secondly , the foolish , meddling Whig Ministers , urged on by ignorant writers , timid morohants , and old ship oaptains , all bred up to Protection under the Navigation Jbaws , began , as soon as those laws wore repealed ; to make new laws for tho mercantile marine . They have never loft it quiet for one single session of Parliament . Instead of folio-wing out the principle of allowing eaoh trade and each business to regulate itself by its own laws , like tho oprn trade , they framed minuto and cumbrous regulating aots . and continued tho tutelage of our shipping as if . it had never ^ bcon de-

      Greneral Trade Repoet. London, Friday Ev...

      GrENERAL TRADE REPOET . London , Friday Evening . The corn trado , which has been dull through tho week , was without animation to-day . . Buyers were very few . The price of wheat was the same as on Monday , barley was 6 < 1 . to Is . cheaper , anil onts could be obtained for less money . Wo » nde ' ?™ J that wheat is now malted to some extent , and useu for making beer . . n ( In the other markets there were no alterations oi importance . The alteration in the Bank rate oi discount has not affected them . b"gar m » . l w & c wore both unaltered in price . For tea tho donwuw continues goodand tho sales have gone o on . of

      , Tllo dulnc ^ of tho . narkot for articles cona - tion is not unfavourable to the mdustnous classes , and generally low prices imply that j , ges go further . As long as tho markets do not so « u « clino as to stop imports , tho advantage ojtlic < w price and dulnesa is all on the side of too con iumere . In our manufacturing district * - * pw the cotton and woollon diatricts — thoso wMg linon is manufactured aro not so weU o W ""'" ^ steadily largo and profitable . Tlwro is nc spoeu » tion . Tho raw materials are comparative !) juu dant , and tho demand for tho fl |» * L ? SSn-Bidorablo . Moneyed men oomplmn t ' ™ " t L ! i not employ money profitably , but gonjnilly , ti . cn B there is no exultation , there aro now very low

      Pla The IYwn says , in its wcolcly commercial roirtoj - " The manufactories in Paris for sue tt J " 7 yCftr become in demand for tho season of N ' " ° , / omhave , during tho last few days , bw » °° "Jj / rftnco ployed . " It doofl not appear by ^ . f ^/ dJIandi returns that trado has made any ft ( 1 n d JS \ , l 0 activity on It , nnd wo must thorofpro bupposo that tno « i noticod is very partial . The ™ ° \ 'C ? ia lto « dlhave lately boon charactered byJ ^ X " . W ness , and stocks ehow raatorlal . Oinunution . p »

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 11, 1858, page 26, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11121858/page/26/