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Show REPUBLICAN GLIB DIMMED Ship Purchase Bill Is Attacked At-tacked and Defended by Members of Congress. NEW YORK, Feb. 6. Republican speakers assailed the pending ship purchase pur-chase bill and Democratic speakers de-feuded de-feuded it at a discussion of the American Ameri-can merchant marine today at the Republican Re-publican club. Representatives Rnfus Hardy of Texas and William E. Humphrey Humph-rey of Washington made the principal addresses. . v ' Mr. Humphrey-characterized the ship purchase bill as a vital danger confronting confront-ing the American people, and asserted that congress had defeated it. He expressed ex-pressed doubt that profits could accrue from the purchase of ships, and attacked at-tacked the provision relating to the prospective sale of the vessels to private pri-vate capital as soon as they should become be-come profitable. Mr. Hardy, a member of the congressional congres-sional committee on merchant marine, asserted that while the ship purchase bill would help a little toward future greatness on the seas, ('the real remedy rem-edy can be obtained only by fearless resistance to the influence of the coastwise coast-wise shipping monopoly of the railroads and of the snort-sighted owners of shipyards." ship-yards." The' production of shipbuilding material mate-rial in America, he said, is better and cheaper than in any other country, and as soon as the seamen's bill, now in conference between the houses of congress, con-gress, becomes a law, he argued, the increased cost of American operation will become a myth. Otherg who spoke were former Representatives Rep-resentatives William H. Douglas and James T. McCIeary and Edward N. Breitung, owner of the steamship Dacia. Regarding the Dacia, over whose commissioning under the American flag a controversy has recently arisen, Mr. Breitung stated that his company had first tried to purchase two French ships and an English vessel, but that their owners would not sell, and so the Dacia was bought. |