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Show WELSH DEFENDS SHIPPING BILL Washington, Jan. 28. For the first time in the two weeks the shipplug bill has been under a continuous Republican Re-publican attack in the senate, the administration's ad-ministration's defense of the measure was brought forward in a speech today to-day by Senator Walsh, who replied to Senator Root's contention that It's enactment would lead the United Suites Into foreign complications. Citing rules of the British admiralty the declaration of London, decisions of the privy council, the United States supreme court and state papers of a century, Senator Walsh declared the right of the United States to purchase pur-chase ships of the belligerents was unquestioned so long as the transactions transac-tions were In absolute good faith; that Great Britain had maintained the same right for more than 100 years and that France for the same length of time had acquiesced in the principle prin-ciple He declared that had Senator Root's argument been advanced by another an-other it would have been accounted impossible. At length the Democratic Democrat-ic senator quoted laws of courts and nations to support his view. Tho case of the cotton ship Dacia, Senator Walsh said, would clearly establish that Great Britain was bound by her attitude preiously ev prettied, on the question of marine transfers in war time "Assuming the transfer of the Dacia to be bonafide," Senator WalSD declared, " there is abundant evidence that she will not be subject to seizure." "As for Great Britain," continued Senator Walsh, "she stands committed commit-ted to the view indicated so firmly that no honorable avenue of escape is open even though it could be conceived con-ceived that she might desire to see it overturned. Her judges asserted and enforced the rule throughout the trying times of the Napoleonic wars, when the very existence of the nation na-tion was at stake." Senator Walsh read a paragraph of a manual issued in 188S by the British admiralty to show that the British rule had been as follows. British Rule Quoted. "A vessel apparently owned by a neutral is not really so owned if acquired ac-quired by a transfer from an enemy or from a British or allied subject, made at any time during the war or previous to the war. but in contemplation contem-plation ol its breaking out. unless there is satisfactory proof that the transfer was bonafide and complete " Instructions to officers In determin-j lng that such tales were bonafide, Senator Walsh declared, showed clearly clear-ly that only the complete legality under un-der the laws of respective countries of the transfer was necessary to be established. "The principle upon which this doctrine doc-trine rests Is sublimely simple," he said "It is that neutral nations' mav trade with either belligerent except In contraband. The neutral may buy anything from a belligerent." Senator Walsh quoted from an opinion opin-ion by the lords of the privy council in the case of the Baltica as follows. "The general rule Is open to no doubt. A neutral, while a war Is imminent, or after it has commenced, is at liberty to purchase either goods or ships (not being ships of war) from either belligerent and the purchase pur-chase is valid whether the subject of it be laying In a neutral port or in an enemy's port." Senator Walsh explained that the Baltica was one of a number of ships involved during the Crimean war when, although, the circumstances attending at-tending the sale naturfally cast sus picion upon it, the bonafide character char-acter of the transaction wa6 estab lished to the satisfaction of the English Eng-lish courts, notwithstanding that the vendor frankly admitted he parted with the essels because of conditions condi-tions sure to arise on the breaking out of the war. |