OCR Text |
Show MERCHANT SHIPS UP 10 CONGRESS CHAIRMAN LASKER DECLARES COMMERCE ON SEAS DE. PENDS UPON SUBSIDY Head of Board Urges Members to Place Question Squarely Before J American People For Their I Decision Washington. Chairman Lnsker of the shipping board Sunday put the future of the American merchant marine squarely up to congress. In" an open letter to all members of the house and senate he declared that one of two things must happen there must either be a ship subsidy bill or the American commercial flag will retire from the high seas. Valuable Valu-able word trade will be controlled by other nations. The United States will have to suffer the loss of the tremendous tre-mendous investment in constructing the great fleet. "The final determination need not be dependent on whether one feels that the United States needs a mer chant marine; the fact is that the shipping board is today in possession of the greatest fleet the world has ever known," Lasker wrote. "The shipping board admits that it cannot, operate its fleet remotely as economically as private owners operate oper-ate their vessels ; the history of prior boards shows that they were unable to put the operation of the govern-men govern-men fleet on a proper business basis. The shipping board believes that the fleet under its charge can never be profitably or successfully operated un. der government control. "What shall we do with this war inheritance? in-heritance? Shall it be sold to private ownership for operation under the American flag? Shall it be sold abroad, possibly some day to rise and plague us, or shall it be junked and charged off to war cost as powder and shell were charged off?" The chairman dismisses as impractical imprac-tical the suggestion that the ships he junked, as it would be an admission that Americans are incapable of opera-, opera-, ating them and it would prove a serious ser-ious blow to the United States prestige. pres-tige. To sell them abroad, he points out, would be to put in the hands of our competitors an effective weapon to destroy our world trade. By substituting the administration's ship subsidy bill for the present form of operation the ships could be turned to profitable private ownership and the taxpayers relieved of a heavy burden. bur-den. Th" ships are costing the gov-ernmo.. gov-ernmo.. $50,000,000 annually, exclusive exclu-sive of depreciation, insirninre and interest. And of 11,000,000 tons now owned by the government Mr. Lasker declared it had been possible to sell only l.'iO.OOO tons In the face of current cur-rent conditions. Since taking over the board every effort has been made to develop profitable prof-itable shipping linf-s by congress, he stated. This proved unworkable because be-cause at the same time private operation oper-ation proved unprofitable and there are no purchasers. "The shipping board believes that the great purpose before us can be accomplished through the agency of direct and indirect aids, as proposed in the measure now before congress," the letter continues. the fleet was acquired through war necessity. Many of the ships are of the wrung type for peace time trade. There can lie no thought of naval equality with Great Britain unless we have as many ships of proper type suitable for naval auxiliaries. Great Britain already has 2."0 ships of this class to this country's fifty. |