the duty of our government to break up, because they are
contrary to our laws.

I am much gratified by this meeting and by the association of so many
practical men, business men, who, by uniting, are really creating a new
force in this direction, upon which I am sure we ought to move.

Let me say one thing about the practical direction of your efforts. The
so-called Ship Subsidy bill has been reduced now to nothing but the
proposition that the Government should be authorized to pay out of the
profits of the ocean mail service adequate compensation to procure the
carriage of the mails by American steamers to South America; that is
what it has come down to. It passed the Senate, as Mr. White has said,
only by the casting of the vote of the Vice-President, and I do not know
what will be done with it in the House. I am afraid in these last days
that it may be lost in the shuffle.

There are two reasons why that perfectly simple and reasonable
proposition failed to carry a great majority of the Senate, and
fails--if it does fail--to be certain of passing the House. One is
because there is a difference between the people who want to have the
thing accomplished about the way in which it should be accomplished.
That is one of the most common things in the world. A certain set of men
who want to have a revival of our merchant marine, say the way to do it
is to pay subsidies, the way to do it is to equalize the differences
between the cost of maintaining and running an American ship and the
cost of maintaining and running a foreign ship, and to equal the
subsidies paid by practically all the other great commercial nations to
their steamship lines. Another set of men who equally desire to restore
our merchant marine, say that is not the right way; the right way is to
throw open the doors and enable our people to buy their ships abroad.
Still others say the true way is to authorize our ships to employ crews
and officers of the low-priced men of the world, relieve them from the
obligations imposed upon them in respect of the employment of Americans,
people of the United States, who will require the high standard of
living that has been produced in the United States by the operation of
our protective system, relieve them from the obligations which are
imposed upon them by our laws in regard to the requirements of the crew,
the air space, the food, and the treatment that a crew is to receive, so
that it will be cheaper to run an Ame