It may seem surprising that an American House of Representativesshould have been so ignorant of the meaning of a common word as toapply the term "commerce" to the carrying trade, when in the sessionof 1869 it commissioned Hon. John Lynch, of Maine, and his associatedcommittee "to investigate the cause of the decadence of Americancommerce," and to suggest a remedy by which it might be restored.
But, it was not more strange than that this committee really appointedto look into the carrying trade to which the misnomer commerce was soinadvertently applied, should have entirely ignored its duty byconstituting itself into an eleemosynary body for the bestowal ofnational charity upon shipbuilders. Its Report fell dead upon thefloor of the House, and was so ridiculed in the Senate that when amotion was made to lay the bill for printing it upon the table,Mr. Davis, of Kentucky, suggested, as an amendment, that it be kickedunder it. Nevertheless, the huge volume of irrelevant testimony waspublished for the benefit of two great home industries—paper makingand printing.
The theory of this committee was that the Rebellion had destroyedanother industry nearly as remote from the proper subject of inquiryas either of these. These gentlemen concluded4that shipbuilding wasbecoming extinct, because the Confederate cruisers had destroyed manyof our ships—a reason ridiculously absurd, in view of the corollarythat the very destruction of those vessels should have stimulatedreproduction. Since that abortive attempt to steal bounties from theTreasury for the benefit of a favored class of mechanics, Government,occupied with matters deemed of greater importance, has totallyneglected our constantly diminishing mercantile marine.
By refusing to repeal the law that represses it, it may truly be saidthat had every ingenuity been devised to accomplish its destruction,its tendency to utter annihilation could not have been more certainlyassured than it has been by this obstinate neglect.
In the session of 1876, Senator Boutwell of Massachusetts renewed theproposition of Mr. Lynch, but his Bill was not called up in theSenate. In the course of intervening years a little more light may bepresumed to have dawned upon Congress, and, therefore, it is to beregretted that the Senator did not obtain a hearing, in order that thefallacy of his argument might have been exposed.
If any one cares to study the origin of our restrictive navigationlaws, he can consult a concise account of it given by Mr. David A.Wells, in the North American Review, of December, 1877. It came outof a compromise with slavery. The Northern States agreed that slaveryshould be "fostered"—that is a favorite word withprotectionists—provided that shipbuilding should also be fostered,and that New England ships—for nearly all vessels were built in thatdistrict—should5ha