The San Francisco Mail Service.

Cromwell Argus, Volume III, Issue 138, 2 July 1872, Page 7

The San Francisco Mail Service.

The following report of a debate which took place in the United States Senate on May 7, is condensed from the Congressional Globe :—

Senator Cole, of California, moved that 425,000 dollars be voted to extend the Honolulu service to New Zealand and Australia. He said the Australian Colonies were, next to India, England's best customers, but the Colonists preferred connection with America. They were holding out the right hand of fellowship, asking America to go over and help them. Their import and export trade amounted to 375,000 dollars a year, and the exports included large quantities of wool. The Colonists desired a closer alliance with us, and to imbibe the spirit of our free institutions.

Senators Corbett, of Oregon, and Casserway, of California, warmly supported the motion.

Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, was asto-! nished that this job should show its head | again. The ugly thing had long since been killed, and how often was it to be resurrected j to waste time and try their patience, and all to please a lobby to whom success meant money ? The thing had been so often exposed that it hardly admitted of serious argument. If it were bona fide, and seriously meant to foster commerce, no one would be more ready than himself to give it respectful attention ; but it was absurd to suppose that we could compete with Great Britain, seeing that our own markets were largely supplied from that country, in spite of the high tariffs. Even if it were otherwise, it would cost three times as much to send goods across the Pacific by railroad as it would cost to send them by ship from London to Melbourne. What single article could the Colonies supply that we could not better produce ourselves ? Senator Cole: Wool. It's coming here largely now. Senator Edmunds : Pshaw ! If my friend came from a manufacturing State, he would know that the causes that have led to the recent importation of wool are entirely exceptional, and at this very moment have almost passed away. The disturbing influences of the late war, and other reasons, caused a sudden rise in wool, making it profitable to import it from Australia; but already cir cumstances have changed, and it is hardly in the nature of things that they should occur again. If we needed to go into the woolbuying business, we should go, not to Ausi tralia, but to Buenos Ayres, which is close to

the Atlantic markets, &c. All this shows the hollovmess of the whole business. If the parties knocking here so persistently must get rid of these old steamers, they had better do so in some other way than by sending such ships abroad, which is more likely to bring discredit on our commerce. Senator Edmunds went on to say that Senator Chandler, the Chairman of the Committee on Commerce, and the best authority on such subjects, had told them about these steamers, and he had never been answered. They had better be warned by a Committee specially charged with the consideration of commercial affairs.

Senator Nye, of Nevada, spoke at length of the necessities of commerce to any nation that would be truly great. He read the amounts of the last subsidies paid by Great Britain, and hoped the day would come when the Star-Spangled Banner would sweep the Pacific Ocean as the Union Jack now did the Atlantic. Why did not America secure a large portion of this vast trade 'i Senator Morrill, of Vermont: Does the Senator really wish an answer ? Because we cannot manufacture so cheaply. We do sell to the people of Australia a few hoes, shovels, and sewing machines, and even so many steamships would not do much more while they (the people of Australia) can buy cheaper in other places. He would be very happy to see indications of such a trade springing up, but he was not favourable to large crop jobs like this. He moved as an amendment that it lie on the table.

Senator Chandler, of Michigan, thought they had done with this steamship job. Once for all, let it be understood that we cannot have these old hulks at any price. When the subject was first broached a year or two ago, the lobbies were ablaze with statements of the vast trade to be secured, and other advantages too wonderful to be named. On looking into it, they found that the vessels had almost passed from the memory ; that they were rotten old hulks, not tit to run on any piece of water on God's earth and pay a profit. When the railroads cut out the Michigan steamers, their owners removed their boilers, and had them turned into lumber barges : those steamer owners, however, did not understand how to get out of a scrape. They ought to have come to Congress, and proclaimed that commerce was suffering, and that they ought to have a subsidy. In Boston, the side-wheel steamers were broken up when they were cut out by the iron screw steamers. In the case of a side-wheel steamer, every five years that she was manning would involve repairs equal to her first cost. Of the 175 steamers now crossing the Atlantic, only one was a side-wheeler, and she was running at a loss. These (side-wheel) steamers would pay with a subsidy of 500,000 dollars a year, whereas screw propellers, with compound engines, would pay with a subsidy of only 100,000 dollars a year, and would give an immeasurably better service. It was useless to run these old wooden hulks anywhere, as it could not be done at a profit. They were laid up for two years because they could not run on any known line. Commercial men were now going to abandon this line because it was not profitable, uuless this vote were passed, although they had already subsidised them to an extent more than enough to run modern steamers. If they were compelled to take these old hulks, he proposed that we should buy them at their full value, put lOibs of nitro-glycerine into their hulls, tow them out into deep soundings, and let us hear no more of them.

The amendment was then put and carried, and the subsidy question shelved for this session.