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BACKING AMERICAN SHIPS WITH AMERI ¬ CAN DOLLARS By K lward X Hurley Chairman United States Shipping Board The United States is the greatest coffee consum ¬ ing nation in the world worldWe We buy every year from Brazil about 100000 OOf worth of coffee Potentially that should be the greatest influence for sales of our own products to Brazil Actually this coffee consumption has yielded to the United States only a fraction of its imtentinl benefits benefitsEuropean European shipping concerns have controlled prac ¬ tically all shipments from Rio dc Janeiro and San ¬ tos to New York and New Orleans About two thirds of the coffee comes to New York and one third to New Orleans An average of three ships a month were required in normal times to carry to New Orleans the 2000000 bags for the south and middle west In a wellbalanced trade these ships would have been available for return cargoes of American products productsThe The middle west especially might have been in an advantageous position because it could command lower railroad rates to New Orleans than New York But the ships of this coffee fleet all under foreign flags made no effort to secure return car ¬ goes After discharging coffee they loaded with cotton and other raw materials for European man ¬ ufacturers They steamed away to Europe took oii cargoes of manufactured goods made largely from American raw materials and carried these I lack to Brazil BrazilLacking Lacking ships to South America and banks on that continent our coffee importers had to pay exchange and commission to European banks The foreign ships upon which we depended provided a smooth highway from Brazilian coffee into New Orleans greased the way for American raw ma ¬ terials to reach European mills and carried Euro ¬ pean goods to Brazil where they were paid for with the Brazilians profits on sales of coffee to the United States These foreign ships were so routed that they rendered their first service to the European exporter their second service to the Bra ¬ zilian coffee grower and we came in for senice after that thatOur Our foreign trade has been full of opportunities like this But lacking American merchant ships and American banking facilities in other countries we have let the foreigner improve the opportunities Now we are building a real merchant marine American banks are establishing foreign branches The American ship and the American dollar are go ¬ ing to work together and the more attention we pay to this great field of business the harder they will work for us usShipbuilding Shipbuilding for war purposes has made a tre ¬ mendous appeal to the American imagination We must now put our merchant marine into the nations thought in just the same way These are the na ¬ tions ships They will increase prosperity for people in the corn belt even more than those on the seaboard They will serve the farmer and consumer even more than the manufacturer and ex porter When we get the American merchant ma ¬ rine into the daily thought of every producer and our boys and girls play with shipping toys and American youth consider the sea in choosing a career then we shall have something upon which to build foreign trade foreign exchange foreign in ¬ vestment vestmentOur Our trade abroad has grown haphazard like Tppsy nnd become lopsided in many ways It hasi been unbalanced financially so that our profits have gone to pay foreign shipping companies bankers and insurance brokers It has been unbalanced in ton ¬ nage so that while we bought products of other natiorm and should have been building trade with them in finished goods we have merely supplied raw materials for other manufacturing nations We have been set aside on one leg of the triangular voyage when we should have been doing business direct give and take as we do It at home you deal with me and I deal with you Our foreign trade has grown against every handicap simply be ¬ cause of excellent American products which over ¬ came competition on merit meritShips Ships are the rallying point round which we must pull all this business together and now is the time for eery American to begin studying our merchant ships and all that goes with them in the way of ocean delivery service foreign exchange and in ¬ vestments sales of American products for the out voyage and purchases of raw materials for the return trip We will shortly have the ships It is time to acquire the knowledge of ships which will enable us to utilize our new merchant fleet for the service of this and other nations
