Chapter IX
The debate, March 1849—Speech of Mr. Herries—Mr. J. Wilson—Question of reciprocity—Doubtful even in the case of shipping—Difficulty of the “Favoured-nation” clause—Marquess of Granby—Mr. Cardwell—Mr. Henley—Mr. Gladstone—Burdens to be removed from Shipowners—Conditional legislation recommended—Views on the subject of the coasting trade—Americans not Free-traders—Smuggling in the coasting trade—Mr. Robinson—Mr. Clay—Mr. T. A. Mitchell—Mr. Hildyard—Mr. Ricardo—Mr. H. Drummond—Mr. Labouchere’s reply—Majority of 56 for Bill—Committee on the Bill—Coasting clauses withdrawn—Mr. Bouverie’s amendment opposed by Shipowners’ Committee—Mr. Gladstone’s scheme also opposed by the Shipowners—Questions of reciprocity, conditional legislation, and retaliation—Details of American Law—Mr. Bouverie’s plan rejected—Mr. Disraeli’s speech—Third reading of Bill—Mr. Herries’ speech—Mr. Robinson—Mr. Walpole—Sir James Graham—Mr. T. Baring—Lord J. Russell—Mr. Disraeli—Majority for Bill, 61.
[Sidenote: The Debate, March 1849.]
The House of Commons, though seldom much interested in maritime and, as was conceived, in intricate questions, was, on this occasion, full to the overflowing. The subject was, indeed, one of crowning interest. The repeal of the Navigation Laws would, as the extreme Free-traders had remarked, sweep away “the last rag of Protection;” as others more pompously had expressed it, would form the “capital of that majestic column of unfettered commerce which their own hands had reared.” The Protectionists, on the other hand, looked on the measure as the final overthrow of our naval power and the destruction of our maritime commerce. The shipowners mustered in great numbers about the Commons; and the author, who had not, at that time, found a seat in the body of the House, was favoured with one in the reporters’ gallery.
[Sidenote: Speech of Mr. Herries.]
Mr. Herries was once more selected as the champion of the shipping interest; and, on the question being put that “this Bill be now read a second time,” moved an amendment that it “be read a second time that day six months.” If Mr. Herries was not gifted with great eloquence, he possessed at least great experience, and a thorough knowledge of his subject. His speech in opposition to the Bill was of the most elaborate character. He insisted, that the more the measure was examined, the more the shipowners and the public were adverse to its passing. He examined at great length the correspondence from our colonies and from Foreign Powers, contending that that from Canada was useless, if not repugnant. In point of fact, he said, taking his text from the report of the Shipowners’ Society, the opinion of the Canadians had changed, and the public sentiment there appeared decidedly adverse to repeal. A similar change of feeling seemed to have come over the West India colonists, and they had shifted their ground. Germany would do nothing until the central German government was appointed, which, in his opinion, would probably be about the Greek Kalends! The United States pointed out the existing law, but could not answer us till Congress had been consulted. The replies from other nations were gone over seriatim, and the conduct of Belgium in adhering to what was thought best for Belgian interests was applauded as a wise and liberal course. No foreign Government had given a distinct answer except Belgium, and that was not a favourable one. We had abandoned, he said, some of our restrictive laws in relation to European navigation, and wisely abandoned them, because we could not maintain them any longer. That was the ground of Mr. Huskisson’s modifications: but we ought, at present, to hold what we could, and to concede only what we must, in matters of navigation. He admitted, amidst the derisive cheers of the repeal party, that the Navigation Laws imposed restraints on commerce, and so far operated unfavourably; but the question to be considered was whether the gain to be derived from the abolition of these laws was a sufficient inducement for running the risk of the loss to which this abolition must lead. All prudence and sound judgment was opposed to repeal. The voice now rising from every quarter would soon reach those in whose hands the government was placed, and they would learn that their first duty was to uphold British interests, maintain British commerce, and promote British enterprise.
[Sidenote: Mr. J. Wilson.]
Mr. James Wilson, who replied at great length to Mr. Herries, had a few years previously started a Free-trade journal, the ‘Economist,’ and, having obtained a seat in the House of Commons, became a staunch and formidable advocate of an extreme Free-trade policy. He was a master in statistics, and, as figures were the rage at the time, he happily seized the moment which led to a political fortune, and, using his knowledge of them to the best advantage became a valuable adjunct to the ministry of the day. His speech on the present occasion showed the beneficial action of Free-trade in the removal of needless restrictions, and, further, that, though our merchants had been exposed to great competition, the aggregate commerce of the country had been proportionally augmented; he therefore asked why the shipping interest should be exempted from a rivalry which other interests had successfully encountered. He then demonstrated the little real advantage the Navigation Laws gave to British shipowners, who, by the very policy of those laws, were exposed to competition in the long-voyage trade in the very places where competition was most injurious to them; and, further, that all the tests fairly applied to the question proved the ability of British shipowners to compete with the foreigner. In some cases, too, he held that the Navigation Laws acted as a protection to foreign at the expense of British ships; and while, practically, of little benefit to the shipowner, there could be no doubt that these restrictions operated injuriously, especially in emergencies, on consumers, and, ultimately of course, on shipowners themselves. If a commercial marine was necessary to support our navy, Free-trade had increased and would increase that marine.
[Sidenote: Question of reciprocity.]
But perhaps the most important part of Mr. Wilson’s speech was that relating to the question of reciprocity. The general question was, indeed, beginning to resolve itself into three points. All parties had come to the conclusion that some change was necessary; but it remained to be decided whether reciprocity, conditional legislation and retaliation, should be the principle of the measure. Mr. Gladstone last year had strongly urged the principle of reciprocity in some cases by special treaties. Mr. Wilson very strongly combated this principle. Nothing he thought would be more prejudicial to the spread of Free-trade principles among continental nations than that this country should sanction the notion entertained by foreign Governments, that the British Government was willing to make concessions not so much for the general benefit of commerce, as for the sake of other concessions, to be thus obtained from foreign countries in favour of England. Foreign nations considered England as an old and wealthy nation, and expected to be overreached in forming commercial treaties.
He objected, therefore, to the principle of reciprocity, as it would actually throw difficulties in the way of those who were willing to meet us. On any principle of reciprocity they must adopt that of equivalents, and this was impossible. Other countries had no colonies, and had, consequently, no equivalent advantages to offer in return for those conferred by England. He admitted, however, that there was a great distinction between reciprocity in produce and reciprocity in shipping. If they imposed retaliatory duties on the produce of various countries, for the purpose of meeting duties imposed on their own goods, they did not visit the same interests with this retaliation. For example, cotton and woollen goods were sent to Prussia: we received from Prussia, corn, timber, and wool. If Prussia imposed high duties on cotton and woollen goods, we could only retaliate by putting high duties on the corn, timber, and wool of Prussia when imported into England. The Prussian Government punished the woollen manufacturer and the cotton manufacturer of England by imposing high duties on their goods; and, then, the English Legislature punished them again by imposing high duties on the raw material from which those goods were manufactured. Nothing could be more monstrous than such a course of proceeding. If we acted on the principle of reciprocity, we ought to give perfect freedom of trade to those who gave perfect freedom of trade to us. If the United States admitted our goods duty free, we could not do less than admit the corn of the United States free.
[Sidenote: Doubtful even in the case of shipping.]
[Sidenote: Difficulty of the “Favoured-nation” clause.]
Suppose, again, Russia, on the Black Sea, imposed a duty of 50 per cent. on manufactures, we must retaliate by a duty of 50 per cent. on Russian corn and timber. We must, in fact, have distinct treaties and distinct tariffs, and there would hence result a most complicated system of international commerce. Reciprocity meant that or nothing. But, after thus stating his views on reciprocity of produce, Mr. Wilson admitted that by imposing restrictions on foreign ships corresponding with those imposed on our own, we should have the advantage of dealing with the same interest, and the weapon would be more likely to be effectual, in that those, for whose sake duties were imposed abroad, would be subject to corresponding disadvantages in this country. But he was wholly opposed to reciprocity even in shipping. He had shown what variety of treaties would be required if the principle of reciprocity was adopted with regard to manufactures and produce; and he felt convinced that a corresponding or analogous difficulty would arise from adopting that principle in the case of shipping. Very intricate and complicated regulations would be required. Thus, supposing we found a country disposed to give all, we ourselves would be obliged to give all. But then it must be borne in mind that there were twenty countries with whom we had already treaties, and to whom we were bound to extend the advantages obtainable by the most favoured nations: and, therefore, if, now, we gave privileges to any one country, we must extend the same to all the other countries which stood in the same position.
Suppose, he said, that Hamburg were to give this country all that it required, and that, in return, its ships were placed on the same footing as British ships; what guarantee should we have that a third country, which had given us nothing, would not derive the same advantages as the shipowners of Hamburg, or that the sugar of Java, and the coffee of South America, would not be brought to this country in their ships? There would be no end of evasion. The United States would reciprocate; Prussia would do the same; Russia and the ports of the Hanseatic League would follow their example: what, therefore, had this country to fear? It was admitted that we should not expect the same reciprocity from France, Spain, or Belgium; but, in these cases, should we be really worse off than we are now? At this moment France and Spain had great privileges in this country. France had the right, not according to treaty, but from the general policy of our Navigation Laws, to send her produce direct to this country in her own ships. She, however, availed herself to a very small extent of this privilege. Nine-tenths of the importations of Spanish colonial sugars came likewise in British bottoms. As far as regards the reservations at the discretion of the Queen in Council, Free-trade unrestricted would most assuredly be the rule and restriction the exception.
[Sidenote: Marquess of Granby.]
The Marquess of Granby followed on the side of Protection, urging the mischief that would result from the great number of persons thrown out of employment; he pointed out how uncertain were the advantages to be derived, and the reality of its evils; but despite of disadvantages, if Englishmen were but true to themselves and their country, he felt that we should be able to weather the impending storm, and retain the command of that “glorious element” which was our natural protector, so that the flag of England might still for years to come “wave triumphant over every sea.”
[Sidenote: Mr. Cardwell.]
Mr. Cardwell, although he could not share in the gloomy apprehensions of Mr. Herries or the eloquent doubts of the Marquess of Granby, felt the importance of this question and its bearing on the mercantile interests of England and her colonies. He warned the House of the danger of not taking timely steps with regard to what was called the “long-voyage” clause, which some of the witnesses before the Lords’ Committee regarded as a fundamental principle of the Navigation Laws; and he showed that the effect of maintaining this clause would be to defeat the policy of the warehousing system, and rob us of a large share of the commerce of the world. There was nothing more important than that great interest known by the denomination of the “warehousing system,” which had been the growth of comparatively recent years and was the offspring of a judicious relaxation in the Navigation Laws: this system he held had made this country the entrepôt between regions furnishing tropical produce and the great consuming countries of Europe. Mr. Cardwell then urged the importance of the Canadian claims, and described the keen competition going on between Canada and the United States.
[Sidenote: Mr. Henley]
Mr. Henley went into a long argument against the Bill, especially animadverting upon Mr. Wilson’s having derided reciprocity, while nevertheless the Bill legislated for it, and Government had been in correspondence with foreign Governments for the purpose of securing it. “What did the Government intend to do,” he asked, “on the subject of impressment? If the masters were to be taken from a superior class, were they still liable to be impressed?”[109] The experiment of Free-trade had not in Mr. Henley’s opinion been sufficiently tried to justify the application of that principle to another great interest. If the country were polled, every man, he was sure, would cheerfully pay the hardly-appreciable advance in prices, rather than run the risk of a failure in an experiment so dangerous. No one had attempted to deny that obstruction was here, and inconvenience there; but when you came to balance the possible risk with the possible gain, no one would be disposed to run that risk, which he for one feared must take place if the measure were carried. It was a great interest to tamper with, and involved not only capital and industry, but the national defences.
[Sidenote: Mr. Gladstone.]
[Sidenote: Burdens to be removed from Shipowners.]
The debate was adjourned to the 13th of March, when it was resumed by Mr. Gladstone, with his usual ability, in an elaborate speech. He supported the second reading of the Bill, as furnishing the only opportunity of inducing the House to agree to a change in the Navigation Laws. He denied that this change would be the destruction of the shipping interests, and thought it was a fitting time for effecting numerous alterations. Mr. Gladstone, however, differed from many who supported the measure. His doctrine was still that they should not abandon the path of experience. In his opinion, it was only on principles analogous to those of Mr. Huskisson that we could safely depart from the system of navigation we had so long pursued, interwoven as this had been, for centuries, with our national policy. There were several demands the shipowner might fairly make upon the Legislature when about to be deprived of protection. He was entitled to the removal of every peculiar burden by which he was now hampered. If we exposed him to unrestricted competition with foreigners, we should give him a drawback, or a remission of the duties on the timber he required for the construction of his ships. He should also be relieved from the restraint with respect to the manning of his ships. There was another compensation to which the shipowner was entitled. By repealing the Navigation Laws, he would have to undergo competition from the Baltic, sharp as far as it went, and from the United States, all over the world. He was therefore entitled to ask that he should be admitted to those fields of employment from which he was then excluded. The policy pointed out by experience, Mr. Gladstone contended, was that of conditional relaxation. He had never entertained the notion that we should proceed by treaties of reciprocity with foreign Powers. There were difficulties in the way of doing so which a wise Legislature would avoid. The American system, so far as it went, should be our model. By adopting it, he considered that difficulties inseparable from the system of reciprocity treaties would be avoided.
[Sidenote: Conditional legislation recommended.]
The immediate effect of conditional relaxation would be to give vessels of such States as conferred privileges on our shipping corresponding advantages in our ports. Such a course would be in accordance with precedent and experience; was demanded by justice, and would be found easier of execution than the plan proposed by the Queen’s Government. There was in his mind an insuperable objection to any form of retaliation. Every word urged against the system of reciprocity told with augmented force against that of retaliation. He would join in opposing that feature of the plan, regarding it, as he did, as a material defect. But if Government would not consent to legislate on the subject, conditionally, he would advise it to do so directly, without the accompaniment of retaliation. In fact, the conditional system was that on which we now, practically, acted with regard to many of the maritime nations of the world.
[Sidenote: Views on the subject of the coasting trade.]
[Sidenote: Americans not Free-traders.]
[Sidenote: Smuggling in the coasting trade.]
There was another feature in the Government proposition Mr. Gladstone regarded as defective. He was of opinion that the mode in which it proposed to deal with the coasting trade would be found ineffectual. Before we could expect to get the advantage of the American coasting trade we must throw our own unreservedly open to that country.[110] Any chance we could have of getting from America a share of her coasting trade must depend upon our offering her our entire coasting trade, leaving her perfectly free to accept it or not, under the regulations now affecting British ships engaged in it. But we must not expect of America that she would fetter herself towards other countries by those particular regulations which it was proposed to lay down, and which do not give up the whole coasting trade, but only portions of it; to any such regulations we could not expect that America would agree. “If we proceed by _un_conditional legislation, and offer up our colonial trade instead of giving up our coasting trade, I believe she will get our colonial trade, and may then be ready to give up some comparatively insignificant advantages in return; but America is not a lover of Free-trade in the abstract. The Protectionist principle is very strong in America,” he continued, “although it is not so strong with reference to shipping as to manufactures.”[111] For these and other reasons Mr. Gladstone insisted on the expediency of throwing open the coasting trade to the foreigner, “if he could find his way into it.”[112] At present the uniform and invariable rule, he added, is to insist on the strictest possible separation between the outward and inward-bound goods, between foreign trade goods and goods coastwise; and, in point of fact, with a system of drawbacks and high duty goods, there would be the greatest danger to the revenue, or we must undergo the most enormous expense, if we do not insist on the separation of cargoes. But if a vessel is allowed to take in goods to carry coastwise, duty paid, she might be taking in tobacco in Liverpool, duty paid, to carry it coastwise, while at the same time she was discharging tobacco at Liverpool, not duty paid. This would be fraught with great danger. Mr. Gladstone then pointed out the conflicting interests of various colonies; and that the only way to render justice to all was by conditional legislation.
[Sidenote: Mr. Robinson.]
The substance of the speech of Mr. Robinson, Chairman of Lloyd’s, who followed Mr. Gladstone, was, in the event of the Bill passing, to claim indemnity for the shipowner. Would Government, he asked, take the duty off timber; the duty on the timber for a vessel of 200 tons being 300_l._? There was also the duty on marine assurances; and, indeed, all the taxes now pressing on the British shipowner, but from which the foreigner was free. Would Government relieve the shipowner from the apprenticeship restrictions, and allow him to man his ship with foreign seamen? Government, he felt sure, could not give any such assurance, and if they did and the promise was realised, Mr. Robinson doubted if, even then, the British shipowner could compete successfully with the foreigner.
[Sidenote: Mr. Clay.]
Mr. Clay, the extreme Liberal member for Hull, who would perhaps have lost his seat had he voted for repeal, made a Free-trade speech, but ended by voting against the Government measure. The position he took was that as long as the burdens of the shipowner remained, protection must be conceded to him. Mr. Hornby, who represented another of the outports, recommended that concessions should only be made pari passu, and that we ought not to give up the all-important maritime advantages we possess.
[Sidenote: Mr. T. A. Mitchell.]
Mr. T. A. Mitchell reproached Free-traders like Mr. Hornby for voting against repeal, and especially animadverted on Mr. Gladstone’s procedure, whose speech in its general effect was surprising, as coming from an advocate of Free-trade. A more effectual mode, in his judgment, could not have been taken to damage the whole scheme. Mr. Mitchell ardently supported repeal, not believing the average rate of freights would decline in consequence; moreover, the repeal, he thought, would enable us to escape the inordinately high freights which, in times of sudden emergency we were now called upon to pay.
[Sidenote: Mr. Hildyard.]
Mr. Hildyard urged very strongly the importance of the coasting trade of the United States, and the necessity of securing it. He admitted that the coast of England was a difficult and dangerous one, and that there was not much chance of America competing with us in that trade. On the other hand, the coasting trade of America was of great importance. An United States committee on harbours and rivers, during the preceding year, had shown that no fewer than eight States were mainly dependent upon seven great lakes for their commercial intercourse; and that the line of coast of these eight States was not less than 3000 miles; while, on the Mississippi and its tributaries, fourteen States in 1846, with a population of 6,500,000, relied for their easiest means of intercommunication. The sea-board of Maine was more valuable still; so that it was of very great importance, if concessions were to be made, that we should participate in the coasting trade of America.
[Sidenote: Mr. Ricardo.]
Mr. Ricardo, while supporting the propriety of freeing the shipowners from many of the burdens imposed on them, argued that the retaliatory clause could not possibly be maintained, and that the proposed reciprocity system was equally untenable.
[Sidenote: Mr. H. Drummond.]
Mr. H. Drummond, in one of his witty, splenetic speeches, opposed the Bill. The object, he said, of every statesman in past times had been to prevent capital from going out of the country, on the ground that, if capital went out of the country, the labour of the country would not be employed. Now every successive minister had to get up, and, on every question brought forward, to go against every principle he had previously defended, and so to take the opposite side of every view he had before maintained. There were Fates presiding from which no minister could liberate himself; while, as for the House itself, there would appear to be a spell over them, rendering them passive and helpless; while every successive Chancellor of the Exchequer picked away at their livers ad libitum. The most celebrated statesman of antiquity said: “There is in maritime States a corruption and instability of morals, for they import not only merchandise but morals, so that nothing can remain entire in the institutions of their country.” The only quarrel, Mr. Drummond added, he had with the Free-traders was with respect to Adam Smith, that they never would read beyond one page of him. And yet, it was by men actuated by similarly interested motives, that the House was now guided. The manufacturer sent out to Africa for cotton; he employed African labourers in its cultivation; he brought it home in an American ship; he spun it into yarn by his machinery, and then sent it in a French vessel to be exchanged for French cloth or silks, or other articles of French manufacture. So that the whole process might be perfected without the employment of a single English labourer. The poet exclaimed:—
“Lives there a man with soul so dead, Who never to himself has said, This is my own, my native land?”
Yes! at Manchester there were a thousand such. Not content with bringing accusations against the English sailors, not content with slighting the opinions of their officers, they now said this country had a superstitious reverence for the navy. He would not deny that they might have had such a feeling, for there was a time when they had a national faith; there was a time when they venerated, worshipped even, the statesman who guided safely the destinies of the country; when they reverenced the magistrates who presided over the administration of their laws; when they gloried in the soldiers and the sailors who maintained the greatness of the nation throughout the world; when the noblest credo that they had was “Rule Britannia!” and when the finest anthem in their ritual was “God save the Queen!”
[Sidenote: Mr. Labouchere’s reply.]
After this protracted debate, Mr. Labouchere rose to reply. He went over the chief points urged against repeal, and asked for no vote in favour of it but from those who admitted the propriety of a departure from the system of the Navigation Laws. He was ready to consider any suggestions, in reference to the details, provided they were not inconsistent with the principle of the Bill. He saw no reason why the present retention of the timber duties should operate as a bar to the immediate repeal of the Navigation Laws. He opposed Mr. Gladstone’s views as narrow and erroneous, and contrary to the true policy of the country. Our commercial policy should not be made to depend upon the views and caprices of foreign States.
[Sidenote: Majority of 56 for Bill.]
The House at length divided, when there appeared for Mr. Herries’ amendment (that the Bill be read a second time that day six months) 210 Against it 266 ---- Majority in favour of the Bill 56 ----
It will be remembered that the opinion of the House in favour of an extensive change in the Navigation Laws was carried in a House of only 411 members by a majority of 117 members. Now, after a year’s reflection, we find that in a House of 476 members, the majority of 117 had dwindled down to 56! This great diminution of the apparent power of Free-traders resulted partly from a general depression of the shipping interests, but, principally, from the great exertions the Shipowners were making to agitate the country in their favour. The announcement of the diminished majority was hailed by the opponents of the measure with loud and prolonged cheering. Every vote was scanned with the most hostile criticism, and Mr. Cardwell, the newly-elected member for Liverpool, was especially censured for voting against the interests of that great maritime port. The Shipowners now took fresh courage, and issued fresh denunciations against the measure, and against the whole of the Free-trade journals—ministerial, Peel, and Cobdenite—which had joined in full cry for the repeal of the Navigation Laws. The agitation against repeal was renewed with fresh vigour on the part of the Shipowners’ Society. It was now fondly hoped that, by agitation, the majority in the House of Commons would diminish in future stages of the Bill, in which case there could be no doubt that the House of Lords would throw it out, and perhaps compel the resignation of Ministers.[113]
[Sidenote: Committee on the Bill.]
[Sidenote: Coasting clauses withdrawn.]
On the 23rd March, the motion for going into Committee on the Bill gave Mr. Labouchere an opportunity of withdrawing the “Coasting clauses” he had previously paraded as an important feature of it. The tone and manner of the right honourable gentleman betrayed the humiliation he was doomed to undergo. He discreetly, however, held his tongue respecting the flat refusal he had received from the United States with respect to their expected reciprocation of the coasting trade, expatiating, instead, at great length, on certain conferences he had had with Sir T. Fremantle, the head of the Board of Customs, the upshot being, that whereas Sir T. Fremantle had previously said that the new proposed regulations regarding the Coasting trade would not endanger the revenue he had now changed his opinion, and, with the officials under him, had come to the conclusion that, if not absolutely impossible, it would be extremely difficult to frame any regulations which should not leave the revenue of the country exposed to great danger if the distinction were done away with between the coasting and general trade of the country—that is, if a foreign or a British ship were allowed to combine a coasting with a foreign voyage.
Mr. Hume saw at once that if the trade were entirely laid open this difficulty would be removed; but, although this was admitted, Mr. Labouchere plausibly answered that to say to an American, “You may come here and carry coals in our coasting trade, but you must not combine that with a foreign voyage,” would be quite illusory. To open the coasting trade in this manner, it was urged, would excite a great deal of unnecessary alarm among the shipping classes; and, so, the coasting clauses were hastily withdrawn. Of course, the refusal of the American Government to reciprocate in the coasting trade did not escape the sagacity of Mr. Herries, who, delighted at the withdrawal of the obnoxious clauses, declared the excuse made about the revenue to be wholly unsatisfactory; moreover, that it was made known, unfortunately, just after the communication from the American Government, so long delayed, had been laid on the table, by which it appeared that Government was not, otherwise, prepared to make the proposed concessions on the subject of this trade.
[Sidenote: Mr. Bouverie’s amendment opposed by Shipowners’ Committee.]
However, in the meantime, Mr. Bouverie, member for Kilmarnock, a Free-trader, had given notice of a long amendment[114] to the first clause of the Bill, which was, substantially, to the effect that the several restrictions and prohibitions contained in the Acts recited in the 1st Clause (i.e. the old Navigation Laws), with certain exceptions, should continue in full force, till it should be shown that British ships were not subjected in foreign countries to the like restrictions and prohibitions. It might have been supposed that the Shipowners would have consented to such a compromise: but they showed no disposition to accept this proposal. Indeed, their hostility to any alteration mainly led to their ultimate discomfiture. At a meeting of the Central Committee for upholding the principle of the Navigation Laws, it was unanimously resolved, “That the fatal consequences of the repealing Clause, No. 1, in the Navigation Law Amendment Bill, would not be removed by the amendment of which Mr. Bouverie had given notice; and, as they were convinced that this clause would still prove destructive to British navigation, they trusted it would not in any form receive the sanction of friends to the shipping interest in Parliament.”
[Sidenote: Mr. Gladstone’s scheme]
This was, perhaps, the last chance offered to the Shipowners: they, however, relied upon throwing out the Bill, and rejected every offer at modification, or conditional relaxation of the existing law, their aim being to uphold those laws in their integrity. Mr. Gladstone’s views, on the other hand, favoured the adoption of conditional legislation, but not exactly in the way proposed by Mr. Bouverie. He proposed to divide the whole trade of the empire into two divisions only: the first of them relating to domestic or British trade; including under that head the trade coastwise and the colonial trade. He proposed to enact a law, not dependent on the discretion of the ministers of the Crown, otherwise than that it would be their business to ascertain when any country was disposed to give Great Britain perfect freedom in its foreign trade, and to provide in such a case that it should receive in return her foreign trade. Whenever any nation would propose perfect freedom in all maritime trade, both foreign and domestic, it would be placed on equal terms with British vessels in all ports, foreign, colonial, and coasting. Mr. Gladstone, however, contemplated a provision for the foreign trade of the colonies by dealing with that trade irrespectively of the conduct of other countries. He suggested the repeal of every direct restraint on the importation of tropical produce—or non-European produce—from Europe, that being a restraint which, according to the actual law, affected British ships as well as those of foreign countries. He was also for the repeal of all fiscal restraints, and of every restraint of the nature of a tax on the British Shipowner. He would have set him free, alike with respect to the command and the manning of his ship; he would also have allowed a drawback on the timber used in the construction of ships.
[Sidenote: also opposed by the Shipowners.]
Such were Mr. Gladstone’s views, which he was sanguine enough to imagine would have been acceptable to the shipping interests, had he proposed a scheme embodying his opinions, and invited the Legislature to make the necessary fiscal alterations. But when Mr. Gladstone saw that both the Government and Shipowners rejected Mr. Bouverie’s proposal, a form as it unquestionably was of conditional legislation, he relinquished his intention of bringing his plan before the House, as it had in fact no chance of being accepted by either party.
Such was the temper of all parties when the Bill went into committee on the 23rd March, 1849; Mr. Herries, before the Speaker left the chair, having intimated his intention of opposing the Bill during all its stages, believing that it could not be rendered a good Bill, whatever alterations might be made in it.
Upon going into committee, Mr. Bouverie brought forward his amendment. He disclaimed any desire to defeat the measure, which he had supported by his vote, still less did he hanker after Protection, for it was strictly in the sense of Free-trade that he proposed it. He only differed with Ministers as to the mode by which the changes proposed should be effected. They had entered into reciprocal relations with almost every other maritime nation. The United States had a complete system of reciprocity: it was the foundation of their navigation system, and it was an example it would be well to follow. The clause he proposed would supersede the necessity of tedious and vexatious negotiations. Out of a score of reciprocity treaties to which England was a party, there were only four which contained the “favoured-nation” clause; and it was idle to expect that, through the instrumentality of any such compacts, genuine or extensively reciprocal advantages could be established as between England and the other nations of the world. It might be difficult, if not wholly impracticable, to realise the principle of reciprocity in the case of tariffs, but it was not so difficult to apply the principle to shipping. Nothing was so easy as to say, we will relax our Navigation Laws, and make certain arrangements with respect to our shipping interests, on the express condition that other countries will adopt similar arrangements and similar relaxations in our regard.
[Sidenote: Questions of reciprocity, conditional legislation, and retaliation.]
If these views were unsatisfactory to the Shipowners, it is certain they were still more so to the extreme Free-trade party. The question had now resolved itself into the expediency of reciprocity, conditional legislation, and retaliation. The extreme Free-traders demanded liberty of navigation without any legislative restriction whatever, and the plan of Government conferring a power of retaliation, though one little likely to be resorted to, was of course the plan least objectionable to the Free-traders. They contended that the Bill as it stood enabled the country to receive concessions from foreign countries by making concessions to them; but, if Mr. Bouverie’s motion was carried, they asserted that, retaining in our hands the power of retaliation, we should be compelled to resort to such measures whenever equality was disturbed.
[Sidenote: Details of American law.]
Both parties in truth exaggerated the difficulties of their opponent’s scheme, being attached to their own. The real question at issue was, which country should take the initiative in a Free-trade policy. Mr. Wilson, as an extreme Free-trader, insisted that the law of America sanctioned reciprocity on their part, without having recourse to Congress, which the members of the Shipowners’ Society controverted. There can be no doubt that the American Law of 1828 did so authorize the President to reciprocate any relaxation of the Navigation Laws we might on our part resolve on. But when Mr. Buchanan had so recently reserved the American coasting trade, repudiating the unauthorized pledge previously given by the American envoy, and had further frankly stated to Mr. Crampton,[115] that “it was probable some difference of opinion would manifest itself in Congress upon this question, from the unwillingness felt in some quarters to throw open the ship-building business in the United States to the competition of British shipbuilders, and more particularly to that of the shipbuilders of the British North American colonies;” we might have been quite sure that Congress would, if necessary, interfere, and, by some special law, annul the liberal principle of the American Law of 1828.
Mr. Wilson and the Free-traders, affecting to be better informed on the state of American law than the Shipowners, went into the opposite extreme, and expressed their entire confidence in the complete reciprocity of the Americans; asserting further, that without going to Congress, the Executive could extend to every country similar concessions as were extended to them. Such was the impression on both the contending parties. As to Mr. Bouverie’s amendment, though it, in some degree, resembled Mr. Gladstone’s views, that gentleman complained “that his scheme had been withered by an unkind shadow cast over it by the member for Kilmarnock,” at the same time, refusing to discuss a plan not dissimilar to his own, and adhering to his opinion, that, as foreign countries were in the habit of adopting measures to meet their own wants, England ought to be allowed to do the same, but only on the principle of reciprocity.
[Sidenote: Mr. Bouverie’s plan rejected.]
It is unnecessary to pursue this point any further. A long debate ensued on it, in which Mr. Milner Gibson and Mr. Bright delivered, with their usual force, their extreme, but then unpalatable, Free-trade opinions, while Mr. Roundell Palmer opposed any change hostile to the principles of the Navigation Laws. It appeared from the general feeling of the committee, that Mr. Bouverie’s amendment had not the slightest chance of being adopted, and he was desirous of withdrawing it. Mr. Wawn, however, insisted upon a division; and when a division was taken, only fifteen members voted in favour of Mr. Bouverie’s scheme of conditional legislation, while 132 voted against it.
[Sidenote: Mr. Disraeli’s speech.]
Various other divisions took place on the consideration of the Bill in committee, and numerous important alterations were then made, so that only eighteen clauses were carried up to the sitting of the 23rd March. On the motion to report progress, Mr. Disraeli protested against the whole Bill, which, by the withdrawal of ten clauses and the modification of four more, had received that night a serious check. He compared the proceedings to those during the French Revolution, on the day when the nobles and prelates vied with each other in throwing mitres and coronets to the dust as useless appendages. That day was still called “the day of dupes;” and, remarked Mr. Disraeli, “the same appellation might be applied when referring to the events of that evening. We have had,” he continued, “two years of protracted legislation against the Shipowners of England.” The course Ministers had pursued during those two years formed no exception to the rash policy which had characterised their proceedings with regard to the agricultural and colonial interests. “Have your deliberations been graver or more thoughtful? This” (holding up the Bill), “this,” exclaimed Mr. Disraeli, “is my answer. Ministers acting in this manner,” he continued, “did more than injure and destroy the material interests of the nation; they laid the foundation of a stock of political discontent, which would not merely diminish the revenues of the kingdom and the fortunes of its subjects, but would shake the institutions of the country to its centre.” After Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Labouchere had spoken in reply, the committee reported progress.
When the committee resumed its sittings on the 26th March, the Retaliatory Clause (19) became a subject of discussion. The several leaders again delivered their opinions on this much-controverted point, the Free-traders wishing to omit the clause altogether; while Mr. G. Sanders intimated an intention of making the Bill operate for a limited term, so as to ascertain whether Foreign Powers would reciprocate or not. The clause, however, was finally carried without a division; but Clause 22, enabling the Queen to reduce the differential duties in certain cases, opened the wide question of dock dues and light dues, in which public and private rights were so confusedly intermingled that it was ultimately withdrawn. The remaining clauses passed with some opposition, the preamble, however, being agreed to. Thus this celebrated Bill now assumed a formal shape; but its opponents, conscious of their power in the House of Lords, gave notice of a last trial of strength upon the third reading.
On the 19th April, Captain Harris made an ineffectual attempt to carry a clause, on the consideration of the Report, enforcing the apprenticeship laws, and Mr. Gladstone obtained a modification of the Bill with regard to the mode of finally adjusting the intercolonial trade by the colonial legislatures.
[Sidenote: Third reading of Bill.]
[Sidenote: Mr. Herries’ speech.]
During the Easter recess, meetings of the shipping interests had been held in various outports, and the whole power of the Shipowners had been put forth to defeat the Bill. On the 23rd April the Bill stood for the third reading, and the venerable Mr. Herries once more headed the party of Anti-Repealers to make a last effort in the House of Commons to reject the Bill. His speech was well prepared, and suitable to the occasion. He very briefly alluded to the points already decided, but dwelt with great force on the Bancroft letter, asserting that nothing had passed relative to the United States, which ought for a moment to weigh with Parliament, in changing its determination to maintain the Navigation Laws. “Let English commerce now speak!” he exclaimed. “Look at the petitions against the Bill, comprising the greatest names in the City.[116] In Liverpool 47,000 persons had signed petitions against the Bill; and among these were 1000 mercantile firms of great note and respectability. This was without precedent in the history of petitions; whilst a counter-petition contained but 1400 names, among which were not found 100 trading firms.” Mr. Herries denied that the subject had any necessary connection with Free-trade. The experiment might be continued, and yet, with perfect consistency, while abstaining from any interference with the main structure and fundamental principles of the Navigation Laws. These laws had always, he alleged, been considered an exception to the general laws affecting trade. After an elaborate speech, Mr. Herries concluded by moving that the Bill be read a third time that day six months. Alderman Thompson seconded the amendment.
[Sidenote: Mr. Robinson.]
A very animated discussion ensued. Mr. Robinson went over the old topics, and said that the new republican Government of France had advertised for the importation of 38,000 tons of coals into France, one of the conditions being that they should be imported exclusively in French vessels. So much for the Navigation Laws of France. The National Assembly had also introduced another measure by which the importation of salt in French vessels subjected to a duty only of 75c., while that imported in British vessels was required to pay a duty of 2f. 75c. So much for Free-trade with France. He trusted the majority in favour of the ministry would be so small as to induce the Government to pause in their career.
Mr. Macgregor, in a very long speech, supported the Bill, though he wished it had been a more complete measure.
[Sidenote: Mr. Walpole.]
He was followed by Mr. Walpole against the Bill, who quoted the Venetian proverb,[117] and said—“Let us first be Englishmen, and then economists.” He considered the Navigation Law the wisest of our regulations. It had given us safety and independence at home; it had afforded security to our colonies abroad; it had protected our trade in every part of the world, and it would protect it, if the laws were not repealed, against all chances of war; and, while it had done this effectually and completely, it had also preserved for them the supremacy on the ocean, by which more than once they had been able to bid defiance to the whole world, when our honour and interests were assailed. Mr. Walpole concluded by borrowing the splendid peroration of Mr. Disraeli in that gentleman’s speech at the second reading.
[Sidenote: Sir James Graham.]
Sir James Graham next rose, and, differing much on some points from the supporters of the Bill, intimated, in an exhaustive speech, his intention of voting for the third reading. Pointing to Sir Francis T. Baring, who sat on the Treasury Bench as First Lord of the Admiralty, the head of the house of Baring, he expressed his disbelief that he would be an assenting party to a measure which, in his conscience, he felt would be injurious to the character and welfare of that commercial navy, to which he and his family for generations had been so much indebted, or that he would give the weight of his influence to a measure which, in his judgment, risked the power and greatness of the Royal Navy, more especially confided by her Majesty to his care. Liverpool had been mentioned. Why, the two members for Liverpool have voted for the Bill.[118] So also did the two members for Newcastle and Glasgow.
Sir James Graham added, that, however valuable reciprocity might have been, when Mr. Huskisson considered the question in the abstract, he, Sir James, was not much attached to it now. It might have been wise and politic at the time; but he could not help thinking that it made the interest of others the measure of our interest, he had almost said it made the folly of others the limit of our wisdom. With respect to reciprocity and to retaliation, which is reciprocity in another shape, as a general rule he would rather leave the Navigation Laws as they were than adopt that principle. What is retaliation? he asked. It is this: because some foreign nation does that which is more injurious to herself than it is to ourselves, we, in the spirit of blind, vindictive passion, proceed to do that which is more injurious to ourselves than to our rivals. To reciprocity and to retaliation, as a rule, Sir James was opposed; but he supported the Bill, on the whole, because without having recourse to either the one or the other, and considering the character of the people of this country, their capital, their undaunted courage, and the advantages they possessed in the race they had already run, he was satisfied that any measure throwing open the trade of the world would greatly increase commerce, and that the lion’s share of the addition would fall to our lot. Every reason, he argued, existing, in the days of Mr. Huskisson, for the relaxation of the system existed in a yet stronger degree at the present moment; and, quoting the expression employed by Lord Stanley, Vestigia nulla retrorsum,[119] as applicable to the recent Free-trade policy, he concluded a highly elaborate speech by remarking that Protection or no Protection was the question at issue; and, as the present measure would crown the work they had already accomplished, he was opposed to reaction, and favourable to progress tempered by prudence and discretion. Upon these grounds he supported the third reading.
[Sidenote: Mr. T. Baring.]
Mr. Thomas Baring avowed his opinion that, as a general principle, restriction must be an injury to trade. If the whole community were to be regarded as a community of merchants, certainly it was desirable to allow the importers to get their wants supplied, and ship their goods where and whence they pleased. If we were, like the inhabitants of the Hanseatic Towns, mere receivers and distributors, then we might say, let every other consideration be disregarded. But the real grievances of the merchants might fairly be taken from their representations, and, if they had sustained such grievances as had been represented, surely they would not have been either indifferent or adverse to the removal of those laws. If he understood the Bill rightly, it was framed on the principle of removing all restrictions on foreigners, and of maintaining restrictions on Englishmen. Let the House mark, he said, that Government which, after great research and trouble in obtaining information, had told us that there was an inferiority on the part of our captains and sailors, now told the Shipowners that they were to compete with those, who had the power of employing better workmen. The only facility given by the Bill to Shipowners was the privilege of building ships abroad; on this he would make one remark, that every person knew the difficulty of recovering a manufacture once lost.
With respect to conditional legislation, suggested by Mr. Gladstone, public opinion was divided on it in the United States. Sweden, in such a case, had nothing to give. Holland could only give one-third, as the Dutch Commercial Company carried on the other two-thirds of the Dutch trade by contract in Dutch vessels. As regards the United States, he was satisfied Mr. Bancroft did not intend to practise a deception. The navigation of the United States offered advantages which might be of account; yet there the favoured-nation clause came in to create difficulties, and it might be that we would feel compelled to abandon the Navigation Laws with respect to those States, or relinquish the advantages which were offered prospectively. We ought to adhere to the main principles of the Navigation Laws in all instances, and make such concessions to each country as our interests might dictate as expedient. The principles of Free-trade ought to be applied to each measure under discussion, according as our particular interests were affected thereby. Sir James Graham had put the question as one decisive between retreat and progress. Reaction was as much to be feared as a rash progress, for reaction might be fraught with suffering to the people, as dangerous to the interests of the country as the proposed change was ominous of evil.
[Sidenote: Lord J. Russell.]
Lord John Russell as Chief Minister of the Crown wound up the debate on his side. He was aware that the law had been almost worshipped as the charta maritima of this country, and that, much of our prosperity and commerce having been attributed to this law, it had been thought profanation to alter it. He thought this was an opinion founded in error, and that, at no time, had this law been essentially advantageous to this country. He then went over the history of the Navigation Laws, quoting authors of various times who wrote of the fluctuations in trade and public policy, and having reviewed the several points of the question, came to the conclusion that with respect to the greater part of the nations of Europe and of the world, we would obtain fair and equal terms of navigation, provided we were ready to give the same terms to them. He went farther; he boldly said that nobody could doubt that in the case of the United States of America, or in those of Prussia, Russia, or Austria, the fullest reciprocity would be conceded. The nations which would not give equal terms were, at the most, only three or four—France, Spain, and Belgium, and perhaps one other.
[Sidenote: Mr. Disraeli.]
[Sidenote: Majority for Bill, 61.]
Mr. Disraeli assumed the privilege of the last word, and, in reply, quoted the last report of the Shipowners’ Society, which has been already given, intimating their readiness to discuss the policy of amending the Navigation Laws on all points not involving fundamental principles. He next took a rapid review of the effects of repeal on the Australian and other colonies, arguing that, if Canada had not a Protective duty on corn restored to it, as demanded by the Legislative Assembly, Canada would be lost to the British Crown. “Woe to those statesmen and to the policy which plucked this jewel from the Crown of England! No shuffling change in the Navigation Law could compensate the people of Canada for what they had lost, and which they felt so acutely.” Mr. Disraeli then referred to the papers from foreign Powers, arguing that they were valueless, and, especially, that everything respecting the United States was a tabula rasa, all that we had heard last year having been obliterated as an element of consideration. The last division on this famous Bill now took place upon the third reading, when the Ayes were 275; Noes, 214; Majority, 61.
FOOTNOTES:
[109] This may appear unintelligible: while actually masters they could not, it is true, be taken; but Mr. Henley said they might be, while changing from one ship to another, and that he knew of instances in which mates had been impressed, placed on board a man-of-war, and kept there for seven years.
[110] While the second reading was under discussion, ministers did not present the papers from the United States, in which the coasting trade was reserved. They discreetly kept the secret up to the last moment before the division. Had the Bill thrown open the whole coasting trade, we now know the Americans would have declined to reciprocate.
[111] This is quite true, but the reader has had this fully accounted for by the antagonistic interests of the non-navigating and navigating States. The opposite feeling was disclosed in the very first debates of the Republic.
[112] The entries and clearances of foreign vessels in the coasting trade of the United Kingdom are quite insignificant.
[113] In the ‘Shipping Gazette,’ March 17, 1849, there is a list of the 51 members of seaport towns in the United Kingdom who voted in favour of the Bill. Mr. Hudson, Sunderland; Mr. Barnard, Greenwich; Lord J. Stuart, Ayr; and Lord J. Chichester, Belfast, were absent.
[114] The Amendment would occupy two pages; it will be found in ‘Hansard,’ vol. ciii. p. 1206.
[115] Vide Letter of Mr. Crampton, 18th February, already referred to.
[116] At the head of the London petition were the names of Thomas Baring; Charles Baring Young; Fred. Huth and Co.; Ransom, Norton, and Co.; Palmer, McKillop, and Co.; H. Davidson; Masterman, Peters, and Co.; Spooner, Atwood, and Co.; Fletcher, Alexander, and Co.; Bosanquet and Co., &c.
[117] “Let us be first Venetians, and then Christians.”
[118] Yes! But they lost their seats by it.
[119] Literally, “You can’t retrace your steps.”
Chapter X
Debate in the Lords, May 7, 1849, on second reading—Speech of the Marquess of Lansdowne—Lord Brougham—Condemnation of Mr. Porter’s statistics—Protected and unprotected Trade—Voyages to the continent—Napoleon’s desire for ships, colonies, and commerce—Earl Granville—Earl of Ellenborough—Increase of foreign peace establishments—Earl of Harrowby—Earl Grey—Lord Stanley—Admits need of modifications—Canada not our only colony—Majority for the Bill, 10—Duke of Wellington votes for it—Proceedings and debate in Committee—Lord Stanley’s amendment—Rejected by 13—Earl of Ellenborough’s amendment—Claims of Shipowners, and fear of competition—Amendment rejected by a majority of 12—Bill read a third time—Timber duties, &c., admitted to be grievances—Lord Stanley’s protest—Royal assent given, June 26—Coasting trade thrown open, 1854—Americans, October 1849, throw open all except their coasting trade.
[Sidenote: Debate in the Lords, 7th May, 1849, on the second reading.]
[Sidenote: Speech of the Marquess of Lansdowne.]
Although the majority in favour of the Bill had slightly increased since the division had been taken on the second reading in the House of Commons, the Shipowners were not discouraged, believing it would be thrown out by the Lords. They knew that the ministry had staked their reputation upon it, and that the fate of the Government depended on the result, but they confidently believed that the Upper House would reject “so pernicious a measure.” The Bill was at once carried up to the Lords, and read a first time on Tuesday, 24th April; and on Monday, 7th May, the Marquess of Lansdowne moved the second reading in a long and elaborate speech. He contended that the origin of the Navigation Laws during the Protectorate of Cromwell did not arise so much from a commercial or political want as from a desire to punish the Dutch for their loyal support to Charles I.[120] He admitted, however, that there were then good grounds for trying the experiment how far the national arm could be strengthened by restriction, and how far the naval force of the country could be thus increased. The noble Marquess next traced at length the changes contemplated by Mr. Pitt, and the incidents of the war with Napoleon, contending that the law, by successive changes, had ceased to be a suit of impenetrable armour, and was now only an imperfect garment of shreds and patches, manufactured out of parchments from statute books. He, further, showed the increase of our shipping since the relaxation of the shipping laws, maintaining that the dread of foreign competition was altogether irrational, and demonstrating, by statistics, the large share of the American direct and carrying trade we had already secured in open competition with American ships hence, and with foreign ships from their own ports to American shores; while we were, at the same time, able to bear off the chief share of the Russian trade from the Baltic ships even within the heart of their own country. He briefly referred to the colonial bearing of the question, and said that the West Indies were subject to great troubles, and Canada engaged in a difficult competition with the United States, the whole trade of the St. Lawrence depending on the repeal of that part of the Navigation Laws still in operation, the complete opening of that river alone, he thought, being sufficient to enable her to retain the trade now fast passing through the United States. The Marquess quoted Bonaparte, whose aim, when at the summit of his power, had been to obtain ships, colonies, and commerce. Bonaparte conquered one-half of Europe; the other half he seduced or entrapped into negotiations. He could create monopolies everywhere, and did so unscrupulously; but the genius of English commerce overcame those monopolies. Ships he could not get; colonies he could not acquire; commerce he could not establish; and was this, he asked, a consequence of the British Navigation Laws? No; it was British commerce and enterprise, which, in spite of restrictions in all parts of the world, secured a footing; and, in spite of edicts enforced by a million of bayonets, was established and conducted successfully. The Marquess then explained that the Administration depended upon this question, and were prepared for all the consequences of a hostile vote.
[Sidenote: Lord Brougham.]
To the astonishment of the country, Lord Brougham, in one of the ablest, or at least the most rhetorical speeches[121] he perhaps ever delivered even in his best days, opposed the second reading of the Bill. His Lordship had supported the other great measures of Free-trade, and now did not escape the charge of inconsistency, which he most eloquently denied. “I will only say,” he exclaimed, “that I glory in what forms the subject matter of this taunt. I glory in having obtained those immortal victories over antiquated error; in having made to triumph the soundest principles of political philosophy, sweeping away the groundless prejudices by which its progress was obstructed heretofore. But if there is one passage of my political life dearer than another to my remembrance, and any drop in the cup of exultation more particularly sweet to my palate, it is the recollection of those worthy, eminent persons, leaders of the revilers, the distinguished statesmen whose support I enjoyed after passing a long life in opposition to them on this very question, and who crowned themselves with honour by abandoning their own errors in vindicating the truth. But it is not now with them as with me. I make no change in my opinions.” The noble Lord then plunged into the Orders of Council[122] during the war, in the discussion of which he took such a conspicuous part.
[Sidenote: Condemnation of Mr. Porter’s statistics.]
In speaking of the tables from the Board of Trade and Customs, he said a lively impression prevailed on all sides, that they could prove anything and everything. Indeed, it had been remarked, give me half an hour, and the run of the multiplication table, and I’ll engage to pay off the National Debt. In statistics it is easy to add a little here, and subtract a little there, quietly to slip in a figure—it may be a cypher among your data—slyly to make what seems a reasonable postulate in your premises, but which turns out to be a begging of the question; and, behold, you gain your point and triumph; until, it is found that your adversary, having access to the same stores of arithmetic, proves his case, and refutes yours, with the same facility. Such are statistics when severed from sound principle and plain reasoning. But how little are these to be relied on when prepared by those in the employ of one party? To trust oneself among such details would be perilous in the extreme. “My noble friend has fared forth into the labyrinth with such bad success, that his fate seems to warn me how I venture to follow his perilous course. But there remains to deter me, like a beacon on the same coast, the sad wreck of another adventurer, the good ship Board of Trade, G. R. Porter, Master, cast away on the shoals of these faithless waters.” The noble Lord then assailed Mr. Porter with the whole force of his sarcasm. He said: “Mr. Porter, showing the comparative progress of English and American tonnage, takes the whole of one part and only part of the other, and thus makes out the result which suits his argument. Lord Hardwicke, the chairman, put this question to the witness, after stating the entire difference of the two returns, the difference being total in one case and partial in the other. ‘Then, consequently, these returns are not to be taken compared together, as showing in any degree the comparative value of British and American tonnage?’ Mark the answer of the hapless Mr. Porter. ‘Certainly not.’” The noble Lord then went on tearing, in the opinion of the opponents of the Bill, Mr. Porter’s evidence to shreds. “I am reminded,” said his Lordship, “of the cooking of the returns. But here we had called up the chief cook to examine him. We asked, ‘Is this dish pure?’ ‘Not at all,’ he answered. ‘Is it nutritive?’ ‘Nothing of the kind.’ ‘Is it safe and wholesome to eat?’ ‘Certainly not?’ ‘Have you any means of correcting its poison by an antidote?’ ‘I am not sure; I rather think I have; but I am not certain.’” The noble Lord then referred to the reciprocity treaties; the fact being that these treaties were all respecting differential duties; all of them were grounded on the comparatively sound principle of only relaxing our monopoly in favour of those States who agreed to give us the quid pro quo; whereas the present scheme was to give the quid without the quo; to sweep away all restriction at once with every country before we secured an equivalent from any one; and so far from proportioning our sacrifice to our gain, to sacrifice everything before we gained anything.
[Sidenote: Protected and unprotected trade.]
“On the statistics of the protected and unprotected trades,” continued his Lordship, “it is, that the greatest errors have been committed. It was among these shoals that Mr. Porter had left a wreck, as a beacon to warn us how we follow his course. He, no doubt, had steered to the best of his ability, and quite unconsciously had been cast away; but, that he acted under the bias of a strong prejudice in favour of his ally and relative, the author of the present Bill, is very much to be suspected, for we all know that the Bill is really Mr. Ricardo’s, who, in 1847, moved the Committee on the Navigation Laws, the Government being afterwards pushed on by their supporters, impatient at seeing them hold their places and do nothing.” After dissecting these tables with a ruthless hand, Lord Brougham asked how any rational man could place reliance upon tables thus framed, and thus abounding on their face with errors the most fatal. Their great concoctor is asked about these errors, and he cannot deny them, so he says the heading of the return is wrong, and that instead of “unprotected,” it should have been “less protected.” Indeed! But that is just giving up the whole value of the table, and making it utterly useless—utterly unfit to be the ground of any inference whatever—utterly foreign to the present question. For, observe, we can understand what is meant by a trade unprotected by the Navigation Laws, and compare it with one that is protected; but a trade “less protected,” how is that to be defined? Less protected than what? What does this tell us? What makes more, what less? How can we compare them together? All depends upon how much more and how much less, and this Mr. Porter does not affect to show.
[Sidenote: Voyages to the continent.]
“But,” exclaimed his Lordship, “this is not the worst of it by a great deal!” He then sifted the whole returns about the voyages to the continent, to which I have already referred. “My Lords, I will readily give a large licence for exaggeration to that lively class of persons who contribute to our amusement by their powers of imagination, drawing upon their fancy for their facts, and on their memory for their jests. To these men I render all grateful homage, as among the gayest of our sad species; so far as fourfold, or even tenfold, I am willing to extend my licence. But what shall we say of a hundredfold, nay, a hundred-and-fiftyfold, and that, not by the lively wit, but by the plodding dealer in returns, tables, and trade and shipping statistics. I must really send them away to bury themselves and their errors in the recesses of the trade department, and no longer hope to obtain any faith here. I have done with such food, such dry food even when it is honestly prepared and fairly served up.”
Lord Brougham then entered fully into the merits of the general question, calling upon their Lordships not to part rashly with what had been called the miserable remnants, the fragments of a worn-out system. “Fragments, indeed! They are of gigantic size; they are the splendid remains of a mighty system; they are the pillars of our navy; the props of our maritime defence.” He showed that there remained the almost entire monopoly of our home trade, and the perfectly rigorous monopoly of our colonial trade, employing above a million and a half of shipping, and 20,000 seamen, with a capital that gave export and import to between fifteen and sixteen millions sterling in the year. He further insisted that the restrictions affecting Canada could be easily removed without unsettling our whole policy.
The policy of the Navigation Laws rested, in his opinion, on the position that, without such a partial monopoly as they gave to British shipping, we never could maintain a sufficiently ample nursery for our navy, an object of primary importance to every insular empire, and, therefore, to be sought at a considerable sacrifice of the wealth unfettered commerce might more rapidly accumulate.
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s desire for ships, colonies, and commerce.]
The Emperor Napoleon I. has been cited as having wished “for ships, colonies, and commerce.” The quotation is not quite accurate.[123] He inveighed against “the ships, colonies, and commerce of England,” and mentioned these as the object of his hostility; whence Mr. Pitt, at a Guildhall festival, gave as a retaliatory toast, “the ships, colonies, and commerce of England,” a retort which derived its point from the French Emperor’s hostility against these special objects. Lord Brougham, in his splendid declamatory style, showed how Napoleon must have wished in vain—for we had swept the seas of his navy, captured all his colours—because we had created our own marine, which, he argued, owed its existence entirely to the encouragement the Navigation Laws gave to ship-building, and the facilities lent by the same laws to the manning our fleets, which that encouragement had created. For nearly two hundred years, he continued, we had abided by that policy; and holding steadily our course, neither swerving to the right nor to the left, never abandoning it, only adapting it to varying events which have altered the distribution of dominion in other regions, we have upheld the system which has made our navy the envy of our rivals, the terror of our enemies, and the admiration of the world. “Are you,” exclaimed his Lordship, with one of those bursts of ready eloquence for which he was so conspicuous in debate, “prepared to abandon a system to which you owe so precious a possession, not only the foundation of your glory, the bulwark of your strength, but the protection of your very existence as a nation?”
“The Bill,” continued Lord Brougham, “contained the seeds of fresh agitation and new demand.” The coasting trade, as well as the manning clauses, “would excite new agitation by other Ricardos and other Cobdens.” In framing his judgment on this great question he had listened but to one voice, the voice of public duty, sinking all party, all personal considerations. He did not on any account, personal or public, desire any change in the government. But he was prepared to encounter that, rather than see the highest interests of the empire exposed to ruin. This measure he could not bear, because our national defence could not bear it. To sweeten the bitter cup which it would fill, we are told, and he firmly believed it, that it would encourage slavery and stimulate the infernal slave-trade; since, whatever cheapened navigation between this country and the mart for slave-grown sugar—whatever lets in the Americans, the Swedes, the Danes, the Dutch, to bring over the sugars of Cuba and the Brazils—must of necessity increase the African slave-trade, by which the increase of those sugars was promoted. “When this new ingredient is poured into the chalice commended to my lips to-night I can no longer hesitate, even if I felt doubts before. All lesser considerations of party policy or Parliamentary tactics at once give way; and I have a question before me on which I cannot pause or falter, or treat or compromise; and, regardless of the comfort in any quarter, careless with what arrangements of any individuals my voice may interfere, I know my duty, and will perform it: as an honest man, an Englishman, a Peer of Parliament, I will lift that voice to resist the further progress of the Bill.”
[Sidenote: Earl Granville]
Earl Granville, in replying to Lord Brougham’s speech, defended Mr. Porter, and especially his statistics; but, as the reasons he and his party gave in support of the measure have in a great degree been confirmed by events, and by the success of the change they then so boldly advocated, it is more desirable to record at greater length the opinions of the opponents to the Bill. From these a lesson may be taught to other nations, which still cling to a policy in favour of which no more powerful arguments could be adduced than those urged by some of the ablest men of the period, arguments, however, which experience has shown, in almost every instance, to have been fallacious.
[Sidenote: Earl of Ellenborough.]
Lord Ellenborough[124] was unwilling, under existing circumstances, to diminish our marine by one ship, or our seamen by one man, and this Bill would tend to undermine the strength of our navy, both in ships and men. He contended that, as there had been a much larger increase in the British tonnage employed in the trade with the British North American colonies than in that of all the rest of the trade with America, fragmentary as the system might be, it evidently produced the effect it was intended to produce, the maintenance and increase of British navigation, and, therein, the security of this country. The noble Lord then drew a picture of our colonial empire, and pointed out the great and increasing demand on our naval resources for purpose of defence. He next directed attention to the well-appointed navy of the United States, of Russia, France, Austria, Naples, and other Continental Powers; and said we should do wrong if we did not consider the present state of the navies of foreign Powers in conjunction with the changes which have taken place in their military position. The military peace establishments of foreign Powers were now equal to their war establishments of former times; while the substitution of railways in the place of ordinary roads will enable States to bring a preponderating force, suddenly, from the most distant quarters to the port of embarkation, and then they will find “a steam bridge” from the continent to these islands.
Lord Harrowby, in an exhaustive speech, argued that wherever the “interests of commerce and navigation were at variance” those of navigation must predominate, as essential to the defence and security of the empire; but his Lordship, and all other speakers, entirely failed to prove that they ever were at variance. Nor can they be so. They rise and fall with each other; and are essentially one and the same. Indeed, if closely scrutinised, they will be found to have no antagonistic principles; and further, that whatever antagonism existed was caused by the operation of the Navigation Laws. Lord Grey, who followed Lord Harrowby, clearly showed that while these laws were of no advantage to the Shipowner, they were, from their practical working, serious drawbacks to his success, and that, instead of affording him any real protection, they were detrimental to his best interests. He further showed that the Navigation Laws were unfavourable to the development of the warehousing system; and, afterwards, dwelt at great length on the colonial part of the question and on the claims of Canada; asserting, also, that we could only perpetuate the connection between the mother-country and the North American colonies by engaging the confidence and participating in the affections of their people. The Navigation Laws were, he remarked, among the proximate causes of the revolutionary struggle which had ended in the independence of the United States. He concluded with an impressive appeal to the House not to peril the interests of the country by rejecting the Bill.
[Sidenote: Lord Stanley.]
[Sidenote: Admits need of modifications.]
Lord Stanley,[125] on the second night of the debate, rose at a quarter-past one o’clock, to answer Earl Grey, then Colonial Minister. After alluding to the recent Free-trade policy, with which this question was not connected, his Lordship asked whether they were prepared to abolish a system which, for two centuries at least, had formed the basis of our national greatness and the foundation of our naval strength. He had no objection to the modifications the Navigation Laws had undergone, nor might he object to some further modifications now. But it was not on the modification of these laws that the House had now to decide, but upon the momentous question of their entire abolition. Were they prepared for such a step, when it was admitted that, if taken, it must be irrevocable? Earl Grey, he said, treated the Navigation Laws as disadvantageous to the mercantile interests of the country. The merchants had not made this discovery, but the Queen’s Government had made it for them. The whole case, as based on its assumed benefits to the commercial marine, therefore fell to the ground; and the objection to the Bill, founded on its injurious tendency, so far as the navy was concerned, remained unchallenged and unrefuted.
[Sidenote: Canada not our only colony.]
[Sidenote: Majority for Bill, 10.]
In Canada, as in all other colonies, the withdrawal of Protection was regarded as a great grievance, hence the repeal of the Navigation Laws was demanded by them only as a consequence of that event. But our North American colonies were not confined to Canada. The shipbuilding colonies of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were opposed to repeal. The exceptional case of Canada might be met without entirely abrogating these laws. Having severely condemned Lord Palmerston for his circular, Lord Stanley then endeavoured to show that the warehousing system owed its origin to existing prohibitions, and that its increase or permanence depended upon their maintenance. He strongly objected to the proposal of admitting a foreign-built ship to British registry. It was essential, he maintained, to keep up the number and efficiency of our private building-yards, which would speedily decrease in number were such a proposal adopted. The question, indeed, could not be decided by one vote. The British merchants, the British Shipowners, the British seamen, and the British mechanics would not be satisfied with a Bill passed by a bare majority of the House, under pressure never heard of before, and with menaces such as had been thrown out. The people of this country will never know when they are beaten. The Marquess of Lansdowne having replied, repelling in indignant language the charge of having used menaces, the House went to a division at half-past four o’clock on the morning of the 10th May, on the question that “now” stand part of the motion. There appeared, Contents, present, 105; Proxies, 68; Total, 173: Non-contents, present, 119; Proxies, 44: Total, 163: Majority, 10!
[Sidenote: Duke of Wellington votes for it.]
This division was regarded at the time as of great political importance. Much uncertainty and speculation had before prevailed as to the relative state of parties upon the question in the House of Lords, and the fate of the Administration was generally supposed to depend on the decision as to the second reading of the Bill. The Shipowners were in the highest degree exasperated that they should be defeated by that which they called a pocket majority of proxies, as they had actually a majority of the Peers present adverse to the Bill. Perhaps that which occasioned the deepest mortification to them was that the Duke of Wellington, who had recently called attention to the state of the national defences, voted with the majority. With so narrow a majority as ten against them, the Shipowners resolved to make fresh efforts to obtain another division in committee, when, as proxies could not be accepted, it was anticipated that the obnoxious measure would be so altered, as to deprive it of its most objectionable features.
Accordingly Lord Stanley on the 18th May gave notice that he intended to propose the rejection of all the repealing clauses, i.e. the first and second, and, in point of fact, make the principle of the Bill one of conditional legislation. He proposed, farther, to enable British ships to bring the produce of Asia, Africa, and America indirectly, and to modify in the same spirit the clauses relating to the European trade. It should be remarked that the alarming news of an extensive rebellion in Canada had reached England since the day of the second reading, and a growing desire was felt that this great question of repeal should be finally settled one way or the other.
[Sidenote: Proceedings and debate in committee.]
[Sidenote: Lord Stanley’s amendment.]
In committee on the Bill (21st May), Lord Stanley brought forward his amendment, Lord Wharncliffe having given notice of one of the same or nearly similar tendency. The object of Lord Wharncliffe’s[126] amendment was that, until her Majesty should be fully satisfied that foreign countries would grant full reciprocity and commerce to this country, her Majesty should have no power to abrogate or repeal the Navigation Laws, so far as they affected the ships and commerce of those countries. Lord Stanley’s aimed at the same object. His Lordship said the distinction between his measure and that of the Government assumed this shape. Should we proceed to repeal, and then to re-enact a small portion, yet a portion, of the Navigation Laws which was the most burdensome to the British owner and the least advantageous to British commerce? or should the repeal be made conditional, by an enabling clause which conferred on the Queen the requisite power, when satisfied that reciprocity was accorded to us?
[Sidenote: Rejected by 13.]
The question gave rise to a very long and animated discussion, in which Earl Grey, the Earl of Harrowby, Earl Granville, Lord Colchester, the Marquess of Clanricarde, Lord Brougham, Lord Fitzwilliam, and the Marquess of Lansdowne took part; Lord Wharncliffe severing himself from Lord Stanley, and, in fact, voting against his amendment. The division which terminated this discussion was decisive of the fate of the Bill. On the question of Lord Stanley’s amendment there appeared, Contents, 103; Non-contents, 116: Majority against the amendment, 13! As no proxies in this division influenced the result, Lord Stanley at once withdrew all opposition to the repeal of the 8 & 9 Vict. cap. 88, which he only wished amended.
[Sidenote: Earl of Ellenborough’s amendment.]
[Sidenote: Claims of Shipowners,]
[Sidenote: and fear of competition.]
The Committee of the Lords sat again on the 24th May, when Lord Ellenborough moved an amendment that instead of the Bill coming into operation on the 1st January, 1850, it should come into operation on the 1st January, 1851. This amendment was in accordance with the prayer of a petition from the General Shipowners’ Society, urging various reasons for delay. It was admitted, his Lordship said, that one of the chief objects of the measure was to diminish the rates of freight; and it was contended that the greater the competition between the shipping of foreign States and the shipping of this country the greater would be the diminution of the rate of freight generally; but, added his Lordship, British Shipowners have not the means of diminishing their expenditure at once, so as to enable them to compete with foreign shipowners upon equal terms, before the Act came into operation. The time allowed for preparation, he continued, was only seven months; but, during that period, a large number of British vessels would not have arrived from distant places abroad, and, therefore, there would be no means of making changes in the modes of sailing and manning them. The contemplated reduction of men required to be made by the owners of ships to enable them to compete with the foreign owners was held to be of great importance. It was computed that five men were employed in every British vessel to every 100 tons; while, in foreign vessels, only three or four men were required for the same amount of tonnage. Assuming 230,000 as the number of seamen employed by British shipowners, there must be a reduction of one-fifth; in other words, 47,500 British sailors must be thrown out of employment.
[Sidenote: Amendment rejected by a majority of 12.]
In mercy, therefore, exclaimed his Lordship, to all parties interested, a sufficiently long time ought to be given for preparation. There was not less, it was said, than 200,000 tons of American[127] shipping in California, which might return by the port of Calcutta, and then be brought into competition with the tonnage of this country. The effect of the sudden competition from the Americans in the freight-market of India on the trade of Australia would, in his opinion, be most detrimental. Our own vessels carried out emigrants to that dependency, and they could only find return cargoes by going to the ports of India; but there, again, they would meet American tonnage from California, and be disappointed of freights. Seven months was not sufficient time to frame treaties with foreign Powers. The timber duties ought to be taken off, and this could not be done in time. His Lordship recapitulated many other objections to such precipitancy, but all were unavailing. The Ministers resolutely persevered in their measure, and opposed delay, and, indeed, every other amendment proposed. In fact, it was believed that they were afraid, if the delay of eighteen months were conceded, that a change of ministry or of public opinion might defeat the measure entirely, and this was the more to be dreaded as all parties admitted that immediate distress to the Shipowner must follow the first passing of the Bill. However, the throwing open the trade of the St. Lawrence was made the ostensible ground of resisting delay, and upon a division only 40 Contents appeared for Lord Ellenborough’s amendment; Non-contents, 56; Majority, 12.
Earl Waldegrave next moved a very long amendment,[128] the general effect of which was to prevent foreign ships from receiving British registration. On a division there were, Contents, 37; Non-contents, 49: Majority, 12.
After this division Lord Stanley relinquished all further opposition to the Bill in committee. He withdrew an amendment which had for its object to meet the complaint of Canada, that there were greater facilities for the transmission of their produce by the way of New York than by the St. Lawrence, because, at New York, the Canadians had the choice of an American or a British ship, while, from Montreal or Quebec, they could only send their produce in a British ship. Lord Stanley proposed to effect the object, not by enabling ships of all countries to enter the St. Lawrence, but by enabling British or American shipping to convey from either outlet the produce of Canada or of the United States. His Lordship seemed to feel himself that this was, if not an impracticable, at least a very imperfect scheme, as it did not legislate for other colonies, and so he relinquished it together with his general opposition. Lord Wharncliffe, finding Lord Stanley did not support him, withdrew his amendment also, leaving conditional legislation to the discretion of the Crown; that is, leaving the Queen’s Government to judge of the expediency of asking for restrictions in particular cases. The remaining clauses were agreed to.
[Sidenote: Bill read a third time.]
All effectual opposition to the Bill was now hopeless. But, on the third reading, Lord Ellenborough took the opportunity of observing that he could not refrain from touching upon the measures which it would be absolutely necessary to adopt for the security of British shipping under the new system. It was only fair that the Shipowner, among various other burdens which he named, should be relieved from all duties on timber. Government should promptly introduce measures for the examination of masters and mates before their appointments, and for their trial upon the loss of ships; also for the establishment of a fund for the support of worn-out seamen, similar in principle though not in extent to that existing for the seamen of the Royal Navy at Greenwich Hospital; also a measure for the registry of ships, the present system being altogether erroneous and deceptive.
[Sidenote: Timber duties, &c., admitted to be grievances.]
Earl Granville agreed with Lord Ellenborough as to the reduction of the timber duty; and, as to the new registration, he was not prepared to say that he saw any great objection to it. With regard to the Merchant Seaman’s Fund, the attempt to restore it made last year, he must remind their Lordships, was opposed and defeated by the Shipowners themselves; the subject was, nevertheless, deserving of the best consideration. It was intended, he added, to bring in a Bill to improve the discipline of the mercantile navy.
Lord Winchelsea, a staunch Conservative, complained that the measure had been carried by the votes of the bishops; and warned them of the danger of carrying secular matters injurious to the best interests of the country by their votes, as in that case England would wish to see Convocation restored, and the bishops represented by a few of their body. Lord Stanley and Lord Brougham satisfied themselves with saying, “Non-content,” and inveighing against the Bill to the last. The Marquess of Lansdowne replied; and the opposition Peers now withdrew in a body, and the Bill was read a third time.
On the question “that the Bill do now pass,” the Bishop of Oxford proposed to add a clause by way of rider declaring that “the said privileges” should not extend to the ships of Spain or Brazil, or to the ships of any foreign country, until the Queen should declare by Order in Council that such governments had given full satisfaction as to the fulfilment of the treaties respecting the suppression of the slave-trade. The motion was resisted by Lord Howden in a very argumentative speech, and rejected upon a division by—Non-contents, 23; Contents, 9.
[Sidenote: Lord Stanley’s protest.]
The various reasons urged against the Bill for the repeal of the Navigation Laws were briefly summed up by Lord Stanley in a protest which he entered on the Journals of the House against the third reading.[129] In this protest the great advantages we surrendered, without any equivalent, were fully recited; and a dissent expressed, because the Royal Navy was mainly dependent for its efficiency upon the commercial marine, and the classes of the community connected therewith. This Bill, he urged, by discouraging the employment of British shipbuilders, ships, and seamen, tended directly to the reduction of the commercial marine, and, thereby, to the diminution of that naval strength which was the main foundation of the greatness of this country, and the surest defence of its independence.
[Sidenote: Royal assent given June 26.]
But all remonstrances, denunciations, petitions, and protests were disregarded. The Bill passed the House of Lords on the 12th June; and, although a petition from the Shipowners[130] was presented to the Queen by Sir George Grey praying her Majesty to withhold her approval of the Bill, the Royal assent was given on the 26th of that month, and thus the Navigation Laws of Great Britain, which had endured practically unchallenged during two centuries, were almost utterly abrogated.
[Sidenote: Coasting trade thrown open, 1854.]
It may be convenient here to dispose of the question of the Coasting clauses, which it will be remembered were withdrawn from the Bill of 1849. Notwithstanding the opposition brought to bear against this portion of the measure, and the continued reluctance of foreign Powers to reciprocate, the Coasting trade of the kingdom was, in 1854, unconditionally thrown open to vessels of all nations without any opposition from our Shipowners, indeed, some of them then expressed deep regret that this trade had not been opened to foreign shipping in 1849.
[Sidenote: Americans, Oct. 1849, throw open all but their coasting trade.]
The actual repeal of the Navigation Laws having, in the summer of 1849, become an accomplished fact, the consternation among all classes connected with British shipping was almost universal, mingled with feelings of curiosity and doubt as to the course which the Americans would now adopt. These doubts were, however, soon removed by a prompt notification of the Government of the United States,[131] issued on the 15th October, 1849, honestly and boldly putting the law of 1828 in motion, but retaining the coasting trade of that country in all its integrity; and, to this day they decline, on alleged constitutional grounds, to consider the voyage from New York to California as in any respect different from the voyage between New York and Baltimore, or as in any way resembling the trade between London and the Cape of Good Hope or Australia, though, in both cases alike, the voyage can only be made by passing the coasts of foreign nations!
FOOTNOTES:
[120] A much more likely reason has been already assigned for English hostility to the Dutch in and about 1652; and that is, their perceiving that the Dutch were gradually engrossing all the foreign trade, especially that on the other side the line.
[121] The speech was published by Ridgway. Our space allows but a brief epitome of it.
[122] I have referred to these in numberless places in the second volume of this work.
[123] The particular quotation may not be strictly exact; but the ambition of Napoleon to possess ships, colonies, and commerce, cannot be for a moment doubted after the able exposition of M. Thiers.
[124] This speech was also published by Ridgway.
[125] The late (1875) Earl of Derby had been called up to the House of Peers during his father’s life, and sat as Lord Stanley. His speech was also published by Ridgway.
[126] It occupies a whole column of ‘Hansard.’
[127] The discovery of large quantities of gold in California had attracted the enormous quantity of tonnage to that region.
[128] Vide ‘Hansard,’ vol. cv. pp. 883-5. It occupies two closely printed columns.
[129] See ‘Hansard,’ vol. cvi. p. 48.
[130] The Petition at length will be found in the ‘Shipping Gazette,’ 13th June, 1849.
[131] See Hertslet’s ‘Treaties,’ &c., vol. viii. p. 968.
Chapter XI
Despondency of many shipowners after the repeal of the Navigation Laws—Advantage naturally taken by foreigners, and especially by the Americans—Jardine and Co. build vessels to compete with the Americans—Aberdeen “clippers”—Shipowners demand the enforcement on foreign nations of reciprocity—Return of prosperity to the Shipowners—Act of 1850 for the improvement of the condition of seamen—Valuable services of Mr. T. H. Farrer—Chief conditions of the Act of 1850—Certificates of examination—Appointment of local marine boards, and their duties—Further provisions of the Act of 1850—Institution of Naval Courts abroad—Special inspectors to be appointed by the Board of Trade, if need be—Act of 1851, regulating Merchant Seaman’s Fund, &c.—Merchant Shipping Act, 1854—New measurement of ships—Registration of ships—The “Rule of the Sea”—Pilots and pilotage—Existing Mercantile Marine Fund—Wrecks—Limitation of the liability of Shipowners—Various miscellaneous provisions—Act of 1855.
[Sidenote: Despondency of many shipowners after the repeal of the Navigation Laws.]
Considering the violent opposition offered by the great majority of shipowners to the repeal of the Navigation Laws, it is not surprising that their despondency, when the Act came into operation, knew no bounds. Many of them resolved—and a few acted upon the resolution—to dispose of their ships at whatever price they would fetch, others determined to register them under a foreign flag; but few, if any, carried out their determination in this respect. On the other hand, as might have been expected, foreign nations, and especially the United States, made extraordinary efforts to secure for their shipowners the more valuable portion of the trade thrown open by the repeal of these laws. Hitherto the vessels of that country had more than rivalled British ships in the China trade; and, ever since the first Chinese war in 1842, when great expectations were entertained of an enormous increase of trade with that country, the Americans had made very considerable efforts to secure the larger proportion of it. To meet these efforts we had, before we were roused from our apathy by the repeal of the Navigation Laws, built various vessels of an improved description, such as the Alexander Baring, John o’Gaunt, Euphrates, Monarch, and Foam, which were equal to any American vessels then engaged in the trade with China. But, in 1845, various vessels were despatched from New York and Boston to Wampoa, of a novel form, which surpassed ours in speed, having low hulls, great beam, very fine lines, and with yards so square as to spread a far larger amount of canvas in proportion to their tonnage than any vessels hitherto afloat. To rival these we, in 1846, first directed our attention to the construction of “clipper vessels,” and as a test of these, Messrs. Alexander Hall and Co. of Aberdeen, sent forth a schooner named the Torrington, to compete with the Americans then engaged in the coasting trade of China, and in the still more lucrative opium trade. As this vessel proved a success, others of greater dimensions soon followed.
But in 1848, the Americans had found out a trade exclusively their own, which led to the construction of larger and still faster vessels than any they had hitherto employed in the trade with China. The discovery of the gold mines in California gave an impetus to their shipbuilding hitherto unknown; and, for that trade, they brought out a class of ships such as the world had then never seen; their dimensions in tonnage being as great as the largest of our old East Indiamen, with a capacity for cargo far greater, and with lines as sharp and fine as almost any Baltimore clipper. The voyage of the first of these celebrated vessels was limited to San Francisco, from which she returned in ballast to New York, having earned sufficient freight on her outward passage alone to amply remunerate her enterprising owners. The others, however, which followed, continued their voyage from California to China, and having the peculiar advantage of their own “coasting trade,” from which the vessels of all other nations were excluded, they obtained an immense advantage over all competitors.
Freights from New York to California, which, at first, were exorbitantly high, still averaged somewhere about 5_l._ per ton: thence, these ships proceeded to China, and there, were able to load cargoes of tea and other produce direct for London or New York, thus securing on the round voyage from 8_l._ to 10_l._ per ton freight, while our ships, engaged in the direct trade between London and China, a voyage nearly as long, could only earn out and home little more than half that rate per ton. It was not therefore, surprising, that loud complaints were made by British Shipowners of the disadvantage in which their vessels were placed, when competing with those of the United States.
[Sidenote: Advantage naturally taken by foreigners, and especially by the Americans.]
Encouraged by this special advantage, the Americans constructed for the California and China trades, vessels of still greater dimensions, and of a still finer description, in which, for a time, they practically monopolised not merely the trade between New York and San Francisco, but also that between China and Great Britain. Attributing the depression from which they were suffering to the repeal of the Navigation Laws, as every branch of trade was then greatly depressed, our Shipowners naturally viewed, with great alarm, the rapid strides made by American shipping. Nor were their fears allayed by a reference to the Board of Trade returns; wherein it appeared that, while the increase of British shipping had, in the year previously to the repeal been 393,955 tons, there had been a decrease in the year after the repeal of 180,576 tons; while, concurrently with the falling off of British shipping, it was also shown that foreign vessels, entering inwards from foreign ports, had increased from 75,278 tons to 364,587 tons. Our position appeared, therefore, critical; and, had it not been for the resources we held within ourselves, and the indomitable energy of our people, foreign shipping might then have gained an ascendency which might not afterwards have been easily overcome.
American shipping, above that of all other nations, had, hitherto, been moving onward with such rapid strides that though, in 1815, at the close of the war, the tonnage of the United States was not more than one-half that of Great Britain, it had risen by 1850 to 3,535,454 tons (including river and lake steamers), against 4,232,960 tons of British shipping, and bade fair, with the special advantages they now possessed, to surpass it in amount ere many years had elapsed. Under such circumstances, unusual efforts were necessary to maintain our position as the first of maritime nations.[132] We had, however, one advantage which our great American competitors did not possess. We had iron in abundance; and, about this period, we were specially directing our attention to the construction of iron ships to be propelled by the screw.
Various of these vessels, to which I shall hereafter fully refer, were launched about the year 1850, and placed in competition with the American liners, which had long, all but monopolised the trade between the United States and Europe. Even if we could not build wooden ships, as was then feared, at as low a cost as the Americans, we had the advantage in labour, in the cost of equipment, and in being able to produce a superior class of vessels suited for the China and other distant trades, from our English oak.[133]
[Sidenote: Jardine and Co. build vessels to compete with the Americans.]
[Sidenote: Aberdeen “clippers.”]
There is, however, no doubt that at this period there were few ships afloat which could rival in speed the Oriental, Challenge, Sea Witch, Flying Cloud, and various similar vessels the Americans had sent forth to compete with us in the trade from China, for, at that time, iron ships propelled by steam could not be profitably employed in so distant a trade. It seemed almost hopeless[134] to expect that we could construct sailing vessels which would enable us to cope successfully with these celebrated ships. But, though great in speed, it was soon discovered that they were inferior in strength; and, as some of them had landed their cargoes in a damaged state, the shippers of tea and other valuable produce from China encouraged the building of vessels of superior strength, hoping, at the same time, to obtain by improved models an increased speed, even if this speed did not surpass that of these famous American vessels. Accordingly, Messrs. Jardine, Matheson and Co. commissioned Messrs. Hall and Co., of Aberdeen, to construct for them a ship, with lines as sharp as those of any American, but of superior strength. The Stornoway, commanded by Captain Robinson, formerly of the John of Gaunt, was the first of the “Aberdeen clippers.” The Chrysolite, commanded by Captain Enright, followed. But, though these vessels proved very fast for their size, they were still no match for the Americans, which were double their dimensions. However, the Cairngorm, also built by Hall for Messrs. Jardine, proved equal in speed to any of her foreign competitors, and, by delivering her cargo in superior order, obtained a preference.
It was not, however, until 1856, when the Lord of the Isles, built by Scott, of Greenock, and commanded by Captain Maxton, in a celebrated race for the first delivery of the new teas from Foo-choo-foo in London, beat two of the fastest American clippers, though of nearly double her tonnage, delivering her cargo without one spot of damage, that British ships regained their ascendency in a trade which their American rivals bade fair to monopolise. From that time, British sailing ships, as I shall hereafter show, gradually gained a complete ascendency over the Americans in the China trade, and carried all before them, until they, in turn, were supplanted by British screw-steamers.
In the meantime, however, our Shipowners were suffering heavy losses in the ordinary branches of commerce, with little prospect of any permanent improvement. It was, therefore, not surprising that many of them contemplated abandoning the business in which they, as well as their forefathers for many generations, had been engaged. To obtain a restoration of Protection was out of the question; while any remission of burdens, or abrogation of restrictions, in the power of the Legislature to grant, would not, they felt, enable them to compete successfully with their foreign rivals. To these burdens I shall hereafter refer.
[Sidenote: Shipowners demand the enforcement on foreign nations of reciprocity.]
As regarded non-reciprocity on the part of foreign nations, they had little expectation that any relief could be obtained. Every State that had anything worth acceptance in the way of reciprocation had, they were convinced, determined on adhering to a Protective policy; and, though the retaliatory clause in the Navigation Act might afford some power of compulsion, the Shipowners saw from the discussions in Parliament that it was vain to hope that such powers would ever actually be put in force. Nevertheless, under such gloomy political prospects, every effort was made by the central body of the Shipowners’ Association in London to impress their views upon the representatives of the maritime towns in Parliament. The outports were urged to secure the return of members who would support a policy opposed to that of the indiscriminate abolition of all Protective laws. The feeling thus provoked exercised its influence during many succeeding years. They who had the moral courage to advocate more enlightened principles were made the victims of the exasperated Shipowners, and a good many members lost their seats at the general election of 1852 because they could not, conscientiously, support any measure restoring Protection to the Shipowners, even in the modified form they now desired, the general enforcement of the reciprocity on other nations.
[Sidenote: Return of prosperity to the Shipowners.]
Happily, however, for the Shipowners, the demand for their vessels soon rose; and, though some of them may have severely suffered for the first twelve months after the repeal of the Navigation Laws, they soon recovered their losses, and their course ever since has been, apart from the usual fluctuations in all branches of commerce, one of almost continued prosperity. Mr. Thomas Tooke, in his well-known work,[135] speaking of the annual state of trade at the close of 1853, states, that the most satisfactory accounts of the year’s business were those connected with shipping. Indeed, 1852, as well as 1853, were years of prosperity to every class of persons connected with ships.
The enormous emigration of the former year, and the great increase of imports and exports in 1853—caused unquestionably by our liberal policy—created a sudden demand for freight, far beyond the resources of vessels really available. British ships of the highest class rose in price from 15_l._ to 21_l._ and 22_l._ per ton, and colonial from 6_l._ 10_s._ to 11_l._ per ton; freights, in many instances, advanced more than 100 per cent.; and it was soon discovered that, though the carrying trade of England had been opened to vessels of all nations, English merchants could not find sufficient tonnage to supply the orders pouring in on them from every part of the world: thus, while the demand for Australia was still on the increase, new branches of commerce were opening out also in other quarters. Freights from Odessa rose from 65_s._ to 120_s._ per ton; the rates to and from the west coast of South America, Brazil, and the West Indies were nearly doubled; from America, both in timber and grain, freights advanced in like proportion, as well as in the Baltic; and, even, in the coal trade between Newcastle and London, the usual standard rate of 6_s._ per ton was more than doubled. The grain trade, beyond all others, was characterised by extraordinary activity, the result of events it was impossible to foresee; while the practical closing of some of the most important granaries during the subsequent war between Russia and Turkey, greatly enhanced the price of corn, and gave rise to large importations of bread-stuffs from the United States and other more distant parts of the world, necessitating, at the same time, a large amount of tonnage for their transport. The surprising prosperity, which had so suddenly succeeded a period of depression and adversity, silenced for a time, though it did not extinguish, the complaints of the already “old school” Shipowners against the repeal of the Navigation Laws.
[Sidenote: Act of 1850, for the improvement of the condition of seamen.]
But, as British ships were now subjected to the competition of the vessels of all nations, Government considered it their duty to afford every facility as far as regards education and the means of obtaining it to the men by whom they were manned, holding that they were bound to secure for them every advantage in this respect possessed by those of foreign nations. We have seen, by the reports from the various Consuls abroad and from other sources, that, in the training of our seamen for the work they have to do, we were far behind our foreign competitors. Consequently, among the earliest measures of 1850, an Act was passed which had for its object the improvement of the existing condition of our seafaring population, especially as regards commanders and officers, and for affording to Shipowners greater facilities than they had hitherto possessed for engaging and regulating the conduct of the crews of their ships. Hitherto, though our ships had been, by some people, pompously, styled the “harbingers of peace, Christianity, and civilisation,” they had more frequently carried with them to other lands vices previously unknown there.
[Sidenote: Valuable services of Mr. T. H. Farrer.]
In point of fact, all other nations, except England, had a code of laws to regulate the conduct and test the competency of those who navigated their merchant ships; life and property with us being placed under the charge of men without any security for their conduct, integrity, or ability. Avaricious Shipowners, too, often bought labour in the cheapest, and rarely, therefore, in the best market; while others, with sons and brothers to provide for, placed them in charge of their ships, or in other responsible positions, for which they were often altogether incompetent. The seamen, themselves, were neglected, and, in many instances, were, to a great extent, under the control of a class of nefarious persons known as “crimps,” who procured them employment, discounted their advance notes at usurious rates, and, too frequently, plundered them of all they possessed at the termination of the voyage. It, therefore, became the duty of Government to do what in them lay to remedy these glaring evils. Happily there had just been appointed, as Secretary to the new Marine Department of the Board of Trade, a young gentleman of rare abilities, who had devoted considerable attention to the state of our mercantile marine, and had accepted this office with a fixed determination to remedy, as far as legislation could do, the existing evils. To Mr. T. H. Farrer the country is greatly indebted for most of the measures which have since been passed in connection with our mercantile marine.[136]
[Sidenote: Chief conditions of the Act of 1850.]
[Sidenote: Certificates of examination.]
The first of these reform Acts, entitled, “An Act for Improving the Condition of Masters, Mates, and Seamen, and Maintaining Discipline in the Merchant Service,” received the Royal assent on the 14th August, 1850, and came into operation on the 1st January of the following year. This Act contains 124 clauses, and places under the Board of Trade the general superintendence of matters relating to the British mercantile marine, with power to carry the Act into execution in all its details. This valuable measure provides for the establishment of local marine boards at the principal seaports in the kingdom. These boards consist of from six to twelve members, comprised of the Mayor or the stipendiary magistrate resident in the district, of two to four members nominated by the Board of Trade, the remainder being elected by the shipowners resident in the place. Two superior officers with various subordinates were appointed to carry out the duties of the marine board under the direction of its members. The first and most important of these duties consisted in the examination of persons intending to become masters or mates of foreign-going ships, who are now required to give satisfactory evidence of their sobriety, experience, ability, and general good conduct, before they are entitled to receive a certificate of their competency.
[Sidenote: Appointment of local marine boards,]
[Sidenote: and their duties.]
Those persons who had previously been in command of ships, or who had served as mates, were not required to undergo an examination, but received a certificate of service, enabling them to accept appointments similar to those they had held previously to the Act coming into operation; so that, in this respect, the law was not retrospective, but only required such persons to undergo examination who had not before acted in the above capacities; power was, at the same time, given to the board to cancel their certificates of service, or of competency, provided those who held them were guilty of misconduct, or otherwise found to be unfit for their duties. Penalties were inflicted for false representations, for forging, or altering, or fraudulently using their certificates. The local marine boards were required to establish shipping offices, where all seamen are engaged; and to appoint, subject to the approval of the Board of Trade, shipping-masters, whose duties were to ascertain that engagements were made in proper form, to issue the advance notes of the seamen, and to see that they joined the ships for which they had engaged at the time fixed for departure. Their duties, likewise, extended to the settlement of the seamen’s wages at the termination of the voyage, and to the seeing that while the men were justly dealt with, they received, also, a proper discharge. They were, moreover, bound to keep a register of the names and character of the seamen and apprentices, and to perform such duties, in relation to the indentures of the latter, as had previously been performed by the officers of Customs. All agreements were to be in a specified form, and to state, as far as practicable, the nature and length of the voyage on which the ship is to be employed, the time when each seaman was to commence duty, the capacity in which he was engaged to serve, the amount of wages he was to receive, the scale of the provisions to be supplied, with such further regulations as might be necessary for his conduct on board, and to inflict fines, short allowance of provisions, or other lawful punishments for misconduct. These agreements the shipping master is required to read over to the seamen, who, if they approve, then sign them in his presence. No alterations are allowed to be made, unless with the consent of all parties; and these agreements must be produced by the master, before a clearance of the ship can be obtained at the Customs. Similar agreements are required for vessels engaged in the coasting trade; but, in this case, they need only be entered into once in six months, and may be signed either on board the vessel or at the shipping office. Penalties are inflicted on masters for taking seamen to sea without such agreement, or for its non-production if required by the British Consul abroad, or by the shipping master, or Collector of Customs in the ports of Great Britain.
The masters and officers are examined in seamanship in its varied branches, as well as in navigation; and the course of examination very much resembles what, as I have already described, has long been adopted in various foreign countries. It is of two grades—first and second class—and has produced the most marked effect in the moral, social, and intellectual improvement of the persons in charge of the vessels of our now gigantic mercantile marine. However much our ships have improved, in all respects, since the Navigation Laws were repealed, and this improvement has been very remarkable, it is not greater than what has taken place in the case of the men by whom they are commanded and navigated.
Throughout the whole of this Act every consideration seems to have been given to the wants of the seamen, with the exception of their education, provision being made for the proper payment of their wages and advance notes, and further facilities afforded for their more prompt recovery.
[Sidenote: Further provisions of the Act of 1850.]
This Act further provides, that, in every ship, nine superficial feet of space, measured upon the deck, is to be appropriated to each seaman, either in the forecastle or in a suitable house on deck; such space to be kept entirely free of stores of every kind, to be securely and properly constructed, and to be well ventilated. The owner is also bound to provide, for the use of all on board, a supply of medicines, in accordance with a scale sanctioned by Government; with lime-juice in certain cases, and fresh vegetables whenever they can be conveniently obtained: the masters, also, of all ships are bound to keep weights and measures on board, so that the seaman may be satisfied that he has his full allowance of provision agreeably with the Act; while heavy penalties are inflicted on owners who do not conform to these conditions.
In the case of desertion, the masters or owners are authorized by this Act to give or take in charge, without warrant, any seaman who had left his ship without “leave,” or any seaman or apprentice who neglects or refuses to join a ship in which he has engaged to serve. Though this clause has since been frequently condemned, and might be limited with advantage to within a certain time before the ship sails, it was absolutely necessary to deal with such cases promptly, for deserting seamen, more especially when in debt to the ship, readily found employment, and would, in many cases, have sailed in other vessels before it was possible to have obtained a formal warrant for their apprehension.
Any misconduct endangering the ship, or life or limb, is considered a misdemeanour; as also any wilful breach of duty, by reason of drunkenness or any other cause, which might tend to the immediate loss, destruction, or serious damage of the ship, or of the life or limbs of any persons, engaged in her. Certain offences may be summarily punished on arrival in port, such as wilfully damaging the ship, or embezzling or wilfully damaging any of her stores or cargo, assaulting the master or mate, wilful disobedience to lawful commands, or combining with any other or others of the crew to disobey these commands, neglect duty, or with impeding the navigation of the ship or the progress of the voyage. All such matters may be summarily dealt with, by inflicting punishment of from one to three months’ confinement with or without hard labour.
[Sidenote: Institution of Naval Courts abroad.]
Naval Courts are also instituted abroad, for hearing complaints with regard to either seamen or masters, and for dealing with them in a summary manner. These courts are constituted of from three to five members, and consist of officers of her Majesty’s Navy, of rank not below that of lieutenant, of a consular officer, and of the master of a British ship; but, if there should happen to be no ships-of-war in the harbour, the Consul has power to nominate any other disinterested master or merchant to act as a member of such court.
Among the more important sections of the Act, I must not omit that referring to the clause enjoining masters of ships to keep a log-book of a prescribed form, known as the “official log.” In this book the master is ordered to enter, not merely the daily course and position of the ship, but all occurrences on board as to the conduct of the crew; any disobedience of orders or neglect of duty; an entry is further required to be made of the death, injury, or illness of any seaman and of the time when he left the ship, should he have done so without leave. This official log the master has to deliver, on his return to port, to the Collector of Customs before an entry of his ship can be obtained; and in the case of any ship being sold abroad, the master or transferrer thereof must deliver or transmit it, duly made up to the time of transfer, to the shipping master or Collector of Customs, at the port to which the ship previously belonged. Penalties of from 5_l._ to 20_l._ are inflicted upon the master or owner for not keeping the log in proper form, or for neglecting to make the necessary entries.
When a seaman is discharged from a vessel by mutual consent, either abroad or at the termination of the voyage, the master must give him a certificate of character, in a form sanctioned by the Board of Trade, specifying his qualifications; but in cases where the seaman has proved incompetent or negligent in his duty, the master may decline to give him this certificate, so far as regards his character.[137]
[Sidenote: Special inspectors to be appointed by the Board of Trade, if need be.]
Power is further taken by the Board of Trade to institute a special investigation, wherever there is reason to apprehend that any serious accident, occasioning loss of life or property, has been sustained, or that any of the provisions of the Act, or of any other Act relating to merchant shipping or merchant sailors, has been grossly neglected or disobeyed; and, for that purpose, to appoint local inspectors or any other competent persons, to inquire into and report thereupon. These inspectors have power to go on board and examine the ship and any papers relating to the voyage, and may call for the production of evidence; and penalties are inflicted for obstructing any of them in the execution of this duty. Various other clauses, for the protection alike of the owner, master, and seamen, are to be found in the Act, which extends to all British possessions at home or abroad, including India. A schedule is attached, regulating the scale of fees to be charged for the examination of masters and mates, and for the engagement and discharge of crews.[138]
[Sidenote: Act of 1851, regulating Merchant Seaman’s Fund, &c.]
I have frequently, in the course of this work, had occasion to refer to the Merchant Seaman’s Fund, established by 20 Geo. II., cap. 38, as also by 4 & 5 Will. IV., cap. 52, and by 6 Will. IV., cap. 15. As this fund had been grossly mismanaged, an Act was passed in 1851 (8th August) to provide for the winding it up, and for its better management in future. Consequently all the previous Acts relating to it, together with various amending Acts, were swept away, and the general supervision of the business of winding-up the fund was placed in the hands of the Board of Trade, or of such persons as that Board might appoint. By the previous Act all masters and mates of ships were required to subscribe from 1_s._ 6_d._ to 2_s._, and all seamen 1_s._ per month toward the fund, of which 6_d._ went to Greenwich Hospital. But the Act of 1851 rendered it no longer obligatory on their part to do so. Those persons, however, who voluntarily continued their subscriptions were to be entitled to pensions in old age, or when otherwise rendered unfit for their duties; and provision was, likewise, made for the widows and children of such persons. These subscriptions the shipping masters appointed under the Mercantile Marine Act of 1850 are authorized to receive, and all moneys and properties forming part of, or belonging to, the Merchant Seaman’s Fund are transferred to the Board of Trade. No master or seaman who had not contributed to the fund before the passing of this Act is allowed to contribute thereto, or to establish any claim for pension or other relief for himself, or for his wife or children; so that the benefits to be derived are confined, exclusively, to those who had hitherto subscribed, and who voluntarily continued their subscriptions after the passing of the Act of 1851; the Commissioners of her Majesty’s Treasury are further authorized to pay, out of the Consolidated Fund, such sums as may be necessary, in addition to the voluntary subscriptions, for the necessary expenditure, and to make good the deficiency; they are also to pay to this fund the unclaimed wages and effects of deceased seamen; and all fines levied for neglect of duty or otherwise are appropriated for the same purpose.
The Board of Trade is authorized to determine and regulate the principles and conditions on which relief is to be granted under the Act, and to make such regulations and by-laws as may be necessary for the receipt and distribution of the fund. The Board has also to render annually to Parliament an account of the receipts and disbursements of the previous year, under several heads; the amount of money in hand, and any sums which may be outstanding; the number of pensioners—distinguishing between men, women, and children, and between different scales of pensions, and the total amount of pensions in each class, together with that of the salaries and expenses of management.
But, beyond these Acts, a great deal more was necessary for the proper government of the merchant service. The vast multitude of Acts of Parliament suspending, repealing, and altering parts of other Acts had involved our commercial maritime law in almost inextricable confusion, and had become most injurious to the public interest. No persons but those well conversant with the subject can imagine to what extent this abuse had sometimes been carried. When the Navigation Laws were repealed no less than forty-eight separate and distinct Acts of Parliament were in force relating directly to maritime affairs; some of them, now before me, are in black-letter type of a very ancient date. It, therefore, became necessary to deal with these Acts; and, for that and other still more important objects, a Bill was introduced in 1854, which dealt in the most comprehensive manner with all questions relating to merchant ships and their crews. In this great measure, the two Acts to which I have just referred were embodied.
[Sidenote: Merchant Shipping Act, 1854.]
The Merchant Shipping Act of 1854[139] contains no less than five hundred and forty-eight clauses, divided into eleven separate and distinct parts or sections.
The first lays down the general functions of the Board of Trade; the second relates to the ownership, registration, and measurement of British ships; and the third is confined, exclusively, to matters referring to the conduct and duties of masters and seamen, and embraces the whole of the conditions of the Act of 1850, with various additions and amendments.
[Sidenote: New measurement of ships.]
The measurement of ships embodied in part second of this Act is a great improvement on all former modes of ascertaining the tonnage of a ship, as it takes capacity for its basis; and thus, while proportioning the dues payable by ships to their capabilities of carrying freight, affords free scope to Shipowners to construct such vessels as are best adapted to the trade in which they are to be employed.[140] This admirable mode of admeasurement was also adopted, at a recent congress, as the basis for ascertaining the tonnage on which ships of any nation were to pay dues on passing through the Suez Canal.
[Sidenote: Registration of ships.]
In dealing with the question of registration, the second portion of the Act of 1854, which contains ninety-one clauses, while it specifies in detail what persons are qualified to become owners of British merchant ships, likewise points out in what proportion of ownership the vessel may be held, inflicts penalties for non-attendance to these rules, and on builders for issuing false certificates. It also requires all change of owners or masters to be endorsed on the register; specifies the condition on which new certificates may be issued, and how they are to be disposed of in the event of shipwreck; the mode of transfer in case of sale, death, or bankruptcy is likewise clearly defined; as also the registration of all mortgages in their priority of claim, the mortgagee having power of sale without being held liable for any of the responsibilities of ownership.[141]
[Sidenote: The “Rule of the Sea.”]
The fourth part of the Act is almost as important as the third, which deals, as we have seen, with the qualifications and duties of masters, officers, and seamen. It refers to the safety and prevention of accidents, a subject which has created much controversy of late, and to which reference will be made more fully hereafter. This important section of the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854 requires all sea-going vessels to be provided with a certain number of boats in proportion to their tonnage and the trade in which they are engaged. It lays down rules as to the meeting and passing of ships at sea, and the use of lights and fog-signals—a regulation of daily increasing importance and more completely carried out in 1863, from the vast number of vessels now traversing the ocean, and especially the English and other great channels of commerce.
Various necessary and excellent regulations are embodied for the construction and equipment of steam-ships, without interfering with their form, leaving their owners and builders every possible scope for improvement, and compelling the fulfilment of certain conditions necessary to insure safety without relieving their owners from their just responsibility to the public. Vessels built of iron must be separated into water-tight compartments, which has since been repealed, and, in the case of steamers, the engine-room must be kept entirely distinct from the hold and cabins; passenger ships (of which further notice will hereafter be taken) are under special regulations with regard to surveys and signals, the use of fire-engines, and the shelter of all persons conveyed on deck.
[Sidenote: Pilots and pilotage.]
In the fifth part, the powers and general jurisdiction of pilots and pilotage authorities are defined. Power is also given by this Act to dispense with the use of pilots which had been enforced at certain places, by the Acts of 1849 and 1853, and was subsequently extended to all ports in the United Kingdom except London, Liverpool, and Bristol, so as to permit “the master or mate of any ship” who “may, upon giving due notice, and consenting to pay the usual expenses, apply to any pilotage authority to be examined as to his capacity to pilot the ship of which he is master or mate, or any one or more ships belonging to the same owners,” and, if found qualified, to receive a pilotage certificate.
The sixth part of the Act refers to the management of lighthouses,[142] buoys, and beacons, whether under the immediate control of the Ancient Trinity House of Deptford Strond, of the “Commissioners of the Northern Lighthouses,” or of the Dublin “Ballast Board.”[143] These separate authorities (subject to the control of the Board of Trade) are hereby authorized to appoint persons to inspect the lighthouses and levy dues for their maintenance (but with revision by her Majesty in Council), and to regulate and alter such dues. Accordingly, each of them may see the following works carried out within its jurisdiction:—(1) Erect, remove, alter, or repair lighthouses, with all other requisite works in connection with them; (2) construct, place, or alter any buoys or beacons; (3) purchase any land necessary either for the lighthouse or its approaches, with residences for the light-keepers; and (4) vary the character of any lighthouse or the mode of exhibiting any lights therein.
[Sidenote: Existing Mercantile Marine Fund.]
The seventh part deals with the existing Mercantile Marine Fund, which, in some respects, but only to the very limited extent I have named, supplies the place of the Merchant Seaman’s Fund, and directs the Board of Trade to carry to this fund all fees and other sums received under the provisions of the third and fourth sections of this Act; all surplus light dues, when not appropriated to the reduction of the charge levied on ships, all rates and moneys received by the Trinity House under the Local Act (7 Vict., cap. 57) for the regulation of lastage and ballastage in the River Thames, and various other fees. It directs these funds to be applied to the cost of the examinations, and of the shipping offices provided under the third part, and of the survey of steam ships under the fourth part of this Act. The remaining portions of this fund not required for the maintenance of the lighthouses, &c., &c., is used for the purpose of establishing and maintaining on the coast of the United Kingdom proper life-boats,[144] and for rewarding the preservation of life in such cases as the Board of Trade may direct, and for remunerating persons in connection with wrecks, casualties, and salvage with which the eighth portion of the Act specially deals.
[Sidenote: Wrecks.]
The inquiry into wrecks, though still requiring amendment, is not the least important part of the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854. It has proved of immense value to the State, and combined with the new law of admeasurement, and, of course, with that wholesome rivalry free navigation has created, has done much to improve the quality and equipment of the merchant vessels of Great Britain, and has, at the same time, tended to the safety of life and property at sea. This part of the Act provides, that whenever any ship is lost, abandoned, or materially damaged, especially in cases where life has been sacrificed, the Board of Trade may[145] institute an inquiry (I object to the mode in which this is now carried out) into the cause of such misfortune, and, for this purpose, appoint suitable persons to form a court, able and competent to deal with all such questions.
Under the eighth part of the Act, the Board of Trade has intrusted to it the general superintendence of all matters relating to wrecks cast on shore, together with the appointment of receivers, who have authority to summon all persons, promiscuously, to their aid, to whatever number may be deemed necessary for the saving from plunder or otherwise the property thus stranded, and to “demand the use of any waggon, cart, or horses that may be near at hand;” “all persons refusing, without reasonable cause, to comply with this summons are liable to a penalty not exceeding 100_l._” The receiver can also use force to suppress plunder, and “if any person is killed, maimed, or otherwise hurt by reason of his resisting the receiver in the execution of his duties, this officer is indemnified against all prosecutions for such acts”—a power somewhat approaching the rigour of the ancient laws, but still not too stringent to suppress the lawlessness even now prevailing when wrecks take place on remote parts of our coasts. Certain rules are laid down to be observed by persons finding or taking possession of a wreck; for instance, he must give notice of it as soon as possible to the receiver of the district, and, if he fails to do so, is, thereby, subject to penalties for his neglect, as well as to the loss of all salvage. Salvage is awarded to persons saving life or property from the perils of the sea, and is regulated in amount by the risk incurred and the extent of services rendered, the saving of life having priority over all other claims.
Provision is, generously and very properly, now made, that no claim for the use of any of her Majesty’s ships in saving life or property shall be valid, and that no person on board of such ships shall be permitted to make any demand on this behalf without the formal consent of the Admiralty, the mode of procedure in all such cases, previously in many ways objectionable, is now clearly established and defined. Nor does the Act omit to deal, and with great propriety, with dealers in marine stores and manufacturers of anchors. Subsequently, but on much more debateable grounds,[146] an act was passed which dealt with the makers of chain cables.
[Sidenote: Limitation of the liability of shipowners.]
The ninth part of the Merchant Shipping Act defines or limits the liability of shipowners under certain circumstances; that is to say, shipowners are not liable, so far as regards fire, loss of life or personal injury, or loss of goods or merchandise, unless they have rendered themselves personally responsible, “to an extent beyond the value of their ship, and the freight due or to grow due in respect of such ship during the voyage.” This liability was further limited in 1862 by Mr. Milner Gibson when President of the Board of Trade.[147] The mode of procedure is laid down at length and with great perspicuity; but nothing in the Act is “to lessen or take away any liability to which any master or seaman, being also owner or part owner of the ship to which he belongs, is subject in his capacity of master or seaman.”
[Sidenote: Various miscellaneous provisions.]
The tenth part of the Act refers to the mode of legal procedure “in all cases where no particular country is mentioned within her Majesty’s dominions;” while the eleventh and last part deals with a few miscellaneous subjects, such as granting power to masters or owners of ships to enter into contracts, under certain circumstances, with Lascars or other natives of India for voyages to Great Britain, Australia, or other parts of her Majesty’s dominions: to corporations for the granting of sites for the erection of sailors’ homes: to the legislative authority of any British possession for the repeal, alteration or amendment of any provisions of the Act “relating to ships registered in such possession:” and to the Commissioners of Customs to recover from the Consolidated Fund, or from the Mercantile Marine Fund, all expenses incurred by them in the conduct of suits or prosecutions raised under the Act.
Such are the leading provisions of the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854, one of the greatest, most useful, and salutary measures ever passed, the repeal of the Navigation Laws excepted, in connection with the mercantile marine of Great Britain.[148]
[Sidenote: Act of 1855.]
In the following year (1855) an Act, which may be taken as part of the great Act of 1854, was passed to facilitate the erection and maintenance of colonial lighthouses; to amend some of the clauses referring to light dues; to specify more distinctly the conditions of ownership and the nature of mortgages; and to exempt the owners of pleasure yachts from having their names and the port to which they belong painted on the stern, as in the case of merchant vessels. Additional powers were also given by this Act to naval courts abroad, in the case of misconduct of the master or crew: for the relief of destitute Lascars, and for other matters of minor importance.
FOOTNOTES:
[132] At that moment our prospects were certainly very gloomy, and it was not surprising that many of our shipowners were disposing of their property. On the other hand, as most of our shipbuilders were idle, it was a favourable moment to contract for the construction of ships. I, therefore, embraced the opportunity, and contracted in one week for six ships of an improved description, of about 1000 tons each. Two of these I built at Sunderland, two at Maryport, one in Dundee, and one in Jersey. Most of the old school of shipowners thought I had lost my senses, and prophesied “ruin;” but others thought there was “method in my madness,” and were thus encouraged to follow my example. Many of my readers may remember the jeering paragraphs which appeared in the Free-trade journals of the period, headed “Lindsay and more ruin,” “Not so bad as they seem,” and so forth. But the fact had an astonishing effect in rousing our shipowners from their dreams of despair, and I never had any reason to regret my “daring speculation.”
[133] Mr. T. C. Cowper, of Aberdeen, himself a member of a well-known shipbuilding firm in Aberdeen, who had spent some time in China at the period to which I now refer, and to whom I am indebted for much of the information connected with our struggles to maintain our position in that trade, gives the following graphic description of his voyage home in the Ganges, Captain Deas, belonging to Leith, one of the vessels we had sent forth soon after the repeal of our Navigation Laws, to compete with the Americans in that trade. “We landed,” he says, “new teas at Wampoa, and sailed on the 1st September, 1851. Two of the fastest American clippers, the Flying Cloud and Bald Eagle, sailed two or three days after us. A great deal of excitement existed in China about the race, the American ships being the favourites. The South-west monsoon being strong, the Ganges made a rather long passage to Anger, but when we arrived there we found that neither of our rivals had been reported as having passed. We arrived in the English Channel on the evening of the 16th of December. On the following morning at daylight we were off Portland, well in shore and under short sail, light winds from north-east, and weather rather thick. About 8 A.M. the wind freshened and the haze cleared away, which showed two large and lofty ships two or three miles to windward of us. They proved to be our American friends, having their stripes and stars flying for a pilot. Captain Deas at once gave orders to hoist his signals for a pilot also, and as, by this time, several cutters were standing out from Weymouth, the Ganges being farthest in shore got her pilot first on board. I said that I would land in the pilot boat and go to London by rail, and would report the ship that night or next morning at Austin Friars.” (She was consigned to my firm.) “The breeze had considerably freshened before I got on board the pilot cutter, when the Ganges filled away on the port tack, and, contrary to his wont, for he was a very cautious man, crowded on all small sails. The Americans lost no time and were after him, and I had three hours’ view of as fine an ocean race as I can wish to see; the wind being dead ahead, the ships were making short tacks. The Ganges showed herself to be the most weatherly of the three; and the gain on every tack in shore was obvious, neither did she seem to carry way behind in fore reaching. She arrived off Dungeness six hours before the other two, and was in the London Docks twenty-four hours before the first, and thirty-six hours before the last, of her opponents.”
[134] All our shipowners had not, however, even then given way to despair, and Mr. Farrer reminds me of a speech which, at the time, had a considerable effect in rousing the drooping spirits of those who were in doubt. He says, in a note I received from him the other day: “Shortly after I joined the Board of Trade, in 1850, I went to dine at some large dinner in the City (a dinner, I think, for one of the great marine charities) at which a great number of the large London shipowners were present. They were then in a state of great irritation at the recent repeal of the Navigation Laws. Amongst those present was the late Mr. Richard Green, who, as is well known, was one of the very few shipowners who supported the Government on the repeal of these laws. After dinner the usual speeches were made, and amongst them was one by the Secretary to the American Legation, a young gentleman who addressed us in the flowing style not uncommon with young Transatlantic orators. After him came Mr. Richard Green—the contrast of style was striking. ‘We have heard,’ he said, ‘a good deal to-night about the dismal prospects of British shipping, and we hear, too, from another quarter, a great deal about the British Lion and the American Eagle, and the way in which they are going to lie down together. Now, I don’t know anything about all that, but this I do know, that we, the British shipowners, have at last sat down to play a fair and open game with the Americans, and by Jove we will trump them!’ The feelings of the other shipowners present may be conceived.” And I may add he did “trump them,” for shortly afterwards he built a ship called the Challenger to match their Challenge, which thoroughly eclipsed her.
[135] See Tooke’s ‘History of Prices,’ vol. v. p. 303.
[136] Mr. Farrer’s connection with the Board of Trade commenced in 1850, when he was employed by the late Lord Taunton, then Mr. Labouchere, to draw up a Merchant Shipping Bill; and he has ever since had important relations with that Board, more especially on all matters connected with the Mercantile Marine, first, as Secretary to that department, and now as permanent Chief Secretary to the Board.
[137] Perhaps if masters of ships were more particular, and instead of inserting in the printed certificate of discharge, as they now almost indiscriminately do, “V. G.” (very good), they would mark the real character of the man, with “V. G.” or “G.” as the case might be, or when necessary substitute “N. S.” (not satisfied), it might have some effect in improving the character of seamen; and these documents, which are now almost worthless, would then become of some service to shipmasters themselves. Why should we not adopt the course which we generally (but not always) do in the case of house servants? A house servant without a character has not much chance of employment, even now, when the demand is very great for them. To give a true and just character is a duty we owe, not merely to ourselves, but to society, and shipmasters should understand that, by granting a certificate of “V. G.” or “G.,” when the character of the seaman does not deserve either grade, may produce far more serious consequences on board ship than would likely be the case in our households, where we can discharge a bad servant at once, which we have no power to do at sea. One bad seaman may not merely contaminate the whole crew, but may be the means of the loss of the ship on which he sails, and of all on board.
[138] This portion of the Act was somewhat hastily framed, especially as regards the extent of inquiry and the power of depriving masters and officers of their certificates; and, although that power was subsequently limited by the Acts of 1854 and 1862, the clauses referring to the mode of inquiry and the power to punish might with advantage be still materially modified.
[139] 17 & 18 Vict., cap. 84.
[140] The rule is to measure the length of the ship in a straight line along the deck, deducting from the length what is due to the rake of the bow, as also to the stern timber, and to divide the length thus taken into from four to twelve equal parts, according to the size of the ship. At each of these divisions the breadth is taken and the depth at each point of the division, and by making certain allowances, which the Act specifies in minute detail, the capacity of each section or compartment is thus accurately obtained. When the products of these are ascertained, the register tonnage is obtained by means of an easy mode of calculation, alike applicable, and equitably applicable, I must add, to ships of any size and every conceivable form. Of course this tonnage is subject to additions or deductions (which have sometimes been the cause of much controversy) for poops, top-gallant forecastles, houses, and other enclosed spaces on deck, which are all additions to the tonnage, while the large spaces occupied by engines, boilers, and coal-bunkers in steamers are deductions from it. Altogether it would not be easy to concoct a more just and wise mode of ascertaining the register tonnage of merchant vessels than that which Mr. Moorson, a man of remarkable genius, after years of labour, submitted for the consideration of Government, and which, through the instrumentality of Mr. Farrer, was in a great measure, adopted and embodied into the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854. I look back, as one of the pleasing reminiscences of my public life, to the hours I spent with Mr. Moorson in going through the details of his scheme before it was submitted to the public; but, though I may have ventured to offer an amendment here and there, as others may have done, the merit of the scheme belongs to him alone. It is now adopted by nearly all maritime nations. Mr. Moorson was the most modest of men; and I have the greatest pleasure in adding my humble testimony to the public labours of this most excellent and unassuming man.
[141] This Act has been a real success. A perfect title to any ship—even to the Great Eastern—can now be obtained at the nominal expense of only one shilling sterling! Why cannot we apply some such principle to the sale and transfer of land? It may be vain to ask such a question; but the reason may be explained by an anecdote: “When in Parliament I was frequently required to accompany deputations from my constituents, and other persons connected with shipping to the Board of Trade. One occasion, when Mr. Henley was President to the Board, I well remember. The deputation was from a great seaport on the eastern coast, and its leading spokesman was an attorney of considerable local influence and reputation. Among the various grievances brought under the notice of Mr. Henley was one which I did not expect to hear, and which has, certainly, never been conscientiously raised either before or since. It related to the law of Ship Registry as settled by the Act of 1854. One of the leading features of that law is, that the Register shall contain nothing but the names of those persons who can give an absolute title to the ship, omitting altogether the trusts and ramifying interests which make the transfer of a title to land such a complicated and expensive matter. The attorney in question, however, attempted to make out the omission to be a great grievance, arguing that all sorts of complicated interests could not be placed on the Register. Mr. Henley, whose shrewdness has now become proverbial (for I do not remember any man in the House of Commons who more readily discovered the flaws in Bills introduced for its consideration), in reply, after dealing with other grievances, in his usual pointed and clear manner, quietly remarked, ‘And now we come to another grievance—that you cannot put trusts on the Register. Now, it seems to me,’ he continued, ‘that we have been tolerably successful in doing for ships what all the wise men are trying in vain to do for land—that is, to save them from a long lawyer’s bill—there may be a grievance—I dare say some one (looking hard at the attorney) has a grievance, but I don’t think it is the shipowner!’”
[142] In the Exhibition of 1851 the French exhibited some beautiful specimens of coast-lights, in which they then excelled, but, since then, (see papers read by Sir William Thompson and Mr. J. Hopkinson before the British Association at Bristol) we have made remarkable improvements in the forms of our lighthouse apparatus, and now produce lights more powerful and brilliant than any other country. These are, chiefly, manufactured by Messrs. Chance Brothers of Birmingham, and, for the mode of arranging the glass reflectors, we are greatly indebted to the genius of the late Professor Faraday and Sir William Thompson. Lights are now constructed, which on a clear night can be seen at a distance of twenty-five miles, perhaps more. But still greater improvements have, since then, been made by arranging the colours, or rather the variation, of lights along a line of coast, so that the navigator may be able, at once, to distinguish one light from the other. For instance, some are fixed, single or double, white, red, or flash lights, or are revolving, displaying alternately these or other colours. But it has been found that red glass absorbs nearly two-thirds of the power of the light, and thus is to a very large extent deprived of its usefulness. Indeed, it has been found that colour of any kind used to distinguish one light from another materially lessens its power. Consequently, we are now adopting other means to distinguish one light from another on any given line of coast. That is, we make eclipses of opaque shades revolving round the usual lighting apparatus, and these we can vary so as to show 5, 10, 15, 20 or 30 seconds of darkness with similar or greater intervals of bright light. We may thus use altogether white or bright lights, which have the greatest power to work in such a manner that one can be easily distinguished from another. I may add that electric light, instead of that produced by oil or gas, has been tried within the last few years. One of these lights was fixed in 1871 on Souter Point, coast of Durham. The flashes were of 5 seconds’ duration, with dark intervals of 25 seconds. The apparatus producing this effect consisted of a dioptric of the third order for fixed lights, around which there was an octagonal drum of glass, consisting of panels of eight vertical lenses; by these the divergent and continuous sheet of light from the fixed portion of the apparatus was gathered up so as to form distinct beams which successively reach the observer as the panels pass in succession before him. The electricity for the production of the spark was generated by one of Professor Holmes’ magnetic-electric machines, worked by a steam-engine of four or five horse-power.
[143] It is to be regretted that the management of all the lights, buoys, and beacons of the kingdom have not been placed under one head, with a view to greater efficiency and economy.
[144] Apart from the aid thus rendered, there is a noble institution for the saving of life from shipwreck on the coasts of the United Kingdom, established in 1824, and maintained entirely by voluntary subscriptions. It is not merely well known in this country, but throughout the world, for no other nation of either ancient or modern times has produced such a truly philanthropic society as the “Royal National Lifeboat Institution of Great Britain.” It has now upwards of 250 life-boats stationed on different parts of our coast. Since its establishment it has expended on life-boats, and other means for saving life from shipwreck, upwards of 356,000_l._; it has awarded 91 gold and 863 silver medals, and 45,200_l._ in coin to brave men as rewards for saving life; while those who manage its affairs and provide the necessary means, have for their reward the inestimable satisfaction of knowing, that the Institution has been the means of extricating from a watery grave and restoring to their friends, during the last half century, no less than 22,660 human beings, of every kindred and of every tongue. How insignificant are the honours conferred by monarchs compared with those which such labours of mercy as these bestow! Its boats, as I have said, are stationed on every part of the coast; and where the rocks are most rugged and the quicksands most deceptive, there these noble craft are to be found with their voluntary crews, the bravest of the brave, daring the rudest storms to save the lives of their fellow-men, and too frequently placing their own lives in the greatest peril. The boats are built expressly for the purpose of encountering heavy storms. The medium, or thirty-feet boat, to pull ten oars double-banked, is probably the best adapted for the general purposes of a life-boat; but, on the Norfolk and Suffolk coasts, and other places, some of the boats actually in use are from forty to forty-five feet in length, weighing from four to five tons, and fitted with lug-sails. These boats put to sea on their grand mission of mercy during the most tempestuous weather.
I remember, a quarter of a century ago, attending, in conjunction with its generous-hearted Chairman, the late Mr. Thomas Wilson, and its present excellent Chief Secretary, Mr. Richard Lewis, and other gentlemen, a meeting which had for its object the renovation of this noble and truly national institution. Its annual income was then only 150_l._; its income is now upwards of 40,000_l._ per annum! But it is only due to the foresight of Lord Cardwell to state that, seeing, when President of the Board of Trade, in 1854, the value that such an institution was likely to prove, he recommended a small Government subsidy to aid it during its struggle for existence. His approval, more than the money voted, was then of great advantage, and he must now look back with no ordinary satisfaction to his thoughtful and generous recommendation. Nor must I withhold from Government the credit due to it for establishing that almost equally valuable and useful contrivance, the Rocket Apparatus, managed by the Coast Guard, under the directions of the Board of Trade, and supported from the Mercantile Marine Fund.
[145] I have frequently thought it would be desirable to institute an inquiry into all losses at sea, where reliable evidence can be obtained. I should have every loss recorded, with a brief notice of the cause of loss, and this record should either be open to the inspection of the public, or published annually by order of Parliament. It would be instructive and valuable, and would, I think, tend to materially lessen disasters at sea, by distinguishing those which arose from unavoidable accidents and those which might have been avoided. Indeed, so strong are my convictions on this subject that, if spared for a few years longer (which I can hardly hope to be, as I am physically myself a wreck), I hope to write another book, to be entitled the ‘Annals of the Sea,’ giving an account of all disastrous shipwrecks, and calling attention to those which would not have happened had ordinary prudence been exercised.
[146] This Bill was introduced by Sir J. D. Elphinstone and Mr. Laird. I opposed it on principle, as I felt that it was an unnecessary interference with the duty of shipowners; and that, if chain cables were to be tested by Government inspectors, we should be obliged to appoint inspectors to examine and report on every article of a ship’s equipment, thus as a matter of fact relieving shipowners from their responsibility to the public. Besides, by subjecting chain cables to an enormous and an unnecessary strain, the fibre of the iron was likely to be destroyed or rendered more brittle, and, hence, less to be depended on. All legislation in this direction should be narrowly watched, and the line carefully drawn, as, in too many instances, it is likely to do more harm than good. Indeed, I cannot too strongly impress upon the minds of persons who have to deal with such questions the impolicy of every measure which has for its object the performance by Government officials of duties belonging to the shipowner, as every such measure necessarily tends to relieve him from his responsibility to the public.
[147] 25 & 26 Vict., chap. 63. This Act altered the law of 1854 by making the limit a sum dependent on the tonnage for 15_l._ per ton in case of damage for loss of life, and 8_l._ per ton for loss of goods. It was found that the law of 1854, by making the value of the ship and freight in all cases the limit of damages, gave a premium to bad, cheap, and ill-found ships, since the owner of the cheap ships could recover against the owner of the valuable ship up to a large limit, while the owner of the valuable ship could only recover against the other a very small amount. It also encouraged the conveyance of passengers in ships of an inferior description.
[148] I look back with great pleasure to the part I took, however humble, in connection with this great measure. Though it was the Act of Lord Aberdeen’s Government, its credit is mainly due to Mr. (now Lord) Cardwell, then President of the Board of Trade, to Mr. (now Sir Henry) Thring, by whom it was drawn with great ability and care, and to Mr. T. H. Farrer, then Secretary of the Marine Department, whose clear head, sound judgment, thorough knowledge of maritime law, and unwearied exertions, were of the greatest value to the able minister under whom he acted. Perhaps, in the whole history of Parliament, no Bill at all approaching its dimensions and the multiplicity of subjects with which it dealt, was ever carried through the House of Commons with so much unanimity, and in so short a space of time, as the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854; and, as the manner in which this was done may be useful to the legislators of to-day and of the future, I shall endeavour to state the mode of procedure. Mr. Cardwell, having made himself thoroughly master of the subject by a careful study of the existing mercantile marine laws of our own and other countries in all their details, invited to the Board of Trade the representatives of all the leading seaports in the kingdom, and having furnished them with an outline of his views, wisely sought their aid in the construction of his great measure. He courted discussion in every form, and, in no instance, declined to receive a deputation from shipowners, sailors, and other persons who could furnish him with useful information on the subject. By such means he was able, not, however, without much labour, though it was unseen and unknown, to complete and perfect a most difficult and valuable legislative measure, the whole of the clauses of which he carried through the House of Commons in one day’s sitting between the hours of 12.30 and 5.45! No such legislative feat has ever been performed before or since. Nor was it, indeed, a less perfect measure than various others of one quarter its size, which had occupied the attention of Parliament for as many days as the hours appropriated by the House to its discussion.
Chapter XII
Parliamentary inquiry, 1854-5, on Passenger ships—Heavy losses at sea previously, and especially in 1854—Emigration system—Frauds practised on emigrants—Runners and crimps—Remedies proposed—Average price, then, of passages—Emigration officer—Medical inspection—American emigration law—Dietary, then, required—Disgraceful state of emigrant ships at that time—Act of 1852—Resolution of New York Legislature, 1854—Evidence as to iron cargoes—Various attempts at improvement—Legislation in the United States, 1855—Uniformity of action impossible—English Passenger Act, 1855—Attempt to check issue of fraudulent tickets—General improvements—Merchant Shipping Act discussed—Extent of owner’s liability—Unnecessary outcry of the Shipowners—Question of limited liability—Value of life—Powers given to the Board of Trade—Mode of procedure in inquiries about loss of life—Further complaints of the Shipowners, who think too much discretion has been given to the Emigration officer—Though slightly modified since, the principle of the Passenger Act remains the same—The “Rule of the road at sea”—Examination now required for engineers as well as masters of steam vessels—Injurious action of the crimps—Savings-banks for seamen instituted, and, somewhat later, money-order offices.
[Sidenote: Parliamentary inquiry, 1854-5, on Passenger ships.]
Although by the Act of 1854,[149] as well as by previous Acts,[150] all Passenger ships were to be surveyed, the impulse given to emigration by the gold discoveries in Australia, and the increased demand for labour in America, combined with other causes, induced Parliament, in 1854, to appoint another Committee of the House of Commons, besides the one which sat in 1851, to inquire into this now important subject, and to pass an Act, in the following year which is the chief Act now in force (18 & 19 Vict. c. 119) exclusively directed to the conveyance of passengers by sea, more especially of that class of persons known as emigrants.
Between 1815 and 1854, inclusive, 4,116,958 passengers left the United Kingdom, being upon an average 102,923 persons annually. But of this vast number 2,446,802, or nearly three-fifths, emigrated during the eight years previous to 1854, and 1,358,096 of them in the previous four years. So great had the rage for emigration become, that in 1854, no less a sum than 1,730,000_l._ was remitted by settlers in North America to their relations and friends in the United Kingdom for the express purpose of enabling those who had been left at home to join them in their adopted country.[151]
[Sidenote: Heavy losses at sea previously, and especially in 1854.]
Yet these acts of generosity and self-denial, altogether unparalleled in the history of the world (we have no record of any such acts in the great tides of emigration from the East, and in those which peopled Carthage from Phœœnicia), had been performed during many previous years, the sums remitted for this purpose having varied from about half a million sterling to more than a million and a half annually. This rush for emigration having induced Shipowners, eager to reap so rich a harvest, to place vessels in the trade, many of which were altogether unsuited for it, with other causes, compelled the Legislature to investigate the whole subject; the result being the comprehensive Passenger Act of 1855, which was passed not one day too soon. During the seven years ending December 1853, no fewer than sixty-one ships were lost in this trade, with the further lamentable loss of 1567 lives. In 1854, alone, nine emigrant ships were wrecked. Five of these were from Liverpool, including the Tayleur, stranded on Lundy Island, when 330 persons perished, and the City of Glasgow, having on board 430 souls, who, with the ship, were never afterwards heard of. The Black Hawk and Winchester foundered at sea in the great storm of the 15th and 17th of April; the City of Philadelphia steamer was wrecked on Cape Race, Newfoundland, in August, as well as the ship Tottenham, from Cork to Quebec, on Cape Breton, but, happily, in these instances no lives were lost.
Such were the disastrous total losses of British ships in 1854; and, although few or any of these losses can be attributed to unseaworthiness, the loss of life was so appalling, that the Legislature was led to bestow more than usual attention to the subject. But besides these, several ships were so seriously injured that they were compelled to return for repairs. One loss, that of the Powhattan, was a singularly melancholy one. This vessel sailed from Liverpool with German emigrants on board, and, after sustaining much other damage, was, afterwards, wrecked at Barnagat, off the coast by New Jersey, during the gale of the 16th April: although stranded within eighty yards of low-water mark, and so near, indeed, that the unfortunate people on board could hear and reply to the suggestions made to them by persons on the land, not a single individual reached the shore, though the vessel did not break up for twenty-four hours after she struck.
[Sidenote: Emigration system.]
But other causes had long been at work to render necessary a revision of the laws relating to passenger ships. The rate of passage being generally higher from Ireland than from Liverpool, on account of the difficulty of procuring cargo, most of the Irish emigrants were shipped on the decks of the coasting steamers to that port; thence, they either secured their passage through the Irish agents of the Liverpool brokers, or they found their way to that port at their own expense, and procured tickets for themselves. Others again, for they were nearly all of the very poorest class of persons, many of them having no means whatever after their passage and their little outfit were paid, acted on orders sent home from New York, their passage-money having been prepaid by their friends or relations in America.
[Sidenote: Frauds practised on emigrants.]
In the first case, instances occurred where emigrants had paid their passage-money, or a part of it, to unauthorized or insolvent parties, and, on arriving at Liverpool, found no ship, nor any broker liable for the passage. In the case of orders remitted from America, the emigrant was of course liable to a similar fraud, with the additional aggravation that, the offence having been committed in a foreign country, there was no chance of obtaining redress for the sufferer or of punishment to the offender. When, however, Irish emigration became so important, and such large sums were remitted from settlers in America, the business became more systematic and fell into more respectable hands.
[Sidenote: Runners and crimps.]
The moment, however, the emigrant set foot on the quay at Liverpool he was beset by a crowd of runners and crimps, one of whom seized his baggage and carried it to the lodging-house in the interest of which he was acting. This runner, besides plundering the emigrant to the extent, at least, of exorbitant charges for lodgings, received 7½ per cent. on the passage-money from the passenger broker; and, indeed, at one time, obtained this without any communication with the passenger. Although a clause in a previous Act[152] had been inserted to check so great an extortion, the system proved stronger than the law; and, notwithstanding further steps were taken to remedy this evil, the percentage was still demanded and paid, though the service was performed without authority. The passenger broker reimbursed himself for this tax by charging the exorbitant commission of 12½ per cent. against the charterer or shipowner; the charge ultimately falling upon the emigrant in the shape of an increased rate of passage.
The emigrant was further persuaded by the runner that it was necessary to lay in a stock of provisions for the voyage, together with other purchases, on all which the runner got a percentage. Great frauds were also perpetrated in “dollaring,” that is, in exchanging money, in which the emigrant was robbed at least 20 per cent.
[Sidenote: Remedies proposed.]
[Sidenote: Average price, then, of passages.]
Although various plans were suggested to the committee, with a view of putting an end to the evils complained of, it is only necessary to refer to that part of the question which affects the actual shipping and conveyance of the passenger to his destination. It was generally agreed that the existing regulations were not stringent enough, the great object of the previous Acts having been to give as much security as possible to the passengers; but it was found impossible to obtain this without increasing the price of passage, which had fallen from 5_l._ in 1842 to 3_l._ 10_s._ in 1851, from Liverpool to New York, and about 5_s._ less to Quebec, including provisions. It is further to be noted that, though in 1842 the charge was higher, there was less given for it, as the Shipowners supplied only two-thirds of the amount of provisions provided at the latter period. While the law, in fact, had obliged the Shipowner to supply a larger quantity of provisions, restrictions as to the extent of the provisions added, together with a superior dietary scale, the money price of the passage had been materially diminished.
[Sidenote: Emigration officer.]
In 1864, the inspection of passenger ships and provisions was carried on at Liverpool, for example, by an Emigration officer, and two assistants who were lieutenants in the Royal Navy. The Emigration officer had to satisfy himself of the seaworthiness of every ship which came under the Act; to see that no greater number of passengers were carried than her measured space would allow according to law; that her boats were sufficient, and that she had the necessary stock of provisions and water for the number of passengers to be carried, and that they were of good quality. He had further to attend to the complaints of the emigrants, and to procure redress for them where necessary. The provisions were tested by the arbitrary selection of some barrels of flour or oatmeal, which were bored through with an auger, so that a fair sample might be brought up and tasted. Whenever any suspicion existed, the inspection was more minute, and the duty of tasting became very irksome.
[Sidenote: Medical inspection.]
The medical inspection of emigrants took place at Liverpool, not on board the ship, but in an office adjoining the dock. The emigrant, taking with him his contract ticket, proceeded to the medical office, which he entered at one door, and, if approved on the inspection, had his ticket stamped, and passed out at another. He was compelled to produce his ticket on embarking. A system such as this naturally opened a door to fraud and personation, while, not unfrequently, after personal examination the emigrant contracted an infectious disorder, the infection spreading before the diseased person could be removed from the ship.
[Sidenote: American emigration law.]
By the United States Statute of the 22nd February, 1847, it was provided that the space to be allowed to passengers should be fourteen clear superficial feet of deck for each passenger, if such vessel did not pass within the Tropics. By an Act of 1848 this was so far altered, that when “the height between the decks is less than six feet, and more than five feet, each passenger shall be allowed sixteen superficial feet; but if the height between decks be less than five feet, then twenty-two superficial feet; and for every passenger on the orlop deck, thirty feet.” Under our Act, no ship could clear out that had not six feet between the decks. In some cases the law of the United States was but loosely observed; while other cases, doubtless, occurred where English vessels sailed from Liverpool to New Orleans with a number greatly exceeding what they could legitimately carry, but which they had reason to expect would not be noticed on their arrival. Owing, however, to some change of persons at the Custom House at New Orleans an inspection was instituted; two vessels were heavily fined, and one was confiscated. But it was found more difficult to provide against the frauds practised by the Shipowners in supplying bad or unwholesome provisions.
[Sidenote: Dietary, then, required.]
The amount of provision by the Parliamentary scale to each adult passenger per week was, viz., water, 21 quarts; biscuit, 2½ lbs.; wheaten flour, 1 lb.; oatmeal, 5 lbs.; rice, 2 lbs.; molasses, 2 lbs., to be issued in advance, at the interval of twice a week. Potatoes might be given in lieu of oatmeal or rice, in the proportion of 5 lbs. of potatoes for 1 lb. of oatmeal or rice; and, in vessels sailing from Liverpool, or from Scotch or Irish ports, oatmeal might be substituted in equal quantities for rice. The dietary was afterwards altered by the Act of 1851, an alternative scale being promulgated, with the substitution of beef or pork, preserved meat, salt fish, split peas, &c., &c., for bread-stuffs. This more expensive scale was adopted in the ports, whence English emigrants usually sailed; but, besides the legal supply, nearly every emigrant took with him some additional provision, such as bacon, eggs, &c., &c.
[Sidenote: Disgraceful state of emigrant ships at that time.]
The filthy state of these ships during the passage was, at that period, worse than anything that could be imagined. It was scarcely possible to induce the passengers to sweep the decks after their meals, or to be decent with respect to the common wants of nature; in many cases, in bad weather, they could not go on deck, their health suffered so much that their strength was gone, and they had not the power to help themselves.[153] Hence, “between decks” was like a loathsome dungeon. When the hatchways were opened under which the people were stowed, the steam rose, and the stench was like that from a pen of pigs. The few beds they had were in a dreadful state, for the straw, once wet with sea-water, soon rotted; besides which, they used the between decks for all sorts of filthy purposes. Whenever vessels put back from distress, all these miseries and sufferings were exhibited in the most aggravated form. In one case, it appeared that the vessel, having experienced rough weather, the people were unable to go on deck and cook their provisions; the strongest maintained the upper hand over the weakest; and it was even said that there were women, who died of starvation. The passengers were then expected to cook for themselves (they no longer do so), and, from being unable to do this, the greatest suffering arose. It was at the commencement of the voyage, that this system, naturally, produced its worst effects. The first days were those in which the people suffered most from sea-sickness, and, under the prostration of body thereby induced, were wholly incapacitated from cooking; the absence of food, if it does not aggravate, at any rate preventing recovery from sickness: and thus, even though the provisions might be honestly and liberally issued—casks in some cases being opened and placed on deck for every one to help himself—yet the passengers would be half-starved. It was time that a system, so barbarous and withal so unnecessary, should be altered.
[Sidenote: Act of 1852.]
[Sidenote: Resolution of New York Legislature, 1854.]
In 1852, various recommendations made were carried into effect by a bill brought in by Mr. Frederick Peel; and, in 1855, the whole law was consolidated and greatly improved by the Passengers Act of that year. In fact, it cannot be denied that whatever improvements had taken place through the operation of the laws of 1849 and 1852, the passengers on board emigrant ships were still, as a rule, great sufferers. The United States Legislatures bear convincing testimony on this point, as, on the 6th January, 1854, that of the State of New York passed a series of resolutions, calling the attention of Congress to the great and increasing mortality on board vessels engaged in the business of carrying emigrants during the previous twelve months, bringing forward undoubted evidence that such suffering and death resulted from insufficient ventilation, &c. The Senate, agreeing with the prayer of these resolutions, concurred, also, in the propriety of inquiry and further legislation. All intelligent, independent parties admitted, indeed, the expediency of concerting an effective system of co-operation between the two governments, so as to prevent an infraction of the regulations mutually agreed upon.
[Sidenote: Evidence as to iron cargoes.]
In conformity with the evidence adduced, frequent disasters to emigrant vessels were ascribed to the effects produced by cargoes of iron; while the inconsiderate manner in which some owners, charterers, or brokers, even against the remonstrances of the commanders and officers, persisted in thus loading their vessels, was alleged to be a fruitful source of disaster.[154] It is likely that the mortality at sea was increased by such cargoes, as they made the ship labour heavily, causing her at the same time to ship a great quantity of water, with the further probability of producing leaks. The people, too, had then to work at the pumps, were hard fagged and badly fed. But the owners or charterers for a time resisted Government intervention, asserting that the Legislature ought not to fetter mercantile enterprise; and, further, that, if ships were restricted as to cargo, the price of the passage must be raised. On the other hand, it was proposed to give a larger discretionary power to the Emigration officer, so as to prevent improper and dangerous stowage. The insufficiency of existing measures of precautions for the preservation of health; the dietaries, the quality of the ships taken up for passengers, the runners, lodging, detention, &c., of emigrants, all became subjects of consideration, and, especially, the number of boats necessary to be carried.
[Sidenote: Various attempts at improvement.]
Accordingly, it appeared absolutely necessary that the authority of the Emigration officers to control the stowage of heavy cargo should be placed beyond doubt; that the number of passengers for whom a surgeon should be required should be reduced from 500 to 300; that the Queen in Council should have authority to make special regulations, in excess of the law, for the prevention of sickness on board ship during the prevalence of epidemics; that the space allowed under the existing Act should be increased; that it should be obligatory to provide water-closets in the “between decks” for women and children; that a more ample dietary should be prescribed; that no ship should carry more than 500 passengers; that the number of passengers necessary to bring a ship under the Act should be reduced from one to twenty-five to one to fifty tons; that the exemption of ships carrying mails should be clearly defined; that runners should be required to wear badges; and, finally, that the subsistence-money in case of detention should be increased.
[Sidenote: Legislation in the United States, 1855.]
Concurrently with the proceedings taken on this side of the Atlantic, the Senate of the United States also took the matter up, but they relied, chiefly, on the answers given to a series of questions framed and addressed to parties competent to give information. Their recommendations, therefore, well deserve notice. Thus, they urged that a space should be reserved on the upper deck for exercise in proportion to the number carried; that a ship’s capacity should be limited by tonnage as well as space; that, during the winter months, the number allowed in proportion to tonnage should be reduced; that no passengers should be carried on an orlop deck; that the number of privies should be increased, with separate accommodation for females; that provisions should be issued cooked; that rules should be established for the maintenance of discipline; and, lastly, that the ship should be made responsible to the extent of the passage-money in the case of passengers dying at sea.[155]
The first Bill proposed in the United States did not pass. But, in 1855, a Passenger Act to regulate the carriage of passengers in steam-ships and other vessels, was introduced and became law. This latter Bill, though much less stringent than the Bill originally proposed, and in respect to space even less so than the previously existing law, introduced several new provisions of considerable value, the chief of which was a more ample dietary scale, and a provision that the master should, on his arrival, report every death on the voyage, and pay on account of such death a fine of 10 dollars. The fines so paid were made applicable to the care and protection of sick, indigent, or destitute emigrants; and the object in imposing the fine was to give the master of the ship a pecuniary interest in the health of his passengers. It was thought by some, that if this could be effected, a great step would be made towards improving their treatment on board. There was, however, a risk that masters would, by insurance, neutralise this interest, as was once attempted as respects the second moiety of passage-money in the case of emigrants sent to Australia.
[Sidenote: Uniformity of action impossible.]
Of course it was in the highest degree desirable that the laws of the United States and those of England with regard to passenger ships should be assimilated.[156] Indeed, various committees of the House of Commons and many eminent philanthropists had urged this assimilation, the main protection for passengers being to be secured by an inquiry as to their treatment by officers appointed at the place of arrival. There can be no doubt that, with a view to a perfect system, the laws on both sides the Atlantic ought to be identical; but the United States government, apart from the necessary diversity of regulations in various States of the Union, is placed in this further difficulty. The United Kingdom is not the only, nor will it be, hereafter, the principal source from which emigrants reach the United States. Large multitudes depart from German, Belgian, and French ports, and in 1853 and 1854, many emigrants sailed from ports in Norway. The passenger laws in each of these countries differ from each other, and even more from the law of the United States. There was, therefore, an insuperable difficulty in framing, on the other side of the Atlantic, a law so general as to embrace the provisions of the several European laws, without making it so vague as to be practically worthless.
[Sidenote: English Passenger Act, 1855.]
But our Passengers’ Amendment Act of 1855, which came into operation on the 1st October of that year, made some important advances towards the law of the United States. The principal alterations introduced by this Act, beyond the regulations of 1852, were, that the number of passengers was limited; the age of a “statute adult” reduced from fourteen to twelve years; a distinction was made between the upper and lower passenger deck; increase of space was allowed to passengers; mail steamers were exempted under special rules; the dietary scale improved; the amount of detention-money increased; and the emigrant runners placed under more efficient control.
One chief provision of the Passengers’ Act required that an abstract thereof and of the Orders in Council should be posted up in each emigrant ship.[157] The Emigration Commissioners, in their report of 1857, give an opinion that the Act has worked satisfactorily; that the changes introduced have tended, materially, to add to the comfort and promote the health of emigrants, the returns of mortality in ships to the United States attesting the same result.[158] On the other hand, the reduction in the number a ship might carry, and the increase in the dietary, necessarily added to the expenses of the passage, and, to a certain extent, diminished for a time the amount of emigration. Further, the Commissioners stated that the runners, at the ports of departure, have been brought more effectually under control, so as to prevent many of the abuses formerly prevalent.
[Sidenote: Attempt to check issue of fraudulent tickets.]
In the United States, also, and especially at New York, efforts have been made to stop the frauds heretofore committed by this class on emigrants. In that city, an establishment, under the control of the Commissioners for Emigration, has been set on foot at Castle Garden, to protect emigrants from runners, and from those who sell them fraudulent or false inland passage-tickets. In consequence of a representation from the United States Government, whereby it appeared that, the suppression in the States, of frauds connected with the sale of inland tickets had led to a system of selling the same description of tickets in Europe or on board emigrant ships, an official notice of this fact was given to emigrants, cautioning them that the safest course was not to purchase an inland ticket in England, but to defer making arrangements for the passage up the country, till their arrival at the port of debarkation. This notice, however, applied to the United States only; and it was stated, explicitly, that the through tickets given by the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada to emigrants proceeding to the St. Lawrence were not open to suspicion, and were, besides, of great benefit to the emigrant.
[Sidenote: General improvements.]
Among the improvements in ships carried out by the Emigration Commissioners, we should mention that they have introduced, of late years, a more suitable dietary for young children, with the making of fresh bread, two or three times a week, for the passengers. This change has been also authorized in private ships. Several new systems of ventilation have, also, been tried. In a sailing passenger ship, especially during the calms which prevail on the Line, their proper ventilation will always prove a matter of greater difficulty than is the case with a steamer, whose own motion is sufficient to create a current of air. Further experience on this point is, however, necessary, though very considerable improvements have recently been made.
[Sidenote: Merchant Shipping Act discussed.]
As great fault was found by the central committee of the General Shipowners’ Society with the 504th section of the Merchant Shipping Act (Part IX.), which lays down the measure of the owners’ liability, it may be desirable to state the nature of the complaints. This section of the Act provides:—
[Sidenote: Extent of owners’ liability.]
1st. Where any loss of life or personal injury is caused to any person being carried in such ship:
2nd. Where any damage or loss is caused to any goods, merchandise, or other things whatsoever on board any such ship:
3rd. Where any loss of life or personal injury is, by reason of the improper navigation of such sea-going ship as aforesaid, caused to any person carried in any other ship or boat:
4th. Where any loss or damage is, by reason of any such improper navigation of such sea-going ships as aforesaid, caused by any other ship or boat, or to any goods, merchandise, or other things whatsoever on board any other ship or boat: No owner shall, in such cases where the events occur without his knowledge or privity, be answerable in damages to an extent beyond the value of his ship and the freight due, or to grow due, in respect of such ship during the voyage which, at the time of the happening of such event, as aforesaid, is in prosecution or contracted for, subject to the following proviso, that is to say: that, in no case, where any liability, as aforesaid, is incurred in respect of loss of life or personal injury to the passenger, shall the value of such ship and the freight thereof be taken to be less than 15_l._ per registered ton.
[Sidenote: Unnecessary outcry of the Shipowners.]
[Sidenote: Question of limited liability.]
The central body of Shipowners, while protesting[159] against the injustice of this Act, forgot that, in point of fact, the limitation of their liability was thereby secured, which it was not under the common law of England. They further contended that the 511th clause of the Merchant Shipping Act was inconsistent with the 504th clause, as the former enacts that parties seeking compensation may refuse to accept the indemnity awarded by the authorities constituted by the Act,[160] and may bring an action against the Shipowner for damages, by which he might be rendered liable to an amount in many cases involving the whole of his capital. But the clause providing that any person who is dissatisfied with the amount of statutory damages (30_l._ each person) may bring an action on his own account, enacts expressly “that any damages recoverable by such person shall be payable only out of the residue, if any, of the aggregate amount for which the owner is liable, after deducting all sums paid to her Majesty’s Paymaster-General in manner aforesaid; and, if the damages recovered in such action do not exceed double the statutory amount, such person is liable to pay all the costs as between attorney and client.”
[Sidenote: Value of life.]
On the other hand, if, as was observed by way of illustration in the course of discussion, a bishop were to fall a victim to an accident, it might be considered that an assessment of 30_l._ would not compensate the surviving members of the bishop’s family for such loss. There can be no doubt that the framers of the present law, when repealing the old laws, endeavoured to deal substantial justice. They must have felt that, to exempt Shipowners from liability beyond the value of the ship and freight would, in too many instances, be an encouragement for unscrupulous persons to employ worn-out and inadequately-manned vessels in the conveyance of passengers and emigrants: and on the other hand, that to subject Shipowners, guilty of no fault or default, to unlimited liability for such calamities would induce men of property and character to withdraw their fortunes from so great a hazard.
[Sidenote: Powers given to the Board of Trade.]
To prevent as far as possible either of these evils, and to insure compensation for personal injury, or injury consequent from loss of life, was one great object of the existing Acts; and fully to carry it into effect, the Board of Trade has now power to require the sheriff to summon a jury for the purpose of ascertaining the number, names, and descriptions of all persons killed or injured by reason of any wrongful act, neglect, or default.[161]
[Sidenote: Mode of procedure in inquiries about loss of life.]
At such an inquiry the Board of Trade is plaintiff, and the Shipowner liable for the occurrence the defendant.[162] A special jury may be called, and the usual precautions as to costs are adopted. The Board of Trade may make any compromise it thinks fit as to damages, which are, in each case of death or injury, to be assessed at the statutory 30_l._, and are made the first charge on the aggregate amount for which the owner is liable. The Act regulates the proceedings, and confers extensive powers on the Board of Trade in the distribution of the funds. With regard to any dissatisfied person claiming more, he is liable, if he does not recover damages to double the statutory amount, to pay costs to the defendant Shipowner; and, even if he obtains a verdict, the damages recoverable are still to be payable out of the residue, if any, of the aggregate amount for which the Shipowner is liable, after deducting all sums paid to Her Majesty’s Paymaster-General. In cases, where several claims are made or apprehended, against the Shipowner for loss of life, personal injury, or loss or damage to ships, boats, or goods, he may appeal to the Court of Chancery to determine the amount of his liability; the question of liability or non-liability being left to another jurisdiction. But it has been held that a Shipowner, who applies to a court of Equity in order to obtain its assistance, must admit that he has incurred some liability. Of course, all costs in relation to these matters may be brought into account among the part-owners of the same ship, in the same manner as any other moneys disbursed for the use thereof.
[Sidenote: Further complaints of the Shipowners,]
Some of the Shipowners complained of the reintroduction of a liability nearly unlimited as set forth in the 511th clause,[163] urging that foreign shipowners could not be rendered liable to its operation, and that Shipowners are expressly exempted from liability for damage caused by the negligence or misconduct of licensed pilots, on the very ground that their competency has been tested and approved by public authorities. This last argument is, however, wholly untenable, unless a perfect immunity is to be accorded to every ship-master who may have obtained a certificate of qualification. The municipal law of one State can only bind those subjects who owe allegiance thereto; but all civilised States frame regulations for the protection of life and property. It would be very difficult to suggest any improvement in the law. The provisions in the Merchant Shipping Act were the result of profound consideration, and ought to be deemed to have effected as reasonable an adjustment as is possible, between the owners of sea-going ships and persons sustaining damage.
[Sidenote: who think too much discretion has been given to the Emigration officer.]
With regard to the Passenger Act, the central body of Shipowners further complained of the discretionary power exercised by the Emigration officer; and, in recent reports, have called attention to those provisions which “while they harass the Shipowner, do not in the least tend to the advantage, comfort, or safety of the passengers;” the consequence of so much being left to the discretion of the Emigration officer leading, as they thought, to this, that the mode of fitting out emigrant vessels depends mainly on his will, and varies, therefore, with each port from which the vessel sails.[164] The “fiend discretion,” as a well-known writer[165] has described it, is no doubt ever abhorrent to Englishmen, who watch, with Constitutional jealousy, the rights of property and of the subject. But it is, indeed, the cardinal difficulty of administration. A hard and fast law stops improvement, and reduces everything to a dead level. Discretion may be tyranny. The experience, however, of the frauds, oppression, and cruelties, practised in former years on the unprotected emigrant, will, I doubt not, continue to operate on the Legislature, and will prevent them from relaxing many portions of the present rigorous system, which has at least produced various salutary improvements.
[Sidenote: Though slightly since modified, principle of Passenger Act remains the same.]
Though modifications and alterations have been made in the Passenger Act of 1855, the most important of which has been the transfer of its management from the Emigration Commissioners to the Board of Trade, its leading principles are still unchanged, and these, in their main features, have now been adopted by nearly all other countries. The changes most worthy of note are to be found (Clause 35, &c.) in the Merchant Shipping Acts Amendment Act of 1862, which gives the owner or master of any passenger ship power to reject, as a passenger, any “drunken or disorderly” person; or to land such person, or others, as “molest or continue to molest any passenger,” at any convenient port in the United Kingdom. Power is also given in this Act to inflict a penalty, not exceeding 20_l_., on any passenger who interferes with the crew in the execution of their duty; or “who wilfully does, or causes to be done, anything in such a manner as to obstruct or injure any part of the machinery or tackle of such steamer.”
[Sidenote: The “rule of the road at sea.”]
The Act of 1862 also laid down more clear and distinct sailing rules; and as these are of great importance, I furnish them at length in a footnote.[166] For these rules the country is greatly indebted to the exertions of Mr. Milner Gibson, when President of the Board of Trade, without whose practical knowledge of the subject (as a first-class yachtsman and navigator), and his patience and temper, the nautical men connected with the Board of Trade and Trinity House, as well as various naval officers, in office and out of doors, would never have consented to them. Even now we frequently read in the daily press letters opposed to these rules, just as we find writers on finance who have their currency hobbies, and who are not, and never will be, satisfied with Sir Robert Peel’s Bank Charter Act of 1844.
[Sidenote: Examination now required for engineers as well as masters of steam-ships.]
By the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854, the master and chief mate of all sea-going vessels, whether sailing ships or steamers, are, as I have already explained, required to possess a certificate of previous servitude or of competency. The Act of 1862 extended, and to great advantage, the principle of examination, also, to engineers engaged in sea-going steamers, who, since then, have been required to undergo an examination, and produce certificates of good conduct and sobriety. Their certificates of competency are of two grades—first class and second class. Any sea-going home-trade passenger steamer, or any foreign-going steam-ship of more than one hundred horse-power nominal, must, therefore, now carry, at least, one engineer who possesses a certificate of competency; and all steamers of greater power must have, at least, two such engineers, one of whom may be of the second class. But all engineers who had served as such in sea-going vessels, previously to the 1st April, 1862, were entitled to a certificate of service, and were not required to undergo an examination.
Though many owners of steam-ships were strongly opposed to any legislative interference with the engineers whom they employed, alleging, among other reasons, that they were thus frequently prevented from promoting men in their service who had served them well and faithfully—as for instance, those in an inferior capacity, such as the head stoker—there can be no doubt that the effect of the law, enforcing these examinations, has been as salutary in the case of engineers as it has proved in the case of masters and mates. There may be exceptions to the rule, but, on the whole, the requirements of the Act have tended, materially, to improve the class of men now employed as engineers on our merchant steamers, and have, as such, been generally accepted by the men themselves.
[Sidenote: Injurious action of the crimps.]
But, before closing my remarks on the mercantile marine legislation of the twelve years subsequent to the repeal of the Navigation Laws, there is one measure, apparently trivial in itself, which has been a great boon to our seamen. Before any of these Acts came into operation, they, as I have endeavoured to show, were to a great extent under the control of a class of men familiarly known as “crimps,” who were the “sailor’s agents.”[167] They found him a ship, discounted his advance note at usurious rates, assisted him to receive his wages at the end of the voyage,[168] and taught him how to spend them. Previously to the Act of 1850, seamen, on the termination of a voyage, were either paid their wages on board ship, or at the office of the Shipowner or his agents. In either case, the crimps, most of whom were keepers of low lodging-houses or beer-shops, were in attendance upon the sailors, and he, who had to receive the largest amount of pay, was attended by the most numerous and obsequious of these vultures, each ready to prey upon him. Suspecting no wrong, Jack was too frequently induced, after he had received his wages, to partake, on the invitation of the crimps, of a glass of grog or a pint of beer at the nearest public-house, and this, apparently, friendly intercourse too often produced the most lamentable results.
[Sidenote: Savings-banks for seamen instituted;]
To obviate, or rather to mitigate if possible, these evils, the Commissioners for the reduction of the National Debt were empowered, by the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854, to establish Savings-Banks for seamen; and, by the Seamen’s Savings-Bank Act of 1856, these banks were placed under the control of the Board of Trade, which was authorized to open “a central office in London, together with branch savings-banks at such ports and places in the United Kingdom as they may think expedient,” where “seamen, or the wives, widows and children of seamen,” might make deposits, not exceeding at one time 200_l._
[Sidenote: and, somewhat later, money-order offices.]
Under this Act, the Board of Trade has opened at all the shipping offices throughout the United Kingdom a department where the sailor, on his discharge, may deposit the whole or any portion of his wages; or may, by means of a money-order office, since added, remit them to his relations or friends. The effect has been salutary, inasmuch as the sailor is thus, to some extent (less than I could wish), prevented from being plundered by depraved persons, whose chief occupation consists in getting what they can out of him. Although Jack may still desire to retain from his wages enough for the proverbial “spree” or jollification after a long sea-voyage, too large a portion of his earnings still go to crimps and other depraved persons; but as a considerable amount is now either deposited at the savings-bank or remitted home, the crimp has less inducement to offer his very questionable services to the sailor than he had before this excellent Act came into operation.[169]
FOOTNOTES:
[149] Merchant Shipping Act, 1854, clause 303, et seq.
[150] The first separate Act for regulating passenger ships was the 43 Geo. III. chap. 56. The substance of this Act and of all subsequent Acts will be found in the Appendix, No. 7, p. 600.
[151] See ‘Fifteenth Report of Emigration Commissioners,’ 1855, p. 1, and ‘Sixteenth Report,’ 1856, p. 329.
[152] 12 & 13 Vict. chap. lxxxi.
[153] See evidence taken in 1851, more particularly questions 4244, 3878, 3879, &c.
[154] See Captain Beechey’s report on Annie Jane, pp. 61, 62.
[155] The United States Passenger Act, passed in 1855, will be found in Appendix to ‘Fifteenth Report of Emigration Commissioners,’ pp. 106, 107, &c.
[156] Great exertions were made by this country to bring about so necessary an arrangement, and in 1870, ’71, and ’72, it was nearly effected; but a question of jurisdiction has since then delayed its further progress. The pending United States election, and a question connected with consular jurisdiction, combined with a few other matters of less importance, now delay the settlement which I trust may soon be brought about, for nothing can tend so much to the advantage of two such great nations speaking the same language as free and easy intercourse.
[157] An excellent compendium of the Act; and the Act itself will be found in Willmore and Bidell’s ‘Mercantile and Maritime Guide,’ 1856, 223, et seq. The rules and Orders in Council are at pp. 244, 245.
[158] But the great cause of improvement was the introduction of steam ships especially adapted for the purposes of emigration, to which I shall refer very fully hereafter.
[159] See their annual reports.
[160] As the law is more especially applicable for emigrant ships, the “statutory damages therein named” are 30_l._ for each person.
[161] This power has only once been put in operation, viz., in the case of the John. Its real importance is only in the cases where the sufferers are very numerous, and too poor to bring actions for themselves. In these cases the Board of Trade acts for them.
But, in ordinary cases, the passengers’ relations proceed for themselves. The owner pays the whole amount for which he is liable into the Court of Chancery, and that Court distributes it among all who have claims—whether in respect of life or of property.
The real defects in the Act of 1854 are well pointed out by the Committee of 1860: viz., first, that the law does not apply to foreign ships on the high seas, whether plaintiffs or defendants; and, secondly, that “value of ship and freight” is a premium on bad ships. These defects, as I have already pointed out, were remedied by the Act of 1862.
[162] As to the laws of foreign countries, see Evidence before Committee of 1860; also correspondence in Appendix, No. 3, pp. 571-82, and correspondence between Mr. Burns and the Board of Trade, Parl. Paper, No. 236, 19th May, 1871.
[163] The shipowners suggested that every passenger should set a value on himself before he embarked!!
[164] Report, 23 June, 1858.
[165] Sir William Jones.
[166]
Steering and Sailing Rules.
Art. 11. If two sailing vessels are meeting end on, or nearly end on, so as to involve risk of collision, the helms of both shall be put to port, so that each may pass on the port side of the other.
Art. 12. When two sailing ships are crossing, so as to involve risk of collision, then, if they have the wind on different sides, the ship with the wind on the port side shall keep out of the way of the ship with the wind on the starboard side; except in the case, in which the ship with the wind on the port side is close-hauled and the other ship free, in which case, the latter ship shall keep out of the way; but, if they have the wind on the same side, or if one of them has the wind aft, the ship which is to windward shall keep out of the way of the ship which is to leeward.
Art. 13. If two ships under steam are meeting end on, so as to involve risk of collision, the helms of both shall be put to port, so that each may pass on the port side of the other.
Art. 14. If two ships under steam are crossing so as to involve risk of collision, the ship which has the other on her own starboard side shall keep out of the way of the other.
Art. 15. If two ships, one of which is a sailing ship and the other a steam-ship, are proceeding in such directions as to involve risk of collision, the steam-ship shall keep out of the way, and pass astern of the sailing ship.
Art. 16. Every steam-ship, when approaching another ship, so as to involve risk of collision, shall slacken her speed, or, if necessary, stop and reverse; and every steam-ship shall, when in a fog, go at a moderate speed.
Art. 17. Every vessel overtaking any other vessel shall keep out of the way of the said last-mentioned vessel.
Art. 18. Where, by the above rules, one of two ships is to keep out of the way, the other shall keep her course, subject to the qualifications contained in the following Article.
Art. 19. In obeying and construing these rules, due regard must be had to all dangers of navigation; and due regard must also be had to any special circumstances which may exist in any particular case rendering a departure from the above rules necessary, in order to avoid immediate danger.
Art. 20. Nothing, in these rules, shall exonerate any ship, or the owner or master or crew thereof, from the consequences of any neglect to carry lights or signals, or of any neglect to keep a proper look-out, or of the neglect of any precaution which may be required by the ordinary practice of seamen or by the special circumstances of the case.
Mr. Thomas Gray, one of the Assistant Secretaries to the Board of Trade (Marine Department), feeling how important it would be to have these rules impressed upon the minds of all navigators, and knowing what effect rhyme has in bringing at once to recollection, for instance, the number of days in each month, put with great tact and ingenuity these rules into verse, thus:—
1. Two steam-ships meeting.
“When both side-lights you see ahead, Port your helm, and show your red.”
2. Two steam-ships passing.
“Green to green, or red to red, Perfect safety—go ahead.”
3. Two steam-ships crossing.
Note.—This is the position of greatest danger; there is nothing for it but good look-out, caution, and judgment.
“If to your starboard red appear, It is your duty to keep clear; To act as judgment says is proper— To port, or starboard, back, or stop her!
“But when upon your port is seen A steamer’s starboard light of green, There’s not so much for you to do, For green to port keeps clear of you.”
4. All ships must keep a good look-out, and steam-ships must stop, and go astern, if necessary.
“Both in safety and in doubt Always keep a good look-out; In danger, with no room to turn, Ease her—stop her—go astern!”
These appropriate but simple rhymes have been translated into various languages, and, I doubt not, have been the means of preventing numerous collisions and other accidents at sea. It may be amusing and instructive to add that, when the question of lights for ships and rules of the road at sea were under consideration, the French Government wrote to our Government proposing a Maritime Congress to settle them. We replied in substance, “No. A Maritime Congress of sailors of different nations and languages will be a Babel. But we will heartily co-operate with you; we will propose a draft of rules and submit them to you. If France and England can agree on this, other nations will probably join.” France adopted our proposal most cordially, and we set to work. At that time we were fortunate enough to have Mr. Milner Gibson at the Board of Trade, who united, as I have explained in the text, what scarcely any other man would have done, perfect knowledge of the subject, a clear, logical, and sensible understanding, and a remarkable power of making other people agree. Not without difficulty, a set of rules was, under his leadership, framed by the Admiralty, the Trinity House and the Board of Trade acting together. These rules were sent to the French Government. They approved them, making some valuable criticisms, but, chiefly, criticisms of detail. We then said, “Now let there be no question of national vanity; no quarrel as to who originated these rules. Do you publish them in your Moniteur on a given day, and we will, on the same day, publish them in our Gazette, merely stating that the rules had been jointly settled by the two Governments.” This, as might have been supposed, was agreed on. To the surprise, however, of every one connected with the facts, the Moniteur some time before the day fixed, published a long story to the following effect:—“That the French Minister of Marine had long been alive to the dangers to which navigation was exposed for want of such rules; that he had communicated his apprehensions to his colleague, the French Foreign Minister, who sympathised with him; that he, the French Minister of Marine, thereupon prepared a set of rules, which he sent to his colleague; that the French Foreign Minister submitted these French rules to the English Government; that that Government gave them its cordial and grateful approval; and that both Governments then agreed to adopt them. Therefore, they were to become law!”
[167] See evidence at great length on this subject before Merchant Shipping Committee of 1860; and especially before Royal Commission on unseaworthy ships of 1873-4.
[168] From having been myself trained in the forecastle of a ship, I am familiar with the character and habits of sailors at sea. Though I have found among them some worthless characters, as may be found in all other branches of trade, and a few scheming and clever but bad men, who were the leaders in all mischief, known frequently as “sea lawyers,” the sailor at sea is usually an industrious, thrifty, and, I may add, a sober man. You will find him in the “dog watches,” or during the Saturday-afternoon holidays, making, mending, or washing his clothes; his trousers, his chief garment, are cut out from a roll of canvas stretched on deck, by means of his jack knife, and usually consist of only two pieces ingeniously stitched together; being, consequently, too flat behind, but having the highly-approved and familiar straight legs. He takes a particular interest in his sea-chest and its contents, and is often to be found arranging them and seeing that they are all in good order. As he approaches home, after a long voyage, you may see him figuring with a bit of chalk on the lid of his chest the amount of wages he will have to receive, and frequently hear him relating to his shipmates how he intends to dispose of them, and his mental disposition of them is usually wise and generous. But, as soon as he goes on shore, his character seems to change, and there he too frequently throws his hard-earned wages away in drink, folly, and vice. I had, when a youth, seen something of the sailor in his usual rendezvous on shore as well as at sea, but nothing good or evil that I remember worthy of note. Therefore, when changes relating to his condition and welfare were contemplated, and when, as a member of the House of Commons, it was likely that I should be expected to aid in effecting those changes, I resolved to see more of Jack on shore than I had ever done before. With that object, I frequently dressed in the rough garb of a coasting skipper or mate. I might have saved myself the trouble of changing my usual attire, for few knew me then in person, and, at best, I never looked better than the character I assumed. Thus attired, I made frequent nightly visits to the public-houses and dancing saloons in Ratcliffe Highway, and in the vicinity of the London and St. Katherine’s Docks, the usual haunts of sailors and of their varied and very questionable “friends.” With my pipe and pint of beer, I sat often for hours among them, and thoroughly made myself master of “Jack on shore” and of his depraved companions. Poor fellow! he was, so long as his money lasted, the victim of them all. Sometimes the whole of his earnings were lost or stolen from him in the first night’s debauch. As you entered these gaudy but wretched saloons, you could at once distinguish in the throng the sailor who had just come on shore, and the sailor out-of-elbows in search of another ship. I shall not attempt to describe these places, of which there are still too many in the East end of London; it is sufficient to state that vice in its darkest forms, without one redeeming spark, held high revel there. They were, indeed, loathsome “hells.” I gained from them, however, a knowledge which I could not otherwise have obtained, and which I hope proved of some service to the Board of Trade when they were framing their excellent measures for the improvement of our mercantile marine.
[169] During the year ending 20th November, 1874, 50,182_l._ 15_s._ 6_d._ was received at the Seaman’s Savings-banks, and 45,964_l._ 9_s._ 10_d._ paid away, leaving to the credit of the seamen depositors, with interest, 81,116_l._ 1_s_. Since the money-order offices were opened in 1855, there has been received through these offices at ports in the United Kingdom and ports abroad, up to the close of 1874, 4,827,093_l._ 1_s._ 11_d._, and remitted to 804,208 persons the sum of 4,822,338_l._ 14_s._ 8_d_. See Parl. Papers, Seaman’s Savings-banks and Money-orders, 161, 21st April, 1875. I most sincerely trust that Government will do everything in its power to encourage and induce seamen to make more use than they now do of these most valuable offices. These and education, more than stringent legislative enactments, are the instruments whereby the power of the crimp is to be crushed, and our seamen elevated to the position of our mechanics.