FRESHMEN WON YALE DEBATE

The Harvard Freshman debating team was declared victorious by a unanimous decision of the judges in the fourth annual debate with the Yale freshmen held last evening in Sampson Hall, New Haven. This is Harvard's third successive victory in the Freshman debates.

Yale upheld the affirmative and Harvard the negative of the question: "Resolved, That the United States should adopt a system of ship subsidies, other than our present mail subsidies, for the encouragement of our merchant marine."

The judges were Professor Charles T. Terry of the Columbia Law School, Professor Garrett Droppers of Williams College, and Professor Grosvenor of Amherst College.

The Speeches.

F. E. Morris, the first speaker for the affirmative, after stating the question, said that at present 90 per cent. of our exports and imports are carried by foreign ships. A system of subsidies is not only practical, feasible, and economical, but is the only adequate remedy for this state of affairs. If the countries which furnish our merchant marine should go to war, our people would lose $1,250,000,000 annually as long as the war continued. As it is now, in time of peace, we are paying out $200,000,000 annually to foreigners for transportation services; why should not this money be paid to Americans? When a recent subsidy bill was defeated in Congress, transportation rates between here and Europe were raised 30 per cent.; foreign shippers now charge American manufacturers rates twice as high as those they charge European manufacturers. The conditions of the American merchant marine, with reference to national defence, are deplorable. Colliers are as necessary to a fleet as cannon; yet we have no colliers. In advocating a system of subsidies the speaker said he did not stand alone: all the great commercial interests of America endorse the system--a system which has been tried by every country which today possesses a satisfactory merchant marine.

S. M. Seymour, the first speaker for Harvard, commenced by saying that we undoubtedly need a merchant marine and a naval reserve. Subsidies, however, do not strike at the heart of the matter; they do not account for and remedy the differences in cost of constructing, operating and repairing ships under the American flag and under foreign flags. Even did subsidies offset these disadvantages, it would be at an unjustifiably enormous expense. Moreover, subsidies are a bad business and economic proportion, for they are only temporary and do not adapt themselves to changes in economic conditions, for there is no relation between subsidies and markets.

A. B. Green, the second Yale speaker, submitted the policy which the first speaker for the affirmative had only touched upon briefly--the system of subsidies--which he said would offset the greater cost of building and operating ships here than abroad. Moreover, by making the subsidy for each ship pro- portional to the amount of cargo which it carries, American vessels will be induced to carry as much as they can and as often as they can, and to outdo foreign rivals. A system such as this is analogous to the one which the United States employed in building up our internal carriage, when Congress gave $70,000,000 and 200,000 acres of public land to the railroads. We now have one of the most wonderful railroad systems in the world; is this not a convincing test of the practicality and efficiency of judicious subsidizing?

A. A. Berle, Jr., was the second speaker for the negative. He began by saying that ship-subsides are very dangerous, as they lead to corruption and fraud. Such was the case with the Pacific Mail S. S. Co. in 1873, when it used improper methods to get its subsidy raised; and such is the case with the Ward Line today. Likewise with the trusts on land, which have been substantially subsidized by the tariff. Also the lobby methods of the shipping interests are today being investigated.

What is more, ship-subsidies are declared class legislation by many state constitutions; and they have been repeatedly declared so by the U. S. Supreme Court. They involve taking the people's money, and giving it to private individuals, to build up private fortunes. Such a use of public money is unjustifiable.

Finally, they will not accomplish their end, as they will not encourage our merchant marine. They will foster great monopolies which will not give us enough more ships to be rightly called encouragement. Altogether, the net result of such a subsidy would be to raise freight rates, and not to encourage our merchant marine.

E. M. Porter, the third speaker for the affirmative, first took up the question from the point of view of the results of a ship-subsidy system to our navy. Under such a system, fast lines and freight routes would provide ample auxiliaries in time of war. By subsidies our navy would be rendered efficient. Also, when it is considered that in the Boer War we lost $30,000,000 through withdrawals of British carriers from trade, the danger from a war between two foreign nations at present doing our carrying can be imagined. Furthermore, there is a direct financial benefit to be derived from the adoption of a subsidy policy, for by such a policy Americans are admitted to competition with foreigners on an equal basis, while commercial intercourse and trade expansion are fostered. Subsidization means the lowering of rates, the securing of better shipping facilities and the diverting of American money from foreign to American shippers.

H. B. Gill, who made the third speech for Harvard, said that the affirmative merely offset the causes for the decline of our merchant marine by governmental aid; the negative wants to remove these causes entirely. A removal of the protective tariff would accomplish this by lowering not only wages but the cost of construction and operation. This would give us an American merchant fleet, not by an enormous expenditure on subsidization but by putting the shipping industry on a sound business basis. A removal of the tariff would give us a naval reserve, for it would cause the withdrawal of $2,000,000 of American money from the foreign shipping to the American registry. Looking at the question from a purely political point of view, removal of the tariff is a wiser policy than subsidization, for while subsidy bills have