The additional speed bounties ranged from one cent per gross
ton for steamers of 1,500 tons and speeding fourteen knots, to 3.2 cents
for those over 10,000 tons and showing twenty-three knots. The act was
to be in force for a term of twenty years, and no contracts were to be
made under it after ten years.
The Hanna bill met strong opposition, and was finally dropped. A
substitute measure, drawn by Senator Frye, of Maine, took its place.
This also was lost with the adjournment of the Fifty-seventh Congress.
At the opening of the next Congress, in December, 1901, Senator Frye
introduced his bill in an amended form. This offered subsidies to
contract mail-steamships based upon tonnage and speed, and practically
restored the rates of the original Postal Aid Bill. It further provided
a fixed subsidy upon tonnage to other American steamers and
sailing-ships, registered, and to be built in the United States. The
bill passed the Senate, but failed with the House.
* * * * *
In 1903 the matter was taken up with greater vigor, by President
Roosevelt. In his annual message to Congress December 7, the President,
"deeply concerned at the decline of our ocean fleet and the loss of
skilled officers and seamen," recommended the appointment by Congress of
a joint commission to investigate and report at the next session, "what
legislation is desirable or necessary for the development of the
American merchant marine and American commerce, and, incidentally, of a
national ocean mail service of adequate auxiliary naval cruisers and
naval reserves.
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