Mr. McBride to Mr. Seward.
Sir: It is affirmed upon undoubted authority that it is the settled policy and determination of the mail steamship company taking the contract to run a line of steamers to China and Japan, “touching at Honolulu,” to make an effort with the present Congress to repeal so much of the law, and rescind so much of the contract, as obliges those steamers to touch at this port at all, and substitute two propellers, owned by the steam navigation company, to run between this port and San Francisco.
In my opinion, such a change would be exceedingly injurious to every interest which the United States government should strive to encourage and promote on this group.
The line already employed by contract will care but little for any but fast freights between this and California, and, consequently, will not be tempted by low charges, temporarily, or by purchase of the sailing vessels now running, to put down competition, but the propellers will, as the carrying trade between this and California will be their entire business, I judge, from the nature of the case, and from what the steam navigation company have been doing on the Columbia river for five or six years past. They have wealth, and will not allow of competition, and we have a right to judge of the future by the past, and when competition is out of the way, it does not require a prophet to foretell the result.
Steam will not be likely to exclude competition, without a subsidy, and the China and Japan line can well afford to give one-fifth of their subsidy to the propellers to relieve them from touching at this port. This would be virtually a subsidy by the government, to aid that company in putting down competition more successfully, and leave them to increase fare and freights ad libitum. I beg the government not to lend its aid to so unfair and injurious an enterprise, as there must be an infinite difference between the steam navigation company and the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, as the latter will care only for fast freights, as with them the carrying trade between this port and San Francisco will be merely incidental.
And, secondly, as those steamers will touch on the return only once a month, they could not, if they would, drive off a fair and honorable competition. But were the same company to put on two propellers to run between this and California, and by which the China and Japan line would be freed from the obligation to touch at this port, the result would be the same as if the other company were substituted, as it is easy to see that there would be the same temptations to push competion out of their way, and hence such a change, even with that company, should not be allowed. It is right, precisely right, as it is.
What is wanting here is something in addition to what we now have. Those propellers, when once competition is out of the way, will not and cannot furnish the mails near as often as we now receive them. We have now two lines of vessels—fast runners—six in all, and some of them are ever on the wing, bringing us mails, freights, passengers, and the accommodations are decidedly good; and, considering the character of the business and the manner in which it is [Page 487] done and has to be done here, there never was an arrangement better adapted to the circumstances and interests of these islands than the present contract with the China and Japan line, and I do hope that our government will hold with a steady hand, and see it promptly carried out. It is no hardship on the company, for they knew as well before and at the time of making the contract as they do now what the expenses would be. They were not a set of children, decoyed by strategy into a hard bargain, but business men of great sagacity and experience, who deliberately made their calculations with a knowledge of all the facts, and should now perform their contract faithfully, without trying to squirm out of it.
And, besides these considerations, there is a popular largeness about the China and Japan line of steamers which no substitute can equal, and it is now the hope and the expectation of everybody in these islands, and its withdrawal would be realized as a great disappointment, and regarded as indicative of vacillation on the part of our government, and calculated to weaken public confidence both at home and abroad. While that line would be a great blessing here, the substitute, if allowed, would be an unmitigated evil, forced and riveted on these people by the action of our government, like the French Emperor’s enterprise in Mexico, with no power in these people to shake it off for the next ten years.
I have the honor to be, sir, with great respect, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.