U.S. GRANT.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, D.C., March 23, 1870_.
_To the Senate and House of Representatives:_
In the Executive message of December 6, 1869, to Congress the importance
of taking steps to revive our drooping merchant marine was urged, and
a special message promised at a future day during the present session,
recommending more specifically plans to accomplish this result. Now that
the committee of the House of Representatives intrusted with the labor
of ascertaining "the cause of the decline of American commerce" has
completed its work and submitted its report to the legislative branch of
the Government, I deem this a fitting time to execute that promise.
The very able, calm, and exhaustive report of the committee points out
the grave wrongs which have produced the decline in our commerce. It is
a national humiliation that we are now compelled to pay from twenty to
thirty million dollars annually (exclusive of passage money, which we
should share with vessels of other nations) to foreigners for doing the
work which should be done by American vessels, American built, American
owned, and American manned. This is a direct drain upon the resources of
the country of just so much money, equal to casting it into the sea, so
far as this nation is concerned.
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