But I repeat that it is
impossible to carry this system to a successful issue without general
approval and assistance and positive law to support it.
I have stated that three elements of prosperity to the nation--capital,
labor, skilled and unskilled, and products of the soil--still remain
with us. To direct the employment of these is a problem deserving the
most serious attention of Congress. If employment can be given to all
the labor offering itself, prosperity necessarily follows. I have
expressed the opinion, and repeat it, that the first requisite to the
accomplishment of this end is the substitution of a sound currency
in place of one of a fluctuating value. This secured, there are many
interests that might be fostered to the great profit of both labor and
capital. How to induce capital to employ labor is the question. The
subject of cheap transportation has occupied the attention of Congress.
Much new light on this question will without doubt be given by the
committee appointed by the last Congress to investigate and report upon
this subject.
A revival of shipbuilding, and particularly of iron steamship building,
is of vast importance to our national prosperity. The United States
is now paying over $100,000,000 per annum for freights and passage on
foreign ships--to be carried abroad and expended in the employment
and support of other peoples--beyond a fair percentage of what should
go to foreign vessels, estimating on the tonnage and travel of each
respectively.
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