Manual of Ship Subsidies | Page 8

224-268. The two steamships called for were the Lusitania, 31,550 gross tons, launched June 7, 1906; and the Mauretania, 31,937 gross tons, launched Sept. 19, 1906, both quadruple screw turbines, about 70,000 horsepower; the largest, fastest, and completest steamers afloat till the production in 1911 of the Olympic, 45,324 gross tons, of the International Mercantile Marine Co.'s White Star Line.]
[Footnote AY: U.S. consul, Charlottetown, P.E.I. in daily Con. Repts. (Jan. 20) 1911, no. 16.]
[Footnote AZ: Consul General Small, Halifax, in Con. Repts. (Dec.) 1905, no. 303.]
[Footnote BA: The American Year Book, 1911.]
[Footnote BB: American Year Book, 1911.]
[Footnote BC: Lloyd's Register, 1910-11.]

CHAPTER III
FRANCE
France has been rightly termed the bounty-giving nation par excellence.[BD] She first adopted a policy of State protection of native shipping in the middle of the sixteenth century with the enactment (1560) of an exclusive Navigation Act, forbidding her subjects to freight foreign vessels in any port of the realm, and prohibiting foreign ships from carrying any kind of merchandise from French ports.[BE] This was followed up in the next century with the institution of the direct bounty system to foster French-built ships.[BD]
In the reign of Louis XIV, Colbert, Louis's celebrated finance minister, perfected (about 1661) an elaborate system of navigation laws, evidently copied from the rigorous English code. This was directed primarily against the commerce of Holland and England, with the ultimate object of upbuilding the home merchant marine and the laying of a broad basis for a national navy.[BF] These acts included decrees giving French ships the monopoly of trade to and from the colonies of France; imposing tonnage duties on foreign shipping; awarding direct premiums on French-built ships. England retaliated immediately. Holland remonstrated first, then made reprisals. For a time under Colbert's energetic administration of the finances and the marine, "prosperity grew apace. At the end of twelve years everything was flourishing."[BG] Then came the six years' war (1672-1678) with France and England combined against Holland, and at its end the French merchant marine lay sorely crippled.[BG]
Still the fundamental principles of the stringent navigation laws long remained. A decree in 1681, and subsequent ordinances, defined what should constitute a French vessel; and corporal punishment was ordained against a captain for a second offence in navigating a vessel of alien ownership under the French flag.[BH] By later decrees, no alien was permitted to command a French vessel. An ordinance of 1727 further restricted alien command by shutting out even French subjects who had married aliens.[BH] It was required that every French vessel should be manned by a crew two-thirds of whom were French subjects.[BH] The system of regulations restricting the trade of the French colonies to French ships, and to the home market held till well into the nineteenth century.
During the Revolution a decree (May, 1791) prohibited acquisition of all vessels of foreign build. In 1793 (Sept.) it was ordained that no foreign commodities, productions, or merchandise should be imported into France, or into any of her colonies or possessions, except directly in French ships, or in ships belonging to the inhabitants of the countries in which the articles imported were produced, or from the ordinary ports of sale or exportation. All officers and three-fourths of the crew were required to be natives of the country of which the foreign vessel bore the flag, under penalty of confiscation of vessel and cargo, and a fine enforcible under pain of imprisonment. A tonnage tax was levied on foreign ships alone.
Despite this elaborate code designed for its benefit the domestic mercantile marine almost entirely disappeared during the wars of the Republic and the Empire; and after the Restoration its revival was so slow that for some time foreign ships were absolutely necessary for the supply of the French market.[BH] Still the underlying principles of the code were retained by the Restoration Government, modified in a few particulars. The modifications included the removal of the prohibition on indirect commerce--- the carrying trade between France and other countries:--yet advantage even in this commerce was held for the French flag through "flag surtaxes," added to the ordinary customs duties levied upon the merchandise imported into France in foreign bottoms, and by the tonnage charges.[BI] A law of March, 1822, renewed the prohibition against the importation of foreign-built ships.[BI]
Early under Napoleon III movements toward the adoption of an economic policy similar to that then established in England were begun, and shortly a succession of radical changes in the maritime code were instituted.[BJ] In 1860 a commercial treaty with England was entered into. In 1861 freedom of access of foreign shipping to the French West Indies was permitted, subject to the payment of special duties varying according to the ports whence the goods were brought, or to which they were imported. Then at length, in 1866, numerous restrictions of the old code were swept