One of the most important postal arrangements under this gentleman’s
administration is the establishing by steamships a postal communication
with China and Japan. Congress passed a law, February 17, 1865,
authorizing the postmaster to contract for such conveyance. The tender
of “The Pacific Mail Steamship Company,” the only one offered, was
accepted and engaged for the service. The compensation therefor is
$500,000 per annum for the performance of twelve round trips between San
Francisco and Hong-Kong, China, touching at Honolulu in the Sandwich
Islands, and Kanagawa in Japan.
This is one of the greatest events of the day, and inaugurates a new
era in the commerce of our country. Unless the United States, however,
unites all her great advantages and brings them to bear upon her foreign
relations in such a manner as to place her commerce on a footing with
that of other nations, the mere fact of a new era with these is simply a
postal experiment. It is for us to become masters of the commerce of the
world; and with this line of steamers regularly established, and the
completion of the Pacific Railway, there is nothing to stand in the way
of success.
Postmaster Dennison, taking this view of it, says, in his annual report,
1864,—
“There are other ocean-routes besides the one to Brazil which can be
safely and profitably occupied by American lines of mail-steamers,—among
which the route between San Francisco, Japan, and China, at present
unoccupied by foreign mail-packets, is perhaps the most important in a
commercial point of view, and may be made available in securing to us a
large participation in the commerce of the East, the greater portion of
which is now enjoyed by Great Britain through her mail-steamship
connections _viâ_ Suez in the Indian Ocean and China Seas.
“The central position of the United States, between Eastern Asia and
Western Europe, affording routes but little longer, if any, than those
now traversed between these distant regions, aided by the superior
expedition of railway transportation between the Atlantic and Pacific
coasts, will furnish such facilities as will make their adoption a
practical necessity for the commercial intercourse between Europe and
the populous countries of Eastern Asia. These considerations, and others
which will readily suggest themselves, render it important that the
Pacific routes properly belonging to us should be occupied by American
mail-steamers, the profits of which, with the addition of a small
subsidy for the mail-service, would justify the establishment of one or
more steamship-lines which would be remunerative to the proprietors.”
Now that the rebellion is ended, those steamers which were withdrawn
during its progress, thus affording foreign powers all the advantage of
ocean lines, will no doubt resume their voyages for the benefit of our
own.