That subclause, subclause 3 of clause 4, is as follows:

"The rules shall not by virtue of this act apply to any contract for the carriage of goods by sea made before such day, not being earlier than the thirtieth day of September, nineteen hundred and twenty-three, as His Majesty may by order in council direct."

We do not know exactly when the bill will get through, and the object of the subclause is to give sufficient time to the interests concerned to enable them to arrange their contracts and other business so as to comply with the act. It I gives power by order in council to fix the date at which the act comes into operation, but once we have issued the order in council fixing the date, our power is gone, and the only thing that could suspend or alter the act would be a fresh act of Parliament.

Power is occasionally given to the executive to suspend the operation of an act, but it is in my experience a rare thing. We have one instance of it in the merchant shipping (convention) act, 1914, which contained as a schedule the International Convention on Safety of Life at Sea. This international convention was signed in London on the 20th of January, 1914, and the act received royal assent on the 10th of August, 1914. Section 29 (5) of the act is as follows:

"This act shall come into operation on the first day of July, nineteen hundred and fifteen: Provided, That His Majesty may by order in council from time to time postpone the coming into operation of this act for such period not exceeding on any occasion of postponement one year as may be specified in the order."

Under that power, we have postponed from time to time the operation of the convention act. It is the only case of the kind I have come across, and the power is one of postponement, not alteration. The postponement has, of course, been due to the war.

Our Parliament does not readily give the Government power to alter laws, and it is a most difficult and undesirable power for any Government department to possess. When our merchant shipping act of 1906 was going through Parliament, it was proposed to give a dispensing power to the board of trade but the board of trade at the time pressed very strongly that this power, if given, should be tied up very tightly. I inclose a copy of a section, section 78 of the merchants shipping act, 1906, and you will see that the tying up has been pretty well done. We can exempt a ship from a specified requirement if we are satisfied that that requirement has been substantially complied with in the case of that ship, or that compliance with the requirement is unnecessary in the circumstances of the case, and that the action taken or provision made as respects the subject matter of the requirement is as effective as, or more effective than, actual compliance with the requiremnt. We are also bound to report each year to Parliament every single case in which the power is exercised.

The one important point I should say in which the Government on this side has more liberty than the Government on your side is in the framing of rules on specific subjects under specific statutory powers. With us, for instance, the collision regulations are made by order in council on the joint recommendation of the Admiralty and the board of trade. (Sec. 418 of the merchant shipping act, 1894.) If it were agreed with foreign countries than an alteration should be made in the international regulations for preventing collisions at sea, the instrument in this country by which this would be done would be an order in council under that section, and it would not require a special act.

Take load line. Section 443 of the merchant shipping act, 1894, gives the board of trade power, after consulting the classification societies, to make regulations on the subject of load line, and those regulations while in force have effect as if enacted in the act.

Another instance is life-saving appliances. Under section 427 of the merchant shipping act, 1894, the board of trade have power to make regulations as to the life-saving appliances to be carried by ships. These rules have to be laid before Parliament and do not come into operation until they have lain for 40 days before both Houses of Parliament during the session of Parliament, and when they come into operation they have effect as if enacted in the act.

Other instances could be given, but these are probably sufficient to illustrate the point as to the power given to Government departments over here to make regulations on certain specified subjects.

As far as my experience goes, the power is given where the Government Department has some definite duty of administering or regulating, and no one here would ever think of giving it in a case like that of the carriage of goods by sea bill. In any case it is certainly not given by that bill and when once the bill comes into operation it is unalterable except by another act.

Yours faithfully,

CHARLES S. HAIGHT, Esq.

C. HIPWOOD.

MERCHANT SHIPPING ACT, 1908

78. (1) The board of trade may, if they think fit, and upon such conditions (if any) as they think fit to impose, exempt any ship from any specified requirement contained in, or prescribed in pursuance of; the merchant shipping acts, or dispense with the observance of any such requirement in the case of any ship, if they are satisfied that that requirement has been substantially complied with in the case of that ship, or that compliance with the requirement is unnecessary in the circumstances of the case, and that the action taken or provision made as respects the subject matter of the requirement in the case of the ship is as effective as, or more effective than, actual compliance with the requirement.

(2) The board of trade shall annually lay before both Houses of Parliament a special report stating the cases in which they have exercised their powers under this section during the preceding year, and the grounds upon which they have acted in each case.

Mr. EDMONDS (continuing). Now, when we closed the hearing last night, I think Mr. Draper had the floor.

Mr. BLAND. Did we effect a reconciliation with Mr. Campbell last night?

Mr. EDMONDS. We talked; I talked with Mr. Campbell and I spent quite a little time with Mr. Draper afterwards, and they spent quite a little time afterwards on the telephone.

Mr. HAIGHT. Mr. Edmonds and I worked for two hours and, so far as I am concerned, I have agreed in respect to a clause which Mr. Campbell says will suit him on the subject of deviation, under which it is provided that nothing in the rules should be construed as prohibiting any carrier from issuing a bill of lading to stop at any number of named ports he likes. Our purpose in doing that was, if he names the ports, the shipper will then know what kind of a voyage the goods are going upon and, if he is willing to accept that voyage, of course, there is no reason why he should not. The proposed clause is as follows:

At the end of subsection 4, page 8, using the regular deviation clause suggested by the Shipping Board yesterday, add thereto the following:

* * * Provided, That nothing herein contained shall be construed to prohibit the carrier from entering into a contract specifically allowing the ship to call at any number of named ports in any reasonable order, to load or discharge for the pending or return voyage.

Mr. Campbell says, if that provision can be inserted, he waives all further objections to the deviation clause, and I understand Mr. Draper says that that is not entirely an unreasonable provision.

Mr. DRAPER. Only as far as Mr. Campbell is concerned; but it does not meet our objections that we want to overcome.

Mr. HAIGHT. No.

Mr. DRAPER. The objections to deviations by steamship companies that we know nothing about in advance.

Mr. HAIGHT. Yes; this will provide that the bill of lading must specify the ports and name them.

Mr. WHITE. Now, right in that connection, I do not understand, as you first read it, it provided that the bill of lading must specify the ports at which the vessel was to call.

Mr. HAIGHT. Yes.

Mr. WHITE. As I understood you, the bill of lading might enumerate the specific ports at which the vessel might call.

Mr. HAIGHT. No; let me read it:

* * * Provided, That nothing herein contained shall be construed to prohibit the carrier from entering into a contract specifically allowing the ship to call at any number of named ports in any reasonable order.

And so forth.

They must be named.

Mr. WHITE. Yes; but, as I get that, it does not add anything to the import of the shipping boards amendment.

Mr. HAIGHT. I can not say that it does.

Mr. BLAND. But it removes the doubt that existed in Mr. Campbell's mind. I quite agree with you.

Mr. WHITE. It might remove something that is outside of the record, but I do not think it changes the shipping board's amendment in its significance, as I read it.

Mr. BLAND. It makes clear their interpretation, as I see it.

Mr. NICOLSON. That was our contention yesterday, that under the amendment as proposed it would be possible to go from one port to another, and also, if the bill said "also intermediate ports," it would be permissible.

Mr. BLAND. But this reads without that.

Mr. HAIGHT. It satisfies Mr. Campbell you were right in your construction. I think you were right, anyhow.

Mr. SCOTT. This is a change to this extent, gentlemen, and it ought not to be overlooked; it allows the ship owner to designate, in his bill of lading, the method of conducting his voyage. Under your interpretation, he would have to stop at the ports in geographical order.

Mr. BLAND. Not necessarily.

Mr. WHITE. Not necessarily.

Mr. NICOLSON. Not under the phraseology of our form. It is quite possible the court would hold, under our form, that he might have to go in the geographical order, but not from the phraseology of the provision itself.

Mr. WHITE. But under the phraseology of your amendment he had the liberty of contract to designate any ports he saw fit.

Mr. NICOLSON. Undoubtedly. At least, we did not intend to restrain him in that respect.

Mr. EDMONDS. I think the doubt in Mr. Campbell's mind was more a question of loading freight. In other words, say you are going to stop at three or four ports, and you go to each port and stop, and you not only unload freight, but you load freight. He seemed to think it possible the court might consider the delay to load freight, before you continued on your voyage to the terminus, would be considered as a delay, as against the shipowner, and he wants these ships that do this trading placed in a position so that they can go to

a port and unload and load-unload cargo on the outward voyage and load cargo for the return voyage-and then turn around and come back again. And I think that is valuable for your services, too, Mr. Nicolson, if there is any doubt that there would be a legal interpretation put on it to prevent that; because otherwise you might not be able to pick up 500 tons of cargo homeward bound at the port on your outward voyage, but, under Mr. Campbell's idea, it would necessitate coming back again and stopping again on your in voyage. And you know the high cost of going into these ports. would simply mean a double cost and a very foolish expenditure of money. If there is any doubt on this at all I think this conforms to the idea we had on it yesterday; if there is no doubt it does not hurt anything, and, if there is a doubt, it fixes it. Now Mr. Draper has the floor.

STATEMENT OF MR. NORMAN DRAPER-Resumed

Mr. DRAPER. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, we do not see that this suggested change would overcome the objection of the shippers. Mr. SCOTT. I do not want to interrupt you again, Mr. Draper, but I have sat on this committee for a good many years and I feel that I know what the committee is anxious to get. I wish you would explain in detail how the provisions of section 4 put you in a worse position than you are now in, and, if it does not help you, why it does not help you. Do you get my question?

Mr. DRAPER. That would not put us in any worse position than we

are now.

Mr. SCOTT. All right.

Mr. DRAPER. However, we think the time has arrived, inasmuch as these bills of lading are being revised in the interest of the shipowners, that the time has arrived when the shipper should also have some consideration given to his point of view, and he deserves to be protected. We do not think, without this clause as it is used in the Edmonds bill, that the shipowner will have any more protection under this bill, as regards deviation, than he had before; and it is a very bad situation, we feel.

Mr. SCOTT. Well, do you think that the provision in the original Edmonds bill would meet your situation?

Mr. DRAPER. Absolutely.

Mr. SCOTT. Then do you not think that the additional provision which is made by this amendment virtually suspends the language, "or any deviation agreed upon between the carrier and the shipper at the time cargo space is contracted for?"

Mr. DRAPER. No.

Mr. SCOTT. Do you not think this subsequent amendment would suspend that?

Mr. DRAPER. No, sir.

Mr. WHITE. That is not what his objection goes to directly.

Mr. DRAPER. No; our objection was not that we would not be able to make a contract. That was Mr. Campbell's objection, and I agreed with him that his position was absolutely right, as he looked at it; but there is another matter involved in addition to the right to make a contract. The thing we are interested in is having some

assurance in this law, that, when we book space on a vessel, and her announced or advertised itinerary is available to us-we want to know when we put freight on that vessel, that the vessel is going where the itinerary said it was going, and we feel that this language in here would have that result. I am not a lawyer, but we have available to us very excellent legal talent, we feel, and all of those lawyers have looked over this language and have agreed this language would accomplish the result that we seek.

You see, what we have now is just freight contracts. You can get a freight contract and it can have on there anything in the world, and it can state that the vessel is going to sail direct to the moon, so far as that is concerned, and that is about all it means; it is a mere scrap of paper; it does not amount to anything; it has no connection whatsoever with the ocean bill of lading, when issued, and you can go into the courts and fight for years, and you won't get any place with the freight contract. Now, with this language we feel it would tie up the freight contract with the ocean bill of lading, when issued, so that anything that is in the ocean bill of lading, contrary to this provision in here, anything beyond that, would be illegal and the freight contract would become a part of the ocean bill of lading and the ocean bill of lading would become a part of the freight contract. Then, if anything happened on account of the deviation from the announced or scheduled itinerary, we have somebody to hold and we can go back to the freight contract and prove the vessel was supposed to go in a certain route, and did not go.

Mr. WHITE. As I understand you, you want it fixed so that in the absence of specific contract designating the particular ports at which your vessel may stop, she must proceed from the port of departure to the port where the goods are consigned, without deviation, except such as may be necessary in order to save life or property, or something of that sort?

Mr. DRAPER. Surely.

Mr. WHITE. That is about what you want.

Mr. DRAPER. That is all we want. In other words, our feeling is this: You can compare it with a railroad. We feel when we ship a train load of stuff from St. Louis to New York, that that train load of stuff should go from St. Louis to New York direct, and by the shortest possible route. If, on the other hand, that train load of stuff went down to New Orleans and then to New York, we would consider we had a justifiable complaint. Now that is just the situation we are complaining about on the ocean. Most of our stuff, or a large part of our stuff, a large portion of our perishable stuff, goes on fast liners. Those liners leave and arrive just like express trains. They are under the continuous control of their owners and there is no more reason why they should go sailing around, and if they intend to go and announce to go, and it even says so in the freight contract that they are going direct from New York to HamburgThere is no reason why they should stop off at Plymouth four or five days.

Mr. SCOTT. Let me get your attention here for four or five minutes, if you will indulge me, Mr. White.

Mr. WHITE. Go ahead.