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Column

Washington Watch

Stop Studying and Build Ships

By Charlie Papavizas, Partner, Winston & Strawn LLP

John F. Kennedy. Rear Admiral (ret.) Emory (“Jerry”) S.

Maybe it is a human trait,

Land was the Vice Chairman. Land had deep shipbuilding or maybe a Washington, D.C. trait, but when confront- knowledge as the former head of the U.S. Navy’s Bureau ed with a dif? cult problem with unpalatable solutions, of Construction, was a formidable Washington hand, and there is usually an impulse to delay the moment of dif- had a close relationship with President Franklin Roosevelt. ? cult decision by ordering a study. The U.S. merchant There was reason for optimism.

marine industry is the poster child for this behavior. And yet the ? rst thing the Commission did was –

The industry has been studied and studied, and is cur- study. At least that study was forthright. It determined rently being studied, but studies don’t build ships -- that the U.S. merchant marine was rife with problems shipyards build ships. and that it would be dif? cult to turn things around, but

Going back to the Lynch Committee in 1870, the the Commission was duty bound to follow the 1936

U.S. government has regularly produced studies on how Act mandate to sustain and create a modern merchant to revive the U.S. merchant marine. President Trump’s marine. The Commission set a lofty goal – build 500

April 2025 maritime executive order sticks to the pat- ships in ten years. Considering that virtually no ocean- tern and directs the production of more studies albeit going cargo ships had been built in U.S. shipyards since together with an action plan that may be released early World War I, this was an ambitious, almost audacious, this year. Meanwhile, nothing is happening to spur the goal. That did not stop the Commission from taking building of commercial ocean-going ships in the United decisive action.

States even though a bipartisan group of members of The Commission canvassed existing ship owners and

Congress and President Trump have said that goal is goaded them into ? rming up plans to build modern re- a national policy imperative. It is long past the point placement vessels in U.S. shipyards. The total number was where the United States should stop studying and just nowhere close to 500 over ten years. The Commission also build some ships. created standard vessel designs – one of which was later

The United States faced a similar situation in 1937. modi? ed to be the World War II “Liberty” ship.

The Merchant Marine Act, 1936 had been enacted to The Commission then used the authority given to it replace the scandal riven mail subsidies of the Mer- by Title VII of the 1936 Act to order vessels for its own chant Marine Act, 1928. The 1936 Act mandated that account to reach its 500-ship goal and sought bids from the United States have a substantial U.S. merchant ma- U.S. shipyards based on a standard design. Title VII rine for national and economic security purposes, a goal had been added as a compromise to assuage members which remains in the law today. of Congress who were skeptical that a privately owned

There were high hopes in the U.S. marine industry that merchant marine – in the wake of ocean mail scandals – a corner had been turned and that the industry would be could succeed.

supported in a meaningful way. President Franklin Roos- When U.S. shipyard bids came in too high for the evelt had prompted the 1936 Act. The newly formed U.S. Commission’s liking, the Commission entered into hard-

Maritime Commission was headed by someone with po- nosed negotiations and simultaneously asked Congress litical heft -- Joseph P. Kennedy, father of future President to give it permission to build vessels outside the United 14 | MN January 2026