Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1874-12-10
TIE CANADIAN RECIPROCITY
TREATY.

A protest against the proposed reciproc-
ity treaty with Canada is about to be is
sued by the National Wool Growers As
sociation. The document which is signed
by the Henry S. Randall the President,
directs attention to the counsel given by
Gen. Washington to avoid political ALI
ances in extending the commercial rela-
tons of the country, and says
This is the last advice given by Gen. Wash
ington to his country, and holds the impor-
| tant place in the well-known State paper with
| which he closed his official career. The
Treaty now before the Senate of the United
States, is a measure entirely in conflict with
this advice, and by its terms binds the coun-
! try for 81 years, and three years after that
period has expired, which is provided for no.
| tice-making in all "a years-in bonds that
cannot be broken, except by war between the
parties. No treaty can be drawn, even by
the wisest statesman that ever lived, that
would be safe for such growing, changing,
and progressive nation as ours to accept as
interchangeable for "a years. There is no safe
| ty in thus binding the men who, coming after
| us, will be charged with the governing and
supplying the means of defraying the expen-
| -
wars that all nations are sometimes forced to
maintain. But of this treaty it cannot be said
| that it is wise in its provisions for even the
present time. Its ratification and enforce.
ment would be greatly injurious to many
| branches of our national industries, and it
would certainly materially lessen our produc.
ton of wool.
Canada wool is, by the terms of the Treaty,
to be admitted to our county free Of all duty.
Wool grown all over the world would, under
such treaty, be smuggled through Canada
| in immense quantities. The woods produced
in England and Ireland are so like those pro-
duced in Canada that even an expert could
not detect them. The Treaty provides that
wooden rags shall come to Us free of duty,
thus furnishing unlimited material for shoddy
goods. Satinets of wool and cotton and
tweeds Of wool solely are free. Tweeds, by
Canada custom, embrace under one general
name fancy cassimeres and variety of styles
of wooden goods. Under this general term
English cassimeres would be struggled in
boundless quantities. Felting to cover boil
ers is also free. Under these various divisions
of material and manufactured wooden goods,
not only the growing of wool, but the
manufacturing would so suffer as vir-
tually to destroy both, as great branches
of national industry. The effect of the treaty
would be to establish free trade in wool and
wooden goods not only between the Dominion
| of Canada but between England and the Uni
ted States. Useing round numbers, the Gen
eral Government now collects every year
about $500, 900, 000-one- third from internal
taxes and two thrds from tariff duties. This
immense sum of money has to be raised from
our industry, and the people of Canada now
contribute about $G,000,000 in gold paid for
duties. The treaty would surrender this sum
and add it to our overweighted industry and
make Canada the thoroughfare for smuggling
for all of the world. Every branch of indus
try in Canada would be stimulated at our ex-
pense. The lower price of labor in Canada,
due to the fact that labor there is not taxed as
it is here to pay great national debt, would
give that country such advantages in produc-
| ing and manufacturing that it could undersell
US in our own markets.
| The document further states that the
treaty admits Canadian vessels to the full
enjoyment of the American coasting and
lake trade, and allows them to be regis
tered as United States ships. 1t shows
that the Hon. Malcolm Cameron Of Cana
da admits that the treaty will secure "the
highest price for everything the Canadian
farmer sells and the lowest price for all
of the goods be buys" and adds:
What does the Dominion give us for all
these benefits? Many things that we do not
want. Among them a promise so to improve
the navigation Of the St. Lawrence River as
to divert trade from our own canals and rail-
roads and lessen by so much the export trade
from our own cities on the shores Of the At
| lantc Ocean.
The mutual right to fish in the waters of
the sea Oh the coasts of the respective par
ties, is already secured in the same words by
the Treaty made al Washington, May s,
1871, and the supposed advantages given us
in that treaty, and which we were to pay for,
as might be determined by Joint Commits
sion of the two nations such payment by this
proposed Reciprocity Treaty is relinquished,
thereby rendering certain articles of the said
Treaty of Washington, null and void. Thus
we are released from'th pay ment of the claim
that the British Government has already
made, under said Treaty of Washington, of
sum of almost exactly the same amount that
was awarded us for our in uries suffered from
| British vessels, carrying The Rebel flag dur
ing the Rebellion. If, as a matter of fact,
the advantage to us, as nursery of seamen,
of fishing along the British American coasts,
are equal in value to $l5, 900, then Ger
tainly the whole of our Nation, and not part
oil IT'S local industry, should make that pay
ment, and we object to having our rights, and
the general well being of the whole nation,
thus bartered away. We cannot sacrifice
our own great interests to secure the very
limited markets of the Dominion for the few
unlmportant articles that we might export to
them, which would be really productions Of
our own country, nor for the unimportant
ends of having canals made in Canada and
the exemption from payment for the right to
fish in Canada seas.
And finally, we insist with full confidence
in the truth of our position that every real
gain that is enumerated, as secured to us by
: the proposed treaty, is either now ours by
treaty or is freely granted, as the result of
policy by the Canadian authorities, and that
there is no necessity of treaty to cause the
, Canadians to allow our vessels, in time of