St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-03-21
NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. FAILURE.

The work of the Pan-American con-
gress is about ended, the session is
drawing to close, the delegates are
preparing to return home, and yet there
is not the least perceptible evidence
that anything worthy of mention has
been accomplished. The conference,
which opened with such brilliant
promise, has proved to be the most dis
NAL failure in modern diplomacy. In
stead of the Pan-American congress
being feather in Mr.. BLAINE's cap, it
has proved to be veritable old man of
the sea. and the HARRISON administra-
ton will have more cause to regret than
to boast of its achievements in this mat
ter. The causes of failure are numer-
Gus. In the first place the delegates
are in no sense representatives OF
the commercial interests of the
three Americas. Most of them are poll
ticians, who at best have only theo-
retical knowledge of commerce. The
South and Central American states APP
pointed as their representatives gentle
men who were connected with the diplo-
matte service, most of whom were living
in this country, and associated with the
various legations. Our government was
equally indiscreet in its selection of
representatives, most Of them being re-
tired politicians, or men who we're iden-
titled with corporation interests. Thus
we find the first great mistake was made
in the character of the delegates. The
second error was in the attempt
made by Secretary BLAINE to run
the congress on the autocratic
plan that he is accustomed to run the
party machine. This gave offense to
the representatives Of the other Ameri-
can states, who supposed that they were
invited to congress where absolute
equality should prevail, and where they
were not to be domineered over by a
self-constituted protection aristocracy.
Then when the congress got through
with the fuss and feathers feature of the
meeting, the banqueting and the junket-
ing, and settled down to work, it was
discovered that the real object of the
conference was not to improve the com
mercial relations between the three
Americas, but that the main effort was
to convert the South and Central
Americans to the Republican protection
idea, and to cajole them into support
of the steamship subsidy schemes that
Mr.. BLAINE and his friends were patron
izing. Taking all these facts into con-
siGeration, it is no surprise that the con-
gress has been monumental failure.
The wonder is that it didn't dissolve
long ago. The South and Central Ameri-
can representatives will go home, it is
true, with enlarged ideas of our national
power and resources, yet they will go
home wondering why such great
nation of people should be such fools as
to permit all the other nations of the
earth to reap the benefits of commerce
with the country to the south
of US, while we hedge ourselves
around with tariff barrier
that is killing out our prosperity.
If we could once be brought to see our
selves as others see us there would be a
tariff reform deluge to sweep away the
last vestige of the war taxes. But we
are stricken with judicial blindness, and
as long as the country remains under
Republican domination we will continue
to grope along in the bogs and quag-
mires of the protection fallacy in the
vain Imagination that we are following
the star of prosperity, when in fact it is
only will O. the wisp Turing us to GER
tain destruction. The South and Gen.
trail American states are wiser than we.
They want no restrictions on trade.
They will profit more from the Pan
American congress than we will.
because it has enabled them to
discover that there is an incubus on
our Industrial life. and they will take
advantage of this discovery to rise in
the scale Of commercial prosperity,
while we are being ground to the earth
by our self-imposed burthen. AS much
as we affect to despise the mongrel civil
ization of South and Central America,
yet in ten years. time, if we continue
this accursed protection policy, we will
be paying tribute to them. If we can
extract this one lesson from the Pan
American congress and lay it to heart,
it will be the one single item of profit
that we have derived from the confer
ence.