New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1896-04-15

Let us food the world with intellectual
light
The Theory of Reciprocity,
The Hopkins reciprocity bill has FOL
its foundation that common sense which
ultimately becomes the common law o
every nation, though, perhaps, not Of ma
tions IN the aggregate.
A newspaper article does not give
space for minute investigation of the
Causes that underlie the economic theorie.
of nations, and yet il is possible to state il
few words the cause-for there are not
! causes underlies the Adam Smith
theory, which is the free-trad theory
Adam Smith was, by all odds, the pro.
foundest thinker of his day upon econom.
ic questions; but his day was one in which
the material for thought was limited.
He wrote as an Englishman, and Eng
land then was easily the dominant COM
mercial power of the world, and appar-
emily destined so to remain. But Eng
land with difficulty produced food sufic-
lent for its then population, and it was
certain that it could not produce food E.
nough for the population that increasing
prosperity was bound to beget in a short
time. England could not produce in any
degree sugar, coffee, tobacco, wine, gold,
silver, or thousand other necessities of
commerce. And, therefore, Smith ar
gued, according to the light of his day,
that free trade, by which non-manufac-
turing Europe should supply raw mater
ial free of duty to manufacturing Eng
land, and admit English manufactures
free of duty, was the true policy. So
far us the premises was southland it
was sound in the faint light then shed
upon 1.-THE conclusion was sound.
But when Adam Smith wrote, Europe
practically was the world. Since then
the economist has seen the United States,
like new planet, swim into his ken. A
new and homogeneous power, having in
its grasp the soil and climate that pro-
duces cotton, figs, wine, gold, silver, ice,
corn, wheat, wool, coffee, in short, near
~ all the desirable products of the earth,
has come into existence. The conditions
OF commerce are changed. And even
as regards England, the telegraph and
the steam power that link the wheat
and cotton fields Of In'lia and Egypt and
the vineyards and wool farmers of Afri-
ca and Australia, and the coffee planta-
lions of Jamaica, and the tea farms of
Assam, all of them British possessions,
into close union with Liverpool and
London, have changed matters.
Today the two great commercial pow
ers of the world, the United States and
Great Britain, have possibilities of self
maintenance; i and the third, Germany, is
struggling toward like condition. A
new power has appeared since Adam
Smiths day, and has proclaimed, "Be'
hold, 1 create all things newt" The ole
in years and the feeble-minded young
may cling to the smithian theory of eco
Monies, but it's day has set.
Reciprocity now is the natural law O
protection for the two strong CONNER
c;al powers against an alliance of all thu
weak ones. England has taken a lea
out of Mr.. Blaine's book, and is shaping
her legislation toward reciprocity. Thu
Hopkins bill shows that the United State
is preparing to return to it.
We have devoted this brief space to
defense of the theory of reciprocity
Its practice needs no defense. BY reel
procity agreements we gained millions
by repeal of them we have lost tens 0
millions. Chicago Inter Ocean.