The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1897-01-30
0UARTER OF A CENTURY OLD

celebrate your twenty-hfth anniversary
amid these imposing surroundings you
make a broader commemoration of the
marvellous development of this metropolis
of Northeastern Pennsylvania.
You have invited me to speak on reci-
procity. 1t is a broad and inspiring
theme-too broad to be treated with any
degree of adequacy within the compass
of an after-dinner speech. 1t marks the
line Of our national development and un-'
derlies the aspiration of commercial ex-
pansion. For thirty years, since Appo-
matoX assured and glorihed a preserved
union, we have devoted ourselves to the
upbuilding of an unrivalled home empire.
We have consecrated our energies to the
development of our own internal re-
sources and to the mastery of our own
mighty domain With this matchless
movement and market among ourselves
we have given little thought to any acqui-
sitons or possibilities beyond. Under
this tremendous impulse we have had a
growth which has never been equalled in
all history.
EUROPE THE COMPETITOR.
What shall we do with the surplus?
What shall be its outlet? Where are the
realms of our commercial conquests? Eu-
rope requires some of our food and cotton
and takes some of our industrial products.
But with her long start, her cheap labor,
crate equipment, she has in many drec-
tons a surplus of her own.
What is the great stake for which we
should play? The nations south of us
on this continent have a population of
nearly T0,00O,O00 and n foreign trade of
81, 600 coo. Except in cereals and chief
ly in wheat, there is no competition be-
tween us. Their staples are for the most
part products which we do not grow Our
products are commodities which they do
not make. We need the fruit of their sol: :
they need the fabrics of our looms and
forges. Nature has allied us without gen
Grating any rivalry. She has given us
the unbounded human energies of the
temperate zone. She has given them the
unbounded natural richness of the tropics
We furnish a market for the sugar, cot-
fee, hides and hemp they grow on their
broad, fertile acres. They ought to fur
nish a market for the products of our
teeming mills and furnaces. Providence
has united us on the same continent with
a bond of natural interchangcs; why
should not the craftsmanship of man
complete and crown the offered oppor-
tunity of pature?
CUBA AND THE LATINS.
cuba lies at our very door She is desc
lated today with a cruel and destructive
war which we hope soon to see ended in
the establishment of her complete in
Dependence This war has interrupted
our trade relations, but with its termi-
nation we shall expect to see them re-
Sumed and broadened. Why should We
take nine-tenths of all her exports, as we
were doing, and furnish only one-third Of
all her Imports? Brazil is not far beyond
our border. Is it reasonable to continue
a condition under which we sell her only
one-SiXth as much as we buy from hey,
while she crosses the seas to buy from
England twice as much as she sells to
that power? The South American nations
annually send abroad $i56, 100000 in value
and we take $1OO,OJDOO0 of it, they buy in
return $iC0,0O0,OO0, and we sell only $33,-
OO0OO1 of the amount We their greatest
purchasers and, taking continent against
continent, their smallest sellers. How
shall we reCtify this reversal of the ma
tural relation?
The true key which unlockS this prob
lem is reciprocity and the conditions
which go with it, Trade is not a matter
of sentiment. If we would secure what
rightfully belongs to us we must take the
practical measures. We must establish
direct lines of communication. We must
develop our merchant marine. We must
enter into reciprocal agreements founded
on mutual interests. We must cleaVe the
continent, wed the oceans, unite our now
divided shores and halVe the commercial
routes of the western hemisphere by the
construction of the Nicaragua canal. And
that canal when constructed must be un-
der unchallenged American control We