The Billings gazette. [volume] (Billings, Mont.) 1896-1919, 1903-08-18
THE FORTUNATE REPUBLIC
BY WILLIAM E. sMYTHE,
uthor of Conquest of Arid America

Author Of "Conau
The rising issue, in English politics
is the question OF preferential tariffs
for the colonies-the qeustion of pro.
tecting the products of the empire
against the competition of the pro
ducts OF the world.
1t is an issue that will shake. Great
Britain from center to circumference,
for it proposes the abandonment OF
the economic policy which has stood
practically u~nchallenged for half a cen
fury and under which the doors Of the
British market have remained wide
open to all nations.
And what is the object of the pro-
posed revolutionary change? In a
word, the preservation and enhance
ment of the prosperity of the British
empire. To be more specific, the aim
is ito develop a wide and growing
market in the colonies for the output
of English industries and to hold the
forty million of Great Bri-
tain as a home market for the colonial
agricultural products.
The fact is that England is hard hit
by the enormous commercial expan-
sion OF the United States. We are
selling our manufactured goods to it's
own people in the very shadow of
it's factories. We are furnishing the
bread and meat to feed it's subjects.
We are selling all sorts OF ingenious
machinery, including agricultural i'm
yes, and building their bridges, sup
plying their locomotives and installing
their electrical plants. We r rapid
ly making the British empire a sort
of commercial province dumping
ground for the surplus product of our
farms, our mines and our factories.
So ominous has this situation be-
come that Joseph Chamberlain,
shrewdest of English statesmen, is
willing to stake his power and his
fame upon the startling proposition
to abandon free trade and adopt pro-
lection ais the only possible means
of saving his country from a condi-
tion of economic dependence, which,
in his opinion. has already become
dangerous and may soon become alb
ject.
What 1t Means to America.
In the meantime Americans have
something to think of. They may
we'll indulge in a moment of pride at
the thought that the struggling peo-
pie who, little more than a century
age snatched up the sword to cut
themselves loose from Great Britain,
have so SCOT vanquished the mother
country on the economic field. But
pride goeth before a fall" II a mar
ket which now absorbs forty per cent
of on export trade shall be closed
against us, where and how are we to
make good so vast a deficit?
That is a question which may only
be answered when we understand the
/ true explanation of our success and
of our strength.
The economic greatness of the Unit
ed States is the fruit of a policy of
peaceful conquest over the resources
of a virgin continent. Without this
great item of raw material, the finished
product which the world acknowledges
in the industrial America of today
Z, would have been impossible.
We shall find continued national
supremacy where we found it in the
first place-in the development OF
our boundless and magnificent rasour-
ces. Those who say that the conquest
of this continent lis now complete"
speak idly, or know net whereof they
speak. The conquest of this continent
is but begun.
Great West Almost Untouched.
If England has its Canada, it's South
Africa and it's Ausoralasia-ato which
it now looks ITO pluck the flower,
Safety, from the nettle, Danger"-we
have our Colorado. Wyoming and Mon
taaa, our Utah, Idaho and Nevada, our
Washington, Oregon and California,
our New Mexico, Arizona and Okla
homa-ln all, II states and territories
with which TO held level, and more
than level, the far-flung dependencies
of the British empire.
And these undeveloped lands Of ours