The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-10-24
SATURDAY, OCT. "a, 1908.
RECIPROCITY OUT OF FAVOR.


The president has issued the ex-
pected proclamation calling congress
in extra session at the capital on the
9th day of November. The purpose of
the session, of course, is to ratify the
reciprocity treaty with Cuba. We are
of the opinion that those who have
been taking it for granted that the
treaty would be put through practi-
cally without opposition are reckoning
without their host. 1t is more than
doubtful whether the treaty will be
able to obtain a majority or not.
If the Republican representatives
dare to live up to the inclinations and
commands of their leaders, the treaty
will even yet be defeated. 1t has never
had the thorough-going approval of
the Republican party. 1t was forced
through by President Roosevelt be-
cause he had made it matter of in
dividual pride and personal policy and
was bound not to be beaten. The
methods by which he advocated it were
no more creditable to him than the mo-
tives that inspired the opposition. But
that the people of the country demand
the granting of reciprocity with Cuba
is not open to question
The truth is that reciprocity is to-
day a word hated and feared by the
real Republican leaders above all
others. They have used it for many
year to conjure with, but never for
moment have they dreamed of in
spring it with real meaning and force.
From the time of Blaine, reciprocity
has been a doctrine approved and
willingly accepted by the people. The
imposition of our present outrageous
tariff duties lent to it still higher favor
as safety valve and a means of re-
lief from the exactions of a robber
tariff But the greater the need of rec
1procity became as a practical relief to
the people, the more determined the
benefciaries of the tariff became that
1t should gain no footing in our recog-
nized national policy.
Once let the entering wedge of rec
tprocity open a cleft in our protective
system and the whole iniquity would
presently be split from end to end
The practical benefits soon to fall to
the people would make them demand
the extension of the reciprocity princf-
PIE to other interests and other Sec
tons of the tariff law, until extraya-
giant duties had been modified ar an
tirely swept away. 1t is for this rea-
son that the word has gone out-in
some cases openly, in some secretlv-
That reciprocity must be discouraged
opposed and beaten wherever it ap-
pears.
That the people of this country by
an overwhelming majority desire re-
ciprocal commercial relations with
Canada amounting to practical free
trade must be admitted Not a week
passes without some important renra-
sentative body putting itself thus on
record. What the public wants for
business reasons in the case of Can
ada. it wants as a matter of not only
business but of justice and sentiment
in the case of Cuba. Yet all the tariff
barons are arrayed against it. The
sugar men. whose proper privileges are
attacked are no more in earnest than
the steel men and the other trust mag
mates; who know that if the duty ON
sugar Is impaired 1t will be followed
quickly by some changes in other du-
ties that have ceased to find any apol-
ogy in business needs or commercial
conditions.
1t is the stand-patters. who Ioathe