The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1903-10-05

five Years AGO. and. their present ad-
dresses,
The English War Against Cobdehlsn
The citations from Mr.. Joseph
Chamberlain manifesto, which was
issued in London to-day as a definite
pronouncement Of his protective |
policy, embody largely the utterances
he has made in public since the proro-
cation of parliament. 1t is evident that |
the irrepressible Joseph will awaken
Englislamen to realization that
there is something In his proposition
which is likely to make the next few
political campaigns in the United
Kingdom very warm with partic-
ularly vigorous discussion, which will
strike fire of a quality calculated to
consume popular faith in the opti1nis-
tic miscalculations Of Richard Golden.
Premier Balfour's deliverances in the
protective interest have been notably
tame and insipid beside the sturdy
arguments of Chamberlain, who has
taken up the variant tentative talk
about fair trade" and the failure of
Cobdenisn1, heard in England during
the last twenty years here and there,
and has massed the disabilities of the
United Kingdom, under the pressure
of the disastrous competition of the
outside world, for the contemplation
of his contemporaries that they may
be won to what he believes to be the
only rational way Of saving British
trade from disaster irretrievable.
Some of Chamberlains arguments
are very forcible. He shows that the
trade with the colonies is all that en-
ables Great Britain to retain her COM
mercial supremacy, as without 1T her
export trade would be smaller than
that of Germany and about equal to
that of France. This colonial trade is
slipping away from England and
gravitating toward Germany and the
United States. Hence the Chamber
lain bugle-call to hold colonial trade
thru the preferential policy, by which
he firmly believes the enormous food
consumption Of the United Kingdom
may ultimately be supplied by the
colonies.
In ten years the colonial exports to
foreign countries increased nearly
$10O,000,0Oo, or nearly as large an in
crease as between the colonies and the
United Kingdom. The Chamberlain
idea of a self-contained empire knit
together by national and commercial
ties is not as chimerical as charged.
The task of the leader of the anti
Golden movement is difficult, but not
impra cticable. What he has to do is
to demonstrate that Cobdenism has
failed and that self-interest demands
a United Kingdom tariff, as weapon
to obtain concessions from foreign ma
lions, and preference duties upon for
eign foodstuffs.
The opponents Of Chamberlain have
raised strong protest against any
food tax, as inimical to the working
man, but this objection Is met by a
program of readjustment of other
duties in a compensatory way: -,
Mr.. Chamberlain's observations
upon the effect of free imports into
the United Kingdom enter strongly into
the force of his argument. That coun-
try has been furnishing a convenient
dumping ground for the surplus prod
ucts of the protected nations. The
British manufacturer Is continually
stabbed under the fifth rib by the un.
comfortable fact that, if he has a sur.
plus and the home market is dull hi
can't protect himself by dumping i
abroad at cost or a little over because
of hostile tariffs, and he finds himself
undersold by foreigners right in hi
own home market. $50
q 1t is contended by Chamberlain tina
coal only remains as the most profit
able article of English export and tina
IS the removal from the United King
dom of a kind of fixed capital which
can never be replaced and, at the sam
time, coal exports are made to coun
tries which are manufacturing com
petitors of England, who is thus fur
pishing them with weapons to destro
her trade supremacy. 1t cannot b
denied that free imports without fire
trade, as Chamberlain says, have upse
all the optimistic theories Of Colder
who did not foresee the enormous in
dustrial development of the nation
IRE and their adoption of protection 70
their own industries. Ft
IS That Chamberlain, with character
istic coldbloodedness, has shaken tn
totem pole of Cobdenism to it's founda
tions in England is evident. He
known as 'the man who does things
and it is not impossible that, under HI
stalwart blows, the aforesaid totel
pole may be made to totter and fall
There has been comparatively little sal
of$late regarding reciprocity with CUB
That is not because the people are il
different, but because they have made l
their minds-the case is closed If Il