The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1911-04-28
is NOW OR never.
President Taft Says Time for
Reciprocity Is Ripe
In an Address at a Banquet of
News Gatherers.
TALK OF ANNEXATION
He Declares Is All BOsh, and
Praises the House.
Absolute Free Trade Was Offer
ed to Canada and Refused.

New York. April 2S.-President Taft
left Jersey City for Washington over
the Pennsylvania railroad at 1890
o'clock this morning. The president had
a busy day here. He attended no less
than four dinners and one luncheon ex-
tending from 1 O'Clock in the afternoon
until midnight and yet had time for an
automobile ride, with brief conferences
with local political leaders sandwiched
between.
The luncheon was held in the resi-
dence of Henry Clews, banker, where
the presidents health was drunk by a
representative gathering as the leader
of the international peace movement.
He attended successfully the joint
dinner of the American newspaper
Publishers association and the Asso-
ciateG Press; a banquet of the Meth
odist Social Inion; a dinner OF the
Aeronautical society, and lastly, BUS
in ass mems dinner given to j. van
Vechten Ocott At each gathering he
Reciprocity with Canada must be
adopted now or never and must stand
or fall by it's own terms.
Amid tremendous applause and the
waving of handkerchief so said Presl-
dent Taft in an address in the Waldorf
Astoria hotel at the fourth annual joint
BANQUET of the Associated Press and
the American Newspaper Publishers
association.
His address was the first of a series
in which he plans to evoke public senti-
ment in support of his policies, and ne
appealed to the company of editors ana
newspaper owners gathered from the
length and breadth of the land to i'm
nress in the public mind that reciproci-
ty should stand alone and fought not
TO be affected in any regard by other
amendments to the tariff law.
His recommendations were cheered.
Annexation Talk Is Bosh.
All talk of annexation he character
ized as 'bosh' and said that the Uni
ted states has all it can attend to with
the territory il as now governing. He
praised the house OF representatives
for its passage of the agreement; de-
clared that it would not injure the
farmer nor any special class, answer
ed in detail the objections that have
Keen raised to reciprocity, ard begged
for at least "a kind of test to d1spel
the ghosts exhibited to frighten the
agricultural classes.
He said in part:
Il am glad to have the opportunity OF
speaking to a body which fully repre-
sents the most important agencies Tor
the formation of public opinion in this
country, upon a question which mas
now reached critical point in its set
Element The agreement is a CONNER
ciaI one and affects the duties on inn
ports from each country into the other,
and, therefore. II Is QllIlCull " SOY IIob
a detailed discussion of tariff schedules
is not relevant and important in consid-
0ring it's wisdom. But the general
commercial, economic and social argu-
ments in its favor are so convincing
that 1 may be pardoned if 1 do not
dwell on specific rates.
THE treaty provides for free trade in
all agricultural products; and in rough
lumber down to the point planning. 1t
reduces the duties on secondary food
products by a very substantial percent
age. and it makes such reductions on Il
number of manufactured articles that
those engaged in making them have
assured us that the reductions will sub
stantially increase the already large
Canadian demand for them.
I'VE rendered to the Canadian COM
rnissionerS absolute free trade in all
products of either country, manufac-
tured or natural, but the Canadian
commissioners did not feel justified in
going so far. 1t is only reasonable to
infer, therefore. that with respect to
these articles upon which they refuse
free trade to us, they felt that the
profitable price at which they could be
sold by our manufacturers in Canada
was less than the price at which their
manufacturers could afford to sell the
same either to their own people or to
us. Hence, it follows that their refusal
to agree to free trade in these articles
az we proposed is the strongest kind of
evidence that if we should take off the