The Washington herald., 1914-05-28
Sbivins isr Nalian's PfesperiIy.

Representative Of the great manufacturing an{
commercial organizations Of the United Stztes com
posing the Natone Foreign Trade convention vhic3
met in Washington yesterday for the principal pur
pose of discussing how to conquer more completed,
the worlds markets. have task before them If the,
hope to check the steady but rapid turning Of the bal
auce of trade against the United States President
James A. Farrell of the United States Steel Corpora
ton, who made the opening address to the convention
called attention to the fact that for the month Of
March, 1915 exports from the United States were
$5ooooeoo in excess of its imports, while in March
1914 the balance was only 100000 in our favor
Only the day before Representative Kelley addressing
the Republicans of Michigan, stated that last month
the of exports had been completely wiped out
and balance against US of $Iooooooo was shown
the first in twenty-one years Probably not even the
administration would deny that this result is due al
most wholly to the new tariff, which has led us to
buy abroad instead of manufacturing at home
But the administration has remedy, which was
recommended to the convention by Secretary of Com
merce Redheld, who told the members to go after
the foreign markets. This is the very program they
are here to discuss for they realize that so long as
the present tariff is maintained the nations prosperity
imperatively demands that larger markets be found
abroad. This can be said more quickly than 1t
can be done, in spite of Secretary Redheld's
encouraging statement that the field is wide,
that American industries are only just awakening.
and that he has seen them grow within the last ten
years, from feebleness to strength and the products
of American industry sold around the world, every
where, in competition with the products of every other
land But more must be sold and the market must
be widened.
1t is great work which cannot be accomplished
in day year. but under the present tariff law it
must be steadily carried forward if industry in this
country is not to languish. If we buy more abroad
we must sell more abroad or risk bankruptcy. The
tremendous Importance of foreign trade to the
American workingman was strikngly illustrated by
President Farrell when he said:
Every business house, every firm, whether in trade
or IN the professions; every chamber of commerce
and board of trade; every man, woman and child in
the United States has vital personal interest in the
furthering and development of export trade.
In our s. S25oooooooo of annual exports labor repre-
sets 30 per cent of the value the wages that paid
in the production and distribution of these products
amount to more than two billion dollars annually
And with the great home market for the products
of the American artisan curtaiIed new ones must be
discovered for them the seas if the American
standard of living is not to suffer- There is
enough therefore, for the whole country to watch
with interest the proceedings of this convention of the
master minds of commerce and industry in Wash
ington this week. and to hope earnestly for their
cess in solving their momentous problem.