Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1916-09-11
]. 5. % N .|SI
ON POLICY CHANGE.
GREAT BRITAIN TO BE TOLD SHE
MUST CEASE TYRANNY OF
SEAS.
PATIENCE OF U. s.
EXHAUSTED BY ACTS
5Iaoklisting, Mail Censorins and Theft
of Trade Secrets to Bring Sharp De-
mand For Cessation-President and
Party Advisers Aroused - American
Firms in Terror.

with great array of notes on the
British blacklist. blockade, and seizure
of mails policies, all of which are daily
injuring American citizens. Demo-
cratic senators today asserted that the
president is prepared to use the retail
atory legislation passed by congress
just before it adjourned.
Secretary of State Lansing has adj
mitted inquiring of London concerning
statements recently made in parlia-
ment by Lloyd George, minister of war
in the British cabinet, to the effect that
trade secrets gained by the censor are
passed along to the proper depart
ments for their uses.
Party Advisers Aroused.
While the president probably is not
of kind to use the weapons placed in
his hands, many of his advisers in the
democratic party want him to do
something more than to threaten to
use them. For number of weeks be-
fore congress adjourned the president
had difficulty in restraining democratic
senators from attacking his policy CT
extreme cordiality towards the allies.
The variance between the statements
of Lord Robert Cecil and Lloyd George
in parliament Last week has been
seized upon here by those who have
opposed the administrations attitude
towards Great Britain as evidence of
it's inability to get any results from
that country. The only concessions
which have been granted to American
firms have been won by the latter on
their own efforts. practically without
assistance from the Washington au-
thorities. as in the case of the Chicago
packers.
Stealing American Trade.
A Wisconsin manufacturer who has
been for years exporting Il large vol
ume of his product to a Scandinavian
country. has been unable to get his
goods to destination since shortly after
the outbreak of the war. In his case
the allies did not wait for the British
blacklist. but put the screws on within
sixty days. His business is virtually
ruined. and he is in receipt of informa-
ton which convinces him that Brit
ish firm is now supplying goods on the
contract he holds. which antedates the
war by a considerable period.
rhe Oliver Plow Company, of South
Bend. Ind, has even had it's business
with South America interrupted be-
cause of the blackIisting of it's New
York forwarding agent, thru whom it
has dealt for twenty-four years.
American Firms in Terror.
The reign Of terror under which many
American firms now exist because of
the ruthless eXactions of the blacklist,
in the opinion of officials. furnishes al
hat 10
blacklist was not even intended pri-
marily as a war measure. but merely
as club by which the allies hope to
insure their commercial supremacy
after the war, with Great Britain the
aggressor at every turn.
Senator Phelan, in a statement to-
day, expressed the view the president
would be compelled to use the retalia-
tory powers. Mr.. Phelan also said he
regretted that his own amendment.
forbidding the use of the mails or 9TH
er means Of communication, to viola
tors OF American rights, had been
eliminated.
There is no war in the Pacific" said
Senator Phelan, yet England has put
it's ban upon the shipment of oil, for
instance. out of San Francisco to Aus
tralia, because a blacklisted firm owns
stock in the oil company, namely, the
Petroleum Products Company Of Cal
ifornia, which had contracts for deliv-
cry in Australia.
Break Open U. S. Pouches.
II have letters from San Francisco
which disclose the fact that American
mails arc violated between Shanghai
and San Francisco: that sealed pouch
es are broken open for the purpose,
which is now clear, since Lloyd George
and Lord Robert Cecil have made their
statements, TO discover the trade se
crets of American merchants with
view to rehablitating English trade,
not now, during the war, but after the
war.
1.-THE chamber of commerce of San
Francisco has complained to me that
recent closed mail from the United
States postal agency at Shanghai to
Seattle, dispatched on the British
steamer Empress of Russia, was OPEN
ed in transit, probably at Victoria, B.
c.. and all the first class mail was
opened, censored, and resealed under
the censor's label. This mail bore Unit
ed States postage stamps and the post
mark of the United States postal
agency at Shanghai.
United States Postal Route.
This postal agency is purely Unit
ed States postoffice as in an American
city and this route has always been
regarded as exactly the same as one
between any other United States post
Offices. The information thus secured
will be of the greatest value to Great
Britain in her future effort to control
the trade OF the Pacific.
II am of the opinion that congress
has given the president sufficient pow
err to check these abuses. Sufficient
cause for retaliation can easily be
found outside the actual interference
with the mails. Therefore, it is rea-
sonable to expect that American mer-
chants will be protected in legitimate
neutral trade, and have so informed
my constituents"
Former EIdora Man Killed.