The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-09-26
eign business transactions.

AnOtner eye created 10 see the facts and state them, no matter whose opinion those facts contradict. !"
 We must cooperate in the field of business. The government with the merchant the merchant with his employe, the whole body of producers with the whole body Of consumers to see that the right things are produced in the right volume and find the right purchasers at the right place, and that all, working together, we realize that nothing can be for the comon benefit which is not for the individual benefit
 There was introduced in the House of Representatives Recently a bill call ed the Webb bill for the purpose of stating it as the policy of the law of the United States that nothing in the Antitrust laws should be interpreted to interfere with the proper sort of Cooperation among exporters. The foreign field is not like the domestic field. The foreign field is full of com binations, meant to be exclusive.
 For Export Combines.
 ''The antitrust laws are intended to prevent any kind of combination which shall be exclusively of new en- terprises within the United States, any combination which shall set up mo- nopoly in America. But the export business is a very big business, very complicated business, very expensive business, and it ought to be possible, and it will be possible and legal for men engaged in exporting to get to- gether and manage it in groups, so that they can manage it at an ad- vantage instead of at a disadvantage as compared with foreign rivals; not for the purpose of exclusive and mo- nopolistic combination, but for the purpose of cooperation.
 'I despise monopoly, and I have an enthusiasm for cooperation. By CO., operation mean working along with anybody who is willing to work along with you under definite understand ings and arrangements which will con- stitute a sound business program. There canNbe no jealousy of that, and if there had been time can say with confidence that this bill which passed the House of Representatives would have passed the Senate also. So that any obstacle that ingenious lawyers may find in the antitrust laws will be removed.
 Urges Aid of Shippers. And then there must be co-opera- ton, not only between the/ govern ment and the business man, but be- tween the business men. Shippers must cooperate, and they ought to be studying right now how to cooperate. odi ately and las rapidly as possible to the recreation of a great American mer- chant marine.
 Foreign vessels carry our goods where they, the foreign vessels, hap pen to- be going, and they carry them only if they have room in addition to what they are carrying for other peo- pie a
 "There has been a good deal of dis cussion about this recently, and 1t has been said the Government must not take any direct part in this. You must let private capital do it, and the reply was All right, go ahead, but we will not go ahead unless you help us.' we said, very well, then, we will go ahead, but we will not need your help, because we do not want to com pete where you are already doing the carrying business, but where you are not doing the carrying business and 1t has to be done for some time at loss
 "we will undertake to do it at a loss until that route is established and we will give place to private capl- tai whenever private capital Is ready to take the place. That sounds Ike a very reasonable proposition. We will carry your goods one way when we have to come back empty and lose money on the voyage, and when there are cargoes both ways and 1t IS pro1lt- able to carry them, we shall not insist upon carrying them any longer.
 And it is absolutely necessary now to make good our new connections Our new connections are with the great and rich republics to the south of us. For the first time in my re- collection they are beginning to trust and believe in us and want us, and one of my chief concerns has been to- see that nothing was done that did not show friendship and good faith on our part.
 'The real wealth of foreign rela- tionships. whether they be the rela-
  of intercourse, the real wealth of those relationships is the wealth of mutual confidence and understanding. If we do not understand them and they do not understand us, we cannot trade with them, much less be their friends.
 There is only one thing I have ever been ashamed about in America, and that was the timidity and fear fitness of Americans in the presence of foreign competitors. I know, by personal experience that there are as effective brains in America as any where in the world. Enterprise, the shrewdness which Americans have shown, the knowledge of business which they have shown, all these things are going to make for that peaceful and honorable conquest of foreign markets which is our reason- able ambition
 We are going to be. I hope, what the world has never seen yet-a body of men who do not want to prevail by the backing of their government, but by the backing of their skill and knowledge.
 Mission of America.
 America has stood in the years past for that sort of political understand ing among men which would let every man feel that his rights were the same as those of another and as good as those of another, and the mission of America i'll the field of the worlds commerce Is to be the same, that when an American comes into that compe- tition he comes without any arms that VVO oyo h tn force