The Alaska daily empire., 1919-09-12
PRESIDENT REFERS TO ALASKA MINES IN HIS RECENT ADDRESS
In Presenting His Views to Con. gress Concerning Economic Conditio.t, Touches on
 Mines

President Wilson in appearing be fore the Senate to talk over econ.
 omic matters, tousched upon the
 mines of Alaska and other places
 The following is taken from his ad- dress:
 I "The copper mines of Montana.
 Arizona and Alaska, for example, are
 being kept on and in operation only
 at great cost and loss, in part upon
 borrowed money; the zinc mines of
 Missouri, Tennessee and Wisconsin
 are being operated at about one-half
 their capacity; the lead of Idaho, Illinois and Missouri reaches only d
 portion of it's former market; there
 is an immediate need for cotton belt ing and also for lubricating oil
 which cannot be met-all because
 the channels of trade are barred by war when there is no war The same is true of raw cotton, of which the I central empires alone formerly pur-
 chased nearly one million bales. And
 these are only examples. There is
 hardly a single raw material, single important foodstuff, or a single class
 of manufactured goods, which is not | in the same case. Our full, normal
 profitable production waits on peace. Our military plans, of course, wait upon it. We cannot intelligentiy
 or wisely decide how large naval or military force we shall maintain or what our policy with regard to military, training is to be until we | have peace not only, but also until we know how peace is to be sus- | tained whether by the arms of single nations, or by the concert of all the great peoples And there is more
 than that difficulty involved. The
 vast surplus properties of the army include, not food and clothing merely, whose sale will affect normal produc- ton, but great manufacturing estab- | lishments also. which should be re stored to their former uses, great
 stores of machine tools, and all sorts
 of merchandise, which must lie idle until peace and military policy are
 definitely determined. By the same token, there can be no properly stu
 died national budget until then.
 Nations that ratify the treaty, such as Great Britain, Belgium and
 France, will be in position to lay their plans for controlling the mar
 kets of Central Europe without com petition from us, if we do not pre- sently act We have no consular agents, no trade representatives, there to look after our interests.
 There are large areas of Europe
 whose future will lie uncertain until their people know the final settle
 ments of peace and the forces to ad minister and sustain it. Without de- | terminate markets our production cannot proceed with intelligence or confidence There can be no stabil- | ization of wages. because there can | be no settled conditions of employ | ment. There can be no easy or nor nal industrial credits, because there can be no confident or permanent re- vival of business. Every element of normal life | amongst us depends upon and awaits
 the ratification of the treaty of peace; and we cannot afford to lose a single summers day by not doing all thai we can to mitigate the winters suf- | fering, which, unless we find means
 to prevent it, may prove disastrous to a large portion of the world. and may, at it's worst, bring upon Europe conditions even more terrible than those wrought by the war itself.
 Nothing am led to believe stands in the way of the ratification of the treaty except certain doubts
 with regard to the meaning and i'm plication of certain articles of the covenant of the League of Nations; and must frankly say that
 I am unable to understand why such
 doubts should be entertained. You will recall that when I had the pleas ure of conference with your com mi.tee and with the committee ol the House of Representative on for eign affairs at the White House Iii March last the questions now most frequently asked about the League o1 Nations were all canyassed, with 9 view to their immediate clarifieation. Real coffee served at the Alaska