New-York tribune., 1920-10-15

upon their resources 10 an extent which
disturbs and endangers the stability OF
our financial system. Let us make no
mistake, however. We cannot COM
pete upon equal basis with country
whose people are willing to invest IN
foreign loans and credits until the
people of America who can invest,
have available the enlightenment and
information which will cause them to
back UP our foreign trade.
Must Upbuild Merchant Marine
Essential to our upbuilding of for
elgn trade and to its protection, and
that of our country in war, is the up
building of our merchant marine. That
Is & matter which does not, as some
people suppose, merely concern the
seaboard of our country; it concerns
the interior just as vitally. The time
mold the position into which we were
brought by the war after a century
of disintegration of American ship
ping. The bondholders and taxpayers
of the United States have invested
three billions Of dollars in new vessels.
We now have at our command q
greater gross tonnage than any but
one nation in the world. The war
nearly sextupled our merchant marine
capacity, and in the year 1919, for the
first time in fifty years, more than
ports were carried in American bot
toms.
II am in favor of holding that adj
vantage. | am in favor of the enforce
ment of the Jones act, which was in
tended to make it possible for us to
hold that advantage. l have no hest
fancy in giving full condemna tion to
the failure of the Administration to put
into effect the bidding of Congress-
am for q growing American merchant
marine. | am for it because of it's pro-
lection to us in time of war, and I am
for it because no great foreign trade
can ai ever be intrusted in great part. to
ships owned abroad and not sailing
under the American flag l am for it
because the freight rates which it
earns in exporting goods abroad are ex-
ports in themselves. | am for q merchant
marine which gives employment to
American mariners and American
crews and protects their welfare by
retaining the seamen's act of 1915,
whicE maintains the standard of Ameri-
can labor on the high seas. I am for
an American merchant marine because
it is the only protection we have
against discrimination in shipping and
! because it guarantees that America
shall have one Of the three great es-
sentials to vigorous, growing for
eign trade.
because Americas foreign trade is
Of vital interest to us all and touches
the prosperity of every home, there
because of the policy, continued during
nearly eight years Of one Administra-
tion, and resulting in heaping upon our
foreign trade impediments and neglect
| share that resentment.
First, there is our diplomacy as it
expresses our foreign policies. It has
a vital effect upon our foreign trade
We have seen a complete failure of the
Administration either to gather, or to
give, to our business men and our
people any warning of the coming Of
the World War. The impending con
! fiict was being discussed by European
statesmen and diplomatic clerks, but
our own State Department gave the
American foreign trade no warming.
rms may have been due to the fact
that the Democratic Administration had
/ demoralized our diplomatic service by
removing from their posts in important {
places substantially every trained man
and replacing them by unframed men,
some Of whom had no other qualihca-
tions than that Of being very large
canpaign contributors.
Seldom has any information come
from the Democratic State Department
that did not first reach the American
people through the reports of our
newspaper correspondents abroad. The
consular service built by Republican
mus is excellent, but the acl, of any
orgenization tc collect and digest nfor-
nation about the current politi-
cal affairs in other countries has be-
un- American policy which from hrst
to last has comprised every possible
attitudc, from active warfare to true
ulent wheeling, has kept US in the
dark rs to our future commercial re-
1ationships with Mexico
of the Administration has gathered
any substantial information about our
future business with Europe it has
failed to divulge it, yet this is time
when Europe requires our help We
can find out almost nothing from our
government IS to the conditions, social
and economic, in those countries which
need our help and might furnish us
with markets. The American people,
last Of any on earth, are able to find
out any facts about their own rela-
tionships with foreign powers. 1t
would be difficult to name a time or
! place, year or state which exhibited
more of secret diplomacy.
Policy Which Humiliates Our Pride
"The American who went abroad to
do business has been told to 90 at his
own risk and look for no help from this
country We have tasted to the dregs
policy which humiiates American
pride and represents the lowest posi-
bic ebb of government service to the
upbullding of confidence upon which
our foreign trade must be founded.
The American people repudiated