The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1921-03-14

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had taken Europe fifty years to &C
lions of dollars in America. 1t hat
been accomplished only thru organ
ization and systematic effort. Hel
people were schooled in thrift, in saw
ing, in greater production and to ad
venture into foreign investments
Europe was fast becoming the cred
itOr of the rest of the world and hel
statesmen and leaders of industry
were educating her citizens to assume
that position and maintain it. On
the other hand Americas foreign
trade just grew haphazard. England
Germany, France, Holland, Belgium
were our creditors to the extent OF
billions and therefore our natural
markets. Their merchants were good
customers and good pay. They
wanted and absorbed our surplus
merchandise readily and at fair
prices. There was no organization
in America, no systematic effort to
acquire world trade. We had no in
ternational chamber of commerce, nc
foreign trade councils, no foreign in
vestment corporations to mobilize our
investment capital for use in foreign
lands our money could be employed
at home-no thrift clubs and NO
schooling of our people to ever as
sumo leadership in world affairs. Our
local chambers of commerce knew lit
tie or nothing of world markets, their
needs or the opportunities they Of
fered for the extention of foreign
trade. The whole continent of South
America was entering on a period of
vast development and calling for
both merchandise and investment
capital. The Orient-China, Japan,
the islands of the sea were waking
up and men with vision and under
standing of world cycles saw oppor-
tunities for trade and investment and
development beyond the widest
dreams of Cortez or Pizzaro.
What mattered it to America Eu-
rope was our neighbor, our friend,
our big creditor. Europe was there
fore our market and ours for keeps.
She bought our surplus supplies and
If we bought less from her, our tour
lists absorbed the balance in her
shops, her picture galleries, her auc-
ton sales and her hotels and tips to
her servants. We were debtor ma
ton by several billions and it would
be years and years and years before
we would discharge the debts and
become the worlds creditor with its
obligations and responsibilities.
Wages and Prices Raise
Let me digress here long enough to
say, that because our production,
our industries, our commerce and
our foreign trade had developed and
prospered without great mental dis
cipline on the part of the masses of
our people, the war found it mentally
equipped to do exactly the things we
did do during the years of fighting
We bought and sold without stint or
limit. We raised wages and prices
again and again; no price was too
high, inequality too good. We were
drunk with the wine of prosperous
times and we lived and worked and
spent without thought of the morrow.
What can be more impressive of this
than to think back today of the friend
with an income of $4,000 or $4,000 at
most who bought an $500 car in
1917, exchanged it for a new model
in 1918 and again for the newest
model in 1919. Or of Mr.. Kincaid's
story of the two lads who came with
a check for $500, the reward for
labor at SO per day, and left minute
later with $500 in money and two
hats. War has forced America into
the position of leadership in the COM
merce and trade of the world as the
great creditor nation, and these
things suggest how deficient we are
as nation in mental equipment to
assume this leadership. We are like
the young princeling, unframed and
without kingly qualifications, called
to the throne in troublous times. We
stand irresolute and afraid.
Effect of the War
In 1914 came the war. We need !
not tell it's story. We know it only
too we'll. Like an avalanche from |
the mountain side, imperialism
hurled itself into the valleys of
democracy and the battle between /
the two forces was on. Instead of |
the commerce of peace, Europe was
searching the world for the things
that make war. Americas fields, |
and mines, her forests and factories
were made ready for the food of
orders that came from Europe and
with the orders came gold and more
gold to pay the bills. When the sup
plv of gold was exhausted the four
billion dollars of American securities
stocks, bonds, mortgages were
poured into the treasury of the war
and sent to America and translated
INTO more food for war. America en-
cred the war and loaned many more
billions to Europe for still more war
and America herself
borrowed billions for her own needs.
The armistice came and war ceased,
tut Europe's needs were as impera-
i've as before. With her industries
'rostrate, having no gold to pay and
10 merchandise to exchange, she con-
inued to buy in America, on credit,
o that by the end of 1919 her float
ng Indebtedness in America aside
rom government loans was a little |
more than four billion dollars. II
Result to Business
See then what four years of war {
las done. America in 1914 a debtor
,atlon to the amount of four bill c