Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-10-04

, the great issue.
Some of the people may not see it
now. Other things blur their vision
tariff. farm relief, prohibition, foreign
commerce, unemployment.
But the penetrating eye OF the PreSi-
dent looking beneath the superficial
and ephemeral, looking beyond the lin
| tied horizon of the here and the now,
sees to the heart of the great problem
and knows that 1t reaches to the very
foundations of the Republic. And so
! in solemn words he warns U.S. Thus
! far America has been built upon a
! system which holds that the major
! purpose Of q State is to protect the
| people and to give them equality of
! opportunity. that the basis of all hap
| pinesS is in development of the indi-
vidual that the sum of progress can
only be gagged by the progress of the
! individual, that we should steadily
build up cooperation among the peo-
| pie themselves to these ends. Shall we
stand b. that system and remain
America, or shall we regiment the pop
ulation into a bureaucracy and direct
every man as to what he may or may
not do, and become another Russia?
Americanism Seen Issue.
There is the real issue, individualism
or collectiviSm, capitalism or commu-
nism, Arlericanism or bolShevism, the
! republic or the soviet?
This issue, IN set terms, may not be
fought out in the next campaign. But
tho outcome of that campaign will have
a very direct bearing on it, one way or
or another. The Republican party
stands for the American system. The
lican party, in Congress and out, is
against that system. 1t Is fighting for
measures which, If adopted, will under
| mine the entire fabric of our Govern
ment as the fathers founded it. It Is
fighting for a creed foreign to our
people. 1t Is asking us to abandon the
philosophy America has followed for
$50 years.
The first and most insistent demand
that is made upon us is that we aban-
don the American system of the pro-
tective tariff. An accepted Democratic
leader recently told this radio audience
that high tariff walls should come
down alike everywhere to a common
level" That doctrine must sound
strange in the ears of a score of other
countries whose tariff levels are higher
than our own. It must sound stranger
still in the ears of American citizens
who have somehow conceived the idea
that the United States is the best judge
OF the legislation that will promote its
own interests, and that in framing its
tariff laws it can do without either the
example or the advice of other nations
Never before, so far as recall has any
american statesman suggested that all
the tariff laws OF all the nations should
be on the same level, a suggestion which
gives no consideration to the differences
In situation, in products, in markets,
in needs and tastes that exist among
the peoples of the world, and that as
sumeS as a possibility what every one
must realize with moments thought
Is impossible. Certainly never before
has any American statesman demanded
that the Congress of the United States
in framing tariff law should consult
not the needs and interests of the
American people but the statutes Of
other nations.
HawIey- SmOOt Tariff.
The Hawley-Smoot tariff bill became
law June II, 1880. It was precisely
Congress, a limited revision" of the
tariff act of 1922, and not a general
revision as these who had opposed it
declared. In a report after the law
had been in operation a year, the
Tariff Commission stated that of the
| $500 dutiable items mentioned in the
| bill, 800 were altered and 2,170 were
untouched. To the charge that duties
| in the bill were unreasonably increased
the Tariff Commission responds that
In the value of the total imports the
duties were increased upon approx
mately 22.5 per cent, while IT'S per
| cent were either untouched or actually
| decreased.
The President asked in his message
| to Congress that the tariff be revised
especially in the interest of agriculture,
and that request was complied with.
| OF all the increases made in the
bill as reported by the Tariff Commits
sion, 1878 per cent are upon produce
OF agricultural origin measured in
value, while only 6.25 per cent are upon
commodities of strictly non-agricultural
origin. The average rate upon agri-
cultural raw materials shows an in
crease in this bill from 1902 per
cent carried in the old law to
1892 per cent, whereas the in
crease on dutiable articles of strictly
ether than agricultural origin was from
3l.O2 per cent to 34.3l per cent. In
other words, the duties of interest to
agriculture were increased nearly IL
per cent, while the duties which con-
cerned INDUSTRY were increased but 3
per cent. Not only were duties in
creased on the things the farmer has
to sell, but 100 imported articles, the
things the farmer has to buy, were
placed on the free list.
Sell to Best Market.
The most insistent attack upon the
new law Is made on the score that it
has destroyed our foreign trade. Other
natlonS VIII not buy in America, we are
TOLD, unless they can sell here. Moth
ing could be farther from the truth,
To cite just two examples: IT. the fiscal
year 1929 British South Africa sold in
the United States only 100000 worth
OF goods, but she bought in our markets
S63 ,OO0,0 900 worth of commodities. The
same year We sold to Japan only $685.
OOO,OOO worth of things, but we bought
from Japan $431, 600, 700 worth. BUSH
ness is cold blooded. It does not go by
favor. 1t goes by price list. Men of all
nations sell in the best market they
can find, and they buy where they can
buy cheapest. Lowering of the Ameri-
can tariff surely would dump larger
quantities of foreign goods on our mar
kets, diSplacing just that amount of our
domestic production and correspond
ingly adding to our unemployment, but
it would not create market for dol
lars worth Of American products in for
eign lands. The falsity of the claim
that Our alleged high tariff prevents
other nations from selling to us and
therefore restricts their purchases from
us is demonstrated by the Custom
House records which show that since the
present law went into effect imports of
goods which are on our free list have
declined to a greater extent than our
dutiable imports. AS to our export trade,
the records prove that 10 representative
countries comprising our leading Gus
toners purchased 20 per cent of their
imports from the United States last
year, while their purchases from us dur
ing the normal years 1924-1927, before
only 20.7 per cent of their total i'm
ports. Official records conclusively re-