The Waterbury Democrat., 1938-02-09

has put himself in alliance metal companies and the Br
 Reason is that the Congression- al move to make the U. s. A. in- dependent of British tin has col- lided head-on with Cordell HulPs attempt to negotiate a trade treaty with Great Britain. And between the two, the Secretary of State is loyal to his one great love-tariff reduction.
 Mir. Hull is even more faithful to this than to his old friend from Tennessee, Representative Sam McReynolds, who obligingly has pushed many measures through his Foreign Affairs Committee.
 McReynolds is now investigat- ing the monopoly of tin by which the United States, al- though using more than half of the worlds tin consumptions, is completely dependent upon Brit ish smelterS. Even crude tin pro- duced in Alaska is shipped all the way to Liverpool, refined, then shipped back again.
 The United States could import tin from Bolivia, thus making it. self independent of Britain, but only one small tin Smelter exists in the United States, and it can- not operate because it cannot get raw tin. Neither Bolivia nor the Dutch East Indies nor the British Malays will sell raw tin to the United States except at artificial ly higher prices.
 Mysterious Monopoly
 Recently representative of Dutch tin interests conferred with U. s. authorities, offered to sell tin here. Then mysteriously he disappeared. On another occasion negotiations were opened with Siam for the purchase of tin. But just as they were progressing, British diplomacy stepped in, and the British monopoly was pre- served.
 In Bolivia, tin is controlled by Simon Patino, the greatest in dividual tin producer in the world, who in turn is financed and controlled by the British. Bolivian tin is sold chiefly to the United States, but first goes to Britain to be smelted. Dutch tin is also controlled by the British.
 How this monopoly is main- tained remains partial mystery. But the reason behind it is no mystery-namely, Britain's desire to monopolize one of the worlds absolutely essential metals. With out tin, no food could be canned. and in case of war the United States would use up it's tin sup ply in one month.
 AnglO-American Deal
 One key to the mystery is rumored interlocking British American interests. Representative McReynolds is Investigating re- port that the U. s. Steel Corpora ton. biggest American user of tin, has an agreement with the British to divide up the tin-plate markets, also that there is U. s. Steel in- terest in the British combine.
 The National Lead Company, an American firm heavily interested in tin, also presumably is in the British combine. Its chairman, Edward J. Cornish. is chairman of Patino Mines and Enterprises, while its president, Fred M. Car ter, is a director and vice-presi- dent of the Patino company.
 Thus big American business appears to cooperate in the British monopoly. and Secretary Hull seems to c0ndone it Re- gently he proposed 10 Mickey holds that the United States buy a huge reserve of tin for war emergencies, rather than set up it's own smelters. Mc- Reynolds urges the latter plan.
 American dependence on for eign ore cannot be avoided. Mo- Reynolds contends, but depen- dence on foreign smelling can be. Free Movie
 The government is offering its $50,000 moving picture, The River, to any exhibitor who will pay merely the shipping costs.
 In this way it is expected that about 5O,000,0O0 persons will see the history of floods and erosion in the waterways of the Mississip- pi. This is five times the audi ence which saw the "The Flow"
 "The Flow That Broke the Plains" was put out timidly by the Resettlement A d m n istration, fearful of the charge of propa- ganda in election year. It was dis tributed by RA field offices, never handled by commercial distrib- uting agent.
 But "The River" is being han dled by Paramount, which bally-