The Fight for Free Trade
DECKER, CLARENCE R.
Grassroots sentiment favors reciprocal-trade program The Fight for Free Trade By Clarence R. Decker The spirit of Cordell Hull came back to Congress this month, stirring Senate Democrats the rise...
...The tariff advocates include the nut industry...
...It revealed that Americans received income totaling more than $850 million for goods and services supplied in 1953 to this single Latin American country...
...He discovered, however, a marked lack of knowledge about exports among the people living and working in the district...
...Their findings have been the subject of much discussion in Congress...
...this spring to bring home to Americans the close connection between the sale of Venezuelan oil in the American market and the ability of the Venezuelans to purchase American goods and services at a rate approaching $1 billion a year...
...producers...
...40 to 45 per cent of the industrial workers were employed by enterprises with a greater interest in exports than in protection, as against 5 per cent of industrial workers with a greater interest in protection than in exports...
...How do the people feel about the reciprocal-trade policy...
...dairy, fishing, cattle, fruit and vegetable interests...
...Clearly, most of the industries in the Eighth District that are dependent upon exports for their margin of profit are small companies...
...participated in the sale of merchandise to Venezuela...
...some coal and oil producers...
...Both feel they have a perfect right to bring all the pressure they can muster upon the members of Congress...
...This announcement at first did not satisfy the internationalist Democrats, the internationalist Republicans, or the high-tariff men in the conservative wing of the GOP...
...Both sides are convinced of the justice of their cause...
...Piquet and Lamar reported: "Among the products manufactured in the district, there are no conspicuous instances where imports are injurious to domestic producers...
...This is the district represented in Congress by Representative Richard M. Simpson, who has repeatedly introduced bills to place tight import quotas on oil and other raw materials, and has been energetic in the drive for protectionism...
...At the Geneva Conference, the Communists have been making strenuous efforts to open up more channels of trade, demonstrating their full awereness of the importance of trade as a vital factor in the economic strength of nations in the modern world...
...It showed that this trade made jobs for about 170,000 Americans...
...There are Americans in Congress, the White House and the country who realize this...
...Yet, a great many of the people in the area were not aware of this...
...Both can point to Congressional actions in the course of American history which have favored one side or the other...
...and Representative Joel Broyhill (D.-Va...
...Clarence R. Decker was for sixteen years President of the University of Kansas City...
...reported 74 per cent in favor of such action...
...These include the U.S...
...found 57 per cent of his constituents for tariff cuts, compared with 7 per cent against them...
...In agriculture, the export interest is clearly predominant...
...The answer is, of course, that they get most of their dollar income by selling the petroleum products of their oil-rich country to American consumers...
...The most far-reaching attempt to trace the producers of United States exports to one specific country was made this year by the Venezuelan Chamber of Commerce of the United States, an organization of 300 American firms engaged in export to Venezuela, which sponsored a nationwide survey...
...companies numbering altogether more than 4,000...
...Who are the leaders on the other side...
...Although the program has become bipartisan over the years, it had come under heavy attack this spring from a group of powerful Congressmen, supported by a vocal minority of Americans...
...more than 10 to 1 in favor of the Act...
...They found that many companies in the district were directly engaged in exporting and others were "vitally affected by exports...
...In industry, there is a noticeable margin in favor of exports...
...The renewal should be by acclamation if in addition to these voices are added those of individuals and citizen groups who understand that the free world's political and military cohesiveness depends directly upon expanded trade...
...Representative Alvin Bentley (R.-Mich...
...If we do not actively and intelligently widen the flow of international trade, we will lose our position as the leading nation of the free world...
...a trend toward careful and unemotional research, encouraged by some members of the House and some trade advocates, to dig into the actual effects of foreign trade upon people in local communities in different sections of the United States...
...Several hundred in non-manufacturing enterprises are directly dependent upon foreign trade for their livelihood...
...pin, clip and fastener makers...
...The protectionists...
...They said: "Such establishments as railway companies, motor-transport concerns, warehouses, banks, and insurance companies all profit from foreign trade...
...found 69 per cent in his district for tariff reductions...
...He has also been a special assistant to the U.S...
...The controversy has been compromised with an agreement to extend the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act for one year...
...and every type of refrigeration equipment is exported...
...Analyzing the findings in an article in Harper's Magazine last February, Carroll Kilpatrick of the Washington Post wrote: "Perhaps the most significant thing about the Eighth District study is its substantial refutation of the popular argument that only the mammoth corporations of the country benefit from foreign trade...
...Calling for immediate action on the President's request for a renewal of the reciprocal-trade program, the New York Herald Tribune declared in an editorial on June 9: "It should be renewed, and without amendment...
...These varied interests converge in two active and effective groups: the Committee of Industry, Agriculture and Labor on Import-Export Policy, and the American Tariff League...
...If we do not push forward with a liberalized trade program, the Communists will crowd us out of many of our markets...
...If the past is any indication, we may be sure that the protectionists will put the fall campaigns to their own use...
...Altogether, the membership of these organizations runs to many millions of Americans...
...In view of the bitter hostility and highly-organized efforts of the minority protectionists, the control of legislative machinery by high-tariff members of Congress, and the difficulty of effecting long-range commitments in an election year, the status quo is perhaps the most that could be expected at this time and may even be considered a temporary victory...
...The largest oil company operating in Venezuela, the Creole Petroleum Corporation, conducted a nationwide campaign in the U.S...
...His study led him to this conclusion: "There can be no question where the balance of interest lies in the First Congressional District in Iowa as between a program to maintain and expand exports and a program to continue existing levels of protection for U.S...
...Most of the evidence available indicates that substantial majorities want the program to be continued and liberalized...
...and makers of ceramics, cordage and twine, matches and scientific apparatus...
...and many friends abroad...
...In 1953, Representative D. Bailey Merrill, of Evansville, Indiana, asked the Library of Congress to survey the repercussions of international trade in his Indiana district...
...The compromise, however, will disappoint many Americans...
...The Democrats declared that they would battle for a three-year program with expanded provisions...
...The size of the majority supporting the trade program is also indicated by the nature and number of the national organizations publicly advocating its continuation...
...The survey showed that more workers in this Indiana district were employed in the manufacture of refrigeration products alone...
...He announced that he would accept a one-year continuation of the Act, pending further study of possible improvements...
...The wide base of this support was evident in the vote taken last June in the House to extend the program for another year...
...Hinrichs suggested that this might reflect the fact that people often did not think of Canada as an export market, and "in other cases it may mean that suppliers of parts and other sub-contractors do not know what happens to the goods they sell...
...The survey indicates that Representative Simpson is acting counter to the economic welfare of a majority of his constituents...
...Technical Assistance (Point Four) Program...
...The Committee for a National Trade Policy sponsored an analysis of the effects of world trade in the 1st Congressional District in Iowa...
...than in all the industries that might gain from tariff production...
...The extension bill passed by a vote of 363 to 34...
...This study disclosed that American firms in at least 450 cities and towns in 43 states...
...Howard S. Piquet and Harold T. Lamar of the Library's Legislative Reference Service did the job...
...Creole executives made public speeches in many parts of the country, frankly acknowledging their self-interest in this issue, but offering facts to support their contention that their interest and the interests of other American companies in Venezuelan trade coincide with our country's national interest...
...notably Representative Daniel Reed, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee???tried to get a commitment from the President to refrain from negotiating any new agreements during the extension period...
...According to polls taken by Congressmen, voters in the Middle West, the East and the South are overwhelmingly in favor of lowering tariffs...
...Another study which uncovered similar results was made by the United States Council of the International Chamber of Commerce in the 18th Congressional District in Pennsylvania...
...This included 179 Republicans and 183 Democrats for it, together with 1 Independent...
...There were 25 Republicans against it, and 9 Democrats...
...Representative Peter Frelinghuysen (R.N.J...
...Chamber of Commerce, League of Women Voters, American Federation of Labor, Congress of Industrial Organizations, National Grange, American Veterans Committee, National Council of the Churches of Christ in America, National Farmers Union, and National Foreign Trade Council...
...Some coal producers and some independent oil companies in the United States are opposed to tariff concessions on Venezuelan oil and seek Congressional action on a bill proposed by Representative Simpson to impose strict import quotas on the flow of this oil...
...It can be renewed if even a fraction of the producers and workers whose future is tied up with expansion of exports and imports make their voices heard...
...who had looked to the President's original three-year extension proposal, with its liberalizing provisions, as the only solid basis for a dynamic foreign-trade policy???a policy that would enable the United States to advance the "trade, not aid" concept, to protect foreign markets for United States industry and agriculture, to foster employment for American workers, and, concurrently, to support American prestige in an increasingly intricate and tense international atmosphere...
...The evidence thus far gives powerful ammunition to the reciprocal-trade supporters...
...Most of them represent special interests which fear that imports are economically damaging to them...
...The hope for a long-range policy is thus deferred for another year???to the next session of Congress...
...There are enough such Americans to make sure that the United States will stay on the road of reciprocal trade...
...These polls confirm what many observers of the national scene have long known: The American people have accepted the policy of breaking down trade barriers as an essential part of a sound economic program for the prosperity and power of the free world...
...The strength of the protectionists in his own party led President Eisenhower to retreat from his original request: a three-year extension of the Trade Agreements Act with liberalizing provisions recommended by the Randall Commission...
...It is to be hoped, on the other side, that those who really believe that international trade is vital to the national welfare will redouble their efforts...
...Four weeks of field investigation were undertaken by A. Ford Hinrichs, who interviewed manufacturers and canvassed farm groups with the aid of experts from the Iowa State College...
...Yet, there has been an encouraging trend this year...
...Where do the Venezuelans get the millions they pour into the United States to pay for all these goods and services...
...In the meantime, the issue may, and should, be important in the fall elections...
...the road of prosperity and mutual security for the free nations...
...Grassroots sentiment favors reciprocal-trade program The Fight for Free Trade By Clarence R. Decker The spirit of Cordell Hull came back to Congress this month, stirring Senate Democrats the rise and fight for the reciprocal-trade program launched under Hull's sponsorship just twenty years ago...
Vol. 37 • June 1954 • No. 26
