First Move

When President Roosevelt has a difficult job he resorts to his great gift for persuasion. Immediately after taking office he resorted to it to reassure the public about the banking crisis. He resorted to it to win public acceptance of NRA. He resorted to it to get his gold bill passed. And last week when he made the first move in his long delayed tariff policy, he resorted to persuasion once again. To Congress he sent a message stating a simple fact, dramatizing it with an appeal to human sympathy, reinforcing it with a man-to-man appeal for understanding:

"Our exports in 1933 were but 52% of the 1929 volume, and 32% of the 1929 value. This has meant idle hands, still machines, ships tied to their docks, despairing farm household and hungry industrial families. . . . You and I know that the world does not stand still; that trade movements and relations once interrupted can with the utmost difficulty be restored; that even in tranquil and prosperous times there is a constant shifting of trade channels. . . . Every nation must at all times be in a position quickly to adjust its taxes and tariffs to meet sudden changes and avoid severe fluctuations in both its exports and its imports. . . .

"I hope for early action."

The action which he hoped for was passage of a bill giving him power to bargain with foreign nations for reciprocal trade agreements and on his own authority to raise or lower U. S. tariff rates by not more than 50%. He might have added that although he hoped for early action he hardly expected it. Often and candidly his Congressional advisers have told him that a tariff proposal would stir up a storm at the Capitol that would last most of the summer.

The bill which the President sent to the Ways & Means Committee was actually briefer than his message. It would authorize him to make trade agreements of three years duration, with the proviso that thereafter they could be terminated on six months notice. His power to raise or lower tariffs by 50% to fulfill the terms of such agreements would not extend to putting articles on the free list or taking them off. He argued that such tariff-flexing was necessary to bargain with foreign nations and to put his bargains into effect without waiting for the uncertain assent of the Congress. He promised that his actions under the proposed law would be carefully weighed "so as to give assurance that no sound and important American interest will be injuriously disturbed."

Republican Congressmen, old hands at tariff dealings, were not swayed by the President's persuasion. Immediately they raised a chorus of condemnation, seized the bill as a partisan issue. Senator McNary cried out that it was another Article X of the League of Nations. House Leader Snell called it "the most outrageous demand for authority ever voiced by any Executive in the history of this country." Even Senator Borah found himself shoulder to shoulder with Old Guardsmen when he declared that the bill was a demand that the Senate give up its treaty-making powers.

A long, hard fight loomed, and possibly an unsuccessful one if tariff-protected business took alarm. Since 1930 the President has had authority to raise or lower tariffs 50% on recommendation of the Tariff Commission after hearings to determine that such changes would "equalize manufacturing costs" at home and abroad. Under this authority a few tariffs have been raised, almost none lowered. The new bill places the responsibility for changes directly on the President.

Last week while the President waited for Congress to start its tariff battle, he went ahead with his other foreign trade plans. George N. Peek, who got out of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration because he felt that the U. S. farmer would be the loser by Brain Truster Tugwell's plans for restricting production, was brought back into the Administration fold on his own terms. He agreed to head the Export-Import Bank founded to promote Russian trade. Later he was also expected to take command of two other unformed banks, one to promote trade with Cuba, the other, trade with the rest of the world.

The Administration did not want to lose the support of a man who has so wide a following among farmers, and Mr. Peek insisted on authority to put his own plans for expanding markets into effect. He not only was given the job of heading the three banks, but retained as the President's "adviser on foreign trade." Having got these concessions, he issued a tripartite manifesto on his personal plans:

"To agriculture:

"I shall not forget the farmers' interest, to which I have devoted myself for at least a decade. I have said on many occasions that I am in politics for agriculture, not in agriculture for politics. I call attention to the fact that for many years I have advocated expansion of our agricultural exports. . . . Increased export of agricultural products to some countries is possible to some extent in spite of existing handicaps, while exports of industrial products alone are possible to certain other countries. Both types of exports can benefit the farmer. . . .

"To industry:

"... I urge industry in its own interest to be temperate in its demands and I invite its fullest cooperation. I want to make it clear that this bank . . . has not been created for the purpose of acting as Santa Claus to hand out presents at home and abroad. Eventually, exports and imports must balance.

"To the public generally:

". . . We did not get into our trouble in a few weeks or months, and we shall not be lifted out of it by any miracle. . . ."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.