Happy Motoring

Since Leon Henderson clamped down on sales of new cars in the U.S. two months ago, some 650,000 1942 models have piled up. That number would scarcely be enough to supply the demand in California and New York--if Californians and New Yorkers could have them. But they would be enough to give almost every automobile owner in Latin America a new car. They could take care of the entire U.S. export market (as of 1940) for three and a half years.

At Rio de Janeiro last month, Sumner Welles told Latin Americans they would get such things as autos, tires, refrigerators --all the shiny gadgets and machines the U.S. has given up for the duration. The U.S. will keep 135,000 cars for official use. Another 14,580 have already been licensed for export. To Latin America some of the rest will go as needed.

The Good Neighbor policy (rubber division) got another boost last week when President Roosevelt vetoed a bill which would have encouraged the growing of guayule and other rubber-bearing plants. His objection: the bill's encouragement was confined to the U.S.; he wanted Mexican and Brazilian rubber promoted too. A Senate committee hastily revised the bill to promote guayule-growing anywhere in the Western Hemisphere.

Neumaticos Para Turistas? The New York Times printed startling news from Laredo, Tex.: "American tourists visiting Mexico can obtain all of the automobile tires they need. . . ."

In the two months since Pearl Harbor, 3,242 tourist cars entered Mexico at Nuevo Laredo-a drop of 1,407 from the same two months last year. Tourists were staying away. They feared a Japanese invasion of Mexico; it was unpatriotic to drive cars for pleasure; they did not want to wear out their tires touring in Mexico or anywhere else.

Mexico can afford to sell new tires in order to lure tourists. Enough crude rubber is stored in Mexican tire factories to keep them running as usual through 1942. Made of guayule rubber, with small amounts of Brazilian crude, these tires are the same kind the U.S. may eventually get. But even the best of them-General Popo, Goodrich Euzcadi-are none too good. Said an amiable Mexican: "They don't wear as long-but then, you don't pay as much for them."

The news seemed too good to be true. It was. Leon Henderson quickly ran up a warning signal, said: "No one may bring new tires or tubes into the United States . . . except under express authority of the OPA."

Probably the only new tires the U.S. would see in the next year or two would be on the sleek new cars of Latin tourists, inspecting the quaint, little-traveled byways of the U.S.

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