Why should Trade benefit Everyone but Us?

What does a man do when he opposes current legislation in Congress, but also stands against the economic policies advocated by the Bill’s opponents? Free Trade is not the panacea for vast growth; actually, Trade today could not dramatically increase in Volume, Air traffic, Sea traffic, Harbor facilities, and Airports restrict any major increase in Volume. Any perceived increases from this Point in Time will be more Inflationary than Technological or Provisionary. Any Specialty Advantage of geographic locality, if ever found, will more likely displace current volumes of Trade, leading to the reconstruction of domestic Production. Any reflective Projections suggest that any World Trade which will increase comes from Production wholly outside the United States, delivered to Countries other than the United States.

What bothers me about Free Traders as exhibited by these Signatories comes from their total rejection of the role of Regulation in Trade. They oppose Tariffs in any form, rile against any forms of Quotas, and deny any potential advantage in protecting Trade-sensitive industries when that Protection can be without major alteration of Trade flows or World prices. They tend to ridicule the Concept of Tariff compensation for the added domestic Production Cost of domestic taxes, granting domestic industries competitive Marketing status. I’ve heard rants against the Smoot-Hawley Tariff law until it is coming out of my ears, but it was only One tariff system out of a probable 6,000 such tariff systems passed in the history of this World. The greatest majority of those tariff system worked with relative effectiveness, and the current World Development was engineered inside their Boundaries.

I favor a uniform Tariff, based not upon type of Product, but resident solely on foreign production; whether in Unit or Part of Production. I see no Need to tax any form of foreign materials utilized in Production; though One could be established for the excessive use of foreign Energy fuels. It amazes Me that current Economic doctrines renounce the Traditional practice of regulating Trade for the furtherance and betterment of the domestic economy. Helping foreign economies to develop Industrial strength may be laudable, but why should there be this rejection of beneficial outcomes for domestic industry? lgl