Evening Post. TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1911. MOMENTOUS RECIPROCITY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 25, 31 January 1911, Page 6

Evening Post. TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1911. MOMENTOUS RECIPROCITY.

-— — «gi The prospect of reciprocity between Canada and the United States is still far from a certainty, but it is decidedly brighter .than the best-informed prophete regarded it when the negotiations opened in the beginning of November. If the commissioners engaged on behalf of the two countries concerned had been plenipotentiaries, the matter would indeed be definitely settled, for they have arrived at an agreement, the terms of which were roughly summarised in our cablegrams on Saturday. The general character of this provisional agreement squares with the anticipations that had been reported both from Ottawa and from Washington. Manufacturers have j been but very slightly touched, and the reductions are mostly confined to articles on which each country can benefit its own consumers without any violent disturbance of vested interests. The free list is entirely confined to agricultural produce or the raw materials of industry. Each country is to remove in the other's favour all the duties on wheat and other grains, dairy produce, fresh fruits, fish, eggs, poultry, cattle, sheep and vegetables. Canada is to place cotton-seed on her free list, and to lower the duty on agricultural machinery. The United States, on the other hand, makes the important concession of admitting Canadian timber free, and the rates on secondary food products are to be reciprocally lowered by both countries, and also those on what is described as "an extensive list of manufactures." From the fact that the names of these manufactures are not given in any case, and also from the comments of The Times, it may be inferred that the list is more extensive than important, and as to the extent of the reductions no information is supplied. Items which are likely to cause deep searchings of heart in_Canada are pulpwood and paper. From the comments of The Times, we learn that America is to admit paper free, conditionally on the remission by Canada of the duty on pulp. But the statement of Mr. Fielding, the Dominion Minister of Finance, makes it clear that Canada's abandonment of the restrictions on the exportation of pulpwood is to be absolute. In order to encourage the local manufacture of paper, Ontario many years ago prohibited the export of the logs from which wood-pulp is made, and Quebec imposed what was the equivalent of an export duty. The United States retorted with a retaliatory duty on pulp and paper made from the timber of the restrictive provinces, but provision was also made that the paper duties should be lowered and pulp admitted free if the restrictions were removed. As Canada remained obdurate the retaliation enacted in 1897 was repeated in the Payne Act of 1909; but the way of peace is now opened. It is, however, very doubtful whether Ontario and Quebec will be willing to see it taken. The struggle will be keen, but Tho limes correspondent expresses the opinion that the agreement will ' be passed both by the Dominion Parliament and by the United States House of Representatives, but that it will be wrecked in the Senate. It must be hard indeed for the best-informed man in either country to balance the gains of the Californian fruitgrowers against the losses of New England, and all the other prospective losses and gains on the two sides; and from this distance the calculation would be difficult, even if we had the fullest details of all the reductions proposed and all the articles affected. What mainly concerns us here is the principle involved and the probable effect of the arrangement upon Imperial development. As President Taft very wisely says in '.his message to Congress; "the financial gain is not the only result to be attained." The promotion of friendly relations between the two countries is a still more important object. The same view was recently urged in the Canadian ; Senate by Sir Richard Cartwright, the Minister of Trade- and Commerce. "There are more considerations in this matter," he said, "than pounds, shillings, and pence. ... In my opinI ion no one thing can be done by Canada; i or Canadian politicians which will be a I hundredth part as great a service to the British Empire as promoting in every way equitable and friendly relations be- | tween the two great Anglo-Saxon Powers." We entirely sympathise with this view, though we dissent from the theory of the Washington Star that Canada will best escape from "the isolation and humiliation" of her position as a colony by carrying her intimacy with the United States to the point ofi being swallowed.