THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1934 PLAIN WORDS TO AMERICA

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21968, 27 November 1934, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1934 PLAIN WORDS TO AMERICA

If President Roosevelt, with the aid of Congress, is agreeable to giving j "rapid and dramatic" effect to the : latest proposals of his advisers, this old and worried world will have a: happier grip on life ere long. In, this instance the advisers are a com-' mission of inquiry into national policy in international affairs, a commission of Mr. Roosevelt s own-j approving. From time to time he j has been obviously ill at ease about j the direction he was taking, al- j though in some respects it was the j direction the United States had ; been taking long before he came to office. His New Deal itself, in spite of his courageous bearing, has given him many qualms, and in his revising of plans according to his admittedly "trial and error"" method of attacking problems he has shown a lack of certainty—it must be accounted a wise frame of mind j whether he was on the right track. 1 These advisers tell him that not only has he been on the wrong track in following the lure of economic nationalism, but that the United States ought to abandon the traditional path of isolation followed foolishly so long. The report they have presented is the most damning indictment of official American wrongheadedness ever laid against the Executive and Congress. It condemns the reluctance to settle war debts, adding a stern word about American default and repudiation in days gone by; it condemns high tariff walls; it condemns playing witlh the price of gold; it condemns discriminatory legislation against migrants from the Orient; it condemns the disinclination to join the League's Permanent Court of International Justice; it condemns the strict limits within which co-opera-tion with the League has been kept. In the commission's own words, the tremd toward isolation ought to be reversed; as far as possible, "under proper safeguards," the United States should get quickly into the stream of world co-operation. From the outline of the recommendations, their sweeping nature can. be appreciated. In the forefront, and of greatest significance, is the urging to establish a commission to settle war debts. Many Americans have been saying this for years*. They first used the name "Shylock" in this connection. The antithesis of "honour or dollars" was their way of putting the facts. They saw and said that the insistence on payment to the uttermost cent was bad business for the United States and a crime against the world. This bold commission takes its stand with them. A particularly interesting suggestion is that in the settlement credit should be given for defaulted obligations of "political units of the United States." This refers to the flagrant ignoring of contracted liabilities by certain southern States, which have ignominiously sheltered under a decision of the Federal Government to disclaim resppnsibility to the European bondholders, chiefly British nationals. Sydney Smith, the famous canon of St. Paul's, sent at the beginning of this impudent default a "humble petition" to the American Congress, describing the repudiation as "a fraud as enormous as ever disgraced the worst king of the most degraded nation of Europe." What he called the "new infamy" has continued since the loans of days before,the Civil War. Twelve States have been involved—Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, Minnesota, Michigan and Virginia, not all southern and not all in the earliest lists—and the dishonoured bonds were put by the North American Review in 1884 at £61,815,800, an amount carrying interest for an average period of 63 years. The British Council of Foreign Bondholders and the Association of British Chambers, of Commerce have made repeated representations to the American Treasury without avail, its sophistry in denial of liability being castigated by the New York Times and by Professor McDougall, of Harvard. The latter made pungent reference to a nation ,that. displays "a primitive, uncritical conviction of its moral superiority to all other States." The commission's reminder of some of these defaults is in order; the principle of acknowledging them is highly relevant, whatever the money value of any proposed set-off against ihe war debts. The rest of the recommendations all point to a wiser course than Washington has been inclined to take. America's high tariffs have obstructed general economic recovery, arid arbitrary American fluctuations in the price of gold have added to the difficulties faced by the world. To put an end to these baleful influences would create needed assurance for trade and currency over a wide area. The dropping of the absolute ban, by legislation, on all immigration from the Orient—placing this matter again within the scope of the quotas instead of making it a direct" affront

to peoples of the Far East—would be a friendly gesture, especially to Japan. On the relations of the United States to the League a refreshingly new lead is given. An American judge is on the panel of the World Court bench, placed there by the vote of the Council and the Assembly, but hitherto there has been no acceptance of the international duty to allow cases involving the- United Slates to be submitted to the, tribunal; the path to that desirable co-operation in the settlement of disputes has been repeatedly blocked bv American "reservations," advanced to provide excuses for aloofness from the main work of the League. It has been unconvincing as to both its wisdom and its sincerity, and to be done with it would do the world much good. In many other wajs there has been welcome and valuable American co-operation with the League, in the manifold activities that are so often forgotten and yet are so useful; but the recommendation apparently looks further, to a closer touch with the peacemaking and peacekeeping task. It \\ould,peihaps, be too much to expect that: League membership is soon likely; from such a reversal of policy Washington may still shrink. Howe\er, there is no mistaking the direction of the commission's recommendation. When the possibilities are officially examined, even so great a plunge may be found possible. What a difference it would make! The proposals raise many hopes of better things, attainable the more surely and speedily with the fuller entry of the United States to world affairs. Mr. Roosevelt can hardly turn a deaf ear to this commission's advice. What will he have to say to Congress about it, and what will Congress say in answer? All the world will want to know soon.