SELLING OUT THE KAISER

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 9964, 7 May 1918, Page 6

SELLING OUT THE KAISER

HIS COMMERCIAL POWER.'IN U.S.A. SHATTERED.

If the recommendations of A. Mitchell Palmer, alien property custodian, and which have the President's approval, are atvepteu oy the Congress, states the San i'rancitco ''Star," tho commercial power of tho Kaiser in America will -be snat-tc-red, if not entirely destroyed. This would be an effective blow against the '.'world supremacy" which lies behind ■all the Jiaiser's military plans, and would be a notification to Germany that she may not hope for a restoration of in© conditions which formerly prevailed, after the war The immense wharves and docks of the Hamburg-American and North German, Lloyd lines at Hoboken, N.J., will bo sold, if Palmer's plans aa - e carried out, together with many other properties ol great value in which tho German Government is believed to have a controlling interest. With these properties in the possession of Americans, or at least of subject* of countries with which we are in sympathy, the power for evil in out commercial, social, and political at' fairs will b» broken, and precautions

ssvould be taken to forever prevent its re-ostahlishinent on this continent.

Regarding the great interests nominally owned by Germans, but to be "operated under direction or for the benefit t>f the German Empire* Palmer declared:

"I am making chocolate, in .Connecticut, rails in Pennsylvania, -woollens and worsteds in New Jersey, chemicals in New York, lumber in Florida, raising ugar in Porto Bico and Hawaii, tobacco in. many, gtatcs in the south, making beer in Chicago, lead noncils' in New Jersey, and conducting all these concerns, many of which are makinjj enormous profits by reason of the- very condition's for which -theoncniy is responsible —wo i conditions. "If I must simply sit here, with the possibility of- re, ii.-na>g both principal and profits to the German owners at the end of the war. 1 am damp a tremendous favour, to the Gorman empire, our enemy." ~ , When the great readjustment comes, following the return of oeace, common sense will dictate that we should erect barriers n-irninst foreign -interests exercising control ovei anv considerable portion of this country's commerce. V, o may even see the wisdom of forbidding, as doe-, Jbpaii. the ownership of land by •iliens and a new demand may arise that American industries, banking interests and politics be controlled and conducted In- and for Americans—native-born and naturalised. "Those who are not willing to a'sume the duties and responsibilities of citizenship, in spirit as well as name should be treated as unwelcome vwitoXß,