WORLD RESTORATION

Taranaki Daily News, 1 September 1933, Page 6

WORLD RESTORATION

ANGLO-AMERICAN VIEWS A WIDE DIVERGENCE. THE LONDON CONFERENCE. FAILED BEFORE COMMENCED.

(By T.C.L.—No. 2.) The London Economic Conference was foredoomed to failure the moment President Roosevelt intimated to Mr. Ramsay MacDonald that the question of war debts was to be ruled out of the discussions. To the British and other European countries this was the key to the situation, this the bridge over the river of stagnation and depression, this the way to recovery and stabilisation. Everything else—tariff review, exchange stabilisation, armament reductions—was secondary. There is reason to believe that when the idea of holding the conference was first mooted, President-elect Roosevelt sincerely desired to consider every matter and every problem that entered into the situation that had brought about the world “malaise,” but after the assembly of Congress he soon found that public opinion as expressed and represented by the people’s elect at Washington was not sufficiently advanced or informed to permit him to proceed with the programme he had set himself to follow in respect to world affairs. He dare not risk his power and influence on such an issue at such a time. He had more vital and important things to consider. He and his Cabinet, had just worked out a series of domestic measures designed to ameliorate the conditions of the United States, all of them highly controversial, many of-them socialistic, most of them policies without precedent. Between the two policies, foreign and domestic, there was no room for doubt as to the more urgent and important to submit to and carry through Congress. ADVISERS DIFFER. This fact has to be recognised in arriving at a judgment of President Roosevelt’s seemingly illogical and inconsistent attitude in connection with the London Conference. But there is another factor having an important bearing on the matter to be considered. Cabinet and the President’s advisers, “The Brain Trust,” were not at one as to the right course for America to follow in connection with the conference nor in regard to even the domestic policy. Two of the strongest men behind the President were Secretary of State Cordell Hull and Assistant Secretary of State Raymond Moley, but between them was a wide gulf of difference as to the means to adopt to regain prosperity. Mr. Hull is a free trader by conviction; he thinks the world will never recover until tariff restrictions are eliminated and other impediments to trade removed. A few weeks before the Conference he said: “It. follows beyond question that business recovery must be preceded by the restoration of international finance and commerce, the alternative to which is a continuance of the unsound economic policies under the operation of which the entire world since 1929 has been in the throes of an unspeakable depression.” The world took heart from this declaration, and felt that at last America had realised the impossibility of maintaining a policy that took no account of the effects of the operation of war debt payments on the exchanges of the world.

But a few weeks later Mr. Moley, the' man who was until this week at the right hand of the President and declared to be responsible for the National Recovery measures, sang to a different key. “It is overwhelmingly clear that a good part of the ills of each country is domestic. The action of an international conference which attempted to bring about cures for these difficulties solely by international measures would necessarily end in failure. In large part the cures for our difficulties lie within ourselves. Each nation must set its own house in order. There are relatively few remedies which might be called international remedies. The people of the United States must recognise that world trade is, after all, only a small percentage of the entire trade of the United States. This means that our domestic policy is of paramount importance. Common sense dictates that we build the basis of our prosperity here.” PRESIDENT ADDS TO CONFUSION. It was just after this that President Roosevelt made one or two statements which did not clear up matters or'show that there was a coordination' of thought and .purpose between him and his principal advisers. He said, on May 6, that the Economic Conference must succeed quickly and that “the task is so complex and difficult that unless it is approached by all nations with the fullest and sincerest desire to arrive at a result, the conference cannot succeed.” The next day, addressing the American people, Mr. Roosevelt reiterated his belief that “the domestic situation is inevitably and deeply tied in with the conditions in all the other nations of the world.” Again,, in a message to the world, he insisted that “the conference must establish order in place of the present chaos by a stabilisation of currencies, by freeing the flow of world trade, and by international action to raise price levels. It must, in short, supplement individual domestic programmes for economic recovery by wise and considered international action.” Thus we had three voices announcing three sets of views and policies, two of them diametrically opposed to each other. Without unity on the part of America in the presentation of its programme or proposals it was hopeless to expect a conference of 66 nations, all with their own political and social, as well as the major economic problems to solve, to reach any well defined and helpful conclusions. BRITAIN AND AMERICA. In the light of what happened at the Conference, it is a great pity that representatives of Britain and America could not have got together before the Conference was called and endeavoured to reach an agreement on the more important proposals. It is true that the British Prime Minister paid a visit to President Roosevelt and discussed matters with him, but obviously Mr. MacDonald was not the right man to send on such a mission. He admits he knows nothing about finance and economics, and whilst he is exceedingly popular in the States he is regarded more as a visionary political evangelist than a practical and discerning statesman. It is also true that Sir Frederick Leith-Ross, chief economic adviser to the British Government, paid a visit to the White House and attempted to negotiate a final settlement of the British war debt with the Roosevelt administration. That mission was unsuccessful for the reason that Congress had given no evidence of a change of opinion or heart on the subject. HOPELESSLY DIVIDED. Besides the war debt question, Britain could not see eye to eye with America over the proposals advanced for monetary stabilisation. America had gone off the gold standard as the first step in her national recovery enterprise and was

bent on cheapening the value of the dollar in order to bring its purchasing power more into line with its previous purchasing power and also to enable American merchants and manufacturers to. compete in the world’s markets on fairer terms with other nations. Again the United States and Great Britain were not in accord on the policy to raise prices by the initiation of large domestic programmes of public works. The British Chancellor of the Exchequer, even in March last, made it. "clear that British expenditure on public improvements would be very much restricted, and that experience had.- taught them that this form of economic stimulation was futile and hopeless. An essential part of America’s new economic- rehabilitation plan is the expenditure of a vast sum (£650,000,000) on public works, and naturally she desires other countries to follow the same policy in order to insulate herself against the importation of cheap foreign goods. So on all of the essentials, when America and England got down to fundamentals, there was an unbridgeable gulf, foredooming the London Conference to failure before it commenced.