The Waipawa Mail Published Tuesday Thursdays and Saturdays Thursday, April 27th, 1911. THE RECIPROCITY TREATY.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXIX, Issue 5705, 27 April 1911, Page 2

The Waipawa Mail Published Tuesday Thursdays and Saturdays Thursday, April 27th, 1911. THE RECIPROCITY TREATY.

So soon as its details woro announced it was apparent that the reciprocity agreement between Canada and the United States would not be carried in either country without considerable opposition, and wo are now in possession of the arguments which are used by the opposing parties. Of all those arguments of the opposition, probably the cry of disloyalty will be at once the most prominent and the least important. It has been used to a considerable extent in England by a section of the Unionists, who while protesting their devotion to the new Imperialism, are always ready to use colonial politics to suit their own ends. To outsiders it must seem that the best answer to the charge is to show its irrelevancy. Loyalty or disloyalty does not depend on tariffs, though it might bo seriously affected by resentment against outside interference. Freetraders will not be induced to change their allegiance by the removal of a grievance, nor protectionists by the presence of competition.

But, obviously, there will be an amount of opposition to the agreement whioh will not be guided by considerations of sentiments. The heads of the great business concerns take a far larger share in politics in Canada than in the colonies, and many of them have already declared their unwavering hostility. The heads of the great linos of transports, who are naturally opposed to a proposal to divert a portion of the traffic from east and west to north and south, have found an economic basis for their arguments. In general, they say that Canada will gain nothing in the way of new markets, since the United States is far from being selfcontained, and will lose part of the profits, first, of sending Canadian wheat to markets over Canadian routes; and, secondly, of turning wheat into flour in Canadian mills. Canada, in short, will be used to make up the supplies of raw material which her neighbour has squandered. In particular, they say that oertain towns, such as Winnipeg, will lose their business as distributing centres, and that Montreal will cease to bo as a shipping port on a level with Philadelphia and New York, that Canadian manufacturers of machinery will bo ruined, and that the American trusts will be able to destroy the fruit industry, which has been built up during the last twenty years in Nova Beotia and British Columbia. With the transport interests have sided several of the bankers, notably Sir Edmund Walker, the President of the Bank of Commerce, who has drawn a number of Liberals with him. On the other side are naturally the whole of the old freetrade party, the farmers of the Middle West, and the growing scotion of the community who rebel against the increased cost of living and the high price of machinery. It is already apparent that Sir Wilfrid Laurier will lose many of those elected to support him ; it remains to be seen whether the new freetrade party will be strong enough to carry him through. On one side it is said that under reciprocity the trusts will come in and make the lot of the farmor and the consumer harder than ever; on the other, that thoy will cease to flourish when they have lost the protection of a tariff.