"The outlook for a general reduction in tariffs, either our own or of other countries, is not bright. The League of Nations has failed to effect even a temporary tariff truce. The best hope appears to lie in the method of reciprocal agreements--either bilateral, as in the case of the recent agreement between Australia and Canada, or possibly multilateral--by which reductions are given in exchange for reductions.

"The method is not without its difficulties and dangers. Duties may possibly be raised for bargaining purposes, while some concessions may be prevented because the most-favored-nation treaties require that a concession to one country be extended to all countries enjoying most-favored-nation treatment. The method, however, has the important advantages of offering nations which are willing to open their doors an opportunity to have doors opened to them in return. On at least two occasions--after the Copden-Chevalier treaty in 1860 and the Caprivi treaties in the early '09's--reciprocal agreements have led to substantial reductions in the world's tariffs.

Reduce Tariffs By Agreement

Of the three leading industrial nations the United States is best above to initiate a movement to reduce tariffs by agreement. Great Britain, absorbed by her present emergency, is turning, for the time being at least, in the direction of protection. Germany can do little, because France more than once has made it plain that she will use her political and financial power to veto attempts by Germany to secure markets through lower tariffs. If there any prospect that the United States will abandon its philosophy of extreme protectionism? Perhaps it is unreasonable to expect most voters to see the connection between commercial policies and their pocketbooks.

"Our tariff policy, however, has been molded, in the main, not by the masses of the voters but by a relatively small number of business leaders. Is it unreasonable to expect these men to perceive that extreme protection practiced by a large creditor nation works very differential from the same policy pursued by a debtor nation?

"Champion Moderate Duties"

"Sooner or later are they not bound to see that prosperity for the United States and the rest of the world will not be promoted by our hoarding gold and threatening our debtors with ruin whenever there is a general depression? It and when business men understand this, we may expect many of our politicians to abandon their support of extreme protection and become the champions of moderate duties.

"Another Object Lesson"

"How long will business men require to discover--the effects of our present policy? This is a question of great practical importance. Will the experience of the present depression be sufficient? Or must we have another object lesson in the interdependence of nations, must we go through another depression, intensified and prolonged by our pull on the world's gold supply, before our business leaders realize that we cannot add to the world's disaster without inflicting injury upon ourselves?