Timberlake Resolution makes Congress face issue

Title

Language

English

Source

The American Chamber of Commerce Journal Volume 8 (No. 11) November 1928

Year

1928

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

18 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL November, 1928 Timberlake Resolution Makes Congress Face Issue Writing in the October Oldtimers’ edition of the Manila Daily Bulletin, George H. Fair child, secretary-treasurer of the Philippine Sugar Association, closed his instructive paper with the following comment, showing the true animus of the resolution sponsored by Congress man Timberlake which would narrow the eco nomic future of the Philippines under the United States by attacking one of their leading indus tries, sugar, through limiting the amount given free entry into the United States to 500,000 tons a year: The Timberlake Resolution serves one good purpose. Without intending to do so, it brings America to the crossroads at last respecting her Philippine policy. On such an occasion, of the utmost national significance, the American people must not be deceived; and, even act ing in the full light of knowledge, the narrow interests of particular congressional districts, or even of States cannot be included as factors of any importance whatever in the solution of the problem presented. For in dealing with the Philippines—as with Hawaii and Porto Rico— the United States must think and act as a nation, a closely federated nation with a forthright and dominant central authority, and not as a loose and impotent union of States seeking a practical compromise of their contrasting interests. To do otherwise—that is to say, to consider what Nebraska, for example, or Colorado may wish as a beet-sugar community—would be to act along party lines and for party purposes, and not upon national lines, for national purposes. It must always be remembered that the Phil ippines are helpless in America’s hands in all these matters: the whole, the absolute, control of the commerce of the Islands rests in the Congress of the United States. There is, there fore, no more complete responsibility exercised by the members of the Congress than that exer cised in respect to the Philippines; and in con sidering the Philippines, the members are, most eminently, not mere representatives of their respective districts and States—and not that at all—but representatives of the nation, the United States, in Congress assembled. Going back to the basis of Philippine policy, McKin ley’s instructions to the Philippine Commission, that stable element upon which both the United States and the Philippines must rely, there are but two desiderata involved in any proposed legislation whatever, and in executive acts and decisions of courts, respecting the Philippines; and the first desideratum is, the welfare of the Philippine Islands; the other, always secondary to the first, the welfare of the United States— this always being sought, and always found, in the welfare of the Islands themselves. In ten years more time, the Philippines, given free trade with the United States, will not be producing for sale in American markets more than a million tons or so of sugar annually; and this will not be on a parity with increasing con sumption of sugar in the United States. Hence there will not be a time in all those ten years when Philippine sugar is menacing the borne crop. But right now, and continuingly so, Philippine sugar does affect, and will affect, Cu ban sugar ; and’it affects the American invest ment in Cuban sugar, and will, as a plain matter of fact, compel, in time, a wider diversification of industries on that fertile island. It is an irony, and an unfounded one, for supporters of the Timberlake Resolution to excuse their attitude on the ground that it would force the Philippines to diversification of crops. Would it do the same for Cuba, who must sell her sugar in the United States or close shop? No, it would, on the contrary, intensify interest in Cuba’s sugar industry, and cause men there to abandon diversification plans, and it would only affect the Philippines, ruinously, which already have well-diversified crops and are now, in contrast to Cuba, producing practically the whole of their principal food crop, rice. Philippine policy can never be safely based upon the mere desire of lenders to collect a Cuban mortgage by having the American people pay it when they fill their sugar bowl. The logic of the situation is that the whole national sugar industry, that in the South, that in the beet States, that in Hawaii and that in the Phil ippines, must be developed and must thrive as a single domestic unit. Essentially that is what it is. Three years ago the Philippine Education company published a book on Philippine Applesauce by Commander Geo. H. Reed of the U. S. Navy. Now they have placed on sale a companion volume by the same author. In it Mr. Reed laughs good-naturedly at the foibles and vanities of some Americans in the Orient. Their lack of adaptability, their purchasing manias, their refusal to understand native ways and native pleasures and their secret love for the Change Oil Every 1,500 Kilometers A Reason—Gasoline Your engine oil after a period of use becomes mixed and diluted with gasoline. Proof? Make this experiment. Drive for 750 kilometers or even less. Then drain off the crankcase oil. Touch a match to the used oil and it will go up in flames—positive proof of its dangerous gas oline content. Your oil becomes mixed with gasoline because today’s gas oline does not burn or evaporate completely. At each stroke of the engine pistons, some of the gasoline remains in Mobiloil Make the chart your guide Make sure that the life and power of your automobile engine is always protected by fresh, undiluted, full-bodied oil. Drain the crankcase oil every 1 „500 kilometers. Refill regularly with Gargoyle Mobiloil. Changing oil repays you many times over in lessened wear; in quieter, more powerful operation. VACUUM OIL COMPANY NEW YORK, U. S. A. ILOILO MANILA CEBU things of which they incessantly complain all provoke from him a sympathetic smile. He tells, too, a few Philippine folk tales in jingling verse that discloses a feeling for the fanciful that was surely never acquired at Annapolis. The title of the book is Bedtime Stories Folklore and More Appleasauce. Its art binding helps to make it attractive as a gift. The price is P2. MONEY IN CIRCULATION The insular auditor reported money in circu lation in the islands October 20 as P140.332.001: coins P21,576,388; treasury certificates P96,266,388; banknotes P22,489,274.—Government reserves on the same date were P122.895.360: GSF(gold standard fund) in Manila P6,982,972; GSF in NEW York P19,646,000; TCF(treasury certificate fund) in Manila P22,141,281; TCF in New York P74.125.107. liquid form. Drop by drop, kilometer by kilo meter, this raw gas oline seeps down past the piston rings and into your crankcase oil. Gasoline thins out your oil, permits fric tion, causes wear and loss of power. An automobile operated with gasoline - diluted oil is being blindly and swiftly driven to the scrap heap. IN RESPONDING TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE MENTION THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL

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