A New American Commercial Policy as Evidenced by Section 317 of the Tariff Act of 1922

PREFATORY NOTE

The policy by which a country defines its attitude toward international trade is a subject too broad for monographic treatment. It includes the complex questions of high or low customs tariffs and of the operation of the mercantile marine, both of which are, in the United States, the subjects of widespread public controversy and constitute major planks in political party platforms. Its full consideration would involve inquiries into these matters, into the matter of shipping and harbor dues and into certain phases of internal taxation. The possible existence of direct or indirect bounties upon production or of differential railroad rates would be among the other circumstances included because of their effect upon business relations between countries.

There is one element in the aggregate national commercial policy which attracts comparatively little public notice but which, because it primarily and with especial directness affects the comity of international relationships, may without substantial inaccuracy be thought of as the external commercial policy of the country which maintains it. Its essential characteristic is the treatment accorded to the commerce of one outside country in comparison with the treatment which is accorded to others; it has its bases in agreements between countries as well as in statutes which they severally enact. The term "commercial policy" is used in this restricted sense in the present monograph, the object of which is both to describe such policy as it appears to exist in the United States at present and to make certain suggestions relating to future developments.

Many of the details of fact used in the following pages are subject to very frequent change. The years since the World War have witnessed an unprecedented array of alterations in tariff laws and commercial treaties, a process which still continues. Effort will be made until the latest practicable date before publication to take account of such changes as affect essential portions of the present study. Much of the illustrative material, however, has been taken from sources now a year or more old and which it is not feasible to bring up to date.

The writer welcomes this opportunity to express his very earnest thanks to the several kind friends who have labored unselfishly to combat the errors and inadequacies that so persistently cling to efforts like the present one.

KNOXVILLE, TENNESSEE, SEPTEMBER 1, 1923.

PRINCIPAL SOURCES

Tariff Act of 1922, with Index. H. R. Doc. no. 393, 67th Congress, 2d Session. Also issued in pamphlet form by the Treasury Department. Tariff Act of October 3, 1913. Published by the Treasury Department. Tariff Acts Passed by the Congress of the United States from 1789 to 1909. H. R. Doc. no. 671, 61st Congress, 2d Session. Abbreviation, Tariff Acts.

Tariff Hearings, 1908-1909. H. R. Doc. no. 1505, 60th Congress, 2d Session. Nine volumes.

Hearings on the Proposed Tariff Act of 1921. Senate Doc. no. 108, 67th Congress, 2d Session. Eight volumes.

Treasury Decisions (weekly publication of the Treasury Department). United States Tariff Commission. Summary of Tariff Information. 1921. United States Tariff Commission. Handbook of Commercial Treaties. 1922. Abbreviation, Handbook.

United States Tariff Commission. Colonial Tariff Policies. 1922. United States Tariff Commission. Reciprocity and Commercial Treaties.

1919.

Treaties, Conventions, International Acts, Protocols and Agreements between the United States and Other Powers, 1776-1909. Senate Doc. no. 357, 61st Congress, 2d Session. Compiled by Wm. M. Malloy. Two volumes. Supplement to the same, 1913, Senate Doc. no. 1063, 62d Congress, 3d Session. Compiled by Garfield Charles. A fourth volume, 1910-1923, has now been published without stating the name of the compiler. 67th Congress, 4th Session, Senate Doc. no. 348. It supersedes the Charles volume and is marked "Volume III." As it begins with page 2493, the page succeeding the last page of the Malloy compilation, it will be considered as a part thereof. Abbreviations: Malloy, Treaties; Charles, Treaties.

Treaty Series, published by the Department of State.

Foreign Relations of the United States, published by the Department of State.

Hertslet, Sir Edward, and others, Commercial Treaties. To date, 27 volumes. London.

Martens, Georg F. von, Recueil des traités, and various supplements. In all 95 volumes, 1817-1919. Göttingen.

British and Foreign State Papers, 1814, et seq. III volumes to date,

London.

Moore, John Bassett, A Digest of International Law. Eight volumes,

1906. Abbreviation: Moore, Digest.

Congressional Record.

Commerce Reports, United States Department of Commerce.

Board of Trade Journal, London.

Conference on the Limitation of Armament. (Official volume of Proceedings, etc.). 1922.

Miscellaneous publications of the League of Nations.

Archives of the Department of State.

Foreign Tariff Files of the Department of Commerce.

SECONDARY SOURCES 1

Culbertson, William Smith, Commercial Policy in War Time and After. New York. 1919.

Girault, Arthur, The Colonial Tariff Policy of France. Edited by Charles Gide. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Division of Economics and History; John Bates Clark, Director. Oxford, 1916.

Hornbeck, Stanley Kuhl, The Most-favored-nation Clause in Commercial Treaties. Bulletin of the University of Wisconsin, no. 343. Economics and Political Science Series, vol. vi, no. 2. Madison, Wis. 1910.

Laughlin, J. Lawrence and H. Parker Willis, Reciprocity. New York. 1903.

Taussig, Frank W., Some Aspects of the Tariff Question. Harvard Economic Studies, vol. xii. Cambridge, Massachusetts. 1915. Taussig, Frank W., Free Trade, the Tariff and Reciprocity, New York,

1920.

Viner, Jacob, "The Most-favored-nation Clause in American Commercial Treaties." (The Journal of Political Economy, vol. xxxii, no. 1, February, 1924, pp. 101 et seq.).

1 The literature of the special topic treated in the present monograph is very scanty.