Address at the National Conference on International Trade Policy.

I AM HONORED to join tonight in this great gathering of citizens from all parts of the nation. You have come here to demonstrate the strength of your support for an enlightened trade policy that promotes jobs at home and peace in the world.

My grateful thanks go to you for this magnificent bi-partisan citizen effort to rouse Americans to the great stake all of us have in widening and deepening the channels of world trade.

This cause that draws us together tonight does not readily command the headlines. Like so many other good things, the benefits of trade are taken for granted and are assumed somehow to be a normal part of life. On the other hand, the special domestic problems to which world trade sometimes give rise, in terms of impact on particular industries, are real and identifiable and demanding of action.

You and I believe firmly that our reciprocal trade program is good for America and we have an obligation to our fellow citizens to set forth our views fairly and convincingly. If we do so, I am confident that the country-wide support of this program will be reflected in Congress. That is where fateful decisions about its whole future will shortly be taken.

We know that the American people will always do what they think is important and necessary to do. Our task is to make sure the importance of expanding trade is understood.

In searching for what is best for 173 million Americans, we must recognize that questions concerning reciprocal trade have been raised by conscientious members of Congress and others, deeply concerned with the economic welfare of their particular communities. On Capitol Hill the most potent arguments regarding trade legislation are likely to be its effect on the industries of specific states and districts.

So, in the effort to dispel honest doubts about the reciprocal trade legislation's great value to the entire nation, we should first hammer home the fact that safeguards in the law are being strengthened to cope with the uneven impact of import competition.

We should next point out that the authority to make trade concessions in the national interest is permissive, not mandatory: It applies to individual products, and will be used only on a case-by-case basis, after full review of all the factors involved.

Likewise, we should present this common sense arithmetic: the defeat of the trade agreements program would destroy far more jobs and job opportunities in agriculture, manufacturing and transportation than it could possibly preserve.

We should make everyone aware of the deadly peril impending if-through blindness--America and the free world are robbed of adequate economic defense against Communist penetration.

I doubt that anyone would favor tearing down our trade program were he to have on his conscience full knowledge of such grave hazards.

We can be heartened because in districts, states and nation a growing majority is finding that far stronger reasons can be advanced for an effective extension of the trade agreements legislation than the excuses made for rejecting or crippling it.

Both job security and national security demand an enlightened trade policy. So compelling and justifiable are these individual and collective reasons that even previous opponents of reciprocal trade should see the need of changing from their former position and so measure up to this inescapable duty of our day.

An informed and observant public would disapprove of anyone who insisted on clinging to old ideas which cannot solve crucial new problems. But it would welcome and praise everyone in public or private life for changing his mind in the best interests of 173 million Americans. Now let me be specific.

Our reciprocal trade program is good for America. It strengthens our own economy. It strengthens the economy of the free world. It reinforces our security against external danger.

The United States is the greatest trading nation. Last year the world's export trade amounted to about $ 100 billion. Our share was a fifth of that enormous total. This vast flow of commerce to and from our shores is vital to our economy. Consider these facts.

World trade makes jobs for at least 4½ million American workers. At a time of slack in the economy like the present these jobs should not be placed in jeopardy by crippling our trade program. The presence here tonight of representatives of the great labor organizations of America underscores this point.

Export trade is big, important business. It was greater than all consumer purchases of furniture and household equipment. It was greater than all residential non-farm building, or as great as the sale of all steel mill products in this country. Such sample facts as these indicate why the great business organizations of America are represented here tonight.

We shipped abroad last year, for example, over a tenth of our machine tool production, almost a fifth of our motor trucks and coaches, and over a quarter of our construction and mining equipment. And that is why so many manufacturers--small and large--are represented here tonight.

Foreign markets provide an indispensable outlet for our farm output. In the most recent marketing year, with the aid of special programs, over half of our wheat, cotton and rice went abroad. So did over a third of our soybean production, a quarter of our tobacco and a fifth of our lard output. Those and other farm exports benefited not only farmers; the movement required financing, inland transportation, storage and ocean transportation for 36 million tons of cargo. That was enough farm products to fill 800,000 freight cars and 3,600 cargo ships. Those activities mean jobs--lots of jobs.

And for those who may wonder what the connection is between these farm exports and our reciprocal trade program let me cite this fact: nearly four-fifths of these record farm exports went to countries with which we have agreements under that program. Loss of income from overseas markets would deal a hard blow to farm families. Such facts as these indicate why the great farm organizations of our country are represented here tonight.

This brief review of our huge export business evidences an inescapable truth: trade is good for all America--for its workers, its businessmen and its farmers.

Now what of the other side of the trade coin--imports?

In discussions of trade problems, some people seem to be for exports and against imports. They apparently assume that we can continue to sell even though we refuse to buy. But our farmers, workers, and businessmen cannot use drachmas, rupees, lira or other foreign currencies. Consequently they cannot accept those currencies for the goods they ship abroad. They can accept only dollars. In the same way, if other nations are to buy our exports to them they must get dollars earned by their exports to us. This means giving them an opportunity to sell in the American market on a reasonable basis.

Our import needs are great--$13 billion last year. We obtained from abroad most of our supplies of tin, mica, asbestos, platinum, nickel and newsprint. Part of our requirements for iron ore, petroleum, copper, raw wool, bauxite, burlap and other materials must be obtained outside this country. Such imports keep our factory wheels turning and assembly lines moving for the national defense.

We also import foods and manufactured goods. They are not as essential to us as are industrial materials. Nevertheless, Americans want them. They are entitled to a reasonable chance to buy them. Selling customers what they want is the way American stores keep in business.. And that is why representatives of consumer groups are here tonight.

Since imports of manufactured goods are the center of much of the trade controversy, we should keep one fact clearly in mind: last year we imported $2 3/4 billion of manufactured goods and exported billion--nearly four times as much. of course, we want, under the law, to accord manufacturing industries relief from demonstrated injury or the threat of injury due to imports. But if we seek to do this by ill-advised measures such as broad and rigid systems of quotas, we should consider the consequences upon our 4 to 1 interest in exports of these goods. We must remember that other countries have trade problems too. As we and they have learned to our mutual regret, everybody can play the costly game of trade restrictions. The choice is plain: it is reciprocity or retaliation.

Important as our trade program is to building a stronger nation here at home, it is equally important in building a strong neighborhood of nations where we can be secure.

Our first line of defense against potential attack is an effective deterrent power widely based throughout the free world. The dispersal of this power is a key aspect of our defense. But dispersal requires cooperation among the free nations--not merely military cooperation but in all the ways which make our allies strong.

It may be trite to say that trade is a two-way street, but is it trite to say that cooperative security is a two-way street? By no means. Allies need to be sturdy. Sturdy allies need progressive economies, not only to bear the burden of defensive armament, but also to satisfy the needs and aspirations of their people.

This fact requires a clear understanding on our part that, for most of these nations, foreign trade is vital to their economies. Some are limited in natural resources, their markets at home are much smaller. In many instances their economies are much less developed. Trade is truly their economic lifeblood. The United States must continue to make it possible for them to trade with others and with us on a reasonable basis.

The American people have long been keenly aware of the Communist military threat. They are determined to maintain ample retaliatory power to deter armed aggression. But we must make certain that our people clearly recognize the danger of the Communist economic drive among developing countries--offering the carrot and hiding the stick.

That danger is real and is growing. The Communists are deterred from military adventure by the defensive forces we and our partners and allies have built. They now seek, through economic penetration and subversion, their purposes of ceaseless expansion.

The danger of the Soviet economic offensive is clear: to the leaders of Communist imperialism economic relations are merely another means of gaining control over nations that become economically dependent upon the Communist bloc.

It is the Communist system that the Kremlin is determined to export.

It is the system of economic freedom that the Kremlin is determined to destroy.

If, through utilizing trade and aid they can tempt free nations one by one into their spider web, they will have paved the way for political victory. And--they will have made progress toward their great goal of economic encirclement of the United States.

Though its resources do not by any means match our own, the Soviet Union is enabled by despotic concentration to use them effectively for special purposes. By forced investment, heavy industrialization and the repression of consumer needs, the Soviet bloc is producing on a growing scale the goods and capital equipment which many of the newer nations must have for their own economic development.

The Soviet capacity to export is coupled by a willingness to import. It is offering to receive raw materials and other products which free nations have to sell. Thus the Communist bloc holds out the prospect of becoming an important supplier of capital and equipment to free nations and a large market for their surplus products.

Communism, like all other forms of dictatorship, is a reactionary movement. Yet reaction has, more than once in the past, enjoyed periods of marked success. Can we be sure that reactionary Communism will not succeed in tempting many nations to exchange freedom for glittering--and sometimes realistic--opportunities for material betterment?

We cannot at all be sure of this unless we see to it that economic freedom is allowed to operate effectively, that the benefits of economic advance in the free world are diffused and spread to others. This means trade.

If free nations cannot find room and opportunity to trade within the free world, they will surely, inexorably turn to trade with the Communist world.

For to live they must trade. It's as simple as that.

This brings us directly to the proposals for the extension of the reciprocal trade program. This program was inaugurated by a great American, Cordell Hull, almost a quarter of a century ago. It has been extended and strengthened no less than ten times. It has become a prime impetus to economic cooperation and to flourishing trade. It strengthens freedom against despotism.

To move forward along the road on which we have thus far advanced, I have recommended to the Congress a five-year extension of the Trade Agreements Act. I have requested authority to negotiate reductions in tariffs, on the basis of the peril-point procedure, by 5 per cent of existing rates a year, during this interval. I have further recommended strengthening the escape-clause and peril-point procedures to recognize more fully and promptly the need for relief in cases where injury to a domestic industry due to trade concessions is established under the law.

This program has been attacked as both too little and too much--which may suggest that it is about right.

In my opinion the authority requested in the bills introduced by Representatives Mills and Kean, embodying my proposals, is necessary to the continued success of the program. So, too, is the five-year extension period essential to the continuity and stability of our trade relations.

There is a mistaken belief spread among some people that the Administration's five-year proposal was merely introduced as a bargaining position. Let me set the record straight. It is a proposal dictated by the facts.

Among these facts is a special one: a great Common Market is now being formed by six nations of Western Europe. These countries will in due course eliminate all barriers to trade among themselves and act toward others as a single economy. That means a common tariff applying to imports from the rest of the world, including the United States. It is expected that important steps toward this common tariff will become effective during 1962--up to four and a half years from the renewal date of our reciprocal trade legislation this summer. If we are to serve the interests of American buyers and sellers, the President must have from the Congress adequate authority for sufficient time to prepare for and conduct negotiations with the Common Market authorities. In the national interest this timetable dictates a minimum extension of the law for five years.

The good of America will not be served by just any kind of extension bill. It must be a good bill. It must be an effective bill. Such a bill is before the Congress.

The issue before the Congress and the American people in this spring of 1958 is a momentous one: will we through apathy or ignorance see our trade program killed outright or gutted by amendments? Will we weaken ourselves by returning to the law of the jungle in trade relations between nations?

Or will the program be extended and strengthened?

The choice is clear.

I repeat: This program is good for America.

It is good for America on straight pocketbook grounds. It is good today because it will help protect millions of jobs. It is good tomorrow because more trade means more jobs.

It is good for America, too, because it helps build the road to peace. I believe this program is vital to our national security. Retreat on this program would make dangerously difficult the holding together of our alliances and collective security arrangements. Less trade means more trouble.

We cannot find safety in economic isolationism at a time when the world is shrinking. for us to cower behind new trade walls of our own building would be to abandon a great destiny to those less blind to the events and tides now surging in the affairs of men.

America will not choose that road, for it is a downward leading road to a diminishing America--isolated, encircled and at bay in a world made over in the image of an alien philosophy.

Rather, America will move forward strongly along the clear road to greater strength at home, expanding trade with other free nations, greater security and opportunity in a friendlier world for this and succeeding generations.

This is a great and continuing mission in which you and I and every American can have a part. We can serve it today by keeping our country firmly on its chosen course of fostering life-giving trade among the nations. And on that same course we shall move ever nearer to permanent security and to an enduring peace with right and justice for all.