i DE GROENE AMSTERDAMMER 'Weekblad voor Nederland On<|er hoofdredactie van A. C. Josephus Jitta lledactearen: L. J. Jordaan, F. G. Scheltema en M. Kann. Secretaris der redactie:] G. F. v. Dam Keizersgracht 355, Amsterdam C - Telefoon 3F964 - Postgiro 72880 - Gem. Giro G. 1000 Opgericht in 1877 No. 2876 Zaterdag 16 Juli 1932 OPEN LETTER to Mr. Herbert Hoover President of the U.S.A. OPEN BRIEF aan Herbert Hoover President der Ver. Staten lï* k' fc'v Sir, . Four years ago you assumed the highest function n your country, perhaps the most. powerful position that a mortal on our planet can accupy. The United States had then attained unprecedented prosperitjr. The greater part of the world's gold jsupply was in the vaults of your banks. The whole ?world was in your debt for immense sums of money, whereas, not so long ago, yours was a debtor country. Behind your tariff walls the highest in the world you had almost every raw material at your disposal in abundant quantities. I deern your commercial policy, protectionism, an . «conomic folly. But I am prepared to admit that, if there were one nation in the world that could afford this folly, albeit with great loss, it was the United States before the great crisis. You fought your way to victory at the elections under the watchword: prosperity will endure." How much of that prophecy has been fulfilled? Your country has been overmastered by events, AS the strands of the sea are flooded by a spring %tide. Your gold, your promissory notes, your raw msiterials, and your tariffs, have been powerless to protect you. The crisis has harried your country, perhaps to a greater extent than any other country in the world. What is the lesson to be drawn from this? Is t not that the interests of all the countries of the world, be they rich or poor, are inseparable? At the moment the world is struggling with f our probleins: 1. the reparation debts. 2. the war debts to the United States, 3. the armaments, 4. the tariffs. Lausanne has cancelled the reparation debts. Whateyer may happen, those debts Will neither be paid nor collected. At the disarmament conference at Geneva, your initiatory proposal reduction of armaments by 30 per cent. has once more brought movement into the almost stationary machine. The entire world owes you a debt of gratitude for that. With respect to the two other problems that I have indicated, I appeal to you to make an equally radical initiatory proposal. Say, that you will propose to Oongress to wipe out the war debts owing to the TJnited Stat e_s, that you will take the initiative in convoking an international conference for the lowering of the tariff walls, and that the United States will set the exampleat that conference. I appeal to your sound judgement as a business man. 'Lloyd George has calculated that the total incomes of the declined at the United States had a value in 1929 of 90 billion dollars. Recently someone has calculated that in 1931 that national income had declined at 20 billion dollars. At this moment that loss will cèrtainly be greater. According to this calculation, the United States has, as a consequence of the crisis, lost in one year three times the capitalised value of all the war debts owing to her, or 80 times the tannual amount due to her. If, by sacrificing once moce one eightieth of the considerable loss that hèhas already sustained, a business man should see the chance of gaining back a great part of the loss hèhas already sustained, what business man would refuse to take that chance? And that chance is nobdoubtful. Whoever, in your position, grasps that opportunity, may reckon on the probability, bordering on certainty, that hèwill meet with success. You distrust Europe. You fear that every dollar owing to you that you sacrifice, will cost you two dollars: one dollar less to be collected and one dollar more to be paid for fresh armaments. For that distrust there is some ground. But, bearing in mind the plight in which the world is at the moment, one in your position should have the faith in God to perform a noble action, trusting that his initiative will be followed by an equally noble response. The entire world cherishes the economie delusion that the creditor is a more powerful man than the debtor. Has the experience in the case of the debtor Germany not thrown sufficient light on the fallacy of that popular idea? If I lend somebody a thousand dollars, I may, at the moment that I place the money at his disposal, imagine that I am more powerful than hè. As soon, however, as the agreèment is carried out, I shall, by experience, cèrtainly arrive at a better insight. My debtor is now in possession of my money, and I have nothing more than his I.O.U. If hèbecomes bankrupt, I am merely the possessor of a worthless scrap of paper. Mercadet already comprehended that the debtor has more power over the creditor than the creditor over the debtor. You distrust the countries of Europe, who are your debtors. That is wrong. You should rather meet them in a friendly spil""!,. My fatherland, Holland, occupies a very special position with regard to you. If you bear that in mind, you will relinquish every suspicion as far as Holland is concerned. Holland is the only country in the world that has lent more money to the United States than the United States has lent to her. Your Department of Commerce at Washington calculated, before the crisis, that your fellów-countrymen had invested about 100 million dollars in the Netherlands, mainly in rubber in the Netherlands East Indies. Your Commercial Attachéat the Hague estimated, at about the same time, the amount that my fellów-countrymen had put into enterprises in your country, at 400 million dollars, largely invested in American railways. Naturally, both those amounts have, as consequence of the crisis, considerably diminished, but their proportion to each other will cèrtainly not have been seriously modified. It even seems to me that your investments in my country are safer than our investments in your country. Have not you also more confidence in the future of rubber than in that if railways? For distrust on the part of an American towards a Hollander there is, at any rate in this respect, no foundation. We are your creditors to a greater extent than vou are ours. Mr. President, Every man has, at any rate, one chance in his life. Some have more than one. You 'have had a great many good chances, and you have known how to make use of them. This. however, is the chance of your life. Moral. as well as material, motives impel, in this case. in the same direction. You will put into practice the precept: Forgive us our debts" and, at the same time, you will help the financial and economie world over the dead point. If you take this initiative, you will, at the close of your first term as President of the United States, have fulfilled the watchword under which you entered on high duties. What a politie act, three months before the elections ! You will place your country and the entire world under an obligation to you. Mr. President, This is the chance of your life! Graspitwith both hands, as you have grasped 3o many chances, for the well-being of the world, of your country, of your party, and of yourself. A. O. JOSEPHUS JITTA Vertaling; Vier jaren geleden hebt gij de hoogste functie in uw land aanvaard, misschien de machtigste positie, die een sterveling op onze planeet kan bekleeden. De Vereenigde Staten hadden toen een ongekende welvaart bereikt. Het grootste deel van de goudvoorraad, waarover de wereld beschikt, bevond zich in de kluizen van uw banken. De heele wereld was U ontzaggelijke bedragen schuldig, terwijl gij niet lang tevoren nog een debiteursland waart. Achter uw tariefmuren, de hoogste ter wereld, beschikt gij over bijna alle grondstoffen in overvloedige hoeveelheden. Ik acht uw handels politiek, het protectionisme, een economische dwaasheid. Maar ik ben bereid te erkennen, dat indien er n volk ter wereld is, dat zich deze .dwaasheid kan veroorloven, zij het ook met groote schade, het de Vereenigde Staten waren vóór de groote crisis. ? \ -.(Slot op pag. 2)