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1936 › Franklin D. Roosevelt (Democratic) › Executive reciprocal trade agreements (1934 Act)

Continue the reciprocal trade agreements to lower barriers against American exports

pledge_forwardspecific_pledgecandidate_directevidence A Diplomacy & International InstitutionsTrade & Tariffs similar solutions · similar reasoning

Solution

Keep making executive trade agreements under the 1934 Act while protecting farmers and manufacturers against dumping and subsidized goods.

Rationale

Trade agreements find outlets for farm and factory products and point toward eliminating the embargoes and quotas that are an 'economic source of war.'

Statements (3)

1936-06-25 · Democratic National Convention, Philadelphia (platform) · conventionparty_platform ✓ verified
We shall continue to foster the increase in our foreign trade which has been achieved by this administration; to seek by mutual agreement the lowering of those tariff barriers, quotas and embargoes which have been raised against our exports of agricultural and industrial products
Source: 1936 Democratic Party Platform (1936-06-23)
1936-08-14 · Chautauqua, New York · generalcandidate_direct ✓ verified
We do not maintain that a more liberal international trade will stop war; but we fear that without a more liberal international trade, war is a natural sequence.
Source: Address at Chautauqua, N.Y. (1936-08-14)
1936-10-31 · Madison Square Garden, New York · generalcandidate_direct ✓ verified
for the regulation of security issues, for reciprocal trade among nations, for the wiping out of slums.

Follow-through

kept

Congress extended the trade-agreements authority in 1937 and again in April 1940; agreements with Britain and Canada (1938) were the largest of the program.

Mechanisms

DateTypeNameEffectConsistent?Source
1937-01-14messageStatement urging extension of the trade-agreements authorityThree-year extension enacted March 1937.
Such an extension is highly desirable in the interest of our Nation.
yesStatement Urging Extension of Authority to Negotiate Reciprocal Trade Agreements.
1940-04-12statuteTrade agreements program renewedSecond three-year extension.
The action of the Congress in continuing the operation of the trade agreements program is expressive of the determination on the part of our people to retain unimpaired, for the next three years, this powerful instrument
yesStatement on Signing the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Bill.

Assessments

kept Franklin D. Roosevelt — Statement on Signing the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Bill.

The program survived Republican attacks in both extensions.

Other positions on this issue

1936-fdr-continue-reciprocal-trade-agreements · created by claude-fable-5-1 · review: unreviewed