Foreign News: Western World v. Japan

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"By no stretch of the imagination can Japanese commercial methods be considered fair!" cried a Conservative M. P. from Manchester. "State subsidies and depreciated currency are not legitimate factors in trade. They, together with the low standard of wages in Japan, and false labels on goods, are what are enabling that country to ruin this country. We do not want a fiscal war, but Great Britain is being mercilessly attacked and must defend itself while there is still something left to defend."

Summing up for His Majesty's Government, Trade Board President Runciman cried: "We have found that in some parts of the Empire goods have been imported direct from Japan bearing British names and trademarks. That is a form of dishonesty which any government should do its best to suppress.

"There appears to be a fairly general view that we should gain by abrogating the Anglo-Japanese treaty. ... I prefer to exhaust all other means before denouncing the treaty. We must not get the impression that Japan has beaten us. ... We are trying to impress the Japanese mind that it is well to live on a friendly footing with us rather than to carry their movement so far as to arouse, not only here but elsewhere, feelings of enmity. I believe we can improve our position, and no effort will be spared by the government in that direction."

With even Sir Herbert Samuel taking the view that the forging of foreign trademarks is a Japanese practice as common as it is indefensible, the House of Commons adopted without a single dissenting vote a motion praying His Majesty's Government to take every step within their power to defeat Japanese competition.

Directors of the Tokyo Electric Light Co. decided last week to repudiate the clause which gives holders of the company's debentures an option to receive payment in pounds or dollars at the old par gold value. The Japanese directors cited as their excuse the cancellation by the U. S. Congress of the gold clause in U. S. contracts. Many U. S. holders of their debentures, they complained, have been demanding and receiving payment in pounds which, to Japanese, seems unfair.