Address in Fargo, North Dakota.

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen:

I am glad to be here in Fargo this evening. I don't think I have seen such a crowd since, I think, 1948.

I have watched with great concern the reports of the floods which have swept through the Red River Valley, and other valleys nearby. I understand that in some places these have been the worst floods since 1899.

Floods like these are not just local affairs. They concern the whole Nation.

I am glad that I have been able to allocate $400,000 from the small amount--and I emphasize that "small amount"--of emergency funds at my disposal to aid in relieving the distress in North Dakota and Minnesota. I have asked the Federal agencies to do everything they can do to help. I know they have been cooperating with your local and State officials, and private organizations such as the Red Cross, to hold down flood damage and relieve suffering.

But I know, just as you do, that no relief program can fully repair the damage caused by these great floods. Nothing can bring back crops lost, or cattle drowned, or topsoil carried away, or homes destroyed.

Relief after floods is not good enough.

We have got to prevent floods. We must control the waters from the point where they originate all the way to the mouths of the great rivers.

To do this we must hold more water in and on the land. We must build check dams on the small streams. We must construct large dams and levees on the rivers.

By doing these things, we will not only prevent disastrous floods. We will make water serve our purposes in agriculture, navigation, recreation, and the production of power.

You folks here in Fargo know how important this work is. The Baldhill Dam, on the Sheyenne River west of here, has been put into emergency operation to help out in this flood. And it has helped.

But Baldhill Dam is only one step toward the full control of the water in this valley, and in all the other great valleys of our country. Flood control in all these great valleys must be our goal.

This will take a good many years to accomplish. It will take great effort. It will take a lot of money. More than all these, it will take the conviction that the time, the effort, and the money are well spent.

I believe that money spent this way, to conserve and make better use of our natural resources, is money soundly invested in the future welfare and prosperity of this great Nation.

Unfortunately, too many people still can't see this plain, obvious fact.

Some people still say, "Yes, it's a fine idea, but it would cost too much."

I wish those people could see the floods in the Red River Valley today. Their false ideas of economy would get a rude shock. They would find that it costs the country more not to act than it costs to act.

This whole job of trying to prevent disastrous floods, by controlling our waters for useful purposes, is a lot like what we're doing to bring about world peace.

Floods are natural disasters, which can be prevented.

Wars are manmade disasters, but they can be prevented, too.

The job of preventing another war is, of course, much more difficult than the job of preventing floods. But the two jobs are alike in requiring many years, tremendous effort, and a lot of money.

The people who say, "Yes, but it costs too much," complain about the cost of our Armed Forces, and the Marshall plan, and all the other work we are doing to build a peaceful world. They just complain about the expense of developing our natural resources. They never can seem to see beyond the ends of their noses. They just won't' understand that it would cost us infinitely more not to act than it costs to act.

The cost of failing to build a peaceful, prosperous world would be a third great war--with an untold cost not only in dollars but in the lives of our young men and Women.

Of course, there is much more to building world peace than simply investing part of the Federal Budget. Building a peaceful world is a job that everybody has to work at, because everybody is concerned with its success.

Our churches, our schools, our labor, farm and business groups, our press and radio-everybody in this part of the country and in all this country has a part in this Nation's effort to win the peace.

You have seen a clear example of that, right here in North Dakota.

For the past 5 years, the farmers of this area have helped to save millions of people from starvation.

The wheat that has been going abroad from our farms has enabled millions of people in foreign countries to have the strength to stand up against communism and keep their countries free.

That has been a real contribution to peace. We need to keep wheat flowing abroad. The people of other free countries need the wheat, for many of them do not have the agricultural land to produce their own. The farmers of North Dakota know from their own personal experience that the United States needs a dependable foreign market for wheat. Out of every 10 bushels of wheat we harvest in this country, 3 or 4 bushels are sold abroad.

We have been working for years to put our wheat trade on a firm basis. In April 1948 an International Wheat Agreement, which had been worked out with other countries after years of effort, was sent to the Senate of the 80th Congress. Under that agreement, we would have had a dependable market in foreign countries for nearly 200 million bushels of wheat each year for 5 years.

That was an excellent arrangement. It would have been good for every farmer and for every foreign county that needs wheat.

But the Senate of the 80th Congress did not ratify that wheat agreement, and it died. That was a victory for the grain speculators, but a costly defeat for the wheat farmers.

After an event of some importance in November 1948 we had a new Congress, the 81st Congress.

We started all over again, and negotiated a new wheat agreement with foreign countries. Because of the delay, the terms of the new agreement had to be scaled down. But it was still a good arrangement. And this time, the Senate of the 81st Congress approved it, in June 1949.

The wheat agreement is just one example of the kind of forward-looking step that we need to take to build a healthy and expanding system of world trade. That is not an easy task. But it is a most essential one.

World trade is of fundamental importance to us in two ways. First, it affects the question whether we shall have world peace or world war. Second, it affects the question whether we shall have prosperity or depression in our own country.

It is sometimes hard for us to grasp the importance of foreign trade and relate it to our daily lives. I think it helps us to understand if we consider what has happened in our own country.

Our Nation has become strong and prosperous because the free flow of trade and commerce among all the States has made us the greatest economic unit in the history of the world. All the States have prospered because each could draw upon the resources of the others.

Try to imagine what it would be like if each of the 48 States were a separate country--each with its own system of tariffs, and customs regulations, each with its own separate rules about travel and trade across its borders.

It is hard for us to imagine such a thing, isn't it? But this much is clear. If such a situation existed, not one of the 48 States would be as well off as it is today.

We must apply this lesson to our trading relations with other countries. The circumstances are different, of course, and require different treatment. But the fundamental principle is the same. A vigorous commerce among nations is beneficial to each of them just as it is among our own States. It increases their economic well-being, it provides a firm basis for peaceful relations.

We have in recent history a terrible example of what comes from ignoring these facts.

During the 1920's, our own country and many other nations of the world were governed by men who did not appreciate the importance of foreign trade. Their philosophy was that each nation should protect its own producers by keeping foreign competition out of the country. They lost sight of the fact that producers also need markets in foreign countries, that foreign trade is a two-way street. They ignored the fact that the whole world suffers when each country tries to make itself a tight little island with high walls all around.

These shortsighted men met every problem with the method of selfishness. When business fell off, they were sure the trouble came from foreign competition. The answer, as they saw it, was to keep foreign competition out of the country. So they increased tariffs and erected other trade barriers. When one country did this, others retaliated. Things got worse. Anybody who understood the facts about international trade would know they could not help but get worse.

But the economic isolationists could not see this. Their answers always remained the same--"higher tariffs," "more trade barriers"--"keep the foreigners out."

The result was inevitable. Economic conditions became worse and worse all over the world. Depression came, and grew deeper and deeper. More and more men were thrown out of work. Hunger and unrest grew. Out of these chaotic conditions came the seeds of armed conflict.

Economic isolationism ran its bitter course to help bring on the Second World War.

Now, we are faced again with the kind of questions concerning foreign trade policies that followed the First World War. Postwar economic adjustments are creating marketing problems in some industries. We are beginning to hear the old outcry against imports.

There are some people whose only answer to these problems is the same as it was 20 or 30 years ago--"keep out foreign competition." But I say to you with all the earnestness I possess--"that is the wrong answer."

We must not again start down the road to economic isolationism.

An increase in world trade is not a matter of one country profiting at the expense of another. It is a matter of increasing prosperity for all countries.

Those who wail so loudly about an increase in United States imports are conspicuously silent about United States exports. But anybody with the least bit of commonsense knows that we can't have high exports, over the long run, without high imports. We can't sell if we don't buy. There isn't a man, no matter what his business is, whether he is a farmer, a laborer, a businessman, or a banker, who doesn't know that if a man can't sell his goods he can't buy any goods. And that is just as true of nations as it is of individuals.

Those who blindly oppose any rise in imports would, if they succeeded, return us to the pattern of trade reprisals and economic anarchy that did so much to create chaos in the world in the 1930's.

The United States cannot prosper behind closed doors or high tariff walls. The United States cannot hope to remain at peace behind such foolish, artificial barriers.

There are some employers and workers who are sincerely worried about the effect on their own businesses of an increase in imports. To them I say: do not be misled by the hysterical clamor of the high tariff lobby.

With a growing economy, such as ours, an increase in imports is a natural thing. The things we import add to our national wealth. They add to our standard of living. Much of the increase in imports will be in raw materials or manufactured goods that we do not produce here in our own country at all.

A gradual rise in imports over the next several years may, it is true, cause minor dislocations in our domestic economy--the same kind of dislocations that occur all the time in a dynamic economy, in which new products and new industries are constantly coming into the market. What do you reckon happened to the Baldwin Locomotive Works when the diesels came along? But you wouldn't ride a Baldwin when you can ride behind a diesel. It will not cause more than that, because our system of negotiating reciprocal trade agreements is set up so as to give full consideration to the claims of every domestic industry that fears possible injury from increased imports.

But we do not, and should not, try to shut out fair competition. Fundamentally, there is no more reason to be afraid of fair competition from foreign goods than there is from domestic goods. We have found in this country that competition leads to better quality, lower prices, and a higher standard of living. If we maintain our dynamic, expanding economy, we need have no fear of a normal increase in imports. I don't care where it is located, they can't compete with us if we make up our minds to compete honestly.

What we do need is to have a majority of the trading nations agree on a basic code of fair trade principles and practices, and agree to settle their trade disputes in a spirit of give and take, and not in a shooting war.

We have such a code in the Charter of the International Trade Organization. Fiftytwo nations signed this charter. The International Trade Organization provides a permanent conference table where nations can settle their disputes. I hope the Congress will ratify the charter soon, so we can set up the Organization and get on with the job.

This is the way to move forward to a world in which nations can trade with mutual benefit, in true international cooperation.

There is no room for economic isolationism in a world torn between freedom and Communist tyranny. The United States has no choice but to work with the free nations of the globe in mutual assistance and partnership.

I believe most Americans know this. But there are still a few who are too shortsighted or too selfish to work for the greatest good of the greatest number.

They are the same old "yes, but . . ." people who always stand in the road of progress. They no longer say, as they used to say in the 1920's and 1930's, "We are isolationists."

They've given up that line. Now they say, "Yes, we believe in international cooperation, but .... " And the "but" takes many forms.

They say, "But . . . we cannot afford the cost of the European recovery program."

In other words they say we can't afford to spend 1 1/2 percent of our national income to keep Europe free!

Or they say, "But . . . it's not our business to help other free countries build up their defenses."

In other words, we should invite the Communists to overrun our friends, and leave us alone in the world. That makes a lot of sense, doesn't it ?

Or they say, "Yes, we believe in international cooperation all right, but let's shut off imports from foreign countries."

In other words, they would cut down international trade, force down the living standards of other free peoples--and ours, too-and let the Communists take over!

The "yes, but" boys underestimate the intelligence of the American people, just as some people did in 1948. So far, every effort to return to isolationism has been defeated.

I am confident that we shall continue to cooperate with other free countries to increase our common welfare.

I am confident that we shall continue to defeat isolationism.

This is the way to defeat communism.

This is the way to build a prosperous world.

This is the way to achieve freedom and peace.

And I am just as sure as I stand here that you are going to cooperate with us and try to accomplish that purpose.

Thank you very much.