Radio Address to the Nation on Free and Fair Trade (1987)
www.reaganlibrary.gov

... My fellow Americans:

Prime Minister Nakasone of Japan will be visiting me here at the White House next week. It's an important visit, because while I expect to take up our relations with our good friend Japan, which overall remain excellent, recent disagreements between our two countries on the issue of trade will also be high on our agenda.

As perhaps you've heard, last week I placed new duties on some Japanese products in response to Japan's inability to enforce their trade agreement with us on electronic devices called semiconductors. Now, imposing such tariffs or trade barriers and restrictions of any kind are steps that I am loath to take. And in a moment I'll mention the sound economic reasons for this: that over the long run such trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer. But the Japanese semiconductors were a special case. We had clear evidence that Japanese companies were engaging in unfair trade practices that violated an agreement between Japan and the United States. We expect our trading partners to live up to their agreements. As I've often said: Our commitment to free trade is also a commitment to fair trade.

But you know, in imposing these tariffs we were just trying to deal with a particular problem, not begin a trade war. So, next week I'll be giving Prime Minister Nakasone this same message: We want to continue to work cooperatively on trade problems and want very much to lift these trade restrictions as soon as evidence permits. We want to do this, because we feel both Japan and the United States have an obligation to promote the prosperity and economic development that only free trade can bring.

Now, that message of free trade is one I conveyed to Canada's leaders a few weeks ago, and it was warmly received there. Indeed, throughout the world there's a growing realization that the way to prosperity for all nations is rejecting protectionist legislation and promoting fair and free competition. Now, there are sound historical reasons for this. For those of us who lived through the Great Depression, the memory of the suffering it caused is deep and searing. And today many economic analysts and historians argue that high tariff legislation passed back in that period called the Smoot-Hawley tariff greatly deepened the depression and prevented economic recovery.

You see, at first, when someone says, ``Let's impose tariffs on foreign imports,'' it looks like they're doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs.

And sometimes for a short while it works -- but only for a short time.

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