611.3731/1015
Press Release Issued by the Department of State, August 24, 1934
Statement by Mr. Cordell Hull, Secretary of State
At the time of the signing of the Trade Agreements Act, I stated that the authority under this new act of Congress would be exercised with the utmost care, fairness, and intelligence; that the primary object of the Administration’s tariff policy would be to benefit every important American interest; that nothing would be done blindly or recklessly; that the fullest possible information would be first assembled and the needs of business studied; and that the negotiations for the conclusion of reciprocal trade agreements under this Act would be conducted step by step in the light of the information obtained. Today, after more than twelve months’ painstaking and expert study, the United States and Cuba have signed a Trade Agreement calculated to restore the once flourishing trade between the two countries, now reduced to a fraction of its former amount. The agreement is mutually advantageous to the United States and to Cuba. Recognizing that the movement of goods has been seriously handicapped by the tariff barriers which each of the two countries has erected, they have agreed, in this instrument, to make substantial adjustments, which, with equal profit and without dislocating productive forces, will facilitate the sale of more American goods in Cuba and of more Cuban commodities in the United States.
In 1924, the total value of our own exports to Cuba amounted to almost $200,000,000; last year, our exports to Cuba were barely onetenth of that amount. We have every hope that the conclusion of this Agreement today will rapidly restore to the American farmer, to the American wage-earner, and to the American manufacturer, the benefits of the important market in Cuba which they formerly enjoyed.