CANADA: Plain Talk Between Friends

Frankness, said the President of the U.S. last week to the Canadian Parliament, “is a measure of friendship.” By that measure, relations between Canada and the U.S. had rarely moved on a friendlier level. Dwight Eisenhower bluntly defended some U.S. policies that had offended Canadians; on other points he offered significant concessions. But the major achievement of President Eisenhower’s visit was simply the warm and easy relationship that he and Prime Minister John Diefenbaker of Canada developed in three days of close association.

Ike & Dief. From the time the President and Mrs. Eisenhower, along with Secretary of State Dulles and Mrs. Dulles, alighted from the presidential plane Columbine III, the President and the Prime Minister lost little time getting down to the serious business that prompted the visit. In the pine-paneled study of the Prime Minister’s residence, Ike and Dief settled themselves in chintz-covered chairs, and for an hour and 35 minutes went over the problems of trade, tariffs and joint defense that they had agreed to discuss. Sitting in with their chiefs were Dulles and External Affairs Chief Sidney Smith, U.S. Ambassador Livingston Merchant and Canada’s Ambassador to Washington, Norman Robertson.

Diefenbaker and Eisenhower, who had met briefly twice before, seemed to hit it off immediately. In Diefenbaker’s office, before and after formal appearances, and once in an unscheduled drive through the scenic Gatineau Hills of Quebec, the two leaders swapped quips and serious words, argued viewpoints, came to understandings if not always agreements.

In the House of Commons, Eisenhower arose to the drumming of open hands on desk tops to make the definitive speech of his visit. He came bearing concessions but no apologies. In a chamber that has rung on occasion with harsh judgments of Washington’s words and works, he defended in plain words the policies that he was not prepared to alter. Items:

¶ U.S. wheat disposal: some wheat giveaways, said the President, have in time of famine saved the starving from death, while soft-currency sales have raised economic standards in the purchasing countries and thus “enlarged the markets for all.” Barter sales, admittedly damaging to Canada in some instances, have been largely eliminated.

¶ Oil import restrictions: heavily criticized in Canada, the restrictions were aimed to strengthen the U.S.’s defenses by encouraging domestic exploration for oil, were drafted to minimize their effect on Canada (other U.S. officials said that quotas have had no effect on Canadian oil sales).

¶ Tariffs: since 1934, the U.S. has gradually reduced tariffs, expects to continue; of “about a dozen” tariff increases granted under escape-clause provisions, only one has materially affected Canadian exports.

¶Canada’s trade deficit with the U.S.: “The U.S. and Canada are not state traders,” said Ike. “All the products of industry manufactured in the U.S. and sold abroad are sold through the enterprise of the private seller. These articles come to you in Canada only because of the desire of the individual Canadian consumer to buy a particular piece of merchandise . . . To try to balance our books once a month or once a year with every nation with which we trade would stifle rather than expand trade.”

Bulletins from the Bosses. Periodically during the President’s visit, his press secretary, James Hagerty, and Prime Minister Diefenbaker’s press secretary, James Nelson, dropped the attending newsmen substantial tidbits of news. From one of the Ike-Dief sessions, they announced, came a decision to set up the Canada-U.S. Committee on Joint Defense. From another working session came an apparent solution to a problem that has irritated Canadians: the regulation of foreign sales of U.S.-controlled subsidiaries in Canada.

The issue flared bitterly last March when a Vancouver trading company purportedly representing Red China charged that the Ford Motor Co. of Canada, Ltd. had refused to consider an order for 1,000 cars because of the operation of the U.S. Trading with the Enemy Act. Last week’s common-sense solution: to review any future cases in Washington and Ottawa, generally free Canadian companies to operate under Canadian rules.

Ottawans had difficulty picking out the Secret Service operatives around the President. But the security problem managed to generate a first-class flap when an Ottawa cab driver reported that two men, one of them carrying what could have been a rifle case, had left his cab near the golf course where Ike was playing a round with three companions. Notified of the cab driver’s suspicions, Ike calmly finished his round (score: 89) while a detail of Mounties beat the surrounding bushes in a vain search for the suspicious strangers.

In his three days in Ottawa, Eisenhower’s attentive manner, his obvious interest in the concerns of his hosts and his famed grin did much to soothe the irritations of recent U.S.-Canadian conflicts. No one expected Eisenhower and Diefenbaker to settle all their countries’ outstanding problems, but they had made a good start, laid a firm foundation for future easy give-and-take between the White House and Parliament Hill.