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American economic nationalism the dangers of which
 
Franklin and Mason had foreseen in 1787, had run its
 
course - as had the schemes of Clarendon and Colbert.
 
     In conclusion one may safely say that it would
 
be no sin if statesmen learned enough of history to rea-
 
lize that no system which implies control of society by
 
privilege seekers has ever ended in any other way than
 
collapse. The wisest of all American statesmen insisted
 
all his life that the way to develop the ideal social
 
order was to leave every man the utmost freedom of ini-
 
tiative and action and always to forbid any man or group
 
of men to profiteer at the expense of others. May we not
 
reasonably expect the statesmen of today a sufficient
 
knowledge of the blunders of the past to realize that if
 
western civilization is to survive, they must find a way
 
to avoid the crime and the terrific disasters of war; they
 
must learn how to develop in a friendly spirit the resources
 
of undeveloped regions of the world; they must lower, not
 
raise, the barriers against the migration of surplus popu-
 
lations; and they maust facilitate, and not defeat, the
 
interchange of surplus goods - with these rational changes
 
of international procedure, a higher culture might easily
 
be carried to the masses of men everywhere; without these,
 
another war and chaos.
 
 
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