World Trade Study Groups Register 100

Enrollment in student-organized seminars on international trade now totals almost 100, and surpasses participation in regular House seminars. Winthrop and Dudley, the only two Houses that do not yet offer the trade seminars, are expected to begin them within two weeks, and Yard discussion groups will be instituted soon afterwards.

Noting the lack of interest in regular House seminars, some Masters have claimed that offerings duplicate regular courses and try to cover too broad a subject. John J. Conway, Master of Leverett House, has suggested that seminars deal with a particular, limited subject that undergraduates really want to study.

Kennedy's trade expansion bill is "one of the two really big issues of this Congressional session, and a topic that people here are interested in," said Joseph B. Kadane '62, commenting on the success of the study he helped initiate. Work is organized so that the time required is "not very great," he added.

Reports and Speakers

Open to Harvard and Radcliffe, the seminars include both student reports (on the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and on the Common Market) and a guest speaker program. David Steinberg, economic consultant to the Committee for a National Trade Policy (a prominent lobby connected with Henry Ford II and Charles Percy) is scheduled to speak tomorrow on domestic effects of tariff reduction.

Dining with a group of 20 seminar members last night at Adams House, Morton H. Halperin, research associate in the Center for International Affairs, stated that tariff reductions harming American industries may hurt U.S. war-preparedness.

In the event of a conventional war with Soviet forces occupying Europe, Halperin continued, cessation of American-European trade might hinder America's ability to retaliate if the United States, through trade agreements, had allowed itself to become dependent on European production.

In fighting tariff reduction that would increase foreign competition, many American industries--textiles, oil, steel--now claim that they are "defense" industries, vital to the war or recovery ability of the nation.