Word: runcimans
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...statement," said flustered President Walter Runciman of the Board of Trade, "will be issued in due time...
Blunt, hard-headed Walter Runciman. president of Britain's Board of Trade, called in Japan's Ambassador Tsuneo Matsudaira one day last week and gave him a strange ultimatum: Either the Japanese Government agree to divide the world's markets for cotton and silk cloth equably with Britain, or Britain would keep Japanese cloth out of Britain and its colonies by means of import quotas based on what Japan sold during the 1927-31 period. Ambassador Matsudaira passed the ultimatum on to his Government which presently sent back word that Japan wanted to think it over...
Nevertheless, Mr. Runciman did not declare unconditional war. He knew that a trade war with Japan will help Lancashire textile men, but hurt other British business with Japan. He invited Japan to compromise, made it clear that his action has nothing whatever to do with Britain's position on Japan's "moral protectorate'' over China (TIME, April 30). To this Japanese newspapers last week retorted: "Great Britain is taking advantage of the unfavorable light in which Japan has recently been placed...
Last week Britain retaliated in kind. Led by President Walter Runciman, the Board of Trade put into effect a 20% increase of duty on most French imports. When it was presented to the House of Commons for approval three days later, only a handful of Laborites and Free Traders voted against it. Even monocled Sir Austen Chamberlain, famed as Britain's ablest Francophile, voted for the tariff. More in sorrow than in anger he announced...
Summing up for His Majesty's Government, Trade Board President Runciman cried: "We have found that in some parts of the Empire goods have been imported direct from Japan bearing British names and trademarks. That is a form of dishonesty which any government should do its best to suppress...