European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - February 20, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 10 the stars and stripes . Rosenthal end hypocrisy of China s forced labor exports Here is some important Legal and bus ii Ess information for americans importing goods from China or investing in chinese factories or mines the chances arc High that you arc breaking the Law of the United states. Specifically. Chapter 19. Section 1307 of in United slates code. It is entitled co Tinct made goods importation prohibited and reads As follows goods wares articles and Mer Chandise mined produced or manufactured wholly or in part in any foreign country by convict labor or and forced labor or and indentured Labo Runder penal sanctions shall not be entitled to entry at any of the ports of the United states and the importation thereof is hereby the chinese government is not Only the largest user of forced labor in world history but its communist Economy i heavily dependent on it. Thousands of Camps scattered around inc country Mil Lions of forced labourers perhaps More than 20 million at this moment. Many labor Camps arc specifically set up and organized to manufacture goods for Export. Specialists on chinese com Merce have no doubt that slave labor products and raw material reach the Ini cd states Market. So far the United states has chosen to ignore the import ban. But Here is another business note for americans in the China Trade the Congress of the United Stales is Likely 10 try to change thai this year. The full congressional spotlight will focus on inc chinese gulag for the first Lime. Involved arc a government report due about May i. Hearings investigations and possible legislative action. Sen. Jesse Helms. . Is organizing a c congressional Battle to expose the convict labor system that underlies so much of the chinese communist econ omy. He will be joined by other republicans and democrats conservative and Liberal in what will be another bipartisan Effort to fight the Bush administration s policy of appeasing Beijing. In the Senate and then in the House of step on it representatives legislation will be introduced to enforce the Law and impose real penalties fines seizure of goods and treble damages. The plan also is to give organizations like labor unions and business associations the Legal right to sue against forced labor imports. Currently that right is limited to companies damaged by the import of forced labor merchandise. There will be a legislative Effort to write regulations against american investment in enterprises using forced labor. Forced labor has been essential to the chinese communist Economy for 40years, although the world carefully looked away. The regime has said so openly in the Law of the land production from Reform through labor shall be come a part of the Overall plan for the reconstruction of the nation s production the same Law also states plans for the distribution and coordination of the labor of criminals will be based on the number of criminals in each area and on the needs of production and the re construction of the the chinese millions being reformed by being forced to work unpaid for the profit of the communist system in clude those deemed Ordinary criminals. In China conviction is a formality after arraignment. Not guilty pleas arc an insult to the state. Political prisoners arc also used in forced labor. Now. Once again that can us anybody the government wants to cutaway. Other millions arc ordered into Job placement Camps when spot need develop Large scale impressment gangs. The factories arc not merely ancillary to the Camps. The contrary. Around China prisons arc established in or near factories specifically designed economically and physically to depend on forced labor. The slave labor factories and mines produce textiles chemicals Iron Coal tools machinery consumer goods another chinese exports. The Bush administration is expected to try to Block legislative action veto it or cripple it by demanding Power for the president to waive enforcement. And some american businesses that Trade in the sweat of slave labor will lobby against the ban arguing that the chinese people will be Hurt. That argument could be countered easily Banning imports of slave labor plants and Dollar exports to them would open jobs in the non prison econ omy. But do we really have to debate even arguing the Point seems like pandering to hard Core hypocrisy. The ban is Ameri can Law. It remains Only to enforce it sorrowfully past time. New York times William f. Buckley or. America s cup cases sport smash p overboard a few weeks from now. The highest court in the state of new York will dispose once and for All of the question. Who actually has the title to the America s cup High Lime. Another year or two of judicial squabbling Over the question and nobody would much care who owned the cup. The appetite for its acquisition having by then foundered along with the titanic and the Bismarck useful Only for future adventurers with a nostalgic turn of mind. The Legal question has to do with the tactic used bythe san Diego yacht club when challenged suddenly in 1987 by the Mercury Bay boating club of new zealand which strode Forth with a Mammoth Baclit 132 feel Long and challenged san Diego to meet it on the Field of Battle. To initiate a Challenge so soon after san Diego s stunning and exhausting Victory against Australia was not very sporting it having been decided by custom for about 100 years that intervals Between the races ought to be about three years. But new Zea land s sportsmen arc an impetuous lot and they want to climb the highest Mountain today not tomorrow. So. The strategists in san Diego figured out there was no Way they could gel their act together within the 10 months specified in the deed of gift Lei alone give time to All those other . Yacht clubs Hal would want to compete for inc Honor of defending the cup or for inc Honor of serving As challenger the America s cup Trust As modified in 1877, specifies that the race shall be Between two boats the defender and the Chal Lenger defined As the two boats that beat other boats Hal seek the Honor. Now the Way the Jolly folks in san Diego faced new zealand s peremptory Challenge was to build a catamaran which is a twin hulled boat whose sailing characteristics arc As different from a Mono Hull As the racing characteristics of a greyhound arc different from those of a horse. The very first race Between a Grey hound and a horse might be fun to watch for those i us who Don t know which of the two is faster. But if the greyhound came in five minutes before the horse there would t be much of an audience there for the second race let alone the fourth and. Was so with the race Between san Diego and new zealand. That Blind gentleman who sailed his boat to Bermuda a few years ago could have beaten the new zealand challenger with san Diego s cat which by the Way weighed 6,000 pounds while the new zealand cars Sloop weighed 60,000 pounds. All of this was done amidst a flurry of court action. The court permitted the race to take place but advised san Diego that this would not prejudice an Appeal on the grounds that by constructing a catamaran the ban Diego people had attached a meaning to the Trust in denture that was highly questionable the san Diego people seized on the word any in the phrase decree ing that the challenger has the right to sail a match against any one yacht or vessel constructed in the country of the club holding the the san deegans interpreted the word any As qualifying the word yacht rather than the word one. Naughty. Because the historical evolution of the phrase in question was precisely designed to safeguard against an entire Fleet As once was done from showing up to defend the cup instead of a single boat where the donor had clearly intended that it should be a one to one contest. Moreover the donor had been so specific As to specify that the challenger should reveal to the defender the length of the the waterline length Dis closes the putative Speed of challenging boat a so that defending boat b has to come in at the same wat Crlin length in order to produce a genuine contest of Speed. The waterline Speed of a boat is roughly computed As the Square Rool of double ils Walc line length so that the Speed of an 18-foot Walc line length Boal would be 6 Knols i.e., inc Square Rool of Isicc 18 36 equals 6. Now Why should a deed of Irusle go to the trouble of specifying the wat Crlin length of a Chat Longcr be Given into do so were meaningless which in becomes when a cat challenges a Mono Hull. The donor or. George Schuyler r . Especially Al this tense moment of the court s Clibe rations whole Back in the 1870s,the terms or the deed of gift Foster a fair com Elilion without either Side holding a built in it judge Bork s detractors will kindly look aside for a moment that is original intent if Ever we saw it and the whole Reliance of the san Diego people on the word any used to give meaning extrinsic to its purpose Isnoel Only bad philosophical practice and bad Law in is bad sportsmanship. The Holder of the America s cup so valiantly won by san Diego in 1987, ought not to be branded inner nationally As a bad sport. Universal press Syndicate
