NAFTA and Western Hemisphere trade on Political Party Support

Reductions in tariffs and other restrictions on trade among the United States, Canada and Mexico which were to be phased in o'er a 15 year period. The reductions between the United States and Canada were not the main subject of controversy since NAFTA merely accelerated duty reductions beneath a previously existing free trade treaty. The per centum of U.S.-Mexico trade which would be free of tariffs was as follows:

U.S. imports from Mexico U.S. exports to Mexico

Pre-NAFTA 13.9 17.9

1/1/94 67.7 48.9

Within five years 76.2 66.3

Within 10 years 99.3 98.1

Within 15 years ampere-second 100

2. Mexico guaranteed for the life of NAFTA the benefits of

recent Mexican laws liberalizing the treatment of foreign

3. under(a) side agreements, the U.S. and Mexico agreed to spend a total of $800 jillion on environmental cleanup on both sides of the butt and set up a procedure whereby any citizen could recoil to a neutral panel of experts of any failure by either country to enforce its environmental laws and such panels would finagle disputes involving minimum wages, child labor and worker safety.

4. Mexico agreed to order legal protection for U.S. and Canadian intellectual property apply in Mexico.

5. Trade Adjustment Assistance would be functional to American workers whose jobs were lost because of th

create labor vociferously opposed NAFTA and so did other elements of the participatory coalition, including Jesse Jackson, Ralph Nader and consumer groups, the core of the House Democratic Caucus led by House Whip David Bonior (D. Mich), House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt (D. Mo.

), a majority of congressional Democrats and others, including New York Governor Mario Cuomo, as strong as Ross Perot, segments of small business and the emerging leader of the republican right, Patrick Buchanan.

In the spring of 1993, the Wall Street Journal account that public opinion polls were showing 2:1 opposition to NAFTA, a figure which fell only to 50:50 on the eve of the House vote. The debate over NAFTA was fierce. Mickey Kantor, Clinton's Special Trade Representative, called it "a mad hatter's teatime party;" and Blumenthal said that "by mid-September, NAFTA was a political draw; by mid-November, it had become a howling hurricane." Johnson described the firestorm against NAFTA as arising out of "conditions that led to intense emotions along class lines. . . As America's industrial and service sectors retrench, fear over the future intensifies . . . that ripples with the ranks of factory workers, farmers and professionals alike."

De Palma, Anthony. "U.S. and Mexico Do What Comes Easiest." New York Times, 21 January 1996, E 3.

Altshiller, Donald (Ed.). renounce Trade Versus Protectionism. New York: H. H. Wilson, 1988.

"Free Trade Is Headed For More calefactory Debate." Wall Street Journal, 17 April 1995, A 1.

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