Mexico Missouri Message

ENGLAND WANTS
EQUAL SUGAR RIGHTS

Demands Entry of West Indian Product on Same Terms as Cuba.

Washington: The President signed the Cuban reciprocity bill a few minutes before 1 o'clock Thursday afternoon.

The bill was taken to the White House by the chairman of the House committee on enrolled bills. With the same gold pen with which the measure had been signed by Speaker Cannon and Senator Frye, president pro tempore of the Senate, the President affixed his signature to the bill, thus making it a law. The pen belongs to Minister Quesada.

Now that the bill has become a law, a question of great interest has arisen, namely, the effect of the reduction of the duty on Cuban sugar upon importations of sugar from other countries. The British government has served formal notice on the state department that under the favored nation clause it expects that British sugar from the British West Indies shall be admitted into the United States on equal terms with Cuban sugar, and it is not doubted that Germany, France, Austria and the other great beet sugar producing countries will do likewise. An old holding of Attorney General Olney in President Cleveland's administration was adverse to such demands, but the question promises to be reopened with vigor.