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What if the Payne tariff bill were formed by bad men as they contend. This can never be made an argument with the intelligent American people. It is only an appeal to passion and prejudice, and is as unfair when resorted to in opposition to the Payne tariff bill, which is a Republican measure, fairly and honestly representing the majority will and judgment of that party, as it has ever since been thought to have been when it was invoked to create prejudice against the Savior of men when his enemies inquired in derision, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" I do not believe that the reduction of the agricultural schedules would in any way reduce the price to the consumer. In my judgment, it would, however, do very great harm, not only to the country at large but to the American consumer. The very highest and best policy requires that the adjustment of our revenue laws should tend to enforce an intelligent division of labor. This country should produce meats enough to feed all the people. It should produce wheat enough, corn and vegetables to supply the needs of our markets. To cut down the duties on these articles would only stimulate the exodus now going on from some of our Western States to the wheat fields of Canada. Our production of meats has become inadequate for our own needs. The great Western ranges which produce cattle are being fast divided into small farms devoted to agriculture and the putting of hides upon the free list will have but one tendency, and that will be to advance the price not only of meats but shoes as well. There will be neither cheap shoes nor cheap beef until we pro

duce these things for ourselves, and I deem it of the very highest importance that everything possible be done that the Government can do in a constitutional way to stop the exodus, not only to Canada but from the American farm to the congested city.

The Payne tariff bill was enacted at a time when other causes were operating to advance prices. The great primary cause of advancing prices is the steady, ever-increasing volume of the world's gold. Our dollar, whether it be of paper, silver or gold, will never purchase more of other commodities than the gold which is required to coin the dollar will trade for a commodity, so that when anyone declares that all prices are going up the truth could be as well stated that gold is going down. Considerable more of this metal has been added to the world's supply in the last generation than was accumulated in all the thousands of years before, and this commodity gold is governed by the same law of supply and demand as any other commodity. From this cause alone it was inevitable that prices should advance, and that they must continue to advance, and it is unfair to charge effects of our changed revenue law which result from the operation of this older law of economics, which is universal in its operation and as persistent as the law of gravitation.

AN OLD-FASHIONED VIEW

OF THE TARIFF.

Has the Constitutional argument for a Protective tariff ever been put more concisely than in these words?

"The power to impose duties on imports originally belonged to the several States. The right to adjust those duties with a view to the encouragement of domestic branches of industry is so completely identical with that power that it is difficult to suppose the existence of the one without the other. The States have delegated their whole authority over imports to the general government, without limitation or restriction, saving the very inconsiderable reservation relating to their inspection proprietary medicines; American clocks and watches are bought, in order as named, by Canada, England and Australia; Canada takes more than one-third of our twine, followed by Argentina, Russia, and England in the order named. Most of the American sewing machines exported go to Great Britain, Germany, Argentina, Netherlands, Mexico, Brazil and Canada. To Canada also is sent most of the jewelry exported. Great Britain exceeds any other country as a market for American naval stores and also leads other nations in the purchase of American illuminating oil, printing paper and paraffin. Exports of American cigarettes are almost equally divided between China and the British East Indies, while plug tobacco goes chiefly to Australia, New Zealand and England. American lumber goes chiefly to England, Canada, Argentina and continental Europe, while England takes more American toys than all other countries combined.

laws.

"This authority having thus entirely passed from the States, the right to exercise it for the purpose of protection does not exist in them; and consequently, if it be not possessed by the general government, it must be extinct. Our political system would thus present the anomaly of a people stripped of the right to foster their own industry, and to counteract the most selfish and destructive policy which might be adopted by foreign nations.

"This surely cannot be the case; this indispensable power, thus surrendered by the States, must be within the scope of the authority on the subject expressly delegated to Congress.

"In this conclusion I am confirmed as well by the opinions of Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Madison and Munroe, who have each repeatedly recommended the exercise of this right under the Constitution as by the uniform practice of Congress the continued acquiescence of the States, and the general understanding of the people."

These words are taken from the second annual message of Andrew Jackson, President of the United States. Written in 1830 they form a terse reply to some of the nonsense talked in 1910.

THE WAR AND THE TARIFF.

About two generations ago the late John A. Wright of Pennsylvania, was employed in railroad construction in Georgia. He returned to the North, and followed the course of Northern industrial development as an investor and a student. Wright was a good judge of stocks and properties, and a painstaking collector of economic facts.

Sometime after the election of 1880 Wright paid a visit to Georgia, and renewed his old acquaintanceships. The "unreconstructed" element was then large and positive.

"I tell you Wright" said one of the old Bourbons, "the day will come when we get both Houses of Congress in our hands, and a President who will sign any bill we pass. Then we will get square with the North. It may be ten years or twenty years, but our time will come, and then we will pay off the old

scores."

A man of Wright's knowledge of public affairs was not surprised at this vindictiveness, but merely at the frankness with which it was avowed. These irreconcilables did not stoop to the humbug about shaking off the fetters of Protection that we may capture the markets of the world, or the false cry that they wanted to reduce the tariff in the interests of the laboring masses. They openly stated that they sought revenge on the North for holding the Union together.

Give them at least the credit due to men who will not conceal the longings of their hearts.

The debates of 1894 showed that much of this old bitterness mained, yet that it was on the de

re

cline. In 1897 a number of Southern Representatives and Senators who, as partisans, voted against the Dingley bill, yet helped to frame some of its schedules and refrained from all that savored of filibustering.

By 1909 the old Bourbon spirit was far less powerful than in 1897. The clearest heads among the old Southerners recognized that the Lost Cause was lost, and the clearest heads among the younger generation did not wish to fight over old issues.

Each year the host of "unreconstructed" is smaller. Already the average Southern Congressman is a fair Protectionist in practice, ten years hence he may call himself one in theory.

PENN. PROTECTIONIST.

OUR MANUFACTURES IN BRITISH TERRITORY.

BY WALTER J. BALLARD.

In spite of the fact that Great Britain is the greatest manufacturing country of Europe and the world's largest exporter of manufactures, nearly one-half of the factorymade goods of the United States go to British territory.

The Bureau of Statistics of the Department of Commerce and Labor ascertains that out of the $671,000,000 worth of American manufactures exported in 1909, $275,000,000 worth were sent to British territory, or 41 per cent. of the total; also that our total exports of all kinds of merchandise to British territory in that year reached a value of $742,000,000 manufactures sharing for 37 per cent.

By the term "British territory" is meant England, Scotland, Ireland,

Gibralter and Malta, Gozoc, etc., in Europe; Bermuda, British Honduras, Canada, Newfoundland, Labrador, and the British West Indies in North America; British Guiana and Falkland Islands in South America; Aden, Honkong, India, the Straits Settlements, and other British East Indies in Asia, Australia, New Zealand, and other British islands in Oceana; British South Africa, West Africa and East Africa on the Dark Continent.

In money the classified record for 1909 of American manufactures sent to British teritory is:

British Europe
British North America
British South America
British Asia

British Ocenana
British Africa

..

$132,000,000 97,000,000 680,000

......

13,000,000 26,000,000

7,000,000

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Of our total exports to the principal British communities, England takes 25 per cent. in manufactures, Canada 58 per cent., Australia 88 per cent., Scotland 32 per cent., India 97 per cent., South Africa 80 per cent., and the West Indies 40 per cent.

THE COST OF PRODUCTION.

Washington Dispatch to the New York Sun. The House voted to appropriate $250,000 "to enable the President to secure information to assist him in the discharge of the duties imposed upon him by the tariff law, including such investigations of the cost of production of commodities as are

authorized by said law and for the employment of such persons as may be necessary for these purposes." Admitting that a competent board intelligently directed could obtain much information of value in the adjustment of rates, much of what could be learned in the process would be utterly worthless when the time came to make use of it. The advocates of the scheme desire that there be obtained an official report and a record of the producing cost of thousands of commodities, both in this country and in all other countries in which they are produced, and from which they are exported to the United States. In the case of some of the most important articles on the list this is out of the question. Take wool as an illustration. What is the cost of producing wool? Is it the same on the Montana ranch as on the Ohio farm? Is the cost of corresponding grades the same in Indiana, in Colorado, and in California? Is there correspondence of cost in New Mexico and Wyoming? Take wheat, cattle, rice, sugar, tobacco, and scores of other articles of daily use and consumption. Local conditions of production, and consequently the unit cost of production, change from year to year. There is no price fixity whatever on a long list of commodities, and yet it is proposed to spend a large sum of money to ascertain the costs of production as a basis of comparison and of regulation of tariff rates.

The variation of costs in different localities and from year to year is doubtless greater in such commodities as those referred to above than it is in manufactured articles and in materials employed in manufacturing processes. Yet even

some raw

in these lines grave difficulties almost if not quite insurmountable are encountered. We have the statement of the Bureau of Corporations that the ascertainment of the cost of producing steel rails in this country "required the work of a considerable force of men for over a year in the examination of thousands of accounts under the direction of an expert steel man." We have the result of that investigation showing the cost in different mills as ranging from $19.33 a ton to $31.27. On what basis is cost to be figured? Shall it be the average of all for a period of years? A tariff on that basis would protect some who do not need protection and would drive others out of business. If this difficulty is encountered here at home how shall we ascertain the cost of steel rails, structural steel bars, sheets, rods, nails, wire, and other articles in England, Germany, Belgium, or France, where we have no authority to demand an inspection of books, and where factory costs vary even as they do here? There are of course many articles whose cost of production can be learned accurately in some cases and approximately in other cases, but a large percentage of them is either relatively or actually unimportant.

A PROTECTION DEMOCRAT.

From the Philadelphia Press,

The late Senator McEnery had the distinction of being the only Democratic Senator who voted for the Payne tariff bill. He voted for it on its passage in the Senate and later was paired in favor of the bill as slightly modified in conference. On most of the amendments submitted

he voted with the majority of the Republicans, supporting, however, any amendment that was clearly for the interests of the planters of Louisiana.

Senator McEnery believed in protection and supported his belief consistently by his vote. Almost every other Southern Senator voted for protective duties for some product or industry in their own particular State, and having secured that protection they voted against the bill, though some of them doubtless would have been sorely disappointed had their votes prevailed and the bill which gave protection to important industries in their States been defeated.

When the Dingley bill was before the Senate, in 1897, Senator McEnery voted, as he did twelve years later, for protective duties for Louisiana interests. There were some others who charged that his vote with the Republicans showed that he was not a Democrat, but the people of Louisiana, whose sugar and rice were protected by the Dingley law, were quite satisfied with Senator McEnery's Democracy. They gave him a public reception in New Orleans after the adjournment of Congress, and the Senator made speech in which he said:

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The Democratic Senator from California voted for a high tariff on borax because California is a borax-producing State. The Democratic Senator from Kentucky earnestly worked and voted for wood alcohol, and the Democratic Senators from Florida, Georgia and South Carolina favored the protection of rice and lumber. Why did they aid and assist in making the bill protective and then vote against it? The interests they advocated would have been lost by the defeat of the bill. I voted for the interests of Louisiana. I secured the protection we desired, and I did not intend

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