commission has reported, a bill must be drawn and presented to the House, and referred to the Ways and Means Committee, and reported by the Committee to the House, and debated in the House, and then-then you're up against it the same old way. Representatives are looking out for particular interests of their several districts. What do they care for your commission of experts? They must look out for their own. long session spent in the hog-scramble, like last summer, and perhaps more than one session, and all that time the same old excessive rates.

A

Yes, and by that time those blessed statistics of your expert commission all out of date. And then another long wait, till the statistics can be made over. What prettier scheme could there be to stave off real tariff reduction?

That Tariff Commission scheme is a good card for Republicans to play. But Democrats ought not to be fooled by it. The Democratic party should refuse to dally with any such humbug. It should start at once with a definite tariff-reduction program. It should demand specific changes. Some of them should be: free iron, including rails and structural steel; free lumber; free coal; free wool; free leather; free machinery; free chemicals; large reductions in the rates on cutlery, glass, chinaware and manufactures of cotton, wool, flax, etc., and silk; free food, except low rates on a few articles imported in large quantities, like cheese and macaroni. The Democratic party should demand that protection be cut out of National legislation.

It is time now to have no more fooling. The Republican party has declared -President Taft said it a year ago, Vice-President Sherman said it the other night, others have said it and most have taken it for granted that the country is committed to the policy of protection. It is for the Democratic party to denounce that policy as inherently unjust and demand that it be cut out.

The Democratic cry should be: Cut out protection! Cut out protection! Protection is robbery of the wageearner; cut it out. Protection is violation of fundamental economic principles; cut it out. Protection is immoral,

in giving one rich man the right to bleed many poor men; cut it out. Protection is corrupting to all National legislation, making it possible and profitable to maintain expensive lobbies in Washington; cut it out.

Don't fool with the subject as those Republican Insurgents in the Senate fooled with it last summer-Cummins and Dolliver and La Follette and Beveridge-fighting for a little less of the same poison. Insist that protection is bad-bad all the time-always was bad -always must be bad. Cut it out!

The Democrats need not expect to win until they deserve to win. They will not deserve to win until they resolutely put the large public good ahead of the petty local grab. They cannot expect to get and hold the confidence of the public until they set their faces squarely against seeking protection favors for their several States and Districts. Cut it out!

But getting something for your District and getting something for your State, that's the way to make friends and win support. Yes, the friendship and support of the few favored ones, but the millions who are the American people, the way to do something for them to win their favor is to shut off these favors to the favored few.

And see the beauty of the creed! No giving away of the people's rights and earnings to King's favorites; no giving away of the people's rights and earnings to a few rich contributors of campaign funds; no getting back at the rich with impossible income taxes; no vain threatening of executive punishment of assumed-to-be wicked trusts; no autocratic sorting out of citizens into sheep and goats;-no, none of that, -only just the striking away of unjust statutes. Another great battle for mere liberty. For the liberty of all of us.

Make that your creed, Democrats. Be, more than any party ever was, the party of liberty-the party of unmeddled-with opportunity-the champion of the millions, who are the people. Асcording to the faithfulness with which you live up to that creed will come your ultimate success as a responsible party directing National policy.

If you Democrats will but brace up to your opportunity!

What the Sun says about a tariff commission has a large measure of truth in it, although we do not think many, if any, Republicans are advocating it for the purpose of delaying revision. Most of its advocates are revisionists. The fact remains, however, regardless of motives, that the facts obtained by a commission will generally be old and useless when revision takes place and that when the time comes for revision Congress will take testimony for itself.

Undoubtedly the editor of the Sun thinks there is no jobbery, no favoritism, no bidding for campaign contributions, in free trade. He may not have turned his eyes towards the great commercial cities during the last presidential compaign, and especially towards New York and Chicago, when the tariff was undergoing revision a year ago. He probably does not know that the largest importing house in this country manufactures gloves and hosiery in Europe. When it was proposed to raise the duties on those articles that house, which is a big advertiser, inspired the newspapers to oppose the threatened advance by talking robbery, high prices, etc., and it organized a movement among club women to memorialize Congress against daring to raise the duties on their pet purchases. Some two hundred thousand of them fell into the trap and this deprived some fifty thousand of their country women from earning a living in producing the articles which are now made abroad, and on which the manufacturing importers make so large a profit that they can afford to finance the Democratic party.

Perhaps the Sun will reply: Suppose this is so; but if you had raised the duties Mr. Littauer of Gloversville, N. Y., and the hosiery men grouped about Philadelphia would have palmed off inferior and ill-fitting goods on the women and compelled them to pay a higher price. This, however, would not be true. They offered to produce goods in all respects equal to the foreign article and without raising the price if they could only get the market-our own American market-and yet the party of protection had become so poisoned with the malaria called "revision downward" that it had not the stamina to stand up and walk with its old vigor, and the result is that a premium was placed upon manufacturing abroad for home destruction.

How do the pure souled advocates of the angelic conception of altruism in business reconcile facts like these with their sense of patriotism and their knowledge of human nature? The trouble with them is that they see the white robed celestials and not the scheming traders. If there is selfishness in protection, the nature of the policy makes it of some value to others besides the schemers, while the selfishness of free trade, whether called by that name or some other, is unpatriotic, oppressive, dwarfing, blighting, and destructive of freedom itself.

As the result of an investigation in Germany, growing out of a controversy over the increased cost of living, it is shown that while there has been a rise in prices since 1895 of 27 per cent., the daily wage of workmen in the same period has increased from 39 to 75 per cent.

Before the Congressional fight is well started there will be many speeches and editorials praising the tariff of 1846. One of the best presentments of the low tariff side made in the last quarter of a century was John G. Carlisle's advocacy of the Mills bill, and in that speech Carlisle had much to say of the general prosperity enjoyed under "the tariff of '46." Occasionally Democratic writers quote a threadbare passage from Mr. Blaine conceding that general business was active, that large amounts of money were in circulation, and that the country seemed to be satisfied with its schedules. The dullest voter who knows that the Democratic party carried the elections of 1852 and 1856 can see that the public dissatisfaction cannot have been serious. It is positive that the resentment of Protectionists had something to do with the defeat of the Democrats in 1848, but it is certain that it did not prevent two successive victories, and there was enough public sentiment in favor of a low tariff to admit of further reductions in 1857.

So much may be conceded, or rather so much bare fact may be stated. But observe that the average Protectionist declares that Protection is a wise policy and instances the good effects of the tariffs of 1824, 1828, 1842, 1861, and subsequent years. The shrewder opponents of Protection, on the other hand, say very little about the unwise cuts made in 1816; ignore the results that followed Clay's compromise; do not quote what President Buchanan

said about Guthrie's reductions in 1857; and quietly pass over the Wilson experiment. It seems to them better policy to single out the tariff of 1846, a bill largely framed by the sagacious mind of Robert J. Walker, and to point to the period of its operation as the golden age of the republic. They cannot by facts or figures prove that revenue tariffs are better than Protective tariffs, but they can show that the tariff of 1846 did not do so much harm as it might have done. During its decade powerful counteracting influences were at work, and its tendencies were consequently checked.

Like all low tariffs the Walker tariff contained many Protective rates, and some of them were of importance. In those days, be it remembered, there was no talk of a solid South or solid North. There was reasonable certainty that some of the Southern Commonwealths would be carried by the Whigs, and this meant that the Democrats had to carry several Northern States if they wished to have any hope of winning. Without compromise and concession the measure could not have been passed, and with the theoretical arguments about the glories of purely revenue duties blended the practical element of duties guarding the native producer against foreign competition.

The Walker tariff was passed in 1846, and scarcely had it become law when the crops of Europe began to fail, the Irish famine coming close on these shortages. An enormous demand for American breadstuffs brought a great deal of foreign money into our ports, and the American farmer, always progressive, spent money freely. When the farmers are prosperous they buy new harness, new wagons, new ploughs, build new barns, paint old ones, and in a score of ways quicken general business.

With this demand should be coupled the activity created by the Mexican war. Long wars, with defeats as well as victories, often depress or even wreck strong houses, but in this war the mighty AngloSaxon tyrant was trampling on the weak Spanish-American, every battle was a success, the news of triumph after triumph appealed to enterprising men, the government bought large quantities of supplies, and everyone rightly expected that peace would bring with it an expansion of territory. Peace was shortly followed by the discovery of gold in California, and this quickened the active, confident spirit that believes in good times and by its own hopefulness helps to establish and maintain them. A boy who reads Bret Harte may think that he sacrifices fact to picturesque effect, but men who remember the gold fever tell us that Bret Harte speaks within bounds. Throughout the commercial flood tides of 1847, '48 and '49 Protectionists were not silent; they declared that the tariff of 1842 should not have been repealed, and that its repeal would ultimately prove disastrous. As men of common sense they admitted that gold from Europe and from California would delay the panic, but they pointed out that the reduced duties had already hurt our manufacturing industries

and that worse injury might be expected.

It would be well for everybody, Protectionist or Free Trader, whatever his political or economic beliefs, to remember Senator Lodge's golden sentence, "The one certain truth of history is that no great result was ever due to a single cause." But if the Walker tariff was the unmixed blessing it is said to have been why did the Democrats lose the election of 1848? Undoubtedly the sturdy manhood of Zachary Taylor appealed to "the plain people," and there was a general feeling that he had been unfairly treated by the President. There were many who blamed the Administration for yielding too much to Great Britain in the Oregon boundary treaty. Van Buren's friends had not forgiven his treatment in 1844, and the Free Soil movement proves how they felt the old grievance. But the successful prosecution of the war, and the large demand for our grain and potatoes abroad were favorable to the Democrats, and their defeat is partly due to the low tariff of 1846. In 1844 the cry in Pennsylvania had been, "Polk, Dallas and the tariff of '42." The workingmen of Pennsylvania believed that the Democrats would maintain the Protective tariff. Polk juggled with words and Dallas was even more of a wheedler. When the crucial moment came Polk deserted the Pennsylvania Democrats who had voted for him almost as meanly as Cleveland deserted Randall. The electoral vote of Pennsylvania, which went for Polk in 1844, was cast for Taylor in 1848.

No man living is free from bias, and it is probable that every writer

or speaker overrates the influences that tell for his side. We can analyze a coin and say that it is so much silver and so much alloy, but we cannot say that an election due to four causes owed 25 per cent. of its effect to each one of them. Let the reader weigh the different factors in the election of 1848 to his own saitsfaction. It is sufficient to say that the opposition to a low tariff was one of the causes that led to the Democratic reverse. Eight years before, under another low tariff system, they had been beaten. President Taylor, himself a Louisiana planter, urged a return to Protective duties, and his successoг, Fillmore, saw clearly enough that the abnormal demand for our breadstuffs could not last unless we were assured that European harvests would always be bad. The crops of Europe were again returning to their normal level, our exports were declining, the fever of 1849 was beginning to give way to a chill, and the belief of optimists was giving way.

Two influences, however, were yet on the side of the low tariff. Cotton and tobacco, two of our leading products, were yielding large crops, and finding a ready sale in Europe. Numbers of people were moving westward, and this led to a brisk movement in railroad construction, which of necessity meant large outlays for wages and materials. Some of the best articles that ever appeared in American newspapers were predictions that widespread disaster would be sure to follow in the wake of our low tariff, and these articles, facing all the facts, admitted that counteracting tendencies might for some time delay the inevitable. It was with distrust and even with

apprehension that the cool-headed Democratic leaders saw 1852 dawn, but General Scott, though a lion in the field, proved a singularly weak candidate. Pierce won the race, and once again the day of reckoning was delayed.

In 1854 came the Crimean war, a war involving England, France, Sardinia, Turkey and Russia. Of necessity this meant a great demand for American grain, and also a lessening of the foreign competition for the American market. The English and French workshops that were taxed to their utmost to meet the needs of the army could not give much attention to America. Some of our industries, hopeless of securing adequate Protection, had adapted themselves to the low tariff. New settlements were growing; there were many encouraging signs in the West; and in 1856 the Democrats elected James Buchanan, a man, by the way, who had always favored a tariff high enough to keep our manufacturers on a solvent basis. It is highly improbable that he would have signed the Guthrie tariff bill which Franklin Pierce inflicted on us at the close of his term. Buchanan was accused of blandness and formality, but he could speak as plainly as Jackson. In 1860 he wrote: "Panic and distress of a fearful character prevails throughout the land. Our laboring population is without employment. and consequently deprived of the means of earning their bread. Indeed all hope seems to have deserted the minds of men." If Polk had signed the Guthrie tariff bill, Buchanan on the eve of departing from the White House signed the first Morrill tariff. With Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and Jackson, Buchanan