Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 January 1889 — JUDGE TURPIE ON THE TARIFF. [ARTICLE]

JUDGE TURPIE ON THE TARIFF.

KEEN THRUSTS AT MONOPOLY TAXES. Trust Attorneys ix the Sfnate Shown Up in True Colors—Why Should They Try to Reduce Taxes Paid bt Foreigners— A T e l l - ing Speech. [Congressional Record, Dec. 19.] Mr. Turpie—“l wish to inquire of the chair whether it would be in * rder to move to amend paragraph 150/’ The President p/o tempore—“An amendment to »he paragraph would l 'e in order.,’ Mr. Turpie—“'Then in line 568 I move to strike out the words ‘six tenths of one cent,’ and insert in lieu hereof the words ‘six mills;’ and in line 570, to strikeout the words ‘six tenths of one cent,’ and insert in lieu x heieof the words ‘six mills;’ so as to read: “150. Wire rods.—Rivet, nail, fence, and other iron or steel wire rods, whether round, oval, flat or square, in coils or loops or in any other shape, not smaUer than No. 6 wire gauge, valued at 3 cents or less par pound, six mills per pound; iron or steel flat, with longitude ribs for the manufacture of fencing, valued at 3 cents or less’per pound, six mills per pound: Provided, That all iron ©r steel rods, whether rolled or drawn, smaller than No. 6 wire gauge, shall I e classed and dutiable as wire.

The President pro tempore—“The question is on agreeing to the amendment proposed by the senator from Indiana [Mr. Turpie.] Mr. Turpie—‘’Mr. President, if I understand the progress we heve made in the tariff debate, paragraph 150 is : art of what is called an amendment to the original bill. It is part of the amendment offered as a substitute for the original bill; and of the original bill itself there is nothing left in the report of the committee except the enacting clause and the Htle. “The title is a v c ry significant one: ‘To i educe taxation and simpl fy the laws in relation to the collection of the revenue.’ T*iere are two purooses expresssd in this title. Certain Senators are of opinion that the first purpose as expressed has been very nine.: impaired by the acti n of the committee and the sub-committee. I am of the opinion that the second purpose expressed has be n lost sight as altogether by the majority who reported the substitute. It certainly was accounted as of equal import nee w'th the first.

“The language of the substitute is that of illusion and deception and deception, not by design, but from the uttor want of opy care or attention to it. Take the expression ‘six-tenths of one cent’ occurring twice in the pendii.g paragraph, and in paragraph 144 the expression is one and one-tenth cents, one and two-tenths cents, one and four-tenths cents, one and fivetenths cents successively. The whole substitute is full of terms and phraseology of that character. “What is the meaning of sixtenths of a cent. A tenth of a cent means a mill, and a mill be defined as the tenth os a cent or the thousandth part cf a dollar. I qo not know that it adds anything to the perspicuity of a statute to put in the definition of a word instead of the word itself.— Mx-tenths of a cent,’ which constitutes the definition of six mills, is meant in a bill, why is it not preferable to say six mills?— In the instance we had under consideration the other day, with respect to phraseology: ‘One cent and one-tenth of a cent, ‘one cent and one-sixteenth of a cent,’ with various others. “I might ask the learned and honorable chairman of the subcommittee whether he has made a completestudy of the subject of

lingual concealment or verbal ambush? I presume he has not, and that there has been no study on the subject at all. Else why was a pound selected as a unit for taxation instead of an ounce? For if the paragraph had provided onesixteenth of a cent and one-tenth of one-sixteenth of a cent per ounce, meaning would have been the same and the mvstery would have been much greater. “Of course, it may be asked who would want to use one ounce of structural iron? I ask who would want to use bne pound of structural iron ? And it nay be asked again, whv is not the ton in the case of structural iron made the unit of asses nnent with resnect to the tariff? It is s2oa ton. Everybody understands that, and the most ordinary beam and girder does not consist of a less weight. “Why is it not based upon the ton as a rnit? Is there any desire to hide the amou..t of the exaction? Not at all t sir; it is simply the want of carefulness and the inattention to what we may consider the plainest terms of English or the vernacular of the United States.

“What is th 1 use of all this dismal array of decimals and fractions? The amendment ought to be made in every section and paragraph of the substitute precisely as it is offered here. The most casual reader would then come to the correct conclusion as to the amount of lax assessed by the bill. “I speak of these words as things because m this connection they are things, and they have the appearance of belonging, to the ‘hidden things of dishonesty.’ They are very far removed from that simplicity which according to the title of the bill ought to characterize its text.

“It is sometimes almost as curious to note the wilderness of unmeaning phraseology in a measure as some of the reasons assigned for its passage. I understood the senator from Nevada farthest from the chair [Mr. Stewart] and the senator from Massachusetts nearest me [Mr Dawes] both to have taken th« .position here that taxes assessed by our t riff legislation we. e paid by foreigners, and it was stated by them with great complacency that thev were perfectly willing that foreigners sho’d pay our tariff taxes, and it was stated with great earnestness that no man anywhere should object to such payment by foreigners ? “The bill is entitled a bill to reduce taxation, and I thought the phrase reduction of taxation alluded to the taxes of our own people. If it alludes to tariff taxes paid by foreigners, as is here el aimed, it furnishes me only an additional reason for being opposed to the substitute. lam not myself in favor of reducing the taxes of foreigners or the amount of taxes paid by foreigners. I would rather increase the amount, if am such are to be so paid. “It seems, from the remarks of these senators, that the prohibitory tariff trust is about inaugurating a period of commercial millenium; that the divine apostolic injunction “bear ve one another’s burdens” js to become not only a rule of private conduct but a maxim of international law and usage. “The onl possible defect in such a policy would be that while sometimes a balance of tradefis largely in our favor, as the foreigners pay the taxes under our tariff legislation, we must then pay the taxes on exports under theirs; and we would then necessarily pay a larger share of the tariff taxes of foreigners than the foreigners pay of ours. “What a very strange sort of fiscal reciprocity, what a very strange view of international economics, chis presents! 1 think those senators upon this side, as well as a majority of sane people, healthful and wholesome-minded people, on the subject ot federal taxation, still retain the notion that taxes imposed by an a t of conSees of the United States, and at they are as local to the pec-

pie of this countiy as taxes for sewerage or gas imposed by the municipal authorities of New York on the inhabitants of that city. . “The honorable senator from lowa opened this debate with a protestation ofl very unusual vehemence in relation to the good faith with which this measure was proposed, stating that it was not a partisan measure, nor offered with a view to benefit any party, and that the sub-commi tee and committee had no other motives in it than thosej'of subserviency to the best interests of the republic.— The same disclaimer was aided by a similar declaration of the very able and accomplished senator from Rhode Island [Mr. Aldrich] the principal coadjutor oi the chairman of the sub-committee in this relentless raid of the monopolies against the people. “Upon this side we are disposed to give full credence to those disclaimers, and to give as full credence without the disclaimer as with it What was the r ason of this earnest and gratuitous protestation in advance by the committee in relation to their purposes and objects in the intr duction of

tins substitute? Had they conceived that there would be anything of reproof from this side of the chamber for the policy contained in the bill ? “The committee and th a subcommittee may be deserving of much reproof, but they are also yet more of sympathy. The majority of the committee and subcommittee and their coadjutor have yielded to an irresistible and uncontrollable influence, the influence of a superstition—a superstition springing from the creed taught now for so many years in that school of political economy so richly endowed by the incorpoators of the prohibitory-tariff trust, instructed in the maxim that all mankind, all the labor, all the capitv. in the country must be taxed for the benefit of a few nonlaboring and non-producing classes. “I suppose tnis superstition, like others of the same character, must have its course. I suppose it will have its day, like the South sea craze in England, the tulip mania in Holland, or the Darien speculation of John Law in France. It will have its day, and it will bring dis ster even to those interests which it pretends to foster. “Again it is said—and I ha.e heard that also with extreme surprise—that no amendments sho’d be offered froyi this side of the chamber; that every such amendment was a request for sj. cial privilege; that whether the amendment provided that hoop-iron for the hay-maker ard the cottonraiser should be put upon the free list, or the enormous tax imposed by tins measure simply reduce , in either event the exemption or the diminution propo ed Was a special privilege that was asked for, and that no one should be exempted from the rate of taxation as thus fixed in this substitute. “It seems to me that this is a a complete reversal of the act and the whole theory of the proposed legislation. Everything that has beer* sa di n this chamber in behalf of the substitute or amendment has been a special plea. The substitute itself is a gross mass of special privileges of the most offensive

“It now Appears that the president laet December was perfectly right in informing the country that there was a surplus in the treasury and in asking also that taxation be reduced. The point misconcieved was as to where the relief should come, he being of the opinion that relief should come to the tax-pay-ing many, the multitu te of the. people; whereas it seems that, after all, the relief should come to the maimed, crippled, wounded, moribund corporations engaged in the manufacture of the protected articles. doomed to decay or destruction ualesz they be perpetually pensioned for total disability by the provisions of this bill. “Instead of any amendme it be-

ing a special privilege, the bill it, self is a vast consei vatory of choice plants of monopoly to be fed nd forced by the sweat of the laboring masses and by every kind of unjust, oppressive and unnecessary exactions. This measure itself is a paradise, the very garden of the gods of uujust mon polies, a paradise situate hard by the country of corruption end decav, and situate also vary near the level of that Dead sea which concealed alike the ashes and the iniquities of Sodom.”