Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 September 1891 — One of Horr’S Jokes. [ARTICLE]

One of Horr’S Jokes.

R G. Horr, the New York Tribune’s tariff joker, is at it again. In a recent number of the Weekly Tribune he tries to show that our protective tariff causes foreigners to lower their prices, and as an illustration of this he says: “We have been for years making no tin plate in the United State-. A protective tariff was placed on foreign tin plate by the McKinley bill, and our business men are preparing to make American tin plate. If my doctrine is true, the following will be the result: Tin plate will be produced in America in a few months after our factories are set in motion, better in Quality and cheaper in price than during the past five years, when we obtained all our supplies from abroad. If such shall be the result, will not that prove the wisdom of that increase of duty? Do not misunderstand me! Ido not say tftat tin plate will not then also be cheaper abroad than it is now That will of course be the case. But we have been waiting for a fall in price for foreign tin plate (which is mostly iron or steel) similar to the reduction that has taken place in iron andsteel goods which are made in this country. It has not come. ” Nov wjien Mr. Horn says this he is either showing his ignomnee of the subject, or e'se he is making a willful mistatemont If he had consulted the Treasury reports he would have found that the plate has declined in price very greatly during the past eighteen years. The tin plate imported in 1873 was invoiced at 7.65 cents per pound; in 1876, at 5.16; in 1879, at 3.78; in 1882, at 3.76; in 1885, at 3.28. The average price for the five years 1886-’9O was 3 cents. For the fiscal year 18V1. however, the import price was 3.socents per pound,an increase due to the enormous demand created by the McKinley law. If Mr. Horr will examine present English market reports he wil) find that the grade of tin plate known as “I C Bessemer steel, coke finish,” the kind most in use, is now selling at exactly 3 cents a pound. This all means that tin plate has fallen to considerably less than half the price it commanded in 1873. This fact

the tariff joker could easily have verified by merely examining the Government reports. But the joker is true to his character as a wag. After making the willful mistatement just exposed, he winds up his a: tide by saying T “Falsehoods have had their day. The supremacy of truth is at Land.” Vhere will Horr stand under that “supremacy?”