Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 June 1894 — BOOBY PRIZE IN SIGHT [ARTICLE]

BOOBY PRIZE IN SIGHT

DEMOCRATS HANDICAPPED FOR THE POLITICAL RACE. AU Duty on Sugar, Coal, Iron and Trust Products Should Be Abolished—Popularity of the Income Tax with the MassesPolitical Notes. Pledget Must Be Redeemed. From present appearances the Democratic party intends to lose the political race in which it expects to engage next fall. In fact, some of its representatives in the Senate are coaching It for the "booby” prize by loading it up with the some ism that broke the back of the McKinley party in 1890 and 1892. It is no use for Democrats to deny it The present Senate tariff bill differs from the odious McKinley bill only in degree. Both are full oi protection to trusts which dictated them. The Gorman bill has the advantage in that it makes free one or two important raw materials that were heavily taxed by McKinley, and in that its protective duties are usually not so nigh—though often just as protective. The McKinley bill has the advantage in that it (being entirely in the hands of its protectionist friends) got through Congress with less scandalous exposure of its liaisons with trusts, and in that it is not the result of hypocrisy —it having never been intended a< a purely revenue bill. As regards the tariff features of the two bills it now teems quite certain that the genuine McKinley bill will put up the best race. Honest men hate hypocrites. The Democratic bill which promised so much and realizes so little has so disgusted hundreds of thousands of free traders that they will stay at home or vote for some third party rather than stultify their principles by sanctioning the hypocritical Senate surrender bill. The non-compromising and honest tariff reform and free trade Democrats, such as were the most of those who fought the hard battles of 1890 and 1892, prefer McKinleyism straight if they must accept protection, to the milk and water mixture prepared by Gorman, Brice & Co. They say “rather than have another protective bill, let the McKinley bill continue to work out its own damnation. ” But there is one feature of the Senate bill that will go far toward saving the party responsible for the bill. The income tax attached to the bill will popularize it in all parts of the country. The masses of the voters undoubtedly favor this method of collecting a revenue from those who now escape their fair share of taxes. If the voters of New York City could have an opportunity to express themselves on this question they would declare with an overwhelming majority in favor of an income tax. And this in spite of the fact that New York has about 1,2j0 millionaires and multi-millionaires and that the income tax is repressed by every New York daily except tne World. This fact has become evident from several mass meetings held in New York. One was called under the auspices of the Reform Club, to ask for the immediate passage of a tariff reform bill “with or without an income tax.” Some of the speakers spoke for, and others against, an income tax. The audience demonstrated that it was strongly in favor of this kind of taxation. Another meeting, called by the Manhattan Single Tax Club, to express indignation at the delay in tariff reform legislation and to ask for a radical tariff bill, declared unanimously (except for four votes i in favor of resolutions declaring against all tariff taxation and in favor of an income tax or some other better form of direct taxation. But it is not too late yet for the Democratic party to redeem some of its pledges to the people. It can never make amends for its tardy action, but it can wipe out the more obnoxious and disgraceful features of the bilL It can do this in two ways: 1. By so amending the bill that it will give us free sugar, free coal and free ores, by replacing and increasing the number of ad valorem duties, and by greatly reducing such highly protective duti s as those on collars, cuffs and shirts, on woolens, glass, etc. 2. By accomplishing this same result by separate bills passed as soon as this dicker contrivance is out of the way. hither of tnese plans, if carried out, would give the Democrats a good fighting chance this fall with excellent pros Deets for 189’. If. in addition, it could pass a separate bill making the products of many of the leading trusts absolutely free, its prospects of success would be much brlgnter. Many duties upon such products produce no revenue and are retained for the sole purpose of protection to offensive trusts and combines. Some of these are the Steel Rail, Steel Beam, Linseed' Oil, Borax, Standard Oil, Match, and Agricultuial Implement Trusts. Often these trusts sell their products cheaper abroad than at home and depend upon the otherwise useless duties to prevent the reimportation of their products. Remove these obnoxious duties and put Americans on a par with foreigners in our markets. It will be a most popular move. Protection is becoming more and more unpopular. It is on its last legs. It is only by a combination of circumstances sucn ai can be brought about only by greed and corruption that protection can possibly hold out a lew years longer. The people have already branded it as unconstitutional robbery and their decision will not be reversed except by those who misrepresent and betray them. If the Democratic legislators will stand by the people in this

fight, the people will not desert the Democratic party. If not—there is likely to be a shaking up of parties, and it may be some time before the Democratic party will come back to its own.—Byron W. Holt Misleading Companions. The Senate Finance Committee must, indeed, think we are a nation of chumps, says a writer in the New York Evening Post Do they hope to delude the people by “official” comparison between the duties of the McKinley act and the Senate and House bills into believing that the average duty in the Senate bill is 36.75 against 35.52 per cent, in the House bill? Do they expect this comparison table will be accepted as fair and just, and that it will make their bill acceptable to the people? While perhaps technically accurate, the comparison is unjust The figures published do not begin to represent the great difference, from the standpoint of protection, between the House and the Senate bills. They are grossly misleading in at least two respects: 1. In the Senate bill duties are included on very important articles which are free In the House bill. Here are three of the articles, and the value of the imports of each in 1893: Sugar and molasses $116,962,222.65 Iron ores 12u.858.7S Coal and coke B,IOI,SUM Total $121398,208.66 The average of 35.52 per cent for the House bill is comp ited upon imports valued at about $360,000,000, while the : 6.75 per cent, average for the Senate bill is computed upon impoi ts valued at about $;>00,(XK),000. To the people who asked for relief from burdensome tariff taxes, this difference is about $65,000,000 —$5 per family. A fairer comparison would include the same articles in both averages. Thus, if we include in the dutiable lists of both bills all articles that are dutiable under either bill, we will have about $5<X),000,090 of dutiable imports. Under the House bill we would get about $129,000,000 of revenue and under the Senate bill about $184,01.0,000. The average ad-valorem duty under the House bill would be about 254 per cent., against 36i per cent in the Senate bill The Senate bill duties on article 4 actually imported are therefore 44 per cent greater than the House bill duties. 2. Many duties that produce no revenue are higher in the Senate than in the House bill. The protective features of such duties have been greatly increased, but no effect has b >en produced upon the average of duties. Thus the House duty of 20 per cent, on steel rails, equal to less than $4 per ton, has been increased to seven-twen-tieths of a cent per pound, equal to $7.84 per ton. Either of these duties will be as prohibitive of importations as is the McKinley duty of $13.44. The Steel Rail Trust in either case will fix prices below the importing point. The Senate bill simply gives 100 per cent, more protection, and will enable the Trust to fix prices $4 per ton higher than would be possible under the House bill. In the same way the House duty of 30 per cent, on structural iron and steel is increased about 80 per cent in the Senate bill. The duty on starch is increased from 1 to 2 cents per pound; the duty on linseed or flaxseed oil, from 15 to 20 cents per gallon. The duties on boracic acid, wash blue, vermilion red, strychnine, and on many other chemicals have been increased, though they were already prohib’tive. In fact, the majority of the 400 increases in the Senate over the House bill are increases of protective and non-revenue-producing duties, which would produce a scarcely perceptible effect upon the “average” ad-valorem duties on all schedules. The unfairness is conspicuous in the comparison of the rates in the sugar schedule. The rate in the House bill is given as 28.43 per cent.; in the Senate bill •as 39.59 per cent. As is well known, the House bill makes all cane and beet sugar free. The 28.43 per cent, represents only the duty on confectionery and on glucose, or grape sugar. The total value of these imports in 1893 was $53,019. The Senate duty of 59.39 per cent represents the duty on the total imports of all kinds of sugars. These in 1893 were valued at $118,285,047. The House duty would produce 815,073, while the Senate duty would produce $46,839,050 in revenue. It will be observed that the discriminating duties of one-eighth and onetenth cent per pound on refined sugars cut no figure even In bringing up the average rate of duty in the sugar schedule. —* Will Gorman Explain Thl»? The assertion that any trust or trusts have dictated any part of any schedule of this bill I pronounce unqualifiedly false. They have received the same attention, although not as much consideration, as Individuals engaged In the business of manufacture—no more, no less. We felt the necessity of dealing all such combinations a death blow.—Gorman. Is that the reason why the sugar trust is given six months in which to import the growing sugar crop free of duty, and a goodly degree of protection after the ex> iration of that time, as well as during the interval? Is that why the specific rate on raw sugars was changed to ad valorem, thus giving the trust the benefit of 40 per cent, on the difference between the foreign price of raw and the foreign price of refined sugar? ,In addition to the 40 per cent, on all sugars the bill puts one-eighth of a cent a pound < n all sugars above No. 16 Dutch standard, and one-tenth of a cent more on such sugars imported from countries which pay bounties. That means about $8,000,000 for the benefit of the trust But that is not

all. It was recently brought out in debate in the Senate that there is an average difference of about one cent pur pound in the foreign price of raw and refined sugar. The refiners get protection under the amended bill equal to 40 per cent, on this difference, or four-tenths of a cent per pound. Mr. Allison stated that this protection was equal to three-tenths of a cent per pound at least. Calling it that, instead of the higher figure, and adding the two specific rates allowed for protection, and we have a total protection equal to 0.525 of 1 cent per pound, or 52* cents per 100 pounds. That is equal to nearly $19,000,000 a year for the trust, assuming that its output will be 3,ti00,000.000 pounds a year. And on top of this is all that the trust can make by importing raw sugar free for six months and then selling the refined product at full tariff made prices. Does this look as though "the assertion that any trust or trusts have dictated any part of any schedule” was “unqualifiedly false?” It certainly looks much as though somebody had been taking good care of the interests of the sugar trust, whether anyone connected with the trust dictated any part of the schedule or not. As Mr. Gorman is a “business-like" sort of man. perhaps he can tell who dictated this scheau'e. Perhaps, too, he can demonstrate the truth of his remarkable statement that “we have reduced the duty on lead 50 per cent., on steel rails 50 per cent, and on refined sugar 75 per cent, more than on the product of any other trust or any other article."—Chicago Herald. Steel Kill I met In Clover. There is a marked difference between the attitude of the House and that of the Senate toward the tariff on steel rails. In the House seventy-nine votes were cast in favor of putting steel rails on the free list, although the duty reported by the Ways and Means Committee was only 25 per cent, equivalent at present prices to $4.40 per ton. It is noticeable, moreover, that so many votes were cast against any duty whatever, in spite of Chairman Wilson’s earnest plea that the rate reported in the bill should not be disturbed. The duty was afterward reduced in the House "to 20 per cent., or $3.52 per ton. On the other hand, in the Senate, the revb-ers reported a duty ot seven-twentieths of a cent per pound, or $7.K4 per ton. and this was quietly accepted on Wednesday, no attempt having been made to reduce it. In the course of the brief remarks in the Senate upon the proposition, no reference to the existence and the exactions of the steel-rail combination was made. It appears that neither side cared to direct attention to the facts which had been so earnestly discussed in the House. The Senate duty, as we have shown, will permit the combination to maintain its ring price of $24 in the East and $25 in the West, for it will prevent the importation of foreign rails at this port for less than $27.75, as foreign prices now stand. Whose influence caused the revisers to increase the duty from 224 per cent. ($3. IMP, as originally reported, to $7.84? There is a rumor that it was the influence of the Republican Senator Quay, but that seems almost incredible. Still. Mr. Quay has discontinued his serial speech, which at one time promised to be endless. —New York Times.

Going for Gorman. The Washington correspondent of the St Louis Republic (Dem.) says that at the conclusion of Senator Gorman's tariff speech, “one Senator, a strong and earnest tariff-reformer, shook hands with him and said: ‘Gorman, it was a mighty good speech, but it won’t condone all the rascality you have been guilty of for the past two months.’ Gorman smiled at this sharp thrust. He considered it merely a joke. That is Gorman's way.” “The most of Gorman’s speech on the tariff bill might have been made by Aldrich, or any other well-known advocate of protection,” says the St. Louis Globe-Democrat (Rep.). “ Aside from the fact that the speaker pretends to be a Democrat," says the Chicago Times (Dem.), referring to the same speech, “it was such an effort as might, with more appropriateness, have been delivered by that bloated knight of protection, William McKinley, or by that other plutocratic mouthpiece, the elephantine Reed of Maine. McKlnleylred Democrats. Senator Hill’s pronounced stand for free raw material, evidenced by his votes for free ore and free lead, will deceive no Democrat any more than they were fooled by the recent speech of Senator German. These Senators, with two or three other McKinleyized Democrats as to their own particular local or political interests, are responsible for the delay of the Senate in passing the tariff bill, and for the emasculated and unsatisfactory condition of the bill, as it now stands. Their coming forward at the eleventh hour and professing to be the most orthodox and sincere of tariff ref rmers is simply the old Blaine performance of casting an anchor to the windward.—Pittsburg Post (Dem.). _ MrKinlcylte* Importing CmL By a curions freak of fate it happens that Nova Scotia coal is being imported to the United States, not by the influence of a free trade law. but under the operations of McKinley’s sky-high protection. These b ata n’t frauds precipitated the* coal strike by cutting down wages already reduced by McKinleyism to the starvation point, and now, in furtherance of their war upon American wage--, they are d}ing th? very thing which for a generation they have declared would ruin them—namely, importing foreign coat—Chicago Times