Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 February 1910 — People’s Demand and the Party Duty. [ARTICLE]

People’s Demand and the Party Duty.

There is a daily growing tendency on the part of the American people to oppose the standpat methods of some of the members of congress and whether just or unjust the power of the demand against the agencies that are responsible for the present tariff is so great that it must be acknowledged and reckoned with. The press of the United States has united in a demand for further revision. Not the democratic press, but the independent and the republican press and while confidence in Taft is unshaken the aggressive attacks on Senator Aldrich and Speaker Cannon have probabjy made the selection of another speaker a certainty and a further revision of the tariff an essential. The Chicago Tribune says the effect on business of the prevailing tariff measure is not longer to be considered. The people have decided that the tariff law is not an ■ j - economic issue but a moral one, and if the people think that the Payne-Ald-rich measure ,was not what they want or what they were promised, they will continue to clamor for something else no matter how fully the operating tariff contributes to general prosperity.. The Chicago Tribune took a poll of republican and independent newspapers last week, asking three questions. Do you endorse the Payne-Ald-rich tariff bill? Do you advocate the re-election of Speaker Cannon? Who is your choice for the next republican nomination for president? The answers overwhelmingly repudiated the tariff measure enacted by the recent special congress. by a great majority the defeat of Cannon for speaker, and gave a slight majority for Roosevelt over Taft as the next republican candidate for president. Based on this poll, the Tribune, one of the few papers that has treated Cannon and the tariff measure with fairness, sums up the situation in a powerful editorial, stating that the people are displeased with the tariff and that while they have confidence in Taft they are disappointed that he has not used more forceful means to bring "'about the results so much expected. The Tribune has based its reputation on the result of its poll, its confidence coming from experience. ’

Therefore, whether right or wrong, there can be np doubt that the policy of the republican party must be the defeat of Cannon, the further reduction of the tariff, a substantial rebuff to some of the dominating factors of both senate and house of representatives and a firmer attitude on the part of President Taft to enforce the issues that the people think to be right. The Republican said soon after the taking effect of the Payne-Aldrich tariff that the proof of it would be in the effect on the country and not based on the critics of the country. We were right. The tariff has done what the country was needing. It restored business; it created a general prosperity that exceeded in the agricultural sections of the United States even the prosperity of the manufacturing centers. But enconomic success was not all that our restless people wanted and they are asserting by their attitude' that they are willing business shall suffer in order that methods of doing ■legislatives business be altered and possibly some of the barons in congress be deposed. The republican party is therefore bound by this demand. The Republican favors a tariff, plenty high. Better too high than too low. But a provision in its administratjpp that will permit the application of almost immediate withdrawl onany schedule whenever abuses in restraint of trade occur. But we are unwilling to see the republican party become a factor in opposition to a tariff high enough to accomplish the means of both protection to American labor and the acquiring of needed .revenue. While we will admit that some of the schedules of the prevailing tariff are too high, we are certain that there is no suffering national, state, sectional or individual because of them, and we are as certain that the people will find in time that the tariff issue is economic instead of moraT. And that the proof of the tariff is just as certain put&sa updn its effect on business and general prosperity as the proof of the pudding is in the eating. And while a house cleaning is a good, thing and while nothing should be left undone to correct the evil tendencies of our legislative body the re-

publican party must not waver from its policy of a protective tariff, which is the fundamental principle of its organization and the reason of its present day control of the affairs of the national government.