Jasper County Democrat, Volume 8, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 May 1905 — WASHINGTON LETTER. [ARTICLE]

WASHINGTON LETTER.

Political and General Gossip of the National Capitol. Special Correspondence to The Democrat: Has President Roosevelt entered the wedge for a split in his party which will rend it wide asunder? This is the question which is being discussed.'wherever politicians, or even business men, are gathered together in Washington and, judging by the reports, in business bouses and clubs all over the country. If one listens for a few moments to a group of stand patters, as they are called who rigidly oppose any change of the tariff schedules, he will be convinced that the Republican party is doomed to disruption and defeat and their reasoning is not surprising. As the servants of the highly protected industries all over the country, Republicans in Congress have been diligently opposing every move toward lowering the tariff schedules and have denied, with haughty indifference to facts, that American manufacturers were selling their products abroad for prices far below those charged in this country. They have refused to listen to the people who have read the last Democratic Campaign Book and who there saw a long list of articles with two prices opposite each, one the price charged the foreigner the other the price charged the American for the same article and with a difference of about 50 per cent in favor of the foreigner. t t t

Now the American public is informed that the claims of the Democrats are obsolutely correct; that two ships which the Panama Canal Commission wished to buy were priced at $1,400,000 in this country, while identical ships, constructed of steel plates made by the American Steel Trust, could be bought in Europe for $750,000; that the domestic price of steel rails is $33 a ton and the foreign price for the same rails, with freight prepaid to Europe is S2O a ton, and, incidentally, that the cost of the rails is only sl2 a ton; that "the protected hogs have their hind feet in the trough” and that it is high time they were taugbtra lesson; that the tariff shelters monopoly and that, in a word, the American consumer is being robbed. And the informant of the American people on all these points is none other than President Roosevelt, the leader of the Republican party. Is it any wonder that the stand patters see defeat ahead ;thfct they foresee their own doom for the reason that they have always been elected by the campaign contributions of the trusts and now that the party of which they are members must follow its leader and elect to Congress men who will vote for tariff revision, their reason for being has ceased?

t t t It all earner about in this way. The President discovered that the Panama Canal Commission, was being robbed by a combination of Americnn trusts; that, as the Democrats have always claimed, the tariff has created monopolies which were so bold as to try to rob the government, which, by its favoritism lias created them and as ungratful as the viper which stung the bosom that cherishe3 ft. When rumors of this condition of affairs first reached the President lie did not believe them, but he began an investigation. First he determined to get rid of Admiral Walker, chairman of the old Commission, Congress, that is n few leaders in Congress, killed the bill that gHve the President authority to reorganize the Panama Canal Commission but the resourceful President “fouud a way;” when he had gotten rid of Walker and the old Commission he placed men whom he knew in charge and told them to report the facts to him. When they made their report he fpund that the rumors wore true and he became angry and used strenuous —not strong—but strenuous, language, referred to the trusts as hogs who had put not alone their fore feet but all four feet into the trough, etc., and then he rendered his now famous decision that the Commission should either compel the American trusts to grant their largest foreign discount or else buy the machinery and supplies for the canal abroad. The President is a protectionist, but he does not believe in the perpetuation of schedules which will allow of extortion, and he is convinced that many of the Dingley schedules do that. t t t

The stand patters are using every effort to defeat the intent of the President. They have spread unwarranted stories to the effect that he purposes to load up the commission before Congress can meet and pass a law compelling the purchase of only American

made goods at Amerio&n trust prioes for the canal. That is not true. The President will do nothing of the kind. He has merely instructed the Commission to make euch purchases as are necessary abroad if the Americans will not make their prices right, bat he knows full well that the Americans will make their prices right when they are compelled to do so. t t t There is a very important investigation going on in Washington of the respective charges against Assistant Secretary of State Loomis and Herbert W. Bowen, former Minister to Venezuela. The indications now are that Minister Bowen will be dropped from the diplomatic service for his lack of discretion. The fate of Secretary Loomis is still undecided. The entire investigation iB eclipsed, however, by the tariff question, but it will keep and in a future letter the importance of the investigation and the ramifications of its bearing will be explained.