Jasper County Democrat, Volume 8, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 February 1906 — PROTECTION GONE MAD [ARTICLE]

PROTECTION GONE MAD

Retaliation Is Declared Against Germany. OUR FARMEES BOUND TO SUFFER A Tariff Game la Which Both Countries Stand Pat—Republicans Favor the Trusts and Propose Still Higher Duties Corporations and Monopolies Will Grow Fat. Other nations besides the United States can stand pat, but in the end there must come a showdown, and some one will win and others lose. In playing the tariff game of freeze-out between nations the people of all countries suffer and the combines and corporations grow fat. That is the case in the United States and Germany today, for both countries are standing pat with poor hands. Even the eventual winner at this tariff game, which the Republican. leaders here and the land monopolists in Germany are playing with the stakes that the people of both countries furnish, will be poorer in the end.

In the United States we boast of our large exports, which are mostly agricultural products and raw materials, and which must be sold to those countries that will buy them, and the price for the surplus we have to sell after supplying our own people is fixed in the foreign markets, where other countries which have a surplus of similar products are also seeking buyers. Germany, France and other protection countries that do not raise enough w’heat, beef, pork and other products set the price they will pay according to the amount that is offered for sale. The price they offer for the surplus fixes the price also In the countries that sell. If a tariff tax Is imposed on any or all of these agricultural products, that and the freight and expenses and profits must be added, and the consumers in Germany and elsewhere pay the total cost. If our people want to buy German or French products the tariff tax that the United States imposes is added to the price these foreign countries charge, and the cost is increased from 30 to 100 per cent, the average being about 54 per cent, besides the freight and profits. But that is not the worst of it by any means, for the trusts and combines, knowing that foreign goods cannot be sold here except with the tariff tax added, put up the price of their products In proportion and thus virtually collect the tariff tax on nearly all our people buy. The trusts get the tax, and nothing goes to the government That is why the cost of living has increased here so greatly since the Republican tariff law was enacted in 1897 and why the trusts' And combines have been so fostered and have so prospered. In Germany a similar condition exists, and the price of the necessities of life has so vastly Increased that great distress prevails. On March 1 the German tariff will be so Increased that her markets will be absolutely closed to most of our agricultural products. Meanwhile the trust controlled statesmen of both countries are standing pat and declaring they will make no concessions. The protection majority in congress are even declaring for retaliation upon the Germans by increasing our tariff rates 25 per cent on German products. Thus is protection gone mad in both countries, and the people are paying exorbitant prices to protect the trusts and combines. When the election of senators and congressmen takes place next fall, will the voters re-elect these stand patters or turn to the Democrats, who are pledged to tariff revision that will eliminate trust protection?