Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 October 1889 — FOREIGN HELP FOR TARIFF REFORM. [ARTICLE]

FOREIGN HELP FOR TARIFF REFORM.

The foreign contingent of those philanthropists who are working to so reform our tariff laws as to admit foreign products without payment for the privilege, are not so careful to conceal the alliance as their co-workers in the United States. J ust now the powerful “trust” which makes all the tin-plates used in the world is menaced by the probability that the manufacture of that indispensable article is to be undertaken in this country, where al,l the elements are to I be found in abundance, and where | more than half the entire output ' ;,f tin-plates is used. Simultaneously free trade advocates on both sides of the Atlantic are vigorously insisting that no encouragement to that end shall be extended by Congress. While there are two tones to the voices thus directed toward Washington, somewhat discordant when brought together, theyjwill be found quite in harmony as to the end desired. Here the plea is that the price of tin will be increased, as witness every writer and speaker heard in behalf of free tin. In Great Britain the fear is that monopoly will be destroyed, as witness the prophecy of a leading trade journal of what will follow if Americans are permitted to make tin-plates. The Ironmonger warmngly "asserts that “sooner or later the tin-plate trade will cease to be the monopoly of South Wales and Monmouthshire” if competition in America is permitted. Further on, speaking of the efforts to discourage the threatened competition, the same journal thus appreciatingly refers to the work of tariff reformers here, and the probable outcome of their joint efforts: The Welsh makers have strong allies in the United States, and if the alliance is made the most of, we should have very Jconsiderable doubts of the success of any application to Congress to increase the present duties . But to insure that result the Welsh makers and their business connections must not only watch but work, and work hard, to checkmate the advance of the American protectionists. There is doubtless some satisfaction for “reform” workers in the knowledge that their efforts are appreciated by those foreign allies with whom they may have “business connections,” while permitted to extract so little comfort from popular expessions nearer home.