The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1856-04-10
From the New York Evening Post. u
SENATOR JAMKSs SCHEME OF A TARIFF.

From the New York Evening Post.
SENATOR JAMKss SCHEME OF A TARIFF.
Mr.. James, of the Senate, has at length
brought in the bill modifying the rates of duty
on imported commodities, which the public has
long expected. His scheme will find good
many friends in both Houses of Congress. By
the manufacturing interest it will be warmly
supported, inasmuch as its principal object is to
favor them by the abrogation of duties on most
of those articles which fall under the head of
raw material used in manufactures. 1t also
simplifes the present tariff, Ia very important
advantage to the importer,) and provided, it is
thought, some new safeguards against the
frauds often practiced by unconscientious per-
sons upon the custom house.
The manufacturers, or at least consider
able class of them, have found occasion Of late
to revise their conclusions regarding questions
of political economy, and are no longer the ad-
vocates of protection. They are now freetrade
men with certain reservations, certain regards
to established interests, which they think might
be in ured by the rude and indiscriminate APP
pication of the abstract principle which they
have lately learned to respect. Senator James,
who brings in the bill, is one of this class he
declares himself the friend of free trade, so far
as may be consistent with the preservation of
we suppose is as far as we could expect a
manufacturer to go.
Mr.. James mentions, as a recommendation
of his system of duties, that it reduces them to
a revenue standard, and that the heaviest are
laid "on the Injuries and elegances <of life,
and the lighter on the cheap comforts and
necessaries of1ife, which enter into the general
consumption, and are used by the laboring
classes" We do not wholly agree with Mr..
James in this view of his bill. Woollen cloths
are something more than a mere luxury. we
do not wear a great-coat for the sake of ele-
gance, but to keep ourselves warm, to defend
ourselves from the weather. Mr.. James's bill,
however, puts duty of thirty per cent. upon
upon the ready-made garment. 1t ought I'd, be
what he calls one of those cheap comforts
which enter into the general consumption, but
duty OF thirty per cent. is clearly not the
way to make it so. Glass has become neces-
sary of life, yet glass is charged with duty of
thirty per cent the laboring man pays on the
glass tumbler from which he drinks nearly
third of its value in the duty Soap, we take
leave to say, is necessary of life, and ought
to be cheap comfort r" but to tax it, as Mr..
James proposes to do, makes it dearer COM
fort than it ought to be.
In our view of the matter, thirty per cent. is
not properly revenue duty. A large class of
commodities-all those in fact which are not
enumerated in the bill--are made subject only
to duty of twenty per cent. Among them
are cotton goods. But for the desire of favor
ing the owners of the woolen mills the FORCES,
and foundries, of the country, there is no reason
why the woollen goods imported should not
pay as light duty as the cotton, nor why the
duty on manufactures of iron-an indispensable
necessity-should not be put at the very lowest
rate. On looking over the enumerated articles,
we do.not find those of sugar and molasses,
which have hitherto stood charged with duty
of thirty per sent, and we therefore infer that
Mr.. James has not been inattentive to the
popular demand for a reduction of the duties
on these commodities. This is we'll but why
not also reduce the duty on paper, which has
become a necessary of life, and which is now
burdened with an indirect tax of thirty per cent.
on its value?
Jewelry, by Mr.. James's bill, is still TO be
charged with duty of thirty per cent, and so
are watches, which come under the class of
manufactures of gold and other metals. There
is no reason why these articles should be
charged with very low duty, except the prob
ability of their being Struggled if they are
not; and this reason is sufficient. By the tariff,
as it now stands, watches pay duty of only ten
per cent. which is judicious regulation, inas-
much as nothing is more certain than that, if
the duty on watches be high, they will be
Struggled to great extent. All jewelry should
come in at low duties, for the same reason.
1t strikes us that some of the articles placed
on the bill which are to be charged with
duty of thirty per cent might well, on account
of the paucity of the importations and the
trifing amount of the revenue which they yield,
be exempted from duties altogether; but of this
we will not speak positively till we have ex-
amined the bill more closely. In the mean
time, we admit that the bill is one step towards
the desired freedom of our trade with foreign
nations. If Congress should not be too much
occupied with other matters of less conse-
quence, we suppose that something like this
bill will be adopted. The objection, however,
will be made in the House, and we think will
be sustained, that this is money bill, q bill for
raising q revenue, and therefore cannot origi
nate in the Senate. Mr.. James himself speaks
of it as q system of duties adjusted according
to the revenue standard. On some goods it in
creases, on others it diminishes the duty, and
we cannot see anything in its nature which
takes it out of the operation of that clanse in
the Constitution which gives the House of
Representatives the sole power of initiating
such bills.
1t may be, however, that Mr.. James's bill, or
something like it, will be adopted and pre-
scented as an original measure by some member
of the House.
POPULATION OF ALABAMA.
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