The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1872-05-20
evening State gd'sraal.
MoNRDAY EVENING, MAY 20, 1872. |
THE INTERNAL TAxEs-sHALL THEY
BE PERPETUATED or ABOLISHED:

do not want my children and grand
children to live under system which shall
INVOLVE corps of detectives, system of
espionage, and the taking of an oath every
week of every month to the honesty and
fidelity of loosoly-kept accounts. | be-
lieye that with the imports of the country
expanding and increasing as they are doing,
the day is not far distant when we can de-
fray the expenses of the government by
customs duties alone, and may give thanks
to God that no direct-tax collector treads
the soil of the United States.
hear the gentleman ask which en-
ploys the most detective officers to-day,
the customs or the internal revenue. |
ask him to say whether both together are
more than either. | ask whether the ex-
penses would be greater if you saved the
nearly $6,000,00 which the collection of
the internal revenue cost last year? l
ask whether the civil service would not be
somewhat reformed il the nearly five
thousand people employed in the internal
revenue service were relieved from gov
eminent service and permitted to devote
their energies to the productive pursuits of
the country? When gentlemen shall
have convinced me that twice five is less
than five, | may see something in the
question whether the internal revenue or
customs service is the more economical.
My proposition is that one does not cost
as much as both.
Leaving that branch of the subject, at
least for the present, let me remark that
the gentleman from Missouri Mr.. Fin
kelnburgl said in the course of his re-
marks:
81 have paid some attention of late to
the proportion of the cost of labor to the
whole cost of manufactured products, and
/ have found somewhat to my own surprise
that it rarely exceeds twenty-five per cent.
For instance, labor represents only fifteen
to twenty per cent. in pig iron, only fifteen
per cent. in wooden goods, twenty-five per
cent. in cotton goods, eighteen per cent. in
paper, and in some articles, as for instance
in soap, it sinks down to only six per
cent"
Mr.. Chairman, have quoted this para
graph that the workers in iron and steel
who may read my remarks may see on
what theory of cost of labor it is proposed
to reduce protection. The labor in ton
of pig iron in Pennsylvania ranges from
eighty to ninety per cent. of the whole
cost. Where it ranges from fifteen to
twenty-five per cent, if there be such
spot in the world, the laborer must be
starved and owners of ore and coal banks
and limestone quarries need but few hum
dred acres to give them the income of
dukedom.
Mr.. Finkelnburg. Your own manulac-
turer say so. have their figures here.
Mr.. Kelley-Let them speak in their
hour. When we reduced the duty on pig
iron from nine to seven dollars per ton, and
there was a vote in the Committee of the
Whole to reduce it from seven to five dol
lars, the argument was, we will cheaper
iron and largely increase the revenue. Sir,
what was the effect produced !? The pro-
duction of iron throughout our country fell
off at once. 1t had been increasing so
rapidly that within less than ten years it
had gone up from eight hundred thousand
to two million tons. Now, however, it is
dropped to a little more than eighteen hum
bred thousand tons. No furnaces were
built, and those that were in blast in some
parts of the country were blown out.
The proof that the production fell off is
abundant and indisputabe. Iron, which you
could buy then at from thirty to thirty
five dollars per ton, is bringing in the
market to-day from torty-seven to fifty
three dollars. More than twenty dollars
a ton additional are our people paying on
the increased consumption of pig IRON
The importation during the six months
ending December l, 1870, was ,60G tons,
at nine dollars per ton. During the six
months ending June 80, 1871, it was 49,
402, at seven dollars ton. You reduced
the duty, and thereby increased the inn
portation and the price at the same time,
and yet made merely nominal increase Of
revenue; the increase Of imports having
been thirty-two and four-ffths per cent,
while the increase of revenue was but three
per cent.
You increased importations and
checked the market for Western
grain for both men and animals
employed in and about furnaces
and FORCES you diminished the market for
your own products within the country and
put up the price of iron not by this cause
alone to the extent of the whole increase
that is made, but you thus added largely
to the price, and in compensation for part
of this increased cost you added three per
cent. to the revenue derived from pig iron.
And if you strike another blow at the duty
on pig iron, the effect will show itself in
the same direction. You will pay more
for iron you will abridge the market for
your breadstuffs and your mules and oxen,
and you will make but an unappreciable
increase in the revenues of the country.
Mr.. Chairman, with this extension of
my time recur to the matter Of internal
taxes. When being denied at Delmonco's,
Mr.. David A. Wells, late commissioner Of
internal revenue, who now seems to be de-
voting his services to the interests of the
Golden Club of England in parenthe-
sis, may remark here that what the gem
tleman from Illinois MIR. Burchardl says is
conceded on all hands, viz: that the sys-
tenn of internal taxes must be perpetuated,
never was preached until the Golden Club
and the Anglo-American Free-.rrade League
of New York formed conspiracy
to retard and restrict the develop
ment of the resources of our country, and
commenced their onslaught on our indus
tries and the wages of the American labor
er-but was about to remark that the
agent of that conspiracy, when being dined
at Delmonico's, without intending dramat-
ic effect at all, lifted his silk hat and, as if
the thought had just occurred to him,
stated how much the duties on the compo-
nent parts of that useful article of apparel
had added to its cost.
Sir, without knowing whether his state
ment was true or false, for find no war
rant for believing it in the fact that he made
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