New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1884-01-18
THE DEWOCR4TTC PLAN

The reasoning of the Carlisle Morrison Demo-
Gratis is substantially this: "A Republican
Tariff Commission recommended reduction
@of % per cent in duties. The bill aftorward
@passed, it appears from an official statement
for the quarter ending September 30, actually
"reduced duties less than per cent. There
fore we can safely cut down duties 70 per
cent And. inasmuch as blunders OF detail
would politically damage us, by disclosing the
incapacity of the Democratic party for prac-
" teal legislation, let us make general re-
"duction of 20 per cent of duties now in force,
instead of trying to adjust to the needs OF diff
fcrent industries new duties which shall yield
G2O per cent less than the present revenue"
To such reasoning THE TRIBUNE replies, and
believes that the Republican party with sub
stantial unanimity will reply;
|. The Tariff Commission was intended to be
and was a nOn-partisan body, it made no at
tempt to represent party.
ii. That Commission recommended certain
reductions of duties which, taken as whole, it
believed would be safe. 1t did not recommend
any conceivable reduction that might amount
in the aggregate to % per. cent Nor was II so
stupid as to propose horizontal reduction.
Thus. if Congress had taken oil all duties on
wool and woollen manufactures, $50, 800 1893,
and ON iron and steel, and manufactures
thereof, tin and tin plates, $21, 665,556, it
would have removed about % per cent of all
duties but would have brought ruin to great
industries, and the Commission recommended
no such act of folly. Or, had Congress taken
Oft one-quarter of all duties then levied on
everything 1t would have cut down the duties
on spirits about $2,1S5,0O0, which would
have been foolish on silk about $4,9l3,OOO,
which would perhaps have been harmless;
and on iron and steel manufactures about
S4,147, 900, which would have Frustrated a
great industry. Lunacy OF that sort was left
for Democratic Congress.
III. The reduction of duties by means of the
new tariff was actually much more than per
cent OH the average. The recent report shows
that the duty collected on dutiable merchandise
for the first quarter of the current fiscal year
was AZ per cent of its value, against 44.2 per
cent collected in the same quarter of 1882 upon
goods then dutiable, but does not show the
value of imports then subject to duty and now
in the free list. Moreover, the change in quail
ity of articles imported has been important.
For instance under the old tariff, the duty was
exactly the same on the poorest and cheapest
sugar mot above No. Dutch Standard in
color" as upon the best and most valuable, so
that the ratio of duty on the cheaper sugars was
from 70 to 80 per cent, and they were hardly
imported. Now the duty is graduated according
to saccharine strength and real value, and does
not amount to go per cent on any class of sugar
that is considerably imported, and consequently
the cheaper grades are brought in mere largely
than before. Thus the average cost of brown
sugar imported in the very month after the new
duty went into effect dropped to 3.S cents,
against a. 6 cents for the same month of the pre-
vious year. Had the same kind of sugar been
taxed at the old rate, the duty would have been
much higher.
~. To cut down all duties 90 per cent would
work the grossest injustice to those industries
which have been obliged already to meet the