Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1886-12-08

energies. IL is THESE WHICH neeu Acienso
and liberty. All our requisite taxation
may be made an easy garment. We have
made prison of IT, plastered stth with
obsolete contentious about protection and
/ free trade.
OUR PRESENT PROLONGED wAR'TARIff
TAxRs.
II is actually the war rates OF the war
tariff OF the last generation under which
we are now living; for the undebated,
unsifted law OF 1888, made by a confer
ence committee, did hut keep alive the
body OF the tariff Of S64,
The average percentage of the taxes on
to the values OF, imported commodities
has been as follows;
Morrill, tariff Of ls59'Gl (Oefore the
wai), was rs "a per cent; war tariff Of
1862. '64 On 1866 was highes) was 4S.35
pr cent; present prolonged war-tarlh
(was in 1850 4G 07 per cent.
My last annual report reviews the his
tory OF this strange survival
Like our currency laws, our tariff
laws are legacy OF war. II its exigen-
cies excuse their origin, their defects are
unnecessary after twenty years of peace.
They have been retained without Sitting
and discrimination, although enacted
without legi latlve debate, criticism or
examination horiz ,ntal reduction
of &c per cent. WAS made ia 1872,
but was repe led in 1875, aud
rejected In 1884. They require at
our custom houses the employment Of a
force sufficient TO examine, appraise, and
levy duties upon more than 4l82 d fferent
articles Many rates OK duty begun in
war have been increased since, although
the late tariff commission declared them
Injurious to the interests supposed TO be
benefited and said that a reduction
would be conductive to the general
prosperity They have been retained,
although the long era of falling prices
in the cas- of specific duties, has operat-
ed large increase Of rates. They have
been retained at an average ad valorem
rate for the last year of over 46 per cent,
which is but "a per cent. less than the
highest rate of the war period, and is
nearly per cent. more than the rate be-
fore the latest revision. The highest
endurable rates Of duty, which were
adopted In 1862 '64 to Offset internal
taxes upon almost every taxable article,
have in most cases been retained now
from fourteen TO twenty years after every
SUCH Internal tax has been removed.
They have Deen retained while purely
revenue duties upon articles not compel
ing with anything produced in
the thirty-eight states have
been discarded. They have
been retained upon articles used as mt
terials for our own manufactures Gin 1884
adding $50, 100000 to their COST, Which,
II exported compete in other countries
against similar manufactures from uu-
taxed materials. Some rates have been
of mi, In ha f.,I
were meant to advantage. Other rates
have been retained after effecting higher
price for domestic product at home
than IL was sold for abroad The general
high level OF rates has been retained on
the theory Of couutervailing lower wages
abroad, when, in fact, the higher wages
of American labor are at once the secret
and security our capacity to distance
all competl ion from 'pauper labor in
any market. All changes have left I'M
changed, or changed for the worse, by
new schemes of classification and other
wise, complicated, cumbrous, intricate
group of laws which are not capable IF
being administered with impartislity to
ell our merchants. As nothing in the or.
binary course of business is imported I'M
less the price here of the domestic, as
we'll as OF the imported article, is higher
by the amount of the duty and the cost of
sea-trausit than the price abroad, the
preference OF the taxpayer for duties
upon articles not produced in the United
States Is justified by the fact that such
duties cost him no more than the treas
ury of his country gets. As for duties af-
ftctlng articles that are also produced in
the United States, the first to be safely
discarded are those upon materials used
by our own manufacturers, which now
subject them to a hopeless competition,
at home and abroad, with the manufac.
turing nations, none of which taxes raw
Materials
FIELD OF FEDERAL TAXES, NOT LAND, NOT
INCoMRs.
The federal power of taxation Is al
most uncrcnmscribed. 1t must be "for
the general welfare" not for a partial or
class benefit. Exports cannot be taxed.
Direct taxes must be anportioned among
the several states according to their pop
ulation. Indirect taxes must be uniform
throughout the United States. These in
clude "all duties, lmposts, and excises,n
which are, though advanced by the home
producer or the importing merchant,
alike actually paid by the final consumer.
Our experience of the difficulty and in
CAPABILITIES of the direct tax when applied
to land, of which square foot ia one
place Is costlier than ! 30 miles square in
another place, and ia proportion to popu-
lationi which varies in density now and
changes continually; or when applied to
individual incomes (the most direct tax
conceivable, for when paid it cannot be
shiited-it has no r-percussion, which is
the only common feature of the taxes
held TO be direct before war had dis
turbed the vision of courts and Iegisla-
tures) under the prescribed rule of ap-
portlonment to the states according to
population, confines their utility to state
purposes, and excludes them from the
Just puryiew Of federal taxation.
BUT THINGS HERE CONSUMED; WITH IN
LAND AND SEAPORT COLLECTORS OF
TAXES.
1t is indirect taxes only which the
federal government now levies, and to
winch, being thus practically restricted
by those provisions Of the constitution,
1t mu look for its revenues and its re-
missions when revenue outruns expense
1t is out of indirect taxes that arise con
tentlons about protection and free trade.
as they arose before the war when onr
debt was little and our expense so small
That many thought congress might have
abolished custom.houses, and no narm.
Free trade" accurately describes the
internal commerce Of our states. 1t an.
| plies to the commerce, one with another.
OF no other great aud sovereign states