Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1888-08-10


9Th. JOHN A. BUCHANAN, of Washington.
10TH R. B. POORE. of Appomattox.
Would the increase of duty disastrously af-
feet the consumer of articles manufactured
from tin? Would it blight the budding pros
poets of our canneries Let us see. Mr.. Clar-
ence NJ Fenton, of the Erie Preserving Com
pany, himself free-trader, recently wrote
letter to the President congratulating him on
his free trade message and especially urging
free tin plates. In that letter he says: ''Free
tin plates means cents per dozen less on all
three-pound tin cans" That would be just
one-half cent on every can. How much of that
half-cent would be saved to the purchaser of
can of fruit Or for that matter, to the pur-
chaser of dozen cans? According to this
estimate, the cost of tin bucket holding two
gallons would be about two cents less than it
now is. Just think what boon that would be
to the workingman who bought the bucket, if
he could get the full benefit, and then calcu-
late the chances of his getting any benefit at
all. But even this reduction in price is based
upon GuG lI06.lIduS doouluJ ludt luO duIJ
is always added to the cost. All experience
teaches the contrary, and a year ago the VIM
DICTATOR would have been one of the first to
refute the charge. Between its learning and
unlearning it must be undergoing torture
Va5yey VirgiaaiaYl.
If men could settle their tariff tax
bill to the general government by just
saying "that's all right" or ''just charge
that" or "just consider that paid" the
Valley Virginian's views of high tariff
tax would be both convenient and suit
able. What, il asks, is a mere two cents
on tin bucket to workingna,aann What
is half-cent OF OF tin fruit can ? Its views
- Ct Mn5ney are large and rotund. and in
clude no housing among paltry two cents
and still paltrier half-cents. The exalted
point from which it regards these petty f.
nancial transactions, calls to mind similar
expressions of the Hon. Jacob Yost, the
other day, in congress. He was advocating
tariff tax on that almost exclusive prop
erty of the poor mantle clay pipe. The
Democrats wanted to admit them free in
the Mills bill, and did it, too. But he
wanted them taxed, and as one of his
reasons, gave this:
ssThe cost of the article to the consumer is
now at the lowest price within the medium of
our currency, namely, one cent per piece for
those in most general use."
And why not? What possible hardship
can there be in taxing a man cent on
anything, if that is the ''lowest piece with
in the medium of our currency" and why
not two, which is only one cent more?
Let our esteemed contemporary come down
among the people with it's views of taxa
ton, and see how acceptable they are p?
The State tax in Virginia is less than ne
half of one per cent-less than one-half OF
cent in dollar, and yet proposition to
raise it up to that half would make a
storm. That small tax gets out of the
Virginia payers oyer Million and Half
dollars in year. We all know what a
storm would follow any attempt to raise
this tax even tenth of a cent. Suppose
our neighbor asks the Staunton Cannery
which will use $4,000 cans, wheth.
er it minds the half cent per can
tax and whether it wouldn't prefer the
$500 tax paid to the government to re-
main in its cash drawer. Suppose it in
Quires of the RockEridge cannerieS which
this season, as we read, will consume near
ly 100000 cans, whether they wouldn't
have preferred to have kept the So 900
tariff tax ia their pocket. Does our neigh.
Dor suppose that the farmers who use on
their thousands of farms SO many cans
care nothing for the half cent can. Does
he suppose that the present tariff tax Of
$5,7OO,00O paid by the people to the gov
eminent comes out of nobody's pocket,
or that the nearly $12,000,000 to which
Mr.. Y ost wanted the tax increased, would
come from nowhere. We should like to see
Republican candidate for congress this fal
advocating the ViTgin6Gn's views before
an audience in which there were Gamers
or farmers who can their products, OF
Workingmen who use tin buckets. Boil
he and our contemporary would soon see
whether two cents, or one cent, or half
cent tax is something the people are dis
posed to submit to.
In the following extract our neighbol
has tripped and we presume it must have
been written in haste and that by this time
it sees the error itself:
Tin plates represent from 95 to 81 per cent
of finished iron or steel and from 3 to pei
cent. of tin. They constituted last year one
one-third of all the iron and steel importa
tions into this country. To admit them free
of duty, as the Mills bill does (and the VIND1
GATOR approves and applauds it) would be
tantamount to transfer of the entire sheet
iron and sheet steel product of this country
to England. Nay more. The Mills bill places
upon the free list:
Iron or steel Sheets or plates OR taggers iron,
coated with tin or lead or with mixture of which
these metals is a component part, by the dipping
or any other process and commercially k1aolcn as
tin plates, terEe plates. and taggerS tin -
It will be observed that this provision OF
the bill does not designate the dimensions OF
the sheet, its thickness or weight, Under it
all classes of sheet iron or steel would be ad-
mitted free after they had gone through the