Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1888-04-25
TARIFF REFORM.
The West Largely Favoring It-Thc Pres
idents Message Went Straight to the
Gist of tho Matter.

The West Largely Favoring It-Thc Pres
ident's Message Went Straight to the
Gist of tho Matter.
The signs of public sentiment in favor of
a reduction of taxes, and thus averting the
manifold evils which further increase Of
surplus may bring forth, are multiplying.
The Chicago Times has made an extensive
canvass of the Illinois farmers on the ques-
ton, and the result shows that quite sixty
per cent. of the Republican farmers arc
heartily in favor of President Clevelands
recommendations, and even counsel more
radical changes in the tariff. Only ten per
cent. of the Democratic farmers favor the
present tariff. This significant result,
united to the many .undeniable evidences of
the popularity of the Presidents sugges-
tons in Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota
and Iowa, will account for the uneasiness
felt by the war-tariff people over the pros
poets of the passage of the Mills bill, which
is an extremely moderate and conservative
measure.
The farmers everywhere are beginning
20 fullyrealize that they are the principal
victims Of the war tariff, and they will
make their influence felt at the fall elec-
ton on the question. The Blaine message
and the frothy, illogical speeches made by
powerless to divert the attention of the
farmers from their own interests. The
Republican press in the West, headed by
the Chicago Tribune and st. Paul Pioneer
Press, is largely in favor Of tariff reform.
Therefore, the Western members of Con-
gress, representing the Republican party,
have significantly kept aloof from all tariff
debates as general rule, preferring to let
their votes speak for them when the proper
time comes.
The editor of the Philadelphia Press, who
first spread CONSERVATION among the Re-
publicans trusts by the alarming announce
ment that there is strong probability that
the Mills bill may pass the House, attempt
ed recently TO explain that he merely de-
sired to arouse the country to a sense of
the situation. There is not the slightest
necessity for any thing of the kind. The
country is fully aroused and is awaiting
with anxious expectancy the passage of the
bill. The Presidents message was like a
trumpet blast, as the high protectionists of
trusts and monopolies have discovered by
this time, and the Press sorrowfully ac-
knowledges the fact, recently, in speaking
of the bright prospects of the Democratic
Tariff-Reform bill: ave might shut our
eyes to the fact, but we don't. We might
like to rest under the pleasing delusion that
every thing is safe, but we can't"
The favor with which the sturdy, patriotic
message of the President was received and
the commentators of the singularly mild
bill prepared by the Ways and Means Com
mittee, are demoralizing the opposition and
| reducing them to a condition of mind de-
cidedly unfortunate for party on the eve
of Presidential campaign. They find, to
their dismay, that the great majority of the
people of this country are in favor of a re-
vision of the tariff and the reduction of the
mischievous surplus. 1t is not comfort
ing reflection for them at this critical junct-
ure The West has realized that it is being
overtaxed for the benefit Of Eastern manu-
facturers, and thousands of farmers, whose
farms are mortgaged for the same purpose,
are heartily in accord with the Democratic
Administration in its grand patriotic work.
Lies and misrepresentation have lost their
old force and no longer can fool the country
on this question. The Presidents message
cleared away all the mists which surround
ed it, and the statesmanlike manner in
which the Democratic majority of the Ways
and Means have treated it has carried ire
sistlble conviction of the necessity of tariff
reform to all except the trusts and their
hirelings in and out of Congress. AlbdnD
! ArgHs.