Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1890-08-08

| schedule except tnat relating 10 sugar
and molasses. In all the other thr-
teen schedules of dutiable goods,
embracing almost every important ar
ticle the people use, except tea and
coffee, which have been free many
years, increases are made, and in
many of them the increase is very
large.
1t will here he seen that the bill
while i'll the house contained no re-
duction OF duties on spurious liquors,
but the finance committee OF the SEN
ate, in order, as it would seem, to
make it somewhat worse, have pro-
vided for lower taxes on imported
brandy, whisky, champagne, cordials,
liquors, arrack, absinthe, kirschwasser,
rattojia, vcrmuth, and other spurious
beverages, known to the high-priced
palates Of the rich and seli-indulgcnt,
while on every article absolutely nee
essary to the home-life OF the farmer,
the mechanic, and the day labOrer ex-
isting tariff taxes have been retained
and in many most vital instances
enormously increased.
1t staggers belief and exhausts all
sense OF fOrbearance towards such a
| system of taxation when we find from
the actual figures here in the plain
light of day that the revenue to be de-
rived from imported spirits of all kinds
is made lighter to consumers by the
sum of $2l7 ,l5S per annum, while in
the schedule relating to wool and the
manufactures of wool the annual in
crease in the amount of revenue to be
derived therefrom under the proyi-
sions of this bill is put down by the
authors of the bill themselves at the
terrific sum of Sl4 ,4l2,653.
Sir, in what age are we living, and
tor what manner OF people are we
legislating? is THIS a period OF dark
ness, and are the American people not
only bereft OF reason to ascertain their
wrongs, bu: also destitute of every in
stinct Of equality and justice in their
own behalf? Even the poor blind
worm TURNS in resentment when it is
| N hn
vocates of this most unnatural and
most revolving measure expect its
victims to do less?
Are we living in the torrid zone
where q scant measure of cotton cloth
constitutes suit of clothes, and
where WOODEN wear is not one Of the
wants OF life? Are we legislating for
the barbarian races of interior Africa,
who are clothed with little else than
sunshine, and to whom taxation on
wearing apparel is an unknown mys-
terry? Or rather are we not here making
laws for great and stalwart people
far north of the equator, whore the
! mercury in the tube marks from zero
to forty degrees below, and with whom
wool and the manufactures of wool
are in as universal use, and are as i'm
perative a necessity to life, as the air
they breathe?
From infancy to old age, from the
cradle to the grave, at every step of
the way on LIES toilsome journey. the
one incessant and memorable want of
the American people is for the manu-
factured productions of wool; and for
that reason. and that reason alone,
this bill levies an additional blackmail
of nearly $l5,OOO,Oc0 year on this
supreme want OF men, women and
children, there being no more escape
from its payment than there is from
death.
There is no pretense that this in
crease OF taxation on woolen goods is
made for purposes OF revenue, or that
it is needed in the Treasury; it is
simply the doctrine of protection run
mad and developed into a Chinese
wall of prohibition against importa-
ton, thus leaving the American mar
kcts, there TO fix His own prices with
no one to undersell him, there to force
the sale of his commodities at double
their actual value on unwilling pur-
chasers who have access to no other
and there to glut, cram, and
gorge himself with worse than stolen
while the farmer continues to
his farm, and the wage-work-
er continues to toll and economize in
order that his wife and children may
have, if possible, one square meal
day.
The mask is off at last; clear off.
We are no more to be deluded with
soft and skillful words in behalf of
protection as an incident to revenue,
nor are we any longer to listen to the
syren's pathetic song in the nursery of
infant industries. These infants,
whose crying woes and puerile at
tempts to walk alone for the last hun
dred years have excited so much
sympathy and subsidized so much
eloquence, have now become full.
grown, robust highwaymen, no longer
asking protection for their weakness,
but demanding the legalized privil-
eyes as right, and without disguise to
raid, loot, and plunder every precinct
of honest industry in the United
States.
The miserable reptile in the fable
that was warmed back into life from a
frozen, dying condition, and at once
sought to fasten its fangs in its bene-
factor, has many and powerful imita-
tors and disciples in these days.
Fostered and built up by the patient
drudgery of the American people in
the indefensible principle of
one interest by taxing an
other, the manufacturing monopolists
have finally seized the mastery of the
and are now crushing out the