The St. Johns herald., 1892-08-04
The Merchants and nlcKlnleyism.

are more alive to the thlevish in- justice of McKinleyism than the merchants. They feel and see the pinch of the increased duties as dis tinctly as the consumer, if not more so. The man who tells them that the tariff is not a tax will find him. selfregarded as eitheran ignoramus ora fool. And if any McKinleyite who sincerely holds the queer mo- tion that making a thing dearer does does not increase it's price he has but to consult a merchant if he wishes to be restored to sanity. Let him ask a business man why it is that the whole amount of the duty is not always added to the price of an article and the business man in telling him why will supply him with the reason for popularity of Cleveland and tariff reform in the mercantile circles of every city of the Union. The merchant vii! tell him that that portion of the tariff tax which the consumeris not com pelled to pay comes out-of the mer- chants profits; that people who have been accustomed to give cer- tain price for an article ''kick" strenuously when asked to pay g new and higher one, and that in order to make sales the merchant is forced to put up with reduced profit. "On box of knives," said San Francisco merchant the oth- CT day, T would have paid four bits at the Custom-house under the old tariff; under the Mckinley tariff I paid $3 50. I don't ask my GUS toners to give me any profit on my additional investment of $3 capital i; I am willing to take the same profit on the box that l did when I paid the four. bit duty and add to the price only the Mckinley tax of $3. But my customers don't like it even at that. They buy fewer knives and sell fewer knives and the volume of my business. and consequently my profits, suffers accordingly. Idlike we'll enough to pass on the tariff tax if I could, but I can't do 1t to any considerable extent, and that's why Pm for Cleveland and 2 new deal" :"
 The tailor who makes clothes to order finds that the man who has been in the habit of paying given price for suit objects to a raise. However patriotic he may be it does not rejoice him to be taxed $5 or $1O for the benefit of the Eastern manufacturer, who in all probabil- ity does not need the money halfs much as he does himself. More over, as the money is his, he would on the whole prefer to keep it rath- CT than to bestow 1t as a gift upon any millionaire, however poor and deserving. So the tailor tries to get even in two ways; he charges the old price, but he makes suit of in- ferior goods, which gives poor satis- faction, and reduces the wages of his employees. Even then he mnst stand a cut in his profits.
 The business man who is man. ufacturer, but not in a trust, gets the pinch on the enhanced cost of his raw materials. The duty on wool has ruined the woolen indus try in California. The tax on coal is burden to every manufacturer. And so it goes through the whole list.
 The defenders of McKinleyism may urge that the business men are we'll able to stand diminishment ot their profits, But we hardly think this argument will appeal with overwhelming force to the merchants, who may justly con tend that whether their legitimate profits be large or small they are their own and that no man, even though licensed by the Republican party to do so, has a right to steal them. If the profits of which they