Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1892-05-26
BINDING TWINE AND BAGGING.
This Is Not Class Legislation, but Is In
tended to Rem edy It


tended to Remedy 1t.
The bill to put cotton bagging on the
free list has passed the house, all the
Democrats excepting Coburn, of Wis
consin; O'Neill, of Missouri, and Eng
lish, of New Jelse ,, voting in the affirm
ative, and all the Republicans in the
negative.
Cotton bagging is in the same cate
CORY with binding twine. 1t is manu-
factured by the cordage combine. The
raw material is free of duty. 1t is used
by southern farmers for covering their
bales of cotton as binding twine is used
by northern farmers for binding wheat
and other small grains. There is as
much reason why cotton bagging should
be free of duty as there is why binding
twine should be free of duty.
But when the Mckinley billion con-
gress was dealing with this schedule it
reduced the duty on binding twine con-
siderably more than one-half and did
not reduce the duty on cotton bagging
at all. 1t Disseminated against the
southern farmer and in favor of the
northern farmer. And now the Repub-
hcans of the house, accompanied, The
Herald is sorry to see, by three Demo-
Gratis, vote unanimously to continue the
discrimination.
The cordage combine did not cease to
manufacture binding twine after the
duty was reduced to seven-tenths of a
cent per pound, or more than one-half.
That it manufactured more than ever
before is fair inference from two facts:
First, that the grain crops last year
were the largest in the history of the
country, and, second, that the importa-
ton of binding twine during the last
fiscal year, covering all the importation
for the crop year, or nearly all, was only
S22 pounds, valued at thirty-three dol
lars.
The opponents of the free twine and
bagging bills have objected to them on the
ground that they are bills for class legis-
lation. They tell us there is no more rea-
son why congress should favor farmers
than there is why it should favor those
who use cables and other articles made
of the same and like materials, and that
it is inconsistent for Democrats who pro-
fess to oppose class legislation to make
such bills party measures.
This objection implies that such legis-
lation would favor the farmers by CIV
ing them cheaper twine and baggipg,
while other classes using products from
the same materials, the duties on which
were not reduced or abolished, would
still have to pay high prices-that is,
it implies that tariff taxes increase the
prices of the articles on which they are
laid, of the domestic as well as the i'm
ported products.
According to the Republican doctrine,
therefore, these bills would not give the
farmers cheaper twine and bagging.
Therefore, they are not class measures.
The Republican claim that really pro-
tective duties do not raise prices is false,
as the benefciaries of the tariff are per
fectly well aware. Their whole system
is a system of class legislation. 1t is a
system under which industries that are
self sustaining are forced to contribute
to the support of other industries that
claim to be and are assumed to be inca
pable of self support. The projections
lists admit that this is the original pur-
pose and effect of their system, and seek
to comfort the victims with the assur-
ance that while they must bleed for a
time they will ultimately, and in some
way not clearly defined, recover their
own with interest.
Now the farmer class is pre-eminently
the victim class. The farmers more
than any others are forced by tariff
legislation to contribute from their
profits to the profits of other classes.
They have been contributing for thirty
years, and they do not yet find them
selves recovering their own. They are
still the victims, as they have been all
these thirty years.
What the Democrats propose in these
two bills and in the bill putting cotton
ties on the free list is not to grant spe-
cial favors to farmers as class, but
only to relieve them from a small part
of the burden which has been laid upon
them as class. They propose not to
legislate for a class, but to relieve a
class in some measure from legislation
which for years has Disseminated
against that class.
Against these Democratic measures of
relief from class legislation we find the
Republicans in the house arrayed in un-
broken ranks, and we will find the Re
publlcans in the senate arrayed ON the
same side in solid phalanx. And as the
fugitive thief shouts "stop thief" more
Justify than his pursuers, 80 will the Re-
publican attorneys for monopoly shout
''class legislationw to bewilder and de-
ceive the people.-Chicago Tribune.
A Mckinley Tariff Drama in Five Acts,
Act I-Scene, Congress, October, 1890
duties raised). Mckinley increases the
duty on oatmeal from half cent to one
cent per pound in the interests of sew
eral large oatmeal manufacturers of
Ohio.
Act H-Scene, Columbus, O., Janu-
ary, 1891 (trust formed under the head
ing, "All the Oatmeal Mills Consoli
dated'D. The New York Tribune de-
scribes what occurred as follows: "In-
corporation papers were filed at Colum-
bus today for the Consolidated Oatmeal
company, with capital of $500, 900.