St. Paul daily globe., 1893-06-13
BUSINESS AND THE TARIFF.

Those falrer Republicans who do not
feel it a matter of conscience to charge
the disasters of the present financial de-
preston on the administration which
has just come into power, and is yet
moving under the momentum given it
by its Republican predecessor without
power to check its movement or, to
change its direction, still contend that
much of the condition is due to the feel
ing among manufacturers and those
middlemen who stand between them
and the consumers of uncertainty as to
what changes will be made in the tariff
and how far their wares and their
values will be affected by it.
Let US have reciprocity in fairness.
To doubt that such feeling exists
among the class of business men af-
fected by any change that may be made
would diseredit their business capacity.
That uneasineSS must have begun
year ago now, when the Democrats pro-
claimed their purpose of eliminating the
principle of protection from our revenue
policy. 1t must have grown immensely
after the Sth of last November. when
the people so emphatieally approved of
the Democratic purpose. 1t will neces-
Sarily continue until the changes are
made. Naturally. production will be re-
stricted to the requirements OF immedi-
ate consumption; there is no fear that
it will fall below that.
But this condition is inevitable under
any tariff system. That never has been
permanent: it never can be. Changes
of tariffs, whether of increase or de-
crease, have the same effect on the buSi-
ness affected by them. Advances are as
much to be dreaded as are reductions,
because, in tie community of selfishness
which pervades protection, advances of
taxes on manufactured product are
compensated by advances on the ma
terial in them. The manufacturer may
look with complacency on the increase
of the tax on his product. but the jobber
and the retailer, who have to take the
products in advance of consumption,
regard with uneasiness the uncertainty
OF advance, and curtail their purchases.
The men engaged i'll making and sell
ing wares whose production is fostered
by law have no real ground for com
plant of the coming reduction. They
have had fair warning OF it and ample
time to prepare for it. There is slight
ground TO apprehend that when it
comes they will not be fully ready for it.
But what an illustration it is of the
folly of system of taxation which thus
constantly imperils business and dis
turbs and diSarranges the productive
energies of the country. What sys-
tenn it is that makes the assembling of
a congress matter OF grave concern to
the business of the country, and its ad-
journment the signal for exultation. Is
it not time that business men them
selves began to question any system of
revenue that produces such results? Is
it not time for them, as matter of mere
self-interest. to begin to study these
questions of taxation, and to demand
the adoption of method which will
not disturb their calcuIatious?
|. In our states we see no such condi-
tions. On the contrary, the situation is
reversed. On the assembling of con-
gress we see delegations representing
different branches of manufactures
haunting the rooms Of the ways and
means committee to resist the reduction
of tax or to demand the imposition or
increase of another. In our states we
see only the representatives of some
corporate interest striving with the
legislatures to prevent the laying of
some special tax on them. We never
see people there asking for increase of
taxes on the business they are engaged
in. The great business interests in the
states bother themselves little about
the amount or kind of taxes the legisla-
ture levies. Whatever they may be
they know that they will not disturb or
affect at all their business.
Is there nothing in this that suggests
to business men that the federal method
of indirect taxation is fundamentally
wrong and vicious, and that the method
which their interests require IS the
direct tax?