Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1893-12-28

said: Have any of the manufacturers come
here to complain or ask for new duties: Is 1t
manufacturers OF New England themselves, to
the manufacturers of hardware, textile fabrics
ETC., there would be large majority against
any change? Do we not know that the wooden
manufacture dates 1t revival from the tariff of
1887 which altered the duties wool?'
The history of American industry shows that
during no other period has there been o more
healthy and rapid development of our manu-
featuring industry than during the fifteen years
of low tariff from 1876 to 1861 nor q more
healthy and harmonious growth of agriculture
and all the other great industries OF the coun-
try.
No chapter in our political experien ce car
ries with it a more salutary lession than this,
and none could appeal more strongly to law
makers to establish just and rational system
OF public revenues. neither exhausting agri-
culture by constant blood-letting. nor keeping
manufactures alternating between chillS and
feyers by artificial pampering. In this direction
alone lies stability, concord OF sections and
OF great industries. We have already
said that public discussion may disclose errors
of minor detail in the schedules of our bill
To escape such errors would require so thor
ough and minute a knowledge Of all the divi-
sions, subdivisions. complex and manifold
mazes and involutions of our chemical. textile,
metal and other industries. that no committee
of congress. matter how extended the range
OF their personal knowledge, or how laborious
and painstaking their efforts, could. ever hope
to possess.
We have not forgotten that we represent
the people, who are the MANY, as well as the
protected interests, who are the few. and
while we Gave dealt with the latter in no spirit
OF unfriendlinesS, we have felt that it was our
duty and not their privilege to make
the tariff schedules. Those who concede the
right OF benehciarles to fix their own bourties
must necessarily commit to them the framing
and wording of the law by which those boun-
ties are secured to them. A COM
mlttee of congress thus is merely the
amanuensis OF the protected interests. It has
been shown clearly and so often in the de-
bates OF this house, that nearly every i'm
portant schedule OF the existing law was made
in its very words and figures by representa-
tives Of the interests 1t was framed to protect
that it is unnecessary in our report to present
the record proof of this fact, but 1t may not be
amiss to cite further evidence to show that this
is not only the necessary rule, but the open and
avowed method OF framing protective tariffs.
When the senate substitute for the bill
passed by this house in the Fiftieth congress-
which substitute is the real basis Of the exist
ing law-was being prepared, Senator Hoar, Of
Massachusetts,. appeared before the senate
subcommittee and used this language: In
stead OF coming before your subcommittee for
a formal hearing on our Massachusetts indus
tries I thought the best way was to carefully
prepare table of all the various industries per-
haps sixty seventy in all, and ask Brother
Aldrich to go over them with me and ascertain
what the people wanted in each case and II
there were any cases where the committee had
not already done exactly what the petitioners
desired or had not inflexibly passed upon the
question could have hearing before you,
but find in every instance the action Of the
committee as Mr.. Aldrich thinks it likely to
be, as entirely satisfactory to the interests
represent, with the exception OF one or two,
and the papers in regard to those cases have
handed to Mr. Aldrich."
No stronger indictment of the whole pro-
tective system could be made than that which
is unconsciously carried in these words of a
United States senator, that laws which impose
taxes the great masses OF people must be
written in language so technical that the most
intelligent citizen can not fully understand
them, and that the rates of taxation should be
dictated by the seltishness and greed of those
who are to receive the taxes. We have be-
lieved that the first step toward a
reform of the tariff should be a release of
the taxes on the materials of industry There
can be no substantial and benef1 cial reduction
upon the necessary clothing and other COM
forts of the American people, nor any SUBJ
stantial and beneficial enlargement of the field
of American labor, as long as we tax materials
and processes of production. Every tax upon
the producer falls with increased force on the
consumer. Every tax on the producer in this
country is projection to his competitors in
all other countries, and so narrows his
market to limit the number and lessen
the wages of those to whom he can
give employment
Iron and coal are tn e basis of modern indus
try The abundance and cheapness OF their
supply offers us in many lines OF productions
the manufacturing supremacy OF the world.
-.
ing exhausted, and the cost OF mining in
consequence is increasing, we are con-
stantly discovering and developing new
sources of supply The discovery OF the i'm
mense beds of Bessemer ores in the lake re-
gion and OF foundry ores in several of the
southern states, their convenience for trans
portation and for the assemblage of materials
the use of the steam shovel in mining-all these
have so cheapened the cost OF producing pig
iron and steel as to take away ali possibility
and danger of foreign competition in almost
every part OF the country.
Not less rapid has .been the growth Of our
coal production. The coal area OF the United
States as stated by Mr.. Saward in the Coal
Trade for 1S93 is estimated at 1872 900 square
miles, of which 10000 can be comfortably
worked at present. This coal area is over
three times larger than that Of the rest Of the
world combined. The existing duty Of seventy
five cents ton on iron ore and on b1tum1nouS
coal can not be justified either as protective
or o revenue duty. The impOrtatiOns into
this country are too small to add
materially to our revenue, while no one con-
tends that the cost of mining is higher in the
United States than in the countries that might
seek our market. 1t could never have been in
tended that legislation which establishes per-
feet freedom OF internal trade among the
states should countenance laws that hold one
section OF the Union, however remote, tribu
tary to other sections for the supplies of those
necessary materials whose location Is or
dained by natural law, and not by human
choice.
This house in two congresses in recent years
having, after full debate passed laws putting
VOC. upon the free list, it is not deemed neces-
sary in this report to attempt restatement of
the reasons for doing so. It is enough to say
that the tariff upon wool, while bringing no
real benefit to the American wool-grower, least
of all to the American farmer who, in any bal
ancing OF accounts, must see that he yearly
pays out good dollar for every doubtful dime
he may receive under its operation, has
disastrously harnpered our manufactures and
made cruel and relentless war upon the health,
the comfort and the productive energy Of the
American people.
Logs are already on the free list. We have
gone step farther and put undressed lumber
generally on that list. This may serve to
cheaper and improve the dwelling houses of
some OF people, but it is justified If it shall
accomplish nothing more than to delay the
rapid destruction OF American forests. We
have also placed hemp and fax unhacked
on the free list for the reasons