Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1893-11-10
ONE PHASE OF 1T.

To The Iowa County Democrat.
The Ways and Means committee of
the house Of Representatives having
in charge the making Of a tariff bill, is
surrounded as that committee always
is by men who beg, threaten, buy or
bully the peoples representatives into
granting them the right to tax the
people. They sing the same old song
OF industry paralyzed, PROSTATE; "
business depressed" the prospect for
the future gloomy and disheartening,'
they must go to the wall unless re-
lief is afforded" "that this is most
unfortunate time to agitate change
in the tariff tax" that "a change
would be especially unwise," that this
change would be met by heavy re-
duction of wages" one claimant for
favors at the expense of the public
throws up his hands with the words,
'you have it in your power to say what
wages we shall pay"
They deceive no one when they
speak Of their private business for
which they beg government aid, as
being 1.-the industries of the United
States" when as matter of fact the
United States does not own, nor did
ever own mine or mill, nor does it
now, nor did it ever make pound,
yard, gallon or gross of anything and
place it on the market for sale. These
men are simply trying by every means
that ingenuity can suggest, to obtain
from the peoples agents an extension
of the lease to tax the people which
was granted to them by the last repub-
lican congress, that they may shut off
by law competition in their private
business, to increase the price of their
goods.
| wonder how much longer these
pampered patriots expect to play
horse with the people? Don't you
forget it, the men who own iron-mines
or who own n-furnaces, are in that
business for the money there is in it,
nothing more, nothing less. Their con-
temptible talk, columns long, about
giving employment to labor is an
insult to a man who has learned his
trade and who signs their scale of
wages, for he knows, and he knows
that they know and require him to pay
fully with his time and strength and
skill for every cent received in wages,
and the moment he fails to do it his
discharge is handed to him. Or if
an equally good man offer to do the
same work for less pay he either comes
down or goes out, to make room for
the new man who has been "given
employment"
The men who are making and sell
ing iron and steel for the money there
is in it have had the help of the congress
of the United States to prevent COM
petition in making and selling their
goods since July 4, 1889, more than a
hundred years. They promptly be-
seiged the very first congress which
met in the United States, to hand over
to them its power to tax, and they
have never let up from that day to
this in their demand that the agents
of the people yield to them the gov
ernment's power to tax.
Let US see, this is the United States,
this is " the young giant of the west,
this the country claiming to have the
most intelligent people, the greatest
labor saving devices, with matches
resources of field, forest and mine.
1t was Pennsylvania, | believe, that
heralded to the world, in letters a foot
long, at the Columbian Exposition her
output of coal to be scores of millions of
tons, her yearly yield of iron-ore and
pig-iron to be scores of millions of tons,
and yet it is Joseph Wharton of Phila-
delphia, Penn, speaking before the
ways and means committee. as vice
president of the American Iron and
Steel association, who said "a change
in the tariff tax would be especially