Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1894-03-02

consumer OF the aEIlcle upon which
the tax is laid.
I'd. The farmers of Wisconsin rails
ed 524,757 bushels of barley in 1891
and were 80 eager to ill their pockets
with the IA cents Mckinley tax that
they sold every bushel raised that year.
Sd. That the average price FOR THE
YEAR is the price which farmers get
for their grain; not the market price
ruling at the time THEY SELL their
grain.
4th. The price Of barley was jerked
up IA notches and the product into
which it was converted did not rise in
price, nor fall in quality or quantity.
AS to the first point, did the Nc
Kinley law give the farmers of Wis
consin IA cents a bushel more in 1891
than they got in 1889? This is very
important if it is true. Let me here
quote from page 103 Milwaukee Board
of Trade, 1928, line that seems to
have escaped attention:
"The crop of barley in Wisconsin in
1891 was the lowest in yield for several
years"
Possibly scarcity had something to
do with the price. 1t happened that
the price of barley was greater in 1891
than it was two years before. In the
meantime the tax was raised, 1890;
hence it is triumphantly claimed the
tax did it. Take similar "chain of
reasoning" in the spring the birds
come back, in the spring the farmer
sows his grain, hence the farmer sows
his grain BECAUSE the birds come back.
Here is every element, every relation
that there is in Congressman Shaw's
syllogism, that is, coincidence of time,
and the conclusion is just as reason
able to the minds of those who think.
1t ought not to be necessary to say
that the price of barley depends upon
the supply, its quality, and the amount
held over by brewers and masters,
and the stock of malt on hand, and
this too, without regard to tariff taxes
or no tariff taxes.
You who believe tariff taxes to be a
sort of legislative handspike that Con-
gress placed in the hands of farmers to
hoist up the price of barley will please
explain this:
In 1879 the average price of barley
on the Board of Trade of Milwaukee,
was 900 cents, WITH NO CHANGE WHAT
EVER IN THE TAX the price in 1881
was SOB cents, or gain to the far
mers in precisely the same length of
time spoken of by Mr.. Shaw, not of
IA cents a bushel but 2O.7 cents a
bushel, amounting to 81 ,269, 786, on a
crop not half as large as the crop Of
1891 spoken of by him, and the price
was not pried up by Mckinley hand
spike either. "The glass of beer of
1881 was just as large, and the price
just the same as in 1870" / would
ask if this rise of 20.7 cents a bushel
"was not a very considerable benefit
to them"
Now suppose the tax had been in
creased in 1880 as it was in 1890. how
greedily the rise in price would have
been seized upon as an example of the
"operation" of tariff taxes. Again,
the average annual price of barley ex-
ported was 50 cents in 1891, after
yanking and prying at the markets for
two years the price sunk back to 49
cents in 1893. or Il cents less than the
first year of its "operation." More
than this, after three years "effects
of the tax the price settled back II
cents bushel below what it was
BEFORE the tax was increased from 10
cents to 80 cents bushel. In other
words, the farmers actually sold their
barley in 1893, for II cents a bushel
less than they sold it for in 1889, as
the kandspike slipped and the brewers
and masters got back some of the
$l,700,0OO, "beneft" they had paid
to the farmers two seasons before.
The average annual import prices tells
the same tale.
I'd. Not even Congressman can
make the farmers of Wisconsin believe
that if they raised 12,524,757 bushels
in 1891 that they sold it all. The Nc
kinley tax did not enrich them IA
cents on each bushel they kept for
seed, surley not, and as they wed
50O,97l acres to barley in Wisconsin
the next year 1 am almost sure it
would take a million bushels to do it;
and if they did sell it all as Mr..
Shaw says they did, then they bought