The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1894-08-14

The Passage of the TarlH Bill
The Senate Bill having been passed by
the House, it now remains for democrats
to make the most of the situation to
see what advantages really remain to
them in entering on the next campaign
and how much encouragement they can
muster to renew the fight for tariff
reform in the somewhat dark hour OF
compromise and surrender. It cannot be
hidden that the close of this great
struggle is disappointing and humili-
ating. The party pledges remain to a
large extent unfulflled: the party prin-
ciples have been abandoned and sacri-
feed. The party leaders nave been in
some measure discredited; the rank and
file divided, and the whole organization
placed in a light before the public
which tends to develop neither admira-
ton nor confidence.
This is the rough first impression of
the situation. 1t is the crude shallow
statement of residual results. 1t is the
one lldI IlSpupllNal1o wa
dwell on, and, it is to be feared, it is
the only one that many people will ap-
preciate. And yet it is very far from
being a truthful summary of results,
and there is room to hope that enough
of the truth will be made manifest to the
voters before election day to prevent any
back track being taken by the enor-
nous majority who voted for tariff re-
form in 1892.
Throughout the struggle between the
majority of the Senate and the Tariff
reform element, it has become a matter
of absolute demonstration that the tariff
question is no longer a party issue. 1t
has become an issue of battle between
different classes of our citizenship; it has
become the ground of parting between
pampered privilege on the one hand and
the struggling masses of our people on
the other. The concessions made by
the so-called conservative element in
the Senate were merely the price paid
for the convenience of a party organiza-
ton. 1t was hopeless for men like Cor
man. Smith and Brice to maintain even
a nominal Connection with the Demo-
cratic party, and yet resist all reduc-
ions in the tariff. They consented to
the least concessions which they thought
could by any possibility pass muster,
just to keep a party standing; but it is
very sure that withafl they schemed and
planned and chicaned for the defeat of
these, for the stoppage of all tariff legis-
lation in some way which would take
a share of the responsibility off their
shoulders.
The true representatives of the Demo-
cratic idea, the leaders in the House of
Representatives, come out of the strug-
gle with honor, and in their hands the
honor of the party is safe too. They
fought for what they considered right to
the very last ditch, and nothing but the
certainty that all would be lost in case
of their further resistance brought them
to the conclusion at which they arrived
yesterday. They simply passed the bill
as the best thing they could do at this
time; they passed it as a measure which,
however, imperfect, yet confers some
benefits upon the country. They passed
it with a resolve, the fixity of which
was shown by their immediate action, to
regard the new tariff as a mere first in
stallment of reform, as a basis for flu
ture campaigns in which the radical
spirit would be INDUCED to the utmost
limit of the country's commercial needs.
On this same basis. it may be regarded
as to1erably certain that the President
will sign the bill However far it may
fall short of his ideas of what is right
or of what the Democratic party owes
to the country, still he must take it as
the best-the only thing in the way Of a
tariff bill that can be wrung from the
present Senate. Wishing as he must to
see this great question settled in order
that the business of the country may be
tranquilizea, and receiving this bill with
the endorsement of his faithful adher-
ents in the House, there is hardly room
for the least doubt that be will accept
the situation, directing his efforts to
the new fight ~inaugurated by the House
upon the 'protective" system in its most
offensive details.
H