The broad ax. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1895-19??, 1896-02-29

Addressing free-traders. Chicago
organ Of McKinleyism asks: Two
years or 80 ago were you not bowling
that the tin plate duty was an infamous
imposture that could not result In the
establishment Of tin plate industries In
the United States?"
No. Free-traders were not bowling
that two years ago or at any other
time. So far from denying, they have
always affirmed that II was possible to
establish an industry by the tariff
method or by the bounty method. They
have always affirmed that IL persons
wishing to engage In industry were as
sisted by bounties high enough or by
arming them with power to tax their
fellow citizens heavily enough they
could succeed.
This Is the very thing to which free
traders strenuously object. They in
sist not only that 1t is wretched econ
omy but that It is grossly Ubiquitous
either to tax the people and hand the
money over to individuals to swell
their gains or to give those individuals
power to collect taxes from their neigh
bors themselves. They agree with the
supreme court of the United States In
the opinion that this sort OF thing Is
not taxation but robbery under the
forms Of law. and that government can
not Justly do any such thing.
With respect to the tin plate indus
try. so far from saying that 1t could not
De made profitable by the tariff method,
they have strongly objected to being
taxed by that method to make 1t profit
able. They have strongly objected to
Being taxed to make that industry ex-
sessively profitable, as they were under
he Mckinley law. The proof that
hey were 50 taxed In seen in the fact
hat the tin plate men have gone right
IN establishing more plants and in
,reasing their output u9dsrNtne new
iuty, which Is Httie more than half as
Nigh as the Mckinley duty.
The organ asks whether 1t is not
rue that nearly 100 tin plate plants
we're established under protection, and
that these 100 rivals for the posses
sion Of the United States market were
-'ree from suspicion of trust combina-
ion" until after the enactment of the
arif Of 1894 There was an American
Tin Plate association before the Nc
Kinley law existed, and II has been in
existence ever since. II may be that
his association did not attempt to re-
strict production or to maintain prices
Until after the repeal Of the Mckinley
ariff. That was hardly necessary,
because they could not produce tin
enough to supply more than half Of the
American demand and there was no
lifficulty about holding prices up to the
igures made by the tariff without form
ng trust.
The industry had not arrived at the
rust stage. That stage is reached
,nly when an industry has become so
developed that II is able to overstock
the home market. Then competition
sets in and 1t is no longer possible to
hold prices up to the tariff level other
wise than by combination. Then the
trust comes in and enables the pro-
tected captains of industry to exact
heir full pound OF flesh.
1t is thus that the tariff breeds trusts
by supplying the motive for their or
yanization. The protectionists have
been telling the people that their sys-
lem reduces prices In the long run
through competition among tie pro-
ectees. They have been telling false
hood. fct the trust steps In and throt-
les competition, while the tariff en-
lbies 1t 10 practice extortion. This is
not less true of the tin plate industry
han Of any other, for 1t Is still in en-
oyment OF plenty Of protection. 1t is
Tot true, as the Mckinley organ wouli
lave its readers believe, that the new
aw has deprived that industry Of pro-
ection. II the stage of real competi-
ion has been reached, which probably
s not the case, the tariff motive to
'rganize trust for the practice of ex-
ortion has come into play, just as Il
las In a score or more OF Industries
which are still much too CONSIDERABLY
90 Chroniele