The San Francisco call., 1896-01-10
TAKE RECIPROCITY OUT OF POLL.
TICS.

The present is a good time to have general
rally for reciprocity, one so far-reaching and
emphatic that it shall be taken out of politics.
The country has just rallied, in Congress and
out, to the support of the President under the
standard of the Monroe doctrine. The Repub-
hcans stand by the President in grandly nom
partisan way, and the Democrats would do
well to reciprocate by upholding reciprocity.
The Chicago Record of yesterday morning
comes out strongly in favor of reciprocity.
This is very significant, for that is mugwump
paper, its Democratic leanings being due to its
espousal of free trade The paper has no other
bond of Democratic sympathy. When, there
fore, the Record urges the passage of the Beach
bill. the reasonable inference is that the free
traders are prepared to abandon the anti
reciprocity ground taken in 1892 and ineor-
porated into the Wilson-Gorman tariff.
The Record begins its leader of yesterday
with the observation, "One good move in the
present Congress is that in the direction of the
revival OF reciprocity legislation" The argu-
ment made in support OF this proposition is not
remarkable, one way or the other, the position
itself being the significant fact in the case.
The argument for reciprocity is put more
cogently by Mr.. Allerton in a published letter
to Congressman Cannon than it is in the
editorial, for he is specially familiar with the
chief bad effect of repeal. MS. Allerton is one
of the leading packers and cattle dealers in
Chicago, or was during his more active busi-
ness life. He has withdrawn. somewhat from
practical affairs, but for many years he has been
one of the kings of the livestock market He
asserts that the repeal OF reciprocity decreased
the shipments of live cattle for export more
than one-haf and the dressed beef shipments
to 100000 head of cattle. Here are the essen
tial paragraphs of the letter:
Restoring the tariff will not furnish Immediate
relief to the Govera ment. 1t will check the i'm
portation of foreign goods until the importer has
sold out then he will be clamoring again for free
trade. Restore reciprocity open the markets of
the world for our cattle, hog products and canned
goods, remembering that we can 1000 900 head
of cattle and that so per OF these goods
shipped abroad. France and Germany have
put excessively high tariff on these goods max
ing it almost prohibtory, and, besides this, have
prohibited our pork products and cattle, claiming
that they were diseased, when the facts are that
and many others have shipped live cattle for a
numDer of years and have never lost one single
steer by disease.
Since the repeal OF reciprocity, although there
less hogs and soc, 600 less cattle than in 1893
cattle and hogs have dropped 81 hundred. The
foreign exchange is made south and west of the
ADeghenies. Restore reciprocity--the farmers
products Will increase In value and will be shipped
abroad and immediate help will be given the Gov
ernment If we can export to the markets of the
world.
If this feature of legislation can be once taken
out of politics it is hardly possible that the
American people would ever consent TO putting
it in again. 1t should be placed on the same
high plane as the Monroe doetrine-Chicago
Inter Ocean.