Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1896-06-04

ing the subject
1t is proposed in order to secure
prompt action that the republican menu
bers of the ways and means committee
shall begin next winter, Immediately
after the presidential election. to hold
informal conferences and begin the
framing of a bill. They can do this
with comparative confidence that their
work will have the approval of their
successors on the committee in the 55th
congress, because they will with one or
two exceptions be their own successors.
There are II republican members of
the present ways and means commit
tee, and all but two or three are prac-
tically certain of reelection. Cen
Steele OF Indiana has somewhat close
district. but he is popular with the
soldiers and will probably be re-eIect-
ed. Evans of Kentucky was an adj
vocate of barring the courts to claim
ants under the alcohol rebate law. and
this advocacy of what his opponents
regard as a discredit to the United
States, may carry him to defeat this
autumn
Probably nine of the present repub-
ican members of the committee will
De reelected in any case so that they
can proceed with confidence to map
out the work for the committee in the
next congress. If they have a bill we'll
advanced when congress adjourns on
March 4, they can give some formal
hearings after the meeting of the spe-
cial session and put the bill into the
house in May. The measure ought to
pass the house before the end of June
and would then go to the senate COM
mittee on finance The senate always
proceeds deliberately in the considera-
ton of tariff bills, both in committee
and on the floor, and it would probably
be September or October before the
bill would be engrossed on the statute
books. The republicans might suffer
IN the state elections in consequence
of the increased rates carried in the
bill and the disturbance to business
which its discussion would cause, but
they count upon its beneficial effects to
special interests to give them a victory
come year later The law would have
been in operation three years when the
next presidential election occurred and
would have been submitted to a more
complete test than either the Mckinley
law or the German law
The lines of the new tariff bill will
be essentially protective. That goes
without saying as the meaning and re-
suit of the wave Of protectionist feel
ing which is sweeping over the country.
The democrats say that there will be
such a wrangle of special interests to
secure favors and exorbitant rates that
the enactment of the new law will
sound the death-knell of republicanism
and open in 1900 another era of pro-
longed democratic ascendancy. The
republicans think otherwise. Promi-
nent republican senators and represen-
tatives declare that some of the man
ufacturing schedules of the German
law will not be greatly advanced. The
cotton schedule was declared by Sen
ator Aldrich in debate to be the most
scientific in it's construction of any cot
ton schedule ever enacted. 1t has
proved fully protective to the coarser
goods and has not seriously injured
American manufacturers of fine goods.
The latter may, however, demand a
slight increase on the highest grades
and a substitution of specified duties
for the blanket ad valorem clause which
winds up the cloth schedule Some
changes are also likely to be sought on
cotton yarns. The silk duties have al
ways been ad valorem and were re
duced only about per cent, taking the
value of the goods as a base line, by
the German law The old rates will
probably be restored in the main, IN
less the agitation for a system of speci-
fic duties prevails over former pre-
cedents.
The wooden schedule will probably
cause the fveliest controversy among
textiles. Some of the wooden manu-
facturers would be very well pleased
with the present ad valorem rates, if
they could add to them specific COM
pensatory duties to offset the protec-
ton which will be given to raw wool.
Other manufacturers, including Rep
resentative Russell of Connecticut, a
member of the ways and means com
mittee, declares that both the prOtec-
tive and compensatory duties should
be specific. This question could be
settled more easily than is likely to he
the case if it were not for the friction
which is likely to develop between the
manufacturers and the wool growers.
The wooden manufacturers are willing
to accord protection to wool in return
for the support of the representatives
Of the wool-growing states for the pro
tective system.
The trouble will come over the
amount of the protection to be accord
ed to wool. The wool growers were
when the present ways and means COM
mittee last December refused hear
ing to Judge Lawrence of Ohio, on be-
half of the national wool growers as
carpet wool than those contained in the
Mckinley law. They put themselves
in better fighting trim than ever before
by providing for a more compact and
efficient organization in all the states
and by arranging for the publication
of a quarterly bulletin similar in its
character to that issued by the manu-