The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-05-15
THE EVERLASTING TARIFF
MIDDLE.


question precipitating a very long and
acrimonious debate in the senate, and
possibly in the house after the Dingley
bill is returned to that body. The
tariff is veritable Pandoras box, and
every time it is opened everything is
let loose. And what is the cause of
this? 1t is that the framing of a new
tariff bill is always an invitation to
every one in the country to come for
ward and take advantage of the OPP
portunity to use the taxing power of
the government to enrich themselves.
The tariff as a legitimate means of
raising revenue for the government has
become a secondary consideration If
not lost sight of entirely 1t has come
to be regarded as a thing over which
manufacturers and producers have the
right of control and that the connec-
ton of congress with it is merely for
the purpose of doing their bidding.
Such being the case it is inevitable that
at some stage in the game of grab
there will arise serious contentious
among the grabbers as to whose rights
are the greater and are entitled to
precedence. That time has arrived in
the consideration Of the Dingley bill.
The sugar schedule of the bill, as
mittee. it is charged, is made directly
in the interest of the Sugar trust. Nor
is that all. Such a charge implies that
there is something rotten in Denmark.
When the Mckinley bill changed the
sugar schedule in favor of the trust it
threw away many millions of revenue
a year. Not only did it do that but it
went further and undertook to COM
pensate domestic producers for the loss
of the duty with bounty. 1t was the
policy of burning the candle at both
ends. The proper treatment of the
sugar schedule, as of all others, is to
make it means for producing
revenue for the government. If the
imposition of a revenue duty enables
the Sugar trust or anyone else to
raise the price of it's prodNct that is
something incidental to the necessities
of the government and is not a prim-
airy object of it. In the framing of a
tariff law the fiscal needs of the gov
eminent are the chief things to be
considered. They have come to be the
last things to be considered. This is
inevitable where the policy of protec-
ton is nothing but paternalism after
ALL But while this is so, still this
paternalism has not excluded the
practice Of primogeniture. 1t is this
same practice of primogeniture that is
causing so much trouble now.
1t is certain that a great big tariff
muddle is fast being created. Nor is
it at all probable that it will be con-
fined to congress or that it will cease
with the enactment Of a tariff law.
The Republican party created just such
a middle for itself in 1890, thereby in
surfing. its defeat in 1892 1t is not
denied that Mr. Cleveland's tariff
policy did something towards bringing
about the defeat of the Democrats in
1894. But in Mr.. Cleveland's case as
in the case of Mr. Mckinley congress
was convened in extra session to deal
with a matter that had not been the
leading issue in the campaigns that
resulted in their election. There is an
important lesson in this fact the
next president may profit by it. And
after a while it may be evident to
political parties that the American
people are wearied with tariff tinker
ing, tariff tinkering merely for the
sake of tinkering.