The citizen., 1897-03-26
Worse Than Mckinley Protection

Worse Than Mckinley Protection.
The New York Herald, another vir-
ulent gold advocate during the last
campaign which shrouded the posi-
bilities'of Republican legislation under
the charitable cloak of financial argu-
mentation, is now forced to admit the
real issue after all was protection. Dur
ing the campaign they would not ad-
NIT this, although the regular Demo-
cratic press called repeated attention to
it. In recent issue the following ap-
pears in their editorial columns:
1t is idle for Mr. Dingley or any other
Republican to pretend that the tariff
bill introduced in the House yesterday
is revenue measure.
Its true character is obvious. 1t is a
protection scheme as pure and simple
as was the Mckinley law. That is man
inevitable effect should it become a
law. 1t generally restores Mckinley
duties, and in some cases advances
them. Its free list is shorter than the
Mckinley free list. For the sake of
protection It'll levies duties where little
or no revenue will result, and even
grants protection to certain industries
which can successfully compete with
foreign rivals in their own markets.
Comparing the Dingley bill with the
Mckinley law in timely communica-
ton to the Herald this morning, form
er Postmaster General Wilson, the au-
thor of the existing tariff law rightly
says: "BOth are east and UOLunainous
schemes Of class tdrdtion, the prOdatc-
ton Of public reue,tue being an incident
and entirely subordinate to the purpose
Of taxing all the american people for
The benefit Of small part Of The peo-
pte."
The effect of this scheme, should it
be consummated, can only be an ad-
vance of prices and an increased cost of
living, which burdens will, of course,
fall most heavily on those least able to
bear them. In other words, as is al
ways the case with protection, the ben
eficiaries will be trusts, millionaire
manufacturers and trade barons, while
the sufferers will be the poorer masses.
This is an imposition for which there
is neither reason nor excuse. If the
purpose of the Republicans were to
meet the expenses of the government,
that end could be attained by judicious
internal revenue taxation, and if neces-
sary import duties on a very few arti-
cles; or, better still, by economy in
public expenditures. But, as we have
said, the obvious purpose of the franz
ers of this bill is not needed revenue,
but protection.
Will the people stand this? 1t is to
be remembered that Mckinley protec-
ton was emphatically condemned at
the polls soon after it was imposed
upon the country. 1t cost the Republi-
cans the House in 1890 and the Presi-
dency in 1892. 1t would have been
condemned as emphatically in 1896
had not all other issues been overshad-
owed by the silver menace and all pa
triots, regardless of party, joined
hands to save the honor and prosperity
of the nation.
There can be no greater mistake
than to suppose that the result of that
election was victory for protection, a
personal triumph of its recognized
exponent or popular mandate for its
revival. Hundreds of thousands of
Democrats unalterably opposed to pro-
lection helped to elect Mr.. Mckinley
in the confidence that the Republicans
would neither misunderstood the pop
ular verdict nor take advantage of it
by abusing their power to force upon
the country policy which had been
so recently and so emphatically repudi-
ated. As former Representative Isidor
Straus well said in yesterdays Herald:
"In voting for Mr.. Mckinley we
thought we were denouncing free sill
yer. We were prepared to have a
change in the tariff along moderate
lines, but the cry of those who looked
after their own individual interests
seems to have overwhelmed the Ways
and Means Committee, and they have
lost sight entirely of the rights of the
millions of consumers throughout the
country, and of the hundreds of thou
sands of Democrats without whom
Mckinley would not have been elect
ed"
From the start the Herald has re-
garded it as a mistake to call an extra
session of Congress to reopen the disas-
trous tariff agitation just at a time
when the country, sorely taxed by a
succession off deplorable crises, is in
need of rest. To this mistake the Re
publican leaders have now added the
suicidal blunder of bringing forward
not timely financial measure, not
even a judicial revenue bill, but a
scheme of protection worse than that
in the repudiated Mckinley law. And
bad as it is, the chances are that the
bill will be worse before it gets through
the Senate, where concessions to no
torious trusts and deals with Populists
and silverites may be the price of its
passage.
We have asked whether the people
will stand this imposition. which is
not only wholly unwarranted by the
popular verdict of last November, but
is even calculated to put in jeopardy
the fruits of that splendid victory.
The answer to this question may be
read in the Congressional elections OF
1899 and the Presidential election OF
1900.