The times., 1897-03-23
The Tariff Debate.

Inc Opening gun IN tHe Sfeht lAIIl ue-
bate of 1897 was fired in the House OF
Representatives yesterday, and Mr.. Ding
ley explained his bill.
A might have been expected, Mr. Dingley
regards the recent period or hard times
In the United States as due to our wicked
ness in forsaking the paths of protection
and bowing down before the false gods of
d revenue tariff. Having assisted a nonli
nany Democratic Administration to effect
the destruction of silver, to bring on the
panic of 1893 and all its terrible conse-
Quences, it is convenient now for Repub-
licans to hold that those consequences were
results from a low tariff policy. But it is
position without an ounce of convincing
force in it.
The purchasing power of the masses hav-
ing been decreased by gold contraction, and
prices for all commodities depressed about
30 per cent, Mr. Dingley views with alarm
a coincident fall OF 10 cents per pound in
the price OF domestic wool, under the pres
tHi law liietA NcDi lilS Sbili-
ulated the use and consumption OF shoddy,
the people being too poor to buy straight
goods: and from this we should expect it to
follow that wool, which could not be foisted
upon CONSUMERS, would stay home in for
eign countries. on the contrary, aIr. Ding
ley explains that importations OF clothing
~,-o>l ,I., R,y.,,, A nnn nna
TO f27 SOC. Zoo pounds in the fiscal year
1896. What became OF all this Clothing
wool that was imported, and which the
people could not buy because they were
compelled To array themselves in shoddys
MIR. Dingiey, of course, does not know, hut
we can tell him.
The wool so literally imported was
made up into clothing and the clothing
bought by the people, TO their great sat
isfaction and to the dismay of the shoddy
and rag manufacturers, who now demand
the protective tariff. A few days ago
The Times showed bow the Dingley bin,
with its 123 per cent duty on corduroy,
article and force people who now use it
TO resort 10 the cheap and nasty but pa
triotic shoddieS and Mediterranean rag
satinetS of New England; and the same
principle, plus the local interests Of some
wooigrowers in Ohio viii apply to the
whole schedule. Under it American man
1rfa troll bn
market, but force il To take UNANIMOUSLY
inferior goods at nearly the prohibiuve
price of honest wares
MIR. Dingiey's remarks on the sugar
schedule are OF equal value. He refers to
1t with affection, as a Philanthropic in
vention, designed to protect our farmers
In making sugar one of their paying crops.
Naturally, he does not emphasize the fact
that it also is clever device to place the
sugar trust absolutely and irretrievably in
controlof the sugar industry of the ountry,
with complete and unassailable power to
fix the price which the farmer who raises
the sugar would be compelled to take, or
to the further fact that, if farmers were
to go largely into sugar raising, under
such a law, the sugar trust could, and
would, depress prices so that the agricuh
tural interest would profit nothing by the
operation? Did not the tobacco trust do
exactly the same thing with the tobacco
growers OF Virginia, Tennessee and North
Carolina?
The wool and sugar schedules are fair
samples OF the whole. In his reply TO Mr.
Dingley, Gen. Wheeler, or Alabama, very
justly described the bin as measure
that had been prepared in secret by
eleven Republicans at the command and
under the instruction of the protected in
dustries." So conceived in darkness and
sin, there can be but one honorable way
90 meet it, and that is TO fight it.