St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1897-06-19
PROSPERITY DELAYED.
Failure of the Republicans to Keep
Their Promise.

Their Promise.
When the election was O yer last
November the country looked for
prosperity. It had been promised.
Mr.. Mckinley had been heralded as
its advance agent The opportunity
TO secure it was at hand. The means
were perfectly obvious.
The prosperity has not come. The
revival THAT might have been wrought
has not been wrought. A new paral-
ysis has been inflicted upon industry
ard new barriers have been erected in
the path of commerce.
The fault lies solely with republic
an misnanag nagement, with the willful
peryersion of power from the pur-
poses for which it was conferred to
purposes of partisanship.
All conditions were favorable to a
great revival Of industry. We had
been for many months, exporting in
| enormous excess of imports. The
strade balance" was heavily in our
favor. Every condition was propitious
except one. The revenues were notsade-
quate to meet expenditures.
To remedy this one adverse condi-
tion was nanifestly to give the coun-
try the rest it tneeded and to bring
about an era of prosperity greater
than had been known since tariff
tinkering for political purposes be-
gan. It was only necessary for the
republican congress to pass bills,
which the democratic president
would gladly have approved, imposing
ii small extra tax on beer and possibly
some ireonsiderable stamp taxes on
transactions involving the transfer of
wealth.
Had that been done the revenues
would have been adequate. There
would have been ne acrasion for an
extra session and the country would
have had badlyneeded period of
rest for recuperation until December
next.
But the republicans feared that if
revenues should be made adequate
without tariff tinkering there would
be no excuse for a new tariff, no op-
portunity to reward compaigns con-
.tributors with benefits and gratuities
to be paid out of the pockets of the
people. And SO they refused to pass
any revenue bills. They deliberately
adopted the extra session for tariff
ripping purposes as a policy-resolved
to give the country the fourth tariff
IN seven years.
stood the activities of the country
halted. The merchant refused to
order goods, not knowing what duties
he might have to pay upon them. The
manufacturer curtailed his operations,
not knowing under what conditions his
products were to be marketed.
Then came the worst blight of all
the threat of retroactive duties.
For fear that merchants might import
goods or manufacturers bring in raw
materials heavily in anticipation of
new tariff bill with enormously in
creased schedules, the house decreed
that all goods imported while the act
was pending should be subject later to
the duties imposed.
The result was in part that COM
merce stopped, and in other part that
bHe importers Oh gDOdS tInQeT une EXIST
ing tariff felt compelled to add to
their prices all that the new duties
threatened. Tie manufacturers whose
free raw materials were threatened in
the same way had to raise their
prices accordingly. Ihe people were
thus forced to pay a tax not one dol
lar of which is likely ever to find its
way into tie treasury.
Thus. instead of the prosperity that
was 50 easily within our grasp, we have
an Industrial and commercial paralysis
forced upon US solely for partisan pur-
poses.
It is a betrayal Of a trust which the
people have already resented in the
spring elections, and which they will
surely punish with blasting severity in
elections yet to come.
The republican promise of prosperity
was an easy one to fulfill It has been
deliberately withheld, and the Ameri-
can people perfectly know why.-N. Y.
World.