Evening star., 1897-04-02
NO ACTUAL PROGRESS
Senate Finance Committee Simply Studying
the Tariff Bill.
The Measure That Came From the
House Will Re Generally
Reconstructed.

The Senate finance committee have made
no actual progress with the tariff bill Up
to the present time they have been devot-
irg themselves to careful study of the
bill as il came from the House, and IL will
be some days yet before they complete
this preliminary survey. They are not dis
posed TO take the hill on faith and II is a
great labor to analyZe and measure the
effect of the several schedules. They are
endeavoring first to find out eXactly-or as
near as may be-what revenue the bill as a
whole will produce, and how the increase
of revenue is distributed through the sew
eral schedules: and second, how various
business interests will be affec ted 10y th.=
change of rates. Tney are receiving Z
great many communications upon the sub
Ject. and giving them all careful con
sideration This work is extremely Ia
boriouS, the committee have to look up
their own data and make estimates for
themselves with the aid of an expert.
A General RECOMMENDATION.
If they intended to put the House bill
through the Senate as a party measur>
this work would be unnecessary. bu; such
IS not their intention. The examina ton OF
the schedules which they are now making
Is preliminary to general reconstrtIc tion
of the bill AS soon as the committee get A
thorough understanding of the measure a.
II now Is, calculating carefully what its
effect on revenue and on business will he
they VIII take up the schedules from the
beginning and go over the entire bill,
schedule by schedule, making changes as
they go along. As far they are able to
Judge from the study of the bill which they
nave made, these changes will be so numer-
Gus as to amount practically to an entire.
reconstruction They have not yet made
"A Change of any character. and il is impos-
sib!e to tell how long il will take them to
complete their work. They are not gong
70 delay their report unnecessarily but
they realize that such a thorough revision
as they contemplate cannot be made in a
hurry. All the schedules hang so together
dependent one upon another, that when
changes are made il is hard to tell where
they will wind up. One change involves
another, and the work becomes accumII-
latiVe.
No Deal With Silver RcpubIicans
Their desire is if possible to make the
average rate of the schedule somewhat
lower than it is in the House bill, but at
the same time to increase d few sched-
uies. There is a mistaken impression as
10 the efforts that Will have to be made in
order TO make the bill acceptable to a ma
Joriiy of the Senate. Speculation on this
subject has been based on the theory that
The support or opposition of some of the
eH-fepublican senators would depend upon
thS VI given 10 pro-
ducts CT their state. This is probably not
The case. AT all events. the republicans
Of the finance committee will probably not
cater to the eX-republican senators I'm this
matter Their effort will be to make as
good a bill possible, which will satisfy
the senators of their own party. and Sc
cure every straight republican vote. This
being done, they will stand their chances
Tor getting the bill through without at
tempting any deal with the silver repub-
iicans. If any of the latter see fit to vote
for the bill, all right and good, but they
Will be left TO take whatever course they
pie ase, and assume responsibility for their
own actions 1t every republican Will vote
for the bill, there are enough votes i'm
sight without taking the silver republi-
cans into consideration at all
Demands OF Their own Party Alone
The general belief is that they can count
on the votes of Kyle and of probably TWO
or three democrats, but even if none but
republican votes are cast for the BILL it
can be passed without trouble. for the rea-
son that the opposition are afraid to take
the responsibility for lis defeat, and it is
thoroughly understood that a number will
refrain from voting, without claiming
pairs, to reduce the number of votes neceS-
sary TO carry, well within the republican
strength. This being the case, the repub-
licans Will consider the demands of their
own party only in the reconstruction of the
bill, and IL is believed that party disci-
pline will be strong enough to overcome
individual objection when the committee
reach the point where they have to say
that this is final and must CO.