Marietta daily leader. (Marietta, Ohio) 1895-1906, 1900-10-02
PORTO RICO TARIFF.
Discussion of the Measure and
Its Advantages.
THE ISLANDERS ARE PROsPERING.

They Are Delighted With Conditions as
They Exist, and ID, Not Care For the
Democratic "Sympath," Which Is he
ing Wasted Upon Them.
One OF the countless questions of the
campaign is in regard to the Porto
Rican tariff. Its constitutional phases
are in the courts to be determined,
but its practical operation is the thing
of most concern to the people of Porto
Rico. The actual workings cf the new
system make a mos. tlS lie show
ing, although the new congressional
law for Porto Rico did not go into eff
feet until July l, and the official fig
ures are not yet at hand beyond the
first month. These figures for the
four months ending with July, show
that Porto Rico sold to the United
States products amounting to s3244,-
$50, an increase Of 81 ,260 600, or about
60 per cent. over the same period last
year, and an increase over the same
four months of 1896, when peace was
complete and before the war with
Spain, Of S1,SS4.000, or nearly $50 per
cent, with the exports to this coun-
try on the increase, according to the
trend of the trade.
There is un oppression in that. Such
sales to the United States win surely
help the Porto Eicans. These are the
more remarkable, in view of the fact
III
than a year after the great hurricane
of August, 1899, which was officially
reported to have destroyed two-thirds
of the current wealth of the island.
An equal evidence of the recupera-
tive power of Porto Rico appears in
its imports from this country. From
April to August, 1900, the islanders
bought of tho United States, $685.
S45 of our goods, as against Si,132 ,122
in the same months last year, or more
than double; and four times the inn
ports from the United States in the
same four months of 1897, the year
before the war. This shows conclu-
sively that the advantages Of the new
relations between the United States
and Porto Rico are mutual, and great,
and growing, and answers any amount
of campaign balderdash.
Porto Rico's new tariff is as near
to the mere shadow of tariff as can
well be imagined, so far as the United
States and the islands are concerned,
being just enough TO establish and
maintain the right of the United
States to make a discrimination in the
case OF territories not yet wholly in
corporated within the Union. With
out this discrimination, 81 the labor
in the Philippine 'isIands AChinese and
Malay-would compete on absolute
free trade terms with American labor,
so that the greatest enactment ever
made for the better protection of
American laborers, and the perfect
safeguard Of their interests, is this
Porto Rican tariff law. Should the
United States supreme court sustain
this principle of discrimination, it will
prove an absolute protection against
any possibility Of destructive compe-
titiOn from the millions Of the Philip
workiasmen worth considering? The
Republicans think, Yes, and enact ac-
cord.nsly Ia opposing such enact
ments, tAo Democrats declare No,
WOst practically and emphatically.
But even as TO the Porto Ricans the
enactment is not a hardship, for tn
rates levied are so nearly nominal as
TO be anything except oppressive. 1t
is not even a IL per cent. tariff, but
Is per cent, tariff upon the Dngley
rates, or an average Of about per
cent. IS between Porto Rico and the
United States productions. More than
that, every cent coming from it, either
in the United States or Porto Rico. is
pledged to be spent upon the island OF
Porto Rico for its exclusive benefit.
Still more than that, all that has
come from customs duties between
Porto Rico and the United States, at
either end of the line, has heen ap-
propriated for Porto Rico alone. Still,
more than that is the fact that upon
the recommendation of special mes
sage of President Mckinley in March
last, over S2,000,000 already collected
on Porto Rican imports was directly
appropriated for the people of that is
land, by a vote in the house of 151 Re-
publicans and l Democrat for it, and
130 votes against it, none of them
Republicans. but all Democrats and