Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1900-12-27
ON THE W RONG TRACK
THE TRUST AND DlNNER-PAiL
QUESTION.
MISTAKEN Democratic Contention that
Tariff Protected Trusts Have Arbi-
trari1y Increased the Price of Neces-
saries-Kansas LIS Regenerated.

saries-Kansas Is Resenerated.
The Boston Post, in it's issue for last
Sunday, discourses at some length and
with considerablefervor on 1.-The Man
with the Dinner Pail" Our Boston con-
temporary submits that those citizens
who were induced by the full dinner
pail argument to lend their aid to keep
the Republican party in power in
Washington are learning something
from the course Of events since the
election. Although the pail may be
full up to the present time, our cQntem-
porary asserts that the man who car
ries it has to pay more to keep IN
that plethoric condition The sudden
activity of trusts in putting up prices
Immediately after election" is noted as
Significant and ominous.' The first or
these offenders to come in for scarifica-
ton at the hands of the Boston Post
/ is 1.-THE great Pennsylvania coal trust,
which, it says, did not wait for the
election, but advanced prices regard
less of the political situation" THE
Others" it says, ''held off until the
party crisis was past; now they are put
ting on the screws The attention of
the man with the pail is called to the
alleged fact that the first in the field
to levy tribute upon him are those
trusts which control necessaries of
life. He will also observe that those
trusts are favorites of the Republican
tariff, sustained by the protection
which the Dingley bill provides against
competition"
Let us inspect the latter of these two
allegations and see how it tallies, or
fails to tally, with the truth The Bos-
ton Post assuredly must know that
| there is no duty on anthracite coal.
That commodity certainly is not
'fayorite Of the Republican tariff.
The Boston Post also knows that Con-
gress has not and, under the Constitu
| ton of the United States, could not
| have, anything to do with the coal
combine. 1t knows also that there is
| not Democrat in Congress who is not
bound by fidelity to his party's creed
to oppose any and every movement
| looking to national control of State cor
porations.
The Chicago beef trust comes next on
our contemporary list of tarif-pro-
| tected sinners. 'This," we are told,
s'is the trust for whose benefit hides
were taken off the free list, where they
had been for a quarter of century,
and a tariff tax was laid upon the ma
| terial of great New England Industry,
and upon the footwear of the man with
| the dinner pail his wife and his chill
dren."
| That duty is SO cents a hide, and 1t
was ostensibly laid for the benefit OF
| the cattle raisers. 1t may be that the
members of the beef combine profit by
| it more than do the men from whom
| they buy cattle, but it is so insigndfi-
/ cant a levy that it is no serious factor
| in the price of meat, nor does it greatly
enhance the cost of footwear Still,
If it is really promotiye of injustice, 1T
might well be repealed.
The Boston Post wakes eloquent in
| it's denunciation of the salt trust. 1t
says, among other things, that under
| the Democratic regime salt was on the
| free list, and for this reason great va
riety of food products were available
to fill the dinner pail at reasonable
prices. The Dingley tariff placed
duty on salt, and as soon as the salt
trust finds this tariff made permanent
by the election Of a Republican gov
eminent, it puts up the price of this
| necessary of life to the top notch that
the protection win stand
IF the protection accorded to the salt
| industry is abused, the wrong should
he abolished. The Washington Post is
inimical to any and all abuses of pro-
| tec4ion. But it is absurd TO speak of
the price of salt as having any great
effect upon the cost of dinner, or even
upon the expense of subsisting the
average family for year.
1 Rut the most ridiculous of our Boston
contemporary' complaints relates to
standard Oil. It is true that the price
/ of oil has been increased, and 1T is also
true that the combine which controls
that business has made and is making
4 immense DTO1lUS. Dut tAO DOSSOA Oot
knows very well that there is no duty
on coal oil, and it is not ignorant Of the
fact that Congress has no right to inter-
i fore with the State charters under
/ which that business is conducted.
There are combinations of more or
less monopolistic character that ara
sheltered by the tariff, but the Boston
/ post skiIlfully lodges them and dellv-
ers its hardest blows upon the anthra-
ciate coal and Standard Oil trusts. 1t
/ would be an insult to our Boston con-
temporary's intelligence to assume or
even to suspect that It IS ignorant OF
The fact that neither OF these combines
| gets any help from the tariff. What,
then. is the object OF such an appeal
i 10 ..the man with the dinner pail?' Is
II possible that our contemporary pre-
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