The age-herald., 1900-10-07

l publican administration which compelled l MT. Mckinley, after proclaiming to the world what was our plain duty towards Porto Rico, to change front and force l Republican Congress Speaker Henderson l says Mckinley worked tooth and nail for 1 the bill) to enact the Porto Rican tariff | law in direct violation of the Constitution 1 of the United tSates and in the face of | the express decisions of the Supreme Court | of the United States?
 'The Constitution of the United States, Art. 1, Section g, Clause 5, says: No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any state Was ever language plain
 CT? Can it admit of but one construction? And yet the Republican party. at the dic tation of the sugar and tobacco trusts | levied duty on articles exported from the | United States to Porto Rico.
 Chief Justice Marshall, as early as 1S2), decided that territory annexed to the United States was much a part of the l United States as Maryland or Pennsylva- | mia, and yet Porto Rico, though a part of | the United States is treated by the Porto | Rican tariff law as not a part of the United States.
 Condemned by Their Own Papers But they convict themselves out of their | own mouths. When the Porto Rican tariff | law up for discussion many influential Republican papers of the United States | condemned the law in unmeasured terms as not only injustice to the Porto Ricans but as a direct violation of our fundamen- tai law. l shall only consume a short DOT | ton of your time in calling your attention to editorials of some of these newspapers | on this subject.
 The American people do not take kind ly to invasons of their primary rights They see in this Porto Rico measure-or
 if they do not now, they will see later a dangerous departure in constitutional construction. It means reversal of Amer ican traditions. Porto Rico was led to ex- peot liberal treatment and was induced to | a1 which, if not very explicit, none the less binding
 Indianapolis Journal The people have considered the matter from a broad and liberal point of view, without regard to temporary eXpedients or makeshlft policies, and they of the opinion that fair con-
 struction of the Constitution in the interest
 of national honor and justice requires that
 the door to trade between the United
 States and Porto Rico, both ways, be
 thrown wide open.
 |" No argument of political expedtency or
 party advantage can lead the people to
 look at the matter differently. They
 breathe a different atmosphere from that
 which sometimes pervades party caucuses
 and conferences in Washington, and they
 must be permitted to reach their conclus-
 jos in their own way.
 Indianapolis News: Our friends in the
 East need not fear that the people and
 papers of Indiana will give up the fight
 against the Porto Rican tariff act They
 have enlisted for the war. And as the days
 go by the more clearly does it appear to
 them that the President has made grave
 miS ake-a mistake from every point of
 view. He has hurt his prestige, seriously
 weakened the party, and injured the stand
 ing of the country in the eyes or the
 world. After all the explanations that have been made, and in spite of the att tempts to educate them, the people Of
 indiana unlike MT. Mckinley adhere 10 the opinion that we ought to do what the
 President said was our plain duty !" Other Papers
 Angola Qnd.) Magnet, Republican,:
 Some of the members of Congress tell us
 that the people do not understand the Por-
 to Rican tariff bill. Perhaps they do not,
 but they have a pretty we'll established be-
 lief that the clause in the Constitution
 which declares that all duties, imposts
 and excises shall be uniform throughout
 the United States means precisely what it says"
 "Cleveland Leader, Republican: "It is long since any policy adopted by the repre- sentatives of the Republican party In Con gress has been attacked by so great pre- portion of the best Republican newspapers in the United States as have resolutely op- posed the Porto Rican tariff bill. The out break of dissatisfaction Is so wide and in | tense that it may well alarm the most l sanguine leaders of the party " "Philadelphia Ledger Republcan-The l bill is a purely selfish one. It Is directly 1 in the interests of two of the most noto- l rious trusts in the country. If the sugar trust and the New England Tobacco Asso- | citation were out of the way, there would be no effort to starve the people of Porto
 Rico under the plea of giving them government
 Ex-PresIdent Harrison Quoted ''The Chicago Times Herald, 3n yhst eX- President Harrison had to say on the sub ject, says Tt must be evident to the gov
 ernment at Washington by this time that the treatment of Porto Rico is alien to our constitution, foreign to our markets, and only entitled to our charity contemplated in the pending legislation, offends the uni versal sense of American justice and honor When such a cool-headed and conservative constitutional lawyer and Republican eX-President Harrison says: T regard the | bill as most serious departure from right principles" it is time for the. Republican majorities in Congress to face the situa- | ton with the courage and wisdom that | dare to acknowledge great mistake and undo a grievous wrong. MT. Harrison merely packed in one sentence the we'll nigh unanimous sentiment of Republicans of the Mississippi Valley
 Replies to Senator Beveridge 'It would be unbecoming in me to come into your State and draw unfavorable comparison between ex-President Harrison and your Senator Beveridge. But when the young Senator crates on how indispensable to the nations welfare and greatness are these new policies, I wonder why the statesmen of the past have never thought of them before. But the young people in these times think they know more than the
 old folks. One of them said: Why, know more now at 20 than my father did at 40.' Your father must have been a natural born old fool an old man quickly replied "A man on the train recalled how the | distinguished Senator from Alabama made | the Senate and the whole country laugh | at the young orator. This man told me that MT. Beveridge went to a venerable Senator on his side of the Senate for con solation and asked him about his speech. but the old Senator advised him he had better wait a while before trying, again. so that your common sense may catch up with your vocabulary And yet this. Is