The Princeton union., 1900-03-29

s89 = = ~ A%xt-1 asASXIxIONsn Of1INAONS.
The gifted and conservative Mr..
Joseph A. Wheelock, the veteran edi-
tor Of the Pioneer Press, in a letter
from Washington to that paper, ably
and impartially reviews the Porto
Rican question. Mr.. S8Wheelock does
not think that the house bill will pass
thes2senate. Politically speaking, he
thinks its passage would be a, serious
tactical biunder@: For even if defensi-
BILE, the mere fact that it puts the Re
publican party on the defensive on the
eve OF a presidential campaign makes
it a grave political mistake, all the
more reprehensible because unneces-
sary and easily ayoidable. %
We cannot reproduce Mr.. Wheelock's
comprehensive review in full, but quote
few extracts therefrom:. '
The tariff bill is justified byits supporters on
the ground that it is a necessary emergency
measure for the relief OF the Porto Rican
can the revenues necessary for this purpose be
obtained so easily, SO promptly or with so little
burden to the people of Porto Rico This plea
might have been accepted as a partial, if not
wholly satisfactory justification of the bill at
the time it passed the house, when there was
no other measure before congress purporting
to provide the revenues needed for the support
of the island government. But following i'm
mn1intalv tic tho ~,
suance Of the presidents recommendation
promptly passed, and the senate has since
passed. the bill turning over all customs re-
ceipts on imports from Porto Rico to the presi-
dent for the use and benefit of the people
thereof This sum now amounts to over
81, 100000, and will amount to considerably
more before any other source of supply will be-
come available. This should so far suffice for
the present wants of the island exchequer as to
make unnecessary the resort to such an ex-
traerdinary and exceptional a measure of re-
lief as the Is per cent. of the Dingley rates
tariff bill for two years.
With these ample, indeed re-
markably liberal, provisions for the financial
needs of Porto Rico, there is plainly no such
lnexorable necessity for the tariff bill as to
justify the insistence on its passage in the face
VI I1O. PlOuouuCeu ulSdpprOVal OF the country
and the party.
Passing over the elastic state
ment that the entire sum in the hands of the
president and very much more is asserted by
Gen. Davis to be needed for other purposes.
including private relief, it nevertheless proves
true that there is no imperative necessity for
the tariff bill. 1t is not demanded by the peo-
pie OF Porto Rico 1t is not demanded by the
people of the United States 1t is manifestlv
repugnant to the prevailing public sentiment
Of the country and of the Republican party as
voiced by the Republican press
For these reasons the obStinacy with which
the leading friends of the bill insist upon it's
passage after the original plea of it's necessity
as an emergency relief measure has at least
ceased to be urgent, seems to me grave polit-
lcal mistake That it would have been far bet
ter for the Republican party if it had adhered.
as it set out to do, to the path OF plain dutv'
marked out by the president in his message
urging free trade with Porto Rico is now con-
ceded, even by some OF the most jealous sup
porters of the tariff bill. For what reason,
then, when it was sailing on smooth seas withil
prosperous breezes behind it, was it's courset|
suddenly changed and directed upon the rocks
and shoals of this unpopular policy? II
In concluding his interesting article.
Mr.. Wheelock naively remarks, ''thej
best way to get out of a scrape is to-
back out of it, i