BoletiÌn mercantil de Puerto Rico. (San Juan, P.R.) 18??-1918, 1901-12-23
SAN JUAN, DECEMBER 23
Editorial Comment.

serious and pitiful is admitted BY ell author
tiles, high and low. Gen. Wood agrees with
Secretary Root, and both are Of one mind
with the Cuban Commissioners now in the
United States, in warning the Government
that troublous times are surely in the store
for the island unless the United States
comes promptly to the relief of it's threaten.
81 commerce. Planters are just now beg
inning to grind their sugar.cane, but where
to find market for their pIodact they DO
not know. Ii it continues to be shut out By
the American tariff, the immediate prospect
for Cuba is trade prostration and widespread
misery, with revival OF brigandage and
pillage on a large scale. That is the admit
ted situation which confronts Cuba. How
can it be melt
The prime conditions Of any effective
measure of relief are three: ~ it must be
speedy; q, it must be legal; q it must
disregard the obstinate selisbness and heart
lessness of those protected interests which
would rather see Cuba starve than surreu
der one penny of their own tariff advan-
tagee. Time is of the essence Of the crisis
Unless the Cuban sugar crop is assured of q
market before mex. May or June, the last
state Of the island will be worse than the
first. This is the consideration which makes
delay until after the establishment OF q
Cuban republic inadmissible. The mischief
would be done long before treaty of reci.
procity with Cuba could be negotiated and
ratified. We must act quickly, if We are
moi. o mock at the threatened calamity Of tie
Oubans. And we must act legally. Bot
there is no legal way in which the people Of
Cuba could do this before they have estab.
lished their own government. They have no
organ Of expression, no authorized mouth
piece. Tkis plan would come to naught
throuh technical difficulties, or else through
fatal delays. We have heard the suggestion
that Gen. Wood, as Governor of Cuba,
make treaty with Secretary hay, provid.
ing for reciprocal markets. 1t is possible
that tbe Supreme Court would represent q
Justice blind enough to let such legal fic.
II m pass; but even so, the method would be
of dubious propriety, and would be too
dilatory to meet the emergency. What we
need is an act of Congress that s0ill 20
swiftly to the heart of the difficulty.
Such an act would be one reducing the
sugar duties in the United States tariff
by one.half. The simplest verbal amend
ment Of the Diugley Law would be suf-
ficient. In place OF the words s'ninety five
one-hundredths of one cent per pound" on
sugars under number sixteen Dutch standard
read fifty one-hundredths; and instead of
one cent ard ninety five one hundredths on
refined sugar, read one cent. A bill of half
q dozen lines would do the business, and
the immediate result would be to give the
Cubans market for their sugar, to make
them so prosperous that they would increase
their orders for American goods by millions,
and, furthermore, to secure just that reduc.
ton in American taxation which the Be-
cretary of the Treasury declared in his
annual report to be highly desirable.
In the last respect, the cutting in two of
the sugar tax would be beautiful way of
making one hand wash the other. We want
to permit the IOubans to live; We want also
to knock of $25, ,OOO, 900 from our own
taxes. Reducing the sugar duties by one.
half would do both. Mr.. Gage informed
Congress that the revenue should be reduc
ed by $50,00e,O00 He pointed ont some
$27 ,O0O, 600 Of internal revenue taxes that
might be removed. AS to the rest, he was
silent-relnctsnt, to arouse protectiouist
ire by singing out any tariff tax to be
lowered or abolished. But there lay the
revenue from sugar just waiting to be
sliced in two. Its average has been for
some years about $50, ,0OO, 900. Reduced
one half, it would give Mr. Gage almost
exactly the sum be specified as desirable.
Why should it not be done
When Mr.. Mckinley in 1890 was looking
about to reduce the revenue, he settled upon
the nn0ar dukiaa aa fhn hat v,l.oa q, v.,.k.