Woodruff County news., 1901-08-22
DILEMMA OF REPUBLICANS.
Enormous Growth of Trusts and MOnOpOIies Under Protection
 Staggers Them.

The unexpected often happens in politics. When the republicans enact ed the Dingley tariff bill they said it settled the tariff question and that the policy of protection would not again be disturbed. They claim that pros perity is dependent upon the main taining of the protection wall they have so carefully erected. But sud denly some of the most pronounced friends of protection express their purpose of making a breach in the wall, and the whole tariff matter is eagaiq brought up for discussion by the very men who said it was settled for all time. The enormous growth of trusts and monopolies under the protection granted them by the republicans was foretold by the democrats when the Dingley bill was enacted, and now the people are being aroused by the fact that the foreigners are buying trust productions for less than they are, the allies of the trusts in congress are in a dilemma. They must cut off pro- lection from the trusts or the prospect Of defeat stares them in the face. But to acknowledge they are wrong and that their theory of protection is at fault is another predicament, and the great majority of the republicans, un- der the leadership of Hanna and the president, have determined to evade the strait they are in by the unconsti- tutional and roundabout way of reel procity.
 But reciprocity will not accomplish what the people are demanding, that protection be withdrawn from the trusts. There is another danger looming up to disarrange the protec- tion theory, and the. only way that can be averted is by giving up the colonies that have been acquired by the expenditure of such vast sums and the sacrifice of so many lives. This the Nashville American dis cusses when it says: "After delay for which there was no defense, free trade has been established with Porto Rico. The country has finally performed its ''plain duty" as point ed out by President Mckinley be- fore he signed the Porto Rico tariff bill. Free trade between all Ameri- can possessions is a policy which no party can afford to ignore or defy. When the republican party, through force of circumstances which no party could control, accepted and adopted the old democratic policy of territorial expansion, it entered upon a policy which is the enemy of a tar if policy. Expansion and free trade go together. A severe blow was struck the republican policy of a pro- tective tariff when Dewey's guns in Manila bay gave to this country the Philippine archipelago, and when the war with Spain gave US Porto Rico and paved the way for the ultimate annexation of Cuba. Free trade has been ablished with Porto Rico, and free trade with the Philippines must follow. It is inevitable EX- pansion is an entering wedge which must eventually drive asunder the tariff wall erected by republican leg islation. The tobacco and cane and beet sugar and rice and fruit grow CTS may succeed in delaying free trade with the Philippines, as they have delayed for a time free trade with Porto Rico, but the time is not far away when trade will be as free between the Philippines and the United States as it is between the states of the American union. And the time is coming when there will be free trade with Cuba also. The logic of events will force free trade in oth- CT directions"
 The only way the people will ever get any relief from tie tariff tax and the extortion of the protected trusts is by revising the tariff on the demo- cratic principle of tariff for revenue only large enough to produce what money the government requires economically administered. Protec- tion is the mother of trusts and must go the way of all monopolies.