Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1901-09-12
IMPERIALISTIC PORTO RICANS.
Damaging Eject of Free Trade ON
One of the Islands Most Inn
portunt Industries.

of injustice. The critics of the repub-
lican legislation for the island should
not yet retire from business. If any
of them on the proclamation of free
trade thought that their occupation
was gone and that they had got to hunt
up other sufferers from imperialist
oppre ssion to weep over, they should
at once realize their mistake ana again
denounce the wicked Foraker law.
1t seems that the Porto Rican coffee
industry is threatened The poor
Porto Rcans. whose desperate wrongs
so appealed to othe oretical free traders
in the months when nominal duties
were paid on commerce between the
island and the United States, find that
the American tariff does not in all re-
spects suit their condition. They
we're taught with fervid appeals to the
principles of human liberty by the
opponents of the administration that
unless they had identically the same
tariff, laws as we had they were being
enslaved. taxed without representa-
ton, exploited and impoverished. Now
they have the same customs duties
and "A absolute free trade with the conti-
nent. and yet they are in trouble. is 1T
because our protective tariff is found
to be a barbarous and stupid system?
Do these uuspoi.ed children of nature
at their first experience of the evil
show their hatred of it and protest
against the Chinese wall which shuts
them off from Spain and England and,
South America and makes them, like
ourselves, a prey to the trusts? Not
a bit of it! II is not more free trade
they want. but more protection. The
United States some years ago put cof-
fee on the free list. With the extern
sion of our tariff laws to Porto Rico.
coffee can be imported there free of
duty, and the Porto Rican planters are
threatened with the extinction of one
of their staple industries. As a tenn
porary measure merchants have been
forced under threat of boycott to
make nonimportation agreements and
to turn back cargoes of Brazilian cof-
fee, much as our ancestors did the tea
ships. though for a different reason.
The Americans objected to taxed tea.
and the Porto Ricans desire taxed cof-
fee. This measure is to be followed
up by an appeal to Washington for a
changed Interpretation or early
amendment of the law so az to levy du
ties on coffee imported from foreign
countries or from the United States.
Free Importation of cheap Brazilian
cOtfeeS would doubtless be a serious in
jury to the Porto Ricans. and their in
terests should certainly be considered
But will our free traders who have
wept so over their hard hips come to
their rescue now? Granting the re-
quest of Porto Rico would mean anoth-
er step in Imperialism. 1t would mean
giving he island once more tariff diff
ferent from our own. 1t would run
counter to all the eternal principles
proclaimed in denunciation of the For
aker act, to the effect that uniform
laws. even though others should be de-
clared constitutional by a degenerate
court. were absolutely indispensable
to the liberty of both the Porto Ricans
and the Americans. The anti-imperal-
lists threw fits to secure equality for
the Porto Ricans, and now that un-
grateful people say they do rot care
a rap for the principle of equality in
tariff laws any more than in internal
revenue laws. They want free trade
with the United States when it suits
them, and a tariff when it suits them.
They have no sympathy with the aca-
demic theorists who insist on their in
alienable right to certain laws, not be-
cause they are needed there, but be-
cause we have them here. Rather, like
sensible people, they say their situa-
ton is not like ours, and where our
laws made for our conditions do not
meet their needs they want different
laws adapted to the islands situation.
That is exactly the imperial position
of the republican party. 1t has pro-
claimed the right and duty of this gov
eminent to solve its island problems
by laws suited to the special require
ments of each island, instead of eX-
tending to them. without regard TO
appropriateness, laws made for this
continent.-N. y. Tribune.