Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1902-06-28
HIGH PRICE OF MEAT
HOW WOULD FREE TRADE HELP
THE SITUATION7
Beef Trust Extortions Furnish No
Grower Should Be Punished for
Condition That in Any Case Is
Only Temporary. - ~

The temporary high prices of beef
and other meats offer no. good basis
for the contention that there would be
no Beef Trust" if it were not for the
tariff on imported meats and cattle. 1t
is noticed that even among protested
protectionists in some quarters there
is a disposition to rail against the
tariff as primarily responsible for the
current high prices of meats, and to
mildly suggest that the tariff might
be removed or at least reduced wher-
ever it breeds trust making This is
merely a breaking out of the trust
trouble of the alarmists in another
place. The shaking of the red flag of
combinations is quite sufficient to
alarm some of the timorous protec-
tionists. To be sure, the government
lays a tariff duty of 1915 a head on
imported cattle, with the chief pur-
pose of shutting them out entirely.
For people can raise here at home all
the cattle that can be consumed here
and more, too. American producers
send to England alone approximately
325, ZOO, 900 pounds of beef every year
and say 100000 cattle on the hoof-
This policy furnishes a sure market
for the farmers and cattle growers
and adds immensely to the general
prosperity of the country
No patriotic American desires to
beat the beef trust by laying the
lash onto the backs of American
farmers and the American cattle
growers. That is what the practical
result would be were this duty of 1918
per head removed from imported cat
tie. If an actual shortage of cattle,
due to the short corn crop and the
drouth conditions, offers an opportun-
tty for the meat packers and dealers
to advance prices to an unwarranted
extent shall the country, therefore,
turn about and punish the American
farmer for it? Shall the door be
opened wide to the Mexicans and the
herders of Argentine that they may
divide the cattle market with the peo-
pie of the United States? The sug-
gestion has no element of patriotism
no grain of craftsmanship, and small
real sound logic from any point oil
view.
The Lewiston Journal, one of the
oldest Maine newspapers, founded and
for a long time conducted by the man
who framed the tariff law of 1897, is
true to its traditions and to him when
it says:
THE free traders will run up
against quite proposition when they
go forth in the next campaign to lift
from American farmers the economic
safeguards of the Ding1ey tariff. Elk
perience shows that this country can
produce beef and butter and all agri-
cultural products in abundance. Were
this country incompetent to raise beef
and to produce butter at fair prices
for home and European markets, then
we might ask the children of the Az
tees and of Bolivia to help us. Now
that under the Dfngley tariff the Am
erican farmer is marvelously pros
porous and barns and lands begin to
count for something, it is an insult to
our agriculturists to make the con-
spiracies of the beef trust an apology
for putting the milestone of Wilson
Gormanism about the neck of our ag-
riculture.
Meantime, if free trade would help
us, why does it not help Great Brit
ain? Beef is higher in London than in
New York''-Guthrie (Okla.) Capital.