Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1903-07-21
The Paramount I..ue.

4
appearances the trusts and tariff will
be the paramount issues The voters
Of the United States will have to dis
crirninate between the two parties
about their opposition TO trusts. but on
the tariff issue there will be a clear
cut difference ard the platforms adopt
ed should not require any interpreta-
ton to discover just where the parties
stand.
The Republican platform Is certain
to denounce trusts and combinations
and point with pride TO the legal steps
that htae been taken to suppress and
| control them. 1t will claim that all
the legislation against the trusts has
been enacted by the Republican party
and will point to the merger suit and
the beef combine injunction as exam
pies of what has been done and prom
Use that other combines will be SO
treated if found acting contrary to the
law.
The Republican platform will also
declare continued adherence 70 the
/
wonderful prosperity that commerce
and labor are enjoying under it and
pledge the Republican par,y to so re
/ wise the schedules if at any time il
should be found necessary to do so
The tariff must be revised only by the
friends of protection is the favorite
way of putting it.
The Democrats will denounce the
trusts as combinations in restraint OF
trade and as extortionate in theil
| prices for their products and being
| protected by the tariff from competi
ton demand that the tariff protection
be revised on those schedules that give
the trusts their monopoly
The question that the voters will
thus have to determine is which party
is really in earnest about suppressing
the trusts and which policy will give
the earliest relief from their oppres
sion. Has the merger suit reduced the
freight or passenger rate on the rail
roads? If so, Republicans are entitled
to the thanks and votes of the people
If the rates have not been reduced
the policy of the merget suit has beer
a failure. Every one who has used
the railroads since the merger sui
was decided can answer the question
and the reply will not uphold the Re
publican contention, for freight rates
have advanced either directly or indi
rectly by changing the classification
Neither have the passenger rates de
creased so the much heralded merger
suit has been a failure, for the rail
roads still continue their extortion an(
apparently the suit was only com
menced to make a showing of opposi
ton to the corporations.
How is it with the only suit the adj
ministration has maintained against
the industrial trusts, that against the
! beef trust. An injunction was granted
| against the beef barons restraining
them from joining together to manip
ulate the price of cattle and hogs and
from debating the price at which theil
/ products shall be sold. The combine
still pays its own price for cattle anG
hogs and charges what it pleases tx
the butchers in all the markets of the
country. Meat is about the same price
that it was before the beef combine
was enjoined and there is no more
| competition in the purchase of cattle
or in the wholesale price of meat thar
before Attorney General Knox began
the prosecution.
How is it with the other industrial
trusts, have they been frightened by
the fear of prosecution by the Attorney
General and reduced the eXtortionate
prices on their products? If anything
! trust prices are higher than before
these spectacular suits were com
| menced 1t may therefore be fairly
said that the Republican program OF
! controlling the trusts, combines and
corporations has been miserable fail
ure.
If the voters have arrived at the
| conclusion that these sample suits
against the railroads and the indus
! trial combinations have been result
/
Republicans refuse to try the Demo
| cratic plan of reducing or abolishins
the tariff that protects the trusts, the
logic of the situation requires that the
Republican administration is a failure
Shall the Democrats be given an OPP
portunity TO try their plan of tariff re-
form? Under that program Congress
would abolish the duty on trust pro
auctions and revise the tariff on other
importations so that enough revenue
would be produced to provide for the
wants of the government honestly adj
I ministered With the duty abolished
on their products the trusts would
have to reduce prices enough to pre-
vent foreign goods of similar kind and
! quality frcln being imported. AS many
of the trusts now export their surplus
/ products and compete with the foreign
manufacturers on their own ground,
| there is no doubt that the enormous
profits they now enjoy could be cut to
the amount of the protection that the
tariff now gives them.
With the monopoly that protection
| gives the trusts abolished, the price OF
trust articles-and that includes nearly
every necessity of life-would vastly
| decrease and the consumers would
benefit accordingly
So the question for the voters to de
/ eide is, which side they will take, the
Republican plan OF continued protec-
ton to the trusts with its extortionate
prices or the Democratic plan of tar
if revision and its certain reduction in
/ trust prices.
Disease in the Philippines
i There are about $4,000 of our sol
I diers in the Philippines and of this
number one-third are brought home
each year and replaced with those