The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1904-08-25

sential to the development of the
country and especially the North
west. The 'sstandpatters'' and
''tariff boosters" tell us this tariff
has not enhanced the price of lum-
Der, yet everyone knows that since
it's institution the price of lumber
has been soaring upward until it
has become so high that poor man
can hardly afford to die because the
to make his coffin costs SO
much.
One can count scores of lumber
manufacturers that have progressed
from bankruptcy to millionaires
since the institution of the tariff.
In the great suit just closed in
Minneapolis between two million
aire brothers, both in the lumber
business, the testimony developed
that one of their mills-not the
best one-pays a dividend of over
two hundred per cent on the in
vestment. The very idea that any
industry paying two hundred per
cent needs protection, is ridiculous
enough to make the ghost of Alex
ander Hamilton, the father of
American protection, grin like a
barefoot boy, with circus ticket
in his hand and a show coming to
town. The facts are that every
man who has bought three dollars
worth of boards in the last ten
years, got dollars worth of lum-
Der and contributed two dollars in
profits to others.
The most eminent ''tariff
booster" in this state who thinks
the only safe tariff revision is a
"revision upward" built an imagi-
nary barn in Winnipeg and a
similar one in the southern part of
this state and gave the price of the
lumber used in the same and
demonstrated that the Winnipeg
barn cost something like two
hundred dollars more than the
Minnesota one. 1t was a plea in
confession and avoidance, not of
justification. 1t shows how honest
men will twist facts to lit circum-
stances. He built his barn of white
pine, and while every one knows,
white pine is about the same price
in both countries, spruce and
hemlock lumber is much cheaper in
Canada than the United States.
He located his barn in Winnipeg
thousands of miles from the lumber
centers where the extraordinary
development of the country has
created temporary demand for
building material of all kinds far
above the supply, instead of at or
near the lumber centers of Canada.
No one ever expects any very cheap
lumber to be imported from the
prairies of western Canada. FL
nally his argument knocks his own
proposition out of joint for if
lumber costs more i'm foreign
countries than it does in the United
States, no local dealer or user is
going to pass the home market by
and purchase in a dearer foreign
one.
The proposition is simple. If
the removal of the tariff on lumber
would make it cheaper, here in this
country where we must build shelter
out of lumber for everything that
breathes, the people are entitled to
the reduction. If lumber is dearer
in foreign markets, then the tariff
placed upon it is useless surplusage
and should be taken off. Not ten
per cent of the republicans of this
state believe IN a tariff on lumber.
Yet ten per cent get what they want
and ninety per cent get it in the
neck. If every republican in Min
nesota who believes that the tariff
on lumber should be removed,
would declare that they would not
vote for candidate for Office, who
in any way influences national
legislation unless he pledged him
self to actively work for the re-
moval of such tariff, it would be
removed before the Christmas holi.
days. We know that the great
mass of republicans are with US on
this proposition. We have mingled
and held heart to heart converse
with more individual voting re-
publicans than any man in the state
during the last eight years. We