The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1904-02-04
THURSDAY, FEB. 4, 1904.
ONE TARIFF ABSURDETY.

The activity, eloquence and influence
atives have disturbed the rest of the
Minnesota delegation and set them to-
thinking how they can head off this in
defatigable and popular worker. Rep
resentatfve Stevens had this in mind,
as well as the wish of the milling in
terest of the state, when he introduced
his bill to permit the sale of by-prod-
ucts of wheat that has been brought
into the country for manufacture with
out the imposition of a duty. At pres
ent Canadian wheat is taxed by the
. tariff, but that tax is RENTED when
the wheat made into -four in the United
States is exported in the latter form.
The by-products, however, which are
an important item of the whole, can
not be exported with profit; and it is
the desire Of the miIlers to sell these in
the local market without thereby sub
jecting themselves to the payment of
a duty on the wheat
There is no objection in the world to
this concession, except that it does not
go to the root of the matter. 1t lops
off only one little tentacle of the tariff
octopus. 1t admits in principle the in
tquity of the whole business, and shows
how the most rock-ribbed advocates Of
protection vince and retreat whenever
it happens to hit their own business
interests below the belt
1t makes the country tired to see the
opponents of this particular measure
draw out to the front that hoary old
fraud, the argument that the admission
of Canadian wheat free of duty would
lower the price of the American prod
uct There is not a man in congress
ought not to be a man in Minnesota.
and probably there is none, except
among the densely ignorant, who does
not know that this is the falsest ana
silliest pretense ever brought forward
to fool the public
The price of any commodity of which
country produces large surplus over
and above it's own needs is determined
by the price of that surplus. This price
is made in the markets where the sur
plus must be sold. 1t is for this reason
that the price of wheat has been fixed
for many year in Liverpool, being de-
termined there by the relation of the
worlds supply to the worlds demand.
AS long as the United States produces
breadstuffs for export in immense vol
ume, the prices of these will be deter
mined as we have stated, and those
prices will rule the home market.
1t matters, therefore, not one iota to
the American farmer whether the dutv
on farm products be a thousand per
cent or nothing. 1t does not alter their
price any more than it affects the tides
Both American and Canadian wheat is
sold in large quantities abroad. The
idea that Canadian farmers could raise
the price of their wheat by shipping it
across the boundary line is simply
silly where it is not intended to be
fraudulent
The high tarif1tes confess this them
selves when they yield, as their idolized
D1ngley act does, the privilege of i'm
portation free of duty for manufacture
ing in bond The milIers have now the
right to bring in Canadian wheat turn
1t into Hour and export that flour with
out paying duty. If the remission of
the duty alters the price of wheat. that
has been done already by this very
provision. There is nothing to prevent
the millers of the Northwest frnno
drawing their entire supply for export
from Canadian fields if they could nv
this means do it more cheaply. The
whole tariff argument as affecting farm
produce is, of course, idiotic. We
wonder how long the people of this