Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1905-12-28


sentimental standpoint and, while its ac-
tual benefit has doubtless been exaggerat
ed by the people Of the islands. they will
accept tais MEASURE of justice as an indi-
cation that the people of the United
States are anxious to aid the people OF
the Philippine Islands in every way and
especially IN The agricultural development
Of their arcii9eiaso. 1t will aid the Fill
pinos without injuring interests in Amer
ica''
Article II OF the constitution Of the
American Protective Tariff league rem
ders obligatory our opposition to the view
just quoted. It is as follows
Article H.-Object.
The object OF this league shall be to
protect American labor BY a tariff on i'm
ports which shall adequately secure
American Industrial products against tbs
competition of foreign labor. z
In the firm and conscientious belief that
free trade with the Philippine Islands,
where lands are cheap and labor com
mands scarcely more than one-seventE
of the price paid in the United States
will fall far short of adequately securing
American industrial products against the
competition Of foreign labor the tariff
league has no alternative. 1t must OPP
pose what it conceives to be wrong an6
an injury to the agricultural Industrial
lists of the United States. 1t is confident
that the president is incorrectly advised
when he expresses the conviction thai
free trade will aid the Filipinos without
injuring interests in America"
The producers of American, cane anc
beet sugar the growers of American leaf
tobacco and the manufacturers of Amer
lean gars-industries whose capital en-
ployed would pay hundred times over
the $20000,000 that the title to the Philip
pines cost the United States and whose
wage earners outnumber the entire pop
uIation of the Philippines-take distinct
ly contrary view. They have looked into
the matter at least as carefully as die
the junketing excursionists of the Taft
club. They have much more at stake
than had the members of that pleasure
seeking company, and their investigation
of conditions and probabilities may fairly
be supposed to be no less thorough and
their conclusions no less accurate. Then
belief is that the removal of the tariff
from all the products of the Philippine
Islands will arrest the development and
likely result in the determination of the
agricultural industries named
As a matter of consistency and good
faith the American Economist must stand
with the American and against the Taft
fino policy. 1t cannot be called the
Roosevelt policy. 1t is Taftifino pure ane
simple. All the knowledge and the in
spiration underlying the presidents Taft.
limo divagation may be traced directly
to the war department. The official re
ports bearing upon the subject have beer
written with Taftifino pens. The excur-
sionists, for the most part invited by
the secretary of war to join him in e
tour of inspection, saw facts and condi-
tons through Taftifino spectacles- Some
Of them, however, saw with American
eyes, and their judgment is that the
I,I, 81 10 ed Hot
cannot Ia justice or fairness be sacrificed
to the cheap cody labor of the Philip
pines. For example, Lafayette Young
editor and proprietor of the Des Moines
Capital, one of the great Republican
newspapers of Iowa, declined to permit
his vision to become perverted by Taft
opticitis. He saw things straight an6
square through sure enough American
eyes. Upon his return from the Philip
the Capital a significant series of sup.
positions as to what President Roosevelt
might say in his forthcoming message tc
congress. Among other things which he
hoped would not come about through the
presidents departure from safe and
sound protectionism, Mr. Young specified.
'sAnd suppose sugar from the Philippine
Islands should be put on the free list, the
labor in producing such sugar being fur
nished by Chinese, as advocated by 9
great many people,.
In summing up the consequences GER
tain to attend the surrender Of settled
principles and policies the Capital CON
cludes with this contentious saying:
IF the president should take such ac-
ton the men who forced him to do it OF
whose agitation resulted in his doing il
would be praying for the rocks anG
mountains to fall upon them inside OF
sixty days
Well, the president has taken such ac
ton as regards cheap Chinese labor com
petition, forced thereto, as we firmly be-
lieve, by the Taftifno element We be-
lieve. moreover. with the Capital that the
policy is mistaken one and that if II
shall be approved by congress to the ex-
tent of inaugurating free trade with the
Philippines it viii bring disaster tc
American industry, to American labor, tc
American homes, to American prosper
ity.