Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1907-09-26
No Apology Needed.

No Apology Needed.
It pleases Democratic speakers and
organs to represent that the present
tariff law is on the defensive and
forced TO find excuses for longer con-
tinuance. The plan of attack is to
discredit the law and then push a gen
eral assault on the protective system
All through its history the Democratic
party has been opposed to the policy
Of protecting American wages and in
dustry, and its talk now of tariff re-
vision is deceptive. Its platforms have
always been against any such protee-
ton in tariff. According TO the de-
clared Democratic belief a tariff should
be framed for revenue only, and work
men and manufacturers should be left
to make the best of such resources as
they can command in open competition
with the world. If the next Democrat
ic national platform leaves out s plank
to this effect it viii be different from
the party's former avowed position. 4
man from any party may favor tariff
~1@S-A' AAAS>NAAA-4c- u VI
schedules when needed. Republicans
from time to time have passed several
tariff laws and changed rates accord
ing to the progress of Industrial de-
velopment Sometimes they have ad
vanced rates as well as reduced them,
but always maintaining the protective
principle. What the Democratic party
means by revision is a general cutting
down Of duties and an elimination of
all protection as fast as it can be reach
ed. When did Mr.. Bryan or any other
Democratic party leader say a word
for protection?
Beyond any doubt the next Repub-
lican platform will speak with pride of
the great success in all respects of the
Dingley tariff, whose results for ten
years have more than realized all that
was expected by the able men who
shaped it. As far as revenue is con-
cerned the only Democratic charge is
that the treasury surplus is excessive.
In general expansion of industry no
decade in the history of the govern
ment, or of any government, can be
compared with the period of the present
law, and the tide of prosperity has
been running, and is running now, high
er than ever before. But the Demo-
cratic cry is for a change and it is
the pretense of that partys that Re
publicans are in a state of nervous APP
T1rnhnDciOU canI-inop tn 1a1ox- 5ip
pictured as already imperatively need
ed and overdue. There is no such feel
ing or opinion in the Republican or
ganiZation. 1t will give the present
tariff most emphatic and enthusiastic
Endorsement, and refer to such modi-
ficatiOns as may possibly be required as
a matter for whose careful considera-
ton, from all points of view, there is
plenty of time, and from which free
trade influences will be excluded.
Since its passage the Dingley law
was temporarily modified in one item
by Republicans, and that example
serves to show how hollow Democratic
theories are on this subject. During
the great coal strike, when the people
of The United States were Threatened
with a coal famine with winter at
hand, some of the leading Democrats in
Congress made imprisoned appeals to
take off the duty on coal, and asserted
that the admission free of foreign coal
would strike at the root of the trouble
The duty on coal is II cents a ton. Con-
gress suspended it for over a year, but
the effect of this revision" really an
experiment in free trade, was abso-
lutely null. Foreign shippers of coal
at once marked up their price. Even
consumers of coal in American Seaports
profited nothing by the addition of the
article to the free list. When the duty
was taken off coffee in the name of
free breakfast table the Brazilian deal
ers added the difference to their price
American consumers paid the same as
before, but the American government
lost the revenue. So revision" often
works. For the Dingley law and the
principle of protection, the Republican
party has only words of triumphant
praise.-St. Louis Globe-Democrat.