The Waxahachie daily light. [volume] (Waxahachie, Tex.) 1894-current, 1908-12-26
FAIR REVISION
OF THE TARIFF
The Rate Of Duty Will Probably
Be Lowered by Next
Congress.
BILLS BY TEXAS MEMBERS
Mr.. Stephens Wants Pensions for Sur
vivors Of Texas Volunteers En-
ployed in Defense Of Frontier
Of the State

OI ulP DldlR.
/ Special correspondence.
Washington, d. c., Dec 21.-
/ If one would correctly measure the
/ progress the republican party has
made towards sounder politics and
1 a more enduring basis of popular
| favor, let ofle note how far it has
I Travelled, during the last four years,
! from its old platforms towards the
! position consistently maintained by
/ the democrats upon the most i'm
portant political questions of our
time. Mr. Bryan has had good rea-
son to complain that President
Roosevelt has ''stolen his Clothes"
especially in the matter of regulat-
! ing railroads and other great inter-
state corporations; and it is becom-
/ ing more and more apparent every
! day since the election that Judge
Taft, the president-elect, intends, If
! possible, to move his party very
much nearer to the old-time demo-
| cratic position with regard to the
tariff. until in time, it may come
to occupy it as completely as it has
A.! done on other leading issues.
The declaration in favor Of tariff
! revision in the last republican plat
form was not taken seriously by
even large element within that
party, to say nothing of the doubts
which the democrats felt about it;
and after the election, republican
congressman, returning here for the
present session, pertly announced
that they would determine later
whether the tariff should be revised
up or down. Judge Taft quickly
put an end to that flippant sort of
talk, when, on November 81, before
he had left Hot Springs, he made
the emphatic declaration, through
an authorized announcement given
to the Associated Press by Mr.. Bur-
ton OF Ohio, that fair and just re-
vision of the tariff would be under
/ taken by his administration, and
that If Speaker Cannon and his
friends in the House should under
take to obstruct such action, he
woud appeal to the conscience Of
the party and become responsible,
himself, for a movement to reorgan-
ize the next House in the interests
OF such revision.
That settled it. One hears no
ing the tariff upward The zinc
miners of Missouri and Kansas, the
pottery workers of New Jersey and
Ohio, and minor interests of other
kinds, perhaps, claiming to have
been overlooked. or inadequately
cared for, in the legislation OF the
past, will ask higher rate Of duty
In the new bill; but it's general trend
will be downward. 1t will not be
carried so far downward, to be sure,
as to seriously disturb the protect
i've policy, or to cripple any impor-
sssssta64e inNuStry !; and there will still
remain III III t0 crlticfBe from 4
democratic point of view. before the
tariff is finally brought to a rev.
enue basis. But a more sincere be-
ginning will be made In that direc-
tion, | am led to believe, than was
thought possible, until recently. AS
an indication of somewhat whole
some change, your Uncle Joe"
/ Cannon, after recent private In
terview with Judge Taft, would like
to meet the man who would dare
intimate that he Is not in favor OF
an honest and thorough revision of
the tariff: and II Senator Mark
Hanna, that old-time chief OF the
| standpatters, could return to earth
and revisit his former haunts about
the Capitol, he would think the
democrats had gained possession Of
the government, to hear the cur
rent talk of tariff revision.
Judge Taft is leader in all this.
| His latest utterances on the subject
at the dinner of the Ohio Society,"
In New York, on the 18th inst, was
strong and unequivOcal. Among
other things, he said: II am pro-
tectionist, but l do not think it
inconsistent in me to say that pro-
lection makes the possibility of
trusts and monopolies much easier
than 1t would II we did not have
protection. We do not wish to de-
prive any one of the Just profit of
business but we do not wish to give
any one chance to secure an ex-
cess. Unless we do revise the tar
if in good faith, II we only make
a surface revision, we shall be made
accountable to the intelligent Amer
lean people. and will suffer the pun
ishment that Is meted out to those
who do not keep their promises. It
Is, therefore, better that we have
no revision at all, that we allow the
Ibili to be defeated, unless we are
honestly going to revise the tariff
on the basis / have Indicated. Nov
let the dominant party dare revise
the tariff upward, or fail to revise