Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1908-02-05
Senator Beveridge Makes Strong
Plea For Revision OF Tariff
By Commission
FAvoRs MEASURE NOW PENDING
Declares Nation Needs System That
Gives Us Same Weapons Possessed
BY RivaIs-AII Producing Glasses
Demand Changes Made Necessary by
Changed Conditions.

Washington, Feb. 5.-The bill to ere
the power of revising the schedules
from time to time and arranging re-
ciprocal trade agreements was before
the senate today. and its passage was
advocated by Senator Beveridge, OF
Indiana. MIR. Beveridge made strong
plea for the passage of the bill. He
said:
THE tariff is fixed by facts; how to
get at these facts is the first question
in the whole tariff problem. Com
mon sense and experience answer that
question: we should create "A body OF
experts to find out these facts for u.s.
These men should be the tittest men
that can be found for this work; they
should give their whole time to this
work and lay before us the result or
their work.
This bill seeks to create such a
commission of experts to find out the
facts upon which congress builds
tariff and to make a classification OF
articles to which congress can plain
ly and accurately fix customs duties.
"By this bill. the commission. itself.
is not allowed to fix duties or even to
suggest any rate The fixing Of du-
ties is left to congress. The commits
sion is kept strictly to the task OF
gathering facts and making clear
classifications: the first is expert in
ho nVnart
clerical work. Neither is Legislative
work.
"The want of classifications of our
tariff is as bad as the want of facts.
Nearly all our tariff classifications are
more than a generation old. This Is be-
cause each time the tariff has been re-
vised, the committees have taken the
language as the old classifications Not
one of them is systematic, accurate and
up to- date.
"We must have more foreign trade.
We must open foreign markets to our
live cattle which are now kept out Of
those markets. Our manufacturers ask
the same advantages in foreign trade
that the German government gets for
German manufacturers. American pro-
ducers demand that the doors of other
nations which are open to their rivals
shall no longer be closed to them. We
cannot open these doors by purely
revenue tariff, because such a tariff
merely gives other nations trade ad-
vantages with us without getting from
those other nations any trade advan-
tage in return.
Eve must have a system that gives
us the same weapons that our rivals
have by which we can get for our
producers the same favors that our
rivals get for their producers. We
must have maximum and minimum
tariff, the first to apply to all nations
that will not give our producers spec
ial favors in their markets, and the
last to apply to those nations that
will give our producers favors in their
markets. BY this plan, German pro-
ducers are selling more German goods
abroad than any other nation. If we
consider area, wealth, history, and all
other elements of the problem, German
producers are selling more German
goods abroad than any other five ma
tions in the world put together.
Germany, Japan, and the world fol-
lowed our plan of single protective
tariff, and then logically developed
that plan into a double protective plan.
We must be as wise now as they We're
then; and just as they took the single
protective plan from them. Our man
ufacturers, our cattle men. our agri-
culturists, our miners, our whole
producing classes ask only the same
advantages that their rivals have in
the markets of the world. They de-
mand no more than this, but they
will accept no less than this. Tariff
for trade; trade for prosperity; COM
mon sense methods for both-these
must henceforth be the American
watchwords in the worldwide contest
for commerce.