The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1908-12-31
REAL fleAr TO COME IN sENAre
But the Prospect Of Reduced Duties
Is Good.
(FTom Mr.. Lows Washington Letter
to the Boston Globe.)


to the Boston Globe.)
1t begins to look as II the country
may score a real revision Of the
tariff and some genuine reductions
of duties, after all the talk that has
been heard about the projected re-
adjustment of the Dingley schedules
being a farce. The hearings before
the House ways and means committee
are drawing to a close. Andrew Car
negie's appearance is the last regular
hearing on the books, though briefs
win be filed for a considerable time
later.
But the hearings have gone to a
point where some estimate can be
formed OF what the ways and means
committee is going to do in framing
tariff bill. Unless appearances are
deceitful, the committee will bring
out a bill that will have teeth, and
will not be a mere perfunctory tariff
measure, failing to reach the situa-
ton of which the country is COM
planning.
1t has been conclusively demon
strated before the ways and means
committee that there are important
|
ductiOn or wiping out of duties with
out being injured. This is notably
the case in respect to such raw ma
terials as coal, iron and steel, hides,
lumber, wool and the like Members
of the committee have not shown, as
rule, much sympathy with the idea
of maintaining the present rate OF
duty on these articles. and have lis
- ha
sentations of witnesses who have ap-
peared before them in connection
with these schedules, and have
pleaded that their business would go
to pieces II there was any lowering
of the tariff.
II is expected In the best-informed
quarters that the tariff on some of
the articles named will be wiped out
and on others reductions will be
made In the bill which the ways and
means committee will report. More
over, it is likely that the House will
stand by the ways and means com
mittee. Speaker Cannon will in all
likelihood be in accord with whatever
the committee favors, this body being
dominated by his friends. All this
simply means that the real tariff
fight is going to come in the Senate
and that if the House makes the re-
ductions' in schedules it is expected
that there will be a great tariff con.
test in the upper house.
The House of Representatives is
apparently going to so handle the
tariff measure that if there is any
censure in the public mind because
no adequate reductions in duties have
been made that censure will be di-
rected against the Senate and not
against the House. The House Re
publican leaders, in other words, are
looking toward a tariff bill on which
they can go to the country and be
upheld. Unless the Senate sees ft
to pull the House chestnuts out OF
the fire and keep the duties up TO
something like their present high
level the session for tariff revision is
/ likely to be much briefer than has
been generally anticipated. But it is
likely there will at least be such an
effort made in the Senate to get
schedules lowered in the House and
raised in the other branch of Con
gress that the session will last until
midsummer.
The hearings before the ways and
means committee have brought out
the fact that good many of the pres
ent schedules are indefensible and
that reductions would not do dam
age. In the case of coal the coal
men themselves admitted before the
ways and means committee the issue
with them was chiefly one of freight
rates, and that if they could get re
ciprocal arrangement with Canada, sc
as to have enough differential to
oqualize freight rates, they would moi
object to the duty being materially
lowered Canada coal might capture
New England's market, but American
coal would dominate the eastern hall
of Canada, from Montreal westward
American coal men want the Ontario
market, and know they control 1t un
der a proper tariff arrangement. II
is to be expected the ways and means
committee will take cognizance o.
this situation.
In the case of hides the Senate hat
to put the duty on hides IL years ago
and it Is likely it will have to do II
again If it is put on. If the duty or
hides is removed the demand for free
shoes will be almost irresistible. Il
DlB pdChSIb arc
an adroit play In this matter of hides
The Armour representative has told
the committee that the farmer ol
man who sells the cattle gets all the
benefit of the hides tariff. So have
others. This is good politics from
the standpoint of those who want the
hides tariff kept ON. 1t is calculated
TO arouse the farmers and get then
urging their members of Congress
to keep the tariff on hides.
In the hearings of the iron ant
steel schedules there has been moth
ing to show that the duties cannot b'
definitely lowered. Judge Gary helt
that with the tariff removed the con
troll of the markets would rest will
the United States Steel Corporation
This is not likely 10 make a stronl
impression on legislators for a reten
tion of the present duty, in view o
the very general impression that thii
corporation already had dominance O
the iron and steel business in th'
United States and to considerable
extent abroad.
Under the wool tariff 1t has beel
shown the number Of sheep has de
creased and the price of wool ha
gone up, and a lumber man told th'
committee that II the duty on lumbe
was removed the price would go dowl
only 90 cents per thousand. That is
ha AanIarad fha srnaaaRnan xu0,tld "a