The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1908-02-06

! classifeations SO much clearer. simpler.
and more accurate than ours? BY the
| common-sense plan of having an expert
! commission arrange these classihcations.
! But that was only a part of the work of
| the German commission. Years ago Ger
many saw that only a body of experts
could get the facts and arrange the sched-
ules for her tariff she saw that the
only work which the Relchstag could do
was the fixing of duties to the Items
which the expert commission classified
and upon the facts which the expert
commission found out and laid before
the Reichstag So Germany selected for
this work 80 OF the best-htted men to be
found In the empire. This commission
consulted more than 2000 trade and in
dustrial experts. 1t investigated every
phase of every industry in the empire
which might bear upon the tariff. 1t
carefully studied the tariffs of other coun-
tries. 1t gave due weight to Germany's
export trade In short, everything that
goes into the making of tariff was
worked out to the smallest detail by
the, German expert commission. 1t spent
almost six years at this work. The facts
thus gathered and the scheduled classi-
fications thus made were laid before the
Reichstag, and the Reichstag then final
ly fixed the duties. after its committee,
corresponding TO the ways and means
committee of our House of Representa-
work of examining the recommendations
of the commission.
Maximum and Minimum Tariff.
I'VE 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 Ger
man manufacturers. American producers
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 a purely revenue
tariff, because such a tariff merely gives
other nations trade advantages with us
without getting from those other ma
tions any trade advantages in return.
I'VE 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 max
imum and minimum tariff, the first to
apply to all nations that will not give
our producers special favors in their mar
kets, and the last to apply to those ma
tons that will give our producers favors
in their markets. BY this plan Ger
man producers are selling more German
goods abroad than any other nation. If
we consider area, wealth, history, and
all other elements of the problem, Ger
man piouhctTS are StlilliS HlOTe dtIIldu
goods abroad than any other five ma
tons in the world put together.
Tariff For Trade.
Germany. Japan and the world fol-
lowed our plan of a single protective
tariff, and then logically developed that
plan into double protective plan. We
must be as wise now as they were then;
and just as they took the single pro-
tectives plan from US, so now we must
take the double protective plan from
them. Our manufacturers, our cattlemen.
our agriculturists, our miners. our whole
producing classes ask only the same ad-
vantages that their rivals have in the
markets of the world. They demand no
more than this. but they will accept no
less than this Tariff for trade; trade for
prosperity; common sense methods for
both-these must henceforth be the Amer
lean watehwords In the worldwide con-
test for commerce.