Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1909-05-28
SOME OF THE MYSTERIES OF
TARIFF MAKING.
"A Republican Senator Points Out
Some of the Absurdities Of the
Republican Party's Sacred
Policies.''

Following are extracts, published in
The Commoner, from the speech de-
llvered in the United States senate by
Senator Dolliver (Rep.) of Iowa.
The protective tariff system has
nothing to fear from the freside of
the Iowa homestead. On the other
hand it finds there its most disinter-
ested advocates and its most impair
tlal judges. For half a century our
people have defended it with their
votes on every election day, with no
direct concern of any large signif-
canoe in any of its schedules and no
purpose to serve except the general
prosperity of the American people.
What l have said of Iowa is true, in
an important sense, of the upper Mis-
slssippi valley, and 1 can not help
thinking that there is a radical defect
In that party leadership which dis
misses the voice of that great COM
munity, fearlessly expressed in both
houses of Congress, with a cynical
sheer about the weakness of public
men who are governed by temporary
political exigencies. For it ought not
to be forgotten that what we are do
ing here must be submitted to the
American people-a jury of unnum-
>bered millions, already impanelled,
with this case under consideration.
1t is not the same jury which passed
upon the tariff act of 1897; it is the
most momentous fact in our national
life, as the late Senator Hoar sug-
gests in his Autobiography of Sew
'enty Years." that within this period
the whole field of American industry
has undergone revolution. The in
dependent workshops Of American la
Dor stand no longer as they appeared
in the magnificent vision of Alexan-
der Hamilton when he laid down the
doctrine that the competition of do
nestle producers would guard the
community against all the evils of ex-
tortion. The inspiring retrospect of
Mr.. Blaine in his "Twenty Years of
Congress, in which he recounted
the triumphs of the protective doc
trine in the perfect fulfllment of
Hamilton's prediction, already needs
a good deal of revision to bring the
narrative up to date.
The Situation in 1897.
In 1897, when the Dingley tariff
law was enacted, the consolidation of
our national system into great cor
poratiOns had not fairly begun. The
business men who appeared before
the ways and means committe of the
house were an anxious company;
they spoke for silent factories and
the dead ashes of furnaces without
fire and chimneys without smoke.
They represented unemployed labor
and idle capital; they belonged to the
old industrial regime, now almost OBJ
solete in nearly all great departments
of production, and they received the
treatment which they would receive
now freely at my hands if had the
power to give it to them. 1t is grim
failure to comprehend what old DR..
johnson used to call 'the sad vicis-
STUDIES of things" when the leaders
of political party summon their fol-
lowers to practically re-enact the tar
iff of 1897 under the conditions which .
prevail today, and when men are de-
rided because, having helped to frame
that law, they seek to have it re-eX-
amined in the light of present day
experience.
Is it possible that man because he
voted for the Allison tin plate rate
of 1889 and heard poor Mckinley |
dedicate the first tin plate mill in Am
erica, can be convicted in this cham
Der of treachery to the protective tar
iff system if he desires that schedule
re-examined, after seeing the feeble
enterprises of 1890 grown within
single decade to the full measure of
this market place, organized into
great corporations, Overcapitalized in
to a speculative trust, and at length |
unloaded on the United States Steel
company with a rake off to the promo
tiers sufficient to buy the Rock Island !,
system? If transaction like that /
has made no impression on the mind
of congress, l expose no secret in say
ing it has made a very profound i'm
preston on the thought and purposes
of the American people.
The Special Duty Of Congress.
repeat, therefore, what I said the
other day, that the duty of this con-
gress is to reduce the margin of pro-
lection provided in the Dingley rates
whenever it can be done without sub
stantial injury to the productive enter
prises of this market place. 1t is our
special duty to take up these sched-
ules which represent the largest in
vestments of protected capital and at
least take out of them the rates that
are now everywhere known to be ex-
travagant and unnecessary, which
rise so far above the level of our real
industrial needs as to bring the policy
of protection into ridicule without do
ing anybody any sort of good. l rec
ognize the peculiar preparation of the
senator from Rhode Island for that