The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1909-06-11
WHAT IS BEING DONE

WHAT IS BEING DONE
In spite of the information Of the
press dispatches from Washington it
is doubtful whether many people have
any adequate idea Of what the little
group OF which Beverage is one are
really doing. nor what their position
is on the tariff OF course we all
have the idea that they are fighting
A.crich who appears on the senatorial
landscape as the enemy of downward
revision. And such an idea is prac-
tically correct. But why is it that the
of things you ask?
The reason that the issue does not
stand out clearer, and the reason that
we cannot form any real idea of what
Is going on--the reason that there are
not any spectacular victories is be-
cause the whole debate as it appears
in the Congressional Record is one
of inconsequential detail. The real
issue never appears as a clear cut
proposition to be voted on, yes or no.
As Senator Dolliver said on the
senate floor the other. day: TT is a
great issue; and yet here we are fid.
ding away our time by debating fea-
lures OF 1t which have no great sig.
nificance"
And Dolliver went on to express
what we of the Middle West feel:
THE great question before the senate,
whether the Dingley schedule, operat-
ing well for twelve years ought to be
disturbed. There is nobody attempt
ms to mutilate 1t. Even my honored
friend from Wisconsin (La Follette),
feeling as he does that the schedule
could be improved by scientific in
vestigation, harhors no purpose TO
make any suggestion that will inter-
fere with the law that has been en-
forced in the United States for the
last twelve years"
But it is we'll understood thing
that Aldrich is continually clouding
the issue with all the artifice born
of years of experience in the senate.
question has come almost to a head
it has vanished as utterly through the
Vaccinations of the finance commit.
tee as lost river.
And this is what Dolliver resents
when he says:
Il beg you gentlemen, especially
you young men, who will have to fight
the battles of the republican party in
the next twenty years, after good
many of the authorities Of today have
disappeared from our affairs, not to
degrade the senate of the United
States, great deliberative body, able
to cope with practical questions. tc
the level Of an uneasy congregation
OF intellectual come-ons"
ANY one who looks over the Con
gressional Record affording as it does
the veriest minutia of the procedure
can see at glance that the finance
committee (of which the New Eng
land senators have the control) il
making the tariff and not the senate
There is never an opportunity for the
slightest action on the real question
Il is not question of whether OF
not the tariff ought or ought not t.
bo raised. That 1t Is impossible to gel
at. It is no great question which
ever gets up. Beveridge and Dollivel
and the rest of the so-called Progress
sives are doing their best. But it i.
only occasionally that they can have
much effect UP to this time.
The real cry of the progressives wa.
uttered when Dolliver said:
sour controversy, then, has
descended to this-not whether
the tariff ought to be raised, not
whether it ought to BE- lowered,
but what has actually been done
70 Il In this bill. affirm that i
has been subjected to very large
variety Of more Or less noticeable
additions to duties now provided
BY law; and I shall proceed to
prove that. IL msy have the at
tentIon especially Of thoss who do