The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-04-10
Men Have Been Made and I'm
made by Their Attitude.
IDEA OF PROTECTION
Was Put Forward as Early as
the Year 1879.
Course Since Then Sometimes
Up and Sometimes Down.

Washington, April 1O.-The tariff
fight which is now holding the CEN
ter of the political stage involves one
of the most complicated problems in
modern economics. Men have been
made and unmade through their atti-
tude on tariff. This does not mean
that the fundamental idea back of the
system is new, for it's history can be
traced back to the times of julius
Caesar and Rome, where a similar
system of "Portulares," port duties,
existed.
The word tariff is supposed to
have been derived from the name of
a town in Spain, Tarifa, in which port
vessels passing were compelled to stop
and pay tribute.
AS early as $50, A. D., duties were
collected in England. Up to the time
of the founding of the republic of
the United States, tariff had been sole
~ a revenue raising institution, but
in 1879, with the first congress of the
United States, a new feature was in
jected into the idea, that of protec-
ton of home industries.
Almost every administration since
Washington's has had to meet the
tariff proposition face to face. During
that time tariffs have averaged all
the way from 8 n per cent to so per
cent. Soon after the first tariff was
levied, in 1888, at " per cent ad val
orem, it was found this was not Suffi-
cient and it was raised to IL per cent
and then to 1914 per cent. In 1872
this tax was nearly doubled, as war
measure for revenue. Four years Ia
ter the great Henry Clay was largely
responsible for the framing of a new
tariff bill which readjusted the sche-
dule. While the Clay schedules were
considerably under the present tariff,
it was Clay's idea to afford protec-
ton. His duties averaged about 80
per cent.
Course Was Upward.
Ten years later this reached 81 per
cent and a year later Al, the highest
tariff in the history of the republic
to that time. Then the trouble broke
out in South Carolina, which state
declared the law providing for the col
states to be null and void and no law.
A threat to secede was embodied in
the declaration to the United States
congress. President Andrew Jackson
at once issued a proclamation in which
he discussed the doctrine of state
rights and followed up his determine
ton to preserve the Union by dispatch
ing a detachment of the army to South
Carolina and by sending a war vessel
to her port, which measure put an
end to the proposed notification.
Then came the horizontal reduc-
lions. The tariff was still further re-
duced in Folks administration by
bill submitted by Robert J. Walker,
then secretary to the treasury. This
bill provided for a revenue tariff with
Incidental protection. The average du-
ties were about ~ per cent. This
was still further reduced to an aver
age of 201z per cent II years later.
This period from 1916 to 1850 was one
of comparative free trade and had it
not been for the outbreak of the Civil
war the problem of protection might
have been determined by the exper-
fence of the period just past. But the
the great conflict between the states
compelled the ones remaining in the
Union to raise the duties in order to
provide means to carry on the war.
The Morrill, Tariff.
Justin S. Morrill, of Vermont was the
author of the new tariff measure in
1861, which increased duties about
one-third and in 1864 these were
again raised so per cent for 80 days.
BY 1870 the country had so far re-
covered from the ravages of war that
reductions in duties were begun. For
the next 1 o years the tariff remained
around the 40 per cent horizontal re-
duction mark, until Horizontal Bill
Morrison came forward with his 20
per cent horizontal reduction on prac-
tically all existing tariffs.
Then came President Cleveland's
first administration with the Mills bill
as it's feature. But the Mills bill lost
owing to the fact that the senate was