The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-03-20

cred their flags to half mast in token
 of what they believed to be the death
 blow to American shipping. In Charles | ton. $. C., the same course was pur- l sued. Here it was the British vessels
 which took the initiative. Many of the | American vessels. thinking that the | lowering of the British flags was due
 to some bad news from home, followed
 suit out of respect to the Britons. The act of 1928 was passed only after | the most strenuous campaign of edu-
 cation that had yet been seen in Amer | ica. Hezekiah Niles was early in the | field with his Register, published in Baltimore. He established such wide
 reputation for candor and fairness, and proved himself such an unselfsh de- votee of the truth first and protection afterward. that his Register gathered to itself a greater influence in direct- ing the currents of public thought than
 any other single agency In the coun- try. He printed both sides. And he did not resort to the doubtful expedi-
 ent of printing the weakest speecbes fin favor of fire etrade and the strongest l in favor of protection. He selected the strong speeches for the former as faithfully as the latter, and both sides
 on the tariff issue read The Register. Another man whose name was con nected with the propaganda of the day
 
 ! absolutely fair, clearly unselfish. who'll | ly devoted to the truth. and eminently just to both sides. He /worked through the circulation of pamphlets and leaf lets. The influence of these two men
 upon the sentiment .of the time cannot
 be ver-estimatedA Their publications went into every school district in the
 land, and the storebox debating socfe- ties. a hundred times more common than now, took their cues from these publications.
 The Free Traders got into the field
 much later. and their efforts never | were as successful as those of the Pro- tectionists. They had memorials to Congress prepared in every county. and these became the local platforms on
 the tariff question. The campaign of
 education went merrily on, and the elections for the Twentieth Congress gave the Free Traders the ascensoncy
 that enabled them to pass the Tariff of Abominations.- Although def:ated before the country and in the Congress the Protectionists were heartened by
 the workings of the act, and their cam | paign after the law went into effect 1 became more aggressive than ever Perhaps the real reason for the Tar fir of Nominations lays behind the | year in which 1t was enacted. The az | itation that sprung up in 1928 for n | revision of the tariff was brought | about by the wooden manufacturers. The cotton manufacturers had got to l the point where they could export cot | ton goods. and were not so much con-
 cerned about a revision. At first it | was only a demand for increases in the
 woolen manufactures schedules. Rut | the lessons of a century have taught
 that one industry cannot appeal for aid | ana support from the Government with | out letting down the bars for demands
 or like nature from others. If was
 the expansion of the campaign from "ooleiis 10 the whole list of manufac- | lures that led to the unforeseen nolj+
 tcal complications and deep-laid in | trigues that produced the Tariff oF ! Nominations
 This tariff led to intense opposition
 to protection in the South. It also
 showed the high water mark of pro- 1 lection from the beginning of the Gov ernment down to the Civil War. But | although It was high tariff it brought
 In revenue enough to support the Gov
 ernment. Further than that it laid tho
 foundations for nullifcation, and the troubles that were to come thereafter There was certainly no law ever en-
 acted by the Congress of the United
 states that bore such remarkable evil
 dences of insincerity as the act of | 1928. No one was satisfied with it. l There is abundant evidence that even
 those who had been responsible for 1t
 became ashamed of their part after l ward. Some tried to reconcile their
 action with their previous and after
 records. but to this day the Annals of l Debates stands out as a mute witness
 to the bad faith of the time. Up to 1 that period of American history the l tariff question was not as much party question as 1t was a matter of geog-
 raphy. But thereafter politics crept | into the situation more and more, and
 it was not long before party align
 ments were made with respect to the
 tariff Notification was in the air, even
 before the passage of this act, and 1t
 served only to give fresh impetus to
 that doctrine.
 | Copyright, 1909. by Frederic J. Has kin
 | TOmOrrON-America Tarif Laws