The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-06-26
TRADING VOTES ON THE
VARIOUS TARIFF SCHEDULES
The Senators Give and Take.--Give Their Votes
and Take What Best They
Can Get.

/
| down to debate and to a test of voting
strength. When the Macedonian pha-
lanx can not dispose of schedules by
| its warriors lock shields and march
against the enemy.
After they have marched over the
| enemy and trodden him into terra
firma they occasionally turn around and
help bind up his bruises The lumber
! schedule is case in point. This is
known as Schedule D. There had to
be real fight over lumber. Some
Senator's wanted it admitted free and
after due debate, there was vote
weeks ago which decided once for all
that free lumber would not be favored
by this Congress.
''The lumber schedule is now prae-
ticaly finished, thank goodness many
a weary soul CALCULATED
| Not so. When the issue of free lum-
Der had been disposed of and the FL
nance Committee had demonstrated its
complete mastery of that schedule, its
members decided to pass on. Senator
Aldrich announced that the committee
had decided to redraw several of the
! lumber paragraphs, especially those on
I dressed lumber. Those revised recon-
mendations have not yet appeared, al
though the Senate has gone as far as
Schedule K. But a number of Senators
who might be little weakened about
/ Finance Committee@paragraph further
IN in the bill, are tremendously inter
ested in items affecting dressed lum
| ber Hence the Finance Committee IS
diplomacy.
AS matter of fact there is not to-
day a completed schedule of the Al
drieh-Payne tariff bill, although the
Senate is probably within two or three
weeks of the end of its work. But
week after week Senate Aldrich has
been leading the Macedonian phaianx
| into hotter and hotter campaigning.
| Lumber was the cause of the first hard
battle, then came sugar and then cotton.
| The battle on wool and woolens will
| probably be deeided next. All the
while, however Senator, the moment
he gets rec ognition, may discuss any old
! question he pleases. If he feels fit for
I taekling particular proposition any
where in the bill he does SO. The cot
! ton battle was not reached till last
| week but nearly month ago Senator
/ Dolliver made his first great onset
against that schedule. No one knows
| when the coal paragraphs will be reach
/ ed, but some days ago Senator Elkins,
of West Virginia, owner of large coal
mines and the leading champion of coal
duties, had finished a speech and had
had it set up in broad galleys at the
Government Printing Office. So he de-
livered his speech.
By the time the Senator gets around
to consider the coal paragraphs, Senator
Elkins may feel like delivering the
speech over again, lest his colleagues
may have forgotten what he has already
said Such a thing has been done again
and again and has wasted many days
of the Senate IS time.
When this easygoing process of pass
ing a tariff bill has been concluded, the,
final Senate vote will not be Immediate
assured by any means. Thus far con,
sideration is in committee of the whole.
From the committee of the whole the
bill is reported to the Senate. Every
item that has been disposed of, can be
brought up again, debated again, and
i a separate vote demanded
Senator Beveridge, of Indiana, was
| beaten in his opposition to a provision
about Inscriptions upon ornamental
watches. He promptly announced that
he would renew the fight when the bill
"came into the Senate. -
It is fair TO say, nevertheless, that
| very little of the ground will be gone
over again when the tariff bill is Gin
|! the Senate The orators will be talk
ed out and vote will be had very
| speedily on the passage of the entire
measure.
Senator Tillman of South Carolina
"Pitehfork Ben inveighed recently
against the sham battles over tariff.
They made him weary. There have in
/ reality oeen scores of sham battles over
the bill, since Congress sought to fix the
tariff upon thousands of items. There
have also been. scores of instances where
| battle has been declined, because ex
actlv the same end could be accomplish
ed by declining battle and conceding as
| by having a sham or a real battle, as
the case might be.
Within a few days Senator Aldrich
and Senator Brown, of Nebraska, met
in the cloak room and had it hot and
heavy. Senator Brown turned out to
be an insurgent early in the considera-
ton of the tariff BILL 1t seemed that
| the captains and lieutenants of the
! Macedonian phalanx had not taken the
! proper precautions about holding Sen
| ator Brown within their lines. One of
the duties he wanted was a good stiff
rate upon pumice stone. There are de-
posits of it in Nebraska and some en-
| terprising Nebraska people aspire to
| furnish the material for securing the
teeth of 90,000,000 people. The Finance
| Committee recommended the duty, but
as Senator Brown was acting badly,
rather selfshly perhaps, when one looks
at the logic of the scramble for tariff
/ duties. in which nearly every Senator
is trying to get something for his con-
| stituents. the committee decided to
withdraw the pumiee stone amendment.
| Senator Aldrich told Senator Brown it
| should not be offered as committee
amendment and Senator Brown angrily
announced that he. would offer it him
/ self,
He did and the amendment was