Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1909-04-15
REVISION MOCKERY
wage GARNER HOLDS The BAG,
SAYS GOVERNOR HARMON.
Ohio Leader Tells Fellow Democrats
That High Protective Tariff FOS.
terS Waste, Hills Commerce and
Encourages txtravaganCe. Special
Interests Control Tariff riakina.

NEW YORK, April 13.-"The re-
ductions in the pending tariff legis-
lation form nothing but mockery of
the demand for relief" asserted Gov.
Judson Harmon, of Ohio, in an ad-
dress tonight at the annual dinner
Of the National Democratic club at
the Hotel Savoy. He insisted that
relief never would be obtained ex-
cept under a congress and executive
following Jeffersonian rules and
treating taxes as a means of public
revenue and not for private gain.
Governor Harmon protested strong
ly against what he termed the grow
ing encroachment of special privi-
lege at Washington, insisting that
the steady tendency since the civil
war had been to exalt the federal
government at the expense of the
state, resulting in the neglect of
economy and the embarkation of the
government into extravagant enter
prises. He instanced the action of
the last congress in appropriating
two billions of dollars and the rails
ing salaries of officials, in the face
of a growing shortage, and con-
tinued:
Nov, instead of seeking methods
of retrenchment, the president and
congress are devising additional
taxes to exact from the diminished
means of the people and are propos-
ing to issue bonds besides. State Of
ficials who would propose such
course would not dare to go home to
their constituents, and would be for
ever disgraced if they should take
it.
"The wage earners, for whom
there is the usual show of deep in
terest, are not present or represent
ed in the pulling and hauling which
is going on SO as to secure the ad-
vantages professed to be for them.
The increase caused by the tariff will
mostly go, as it has always gone, to
make unnatural profits for the en-
ployer, whose solicitude for his work.
men does not even take the form of
fair division of the spoils.
Some luckless interests whose
pull has grown weaker or has been
overcome by counter-pull. like the
wood pulp paper trust, may with
great ceremony be anointed with the
oil of sacrifice for the salvation of
the other, but the reductions, when
real, will be mockery of the cry
for relief.
1T is hardly fair for Republicans
at least to charge with inconsistency
Democratic congressman who take a
hand il this selfish scramble. In
the last campaign the Republican
candidate for president openly Of
fered share of tariff spoil for DEM
ocratic votes. When special favors
are the order of the day, it is nat
ural for a representative to think
that he ought to secure a share for
the interests at home.
"Why tax the people to build a
costly canal and secure ships for for
eign commerce while tariff system
is maintained to discourage or kill
foreign commerce, except such as
consists in selling our products
abroad for less prices than are i'm
posed on our own people. What state
government ever committed such
folly?
"Surely instead Of the union DOM
mating the states which form it, it
would require from the central gov
ould require from the central gov-
ernment which their people estab-
lished and maintained, strict obser-
vance of the same principles and
practices of economy. fairness and
equality Of rights and benefits which
have always prevailed in them. This
can never be under the rule of the
Republican party"