Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1909-03-24
WOOD

NJ ADAM, permit us to introduce
NH Representative Serene E. Payne
4LA of New York. You will have oc-
sacion to think often of Mr.. Payne dur
ing the next few years. He is the au-
thor of the tariff bill that was intro
duced in congress the other day. You
say you are not interested in the tariT
bill? oh, yes, you are. You may not
think you are, but you are, just the
same. Let us prove it to you. Now,
there are those puffs you have peen
wearing for the past season. ON, that >
different, is it? Well, they are ad-
vanced from 20 to 65 per cent ad
valorem. Ad valorem? oh, that is
term used by tariff makers to impress
the people with the Importance of their
work Strictly speaking, it means "ac-
cording to value" 1t is a term ap-
piled to a duty charged on goods &C
cording to their value al the place OF
shipment, as sworn to by the owners
and certified by customs appraisers
All manufacturers of hair are III TINS
ad valorem class, and they are all just
as hard hit as puffs are. Then there
are women's gloves. You thought they
were high enough last winter. dion I
you? But they were not. Congress
man Payne says So in his bill. He is
going 10 put a tax of "a a dozen on
imported gloves if he can manage 1t.
Worse than that! Four dollars dozen
is to be the tariff on gloves that are
only fourteen inches long. If you nap
pen to need a fifteen-inch glove you
Will pay your share of 35 cents for re-
curing the extra inch. In fact, the
tariff bill adds IS cents an inch for
every inch that the glove is in excess
of fourteen inches. This, of course, is
per dozen, not per pair. Thus one
dozen sixteen-inch gloves would cost
for import duty alone $40.
But perhaps you do not wear raise
hair or gloves? We VIII not insist
upon an answer, at least not to the
first part of the question. Certainly,
though, you sometimes use perfumes
Well, the tariff on perfumes and all
other toilet; articles is to be increased,
if the Payne bill passes, from 30 to go
per cent ad valorem. That is from one
half to three-fifths of their value. Pos
sibly you can manage to get along
without perfumes and toilet articles,
but you will certainly occasionally re-
uuire a cake of fancy soap-for the
guest room, you know. The new tariff
greases the soap chute and permits OF
it being pulled up another notch-fron
Is to 20 cents a pound. All these. you
say, are luxuries? True they are. But
how about feathers? You would not
call them luxuries. would you? Well,
feathers-no, they are not taxed on a
pound basis!-feathers are raised from
is to 20 per cent ad Valorem. And how
E oout figs, cocoa and pineapples? You
use them occasionally? And never
thought of calling them luxuries, did
you? Cocoa goes up in various kinds
of steam, according to the grade, the
increase ranging from to cents a
pound. Figs will go down one-half a
cent a pound harder than they for
merly did and pineapples will grow
thicker skinned than ever when they
hear that the tax on them is to be 50
instead of 81 a thousand. The real
lemon is handed to us in the tax on the
fruit of the same name. Lemon duty
is not / cent a pound. You may have
thought it was more than that when
some friend gave you that last one
but that was pure imagination. Here
after, if Mr.. Payne has his way about
it, the fruit will not be so common in
this country. The duty is to be IL
cents a pound.
And then there are mercerized ma