The San Francisco call., 1910-07-23
Interests Attacked
Insurgents Speak
TARIFF A FRAUD,
ASSERTSCUMMINS
Cannon and Aldrich Never In
tended to Keep Party Pledge,
Says Progressive

~
COUNCIL GROVE, Kan, July 22.-
Senator Albert B. Cummins of low
n a speech before a Chautauqua audi
snce here tonight asserted the pledg
1 revision of the tariff was not full
filed, and Senator Aldrich and Speake
Cannon and the others who took tn
cad in framing the tariff bill had neve
attempted and never intended to kee
he pledge.
Senator Cummins came into the dis
-rict of one of the Kansas regular
congressman, Representative jaime
Miller, to give this message. He said
Cannon and Aldrich and other
standpat leaders were driving the
ative control and away from the
individual or competitive theory.
Make PARTY PROGRESSIVE
1 am an exponent of the pro-
gressive republican idea. L believe
the republican party can be made
the most progressive party on
earth; the one that does things for
>
the special interest man must be
eliminated. That is my sermon.
That is what L advocate, and II
1t helps or hurts any of my audi
10 years | fought for progress in
Iowa, and we have won and are
winning. This is not local mat
ter at all, but one covering all this
country and affecting other coun-
tries.
SnooIar Tsan,on ap5 caoo+or Aid
rich are driving the country into a
socialistic form of government and
industry by promoting the cause of
monopolies. They are unwilling to
idly growing tendency toward mo-
nopoly or to disintegrate and de-
stroy the monopolieS already in eX-
istence, whereby the prices of COM
modities are fixed, not by the usual
laws of trade, but by the will of a
single man or group of men. Mo-
nopoly does not mean q single fac
tory with absolute control of one
article, but combination of facto-
-ries making the same article,
whereby the prices are the same In
all, whether or not the factories
are owned by one company or are
controlled through a trust agree
ment.
MISSING
1t is only within the last few
years that the lack of competition
between American and foreign
goods has become so marked that
the people began to talk about the
tariff duties being too high. The
people have found the absence of
foreign competition in the markets
of this country has made it possible
for the American manufacturer TO
increase his prices at his own sweet
will, without regard to actual mar
ket conditions.
In the republican platform there
the tariff upward or downward.
The party simply pledged itself to
make such revision of the tariff as
would equalize the cost of produc-
tion here and abroad and make
competition possible in this coun-
try in many lines.
1t was the duty of congress to
make this revision. Congress did
not do it. 1t did not even attempt
Cannon and Aldrich the tariff was
revised without the slightest heed
to the cost of production of any
thing. 1t is of no avail to reduce
the duties of any commodity IL
the duty is left so high that the
domestic producer can still main
tain his prices by keeping out COM
petition or even make his prices
higher than before and still have
lower duty. Some duties were re-
duced, but not so it would benefit
the American people in any way.
because there was no effort made
to get the productive cost of the
article.
PRICES INCREASED
In many cases the charges were
left so high that the price on many
articles was increased in the face
of reduced tariff and because the
domestic manufacturer was not
afraid of foreign. competition.
Here is sample: The duty on
steel rails was reduced from $7.24
a ton to $5.93 ton, and still the
United States steel corporation is
able to maintain a price of SIS a
ton because we make rails SO much
cheaper than In other countries;
The cotton schedule was actually
raised an average of 25 per cent
simply by changing the duties from
ad valorem to specific duties, and
this was one of the biggest frauds
perpetrated by congress in revising
the tariff.
In all the long debate on the
tariff bill Senator Aldrich never at
tempted to apply the standard OF
The hIl apeny pyedge agd
contemptuously repudiated every
word of that platform pledge. In
all the evidence taken by the house
ways and means committee there
were not a. dozen items of the
5000 in which a showing was made
as to the cost of production at
home and abroad.
REPUDIATED
1t was an open and explicit re-
pudiation of our platform and a
perversion of the protective theory.
/ am not an insurgent republican
If it is said that I am insurging
against the republican national
platform. I am insurging against
men of the Cannon Aldrich stripe;
men who are openly violating the
pledges of the party and advancing
the cause of monopolistic control
The Insurgents or progressives. a
better term offer two remedies.
First, knowledge of the cost of pro-
duction. No one knows what the
different items of cost now are.
of an intelligent. independent, inn
partial and nonpartisan tariff COM
mission.
The second remedy is to make a
rule whereby any schedule of the
tariff bill may be revised at will
without going through the whole
of the tariff schedules. This would
eliminate the intolerable vice of
the present system whereby con-
gressman will make combinations
with other members and will vote
for many schedules he believes are
absolutely wrong to get schedule
he believes is right.
1 and all progressive republicans
sincerely believe in the protection
theory, but we do not believe in
allowing monopolies to control the
Industries of the country.