Los Angeles herald., 1910-02-15
TARIFF AND PRICES

JUDGING by the general increase in
| prices, it is evident the merchants
~ of the United States have made up
their minds the tariff will add to The
cost of living That there has been an
| increase cannot be disputed, Facts,
/ figures, instances are abundant, and it
is the subject of official inquiry. What
action may be founded on the inquiry
| il is difficult to guess.
All that has been accomplished by
| inquiry to date has been to confer the
sanctity and dignity of an oath on
! communications that We're matters of
common knowledge.
But what has baffled congressional
| inquirers (who do not care to put the
blame on the tariff, and 50 will
probably remain bafhed), and has puz-
zled economists of the hidebound typeS
is plain to the inspirational explanatory
| genius of writer in our respected
contemporary who has solved the eco
nomieaI problem, and has explained
why there are 10000 hungry children
| in Chicago, and thousands more in
| other great cities of the United States.
Our friend boldly and BADLY says
the fathers of starving families are to
blame for their starvation.
| Only a writer of extraordinary and
unusual inexpcrience could have origin
ated the following passages:
Alas, there are hungry children
| ~, b11t ba noouc from
| which the innocents suffer are not
| to be laid at the door of any tariff
| bill, present or past There are un-
natural fathers in Chicago, as there
are in every city in the world, who
care too little or nothing at all
| for their offspring.
| There are men who spend their
| earnings on their own selfish, mean,
sinful and base pleasures, and let
their children go hungry. There are
| hungry children the world over
whose fathers are very liberal.
They are hail fellows we'll met
| with Tom, Dick and Harry and all
the rest of the Christian names in
the world. 1t is "Have cigar with
| me-" "Come and have drink"
The treat costs 25 cents, which
| would furnish the child at home
| with a full days ration. But the
child is not yet educated to smoke
cigars nor to drink cocktails. The
| money goes for the qualification of
the mans passions or pride, and the
child goes hungry. Alas, there are
men in the world who, no matter
| how much they earn, are always
| poor and always will be, with fam
lilies poorer than they are. There
are easy marks who will hand out
fac dollar piece, a ten or twenty
in order to show good fellowship
when some bum companion asks
for loan, while at the same time
| they know their homes are squalid,
| their wives need clothes and their
children are hungry
! OF the existence of the easy marks
of our friends acquaintance we have
no knowledge. In fact, we never sus-
pected there were such people in Cali
fornia until he betrayed the secret.
Men who will hand out a fve-dollar
piece, ten or twenty-phew!
Our contemporary is wildly erratic
in endeayoring to place the blame of
the hunger and destitution of thou
sands upon thousands of American
children on the irresponsibility or go
ciability' of their parents Men with
families must buy provisions and
clothes for them. When tariff, COM
bined with other causes, raises prices
so that the earnings of these men are
swamped, and they are unable to make
proper provision for their families. It's
adding insult to injury to accuse the
poor, harassed, care-driven citizens,
with whom we sympathize most in
tensely of having brought their penni-
lessness upon themselves by their reck-
less extravaganza. Any writer or any
man who would venture such an expla-
nation in the face of facts is modern
Pharisee.