Iron County register., 1911-04-20
POLICY OF PLUMBER
SOME FACTS ABOUT THE INioul.
Tous TAX ON WOOL.
Schedule Well Described by President
Taft as MISUNDERSTANDING
Game to Which People OF
Country Submit.

If the United STATES should be cut
on suddenly from the rest of the
world you would be in heap of troa-
BILE about the time you should go to
buy your next winters suit of clothes.
Prices would be way up, and the
stock to select from scanty. You
would find the same difficulty in buy
ing underwear and blankets and car
pets.
This country produces only little
more than half the wool 1t uses. With
out the product Of foreign countries
there wouldn't be anywhere near
enough to go round. Even as 1t is.
wool is SO valuable that none Of 1t is
wasted. The rag man goes about and
gathers up old clothes, which are
chopped up. The yarn is saved and
made into inferior grades of cloth.
The shoddy and the mixtures Of
wool and cotton testify to the scare
fly Of the pure fabric.
, Woolen goods are among the neces-
saries of life, like shoes and bread
and butter. Every family must use
them. Certainly 1t is for the general
welfare that they be produced at as
reasonable price as possible.
But there are some great western
syndicates raising sheep, and there
are some great eastern corporations
manufacturing WOODEN cloth, and 1t is
fn fhniT, irktn hok h. al ~
kept high. A few weeks before the
ways and means committee met to
frame the Payne-Aldrich tariff bill
representatives Of these two branches
Of the wool industry conferred in Chi
cago and decided that the tariff rates
on wool and woolens were "satis-
factory" and must not be changed
Satisfactory" 1t is to Taught On
the variety of wool which is so scarce
in this country that it simply must be
imported In quantities to supply the
people, the duty Is IL cents pound,
which is nearly half as much as the
wool is worth. The American people
maintain an artificial price half as
much again as the commodity is
worth, on an article which every fam
lily must have, in order to swell the
profits of the sheep-raising syndicates
of the western plains.
But don't the manufacturers com
plain of the price of their raw mate
rial? Not they. They are In on the
grab themselves. Lest foreign manu-
facturers, buying their wool at rea-
sonable price, sell the finished prod
lst in the United States at figure
that might bring woolen suits and
woolen underwear and woolen blan-
kets within the reach of every family,
The importation of woolen goods is
heavily penalized.
The American manufacturers are
first given duty which is calculated
to compensate them for the extra
price they must pay for their wool.
Then on top of that they are given
another duty just to make sure that
hey have the field virtually to them
selves, SO that they can get their own
prices for their fabrics.
On one variety of dress goods, for
Instance, of which a large quantity
8 imported, they are allowed first tho
compensatory duty Of AZ cents "a
)ound to compensate them for the
/ cents pound which they must
,ay extra on their raw wool, counting
our pounds of raw wool to one pound
If the finished fabric. In addition
hey are allowed So per cent ad
'alorem. The total protection to the
is more than 100 per
'ent on the value Of the product.
That is, SO long as he keeps his price
It about twice what the fabric could
,e bought for abroad, he need fear
10 foreign competition. r.
And the American people stand for
his sort of a hold-up game, worked
W combination of western syndi-
ates and eastern corporations!
Is it any wonder that President
Taft called this whole schedule "inde-
ensible?" Or that the wooden trust
8 in panic lest congress domi-
lated by progressives, meeting in ex-
ra session, lop off these monstrous
luties?