Daily Kennebec journal., 1911-04-17
The Farmers Free List.

How quickly they begin talking
about 'class legislation" when it is
some one other than the farmer who
is the victim of tariff changes! Wow,
1t is SUCH an injustice. OF course
this farmers free list is all wrong,
in the minds of those who have shout
ed themselves into conniptions for
reciprocity,
We would not claim that this farm
ers' free list" is fair or any other than
a Democratic move to capture the
benefits of the Republican reciprocity
blunder. But we do claim that it is
just as fair as the secret attempt to
cut the farmers income from under
him. Incidentally not as many people
outside the soil workers will benefit
by the farmers free list as would be
injured by reciprocity.
1t was the injustice of the reciprocity
plan which We have opposed from the
start and we should not have opposed
it, nor would there have been need of
an extraordinary session of Congress.
If some sort of an american farmers
recompense" had been arranged stimuli
taneously with the reciprocity. Of
course much of this farmers free
list Democratic sop to the farmers)
is folderol-useless except in sound
but it is something. 1t ought to have
been more and better. and the Friends
OF protection ought to have arranged
it.
The following clipping from the Ros-
ton transcript is a mild sample of the
objections that are sure to follow.
charging class legislation" The or
gan of hyphenated invective may be
expected to fly off the handle again.
the Democratic free list reported to the
Rouse IS drawn up to conciliate the far
hlefs az the expense of the manufactur-
ers; All the things the farmer must have
ana many of those he may have will he
iree OF duty if this list should become
law Goods manufactured for farmers
nave no protection. but goods of the same
@ r,a.tfial not primarily intended for far
iiers consumption have as much prOtec-
lion as the Payne-Aldrich tariff left them
IL Is proposal for class legislation. this
lree hst, devised to the end that the con-
Suiiier VINO is not a farmer shall derive
as as ittle advantage from it as possible.
me ejaculation plainly is that the pro-
posal, the reporting of this series of sons
10 the farmers will have great influence
on the agricultural vote in 1912. and still
more II it is enacted. The determine
tioh or the Democrats to put it through
the House without amendment is in ac
cordance with the policy underlying its
production. There are "jokers'' in it, one
at least, having been unearthed bv Con
| gressnan Hill, Rep, of Connecticut who
toid ms Democratic colleagues that the
clause covering baked confectionery had
Deen so qualified that ii was nugatory.
but the Democrats Were in no mood Ia
listen TO criticism of their magnum opus
and the bill comes in. "jokers' and all
me argument for this one-sided free
farmers are entitled to compensation for
| the loss Of protection that will follow
| reciprocity with Canada. If they are
not 10 nave the duties on food stuffs they
now ENJOY they ought to have manu-
featured goods of which they make the
most use free. The sufficient answer is
that while by Canadian reciprocity the
farmers VIII be exposed to the compe-
ttioh OF one country. the Democratic free
nst would expose the manufacturers ia
the competition of all the world a dis.
crimlnatlon so unjust as to be of itself a
sufncient condemnation of the whole
project
the cry on which Democrats RELY for
popular support in the West and South
against the East. is that their free list
VIII reduce the cost of living. The corol-
larry Is that prices are altogether deter.
| inihed oy the tarir, whereas it ought to
De evident to all candid investiga tors
that the tariff is by no means a Governing
factor; Whether the cost of living viii
be reduced or not by the enactment OF
the proposed free list, the cost of conse-