The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1911-03-03
The President and Recinroeitr.

The President and Reciprocity.
1t does look as if we might be i'm
sight of the Promised Land when we
have the head of the Republican party
the party that has SO long main
tanned inviolate the policy Of high
protection In the United States-act-
ually adopting the arguments which
the Courier-Journal, almost as long,
has pressed against the policy of high
/ protection
President Taft, in his speech before
the Illinois Legislature Saturday in
favor of lowering the tariff wall be-
tween this country and Canada, but
tressed his contention with two of
these arguments.
| One of them was that it is prepos-
ferrous to say that the tariff on wheat
protects the farmer Of the United
States, as we grow far more wheat
than we can consume, and as the price
of wheat is fixed, not ON this side of
the Atlantic, but in Liverpool
The other was that if the protec-
tonists persist in closing their ears
to all reason and resisting all efforts
to reform the tariff in the light of
modern progress they are likely to
provoke ultimately popular revolt
that will overthrow the whole tariff
system.
Both arguments are good-as good
when made by the President in adj
vocacy of Canadian reciprocity as
they have been when made by the
Courier-Journal in advocacy of a tar
iff for revenue only. His recognition
of the fraud of a tariff on wheat is
peculiarly significant at this time.
This tariff, along with that on most
Of our agricultural products, was in
cluded in the tariff laws for the sole
purpose OF hoodwinking the farmers
into acquiescence in the tariff ON
manufactures and other commodities.
With a tariff tax on those things
which the farmers had to buy, it was
sought by a meaningless tariff on
their own products to deceive them
into believing that they, too, were in
cluded in the subsidies of the protec-
tive system and that all were protect
ed alike. BY this hollow pretense the
farmers of some parts of the country
have been kept in line for the system
under which they have been robbed,
and it is especially noteworthy that
this pretense is now admitted and eX-
posed by the leaders of the party of
protection in the urgency of his eff
fort to modify and modernize the tar
if in the direction OF latter-day COM
nonsense, equality and expediency.
Mr.. Taft must be struck by the fact
that the very policy which his party
created to fool the farmers into sup
porting protective tariff is now en-
ployed to fool the farmers into re-
sisting any reform of that tariff
All this aside, however, it is good
to see the President standing up va
liantly for the Canadian pact, and he
is more than welcome to any ammuni-
ton in the Democrats locker. He is
doing the very best thing he can do
toward re-establishing himself in the
confidence of the country and toward
saving his party from the boneyard.
The salvation Of his party is prob
ably beyond his ability, for his party
seems hopelessly lost in the worship
of the Golden Calf, but he has it in
his power to serve his country and to
confirm his own claims to enlightened
craftsmanship.
Regarded from a merely partisan
angle, the situation Is more than in
teresting. While the President was
using Democratic arguments at
Springfield in urging modernization
OF the Republican tariff, his measure
was going through committee at
Washington only by means Of Demo-
cratic votes. III it goes through Con-
gress it will be only by means of
Democratic votes, against, it seems
now, majority of the Republican
nd
The Republicans heretofore, with
considerable justification, have count
ed on the Democrats to blunder at the
critical time, but now every indica-
ton is that the Republicans are to do
the laundering. Learning nothing from
the rebuke administered to them at
the polls last November for their fail
ure to give the country any relief from
tariff taxation, they now seem bent
upon opposing so moderate a measure
of relief as that provided by the Cana
dian agreement, forcing their wiser
and more patriotic chief to accept the
assistance of the Democrats to secure
the ratification of this agreement
Meanwhile the Democrats, loyal to
the principles Of their party, have de-
termined in causus to give the Presi-
dent the necessary assistance; the
result being that, whether the agree
ment be ratified or rejected, their rec
ord will be unassailable. If it be
ratified, they will receive full credit;
If 1t be rejected, they will receive just
as much credit for doing what they
could to ratify it, while the Republi-
cans will receive all the discredit for
rejecting it. Mr. Taft, in either case,
will receive full credit with the Dem
ocrats, if he stands by his guns. AS
for the Republican party, it would
seem to be fatally split, the reaction
aries refusing to come out of Death
Valley, the progressives unable to
agree among themselves as to the
extent of their progressiveness, and
President Taft, while winning the
respect and gratitude of the country,
having nowhere any cohesive political
party behind him.
Truly, the situation begins TO take
on a mighty interesting aspect-From
Courier-Journal.