Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1912-11-29
TARIFF CUT
Confined from Page u

:
The House free sugar bill, passed al
the last session, did not meet the APP
prevail of the Democrats in the Senate;
end II still rests in conference com.
mittee of the two houses.
Suggestions have been made by in
fluential members Of the Senate with
in the last week that a joint COM
mittee representing House and Senate
Democrats be formally selected be-
fore the special session begins to go
over the tariff situation and harmon
| ize whatever differences may exist
between the Democrats Of the two
bodies upon the more important tariff
schedules.
Such action would result in speedy
disposition of tariff revision, ii is be-
lieved, when the new Congress meets
| in April
Almost Continuous Work
President-elect Wilson's determine
| ton to call the extra session per-
fects record of practically continu-
Gus work upon the tariff since the
special session called by President
Taft in 1909. Following the general
revision of that year, embodied in the
Payne-Aldrich bill. there have been
attempts to devise Canadian reci-
procity system and to revise certain
schedules of the tariff law, but no
changes in the tariff have been eff
Ifected since the passage OF the Payne
Aldrich law
| There will be more than 100 new
and untried men in the next Congress.
Whether they are radical or conserva-
tive on the tariff is not known. Judged
Iby the past records of the hold-over
Democrats who have engineered tariff
revision through the House twice
under the leadership of Mr.. Under
wood, only to meet with an execu-
tive veto, the men in power in the
House may. with propriety, be called
radicals These men, in all likelihood,
will be as potent in the Sixty-third as
they were in the Sixty-second Con-
gress. II the bills constructed by
Mr.. Underwood were sufficiently
Democratic to be put up to Repub-
lican president, that leader ought to
consider them good enough party
Legislation on this economic question
to submit to the approval Of Demo
cratic executive. To do otherwise
might subject him to the things of In
sincerity in the efforts that failed of
fruition.
Few Changes Expected
For this reason it is the consensus
of opinion that the bills Mr.. Under
wood will report, and which the
House will be asked to pass, IN the
main will be identical with those
passed at the last session of Con.
gress. For the purpose ON impress
ing the Senate with it's responsibility
and bringing their tariff product be-
fore the country at an early day, there
will be little dilatoriness in reporting
the measure from the ways and means
committee. Experience has shown
that by iudicious use of the House ma.
chinery, under control of the com.
! mittee on rules, it is an easy trick to
jam big measure through that body
without unreasonable delay; almost.
it might be said, with unreasonable
haste. l.
If certain group of senator's, rec
ognized in the past as protective" in
their tendencies, act in the next Con-
gress according to form, the danger
signals will be set in the Senate. Par
ticularly will this be true if the House
insists upon an extension of the free
list and Mr.. Underwood attempts to
jam through a bill loaded with free
raw materials. There is where mum.
! Der of influential cenators will balk or
be compelled to repudiate their acts
in recent years and stultify them
selves if they reverse the positions in
which the Congressional Record. with
its history of yea-and-nay votes, has
| placed them.
The Democratic majority in the Sen
! ate will not be more than two, if the
! latest election figures stand. A de-
lection of very few Democrats, there
fore, would be sufficient to put any
party measure in jeopardy. The in
dication of any House bill that comes
to the Senate. with careful revision
of such features as may be deemed
too radical. When the tariff question
was up last year and the year before,
Democrats in the Senate were not IN
willing to vote for rates the wisdom
of which will not eneirely accord with
| the measure, if it passed both houses,
could not avoid a presidential veto.
When these same protection" Demo
Gratis know that a Democratic pres