The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-10-25
THE TARIFF TAX
tBy Andrew s. Phelps.l

The Republican National Commit
 tee publishes statement In; which collection for ninety-three NniIlions of people through the custom house is $3.46. If each voter, represents five persons, he pays into Ntfle national treasury for the support of the na- tiona1 government $17-30 upon. goods actually imported into the country governmental expenses some way. there is no actual loss to the people upon actual ,i1nportation. Y
 Their statement is an appeal to vo- terE and is deceptive. in an attennp to Induce the voter to believe that
 the tariff only costs him $3.46, and that all the proceeds of it are paid into the national treasury.
 In the first instance. the importer pays the custom dues, freight broker
 age, etc. which he adds to his for
 himself, and thus establishes the do- m estic price There will be no inn
 portatiens unless as domestic price level can be established sufficiently ges and a profit to the importer. the less revenue the governcent re ceives. The more goods imported, the greater the revenue. The tariff tax with all the other charges is uI- timately paid by the consumer of the importation.
 There is a further deception in the statement of the Republican national committed, in that it leaves out of consideration, and so far as it can, eonceals the fact that our irnporta-
 tiOns constitute a very small percen- .tage of the domestic consumption of these same commodities. Yet all these commodities are sold at approx imately the same domestic prices whether made here or in foreign countries. F.
 Perhaps the most aggravated case of the whole matter is in the woolen schedule which everybody has heard more or less about, and I shall take that as an example to illustrate the principle. The average duties col Iected under the schedule for several years past equal 90 per cent of the foreign cost; the importations about 4 per cent. of the domestic consump- tion.f Domestic manufacturers who supplied the other 96 per cent. were enabled to collect 24 times as much tariff duty as the government did, 24 times as much freight and other charges as the importers paid, and A times as much profit as the inn pOrters made and sold 24 times a S many goods IS were imported if they sold the goods at the importers price. and there is only their natural desire to shut out importations to restrain them from doing SO. To accomplish that purpose they would doubtless concede in price only what was neces Sary.
 While no other tariff schedule presents so aggravated case, the gen eral principle applies to every sched- uie, that Is the domestic manufac- turer collects as much Of the tarih- freight, t etc, as he can and keep out the foreign made article. Men who have examined the subject under au- thority of the Department of Com merce and Labor, publish figures that warrant the statement that of every s7 collected from. the Consumers by reason of the tariff one dollar goes to the government and six dollars goes it more plainly, where the govern ment gets $500, O,OOO,O00 the protect ed industries get $1,800,0O0,00O. This seems a very moderate estimate con slderlng how the wool. schedule op-s crates. No other commodity except sugar, bears so high a rate and few other eomrnodities show so small a percentage of importation. z This not only shows how millionaires are made. but shows how very. many peo- pie not yet arrived at that dignity, Roosevelt says. through dividends on stock they have acquired in protect ed industries. VI .a
 The Republican committee and MT Roosevelt both insist that the fSys- tenn must be preserved althouet both admit that some -schedules need reVlslon which the Republican party promised in 1908, but their style of revision increased rather than dinain- 1shed the burden on consumers 4 Tne Democrats in Congress, aided Dy MT. LaFollette and some otterj
 Progressive Republicans's 'Prepared and passed some reasonable bills . Wnlcn MT Taft vetoed, leaving the sltua tlons substantially sthe same as it was four years ago.
 NO one believes that Democrats. if entrusted with bower, intend to do anythlng unreasonable or hasty with the tarlf system, but whatever they 90 do will be in the direction of re-] neVlng consumers of the burden, which this s1,aO0;0O0,0OO imposed up on on them If 1t is fairly stated and, the probabilities are much in it's ia a! vor, then instead of the expense per capita being $s-46. our 90. 900, 900 peo- pie pay S3:46 plus S2O or $23.46 per capita and each voter renresentS $al1:3o national taxation instead ofl