Valdez daily prospector., 1913-11-04
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 1913.
THE CONSUMER AND THE TAR
 IFF.

President Wilson's critics are work ing overtime in their efforts to make political capital out of the new tariff act, some of them going to the rep rehensible extent of predicting indus trial stagnation and lowering of wages, without compensating benefits to the consumer. Some phases of the law and its operation will be determined only by fair test of the measure. As y t there are no ln- dications that the act will fall short of the splendid results predicted for it by it's advocates.
 What more keenly interests the practical man of today is the direct effect of this change in national pol icy. In dollars and cents the benefits may not be immediate; it may re- quire some time for the country to feel the full measure of relief which the lower rates will bring ultimately That they will give real relief in due  fact stated by MT. Underwood, that "this bill, with it's twenty-six per cent average, is almost as low as the famous Walker tariff" and that in contrast with this twenty-six per cent the Payne-Aldrich law had an average of more than forty per cent -t. 1Cf 11on h. stantial benefit to the consumer, es- pecially when to this decided lower ing in the average of protection is added the absolutely open door for many articles which have been put upon the free list. The fact that ev- en the manufacturers who have fought against reductions most bit terly have ceased their predictions of ruin shows how fair and sound was the crusade the Democratic party has waged in the popular interest, and how we'll justified they were in denouncing former rates as shame less and eXtortioDate. In point of fact, the effect of the new "tarlh should be as beneficial to manufac- turers as to the people, in stimulat- ing their independence of character and their business and their commer- cial energies to meet competition without depending entirely on the pro- tecting arm of the government.
 But the great and incomparable value of this new law is in it's char acter as an act of national morality. Whether the theory of protection as an economic doctrine be true or false, it's practice in this country has been a species of licensed robbery, in con 1ict with every principle of justice and fair government. No system so dishonest could fail to be corrupting, and the same agency which has built up the colossal fortunes of few at the expense of millions of the plain people has served, by it's pernicious example, to spread the poison of de- moralization through every rank of society. IT we are more HldIeIldl, more luxurious, more eager for worldly wealth and more careless about high standards and ideals than in the earlier years of the republic, it is largely because public and bus mess virtue have been corrupted at the fountain head by a system which took one mans money arbitrarily and gave it to another and which tended by it's results to render men cynical and greedy.
 Thoughtful Americans for years have recognized that the tariff is a moral, as well as an economic issue, and the law just enacted promises to have pronounced and lasting eff. feet in redeeming and strengthening the national business character Tacoma Tribune.