New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1913-05-17
MIR. Wilson Is Not So MARKHAM as
MIR. Redfield or MIR. Underwood.

President Wilson is not as good MARKHAM as sec
rotary Redfeld or Representative Underwood. lie
doesn't use rs much imagination as they do III III
terpreting The New Freedom in economies. fos-
sbly being himself the author of the new system OF
doctrine he knows considerably more about 1t.
At any rate he does not hold that under the pro-
posed tariff law or under any existing law MT heu-
field and lIr. Underwood have the right to Com
persize domestic industry by issuing an unfair ist
carrying the names of those producers who decline
10 proclaim by word and deed the supreme wisdom
of the downward tariff revision which the Demo
cratic party has undertaken. According TO the WISH
ington correspondent of THE New York Times
the President does not feel that the Secretary Oh
Commerce. through the Bureau of Domestic ana
Foreign Commerce. will have plenary power to apply
the blacklist and the secondary boycott to producers
who shut down their plants or reduce their LABOR
forces because they don't care to lose money operat-
ing after the Underwood law goes into effect Says
"'The Times's" dispatch:
The President was told that his statement in this
connection was very important, because the I'M
preston was abroad that whatever the bureau re
ported would be adopted and, in fact IL was au9eu,
il had been ntimated that there would be criminal
prosecutions if the bureaus recommendations were
not followed by manufacturers.
The President indicated that as there was no
such provision in the tariff law there was no IN
tenton of the administration to proceed on such d
line He explained however that If there was a
conspiracy between manufacturers TO reduce wages
that would be another matter. and might be re-
carded as restraint of trade and commerce. the
administration, he said, would not go beyond the
law.
II is consoling to know that the Bureau oil
Domestic and Foreign Commerce is not 10 DE
turned into Bureau Of Blacklistng and Secondary
Boycottng Erring "tghtwad" producers who try
TO "discredit' Mr. Underwood merely to be
dealt with as conspirators under the Sherman anti
trust law If they reduce wages or cut down theii
lists of employees they will be prosecuted 1or IT.
straining interstate trade and commerce.
That is as it should be under THE New Freedom
If manufacturers of commodities reduce wages, they
clearly are trying to set up monopoly; but II
laborers and agricultural producers combine to
raise wages and to boost the high cost Of living they
are engaged in benefcent effort TO vitalize compe
ttion and should be exempt from indictment under
the Sherman act This ingenious theory has been
embodied in the sundry civil appropriation DILL
which Congress has just passed and to which the
President is expected to affX his signature
Producers who do not want to offer UP their all
ON the altar of downward revision under threat OF
being GomperSzed will be relieved to find that they
will he committed to the mercy of the federai
courts That is better than being shot like Madero
while the way to the dungeon rooms OF the
Bureau of Domestic and Foreign Commerce.