Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1914-10-19
WILSON REVIEWS
/ CONGRESSES WORK
In Letter to Underwood He Tells
What His Administration
Has Accomplished.
IMPORTANT LEGISLATION
PASSED, HE ASSERTS
Says Tariff, Currency and
Trust Problems Are
l. Settled.

WASHINGTON, Oct. 19.-PreSi-
dent Wilson yesterday made public a
letter written by him to Representa-
tive Oscar w. Underwood, of Alabama
majority leader of the House. In the
letter the President reviewed the
achievements of his administration
and outlined the program of the next
session of Congress. He declared
the Democratic party Is now In fact
the only instrument ready TO the
country's hand by which anything
can be accomplished"
In part, the letter said:
'The White House,
Washington, Oct. IL, 1914.
my Dear Mr.. Underwood:
II cannot let this session of Con-
gress close without expressing my
warm admiration for the fidelity and
intelligence with which the program
outlined in April and December of
last year has been carried out, and
my feeling that the people of the
country have been served by the
members OF this Congress as tAey
have Seldom If ever, been served be-
fore. The program was a great one,
and it Is a matter of deep satisfac-
ton to think Of the way in which it
has been handled.
1T had several distinct parts and
Dldny iltfilSg Dul dltCl all u olht3 ~
purpose, namely, to destroy private
control and set business free. The
purpose was manifest enough in the
case of the tariff and in the legisla-
ton affecting trusts; but, though per-
haps less evident upon the surface
there, it lay at the very heart of the
currency bill, too. May I not add,
even though it lies outside the field
of legislation, that that, and that
chiefly, has been the object of the
foreign policy of the government dur
ing the last eighteen months?
''Private control had shown its
sinister face on every hand in Amer
lea, and shown 1t for long time,
and sometimes very brazenly, in the
trusts and In virtual domination of
credit by small groups of men. The
safest hiding place and covert of such
control was in the tariff. There 1t
for q long time hid very shrewdly.
The tariff was very complicated
matter; none but experts thoroughly
understood it's schedules. Many of
the schedules were framed to afford
particular advantages to special
groups of manufacturers and invest
ors That was the soil in which trade
combinations and combinations of
manufacturers most readily grew,
and most rankly. High prices did not
spring directly out of the tariff. They
sprang out of the suppression of do
nestle, no less than of foreign, COM
petition by means of combinations
and trade agreements which could be
much more easily contrived and
maintained under the protection of
high tariff than without it, The
European war came before the with
drawal of this much-coveted oppor-
tunity for monopoly could show its
full effects and active competition
bring prices to their normal level
again; but it is clear enough already
that the reduction of the tariff, the
simplification of its schedules so as
to cut away the jungle in which Sc
cret agencies had so long lurked, the
correction of it's inequalities. and in
thorough recasting with the single
honest object of revenue, were an in
dispensable first step to re-establish-
Ing competition.
Predicted Panic Missing.
'The panic that the friends of privi-
iege had predicted did not follow.
Business has already adjusted itself
to the new conditions with singular
ease and elasticity, because the new
conditions are, in fact, more normal
than the old. The revenue lost by
the import duties was replaced by an
income tax, which In part shifted the
burden of taxation from the shoulders
of every consumer in the country,
great or small to shoulders more GER
tainly able to bear 1t.
I'VE had time to learn from the
actual administration of the law that
the revenues resulting from the dou-
BILE change would have been abundant
had it not been for the breaking out
of the present war in Europe, which
affects almost every route of trade
and every market in the world out
side of the United States. Until the
war ends and until its effects upon
manufacture and commerce have been
corrected we shall have to impose
additional taxes to make up for the
loss of such part of our import duties
as the war cuts off by cutting off the
imports Themselves veritable war
tax, though we are not at war; for
war and only war, is the cause of 1t.
ut is fortunate that the reduction
of the duties came first The import
duties collected under the old tariff
constituted much larger proportion
of the whole revenue of the govern
ment than do the duties under the
new. A still larger proportion of the
revenue would have been cut off by
the war had the old taxes stood, and
O larger war tax would have been
necessary as consequence. No mis-
calculation, no lack of foresight, has
created the necessity for the taxes,
but only a great catastrophe world
wide in its operation and effects
with similar purpose and in like
temper the Congress has sought, In