The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1914-10-30
Permanent Prosperity
Continued from Page One.)

This was passed only by logrolling,
oy trades and deals, and by the lash
Of party regularity.
That law, in substance, said that
such prosperity as we then had might
90 on if nearly all the people and most
business interests would allow them
selves to be robbed for the benefit of
very few business interests and
small fraction of one per cent Of the
people.
Result Inevitable.
or course the result was inevitable.
Not only did the majority resent the
inequality and injustice OF that law but
he moral sense of the nation was
shocked and outraged. In debate on
the floor of Congress, and later in dis
cussion before the people. the Payne
Aldrich Tariff Law became quite as
much a moral as an economic ques-
lion.
So the party under whose name this
aw was framed up was put out OF
power and the other old party, prom
sing to correct those abuses, put into
power. Last year this party tore the
Payne-Aldrich Law all to pieces and
made a new tariff law from beginning
10 end.
This new law is quite as unjust as
the old law was. For example, 1T
leaves the American farmer out in
the cold altogether and treats him
precisely as though he were a China
man, a Russian, or an inhabitant of
any other foreign country. Yet it is
now we'll known that the problem of
fertilization of our comparatively eX-
nausted lands is alone enough to re-
quire protection of farm products if
the American farm is to supply the
future food of our own people. And
this injustice is only one of the many
with which the present tariff abounds
What They Promised.
Yet, time and again, the leaders Of
the party in power boldly said that
his new law was sure to do several
.hings 1t would, they said, cut down
the cost of living; at the same time
t would raise the prices of the farm
ars products by the same process it
would give labOring men more en-
plOyment at better wages: it would
expand our foreign trade. increase the
output of our factories, mills and
mines: and greatly improve the bust
ness and increase the profits of our
domestic merchants.
Every one of these predictions and
promises was made formally, with the
cocksureness OF absolute certainty;
and there is no doubt that many of our
people believed that all these things
would come to pass. The country found
out, before the great word-war came
On. just how accurate were these
claims of the authors of our present
tariff law.
world in arms now suspends, for
a season. the operation of any tariff;
and IT, after a while. the farmer finds
The prices Of his products going up he
will know that 1t is because he is call
ed on to feed battling nations; if fac
tories and mills again begin to run
night and day, and the laborer returns
70 his work at good wages. it will be
because the factories and mills of 9TH
ar nations are cold and silent, and
because their artisans and workmen
are on the battlefield; if our flag once
more appears on the oceans, it will be
because foreign ships are shut up in
pert, engaged in conflict or at the
bottom of the deep.
Propose Worse Law.
Before the war began, however, and
even since, the very same men who
made the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Law
asked the people to let them and their
party make another PayneAldrich
Law II the people needed these men
we should have an even worse law
than the Payne-Aldrich Act: for these
men would say, and with some show
Of reason. that the people are so dis
gusted with the present law that they
will tolerate any kind Of high tariff
no matter how high or extortionate 1t
may be.
Indeed. these men are saying this
very thing right now Also. the shat
tered commercial and industrial inter
ests of other nations would furnish
them a cover for enacting anything