, 1921-07-19

n.,;.v than any other system presented since the
foundation Of the government The schedule OF rates
of duty is not intended as an insurmountSble bar
rier 10 the imports of other manufacturing nations
but to place their cheaply produced articles on an
equality with our own more costly GOODS Vnen IN com
petition in our own market, by taxing them FOR suen
goods as we do not produce or cannot successfully
produce. there is the free list; and this gives 70 other
nations the advantages Of friendly exchange.
The duty Of t~hirty-fve cents a barrel on crude pc
troleur,. and twenty-five cents a barrel on fuel oil
proposed in the new tariff bill is questioned as a ma
tional benefit, in certain quarters
It need not be. 1t is sound Republican policy. We
have in Mexico a competitor for our local markets.
Mexican oil is more cheaply produced and therefore
Mexican oil must pay. The same is true Of the by
products, which are not absorbed by the markets OF
the Sorid as readily as the raw material These To-
cal markets are reserved TO US by the protective tariff
The contention that the domestic oil supply is lin
tied and will soon be exhausted, has been rung with
variations since oil was discovered. To prove the
fallacy Of the contention and the fact that nature is
inexhaustible new, better and larger oil fields have
been regularly brought in when demand insisted.
Others will follow. The enterprise of American dis
covery and development can be depended upon in the
future as in the past.
The other argument that a duty laid upon oil with
the design of stimulating output is in conflict with
another established and approved policy, that Of con-
serving natural resources, may be set down as un-
tenable. The development and use Of natural re-
sources was intended by the creator else these essen
tials, for the use of mankind, would not have been
placed in natures storehouses- The only requirement
is their economical use. The fear, constantly ex-
pressed that all the oil IN the vorld VIII De squan-
dered. and our descendants will have to sit around in
the dark and will have no gasoline for their fivvers
is every bit as silly as it sounds. Our descendants
are not going to use oil for light, neither are they go
ing to use gasoline for motor fuel. Electricity or some
other newer force will take care Of all that. And as
for the by-products don't worry science and the
Standard Oil company will both be on the job in
that day.
There is one other point in which the claim is put
forth that, the United States is inconsistent, even
stultifes itself, when it protests against exclusion
from tbs development of Mesopotamian and other
Asiatic oil fields, and then places n tariff on the i'm
%portation Of foreign oils into the United States. The
United States has asked Of other countries an equal
right with other nations to enter oil territory and de-
velop it. This same right being extended by the
United States to come into her territory for the same
purpose, to all other countries.
A tariff on oil such as is written into the forth
coming act is perfectly proper and in line with trsdi-
tional Republican policy. There is no more excuse
for free oil than there is for free wool or any other
raw product we produce.