The New York herald., 1921-02-23
Half a Hundred Tariffs Needed.

Half a Hundred Tariffs Needed.
There Is sense ana there may be
success in the tentative plan to inn
provise a temporary tariff measure
out OF the old Payne-Aldrich law,
modified to meet present world condi-
tons which are various and varied
but not battling.
The PayneAldrich tariff. of course,
is dozen years old and this is q diff
ferents country and different world
from what we knew when that leg
islation was enacted in 1909. But ii
embraces all the fundamental prin-
ciples OF the American tariff system,
and with necessary readjustments to
make it workable and effective it may
serve TO navigate the country under a
jury rig, so to speak, until Congress
can provide Il soundly reasoned and
carefully worked out measure.
No tariff scheme Is going to be worth
the powder 10 blow it If it does not III
some way equalize, not merely the
lower labor costs, as expressed in
wage terms, but the fiuctuating eX-
changes Of the whole world, where
some countries are solvent but with
slightly deprecated currency, and
others are bankrupt with q currency
utterly worthless.
Obviously rigldity OF tariff rate
which would keep out an avalanche
of British goods, manufactured with
labor charges not excessively lower
than our own, would not be effective
against Japanese goods manufactured
with labor charges very much dnder
the British standards. But obviously
also French exporter whose goods
We're paid for by the exporter in
francs worth only about one-third
their normal value could land his
wares in this country to be sold at
American prices, as against the Brit
ish exporter whose labor was paid in
n currency worth four-ffths its nor
NAL value.
No tariff designed to regulate i'm
ports from the normal or near normal
country would be Of the slightest
avail against German goods paid for
in Germany with a currency only one
fifteenth Of its normal value, but
offered in this country for American
gold.
There Is no getting away from the
fact that for years to come the only
tariff that will safeguard American
industries from tidal waves of i'm
ports will be flexible arrangement
infallibly working to express import
valuations in common measure when
they reach our custom house. Cheap
foreign cost, rs 70 the wage Itself
or as to the money paying that wage,
must be equalized at our port of en-
Try, otherwise We shall have no power
of control over vast quantities of
goods dumped upon our markets.
Otherwise, also, we shall be exclud-
ing the goods Of solvent countries
that owe us prodigious treasure and
want TO pay their debts. while we
shall be admitting the goods OF in
solvent countries that will drain us
of our substance while undermining
the very foundations Of American
industry.
This country. in other words. must
have not one tariff but. in effect. half
hundred tariffs. They must work,
each in it's application to its particu-
lar object. with impartial justice TO
the exporting country. whether it Is
Great Britain, France. Japan. Ger
many or Czecho-Slovakia. They must
work with perfect precision to the
welfare and security of American in
dustries and labor. The American
dollar. then. must be the weight in
the import scale to measure the value
of the foreign article which comes
here for sale against our own home
production, whether at the factory OF
on the farm.