The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1921-04-04
Early Bills Contained No
EMISSIONS - Were Made
to Pay Debts

WASHINGTON. April 4.-Many a
musty oddly of forgotten tariff statutes
| has been turned up by a search of the
capitol archives. This has disclosed that
| the first congress assembled under the
constitution faced the same problem as
will the Sixty Seventh. when it meets a
week hence-that of enacting tariff law.
| The first tariff act was passed on July
! /, 1889. It's formal title statement of
purpose-'for laying a duty on goods,
wares, and merchandise imported into
the United Statcs"-carried Il bluntness
which statesmen for the next hundred
years were to avoid.
| 1T is necessary for the support of the
government" this first congress said. for
the discharge Of debts of the United States
and for the encouragement and protection
of manufacturers that duty be laid upon
goods, wares and merchandise imported
! It was just 100 years, the compilation
shows, before such Il straightforward
statement of purpose about encouraging
and protecting manufacturers would be
made again in an import tax statute,
though the purpose was most evidently be-
hind most of the scores of following acts.
So simple was the first bill that it re
quired only two pages of the committee
print against more than 100 for the
Tariff Made to Pay Debts.
Too simple. it probably was, for a year
later-August 10, 1790-cOngress passed
IAN act making further provision for the
II payment of debts of the United States
II More deity, the purpose of the next
tariff bill as it passed on March >, 1872,
was stated to be for the raising of a far
Their sum of money for the protection Of
! frontiers" evading any remarks about
nrnTnRfInn nf or r.
/ increased. and one duty imposed was "On
coal, per bushel, four and one-half cents
I Two years later the famous Tripoli
! troubles arose and congress, on March 20,
1874, passed IAN act to protect the COM
llnerce and seamen of the United States
slapped on a general increase of 212 and
/ 10 per cent ad valorem duties. The stat
ute stated itself to be temporary, for one
year, but the title proved to be too good
10 be wasted. Year by year, after, clear
Iup to 1913, congress reiterated its laud-
able purpose, re-enacted its increased
schedules, and announced it was going
after the Barbary pirates with n contin-
uation of the tariff for another y month.
War With Britain Boosts Tarim.
In 1913, however. the nation went to
war with Great Britain, and in a haSty
and brief paragraph of statute, congress
announced IAN additional duty of 100 per
cent on all permanent duties to be col
lected for the duration of hOstlities The
tax On imported salt, incidentally. got up
to 20 cents pound.
This was about the end of the early
tariff era. according to the compilation,
For the next 40 years, most of the act
were labelled to reduce Duties Thi,
fthey plainly did, for the salt tax was
placed at 10 cents barrel. Congress was
fruitful of enactments ito release from
duty iron prepared for railways and the
j Presidential proclamations reduced
schedules even further. One dated FebrU
. airy -. 1853, noted that vessels and sub
jects of His Holiness, the Pope wer,
: no longer to be charged higher custom.
t rates, because reciprocity with the HOLY
/ See had been arranged.
Civil War Increases Duties.
+ But the tariff came back with the be
. ginning of the Civil war. Congress OF
: March ,, 1861, passed IAN act To provid
4 for payment of outstanding treasur,
= notes" It was composed of 20 pages o
tariff schedules. This length foresEadowc'
: the modern era.
= With misplaced optimism, On July Il
1862, congress asserted it had passed "a
act increasing, temporarily, the duties o.
imports. The succeeding war enactment
= took the word temporary completely on
10 of the congressional, taX-levying vocah
( Ularv.
With the end of the Civil war, acts re
4 ducing import duties went into effect, bu
e on March <. 1888, when the modern polit
8 cal controversy over tariff was we'll unde
way. the title was almost as politely eva
l. siye as the version about the Barbary p
o rates. 1t was called ian act to reduce il
c ternal taxation"
y One or two measures designed as T,
auctions interviewed, and then cOngrcs
: came back, after Il century, to speak a
}. straghtforwaUdly under President Ne
= Kinley, in 1897, as it had under Prcsidcr
= Washington. The tariff label offciau
: was AN act to encourage the industries. {
law. enacted some 16 years later, use
j., almost exactly the same words. Will
5. preliminary drafts of majority proposal
to come before the new congress. whic
e meets a week hence, indicate that Il
G.. Mckinley Washington precedent will [
respected again.
/. DUAIMERSTON.