The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1922-05-23
WATSON TAKES PART
IN TARIFF DEBATE
JOINS ISSUE WITH THE IDAHO
SENATOR. UNDERWOOD AL
so ATTACKS MEASURE.

WASHINGTON, D. C.-All prod
ucts OF the farm are on the dutiable list
in the McCumber- Fordney tariff bill,
Senator Gooding, Of idaho, chairman
of the republican agricultural tariff
bloc, announced today in the senate.
IF any farm product is on the free
list | do not know what it is" he
said III we find it we will put it on
the dutiable list if it needs protection"
Senator Gooding said the average
rate of duty in the bill on farm prod
ucts was II $40 per cent, and called
attention that only few things pro-
duced by the farmer were on the du-
table list in the Underwood law.
Watson Takes Issue.
Declaring that this was the first tar
if bill ever framed that gave the farm
er a square DEAL" Senator Gooding
charged that 'all this delay in the
senate" was for the purpose of mold
ing public opinion to the idea that
this bill is infamous"
The tariff is a laboring mans ques-
ton, Senator Gooding said, adding
that there was no use CT talking about
going back to pre-war costs.
Following Mr.. Gooding Senator
Watson, Of Georgia, took issue with
the Idaho senator's statement, deelar-
ing it was to the effect that slave
pressure" was responsible for the low
tariff sentiment in \the south. He de-
clared he had opposed high duties be-
cause they resulted in the southern
people paying the tax" on everything
they bought while the benefits went
to few privileged interests. Mr.. Wat
son said he noted in the congressional
directory that Mr. Gooding was born
in England.
''Yes, unfortunately, | was" inter-
rupted Mr. Gooding, land that is one
of the reasons | am a protectionist.
/ went to work in lace factory when
l was 7 years old, and I know the
conditions in free-trade England"
Labor in South.
The Georgia senator replied he did
not think Mr.. Gooding had yet ex-
planned his statement about the south
ern idea OF tariff rates, and Mr.. Good
ing retorted that the south did not
respect" its labor as the north and
west does.
But show me a country or a sec
tion of a country" returned Mr.. Wat
son, where labor has made the prog
ress it has in the south.
He added that since the negroes
were freed they have come to own
lands, banks and stores, and Senator
Harris, of Georgia, interrupted to say
that the south saw little in the pend
ing tariff bill that could possibly help
but much that could hurt.
Replying later to Senator Gooding,
Senator Underwood, of Alabama, said
he belonged to the school of thought
which believed that congress had no
or moral right to use the
taxing power of the government for
the purpose of building up fortunes
or tearing them down.
Il am just as much opposed, he
said, ito the idea, under the guise of
a tax, of taking money out OF the
pockets of all the people to build up
an industry and making a few per-
sons rich as | am to the idea OF ex-
tending the power of taxation to such
an extent as to confscate property as
it has been conhscated in soviet Rus
STA under the red flag"
Senator Underwood insisted that
for every 81 of protection that the
farmer would receive under the pend
ing bill he would have to pay 500
in taxes to producers of necessities
which he used. He asserted also that
if it were not for the support given
to the bill by the agricultural group
in the senate it would be impossible
to pass the measure.