Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-05-26
EXPECT PASSAGE OF NEW TARIFF
LEGISLATION IN FULL HARMONY
Leaders Believe Bill Is on Way to Triumph,
With Only Few Republicans
Voting Against It.

tually thinking is the subterranean fact
which makes 1t impossible to predict
that the tariff question in the United
States is going to be genuinely settled
by the legislation now walking its way
into the statute books.
The essential character Of this leg
islation after it leaves the house will
not be changed by the Senate. The
Senate will take the bill as 1t comes
from the House and will simply make
1t, as one might say. more So"
Almost every spacious element In our
population will be, as the phrase goes,
substantially satisfied by the bill
This is the reason why the opposition
in the House on the Republican side
has been so generally f1attened out.
The corn farmers are the only really
large class Of farmers among us for
whom the bill could have done some
thing and for whom nevertheless 1t Is
doing nothing The increase in the
tariff on corn from Is cents to Is cents
a bushel is an empty gift. Imports OF
corn are negligible. The effect Of a
tariff of a million dollars a bushel on
corn would be negligible. What the
corn farmers really wanted was q stiff
tariff on blackstrap molaSses and on
sago and tapioca in order to promote
the use OF corn in the manufacture OF
industrial alcohol and Of starch. They
are not getting it. Corn is our largest
crop, by far, in acreage. There is a
chance that the Senate in this respect
may do what the House has failed
to do.
Virtually all other important classes
of farmers have been considerably rec
ognized" by the bill The dairy farm
ers get numerous increases. The fruit
farmers and the nut farmers get some
strong increases. The vegetable farm
erS get increases which in many in
stances are prodigious. The cattle
farmers get quite drastically height
ened tariff wall against the cattle of
the farmers of Canada.
This last increase, while thoroughly
in harmony with the present accepted
principles Of tariff construction. has
raised acutely the question as to whether
or not those principles are wise.
Cattle Import Small.
The total number of cattle and
calves in the United States in 1927
was approximately $4,000 The num-
Der of cattle imported in that year
from Canada was only approximately
400, 900.
1t is asked:
Might it not be better, not from the
cattle mans standpoint, but from the
Nations standpoint. If we let the Ca
nadians freely send us their relatively
few cattle II in return they would be
able more abundantly to purchase from
us our oranges and our lemons and our
pears and our grapes and our berries
and our peaches. for which Canada is
already our chief foreign market?
Might it not be better, in other words,
to set up between ourselves and the
Canadians a system of division of labor
and Of exchange of commodities and
services rather than system of COM
petitive exclusion whereby. in the end,
If we take less Of the products OF their
ranches they will inevitably take less
Of the products of our orchards?
That. ESSENTIALLY. is the query pro-
pounded by the Cordell Hull school of
thought. The present new tariff bill
will GO to the country scattering salts
faction" to a multitude of interests, In
ternational and agricultural, and yet
pursued by a haunting Interrogation
mark. 1t is the climax Of the accepted
system. There is speculation as to
whether 1t may not be also the prelude
to another. 49,.
CCopyrisht, 1897