THE AMERICAN TARIFF.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1716, 5 April 1913, Page 4

THE AMERICAN TARIFF.

0 * The telegrams reporting the nego--1 (nations —or tho newspapers' account: i of tho negotiations—between the Prei sident of the United States and mem--0 bers of the Ways and Means Commite tec arc not very clear or very ade- • quate. We arc definitely told, how--1 over, from two isources that an agreef mcnt has been come to so far as wool i is concerned, which means, we sup- - pose, raw wool. The report is to the 3 effect that tho Democrats have do- - cided upon placing raw wool on the - frco list, and this greatly interests -■ Australksia, as a large wool-produc-r ing country, foi: at present the duty f on raw wool is about sixpence a l pound, a duty that is almost pro--1 hibitivo. No article in consumption 1 figured so largely as wool in the 3 tariff fights in America in 1911-12, E and it was upo:i "Schedule K." (the I wool and woollens schedule of the i American tariff) that the most vigor- - ous stand was made against the high- - tariff Republicans by tho Democrats I and the "Progressives." During . February, when the Democratic mem- ; bers of the Ways and Means Com- , mittec were considering tho business j of tariff revision, under the direction i of Mk. Underwood (whose Bills in , the last Congress, striking a fairly - heavy blow at tho Payne tariff, were ; vetoed by tho President), one of the j most influential New England Demo- ; crats said: "Tt.c Republicans were ■ destroyed by their wool schedule ■ more than by anything else." He i added, however, that it would not dc i (i.e., that it would not be safe for the . Democrats) to go too far in the other . direction; and his statement was { taken as ail indication'that however ■ vigorously Radical Congressmen : breathe fire and slaughter against t - "Wall Street," they are secretly . worried about how Wall Street feels. The reported decision of the Demoi crats to commit-themselves to "free . wool" is of special interest and im- ; portancc from tho fact that even so i lately as six weeks ago some of the soundest of the anti-tariff critics predicted nothing more than a "reasonable cut" at the tariff, especially sc far as "Schedule K" vas concerned. The Boston correspondent of-the New York Post, for example, wrote on February 20 of a brisker business tone as a result of "decreased apprehension" over the tariff question. This correspondent represented thai the manufacturers were so well established that tliej- could afford, although they would not cease to oppose, a substantial "revision downwards." Some of tho larger interests in New England, ho said, wero indeed desirous of a reasonable tarifl out," in order, that "tho public clamour against ovcr-prot«ction' : might be stilled. There is nothing we know of which goes to show that tho beneficiaries of tho tariff have any other purpose in countenancing any reduction of tho oppressivelj high duties than this fear thai "standing pat" might only defer, tc .. make more drastic when it came, the inevitable reduction of the tariff ,tc a point more nearly favourable tc the interests' of tho'-consumer. President Wilson has'denied that he is a Freetrader. Like Mr. Underwood. apparently, ho favours a revenue t u ri i? kased on the. principle that it shall give to thei American manufacturer such protection as will "equalise the cost of production." Such a position would in England be called a purely Protectionist attitude, and it speaks wholo volumes for the oppi essivo character of* tho existing American tariff that to Americans it seems to bo the attitude of a prettv bold Freetrader. The old Republican position was well described by Mr.'Roosevelt, in a speech at Providence in August during his campaign tour, as the defence of a tariff for privilege in industry." ( He described the Underwood, or Democratic, proposal as "a tariff for the destruction' of industry." His own proposal was entirely vague as to details, but its general principio was "a tariff in the interest of labour.": "We stand for a protective tariff, but we wish to see the benefits of the protective tariff get into the envelope of the wage-worker." Mr. Roosevelt stands—or at any rate stood—for what in Australia is called "the new protection." Nobody, it will be seen, has tho courage to 'come' out squarely for the abandonment of the Protectionist principle: they are all Protectionists of one sort or another. There is now some prospect, however, that tho Democrats may, from a Treasury point of view, go a good deal further in tho way of cutting the tariff than they would once have cared to go. At the beginning of February a unanimous vote by both Houses in Wyoming made up the three-fourths majority by States necessary to the incorporation in the Constitution of the amendment (which will be known as the "Sixteenth Amendment") giving Congress power to levy a general income tax. It has been estimated that a rate of income taxation which can become law will yield a. hundred million dollars a year, and as the Customs revenue amounts to three hundred million dollars,' it is evident that an income tax will enable a considerable reduction of duties to be made without embarrassing the Federal Treasury. In tho meantime the schedule which most concerns Australasia is the wool schedule. A freo. entry for wool will strengthen and improve our market.through its stimulus to wool consumption in tho States, even if it does not even enlarge tho territory _of our salesi, Similarly, a reduction of the American tariff on mutton would increase tho consumption of mutton, and so increase the general demand for it. But at every stage there are interests to be fought, and we are still a lolig way from seeing any substantial lowering of the American tariff wall.