198 



CONGRESS. (REVENUE REFOEM.) 



from State, county, and municipal obligations. 

 He contributes nothing to the support, the 

 progress, and glory of the nation. Why 

 should he enjoy unrestrained equal privileges 

 and profits in our markets with our producers, 

 our labor, and our tax-payers? Let the gen- 

 tleman who follows me answer. We put a 

 burden upon his productions, we discriminate 

 against his merchandise, because he is alien to 

 us and our interests, and we do it to protect 

 our own, defend our own, preserve our own, 

 who are always with us in adversity and pros- 

 perity, in sympathy and purpose, and, if 

 necessary, in sacrifice. That is the principle 

 which governs us. I submit it is a patriotic 

 and righteous one. In our own country, each 

 citizen competing with the other in free and 

 unresentful rivalry, while with the rest of the 

 world all are united and together in resisting 

 outside competition as we would foreign inter- 

 ference." 



Mr. McKinley denied that the Mills Bill, 

 though it professed to aim at a reduction of 

 the revenue, would have that result so far as 

 its tariff changes were concerned : " Take from 

 this bill its internal-revenue features, its re- 

 duction of twenty-four and a half million dol- 

 lars from tobacco and from special licenses to 

 dealers in spirits and tobacco, eliminate these 

 from the bill, and you will not secure a dollar 

 of reduction to the Treasury under its opera- 

 tion. Your $27,000,000 of proposed reduction 

 by the free list will be more than offset by the 

 increased revenues which shall come from your 

 lower duties ; and I venture the prediction here 

 to-day that if this bill should become a law, at 

 the end of the fiscal year 1889 the dutiable list 

 under it will carry more money into the Treas- 

 ury than is carried into the Treasury under the 

 present law, because with every reduction of 

 duties upon foreign imports you stimulate and 

 increase foreign importations ; and to the ex- 

 tent that you increase foreign importations, to 

 that extent you increase the revenue." 



Mr. McKinley criticised certain inconsist- 

 encies in the details of the bill, and then de- 

 nounced one of the main features of it : " Now, 

 there is one leading feature of this bill, which 

 is not by any means the most objectionable 

 feature, but which, if it stood alone, ought to 

 defeat this entire measure; and that is the 

 introduction of the ad-valorem system of as- 

 sessment to take the place of the specific sys- 

 tem now generally in force. You all know the 

 difference between the ad-valorem system and 

 the specific mode of levying duties. One is 

 based upon value, the other upon quantity. 

 One is based upon the foreign value, difficult 

 of ascertainment, resting on the judgment of 

 experts, all the time offering a bribe to under- 

 valuation ; the other rests upon quantity, fixed 

 and well known the world over, always de- 

 terminable and always uniform. The one is 

 assessed by the yard-stick, the ton, and the 

 pound-weight of commerce, and the other is 

 assessed by the foreign value, fixed by the for- 



eign importer or his agent in New York or 

 elsewhere; fixed by the producer, fixed by 

 anybody at any price to escape the payment 

 of full duties." 



Of the value of a home market and the dif- 

 fusion of profits under a protective system, Mr. 

 McKinley said : " Why, the establishment of a 

 furnace or factory or mill in any neighborhood 

 has the effect at once to enhance the value of all 

 property and all values for miles surrounding it. 

 They produce increased activity. The farmer 

 has a better and a nearer market for his prod- 

 ucts. The merchant, the butcher, the grocer, 

 have an increased trade. The carpenter is in 

 greater demand; he is called upon to build 

 more houses. Every branch of trade, every 

 avenue of labor, will feel almost immediately 

 the energizing influence of a new industry. 

 The truck-farm is in demand; the perishable 

 products, the fruits, the vegetables, which in 

 many cases will not bear exportation, and for 

 which a foreign market is too distant to be 

 available, find a constant and ready demand at 

 good paying prices. What the agriculturist of 

 this country wants more than anything else, 

 after he has gathered his crop, are consumers 

 consumers at home, men who do not produce 

 what they eat, who must purchase all they 

 consume; men who are engnged in manu- 

 facturing, in mining, in cotton-spinning, in the 

 potteries, and in the thousands of productive 

 industries which command all their time and 

 energy, and whose employments do not admit 

 of their producing their own food. The 

 agriculturist further wants these consumers 

 near and convenient to his field of supply." 



After arguing that a protective system main- 

 tains high wages for the laborer, Mr. McKinley 

 asserted that it also tends to reduce prices of 

 commodities, and he illustrated his position as 

 follows : " Blankets are numbered according 

 to grade and according to weight. There are 

 several grades of five-pound blankets numbered 

 3, 2, 3, 4, and 5. A No. 1 five-pound blanket 

 made in the city of Philadelphia sells for $1.72. 

 The labor represented in the blanket is 87^ 

 cents; the duty is $1.02. Of a scarlet blanket, 

 five pounds, the price is $2.27; the labor is 

 87i cents; the duty is $3.17. Of the white 

 all-wool Falls of Schuylkill blanket, the price 

 is $3.62; -the labor, $1.05; the duty> $2.60. 

 Of the Gold-Medal blanket the price is $4.53 ; 

 the labor, $1.05; the duty, $3.50. 



" Now, Mr. Chairman, if the duty was added 

 to the cost, what would the American manu- 

 facturers get for these blankets? They should 

 get for the first blanket $2.74. How much do 

 they get? They get only $1.72. They should 

 get for the second blanket, duty added, $3.77. 

 How much do they get? They get $2.27. They 

 should get for the third $5.12. How much do 

 they get? They get $3.17. They should get, 

 duty added, for the fourth class $6.22. How 

 much do they get? They get $4.35. They 

 should get, duty added, for the highest grade 

 $8.03. How much do they get? They get $4.05. 



