CONGRESS. (THE DIXGLEY BILL.) 



175 



increasing the profits of the domestic manufacturer 

 by putting a burden upon his competitor. That is 

 the Republican idea, and that was the idea em- 

 bodied in the MeKinley bill. Under that bill, Mr. 

 Speaker, the revenues fell. 



My friend from Maine, so far as I could under- 

 stand him at this distance, stated that there were 

 no withdrawals of gold until after the advent of 

 the Democratic Administration. I will not say that 

 I apprehended his statement correctly, but that is 

 what I understood him to say that the withdraw- 

 als of gold did not begin until after the inaugura- 

 tion of the present President of the United States. 

 What is the fact i During the nine months next 

 preceding March. 18!):} the date when the Demo- 

 cratic President was inaugurated the withdrawals 

 of gold were so 8. 746,000. That was under the Me- 

 Kinley law and under a Republican President. You 

 gentlemen recollect very well the apprehension that 

 existed in the Treasury Department as the time for 

 the inauguration of Mr. Cleveland approached 

 the apprehension that there might be a necessity to 

 issue bonds before that event took place. You rec- 

 ollect the stories that went through the press I do 

 not vouch for them that already in the Bureau of 

 Engraving and Printing they were preparing bonds 

 to be issued to build up the gold reserve. 



Now. Mr. Speaker, there is no additional taxa- 

 tion needed. We have that information from the 

 Secretary of the Treasury. We ought to be candid 

 with each other. Suppose you passed this bill; 

 suppose it increases taxation $40,000.000. and that 

 $40,000,000 goes into the Treasury each year. How 

 will that help the existing condition i The Presi- 

 dent's message to which my friend from Maine has 

 referred does not appeal for more revenue. It ap- 

 peals for a particular kind of money. If you agree 

 with him that that particular kind of money ought 

 to be piled up in the Treasury, then you ought to 

 provide some method by which it may be accumu- 

 lated. The method now suggested, as stated by the 

 Secretary of the Treasury, will be wholly inade- 

 quate to prevent or remedy that condition of things 

 which alone prompts the President and the Secre- 

 tary of the Treasury to appeal to Congress for re- 

 lief. They ask for a particular kind of relief, and 

 you offer them a supposed measure of relief which 

 you know they do not want.'' 



Mr. Payne said: 



"The gentleman from Georgia says that there 

 was a deficiency of revenue under the tariff act of 

 1890. Mr. Speaker, the tariff act of 1890 produced 

 sufficient revenue to meet the expenses of the Gov- 

 ernment down to the 1st day of November, 1892. 

 Not only that, it put into the Treasury a surplus of 

 over 138,000,000. I can not stop to" describe the 

 other benefits that are known and read of by all 

 men that followed from the tariff act of 1890 "into 

 every nook and corner of the United States. 



11 hi November, 1892. there was a deficiency in the 

 revenue. There was not quite enough to meet the 

 expenditures. But the gentleman from Georgia 

 seems to have forgotten what also occurred in 1S92, 

 when the Democracy was placed in power in the 

 White House and in both ends of the Capitol, and 

 their destructive hand was cast like a shadow over 

 every industry in this broad land. It was that 

 shadow that brought a deficiency of revenue in 

 November, 1892. It was followed by their ac- 

 quisition of power, on the inauguration of their 

 President in March, lsj)3. and by the events which 

 followed, until the Wilson-Gorman bill was written 

 upon the statute books: and from the very day and 

 hour that you placed that bill upon the statute 

 books there has been a deficiency in the revenue of 

 the Government. It is true, that for two months 

 the Treasury Department figured out a surplus ; 



but it is equally true that in each of the months 

 that followed there was an ex<-es- of expenditures 

 over the expenditures of the month preceding of 

 $7,000.000 to $10,000,000. Your deficit in tin- 

 re venue brought further distrust among the people. 



When we assembled in the summer of IS!):], the 

 President of the United States informed us that all 

 that was necessary to bring prosperity to this coun- 

 try was the repeal of the so-called Sherman silver 

 act. The Republican party united with a few of 

 you who voted for it on the" other side and repealed 

 that silver act: but we told you then that if you 

 wanted to bring prosperity back to the country you 

 should follow it by the further declaration that you 

 would not have any tariff legislation : that you 

 would not interfere with the industries of this coun- 

 try. And we predicted to you then that if you per- 

 sisted in your agitation, that if you persisted in 

 the passage of your bill, evils would come upon 

 the country ; and they have come since that time 

 and have followed as surely as night follows the 

 day. We have had this run upon the Treasury. 

 Now. the gentleman from Georgia says that there 

 is $175,000,000 in the Treasury 100,000,000 of 

 redemption fund and $75,000,000 more and that 

 is true; but you have borrowed $181.000.000 since 

 you came into power; and if you had not borrowed 

 a dollar of that money the $175,000.000 would be 

 gone and the Treasury bankrupt by a sum of over 

 $6,000.000. Do you want to continue that state of 

 things i Do you want to deal with syndicates that 

 charged a premium of $10,000,000 upon a $60,000,- 

 000 loan ? 



We propose a business method. We propose 

 that the income shall equal the outgo. Now it 

 lacks nearly $40,000,000 or $50,000,000 per annum. 

 We offer it to you. We offer it to you in the shape 

 of your own tariff bill, with a horizontal increase of 

 15 per cent. 



" How can any of you refuse to vote for it f Why, 

 you often cry that you favor a tariff for revenue with 

 incidental protection. This is your kind of a tariff. 

 We give it to you as a temporary measure. We 

 give it to you to increase the revenue. We give it to 

 your President and your Secretary of the Treasury 

 to help lift the business of the "country and the 

 Treasury out of the bankrupt condition which 

 seems to be the result of every Democratic admin- 

 istration that ever had full control of the country 

 from the time of Monroe's inauguration down to 

 the time of Grover Cleveland." 



Mr. Bell spoke in favor of the double standard of 

 gold and- silver as a remedial measure, and Mr. 

 Meiklejohn said that if amendments had been per- 

 mitted to the bill, he would have proposed one on the 

 imposition of duties on sugar which were not 

 touched upon in the bill. 



M r. Dockery said in part : 



' Mr. Speaker, the adverse business conditions 

 prevailing in 1892, under the MeKinley law, con- 

 tributed largely to the overwhelming defeat of Mr. 

 Harrison. Gentlemen will remember the cyclone 

 of disapproval which swept over this country from 

 Maine to California. Why. even the eminent 

 Speaker of this House, with" his distinguished col- 

 leagues from Maine, only escaped the wreck made 

 by that cyclone because they ' got over the bridge ' 

 before it'went down in November. 1892: and the 

 bridge went down largely because of adverse trade 

 conditions. It was "the paralysis prevailing in 

 business circles which compelled the Republican 

 party to extend $25,000,000 of maturing Govern- 

 ment bonds and take $54,000,000 of trust funds be- 

 longing to holders of national bank notes and cover 

 them into the general Treasury. All this occurred 

 long before the election of Mr. Cleveland. 



'* We find that the original outflow of gold from 



