172 



CONGRESS. (THE TARIFF BILL.) 



" We begin our task by an effort to free from 

 taxation those things on which the industrial 

 prosperity and growth of our country so largely 



" Of all the reductions made in this bill there 

 are none in their benefit to the consumer, none 

 in their benefit to the laborer, that can be com- 

 pared with the removal of the taxes from the 

 materials of industry. We have felt that we 

 could not begin a thorough reform of the exist- 

 ing system, built up, as I have shown, story by 

 story "until it has pierced the clouds, except by 

 a removal of all taxation on the great materials 

 that lie at the basis of modern industry, and so 

 the bill proposes to put on the free list wool, 

 iron ore, coal, and lumber. 



" Perhaps I should add that with wool we in- 

 clude all other fibers. I do not believe that it 

 will be necessary for me to take up these arti- 

 cles one by one, and discuss them at length be- 

 fore the committee. 



" Twice in recent Congresses the battle for 

 free wool has been fought, and twice it has been 

 gained in this House. All the reasons for it and 

 all the reasons against it have been presented to 

 the American people. Free wool has become an 

 acknowledged and well-understood part of the 

 Democratic scheme of tariff reform. 1 myself 

 believe that if every other item in this bill were 

 stricken out, if in the wisdom of this committee 

 every other proposed change were abandoned, 

 yet if we could carry through a bill putting 

 wool on the free list and reducing the duties on 

 woolen goods, we should make a great, benefi- 

 cent, revolutionary step in the work of tariff re- 

 form that would justify all the efforts we have 

 put forth. 



" Mr. Chairman, if there is any one great in- 

 dustry as to which we could throw down to-day 

 our tariff walls and defy the world's competi- 

 tion, it is the great iron and steel industry of 

 this country. The consumption of iron and 

 steel is a test of civilization. The consumption 

 of iron and steel is a test of the material prog- 

 ress of any country. All the other countries of 

 the world put together have not kept up with 

 the progress of the United States in the last few 

 years in the production of iron and steel. The 

 world's product of pig iron in 1878 was but little 

 more than 14,000,000 tons. The United States 

 alone produced, in 1892, over 9,000,000 tons. 



" In 1878 our product was but little more than 

 2,000,000 tons. That has been due, sir, to the 

 fact that in this great undeveloped country of 

 ours, where we are as yet but running to and 

 fro to find out its resources, we have found 

 along the Appalachian ranges of the South, 

 around the Great Lakes of the North, deposits 

 of iron ore, so rich, so easily worked, so accessi- 

 ble to other materials, and so convenient to 

 our cheapest systems of transportation, that we 

 can now mine the ore and make the pig at less 

 cost than anywhere else in the world. With the 

 rich deposits upon the surface, with the im- 

 proved methods of mining, with the aid of elec- 

 tricity and the steam shovel, with all the inven- 

 tions and improvements that accompany the 

 march of a great developing American industry, 

 we can load iron ore upon the boats on the lakes, 

 or upon the cars in Alabama and elsewhere, at 

 less than the cost of getting it to the pit's 



mouth, in the countries from which we have 

 been fearing competition. 



" So true is it, then, that the tax on iron ore is 

 no longer needed to protect us who have the larg- 

 est product of all the world; so true is it that 

 any little stream of foreign ore that might come 

 from Cuba or elsewhere would only increase the 

 use of domestic ore by combination with it ; so 

 true is all this, that but for the timidity and 

 selfishness that come from thirty years' leaning 

 on the tariff, the iron masters of this country 

 might to-day boldly say : ' Throw down the bar- 

 riers ; we will not only supply our own country, 

 but we will go out and build up other great 

 countries with our products.' 



" There is now a duty of 75 cents a ton on 

 bituminous coal. The Republican platform of 

 1892 called for duties on foreign imports to com- 

 pensate for the wages paid in their production in 

 this country as compared with the countries 

 from which they come. 



" In the testimony before the Committee on 

 Ways and Means it was proved that in my own 

 district the cost of mining was from 40 to 60 

 cents a ton ; that in the district of my colleague, 

 in what is known as the Pocahontas region, the 

 cost of mining is from 25 to 30 cents a ton. 

 That is what is paid to the miner. We are not 

 only the great iron-producing country ; we are 

 the great coal-producing country of the world. 

 If the regular book of the coal trade Saward's 

 Coal Trade, 1893 is reliable, and I suppose it is, 

 we have 192,000 square miles of territory under- 

 laid with coal, of which 120,000 square miles 

 can to-day be profitably worked. Three times 

 more than three times greater than the coal 

 area of all the rest of the world. With such ex- 

 haustless supplies, so close to the surface that 

 the cost of mining has been reduced to a mini- 

 mum to less than is possible in Nova Scotia, to 

 less than is actually paid in England the ques- 

 tion of a tariff on coal is neither a question of 

 protection nor a question of revenue, but simply 

 a question of subsidy to the great railroad cor- 

 porations of the country. 



" As to lumber, another article put on the free 

 list, I need say but a few words. Logs, as every 

 one knows, have been free for years. Under the 

 existing tariff we are denuding our forests and 

 rapidly destroying the most valuable part of our 

 timber. It is not contended that the cost of 

 lumbering in this country is materially higher 

 than in the countries from which we might im- 

 port such products. Along the Canadian bor- 

 der the work is largely done by the same labor 

 on both sides of the line, and I presume at prac- 

 tically the same rates. Here, again, we are a 

 large exporter. Our export of dressed and fin- 

 ished lumber is one of the growing, as it is to- 

 day one of the largest, items in our export trade. 

 If we can send our lumber to Europe, to the 

 West Indies, to South America, we can certainly 

 compete, we can certainly hold our home mar- 

 ket without the aid of a tariff. 



"I have already said, Mr. Chairman, that I 

 believe no tariff bill could carry any benefit to 

 the American people comparable to the proposed 

 release from taxation of the materials of indus- 

 try. Better give a workingman untaxed mate- 

 rials to work with than give him untaxed cloth- 

 ing to wear. Better give him untaxed materials 





