300 Presidential Addresses 



perhaps paralysis in the industries and business of 

 the country. The fact that the change in a given 

 rate of duty may be thought desirable does not set 

 tle the question whether it is advisable to make the 

 change immediately. Every tariff deals with duties 

 on thousands of articles arranged in hundreds of 

 paragraphs and in many schedules. These duties 

 affect a vast number of interests which are often 

 conflicting. If necessary for our welfare, then of 

 course Congress must consider the question of 

 changing the law as a whole or changing any given 

 rates of duty, but we must remember that when 

 ever even a single schedule is considered some in 

 terests will appear to demand a change in almost 

 every schedule in the law; and when it comes to 

 upsetting the schedules generally the effect upon the 

 business interests of the country would be ruinous. 

 One point we must steadily keep in mind. The 

 question of tariff revision, speaking broadly, stands 

 wholly apart from the question of dealing with the 

 trusts. No change in tariff duties can have any 

 substantial effect in solving the so-called trust prob 

 lem. Certain great trusts or great corporations are 

 wholly unaffected by the tariff. Practically all the 

 others that are of any importance have as a matter 

 of fact numbers of smaller American competitors; 

 and of course a change in the tariff which would 

 work injury to the large corporation would work 

 not merely injury but destruction to its smaller 

 competitors; and equally of course such a change 



