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The Commoner.
4
VOLUME 9, NUMBER 25
EDUCATIONAL SERIE
The Commoner.
ISSUED WEEKLY.
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THE COMMONER, Lincoln, Nob.
i .
"Tho divine -law, wounded and offended in
this world, must possess the inward force to
heal Itself from tho wound, to reinstate itself
in Its own form. In that nationality, by whose
Injury humanity has been most cruelly violated,
tho idea of humanity must most powerfully
vibrate. Our death was necessary, our rising
up will ho necessary; in order that the word
of tho Son of God, the eternal word of life,
may djffuso through the social circles of tho
world. It is through our nationality, tortured
to death upon the cross of history, that it will
bo revealed to the human Bpirit, that the politi
cal sphere must be transformed into a religious
sphere, and that the temple of God on earth
must bo, not this or that place, this or that
form of worship, but the whole planet. For
tho earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof."
S1GMUND NAPOLEAN KRASINSKI.
If it is true that President Taft was asked
to break tho senatorial deadlock in Illinois, we
prefer to believe, in view of the results of that
deadlock, that he firmly refused.
Western republican organs are always telling
us how their senators have been taking falls
out of Senator Aldrich, but the Aldrich sched
ules continue to get into the tariff bill.
Who said Philadelphians are slow? A Phila
delphia lawyer filed a suit for personal injury
damages, and the records show that he filed
the suit sixty days prior to tho dato of the
alleged injuries.
The money invested in one modern battleship
would establish an experimental farm station
in every state in the union, or build two $40 000
iabor temples in every state, or build l'.OOO
miles of macadamized roads in one year.
Yes, a few republican senators are doing
fairly well on some of tho tariff schedules, but
the bulk of tho republican senators and mem
bers continue to pile up tho taxes and to" laugh
at the consumers who were foolish enough to
expect reduction at tho hands of the "friends of
protection."
The Times-Dispatch of Richmond, Va., says
that "even a United States senator is a servant
of tho people, and the humblest journal has
full freedom to . criticise his official acts."
Thanks. The Qommoner appreciates this vindi
cation of the right to criticise, and will endeavor
to exercise tho right with wisdom and nioder-
TAXES THAT ROB THE COMMUNITY
Franklin Pierce writes in the New York
World as followti:
A large proportion of the tariff schedules aro
so high and the American monopolies have made
them so effective that the consumers in this
country, by reason thereof, are actually paying
an enhanced price for necessaries equal to the
whole cost of labor in the protected manu
factures How does tho reader like this? Out of your
Income scanty, perhaps you pay the whole
labor cost of most of the products of American
protected manufacturers, and you pay it under
tho humbug plea that it only covers tho differ
ence between wages in the United States and in
Great Britain and continental Europe.
Tho value of all manufactured products in
the United States in 1900 was $14,800,000,000,
and tho total wages paid in factories that year
were $2,600,000,000; and even then, when the
trusts wero not in full efficiency, tho American
people, because of the tariff, probably paid out
of their own pockets the greater part of that
entire labor cost for the encouragement of man
ufacturing. Not only this, but the duties are so
high on a great part of the dutiable imports
that they actually prohibit the importation. Tho
cases in which they prohibit the importation are
generally cases where 'he duty is known as a
compound duty, specific and ad valorem so
much duty per pound or per yard, together with
an ad valorem duty. The result is that the
cheaper grades of materials pay much higher
ad valorem duties than the costlier, and tho
class of goods worn by the poor in practically
all cases are kept out.
According to Mr. H. E. Miles, chairman of
the tariff committee of the National Association
of Manufacturers, who testified before the ways,
and means committee, the entire labor cost at
Pittsburg of converting iron ore, coke and the
other materials which go into a ton of pig-iron
is 90 cents, while the tariff on pig-iron is $4
per ton. The duty on a ton of pig-iron is
more than four times the entire labor cost.
Before the industrial commission Mr. Schwab
testified that the cost of converting pig-iron
into rails was $3.75. The duty on steel rails
is $7.84 a ton. Deduct $4 duty on pig-iron
and we have a duty of $3.84 to cover a labor
cost of $3.75 for converting pig-iron into steel.
The wage cost of the American Brass com
pany in making their output is 17 per cent of
the total cost, while the tariff is 45 per cent;
and this company exports $4,500,000 worth of
product yearly and sells it in competition with
the rest of the world.
The builders of railway cars have a wage
cost for their product of 19 per cent, yet the
tariff on their product is 45 per cent, and they
export about $9,000,000 worth yearly.
The wage cost of labor in refining to the
American Linseed Oil company is, according to
Mr. Miles, about 3 per cent of the value of the
product, while" the tariff on the product is 50
per cent.
The Glucose trust has a total wage cost on
its product of about 11 per cent, while the gov
ernment extends to it a duty upon importations
of from 46 to 69 per cent, and this trust actu
ally exports about $3,000,000 worth of product.
The government kindly extends to the tobacco
trust duties running from 147 to 155 per cent
on imports of competing product, while the wage
cost of its product is only 19 per cent of the
value of the product. The internal revenue tax
upon tobacco is the reason for a considerable
part of the duty on tobacco.
The rubber trust pays in wages about 15 per
cent of the value of its product, while the gov
ernment affords it a protective duty of 20 to
It ?Z nn?1' anM ?Is rust exDorts about
$5,000,000 worth ,of product.
The sugar trust, with a labor, cost of 3 per
cent of the cost of its product, is protected by
a practically prohibitive duty of 72 per cent on.
refined sugar.
The woolon goods trust, with a labor cost of.
18 per cent of its product, is protected by well
nigh prohibitive duties. of 55 to 135 per cent'
on cloth, 70 to. 118 per cent on dress goods, 96
to 141 per cent on knit fabrics, 86 to 144 per
cent on flannels, and 96 per cent on felts
Mr, George IL .Mayor of the house of John
Lucas & Co., of Philadelphia,, appeared before
the industrial commisison in 1900 and testified
that the Pittsburg Plate Glass company con
trolled 80 per cent of all glass sold in tho
United States, and that since the passage t.f
the Dingley hill in 1897, the Pittsburg Plate
Glass company had increased its price to John
Lucas & Co. in the amount of 150' per cem.
Testimony was given before the ways and means
committee recently that the specific duty on
the foreign cost of many imports of plate glass
is in the neighborhood of 160 per cent of tho
cost value abroad, and that all branches of im
ported plate glass, figured 'cut on an ad valorem
basis, runs from 89 per cent to 160 per cent.
Paragraph 364 of the Dingley bill provides
that "wool and hair which has been advanced
in any manner or by any process of manufacture
beyond the washed or scoured condition, not
specially provided for in this act, shall be sub
ject to the same duties as are imposed upon
the manufactures of wool not specially provided
for in this act. This provision was made for
the benefit of the Arlington mills, which have
a monopoly in what are known as tops chang
ing wool through combing, at a cost of 2 to 5
cents per 100 pounds.
The provision which we have cited above, to
gether with paragraph 366 of the Dingley bill,
results in giving to this mill a protection of
1,480 per cent on the cost of combing wool.
When yc;U buy a jack-knife of foreign make
for 50 cents, you pay a duty of 150 per cent
thereon. When your wife buys a pair of the
cheapest foreign scissors, slie pays a duty of at
least 100 to 150 per cent, and she pays on the
commonest table knives and forks a duty of
100 to 22 per cent. The duty on a pound of
Sumatra tobacco, the foreign cost of which is
75 cents, is only $1.85, or 34 per cent.
The educating process in religious matters
of these monstrous duties is well illustrated by
the zinc producers of, Joplin. Mr. S. Duffleld
Mitchell, of Carthage, Mo., appeared before the
ways and means -committee on November 25,
1908, and asked for a duty of 1 cents per
pound on calamine, an ore of zinc, produced
far away in Mexico, and brought from Mexico
to' the Kansas and Missouri smelters at a cost
for ore and freight of abo.ut $12 a ton. Al-
though admitted free, only 59,000 tons of this
zinc ore found its way to the Joplin district
in 1907. The Mexican ore has only 40 per
cent of metallic contents, while the Joplin ore
has 60 per cent. This 1 cents duty per pound
on metallic contents would mean $12 a ton on
the 40 per cent Mexican ore and $18 per' ton
on the 60 per cent domestic ore. While Mr.
Mitchell, and his associates were pleading with
the ways and means committee to keep out
Mexican ore, and thus materially increase the
price of galvanized and brass products, the
clergymen of Joplin were praying for the con
version of the ways and means committee, and
while the clergymen prayed the choir sang a
hymn, the refrain of which we are told was:
So now we humbly pray that we
Be saved from ruin's brink;
We will accept whate'er must be,
But Lord remember zinc.
FRANKLIN PIERCE.
New York, March 15.
THE HANDS OI? AGE
The hands of, youth are smooth and beautiful,
And round, and finely formed, and white, and
cool.
SSL1,1"1 knwn two old and twisted hands,
with knotted veins; and fingers bent with work,
No grace of form is left to those worn frames
Wherein the hidden grace of life doth lurk.
But thin, and cramped, and old, they on thent
bear
The scars of those who toil and struggle much
The patient strength of all the 'earth is theirs.
And tenderness untold is in their touch.
The hands of youth are white and soft with ease.
But God hath clasped such twisted hands at
these.
Henrietta Sperry in Smith College Monthly
Mr. Carnegie is going to .-write a . magazinq
story and .tell us how much he .has spent for.
libraries, and how it made him feei to, spend it
He should follow up this story by another one
confessing just liow he made it
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