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Show THAT LEAD TARIFF DEBATE. We made reference last week to a debate in the Senate in which the tariff on lead was involved. in-volved. The Congresional Record of the 14th Inst, has the proceedings In full. A clause in the Mc-Kinley Mc-Kinley and Dingley tariffs, practically removes the tariff from articles sent into this country to be manufactured and then again shipped out. The first paragraph reads as follows: "Where imported materials on which duties have been paid, are used in the manufacture of articles, manufactured or produced in the United States, there shall be allowed on the exportation of such articles, a drawback equal in amount to the duties paid on the materials used less 1 -per cent of such duties." Senator Hansbrough of North Dakota, offered an amendment to that clause to exolude American Ameri-can wheat, because of the hardship it worked upon American wheat growers and because of the abuses which have crept into the system. Senator Patterson of Colorado, wanted lead, included in the amendment and made a brilliant speech to enforce the justice of his claim. This brought out the fact that the tariff does not protect the lead miner in the least. When the question was asked why the demand should be made now after the system has been accepted for years, Senator Heyburn of Idaho, explained that the system had not been willingly accepted, but that the lead-miner lead-miner was in the tolls of the lead trust and did not dare compHin, When Mr. Cleveland was elected the last time, it was just when the frauds which had been perpetrated In the importation of I Mexican lead had been unearthed. Mr. James S was in Washington and was able, by "the help 0f I some experts familiar Willi" the whole business, t0 lay the facts before Attorney General Olney jje H made an investigation and determined in his own 1 mind that the drawback could not be applied to a I metal, the quantity and value of which could not be ascertained by measurement or assay but I must rest on the frailty of the human affidavit But that ruling was reversed by Attorney Gen I eral Griggs and by Attorney General Moody and the effort of Senator Patterson was to get a legal I interpretation of the law by Congress, for under I the two last rulings it is true that if a lead miner sends ten tons of pig lead to market he has to accept the price which the lead trust offers, which is never more than three and a half cents per pound. At the same time if he wants to buy back one bar or the whole amount of that same lead he can not get a pound less than 4 7-10 cents At the same time manufactured lead, white and red lead, is twice as high in the market as when lead was worth six cents per pound, In other words the tariff on lead merely swells the profits of the trust; it is no protection to the miner. And this Is true though the miner takes all the risks, and bears all the losses, and though were lead mining to be finally forced to the wall, a very largt ratio of the gold add silver now produced would remain re-main unmined because that ratio of the precious D metals is in combination with lead in the mines H and goes into the market a bl-product. 0 The final outcome of the 'debate wa.s the H tabling of the Hansbrough amendment, an J wnen n it came to a vote directly on the Hansbrough H amendment, the Senators from Utah who hart said I nothing, voted against it. I ' It was -most unfortunate. Had the Senators from the silver States all joined to take the matter from the whims of Attorney Generals and make the law specific, it might have carried. It wa a most important matter and it was such an oppor tunity as may not come again for years, but the Senators from a State In which 50,000 ton5 of lead are produced annually, were mum as oysters H until the vote came and then by their vote they gave every lead miner in Utah a slap in the face |