| OCR Text |
Show I! J If . MEEOD OF UHWOOD TIFF !l f Dili OPEBITIOi BEFORE MMR j J : . 01 OF DEPRESSION 10 WIT j By WILLIAM R. WILLCOX j j k Chairman Republican National Committee. j A large portion of the Democratic Text Book is given up to a ijjf display of tables and text showing our wonderful prosperity under j ! Wilson and the Underwood Tariff. Strangely enough, however, the j I ; statements begin with August 1 , 1914, instead of, as would be ex- j Ms pected, March 4, 1913, or even October 3, 1913, the date of the i Mi adoption of the Underwood Tariff. fSp There Is nothing in the Democratic Text Book calling attention to the jit failures, the idle men and the depres- ' li, sion in all kinds of business from Oc- , i j tober 1, 1913, to August 1, 1914. But . j I ' after August 1, 1914, and up to the vT j :; present time, we find that the United . i States has been growing continually Hj . in prosperity, has been selling more Hl ' and more abroad, has been getting Hl j 1 ' more for what it does sell and that all ; jS this is due to Woodrow "Wilson and ' V the Underwood tariff. This sort of B ' campaign argument is insincere, not Hl lit; to use a stronger word, unless Mr. ) 'jj Wilson and the Underwood tariff m- (jj brought about and have continued the I ; war in Europe. In no other way can jj Mr. AVilson and his tariff law claim ! any credit whatever for the unprece- m i: dented exports of the last two years, ! ;f . j , any more than they can claim credit j j ( ;J for the unprecedented agricultural out- H3 ! put of 1915. "When a table of figures ! ;!j is shown giving 'the exports of manii- mi 1 jj" factures under the Underwood tariff ' ! law in one column, and under the -j ' j Payne tariff in an adjoining column, ( ! with the increased per cent made em- ' phatlc, then it would seem that there 1 ) 1 is an intention to deliberately de- H i I ceive. iff- In the first place, tariffs, that is H-j i i jijT duties on Imports, whether large or H-i h " '1' small, are not made for the purpose Hi ' 'S ' of aGCnS exports. A tariff may be H; J jJT ' indirectly responsible for sales H.4 abroad, because it may so stimulate Hji 'J home production as to enable a manu- Hk1 .' jjfl' facturer, or many manufacutrers, to HI ; Igj have a surplus that can be sold to HJ 'Bii advantage in a foreign market, but la i ' m tariffs are primarily imposed for the 111, j' purpose of affecting the goods which H 1 i fjjjj we buy, and not the goods which we Mil f fli sell. And the claim of the Democratic H' j '' campaign committee that our Immense war sales have been due to Woodrow Wilson and the Underwood tariff should be noted by the voter and given giv-en vdue consideration. The fact of the matter is that the Democratic party, or the Democratic leaders, are trying to do just what took place in 1844 and 1892. They are trying to deceive the people about the tariff. They are trying to ignore the results of the operation op-eration of the Underwood tariff during dur-ing the normal conditions and emphasize em-phasize the unusual conditions since the war broke out and make the people peo-ple think, if possible, that our war prosperity, or battlefield prosperity, has been due to Cho Wilson administration administra-tion and the Underwood tariff. Figures are given and statements are made that bear no semblance whatever to the figures of the government. govern-ment. For instance the official report re-port of the census office says that the value of our manufactured products In 1909 was $20,000,000,000, and five years later, in 1914, or two years ago, was $24,000,000,000. Now the Democratic Demo-cratic Text Book comes in and says that the total value of manufactures during the fiscal year 1916 is over ?30,000,000,000, although less than S2,- 000,000,000. These absurd statements of the Democratic campaign committee commit-tee will be published far and wide and may possibly give the impression that they are intended to give, but the voter should consider them in connection connec-tion with the actual facts, and he should consider that the Underwood tariff had a normal operation for ten months and the Wilson administration for sixteen months before the war broke out; ajd it is that normal period pe-riod that should be considered when getting at the true estimate of the effect ef-fect of Mr. Wilson and his tariff upon the country. |
