The Tariff in Our Times

by Ida M. Tarbell

It was not until about noon of Saturday that Mr. Kelley, pale from fatigue and suffering, presented the report. The House was in a state of the greatest confusion at the time, the galleries crowded with visitors, many of whom were women, the corridors alive with excited lobbyists, the floor in disorder from the running to and fro of Democrats, still bent on obstruction, and of moderate Republicans anxious but hardly daring to defeat the report. Such was the din that Mr. Kelley could not be heard when he tried to read a statement showing the changes the conference had made. The Democrats would have none of his statements—they wanted the whole report, schedules and all, and so the worn-out clerk was called to read the entire document.

Two hours were then allowed for debate. Mr. Carlisle criticised the bill in sober and dignified language, his chief point being that the bill did not, could not produce the decrease Mr. Kelley claimed for it—that it was for that reason a deception. Others of his side were violent over the increases; many sarcastic over the acceptance of a Senate measure. “They have swapped the Constitution for a high tariff,” declared Mr. Tucker. But the criticism of Mr. Carlisle and his friends was not so severe as that of those high protectionists who had failed to get the increase they asked, particularly of the supporters of higher duties on wool. “I have voted with the protectionists of Pennsylvania and with the protectionists of New England,” complained Mr. Robison of Ohio, “with the assurance—the most positive assurance—that this great interest I represent should be taken care of, ... and you have stricken us down.”

There is no doubt but that on the morning of the 3d there was very real doubt about the report being adopted. The moderate protectionists on the Republican side were against it, and all conservative Republicans were disgusted with the jugglery which had brought it through. A strong high protectionist element, too, including Speaker Keifer, was against it—but before four in the afternoon, when the debate was to close, the tide turned. It was the pressure of the country which did it. From one ocean to the other business men commanded and implored over the wires that the bill pass—good or bad. So many telegrams, it was said, had never before been received in Washington. And so the bill passed. And a few minutes before Congress adjourned it was signed by President Arthur.

At the time of its passage nobody knew what was in the bill of 1883, such had been the juggling. But this was certain, everybody but the persons who had saved their duties was disgusted with it. Mr. Sherman went home to meet a political storm such as he had never met before—a storm which forced him to explain and defend himself. It was raised by the dissatisfied wool-growers. The Democrats went out with the story of the barter and trickery which had attended the measure. The Republicans everywhere were obliged to defend themselves for doing or not doing. Dissatisfaction was increased with the testing of the bill. It did not produce the reduction promised either in internal revenue or in customs. The bill went into operation July 1, 1883. In the first year of its operation it reduced duties only about $20,000,000 (from $210,637,293 to $190,282,836). The average reduction on iron and steel proved to be only 4.54 per cent; on clothing wool 10.73 per cent; on woollen goods 1.01 per cent. On many articles there was an increase: 13.11 per cent on earthenware; 1.48 per cent on glassware; 2.54 per cent on cotton goods.

But there were more serious features still. Mr. Sherman says in his “Recollections” that the “Tariff law of 1883 laid the foundation of all the Tariff complications since that time.” The lack of “harmony” in duties, the failure to protect all interests equally—wool and woollens, iron ore and pig-iron, and their products—was what disturbed Mr. Sherman. If we are to have protection, his view was, all must be protected. “The dogma of free raw material is more dangerous to the protective policy than the opposition of free-traders.”

There was something more serious than the failure to admit the claims of all to protection. It was the semi-official recognition of the organized business man in the making of tariff schedules. True, they had been more or less active in every bill since the war, but never before had their right to stand day and night at the doors of Senate and House, to sit in committee, to be closeted in every leisure hour with their representatives in Congress, been conceded. It was recognition they were not likely to forget. Moreover it was demonstrated clearly in 1883 that the size of the duty is according to the size of the organization. The quinine-makers, even with Mr. Kelley’s help, were unable to get their product off the free list where it had been put in 1879, but they were a feeble folk—only four of them in the country! The pottery people, on the contrary, received an advance of some 13 per cent on their wares, for they were strong in Ohio and New Jersey. Mr. Joseph Wharton, standing alone, had to submit to a reduction of 50 per cent on his nickel; standing with iron men he suffered a reduction of only 4 per cent on his pig-iron. It was a great lesson in the value of organization and numbers.

CHAPTER VI
GROVER CLEVELAND AND THE TARIFF

The most conspicuous political figures in the United States in the fall of 1883 were two Democrats—John G. Carlisle of Kentucky and Samuel J. Randall of Pennsylvania, rival candidates for the Speakership of the House of Representatives. Their contest was something more than a struggle for leadership. A grave question was at stake. Should or should not the Democrats open the tariff question? The Republicans had passed a bill violating their own promises. It was the second time in twenty-two years that they had broken faith on the question. Mr. Carlisle claimed that the Democrats should now make it their duty to effect the reforms so long promised and every day more needed. Mr. Randall claimed that the tariff should be left to the Republicans.

Two men could scarcely have offered a greater contrast in training, in methods, and in ideals than the two thus thrown into prominence. Sam Randall was the older and by far the more experienced in national affairs. For several years he had been the leader of his party. He had accomplished this mainly by the coolness and the skill with which he led a weak minority so that it frequently was able to frustrate the plans of a big majority. To play the parliamentarian game successfully against such odds as Randall faced had aroused enthusiasm and devotion and given him supreme power. The first serious shock to Randall’s leadership came in the early ’80’s. Then the issue of tariff-for-revenue only became acute with his party and he could not follow, for Randall was a protectionist of the Kelley brand. In youth he had been a Whig, but in 1856 he and his family went over to Buchanan, largely on the ground of personal liking, it seems. In Congress he had always supported the high tariff arguments and bills, without ever bringing much light to the question, for he was not at all well equipped for tariff discussion. Indeed, as late as the bill of 1883 he went about the House studying a little handbook on the tariff—for the first time posting himself on the vocabulary and the schedules. As it became more evident that the Democratic issue was to be tariff revision, Randall’s place became more difficult, for it was a Republican district which was sending him to Congress and it was no secret that they sent him on condition that he support protection. To an outsider it seems now as if the natural thing would have been for Randall to have gone over to the Republicans at this juncture, but he believed, honestly enough no doubt, that he could force the Democrats back from the position they had taken, that he could in fact protectionize the Democratic Party.

But Randall was dealing with a bigger force and a bigger man in 1883 than he realized. John G. Carlisle, his opponent, was probably the nearest approach to a statesman then in the United States Congress. Born on a Kentucky farm, he had spent the days of his early youth at farm work, the nights over books. He had become a school teacher and in his leisure had read law. Admitted to the bar, he had continued to study until he was called the ablest lawyer in the state. Admitted to the state legislature, he had become a leader of his party by force of knowledge and intellectual vigor. Carlisle had first entered the House in 1877, fourteen years after Randall, and he immediately made a deep impression on the country by his thorough mastery of subjects, his clearness of statement, his gravity and candor in argument, and his freedom from the trickery and deceits of partisan politics. In the spring of 1882 he made a speech against a Tariff Commission which, as an argument for thorough tariff reform, was one of the ablest of the period. It really framed a strong logical position for the Democrats. His speech in 1883 when the Kelley Bill was under consideration gave his position in the tariff: