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Vol. 64

The

The Puerto Rican

APR 7 1900

CAMBRIDGE, MASS.

Published Weekly

April 7, 1900

Near the beginning of last week Senator Foraker Compromise introduced an amend ment to the Puerto Rican Bill, limiting the tariff on Puerto Rican products to two years, and providing for free trade at an earlier date if the local government in Puerto Rico could raise the needed revenues by internal taxation. This amendment conciliated enough of the "insurgent" Republican Senators to secure the passage of the Puerto Rican Bill, and a vote would have been reached last week had it not been for the desire of the opposition for a fuller discussion. Since the passage of the law returning to Puerto Rico the two million dollars of revenue collected from her products subsequent to annexation, it has been generally admitted by Republican Congressmen that Puerto Rico's need of revenue furnished only one of the reasons why the party decided to establish a tariff between the United States and Puerto Rico, instead of carrying out the President's original policy of reciprocal free trade.

The change is, as we have heretofore said, due to several causes: (1) to the representations of various intereststhe cane-sugar growers in Louisiana, the beet-sugar growers in Nebraska, the tobacco companies in Connecticut, and the fruit producers in California; (2) to the protests of labor organizations fearing an influx of low-priced and contract labor; (3) to the protests of ultra-protectionists, alarmed lest a supposed basic principle of the Republican party, namely, protection, should be threatened with ultimate extinction by reason of free trade with Puerto Rico; (4) to the supposed desirability of establishing a test case for a Supreme Court decision to establish the right of Congress to legislate for a dependency without being hampered by the restraints of the Constitution. The Foraker compromise limiting the tariff on Puerto Rican

No. 14

products to a short period, which could be further shortened by the action of the Puerto Ricans, conceded a good deal to those who demanded free trade with Puerto Rico, but it left to the protected interests the opportunity to learn from the Supreme Court whether or not the retention of the Philippines would extend to their inhabitants the right of free trade with ourselves and consequent free access into our labor market. From both Republican and Democratic sources we learn that the fear of labor agitation against the inclusion of the Malays, corresponding to that of a few years ago for the exclusion of the Chinese, was the supreme motive for the proposed tariff.

The Republican Protests

The compromise satisfied nearly all the Republican Senators except those who maintain that the new possessions are in such a sense part of the United States that the people of those territories possess all the rights guaranteed to the people of the States and Territories of the United States, and that consequently the retention of the Philippines will give to the Filipinos all the Constitutional rights possessed by the people of Oklahoma. There remained, however, several "insurgents" who were unwilling to compromise the moral principle that we are bound to treat the Puerto Ricans as our own people, who refuse to tax them even temporarily for the benefit of protected interests here. Senator Cushman K. Davis, of Minnesota, took the lead among these remonstrants, and on Wednesday delivered a telling speech against any tariff whatever. He reported that Puerto Rico produces yearly 120,000,000 cigars, 250,000,000 cigarettes, and 1,300,000 gallons of rum. If these articles were subjected to our internal revenue duties

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$1.10 a gallon on rum, $1.50 a thousand on cigarettes, and $3.60 a thousand on cigarsa revenue of more than $2,000,000 a year could be secured. Yet all these articles were left untaxed, and a tariff bill pressed against which the great body of the people were protesting. "What," he asked, "are the people going to say if this bill passes? They will say: Free rum, and a tax on the flour the people eat." Senator Beveridge, of Indiana, also remonstrated against the proposed tariff on Puerto Rican industry, but his protest was less aggressive. His speech, delivered on Thursday, was largely an argument that the territories which "belong to" the United States cannot be "a part of" the United States, and that Congress was given by the Constitution a "free hand" in dealing with all the Territories. The fact, however, that Puerto Rico did not possess the Constitutional right to "reciprocity" did not absolve us from the duty to grant her this privilege, and he would vote for an amendment granting the island immediate access to our markets. Nevertheless, if this amendment failed, he would support the compromise bill asserting the right of this country to tax the territories as we see best, unrestrained by any provision of the Constitution. The day following Senator Proctor, of Vermont, made a forcible speech against the proposed tariff, in which he indicated that he would not accept it under any circumstances. With him, of course, are Senators Hoar, Mason, Wellington, and possibly one or two other Republicans, who maintain that "the Constitution follows the flag." Over against these, however, may be set Senator McEnery, of Louisiana, and perhaps one or two other Democrats, who will support the compromise bill, making its adoption almost certain.

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licans. Not in recent years has there been against any measure in Congress a popular feeling more deep, more intelliget, and more creditable to the country. So far as can be judged from the statements of leading Republicans and an examination of official Republican journals, the Far West, the Northwest, and the Middle West are almost a unit against the proposed tariff; and, with few exceptions, the leading Republican journals in the Middle States and in New England are also opposed to it. One of the foremost Republicans of the Northwest put the matter tersely last week when he declared that the instincts of the people are against the tariff, and when the instincts of the people are against a measure it is to be presumed that the measure is wrong. The President, in the judgment of many of the most open-minded men in his own party, has made the greatest mistake of his life in consenting to abdicate his leadership and modify his free-trade message at the demand of men possessing, as the result has proved, less popular and political sagacity than himself. The bill may pass the Senate in some form; it is doubtful whether, if it goes back to the House, it can pass the House again; and, in our judgment, if, under party pressure, it is pushed through Congress, it will cost the Republican party heavily at the polls in the next Presidential election.

The United Socialists

In the Presidential campaign of 1888 there were two feeble but hostile labor parties in the field, bearing the incongruous names of the United Labor party and the Union Labor party. This year it seemed for a time as if there would be two feeble but hostile Socialist parties in the fieldthe Socialis: Labor party, which for several years has polled a considerable vote among the German immigrants in New York, Chicago, and Milwaukee, and the Social Democratic party, which has recently shown such unexpected strength among American voters in Massachusetts. Apparently, however, the anomaly of two unsocial Socialist parties may be avoided, for a convention held last week in New York City seems to have secured some measure of union for the approaching campaign. If

the fusion is completed, the United Socialists will support the ticket recently nominated at Indianapolis, on which Eugene V. Debs was named for President, and Job Harriman, of California, for Vice-President. Mr. Debs was the organizer of the American branch of the Socialist party, and to his remarkable work as an agitator must be attributed in large measure the attention which his programme is arousing, not only in Massachusetts, but also in the extreme West, and even in some of the cities in the South. This programme, as stated in the platform adopted at Indianapolis, aims at the ultimate public ownership of all the means for the production and distribution of wealth. Its immediate demands are: the public ownership of all natural monopolies and of all industries controlled by trusts; the reduction of the hours of labor in propor-tion to the increasing facilities for production; the inauguration of public works for the employment of a large number of the unemployed; equal rights for men and women; public insurance against accidents, lack of employment, and want in old age; the adoption of direct legislation, and the abolition of war. In the campaign of 1896 Mr. Debs and many of his lieutenants supported Mr. Bryan, but this year they are hostile to him-partly because his programme is not sufficiently radical, but chiefly because his antagonism to trusts shows him to be "at heart an individualist." The Socialists welcome the trusts almost as much as the monopolists, for they believe that domination by private monopoly will necessarily introduce domination by public monopoly; in ther words, that the success of trusts will prepare the way for State Socialism. The Outlook is so far of the same opinion as to believe that the remedy for trusts is not a return to individualism, but a forward movement toward a government at once more highly organized and more democratic.

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given testimony incriminating the Republican Secretary of State and other party leaders. The latter have been held for trial, but the character of the witnesses against them is too doubtful, and the rewards for testimony of this kind are too great, for any judgment to be passed until the court has tried the case. Unfortunately, this trial may be postponed for several months. The defense, it is reported, will demand that the case be transferred from the Frankfort courts to some part of the State where public sentiment is less hostile to the accused. As regards the case involving the legal rights of the Republican and Democratic claimants to the Governorship, one of the State courts has decided that the decision of the Legisla ture is final, and the Court of Appeals is expected to reaffirm this view. In that event the Republican Governor will try to appeal to the Federal Supreme Court, but Judge Taft's recent decision indicates that the Federal Courts will not interfere. At present both claimants are exercising the functions of Governor, and different State and Federal officials are recognizing whichever their party preference dictates. Governor Nash, of Ohio, has refused to honor requisitions from Kentucky unless they are signed by both "Governors."

The Grand Jury and

the Police

The presentment handed in by the New York March Grand Jury, of which Mr. George Haven Putnam was the energetic foreman, cannot be disregarded by the Tammany officials in this city. It has too much weight behind it, it is too definite, and it is too confirmatory to prevalent impressions of the revival of the old-time connivance between city officials and crime, and of the revival of the system of revenue which flows from the unnatural combination of the keepers of the law with its violators. The extraordinary spectacle has been presented in this county of the failure of the District Attorney to give any aid or help to the Grand Jury in its work; indeed, so clear was their conviction that he was a hindrance rather than a help, that the Grand Jury felt compelled in certain cases to exclude the District Attorney from its sessions. In their attempt to arrive at the facts respecting the charges that

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