Exhibit B.

Mr. RANDALL. Mr. Chairman, I propose to occupy the time allowed me to an examination of that portion of the bill under consideration which relates to the internal revenue, to determine whether the necessity exists for the collection of such an amount as is now imposed, and whether the levying and collecting the same is the best system which can be devised. The President in his last annual message to Congress made the following recommendation:

"I recommend that all taxes from internal sources be abolished except those collected from spiritous, vinous, and malt liquors, tobacco in its various forms, and from stamps."

Why should we not in the main follow his suggestions? I am disposed to so act in reference to this subject, and I ask his political friends in this House to give me encourage ment by their votes when I shall offer such amendments to this bill as will go to reach a practical adoption of his views.

The time has come when we can safely relieve the tax payers by a material reduction of the internal assessments, and relieve them from the present very many annoying modes of collecting such as we do assess.

I hold that the revenue derived from internal taxes should be confined to the following Sources: distilled spirits, tobacco, snuff and cigars, and fermented liquors. The necessities of the Government require that these taxes should be continued, and as far as I am informed the manufacturers do not offer serious objection thereto. The mode of collecting these taxes I propose to confine to stamps exclusively, whereby we shall be able to dispense with a large army of useless revenue officers, such as assessors, assistant assessors, and clerks, numbering about two thousand. The annual cost of their retention in office is about $3,500,000. At the proper time I shall therefore give my support to the bill introduced by the gentleman from Massachusetts, [Mr. DAWES,] and which is said to have the unqualified approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, looking to this reduction of force in the revenue department.

The rates of tax which I will propose shall be as follows: upon distilled spirits, seventy cents per gallon, to be levied and collected as now provided by law for the tax of fifty cents per gallon; upon tobacco and snuff, twentyfour or twenty cents per pound; upon cigars, one half cent each; and upon fermented liquors, ninety-six cents for every barrel containing not more than thirty one gallons, and at a like rate for any other quantity or for any fractional part of a barrel authorized by law. And a discount of ten per cent. shall be allowed upon purchases of stamps representing the tax upon distilled spirits whenever

the tax upon such spirits is paid and the stamps affixed at the time said spirits are drawn from the receiving cisterns and gauged, and a like discount upon stamps for tobacco and snuff when the tax is paid and the stamps affixed before removal from the place of manufacture; but no discount shall be allowed in any other case.

Thus to impose a single tax of seventy cents on distilled spirits in lieu of all taxes whatsoever now levied; this I consider about the same figure as fixed in the majority and minority report of the Committee of Ways and Means, when we include the additional charges they propose, which I altogether omit.

Under the present laws, there are nineteen different taxes levied on distilled spirits, to wit: 1. Distillers, gallon tax, paid by stamps.

2. Distillers, special tax, assessed on annual list. 3. Distillers, barrel tax, assessed monthly.

4. Distillers, per diem tax on distilleries, monthly. 5. Distillers,distillery warehouse stamps, monthly. 6. Distillers, store-keepers' compensation, monthly.

7. Distillers, gaugers' fees, monthly.

8. Distillers, on sales not made at distillery, as dealers.

9. Rectifiers, special tax, annual list. 10. Rectifiers, barrel tax, monthly. 11. Rectifiers, stamps, monthly.

12. Rectifiers, gaugers' fees, monthly. 13. Wholesale dealers, special tax, annual list. 14. Retail dealers, special tax, annual list. 15. Dealers, additional tax, on sales, monthly. 16. Wholesale dealers, stamps, monthly. 17. Wholesale dealers, gaugers' fees, monthly. 18. Manufacturers of stills, special tax, annual list.

19. Stills and worms, monthly.

The amount of spirits produced under the act of July 20, 1868, and from that period to July 1, 1871, the production is reported at 181,091,420 gallons, an average per year of 60,363,807; and the amount of tax received during the latter period at about seventy-three cents, and a few cents additional per gallon, if we include storekeepers' charges and gaugers' fees, was last year $46,281,848 10. The manufacturer is willing to pay sixty-five,

seventy, or even seventy-five cents, provided it is made one tax, to be paid the same as the present gallon tax, on withdrawal from warehouse, or at the still, with an allowance of ten per cent. if paid in such manner.

The bill reported by the Committee of Ways and Means proposes to consolidate the following taxes:

1. The tax of fifty cents per gallon, yielding lasti
year....
.$31,157,314 15

2. Per diem tax on distilleries..
3. Distillers' special and barrel tax
4. Distillery-warehouse stamps

Total

1,901,602 98 5,683,077 31 249,699 00 ..$38,991,693 44

for which a tax of sixty-five cents per gallon is substituted.

The average product for the three years ending June 30, 1871, was, as heretofore

| shown, 60,363,807 gallons, which, at sixty-five cents, would yield $39,236.474 55.

The other taxes from distilled spirits which the committee propose to retain, exclusive of the rectifiers' and dealers' stamps, are as follows, for the collection of which an assessment is required:

1. Rectifiers' special and barrel tax
2. Retail dealers' special tax....
3. Wholesale dealers' special tax.....
4. Manufacturers of stills, special tax......
5. Stills and worms

Total

RECAPITULATION,

$959,800 18 3,651,484 73 2,151,281 06

1.927 49

3,240 00

.$6,767,733 46

Last year's revenue, $46,281,848 10. Of this sum about sixteen million dollars was assessed, the remaining $30,000,000 was collected by sale of stamps.

Committee bill: by stamps, at sixty-five cents, $39,236,474 55; and by assessment, $6,767,733 46; total. $46,004,208 01.

The amendment I proposed, say on an average of 60,363,807 gallons at seventy cents, would yield $42,254,664 90.

The latter plan, as I suggest, would require no assessments whatever, and hence a fair deduction of the cost of such assessments from the amounts received last year, and from the estimates of the committee's bill, should be made.

I find the cost of such assessments to have been about two million dollars last year, and I see no reason to think it would be less during the coming year. Under the seventy cents tax per gallon at still or in warehouse this expense would be dispensed with, making the figures in fact as follows:

In lieu of this I propose a uniform tax on all tobacco and snuff of twenty four or twenty cents if the House so determine. This is said, in mode of levying, to be satisfactory to the manufacturers, and at a rate not perhaps all that they should have, but almost all we can at this time yield. I am not, myself, unwilling to submit to the recommendation of the majority, and place the uniform tax on tobacco at twenty cents.

There are under the present law eight distinct taxes on tobacco, snuff, and cigars. The. committee propose to reduce to six, as follows: 1. Manufacturers of cigars.

2. Dealers in leaf tobacco.

8. Manufactured tobacco.

4. Manufacturers of tobacco.

5. The uniform tax of twenty cents.

6. Cigar tax of one half of one cent on each cigar.

The amendments propose in lieu of all these vexatious taxes a simplification of two, the one of twenty-four cents or twenty cents on tobacco of all kinds except cigars, and the one of a half cent on cigars-a result much desired by manufacturer and consumer.

There are also many annoyances connected with the manufacture and sale of cigars, such as requiring them to be packed in new boxes, which is a destruction of every box when emp. tied, and the requirement that retailers shall sell from stamped boxes only, as well as others, which might all be avoided by a provision that the stamps should be affixed to each cigar instead of the box, a provision which could be readily enforced by authorizing any person who finds an unstamped cigar to seize and confiscate it.

There was realized last year from taxes on tobacco, snuff, and cigars, $33,578,907 18. The tax was levied as follows:

1. Dealers in leaf tobacco, annual list.

2. Dealers in leaf tobacco, additional special tax, monthly.

3. Dealers in tobacco, annual list.

4. Dealers in tobacco, additional special tax, monthly.

5. Manufacturers of tobacco, annual list.

6. Manufacturers of cigars, annual list.

7. Manufacturers of cigars, additional special tax, monthly.

6. Additional special tax on manufacturers of tobacco whenever his bond is increased.

The committee propose a uniform tax of twenty cents, which is, upon an estimated average

Say of 105,828,963 pounds, at 20 cents....$21,165.792 60 Cigars, &c...... 6,598,173 24

The present tax on fermented liquors is nominally one dollar per barrel, but a discount of 7 per cent. is allowed on stamps, which inakes the actual tax 92 cents per barrel. Taking the size of the packages allowed by law, and this involves a fraction of a cent in the tax on each, and the computation of the tax in brewers, assessors, collectors, and the office accounts is in consequence much complicated. The barrel is 92 cents; half barrel, 46 cents; quarter barrel, 233 cents; sixths, 15 cents; eighths, 11 cents. Taking the tax at 96 cents per barrel without discount, and the whole fractional complication is abolished, and a single stamp tax at this rate will yield more than is at present realized from both stamps and special taxes. The amount collected last year from beer stamps was $7,159,740 20; representing at 92 cents per barrel, 7,740,260 barrels, with the tax at 96 cents, this would yield $7,480,657 60, a little more

3,000,000 00 84,748,506 44

If tobacco is left at twenty cents it involves a reduction of, say............ 4,000,000 00 Leaving the net revenue at...$80,748,506 44

The tax upon banks and bankers I would combine, as far as the banks are concerned, and authorize the payment of the same directly by the banks to the Treasury, giving the Comp troller of the Currency full power to see that the payment of the same is regularly and correctly made under the terms of the existing

law.

The tax upon private bankers I would abolish, in like manner as I would abolish the tax on gas, amounting to $2,573,122,92, and on friction matches, amounting to about two million three hundred thousand dollars.

It is interesting to examine what the taxes are which the committee propose to retain, which require the employment of assessors, their assistants, and what will be realized therefrom. As far as I am able to ascertain it would be as follows:

Distilled spirits by assessment...
Manufacturers of cigars..
Dealers in leaf tobacco......
Dealers in manufactured tobacco.
Manufacturers of tobacco........
Brewers' special tax.
Banks and bankers' tax.......

Total......

$6.767.733 46

142,192 40 221.661 98 970.017 96 20,174 93

229,761 62 3,644,241 53

. $11,995,783 88

which will constitute the entire employment necessary for the two thousand assessors, assessors' clerks, and assistant assessors, whose salary and expenses amount to about $3,500,000 the last fiscal year, and is likely to be the same this year under the committee's bill.

Reduction of expense by above: Assessors, assistant assessors, and ex

penses

225

500

1,400

30 2,180

..$3,541,932 12 181.677 68 $3,723,609 80

Should the recommendations I make be in grafted on the law, as sooner or later they will and must be, then I would suggest a further amendment, looking directly to the transfer of all the duties of the Commissioner of the Revenue from the said officer to what I would hereafter call the commissioner of customs and internal revenue, dispensing altogether with the officer now known as the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, in some such language as follows: That the office or bureau of internal revenue shall be, and is hereby, abolished, and all the powers, authority, and duties pertaining to the office of Commissioner of Internal Revenue are hereby transferred to and vested in the Commissioner of Customs, who shall hereafter be styled commissioner of customs and revenue, and shall have charge and direction of all papers, books, records, and business pertaining to the internal reve nue, under the direction of the Secretary of the Treasury. And the Secretary of the Treasury shall transfer to the office of customs and revenue so many of the clerks now em ployed in the office of internal revenue as the necessities of the service may demand.

The figures which I have presented and made comparison of are not only interesting but instructive, and show clearly that the internal taxes can be at once reduced to $80,000, 000, without embarrassment to the Govern ment and with great relief to the people. Under such circumstances we, in my judgment, criminally fail in our duty if we continue them longer. I may as a general proposition declare that every dollar raised by internal taxation can be placed to the payment of the principal of the public debt, the receipts from other sources being equal to the sum required to pay the interest on that debt and the current expenses of maintaining the Government if economically administered.

My proposition is to abolish all internal revenue taxes except upon distilled spirits, tobacco and snuff, cigars and fermented liquors, and to make these stamp taxes requiring no assessment, thus doing away with the necessity of keeping up the army of assessors, their clerks, and assistant assessors, at the yearly cost of over $3,500,000, and also to abolish those nondescript officers called supervisors, who, being nominated by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, are confirmed by the Secretary, and yet are authorized by law to suspend from office officers appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, the latter at a cost to the Government of Collections of internal revenue as stated in the official reports of the Secretary of the Treas ury, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, and the Fifth Auditor, from September 1, 1862, to July 1, 1871.

There is one more subject to which I wish to direct the attention of the chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means, the members of the House generally, and the country, which I may characterize as the discrepancies in the accounts of the Treasury Department as to the receipts of public money into the Treasury during the nine years last past, from June 30, 1863, to June 30, 1871, inclusive:

$37.610.787 95

109,741.134 10

209,464,215 25

June 30, 1866.

309,226,813 42

June 30, 1867.

52,864.416 00

11,510.859 84

179,265,266 30 139.707 473 20 168.476.458 59

11,915,207 93

20,331,871 09

16.759,409 38

130,864,141 11

13,147.035 13

$1,437,648,102 79

$188,924,779 43

June 30, 1868. June 30, 1869.. June 30, 1870. June 30, 1871. Total...

* Finance report, 1871, pages 14 and 16.

265.920.474 65 191,180,564 28 160.039,344 29 185,235,867 97 144,011,176 24 $1,626,572,882 22

+ Commissioner's report, 1871, pages 278 and 279.

Auditor's report, January 1, 1871, page 163. Finance report, 1871, pages 204 and 205.

These discrepancies are of a grave and extraordinary character, reaching as high as $188,924,779 43

A merchant whose books exhibited such a state of facts would promptly bring his accountant to an examination and explanation of the same.

It is alike due to the Secretary of the Treas. ury and to the country that the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee should before the close of this debate give some explanation as to these discrepancies in the public accounts.

I yield the remaining portion of my time to the gentleman from Obio, [Mr. LAMISON.]

Mr. LAMISON addressed the House in remarks which will be found in the Appendix. Mr. TOWNSEND, of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, having had an opportunity at an early period of this session to speak somewhat at length on the subject of the tariff, I do not propose to enter into its details now. In what

I shall say I do not intend at all to speak of pig iron, and I have no doubt my free-trade friends, and my revenue reform-friend from Illinois [Mr. BURCHARD] who sits behind me, will think a tariff speech by a Pennsylvanian without pig iron" in it would be very much like Shakspeare's play of Hamlet with the part of Hamlet omitted.

I propose to occupy the attention of the committee for a short time with a branch of the subject which I have not heard mentioned heretofore in the discussions which have taken place, and that is as to the effect of a tariff on resumption of specie payments. We have been suffering for the last ten years under an irredeemable paper currency. That currency has varied in its value from thirty five cents on the doilar, as it was in July 1864, to eighty nine per cent., at which figure it is now, or ninety and one fourth cents, at which it stood a little while ago. It has been subject to great and

violent fluctuations. This has had a bad effect upon the business of the country. It has rendered contracts between man and man so uncertain that a man making a contract any day that was to be consummated at some future time would be unable to anticipate whether he would gain or lose by the transaction. It has been the bane of business. It has been operating prejudicially upon operations of all kinds and in all transactions. There has been no man so high in pecuniary circumstances and no man so low but what has been more or less affected by these fluctuations in the value of the currency.

Let us look for a moment at the condition of the currency at the time at which specie payments were suspended and as it stands now. In 1862, when the banks suspended specie payments, their immediate liabilities in circulation, deposits, and what was due to banks, amounted to $541,000,000. Their immediately available assets at that time amounted to $221,000,000, making the whole immediate liabilities in excess of immediate assets something like three hundred and twenty million dollars. We had also at that time in the country $300,000,000 in specie, of which about one hundred millions were then in the banks. The whole amount then of excess of liabilities being only $320,000,000, was, as respects the business transactions of the nation, easily managed. There was no trouble or difficulty

in the every-day operations of commerce, manufactures, or agriculture, however extended, and when a man made a bargain that was to be consummated at some future time, he had a very fair prospect of knowing what he had to pay or to receive. How is it to-day? By turning to the tables which have been furnished to us by the Treasury Department, we find that the immediate liabilities of the banks on the 27th of February last, such as notes out standing, deposits and dues to banks, amounted altogether to $1,096,000,000, to meet which the immediate assets in the banks were only $400,000,000, leaving an excess of immediate liabilities over available assets in the banks of something like six hundred and ninety-six million dollars.

To ascertain the actual condition of the country, we have, besides regarding the condition of the banks, to look at the condition in which the Government finds itself. By turning to the reports of the Secretary of the Treasury we find that at the same time the whole amount of immediate indebtedness of the Treasury was $441,000,000, the immediate assets in coin and currency in the Treasury amounted to $124,000,000, so that the immediate currency liabilities of the nation in excess of its immediate assets amounted to $317,000,000.

This amount added to the immediate liabil ities of the banks made $1,013,000,000 of immediate liabilities over and above the immediate assets of the banks and of the Government. We had got into a far worse position than we were in ten years ago. We had increased the excess of immediate liability over the amount of immediate assets something like $700,000,000.

In addition to this growing excess of liability and indebtedness of the country, as shown by the bank and Treasury statements, when we come to look at the condition of the imports and exports we find that from the time that specie payments were suspended up to the present time we have been constantly and rapidly increasing our imports over and above our exports. The whole amount of the imports of the country from 1864 down to the end of the last fiscal year have been, inclusive of five per cent. for undervaluation and smuggling, $3,403,000,000, while the whole amount of our exports reduced to specie values, and including specie, amounted to something like $2,987,000,000; making a balance of $416,000,000 against us.

To this we may fairly add freight on imports in foreign vessels, say eight per cent. on sixty-eight per cent. of the imports, and we have $184,000,000; and the interest we have paid abroad in that time has amounted to at least $250,000,000. Our bonds were sold at an average discount of twenty-two per cent., or seventy-eight cents on the dollar; so that our whole indebtedness abroad, at the lowest figures, cannot be less than $1,000,000,000 to $1,200,000,000.

Still further, I would state that the debt of the country abroad in 1863, according to the authority of ex-Commissioner Wells, was almost liquidated; it amounted to nothing practically; but by inquiry at the Treasury Department, and by consulting the documents that are issued therefrom, I find that our indebtedness to foreigners is about as stated above. I do not fix it at so high a figure as my friend from New York [Mr. ROBERTS] did the other day when he placed it at $2,000, 000,000.

Now, what are we to do? What do the free-traders and the revenue reformers, and the friends of a revenue tariff, desire to do? Do they desire to increase that debt, or do they wish to diminish it? Let their proposed action and its necessary results be the answer. They demand a lower tariff. They demand a reduction of duties, the effect of which would be to make additional imports. We are importing to-day at the rate of $30,000,000

to $50,000,000 annually in excess of our exports. We export annually in payment of merchandise $50,000,000 in gold, while we produce annually only $25,000,000 of gold throughout the whole country. In 1866 the amount of gold on hand was $300,000,000, of which $100,000,000 was in the banks, and it has been going out ever since until there is now only about $130,000,000 in the Treasury and in the banks and in the hands of the people.

The revenue reformers propose by their policy to increase our debt abroad. They desire to make foreign merchandise cheaper, to bring a large amount of it into the country, and thus far displace American manufactures. Another effect will be to raise the price of gold. This will increase, with a low tariff, to an indefinite extent, because of the demand for gold to pay for excessive importations, until the foreign indebtedness against us will become unable to be borne, and we become the slaves of foreign capitalists. Instead, sir, of being on the road to resumption, we are on the road to an everlasting suspension. We are $700,000,000 further away from the resumption of specie payments than we were in 1862, or at any time since. We are widening the difference between our assets and our foreign indebtedness. We are making it broader and greater every day. That debt is rolling up until it will become mountain high, when it will render impossible a return to specie payments, and overwhelm us in a common bankruptcy and ruin.

Now, what is the remedy for the existing unfortunate condition of things? How are we to get back to specie payments? I know that it is said that the way to resumption is to resume at once. I know that by congressional action we can command a resumption, but as it is a financial and commercial question rather than a legislative one, I feel well assured that with our heavy debt abroad and a low tariff increasing imports we could not maintain a resumption for a month. It would be a financial impossibility. An attempt at it now would be to invite our securities from abroad to obtain their price in gold at a handsome profit over their cost. It would be to bring back millions of bonds and to drain from us every dollar of specie.

It is not to be done by low tariffs and heavy importations, and not by buying more than we sell, as we are doing every day, and not by acting the part of the spendthrift who spends all and saves nothing. It can only be reached in one way, and that is to sell more than we buy; to export more than we import, and to regulate the tariff so that the balance of trade shall be in our favor. We cannot do it under a low tariff, for every low tariff has destroyed manufac tures, impoverished labor, and prostrated agriculture. By the means indicated, and by that only, can we return to specie payments, and bring values to a sound, proper, and suitable condition for the business of this great nation. Our country was never so prosperous as when the tariffs have been high enough to give the preference of our markets to the American citizen, and never so dilapidated in its business relations as when mere revenue tariffs gave our markets to the cheap goods of foreigners.

The bill of the majority makes unwise discriminations. It leaves duties remain on articles we neither produce or manufacture, and takes them off or reduces them on those articles our own workmen can supply. This, in my judgment, reverses all the best principles of political economy, and should that policy prevail, another inundation of foreign fabrics, an increased indebtedness abroad, will postpone resumption to a period beyond the lives of most of those who now sit within this Hall.

Now it has been said by gentlemen on the opposite side of the House that the tariff is a tax on the industry of the people; that it is not

may be a half an hour or an hour hence on the subject of the tariff. It is barely possible that, with the next clicking of that little instrument which brings news from Cincinnati to us and to all the rest of mankind," we may change sides on this subject; and that my Democratic friends, under the lead of the heroic Greeley, may be marching forth with "high protection" inscribed upon their banners, leading the country ahead of our present views and present sentiments on the protective side of the tariff question; and I warn my Republican friends not to be too high protective tariff just now, for to-night or to-morrow we may be outstripped by the Democracy under the gallant leader that we have followed so long, and in the efforts to outstrip us they may be com

equal taxation on every description of property according to its real value, including Government bonds and other public securities."

In other words, they are for taxing as well the horse of the poor man as Bonner's fiftythousand dollar Dexter. They are in favor of taxing the cart of the laborer who works upon the roads as well as the coach in which rolls the millionaire. They are in favor of taxing the Dutchman's lager-beer and the rich man's brandy. They are in favor of taxing the poor man's pine table, on which he eats his daily meal, as well as the rich man's mahogany. They are in favor of taxing alike the one-dollar shawl of the poor Irish woman and the thousand-dollar shawl of the banker's wife. They are in favor of taxing alike the rich smoking-cap with its gilded tassel of the voluptuary and the cotton night cap of the poor woman's baby as it lies in its humble cradle.

In fact they are in favor of taxing every thing that bears the name of property whether real or personal. They want the tax-gatherer to go everywhere. They want his Argus eyes to see everything, however small and remote, and his Briarean arms to gather within his grasp every object that may be within reach of taxation. This is the meaning of the taxation plank in their platform of 1868.

It means low tariff now, and free trade and direct taxation as soon as they can get it. It means the tax-gatherer in every man's house and espionage everywhere. The low tariff is the velvet paw which conceals the sharp claws of free trade. Either or both of them are the equivalents of overwhelming debt abroad, of destruction of home industry, of capitalists ruined, of laborers beggared, of an indefinite suspension of specie payments, aud of universal national bankruptcy.

If such a bill as that before us shall pass, I shall despair of ever seeing again a specie currency.

Mr. BRIGHT next addressed the House. [See Appendix.]

The CHAIRMAN. The Chair will state to the committee that at half past one o'clock the Committee of Ways and Meaus will resume the floor. In the mean time the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. CONGER] will take the floor, with the understanding that he will yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES] at half past one o'clock.

Mr. CONGER. Mr. Chairman, a stranger coming into this Hall now, at one o'clock on this 3d day of May, in the year of our Lord 1872, and witnessing the excitement and the running to and fro of men of both sides of the House, who are earnestly looking over bills or telegrams, or whatever they may be, would be at a loss to determine whether the very exciting question of the tariff and its effects upon the country caused all this commotion, or whether, perchance, it might be a telegram from Cincinnati, indicating the progress there of each candidate in the canvass. My own opinion is that this excitement partakes partly of both; and I venture to say that among the Republicans and Democrats in this House no one can tell certainly what his opinions

interests of the country demand.

Gentlemen had better not be running after telegrams and neglecting this tariff question and this discussion and the remarks which they ought to hear me make on this subject in this last half hour of discussion, for I venture

to say that no man can tell what may befall him in the next few minutes or hours.

Mr. ELDREDGE. My friendMr. CONGER. I cannot yield to any interruption, even from the Democratic leader of the House.

Mr. ELDREDGE. I was only going to suggest to the gentleman that he had better defer his speech until he had heard the news.

Mr. CONGER. No; my speech must move on and grind, however slowly, whatever may befall either party of us here. Now, in this uncertain state of the canvass at Cincinnati, and in the uncertain state of this bill in this House one can hardly tell on either side of the House what doctrines to advocate or what theories to advance. And I have noticed that on the Democratic side-and I call the attention of whoever may have the audacity to read in the Globe the speeches made here to this fact that in the last two or three days there has been a dwindling down on the part of Democratic speakers of opposition to the tariff. Their opposition has grown beautifully less and less, until the present moment. It may revive, and the Democratic party, under the result of operations at Cincinnati, may yet become as bold free-traders to-morrow as they were a week ago; and they may be violent protectionists next week; who knows?

I submit with all humility as my judgment that life itself is not so uncertain as the theory and the policy of parties to-day on the tariff, at least for the next hour. But, Mr. Chairman, let that pass. I have attracted the attention of the House for a moment from these telegrams. I wish I could keep it a few moments longer in the midst of this wild excite.

ment.

I do not propose to enter into the discussion of tariff questions or tariff principles in general, but to confine myself to this conglomer ated tariff bill, which is the best the freetraders of this country can present through our chairman, who, I believe, has seized hold of this bill merely that he may control it, not that he approves it. This measure is the best that the free-traders offer to us; and I proceed to consider their compromise on the tariff.

No man has advocated this bill except my unfortunate friend from Illinois, [Mr. BURCHARD.] No other man dare advocate it. No man who believes his speech will ever be read by the people of the United States dare say that this measure is fair or just or equitable or desirable. As for myself I stand here to say (and it is for that purpose only I wish to speak) that in almost every provision of this bill there is a deadly thrust at some vital interest of my State. It contains scarcely a provision which has not a tendency to injure and destroy our interests, not only in what we consume but in all we produce. This bill, re ported by free-traders and supported by the

free-traders of this House, walks up boldly to the destruction of the interests of almost all the States, and especially the interests of the State of Michigan. It comes here earnestly and savagely to destroy the interests of my State, and for that I oppose it and would destroy it.

66

A friend near me, a moderate, quiet man, when I spoke earnestly against this bill said to me, But be calm, treat it gently, treat it mildly, try to modify it; amend it so as to make it more suitable to the country and more advantageous to the interests of the people." Sir, when we are met by a bill which seeks to destroy all the interests of Michigan, as well as other States; to destroy them by half-way measures, by a lingering death, (I would rather free trade should sweep over our State at once,) why should we meet it mildly?

Mr. Chairman, inasmuch as several gentle men in discussing this question bave illustrated by stories, and even the gentleman from Pennsylvania, [Mr. KELLEY,] one of the oldest members of the House, illustrated his remarks with a dog story, it may not be inconsistent for me to follow the example. I have read somewhere that during the "late unpleasantness" in the South one of our soldiers who was set to guard the property of a gentleman of the South from the attacks of our own soldiers or of rebels, was attacked fiercely and furiously by a Cuban bloodbound that bad escaped from his kennel. The bloodhound with red eyes and open mouth rushed upon the soldier furiously to destroy him; and the soldier, with his bayonet set, did not take it mildly, but thrust the weapon into the dog's mouth and throat, pinned him to the earth, and destroyed him at once. But the owner, coming round soon after and seeing his Cuba bloodhound killed, was very angry and remon strated with the soldier, as my friend did with me, and said to the soldier, "Why didn't you meet the hound mildly and keep him off? Why did you thrust your bayonet into the dog and destroy him? Why didn't you take the but end of your gun and keep him off till I came and saved you?" The soldier very prop erly replied: Why didn't your dog come at me with the other end,' and then we would have met but to but?" [Laughter.] So I say about this tariff; there is no reason why we should meet it mildly. It comes at us fiercely to destroy the interests of every State of this Union. Let us pin this bill and every similar bill to the earth and destroy it in this "unpleasantness" as the soldier did in that.

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Mr. Chairman, this bill as it stands here to-day proposes to reenact a duty of ten cents per pound on tea and two cents per pound upon coffee. If this bill be passed, all we have done in that direction is lost, and we restore those duties; for the committee have not had the grace to withdraw even that part of the bill, notwithstanding the concurrent voice of the House and the Senate against it, by the pas sage of a bill which has now become a law, making tea and coffee free of duty to all.

The great leading products of Michigan are its lumber, its salt, its iron, its copper, and its wool; and yet while these are the leading elements of the productive interests of the State of Michigan, there is not one of these interests but what this bill seizes upon and so reduces the tariff upon most of them, as to render it inefficacious as protection to them. utterly so. What do the Representatives of my State say on this subject? What do they say without respect to party? My friend who represents the sixth district, [Mr. SUTHER LAND, as well as the Republicans in the House from that State unitedly and unanimously say to the House and to the country that this bill is ruinous to the interests of Michigan, and therefore we oppose it.

Sir, why should the committee propose in this bill to reduce the tariff on subjects upon which the sense of the House and the Senate has been so lately taken? Did the commit

tee forget that this House by an almost unparalleled majority in response to the wish of the whole people lately placed tea and coffee upon the free list? And yet they leave it in the bill at the rate of ten cents a pound on tea and two cents upon coffee. Did the committee forget that not long since on the subject of lumber in the Senate and in the House, when the proposition was made to admit a small quantity of lumber free of duty, the Senate and the House struck out even that license and prohibited the introduction of all lumber free of duty? Did this committee forget that but a few years ago when our copper interest was entirely destroyed in this country the House and the Senate passed an act taking copper from the free list, and imposed a duty on it for the purpose of its protection?

And did they not know to-day that more than two thirds of the copper mines of Michigan, as well as of the copper mines of the United States outside of Michigan, are lying idle because their productiveness is not remunerative, even with the protection they now have? No, the committee ask to reduce it. Did the committee not learn that to-day more than half of the salt-manufacturing works of the Saginaw valley in the State of Michigan are lying idle because the sale of their salt in the market is unremunerative? Did not the committee know the wharves and docks of Canada, lying across the river from Michigan, and across the lake, are piled high with Canadian salt, waiting for such a bill as this to be introduced into Congress and become a law, thus depriving hundreds and thousands of our laborers of the reward of their industry, and the support and education of their families? Sir, I will not dwell on these things. I have no desire to criticise further these defects of the bill. I have merely referred incidentally to these particular interests. But, sir, there are interests affecting the whole country, small interests as well as large, that need revision. Among others that should be put on the free list are the articles of gilling twine and net twine used by our fishermen all along the Atlantic coast, all over the lakes, all through the Gulf of Mexico, and all over the rivers in our land. It is a small article, and yet on that article, not manufactured in this country, a duty of forty per cent. is laid, and there it remains notwithstanding the petitions of our people from different parts of the coun try, and letters received and presented on that subject. Canadian fishermen have free twine; but it is too simple to attract the attention of the committee. Although it affects interests in every State in the Union, yet it is too unimportant to be placed on the free list by the committee who reported this bill. At the proper time I shall ask this protection, this benefit to our fishing interests.

Sir, I call the attention of this committee to the effect on these interests of this sort of halfway reduction, which does not benefit the consumer of the article and which tends to the ruin of the producer. Free trade with all its enormities is better than this mangling half-way bill; and I hope either this bill will be in these respects materially modified or that it will be utterly destroyed. The action of the Senate has opened the way for a different bill, looking to the removal of internal revenues, looking to the placing on the free list of many such articles as I have alluded to, such as gilling and netting twine, which enters into one of the common industries of the country, an article not manufactured in this country and which now bears a duty oppressive to the people engaged in that industry, as well as oppressive to the people who use their productions.

Mr. Chairman, I might say a good deal more upon this bill and upon this subject, but in the present excited state of the committee, or the members of the committee, awaiting the news from Cincinnati, which, as I have said, may shape their views on the tariff, it is idle to

spend time longer upon it. I have asked the attention of the committee that I might speak for the State which I have the honor in part to represent, against the passage of this or any bill similar in its nature. I have asked the attention of the committee, and I call their attention now to the fact that there are many articles in our common use of great importance which ought to be placed on the free list; and which, if this bill progresses, I shall bring under the notice of the committee in amendments which I shall offer.

But, as there are other gentlemen who desire to address the House in the brief space of time which is left to us, I shall not longer occupy the attention of the committee.

By the downcast looks of my Democratic friends, I presume this last telegram announces the nomination of the champion of protection at Cincinnati. The transition is somewhat sudden; but the resolute Democracy will prove equal to the emergency, and hang out the banner of protection on the outer wall.

I now yield a moment to my colleague, [Mr. SUTHERLAND,] and the few minutes left, to the gentleman from Rhode Island, [Mr. EAMES.]

Mr. SUTHERLAND. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Globe some remarks which I have prepared on the pending bill.

There was no objection; and leave was granted. [See Appendix.]

Mr. CONGER. I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from Rhode Island, [Mr. EAMES.]

It

Mr. EAMES. Mr. Chairman, I desire to address to the committee a few remarks in regard especially to the interests of the State of Rhode Island as affected by the provisions of the bill reported by the Committee of Ways and Means, and now under consideration. The gentleman from Michigan [Mr. CONGER] who has just taken his seat says that this bill touches every interest there is in the State of Michigan. I may respond that it touches, also, every interest of the State which I in part represent upon this floor. is proposed by the bill which has been reported by a majority of the committee to reduce the duty upon cotton goods twenty per cent., and upon woolen goods twenty per cent. also. It is known that so far as Rhode Island is concerned her material interests depend to a considerable extent upon her waterpower, by means of which she is enabled to propel the wheels that move the spindles and looms that spin and weave the cloth that is there produced. We live upon a soil that is naturally barren and sterile. We can only live by encouragement on the part of the Government to the industries we may there pur sue, and in relation to these and the proposed reductions upon them I feel, sir, although hardly able to utter a word, that it is my duty to make a protest here before this debate closes.

But, sir, my purpose in rising was not to discuss the questions of the tariff either upon the theory of free-trade or revenue reform, or upon the theory of protection, but simply to call the attention of the committee to two positions which have been assumed by gentlemen who have supported the bill which has been reported by the committee, and also to a statement that has been made with reference to the condition of laborers who are engaged in manufacturing pursuits in New England.

One position is that which was presented by the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. FINK. ELNBURG] in opening the debate upon this question. In doing so, he took the ground that this was the time to make a reduction, which should be no more, as I understood his argument, than an equivalent for the taxes imposed by the internal revenue laws which had been repealed in 1868.

Now, sir, the argument of the gentleman

was very plausible, indeed; and so was the illustration by which he sought to enforce it. He presented to the House the basis upon which the present tariff upon wool and woolens was adjusted, and by the statement he made and the arguments be presented, perhaps his theory was entirely carried out in respect to wool and woolens. But I had occasion to look at other articles in this long list, the duties on which it is proposed to reduce, and I find that the same idea is not carried out in any other portion of the bill. Upon cottons the reduction is twenty per cent., whereas the tax imposed by the internal revenue system was only five per cent. upon the amount of sales. And, so, sir, you may follow the bill through on the different articles of manufacture in iron and other materials, and we find that it is only in one particular, the case of wool and woolens, that this bill coincides with the statement which the gentleman made, and which furnished the plausible argument the gentleman presented on this floor why the bill should receive the favorable consideration of this House.

But there is one other position which has been taken, to which I desire for one moment to allude; and that is the assertion which was made in the first place by the gentle. man from Missouri, [Mr. FINKELNBURG,] and which was repeated by the gentleman from Illinois, [Mr. BURCHARD,] and echoed and reechoed by every gentleman who has taken that side of the question upon the bill under consideration-that to the extent that a duty is imposed for the benefit of any of these home industries, and exactly to that extent the consumer is obliged to pay.

But the gentlemen who maintain this proposition overlook the fact that these protected industries furnish a profitable home market for a very large proportion of the products of agriculture, and they ignore entirely in their calculations the important and material fact that in every case in which home industries have been developed by the fostering care of the Government, the result has been a material reduction of the price of the foreign product. That such has been the result is established by the reduction in price of the following articles of domestic production now in common use:

year.

The manufacture of ribbed hose was com menced in this country in 1824. Previous to 1850 only three sets of machinery were in operation, producing three thousand dozen a The price which at first was paid for knitting the legs was $1 20 per dozen, and for knitting the feet 75 cents per dozen. In 1867 the price for knitting the legs was 2 cents a pair, and for the feet 5 cents a pair, and instead of three thousand dozen the product was five hundred thousand dozen a year.

The price for knitting ribbed shirts in the early stage of the industry in this country was $4 per dozen for the bodies, and $1 25 for the sleeves. The price in 1867 was 12 cents for a single shirt and sleeves.

Jeans, a light, twilled fabric, when imported sold for 30 cents a yard. When first manufac tured in this country an article of superior quality sold for 23 cents, and in 1860 the price was from 6 to 7 cents.

Cotton hosiery which sold for $3 a dozen in 1860, and for $5 during the war, in 1867 could be manufactured for $1 60 a dozen, a reduction of nearly one half.

The price of brown cotton goods in 1816 was 30 cents per yard; in 1819, 21 cents; in 1826, 13 cents; in 1829, 84 cents; and in 1843, 64 cents per yard.

The average price of print cloths in 1825 was 23 07 cents; in 1830, 16.36 cents; in 1835, 16.04 cents; in 1840, 12.09 cents; in 1845, 10 90 cents; in 1850, 9.24 cents; and in 1855, 9.15 cents per yard.

The heavy domestic cottons have to a considerable extent superseded the foreign article. Mixed fabrics of cotton and wool have been re