the south of Europe for emigrants to Atlantic promoters have failed to sell them at any ports is from $21 to $35; and this rate has price. With more freight than they can literally poured hundreds of thousands of handle and more demand for rolling stock immigrants into Atlantic ports. This is the than they can finance, the railroads cannot very class of labor-gardeners, small fruit carry these bulky commodities for less than farmers, nut growers, manual workers-for $10 or $16 a ton to the Eastern market. The which the Pacific Coast is at its wit's end. commodities cannot be worked profitably Now look at the figures. The steamship with a higher freight rate than $5 a ton. San companies carrying via Panama are already Francisco hopes, when Panama opens and considering an emigrant rate from Mediter- these bulky commodities find their market, ranean ports to California of $40 the trip that it will prove a second Yukon. without a break. Is California mad in reckoning that at last she will get her much needed share of the incoming tide of foreign workers? That Oriental trade at best was but a forwarding business. This will be a permanent traffic, a permanent aggregate to the stable wealth of the Pacific States.

NO MORE RAILROAD OPPOSITION

This probably explains why the railroads, instead of curtailing in anticipation of Panama, are really expanding. Said a representative of the Santa Fé: "You know the gigantic strides the West has made in the past ten years. Well, we consider that is only 20 per cent. of what is possible. It taxes the resources of the railroads to handle the present traffic. My opinion is, Panama will simply relieve us of a great pressure and let us concentrate our efforts in local freight." Said a representative of the Great Northern: "If all the orchards set out in the West were bearing, not twenty times all the rolling stock that to-day exists could haul the fruit to market."

As to the difference in freight rates to San Francisco, one example is sufficient. One Antwerp liner will carry a ton of grocer's commodities round the Horn for exactly the same amount as it costs to ship that commodity by rail from San Francisco to Los Angeles. In other words, a ton is carried from Antwerp round the Horn, 14,000 miles, for $7.25. The same ton is hauled by rail 420 miles for from $7 to $10.

PORTLAND'S PLANS

As to Portland, nothing needs to be said. farther than that she is already one of the big grain shippers of America. With Celilo Canal completed, giving her access to an inland empire for four hundred miles, it is hardly necessary to give any proofs of how she will benefit from Panama. Before the opening of the waterway up the Columbia, the freight rate from Portland to the Dalles used to be $6.40 a ton on nails. When the river traffic began, the rate dropped to $2. Where the river steamers run, the rate on salt is $1.50 for eighty-eight miles. Beyond the steamers, that salt has to carry a rate of $8 for a hundred miles. In fact, though there are some very sore heads in Portland over the city going into civic stevedoring and civic steamboating, you can set it down that Portland knows exactly what she is doing. The prize she aims at is to bring down the traffic of that inland empire via Portland and Panama.

THE CITRUS GROWERS

Down at Los Angeles, Panama is in the very air. Men sleep with and eat with it and walk with it, though all the other cities on the coast may call San Pedro "a frog pond." Los Angeles yearly handles a citrus crop running from $38,000,000 to $50,000,000 according to the season. In the shipment of that citrus crop East, $15,000,000 goes for freight. By water via Panama, "we will There is another feature in this Panama save $6,000,000 annually on our oranges and traffic that appeals tremendously to San lemons alone," declared Mr. Woodford, the Francisco. Scattered through the Pacific General Manager of the Fruit Growers' Coast States are bulky commodities that Associations. "We have already tried one would be a veritable gold mine if they could experimental shipment of oranges to New be put on the Atlantic market cheaply. There York by way of Panama. It is 40 per cent. are infusorial earths and ores used in smelting. lower than across the continent." There are salt fields. I know of one where almost pure salt can be shoveled on the wagons as fast as it can be hauled away. Near a market, these salt fields would be

FOREIGN TRADE

Two other prizes the Pacific Coast ports

South American trade and Oriental trade. fifteen first-class liners on the West coast Asia is being modernized, republicanized. of South America. The United States has Can the Pacific ports make a bid for the trade not one. The difficulty is not in getting a of the 800,000,000 Orientals? South Amer- cargo to go to South America. It is in getican trade with the United States totals from ting a cargo back to United States ports: 479 six hundred million to a billion a year, im- ships of different flags go annually to the ports and exports altogether to all countries Argentine from the United States; but only to two billions. What is to prevent the 91 come from the Argentine to the United United States bidding for that? It's a States. curious thing and you have to look at a map to understand it; but it is shorter for freight to go down the West coast of South America and be shipped inland from Chile or Peru than to go out round the bulging East coast and be shipped in from the Atlantic.

Two difficulties stand in the way of South American trade,-bad packing and lack of steamers. Said a Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce man who had gone down to investigate conditions: "Unless American goods are packed to stand the shock of two train collisions, do not send them to South America. The stuff falls to pieces. It is not unloaded as we unload. It is just pitched overboard to the docks below."

As to steamers, while six lines run from New York to the Argentine, three English, three American, not a ship has the United States south of Panama on the West coast. Some British companies have as many as

On one other prize the Pacific Coast ports are planning; and the Eastern steamship men, to be perfectly frank, think they will be disappointed. The Pacific ports hope, too, that Panama will bring hundreds of thousands of people as tourists who now go to Europe. They think the sea voyage of thirty days from Atlantic to Pacific will divert traffic from Europe.

"I don't," emphatically declared a big steamship man on the East Coast who is ready to put thirty freighters through Panama when the canal opens. "I don't, and I'll tell you why we shall not put a single passenger liner through Panama. We cannot carry a passenger from New York to San Francisco for less than $125, the very lowest figure for thirty days or six weeks. Well, the railroads can do the job for $75 in five days. That settles it as far as practical steamboating is concerned."

THE NEED OF A TARIFF BOARD, OR COMMISSION

THE

BY ALBERT G. ROBINSON

HE result of the method employed in bates and speeches in Congress, relating to tariff making in this country has invari- those 261 enactments, were to be collected, ably been a jumble of economic absurdities compiled, and indexed, they would form a arising out of limited information and political compromises.

library of imposing proportions and of the dreariest possible contents. Yet, notwithstanding all that has been said and done about the matter, we are perhaps no nearer a satisfactory determination of this persistent and perplexing issue than we were a hundred years ago.

A concurrent resolution passed by both houses of Congress on August 5, 1909, authorized and directed the preparation, compilation, and indexing of "all the acts heretofore passed by Congress imposing duties on imports." The result is a tome of 1040 pages, In some of its various features, the question II inches by 7, containing all the tariff acts is now even more obscure than it was in earlier from 1789 to 1909, "including all acts, reso- days. The processes of production and dislutions and proclamations modifying or tribution, and the facilities for communicachanging those acts." Act No. 1 is dated tion, in this country and throughout the July 4, 1789, and Act No. 261 is dated August world, have changed and expanded in ways 5, 1909. If all the committee hearings, inves- and to a degree far beyond even the dreams

half of the nineteenth century. Some of the false impressions and mistaken notions of earlier times have become, in many minds, fixed convictions equally erroneous and of seemingly hopeless fixity.

There are those of an unshakable belief that without a tariff protection that falls little short of prohibition of imports, this country would sink to a level of social and industrial degradation without parallel in the modern world, and there are those who regard protection in any form or degree as a devilish device for enabling the few to rob the many. These and all the intermediate shades of notion, opinion, and belief are prevalent, but what, after all, do most of us, or perhaps any of us, know of the facts of the matter?

mission was authorized to hold sessions in any part of the country, and was directed to submit its final report at the opening of the Congress in the December following, thus giving the body an actual working term of less than seven months for its organization, investigations, and the préparation of its report. In preparing its tariff law adopted in 1902, Germany consumed five years and gave careful consideration to the views and information of more than 2000 experts.

The time and the expense of the commission of 1882 were practically wasted. Its findings were of little or no service in the preparation of the tariff law of 1883, and of no use whatever as a factor in the solution of the tariff problem in its larger aspects. Since that time we have had the McKinley bill of 1890, the Wilson-Gorman bill of 1894, the Dingley bill of 1897, and the Payne bill of 1909, and we are now as far from an intelligent and scientific tariff as at any time in the history of the country.

THE PRESENT TARIFF BOARD

The farmer is confident that without a prohibitive duty on corn, on lard and bacon, on cattle, vegetables, and dairy products, our millions of fertile acres would revert to their original condition of prairie and woodland, and that millions of agriculturists would wander in doleful poverty seeking employment. The flock-masters believe that free wool would shortly make sheep in this country as much of a rarity as are bison. On the other By an act passed in June, 1910, the present hand, millions believe that a "substantial so-called Tariff Board, originally created for downward revision" of the tariff would a different purpose, was authorized to engreatly reduce the cost of living, the prices of large its field of activities and to investigate food and clothing, rents and amusements, and the cost of production of commodities, but enable them to live well, pay their bills, and the boundaries of the field were vaguely deput money in the bank. What, after all, do most of us or even any of us really know about the possible or probable or certain influences of the tariff on industrial conditions and the prices of commodities? Our present sources of information and misinformation are limited almost wholly to the outpourings of political partisans and to the conflicting assertions of selfish interests.

THE TARIFF COMMISSON OF 1882

In 1882, a commission was appointed, pursuant to an act of Congress. It was composed of nine members, all chosen from civil life and presumably qualified and equipped for the work given them. As prescribed by the act under which they were appointed, the duties of the commissioners were "to take into consideration and to thoroughly investigate all the various questions relating to the agricultural, commercial, mercantile, manufacturing, mining, and industrial interests of the United States, so far as the same may be necessary to the establishment of a judicious tariff, or a revision of the existing tariff, upon

fined. The sum of $250,000 was appropriated to carry on the work until the close of the fiscal year 1911. In his message of December 6, 1910, the President urged that the then existing board with indefinite duties and limited powers be made a permanent Tariff Commission, "with such duties, powers, and emoluments as it may seem wise for Congress to give." A bill providing for such an institution passed the House in January, 1911; passed the Senate, with a few unimportant amendments, on March 3; and was sent back to the House, on March 4, for concurrence in the amendments. A small minority in that body killed the bill by a filibuster in the closing hours of the session.

An appropriation made while the bill was under consideration provided money for the continuance of the work until July, 1912, and the President, as far as it was possible to do so, put into effect the provisions of the defeated bill. By the addition of two Democrats, the membership of the organization was increased from three to five. Under date of February 28, 1911, the board submitted, in response to a call from the Senate, a report

the proposed Canadian Reciprocity meas- States west of the Mississippi as 31 cents. Under date of December 20, 1911, it The department also reports the cost of prosubmitted to the President a report on wool ducing wheat, in the same year, as 84 cents and woolens. Under date of March 26, 1912, in Pennsylvania, 79 cents in Ohio, 64 cents in it submitted a synopsis of its report on cot- Illinois, 55 cents in Nebraska, and 54 cents ton, followed later by its full report. in California.

on industries and its actual effect on com- clearly make impossible any adjustment of modity prices. The producers of those com- tariff rates along exclusively financial and modities believe that they are financially economic lines. Members of Congress have benefited by the tariff on corn, eggs, butter, not the time for a work that demands months lard and bacon, and the consumers believe or years of close and special application. that because of the tariff they must pay ad- Schedules may be revised and rates may be vanced prices. Much would be done if, increased or decreased and the result be only through some responsible official channel, the a different and not a better tariff, a mere repeople of the country could be told the truth arrangement of the groups of the satisfied and about these and scores of other commodities the dissatisfied. now included in the various schedules, and could be fully assured that it is the truth. From nowhere in the wide world could there possibly come enough of any of the abovementioned articles to supply this country for a single meal, or enough to affect prices by the smallest fraction of a cent.

HOW ARE PRICES AFFECTED?

Behind any right adjustment of rates there must stand an intelligent public opinion. That can no more be created by the publication of interminable pages of statistics that By one group, the producers of these com- are difficult of comprehension even by spemodities have been politically humbugged cialists than it can be by a limited circulation into a conviction of price benefit, and, by of reports of committee hearings and political another group, consumers have been politic- speeches on the floor of the House and Senally flimflammed into a conviction of higher ate. The demand for revision of the tariff, a prices due to tariff rates. The notion is wide- demand widespread and persistent, springs spread and deeply rooted in many minds almost entirely from the belief that because of that somewhere outside our boundaries there excessive rates imposed, the public is comexist unlimited quantities of every known substance needed or desired by the American people, and that the tariff schedules are the only barrier against an influx of those commodities at prices materially below the cost of producing similar goods and articles here. For a half-century we have taken the tariff question so seriously that we have been deaf and blind to its multitude of absurdities and to the rank humbuggery that permeates it. The absurdities and the humbuggery have no serious economic results. Nothing goes into the farmer's pocket, and nothing goes out of the consumer's pocket, by reason of the tariff on corn. Nothing whatever would be changed if the present tariff rate of 15 cents a bushel were increased to $15 or dropped to one-fifteenth of a cent. The need of a board or a commission to study, intelligently and free from any political bias, the tariff itself in its relation to productive industry and commodity prices lies in the many known and more suspected absurdities of this kind.

pelled to pay excessive prices for many of the wants and requirements of daily life. This is probably the fact in no more than a comparatively limited number of articles, but the belief will exist as long as our methods of tariff making give cause for its existence. It will exist until the public has been shown clearly, fairly and authoritatively the precise effect of tariff rates on the prices of food and clothing, light, heat, and all else necessary for life and for reasonable physical comfort. It will exist as long as the public, or any important part of it, can be led to believe that protected interests, by the protection afforded them, gorge themselves with profits at the expense of their victims, the consumers. This is a widespread notion, but it rests on political assertions and not on authoritatively ascertained facts.

In brief, the tariff will be a bone of political contention, a cause of disturbance and depression in trade and production, until, through the agency of some responsible and The consideration most needed is an im- politically independent board or commission, possibility for the Congress. The adjustment the facts of the various industries affected of rates by a commission is impossible. The and supposed to be affected have been studied nation needs the revenue now derived through and intelligently reported to the American the customs. There are industries that need people. Until there is a wider and clearer and may reasonably be afforded protection. public knowledge of the influences and the There are industries that require only a part effects of schedules and of individual rates, of the protection now given them, and there the tariff will continue to be the jumble of are others that need no protection. The economic absurdities and political compro