This is free trade in the concrete, and the list furnishes conclusive evidence of the intent of the House bill, which cannot be neutralized by ' the eleventh hour disclaimers of its supporters.

Upon investigation it will be found that, with the exception of tin' plates, the supply of the above articles for home consumption is now furnished to a great extent by domestic producers, whose business would be, in most instances, at once destroyed by the adoption of this bill.

The committee have not been able to secure accurate statistics of the aggregate value of these manufactures, or of the number of persons employed in their production. It is evident, however, from an examination of the list and of the testimony taken by your committee and the reported value of the products of 1880, that at least $500,000,000 of capital and 300,000 workingmen are now so employed. These itens seem to have been taken indiscriminately from the present dutiable list, and there is no reason for the removal of duties upon them which would not apply with equal force to hundreds of other manufactures which are now dutiable. They owe the distinction of having been designated for the first sacrifice on the free-trade altar to the fact that neither the interests of a section nor the political control of a District demanded their preservation.

In many cases where the manufactured article is placed on the free list a duty is retained on the materials from which it is manufactured. It is needless to say that this discrimination would act as a prohibition upon production in this country.

Soap is placed on the free list while duties are retained upon caustic soda and essential oils, and a tax is retained upon alcohol. This would undoubtedly result in the destruction of a large industry which gives employment to nearly twenty-five thousand persons.

German looking-glass plates are placed on the free list, while a duty is maintained on polished cylinder and plate glass, not silvered, of from 2.5 to 45 cents per square foot, equal in some cases to 152 per cent. ad valorem. A duty is also retained on nitrate of silver and tin-foil used in the silvering process.

Tin-plates, or iron and steel sheets coated with tin or lead, are placed on the free list; while iron-ore and pig-iron, as well as the iron-bars or steel billets and slabs, from which these sheets must be rolled, are dutiable at from 45 to 60 per cent. ad valorem. A duty is also placed by the bill on common black sheet-iron of from 1 to 1.4 cents a pound, and iron and steel sheets, when galvanized with zinc or coated with any other metal except tin or lead, are required to pay an additional duty of from to of a cent a pound above these rates. There is also a duty levied of 14 cents a pound upon pig-lead.

Iron and steel cotton-ties and hoops for baling or other purposes, not thinner than No. 20 wire gauge, are made free; while other hoop, band, or scroll iron is dutiable at rates varying from 1 to 13 cents a pound, and an additional rate of of a cent a pound is levied on articles

wholly or partially manufactured from hoop iron.

The iron bars or

steel slabs from which cotton ties or hoops must be manufactured are

dutiable at from 45 to 60 per cent.

Needles are placed upon the free list, while the duties on steel remain unchanged at not less than 45 per cent. ad valorem.

The duty is removed from ocher and ochery earths, and umber and umbery earths, dry and ground in oil, while a duty of 15 cents per gallon is retained on linseed oil.

In the manufacture of the chemical and other products which are placed on the free list the use of expensive apparatus and machinery is required, and these remain dutiable. Alcohol, upon which a tax of nearly 400 per cent. ad valorem is retained, is largely used in some of the products on which the duties are removed or greatly reduced.

In a considerable number of cases the admission of important manufactured products free of duty while a duty is retained on materials, would not only extinguish the industry directly affected, but would effectually destroy important collateral industries.

The free admission of iron or steel sheets of all thicknesses coated with tin or lead would not only prevent the production of tin plates in this country, but it would cause a substitution of imported tin plates. or sheets in most cases for roofing, and other building purposes, and for domestic uses, where galvanized or other sheet iron or steel is now used, and thus large and important American industries, now fully established, would be annihilated.

The provision to admit German looking-glass plates free of duty would not only destroy the business of silvering plates in this country, but the much larger and more important industry of manufacturing plate or other polished glass for all purposes. As the glass referred to is of the finest quality and highly polished, it would not only take the place of plate or other polished glass for looking-glasses, but of glass for other purposes, as it could be cheaply silvered and the silver removed at an expense which would be insignificant compared with the duty on foreign glass. This provision also contains, we believe, the first attempt which has been made in an American tariff to discriminate between the productions of various foreign States, and it can be safely assumed that the producers of France, Belgium, and England would not consent to this discrimination in favor of German manufacturers.

Placing curled hair upon the free list would ruin a useful trade, and it would also deprive the farmers of the United States of a profitable market for millions of pounds of hair.

In many cases the duty is removed not only from materials, but also from the manufactured product in various stages as well. Raw wool is free of duty, and no duty is levied on washed or scoured wool, or on wool tops or other manufactures of wool less advanced in condition than yarns.

Jute is put upon the free list, and the duties are also removed from burlaps, and bags of jute for grain.

If Canada consents, round and square timber and sawed boards are all free from duty, while the duty on planed lumber is left an uncertain quantity.

Several important crude minerals, like copper, quick-silver, and antimony, are placed on the free list, and the duty is also removed from the unenumerated manufactured products of these and of the crude minerals, gold, silver, aluminum, bromine, bismuth, and many others of importance which are now free. It is impossible to say what the effect of this sweeping provision would be; it certainly would admit free of duty a large number of valuable manufactured articles which are now dutiable.

Crude and refined borax and boracic acid, coal-tar, and coal tar products, and grindstones, finished and unfinished, are placed on the free list.

It is evident that in these, and in many similar cases, free raw materials would not benefit the domestic manufacturers.

In several cases articles are free under one description and dutiable under another, for example:

Iron hoops for other purposes than baling are free, while iron hoops for all purposes except cotton-ties, which are specially provided for, are dutiable at from 1 to 1.3 cents a pound. All vegetable fibers, including flax, are free, while hackled flax is also dutiable at $10 per ton. All earths and clays unwrought are free, while china clay, or kaolin, unwrought is dutiable. All unmanufactured or undressed monumental or building stone, including marble, is free, while undressed marble is also dutiable at 40 cents per cubic foot. Cocoa prepared and manufactured is free, while chocolate, a preparation of cocoa, is dutiable at 2 cents a pound.

In a great number of instances materials used by the manufacturer are dutiable at one rate, while the finished product is dutiable at a lower rate. This want of relation in rates, which extends to every schedule in which changes are made, will affect injuriously all of our important industries.

For instance, white lead when dry, ground, or mixed in oil is dutiable at 2 cents a pound, while orange mineral, a manufactured product of white lead, is dutiable at 14 cents a pound; the rate on red lead and litharge, two other lead products, is but one-fourth of a cent above the duty on pig lead; while the rates on brown and white acetates of lead are so low that production would cease in the United States if this bill should become a law. The rates on structural iron and steel are reduced to of a cent a pound, while the duty of 1 cent a pound is retained on bar iron, from which iron beams must be manufactured. The duty on sugar above No. 20 Dutch Standard in color is fixed by the bill at 2.8 cents a pound, which is equivalent to nearly 85 per cent.

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ad valorem. The duty on colored and other confectionery is 40 per cent. ad valorem. Refined sugar could be manufactured into confectionery by machinery at an additional cost of cent a pound, and imported at a rate of duty which would be about one-half of that imposed on the sugar before it was manufactured. Prepared and manufactured cocoa, which contains 75 per cent. of pure sugar, is admitted free, and under this description chocolate confectionery would also be admitted free. We should have then under the House bill refined sugar dutiable at 2.8 cents a pound as sugar, dutiable at half this amount as confectionery, and free as manufactured cocoa. The effect of these provisions upon the manufacturers of confectionery, cocoa, and chocolate, and upon the business of refining sugar in this country can be readily understood. The value of the domestic manufactures of these articles by the census of 1880 was $182,424,602.

Several important manufactures of iron and steel, including files and file-blanks, cut tacks and brads, and steel pens, which now have a specific rate, are given an ad valorem rate of 35 per cent., while the steel from which they are made is dutiable at not less than 45 per cent. ad valorem.

Type-metal is dutiable at 15 per cent. ad valorem, while the lead of which it is largely composed is dutiable at 14 cents a pound, or 50 per cent. ad valorem. Lead imported as type-metal would pay a duty of of a cent per pound, instead of 14 cents if imported as pig-lead. The lead could be recovered by the sweating process at a cost of about onehalf of a cent per pound, and still a saving of of a cent per pound could be made in duties.

Machinery, hardware, and other articles and wares composed wholly or in part of copper, are dutiable by the bill under consideration at 35 per cent. ad valorem, while machinery, hardware, and other manufactures of iron, steel, or other metals, or of which these metals are the component material of chief value, are dutiable at 40 per cent. ad valorem. Very much the larger portion of all the machinery and hardware now manufactured is composed in part of copper or brass, and if this bill should become a law all machinery and hardware would contain copper or brass, and in this way the duty on all such manufactures would be reduced from 45 per centum ad valorem, the present rate, to 35 per cent. The effect of this large reduction on the finest manufactured products of iron and steel and other metals, while the duty on the materials of which they are composed remains practically unchanged at much higher rates, would certainly be disastrous to many very impor tant American industries. Machinery is still further discriminated against in the section authorizing the collection of a duty upon pack ages.

A duty of 25 per cent. ad valorem is placed on paper, while the duty on paper envelopes, the raw material of which is paper, is reduced to

20 per cent., and the duty on the various manufactures of paper not otherwise provided for is fixed at 15 per cent.

Buttons, braids, fringes, and trimmings of all kinds, of wool or silk, are dutiable at 50 per cent. ad valorem, while cloaks and other garments for ladies' and children's wear, made up, are dutiable at 45 per cent. ad valorem.

Ground rice and rice meal are dutiable at 15 per cent. ad valorem, while paddy, or rice with the outer hull on, is dutiable at 1 cent a pound, or 160 per cent. ad valorem. Rice starch, an advanced mânufacture of rice, is also dutiable at 1 cent a pound, while by a change in classification the rate on uncleaned rice is advanced one-half a cent per pound beyond existing rates.

Oil-cloths are dutiable at 25 per cent.; oil-cloth foundations bear the same rate, while linseed-oil and many other materials used in the production of oil-cloth are dutiable at a higher rate.

The inconsistencies of the bill are numberless.

Cotton bagging is dutiable at three-eighths of a cent a pound, while a portion of the machinery for manufacturing cotton bagging is admitted free. Jute bags and burlaps which can be used for covering cotton are free, while the machinery for the manufacture of burlaps or jute bags is dutiable at 35 or 40 per cent. ad valorem. Bags of jute for grain are free, while bags of jute for flour, fruit, vegetables, or other purposes are dutiable at three-eighths of a cent a pound. Burlaps not exceeding 60 inches in width are free, while burlaps exceeding 60 inches in width are dutiable at 25 per cent. ad valorem.

Bibles and other books in foreign languages, printed for gratuitous distribution, are free, while Bibles and other books in foreign languages, if printed for sale, are dutiable at 25 per cent. ad valorem.

Needles and looking-glass plates are free, while protective duties are levied on iron ore and soda-ash.

Extract of hemlock bark is free, and extract of sumac is dutiable. Beans and peas are free, while rice is dutiable at $1.28 per bushel. Wool and salt are free, while sugar and coal are given high duties. Copper-ore is free, and nickel and zinc ores are protected.

One clause of the bill fixes the duties on screens, covers, and a large number of other articles of silk, jute, or vegetable material, at 40 per cent. ad valorem, while other provisions of the bill fix rates on the same articles at from 15 to 50 per cent.

We have enumerated but a few of the many defects and incongruities of the House bill, as every correct principle of tariff construction has been violated in selecting articles for the free list and those upon which large reductions in rates are made.

FREE RAW MATERIALS.

We have shown the deceptive character of the claim that the propo sition of the House bill to place certain materials on the free list would stimulate manufactures.