The Tariff Act of 1930
The Flexible Feature
and
The Tariff Commission
Speech of
Warren R. Austin
Senator
of Vermont
in the
Senate of the United States
March 28 and 29, 1932
(Not printed at Government expense)
United States
Government Printing Office
Washington: 1932
111644—7947
SPEECH
SENATOR WARREN R. AUSTIN
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I am opposed to the substi¬
tute submitted by the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. HARRI¬
soNI for House bill 6662 for the reasons which were so elo¬
quently and persuasively stated by the senior Senator from
Utah [Mr. SmooTI and by the junior Senator from Michigan
[Mr. VANDENBERGI. I must admit also that I am opposed to
the substitute because of some of the reasons advanced in
its behalf by the distinguished Democratic Senator from
Massachusetts IMr. WALSHI.
OPPOSES HARRISON SUBSTITUTE
I am in hearty favor of any effort to secure justice in
the administration of government in any of its depart¬
ments, and particularly with respect to so important a func¬
tion of government as that of regulating commerce between
the nations, by the imposition of tariff duties. I am also in
full sympathy with the sentiment so forcefully expressed by
the senior Senator from Massachusetts against logrolling
in the fixing of tariff rates. Therefore, what I myself have
to say relating to the substitute can be understood to be in
full harmony with that objective.
As a first objection to the proposed substitute for the
House bill, which itself is a proposed substitute for section
336 of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, I claim that the sub¬
stitute is entirely unnecessary to accomplish the objectives
mentioned by its proponent and by the distinguished Sena¬
tor from Massachusetts. The substitute is unnecessary be¬
cause Congress already possesses all the powers, the grant¬
ing of which both of these distinguished Democratic Senators
allege as a reason why the substitute should be adopted.
PROPOSALS NO CURE FOR LOGROLLING
Moreover, the proposed substitute is not a cure for log¬
rolling. It is obviously, frankly, and plainly a cause for
logrolling. Its main feature is to take out of the business
of fixing tariff rates the only scientific element now in it,
absolutely to cancel it, and in place of that to return the
determination of the exact amount of tariff rates to the log¬
rolling process of Congress. Senators on the other side of
the aisle have the power to do that this instant. In the
House the Democratic Party is in control, and, therefore, it
has the opportunity to express itself upon any item in the
tariff act and begin instantly to do what Democratic Sena¬
111644—7947
tors say they do not want to have take place but which is
the very objective they seek by this substitute, namely, an
opportunity to begin the logrolling process on any item con¬
tained in the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. The fact that they
have not seen fit to do that, the fact that they have utterly
failed to name a single item there which they claim is too
high and should be reduced, or a single item that bears a
tariff to-day that should be put on the free list, is extremely
significant. It is not mere silence. It is silence weighted
with the significant statement to all the world that there is
no such item and that this bill, H. R. 6662, and its substitute,
are gestures made for the purpose of satisfying a political
expedient at this particular moment of our history.
CONGRESS ALREADY HAS AUTHORITY TO REVISE TARIFF
The proponent of this substitute made the following
statement:
Mr. President, the object of this legislation is to restore to
Congress the power designed by the fathers of laying taxes upon
the American people.
Is not that an astonishing objective to assert with respect
to this substitute? Congress does not lift itself by its own
bootstraps. Congress never has parted with that power.
Congress possesses it to-day, and it can not be restored to
Congress by any action of Congress. In other words, for
that specific objective of this bill there is no cause to pass
this substitute. Congress has that power. The proponent of
this substitute bill stated as the principal objects of the bill,
and as significant differences between the bill and H. R.
6662, and this substitute as follows—and I call your atten¬
tion in passing to the fact that this statement, taken all
together, and construed as it must be as an entire statement,
reveals a consciousness of the fact that the fixing of tariff
duties is a national objective, and that the national interests
should be attained, even at the sacrifice of local interests.
It is a recognition of the fact that in ascertaining interests
regarding and touching the tariff we find that some Demo¬
crats located in certain places desire and struggle for a tarifi
on certain commodities as a matter of local interest, and
some Republicans in other places desire and strive for a
low tariff on certain commodities. That is local; and it
shows how much the two great parties of this country have
approached an understanding upon this economic problem
and how much they really pull together when they get at
the business of creating a tariff.
Here in this great sounding board for the Nation Senators
on both sides of the aisle represent the extreme conflicting
views for certain purposes; but I venture the suggestion, as
coming from one who has but recently entered this great
Chamber and one who has recently come from a community
that is striving to uplift humanity by proper means of
manufacture and proper means of protection of the wage
111644—7947
earner and the farmer, that the real interest that must be
considered in creating tariff rates is the national interest and
not the local interest, and that both parties will work for
that objective.
The senior Senator from Mississippi said:
One of the differences between the Senate substitute offered by
the minority of the Finance Committee and the House bill is this,
and it is most important.
And thereupon he states how the commission goes to work
to ascertain the difference between cost of production at
home and cost of production abroad and makes its report
in order that the difference may be equalized. Then he
names five points constituting the particulars in which I
claim that the proponent of this bill has shown to Congress
and to all the world that this substitute is wholly unneces¬
sary, and a mere gesture. He says, telling of the various
things that this substitute provides that the commission
shall ascertain and report to Congress¬
THE TARIFF COMMISSION'S AUTHORITY UNDER 1930 ACT
The efficiency and economic operation and location of the
domestic industry under consideration.
I call the attention of the Senate to the Smoot-Hawley
bill upon that subject, the statement of which, I think, and I
respectfully submit to the Senate, is much more effective
than his statement of the matter, because it is much more
broad and gives more power, namely—I am reading from
section 332, clause (d) (6):
Information for President and Congress: In order that the
President and the Congress may secure information and assist¬
ance, it shall be the duty of the commission to
* »
(6) Ascertain all other facts which will show the differences in
or which affect competition between articles of the United States
and imported articles in the principal markets of the United
States.
Under that provision of the present law, the Tariff Com¬
mission can do exactly what section 1 of the statement of
the proponent of this bill says the Tariff Commission is
vested with the power to do under his substitute; namely.
investigate “ the efficiency and economic operation and loca¬
tion of the domestic industry under consideration.
(2) The conditions of such domestic industry with respect to
profits and losses, the extent to which productive capacity is uti¬
lized, and the extent of unemployment.
I call attention to the Smoot-Hawley law, section 332 (a):
It shall be the duty of the commission¬
Senators understand that I am condensing these sections
in reading them, so as to get to the very point under con¬
sideration¬
. *
in general to investigate the operation of customs laws,
including their relation to the Federal revenues, their effect upon
the industries and labor of the country.
111644—7947
There is a much broader power than that specified in the
proposed substitute, because it does not point the finger at
unemployment and does point the finger to all conditions of
labor, whether of employment or unemployment, of pros¬
perity or of depression.
Now take the third. Of course, the two features to which
I have now called your attention, which are already con¬
tained in the present law, were commented upon by the
proponent of this bill as “very splendid factors to be con¬
sidered in determining what rates should be imposed upon
importations from this country.” We agree, but we say they
are wholly unnecessary, because the law carries them
already. Now take the third one:
(3) The extent to which adverse conditions of production may
be due to foreign competition or to other specified factors.
I refer to section 332 (b) of the Smoot-Hawley tariff law.
Investigations of tariff relations: The commission shall have
power to investigate
conditions, causes, and effects re¬
lating to competition of foreign industries with those of the
United States.
Another statement of the matter, a better statement of
the matter because it is more comprehensive and gives more
power instead of less power. In other words, it ascertains
the simple facts stated here, namely, stated by the proponent
of this substitute, the extent of which adverse conditions of
production may be due to foreign competition and to other
specified factors.
Understand that in passing over these specifications of
merit alleged as reasons why this substitute should be passed
here it is my objective to make the point that not only does
Congress possess all these powers, but that the Tariff Com¬
mission possesses these powers to-day, and much more and
better powers, under the Smoot-Hawley law, in sections
thereof which are not questioned by the proposed substitute.
(4) The extent to which adverse conditions of production may
be remedied by adjustments in the tariff law, taking into con¬
sideration the substitution of articles used for the same purposes
as the articles under consideration, and taking into consideration
any other pertinent competitive factors.
I call your attention to section 332 (d) (3) of the Smoot-
Hawley law:
Information for President and Congress.
This is what the present law does for the commission and
for the people of the United States in respect to a scientific
and a just ascertainment and fixing of tariff duties:
(3) Select and describe articles which are representative of the
classes or kinds of articles imported into the United States and
which are similar to or comparable with articles of the United
States; select and describe articles of the United States similar to
or comparable with such imported articles; and obtain and file
samples of articles so selected, whenever the commission deems it
advisable.
111644—7947
I respectfully submit that therein is given the power of
substitution in a more scientific manner and in a manner
calculated to effect the very thing specified in the fourth
item of the specification of the proponent in respect to this
measure
Now, fifth. The learned Senator from Mississippi said that
one of these important differences, and therefore one of
these causes for enacting this substitute into law, is this:
(5) The effects of any proposed increase or decrease in rates of
duties on other domestic industries and on the export trade of the
United States.
Of course, any Senator will at once reflect that his experi¬
ence at all times has been to do that very thing in framing
a tariff bill whenever one has come up for consideration, or
in fixing a single item when it has come up for considera¬
tion. But let us see whether it is expressly provided for in
the Smoot-Hawley law. Section 332 (a), the first subdivi¬
sion, provides:
INVESTIGATIONS AND REPORTS
It shall be the duty of the commission to investigate the admin¬
istration and fiscal and industrial effects of the customs laws of
this country now in force or which may hereafter be enacted, the
relations between the rates of duty on raw materials and finished
or partly finished products, the effects of ad valorem and specific
duties and of compound specific and ad valorem duties, all ques¬
tions relative to the arrangement of schedules and classification
of articles in the several schedules of the customs law.
I respectfully submit that that is a broader, a more ex¬
tensive, a more effective grant of power for the same pur¬
pose than this section 5 in the substitute proposed therefor,
namely
The effects of any proposed increase or decrease in
rates of duties on other domestic industries and on the
export trade of the United States.
That is the full bill of particulars; that is the reason why
the Congress is asked to strike out of this important law
section 336, which had a specific objective, namely, the scien¬
tific correction of errors which may occur from the logrolling
process in Congress, and substitute a paragraph for it which
has no flexibility whatever, and which perpetuates com¬
pletely the logrolling process.
Not one of the things specified in these five items can be
said not to be possessed by the Tariff Commission to-day
under the law as it is. Yet the great Senator from Missis¬
sippi, who has my respect and very high regard, remarks.
after making this specification:
Mr. President, a tariff commission as it is to-day, by law charged
with the duty of ascertaining the difference in cost, with broad
discretionary powers given to it as to what factors shall enter into
the ascertainment of those cost differences¬
I call special attention to the following:
without the power to consider, as it does not consider, the amount
of importations that come into this country or the amount of
111644—7947
exportations that we send abroad, without considering the effi¬
ciency and the economic operation of the industry, can not ascer¬
tain the right rates to put on a commodity.
I would say “amen ” to that general statement, but does it
apply in support of this substitute for section 336, for this
substitute is a substitute for the House bill, which is a sub¬
stitute for section 336. We say no. We say that when you
subject it to that test you find it does not fit at all; is not
according to fact.
On the contrary, the Tariff Commission does consider, the
Tariff Commission does have the power to consider, the
amount of the importations and the amount of the exporta¬
tions, and the present law provides that those facts shall be
considered.
I now call attention to section 332 (b).
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. HARRISON. May I ask the Senator, since we are
trying to arrive at the same proposition, whether I under¬
stood him to say that under the flexible provision of the
Smoot-Hawley law the Tariff Commission takes into con¬
sideration, in making its findings, the exportations and im¬
portations of a particular product being submitted?
Mr. AUS
N. No; that was not my statement.
Mr. HARRISON. I am glad to get the Senator’s correc¬
tion, because I had the impression that in criticizing this
substitute and analyzing the two measures he was making
the statement that under the so-called flexible provision of
the law they did take into consideration exportations and
importations. When they make their findings they file a
report, and in their supplemental report they state the
importations and exportations, but that is not a controlling
That is why in the amendment we have
factor at all.
drafted, which is now being considered, we provide that the
Tariff Commission should make investigations of these vari¬
ous propositions and that the Congress then will conside
whether or not they will put in a particular rate, taking into
consideration, among other things, the exportations and
importations of the particular product.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, there can be no confusion
about what I have said. Perhaps there might be confusion
about the application of what I stated, and I will try to clear
it up.
Every time I have charged that the things stated in this
substitute as powers to be given to the Tariff Commission
are already given to the Tariff Commission by the present
law, I have been careful to call attention to the section and
subsection of the law where it is stated, and I have not
claimed that it was in the flexible part of the tariff law. I
repeat now that this matter of investigating exports and
imports is provided for by the Smoot-Hawley tariff law in
111644—7947
another section, which is not the flexible section of the law,
and it is considered whenever Congress creates a rate.
I call attention not only to section 332 (a) and (d) (6),
but also to section 334, relating to cooperation with other
agencies. It reads as follows:
The commission shall in appropriate matters act in conjunction
and cooperation with the Treasury Department, the Department of
Commerce, the Federal Trade Commission, or any other depart¬
ments or independent establishments of the Government, and
such departments and independent establishments of the Govern¬
ment shall cooperate fully with the commission for the purposes of
aiding and assisting in its work, and, when directed by the Presi¬
dent, shall furnish to the commission, on its request, all records,
papers, and information in their possession relating to any of
the subjects of investigation by the commission and shall detail,
from time to time, such officials and employees to said commission
as he may direct.
Just think of the scope of the investigation which can be
made by the Tariff Commission already.
There are many other provisions in the Smoot-Hawle;
tariff law which augment the resources of the Tariff Com¬
mission to gain information beyond the limits of that spe¬
cifically drawn substitute, which does not grant power but
limits power and cripples this organ of the Government,
which should be rendered more efficient daily instead of
being hampered and limited. Certainly its powers should
not be reduced under the guise and representation of giving
powers which it now does not posses
We claim that the argument that you can not fool some
of the people some of the time and all the people all the
time, made by the learned Senator from Mississippi in his
opening, it is not applied on this side of this question, but it
may well apply to this supposed substitute for section 336,
for there is not one single power named in that substitute
which is not already granted by some other section of the
Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which is in effect to-day.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator please
turn to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act—I see he has a copy
of it before him—and call our attention to the provision
in it where the commission takes into consideration effici¬
ently operated and economically located plants?
Mr. AUSTIN. I will call the attention of the Senate to
three different places where that subject is taken care of—
section 332 (b) (6), page 122; also section 336 (e) (2) (c)
page 125; and section 336 (h) (4), on page 126.
All of those sections we claim are broader, better stated,
more comprehensive, and give more efficiency to the com¬
mission than this particular one, which draws down and
narrows the consideration to a mere fact, namely, the effi¬
ciency and economical operation and location of the domes¬
tic industry under consideration.
111644—7947—2
10
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield
again?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. HARRISON. Will the Senator object to putting in
his remarks at this place the provision to which he has
called attention, so that we can see for ourselves, and so
that those who may read his remarks may see, whether or
not the provisions mean the same thing?
Mr. AUS
IN. I read from page 122, section 332, subsection
(d) (6). We should consider the beginning of the para¬
graph in order to get the connection. It is headed
“In¬
vestigations and Reports.” Subsection (b) is headed
In¬
vestigations of Tariff Relations,” and provides that
the
commission shall have power to investigate, and so on.
Now I turn to subsection (6), which reads:
Ascertain all other facts
. . . which affect competition.
That is one of the most general powers that could pos¬
sibly be given to a commission of this character with respect
to the limitations and outline of the things which it can
* *
ascertain. It can “ascertain all other facts which
affect competition between articles of the United States and
imported articles in the principal markets of the United
States.
I will read from page 125, now. This is part of the pres¬
ent flexible feature of the Smoot-Hawley law. Section 336
(e) (1) (c) provides that¬
In ascertaining under this section the differences in costs of
production the commission shall take into consideration in so far
„as it finds it practicable.
(1) In the case of a domestic article—
Senators will observe that in the specifications the foreign
article was not included, as it was in the item I have pre¬
viously read, but it was limited to the domestic article, and
that is how the Smoot-Hawley bill is limited in this par¬
ticular phrase:
In the case of a domestic article: (c) Other relevant factors
that constitute an advantage or disadvantage in competition.
Mr. HARRISON rose.
Mr. AUSTIN. I see the learned Senator from Mississippi
on his feet. I should like to ask him a question, if he will
permit.
Mr. HARRISON. Yes; I will answer the Senator’s ques¬
tion if I can. If I understand the Senator, he has quoted
the general provision that in the discretion of the commis¬
sion they might interpret the provision carried in the sub¬
stitute, “economically located and efficiently operated
plant,” as included in the definitions of the general terms of
those provisions; that is, I understand the Senator’s inter¬
pretation to be that that language is broad enough in the
present law to give to the commission, as they see fit to
111644—7947
11
exercise it, the power to take into consideration efficiently
operated and economically located plants. But I do not
understand the Senator to say that specifically it points out
in terms plain and clear so they can not be misunderstood,
as it does in this report, that the commission shall investi¬
gate the “efficient and economic operation and location of
the domestic industry under consideration. In other words,
nowhere in the present law is such language employed as
that, but only in general terms. Is not that true?
Mr. SMOOT. Mr. President¬
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Vermont
yield to the Senator from Utah?
Mr. AUSTIN. I wish to answer the question of the Sen¬
ator from Mississippi before I yield to the Senator from
Utah, which I shall be glad to do in just a moment.
Mr. SMOOT. All I want to do is to say-
GTTT
Mr. AUSIIN. Does the Senator from Utah wish to an¬
swer the question of the Senator from Mississippi? If so,
I yield now for that purpose.
Mr. SMOOT. I was going to call attention to the fact
that in the existing law it is mandatory. There is no ques¬
tion about it. The Senator is absolutely correct.
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator says it is mandatory. Can
the Senator, except in the case of glass, in which a decision
was recently handed down by the commission, point to a
single case where they have considered the question of eco¬
nomic location or efficiently operated plants in this country
Mr. SMOOT. I have not any doubt that I can.
Mr. HARRISON. Only in the report I have read with
reference to glass where they pointed out that the tariff,
which was put so high the last time, was not applicable
because certain industries in this country, notably the
Libbey-Owen people, were making the products under the
foreign process and the other industries that wanted the
higher protection were making them under the old process.
Only in that report have I ever found where the commission
hinted at any “economically located and efficiently operated
plant.” It is said that they can take into consideration all
of those factors, but it does not name specifically that au¬
thority. What I propose to do is to point out clearly that
even though the Senator from Utah himself was on the
commission he could not get away from it and he would
have to bring in the right kind of a report.
Mr. SMOOT. I want to say to the commission that if I
was on the commission I would follow the law, and the pro¬
vision is in the law as I have stated it. In all three cases
referred to by the Senator the words “shall take into con¬
sideration” are there. It is not provided that they “may
take into consideration in ascertaining the difference in cost
of production. That is exactly the position the Senator from
111644—7947
12
Vermont is taking. All three references are “shall” and
not “ may
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I appreciate the discussion
of this matter by both the learned Senator from Mississippi
and the learned Senator from Utah. I think all of us will
arrive at the same conclusion in the end, though we may
differ on the way. I think the very next section I shall
read in response to the request of the proponent of the
substitute will show that there is no possibility of detour
and that the method, the very language spoken of here—
that is, “ economical operation and location of the domestic
industry under consideration ”—defined in the Smoot¬
Hawley law as “method of manufacturing,” must be taken
into consideration. That is found on page 126 of the
act in subsection H-4 of section 336. A part of it reads
as follows:
The term “cost of production," when applied with respect to
either a domestic article or a foreign article, includes for a
period which is representative of conditions in production of the
article¬
Note the situation there, “ a period which is representative
of conditions in production of the article. I continue:
(a) The price or cost of materials, labor costs, and other direct
charges incurred in the production of the article and in the proc¬
esses or methods employed in its production.
That is a specific direction which can not be detoured or
evaded in any way.
But, Mr. President, let it not be overlooked that I am
employing these references to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act
in order to show that there is nothing, absolutely nothing,
in the first six pages of the substitute offered by the Sen¬
ator from Mississippi which gives now or which adds any
power or does anything excepting to reflect the shadow.
and a broken shadow at that, of the Smoot-Hawley Act.
To be sure, it deletes some things completely, and for that
reason I am opposed to it.
But before passing to that I wish to call attention to the
effect of the provisions of the Smoot-Hawley Act in respect
to investigating along all the lines mentioned in the sub¬
stitute bill. Take the provision for the cooperation and
coordination of other branches of the Government which
brings in many of the things mentioned in the substitute,
namely, the amount of exports, the amount of imports, the
conditions of labor, the conditions of investment of capital,
the economic manner or method in which the product is
produced both at home and abroad, and let us see how it is
worked out.
TREASURY ATTACHÉS AND THEIR WORK
Have we ever heard of Treasury attachés? We have if
we have ever been to Congress and appeared before the
Finance Committee of the Senate or the Ways and Means
111644—7947
13
Committee of the House endeavoring to get the phraseology
of an item changed or its classification changed or the
amount raised, as I have done, and encountered the evidence
of Treasury employees abroad. This I am taking from an
authority. This is an extract from the address of Capt.
F. X. A. Eble, United States Commissioner of Customs. He
said with respect to Treasury employees and foreign service
as it bears upon the powers and efficiency of our Tariff
Commission:
In addition to our bureau in Washington and the field service
throughout the United States, the Customs Service maintains a
foreign force, whose headquarters are located in the capitals of the
principal European countries.
There are also two offices in the
Orient. The officials in charge are known as Treasury attachés.
These officers are a branch of the investigative unit of the bureau
in Washington. This unit, which is the directing office of the
customs agency service, constitutes the eyes and ears of the com¬
missioner, and assists him materially in the detection and preven¬
tion of frauds upon the revenue.
I will skip a portion of the statement and proceed:
It is in the establishment of foreign values that the agents
of the customs foreign service render very valuable assistance to
our appraising officers. If any United States appraising officer is
uncertain as to the real or market value of any imported foreign
commodity, he sends a request to the department that an investi¬
gation be made and this, in turn, is forwarded to the Treasury
attaché stationed in the country from which the merchandise was
exported to the United States.
Mr. President, so far as it is practicable to ascertain the
facts abroad with respect to the economic conditions of pro¬
duction there, with respect to the difference in the cost of
production there and at home, we now have adequate laws
to do that, and we do not need anything that can be found
in the substitute in order to exercise that necessary function.
It seems to me, that I heard the Tariff Commission at¬
tacked by the learned Senator from Massachusetts [Mr.
WALSHI, who asked what it had done and what good it has
accomplished. I, therefore, feel impelled to invite attention
to the fact, also taken from the high authority of the
United States Commissioner of Customs, that¬
HISTORY OF TARIFF COMMISSIONS
Historically, our experience with tariff commissions goes back
to 1882, with the appointment by the Congress of the commission
to accumulate and prepare data for the tariff revision of 1883.
After a lapse of a quarter century, the commission principle was
again revived with the appointment of the so-called Taft tariff
board, which continued to function as an investigatory branch of
the Government until 1912, when it became defunct due to the
failure of the Congress to provide funds for its continuance.
The present Tariff Commission was established in 1916 under a
revenue law of that year, and it, too, was originally established
as an investigatory body to provide the Congress with data for
use during congressional revisions of the tariff.
The Tariff Commission from time to time made investiga¬
tions and reported a certain amount of definite information
111644—7947
14
to the Congress when it went to work on tariff measures;
that is to say, for years it did all and everything that was
provided for it to do in the substitute bill, and if we should
adopt the substitute we would be going back to conditions of
years ago and surrendering and giving up, without considera¬
tion or any benefit received, that which has been developed
by experience, the benefit of progress, the benefit of adapta¬
tion to the changing business conditions in the world as well
as in the United States.
This story of the Tariff Commission goes on to say:
The commission is a bipartisan body made up of 6 men,
3 Republicans and 3 Democrats.
With the passage of the Fordney-McCumber Act of 1922, the
commission was given a new and very important function¬
And that is the function that this substitute measure seeks
to kill—
which has been continued under the present Smoot-Hawley law.
This is the so-called flexible feature of the law, by which the
commission is authorized to determine such changes in existing
rates of duty as may be necessary to equalize the difference be¬
tween foreign and domestic costs of
production. The commission
reports its findings to the President, who makes them effective by
presidential proclamation, adjusting, either up or down within a
50 per cent limitation, the rates of duty in the law in accordance
with the cost-of-production formula.
CONSTITUTIONALITY OF FLEXIBLE CLAUSE
Mr. President, let me digress to consider for a moment
another argument made here to-day, and that is that the
flexible feature of the tariff law is unconstitutional and that
it has been determined by a customs court to be unconsti¬
tutional.
Of course, it is not our function here to undertake to pass
upon the constitutionality of any specific provision of law,
and I would not have the temerity to stand before any
tribunal engaged in seriously considering the subject and
undertake to talk about a specific case concerning which
I am informed only by what I hear on the floor of the
Senate or what I read in the public press; but, as near as
I can understand from what I have heard here to-day and
what I have seen in the newspapers, in a particular case
on a particular item, that is, wire fencing or netting, cer¬
tain customs officials undertook the great function of de¬
claring this provision of the law to be unconstitutional.
We know that if there is any one distinguishing char¬
acteristic of the Government of the United States which
makes it stand out superior to any other form of govern¬
ment ever created in all the world and in all time it is the
Supreme Court of the United States, which is invested with
exclusive power and the exclusive sovereign right of saying
what acts passed by the Congress of the United States are
and what are not constitutional. No other body in all the
world exercises any such power as that; no other body in
111644—7947
15
all the world can, with any effect whatever, undertake to
declare an act of Congress unconstitutional, and yet a
customs officer, a customs court, assumes that attitude.
On close examination it would probably be found that
the decision was rendered for the sole purpose of raising
the question and getting it to the Supreme Court, and not
with any view of having any effect upon the act either in
legislation here that may be reflected by that decision or
in any judgment that may flow from it. Of course, it is
an act of temerity for a Senator to stand here and con¬
trovert the court and say that he believes the law is con¬
stitutional notwithstanding that judgment, but I am going
to be so hardy as to do that, and to declare that I am firmly
persuaded, as a Senator, that this law is sound and is con¬
stitutional or I would not be on my feet supporting it.
le fact is, so far as I can see, that what the Tariff Com¬
mission did in the case of woven wire was to give it a dif¬
ferent tariff rate. One may call that any name he pleases,
but, as I see it, it was the exercise of the right to change
the classification of an item of trade. The Tariff Commis¬
sion merely lifted woven-wire fencing out of a basket pro¬
vision, as it is called, a general provision, including many
items; it lifted this one item out of the basket clause and
“ We will, within the 50 per cent limitation, increase
said,
the rate on this one item out of a whole basketful.” I be¬
lieve that is what was done. If that be the case, that change
of classification, if it is such a change, that change of rate,
is not legislation; it is not fixing rates. When Congress put
a maximum and a minimum limit upon the flexibility of
the rate it legislated; the legislative act was complete and
finished; and an increase of the rate within the limitation
was a mere administrative function under the law. When,
under their power, the commission lifted that item out of the
basket clause, it did what it was specifically granted the
power to do as an administrative act, and not as a legisla¬
tive function.
When it comes to hearings before the committees of either
House of Congress with respect to the imposition of a tariff
on an item that is free, or with respect to the change in
the rate of duty on the item or with respect to putting it
among its proper associates and taking it out of bad com¬
pany, the committees of the Senate and of the House of
Representatives to-day have the benefit of the advice of the
Tariff Commission. It is not necessary to destroy the flexible
feature of the tariff law in order to continue to enjoy all
the advice, support, and assistance of the Tariff Commis¬
sion which has been heretofore enjoyed and is enjoyed to¬
day and is not created by this substitute bill.
I have spoken somewhat from my own observation in re-
spect to this matter, but I do not like to rely upon that.
111644—7947
16
Therefore I cite authority for this proposition in general.
I quote from the Commissioner of Customs, who says:
In the hearings before the Senate and House committees, every-
one is given an opportunity to be heard and to present his case;
and you will get an idea of the extent to which this is done when
I tell you that the record of the hearings before the two com¬
mittees covers some 18,000 printed pages.
He was referring to the very tariff bill to which an amend¬
ment is now proposed.
I might add at this point that in our recent revision there has
been a decided tendency for the Congress to rely less and less on
the data submitted at these hearings and to frame the bill in
consultation with the Government experts of the Tariff Commis¬
sion and of the Treasury Department.
Anyone who has gone to the Tariff Commission in an
attempt to secure an increase in a tariff rate or a change in
a schedule in any way has encountered the vast amount of
information and ścientific data gathered at home and
abroad affecting the subject which really puts his own in¬
formation completely in the shadow.
I should like to refer to the subject later in discussing the
second feature of this tariff measure, but it is getting late,
and I am sure the Senate has been very generous listening to
me so patiently after a long day. So I will conclude the first
proposition which I desire to make here and will be glad¬
Mr. WATSON. Does the Senator desire to conclude’ to¬
morrow
Mr. AUSTIN. I will be very glad to complete my remarks
to-morrow, if I may then be recognized.
The VICE PRESIDENT. The Senator will be recognized.
Tuesday, March 29, 1932
RÉSUMÉ OF ADEQUACY OF LAW
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, on yesterday we suspended
the discussion of reasons why the Harrison substitute to the
pending measure (H. R. 6662) ought not to pass with the
claim that the substitute is unnecessary to effect the pur¬
poses stated by the proponents of that measure. It is
alleged that Congress has and exercises the power which
the proponents claim the substitute would return to Con¬
gress. It exercises those powers under and by virtue of sec¬
tion 8, Article I, of the Constitution in vesting Congress with
the power to “lay and collect duties, taxes, imposts, and
excises.”
Again, the proposed substitute, we claim, ought not to be
enacted, because it is not necessary to invest the Tariff Com¬
mission with the powers claimed by the proponents to be
invested by the substitute. The commission already has and
enjoys these powers by virtue of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff
Act and by virtue of sections not objected to and not sug-
gested to be changed in any manner by this proposed amend¬
ment.
111644—7947
17
Again, the substitute is inadequate and deficient for the
purposes stated by its proponents, because it omits very es¬
sential elements that are found in section 336 of the present
tariff act.
Again, it is destructive and not constructive, because it
removes the only effectual plan for correcting errors in rates.
It ought not to be adopted, as we urge justly, because it
eliminates consideration of the national interests and mag¬
nifies the consideration of local interests by turning back
to the ancient and discarded method of logrolling for the
proposed correction of errors, the very abuse against which
section 336 was aimed, and aimed effectually.
THE MAPLE SUGAR INVESTIGATION
Furthermore, it destroys the beneficial element of speed
in securing a remedy. I call the attention of the Senate to
the speed with which the flexible feature of the Smoot¬
Hawley tariff law was employed against the farmers of 21
States in this Union which produce maple sugar, and par¬
ticularly against the farmers of the State of Vermont. With
the permission of the Senate, I will read a short paragraph
from a letter from A. H. Packard, president of the Vermont
State Farm Bureau, written to me, dated January 21, 1932:
Pleased to receive your letter of January 14 regarding the tariff
on maple sirup, and will say that the deflation of Canadian cur¬
rency takes away part of the protection which we had even after
the Tariff Commission got through with us. You will recall that
our tariff from 1920 to 1930 was approximately 30 cents per gal¬
lon; that Congress, on June 8, 1930, gave us approximately 60
cents per gallon protection; and that fall someone got the Tariff
Commission started, and when the sky cleared we had approxi¬
mately 44 cents protection. A 20 per cent discount on money
reduces this 44 cents quite a way back toward the old 30, and
practically opens up the door so that Canada can again send
sirup in with very little hesitation.
I have ascertained that what took place to which this
Vermont farmer alludes was the following: Of course, we
start from the point that the tariff act of 1930—the Smoot-
Hawley Tariff Act—became a law, on June 17, 1930. On July
2 the senior Senator from New York [Mr. COPELANDI asked
unanimous consent for the consideration of Senate resolu¬
tion 313, which proposed an investigation by the Tariff Com¬
mission, under the flexible clause of the tariff act, of certain
specified commodities.
HISTORY OF TARIFF RATES ON MAPLE PRODUCTS
There was no debate in regard to the resolution, but it was
objected to by the Senator from Idaho IMr. THOMASI and
went over until July 3, when it was again brought up, and
agreed to. Before the last-mentioned action was taken, the
senior and distinguished Senator from Mississippi [Mr.
HARRISONI offered an amendment to include maple sirup and
maple sugar among the commodities to be investigated
under the resolution. No objection was raised to that
111644—7947-
18
amendment. Following its investigation of maple sugar and
maple sirup under the terms of the Copeland resolution, the
Tariff Commission submitted its report to the President on
February 2, 1931, recommending a decrease of the rate on
maple sugar from 8 cents to 6 cents, and a decrease of the
rate of duty on maple sirup from 5½ cents per pound to 4
cents per pound. The President subsequently issued a proc¬
lamation changing the rate in accordance with the recom¬
mendations of the Tariff Commission.
I call the attention of the Senate now to the element of
time involved in this proceeding in order that there may be
impressed unforgetably the fact that section 336 of the
Smoot-Hawley tariff law creates speed in the correction of
any error, if such there has been, in fixing the rate of duty
upon any single commodity by the Congress. Speed! This
change in the rates on maple sirup and maple sugar,
whether right or wrong—and I am not debating that ques¬
tion, it will be understood, for it will be soon enough to take
it up if we can persuade this body to do so—whether right
or wrong, I say those rates were changed before even the
law had an opportunity to be applied to maple sugar and
maple sirup. Before ever the farmers of Vermont and other
States could produce a single crop to benefit by the rate in
the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act some interest caused a resolu¬
tion of the Senate of the United States to excite the action
of the Tariff Commission, and all the machinery which is
provided by the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was actuated into
motion. The entire investigation completed; the proclama¬
tion by the President issued; and the beneficial effect of the
action of Congress in raising the rate on maple sugar
entirely destroyed before the farmer could even try it out.
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President¬
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Vermont
yield to the Senator from New York?
IN. I yield.
Mr. AU
Mr. COPELAND. Is not what the Senator says an argu¬
ment in favor of the Harrison proposal that before a change
shall actually be made, after the Tariff Commission has
acted, it shall be brought to Congress for its opinion?
I am in the fullest sympathy with the Senator regarding
the rates of duty on maple sugar and maple sirup, because
they are produced in my State as well as in his; but this
action was taken by the President under the present act
without any opportunity on the part of the Congress to be
heard regarding its wishes in the matter.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, the answer to that question
in a word is “no,” and the explanation of the answer is as
follows: There is no more logic or sense, even, in saying
that the Tariff Commission should be abolished because it
has rendered an adverse judgment to some interest than
there is in saying that the Senate should be abolished for
111644—7947
19
exciting the action of the Tariff Commission. It is not a
question of whether the action taken was right or wrong;
it is not a question of who is responsible for doing this
thing; the question to-day for us is—and it is a serious ques¬
tion for the people of the State of Vermont, because one-
third of our population is engaged in agriculture, and the
making of maple sugar is a very important prop and sup¬
port to their humble lives—the question to-day is, Shall we
have an equal privilege with those who started this attack
upon maple sugar to recover and have restored to maple
sugar its rights and to the farmers of Vermont their rights,
if they have them? I would as soon think of saying we
should abolish a court which renders judgment against me
as to think of abolishing the Tariff Commission because its
action in the case of maple sugar was unfortunate and
harmed the interest of the farmers of my State.
The substitute of the Senator from Mississippi, if enacted
into law, would strike from under the farmers of Vermont
and every other State where maple sugar is produced the
privilege of presenting the case to a board which can act
scientifically, which can take into consideration facts which
were not previously presented to them, can take into consid¬
ration changed conditions, and render a judgment as of
to-day, and render it with speed; because, if the substitute
is adopted, the element of speed is gone, and gone forever,
until we restore, if we ever should, to the tariff measure some
flexible feature that will provide for an immediate correction
of errors committed in the logrolling process in Congres
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Vermont
yield further to the Senator from New York?
Mr. AUSTIN. Yes; I yield.
Mr. COPELAND. It seems to me the Senator is unfor¬
tunate in his particular example of the efficiency of the
present system, because if, under the proposed substitute,
we had the report of the Tariff Commission on maple sirux
and maple sugar, we could here bring our own individual
views to bear upon the decision. I have no doubt that the
able Senator from Vermont could bring material here to
bolster his thought that there should be greater protection
upon this commodity, but at present, when the recommenda¬
tion of the Tariff Commission goes to the President and the
President acts, then we are foreclosed until we have a gen¬
eral tariff revision. I think that it was very unfortunate that
these particular items, maple sugar and maple sirup, re¬
ceived the treatment they did at the hands of the Tariff
Commission and at the hands of the President. I doubt
exceedingly if it would have happened had the Harrison law
been in effect and had the report of the commission been
brought back here. Even though there might have been a
few months' delay, there would have been greater justice
111644—7947
20
done to the farmers of Vermont and the farmers of New
York than under the particular action which was taken by
the Tariff Commission and by the President.
Mr. AUSTIN. The argument of the learned senior Sena¬
tor from New York brings out in fine relief the very thing
we are contending for, and that is this matter of speed,
which can be preserved if we preserve the flexible feature of
the tariff law, and which can be destroyed if we destroy the
flexible feature of the tariff law.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. FEss in the chair). Does
the Senator from Vermont yield to the Senator from Missis¬
sippi?
Mr. AUSTIN. I do.
Mr. HARRISON. Do I understand that the Senator is
criticizing the Tariff Commission for showing too much
speed in reducing the rate on maple sugar and maple sirup?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, the Senator was not criticiz¬
ing the Tariff Commission for anything. The Senator was
praising section 336 of the Smoot-Hawley tariff law because
it permitted immediate, prompt change, within the limits of
the act, of the amount of the tariff on a certain commodity.
I intend to follow this with a statement of the general record
of achievement of the Tariff Commission and to make the
claim that if the commission were wiped out and it became
necessary to go to Congress in place of going to the Execu¬
tive for the purpose of making a proclamation, you could go
only at stated times of the year. Your would deal with three
or four hundred individuals instead of with one individual.
You would excite the cupidity, the selfish interests of all
the different localities that wished to do some logrolling for
their benefit the moment you stepped into Congress with this
matter; and instead of having the comprehensive and broad¬
visioned and special expert knowledge of the Chief Execu¬
tive, with his staff, you would have the specialized, diversi¬
fied, and expert knowledge of really hundreds of different
perts trying to deal with that matter. So that in every
respect I praise, and do not criticize, the Tariff Commission.
Mr. HARRISON. Then the Senator praises the Tariff
Commission for having reduced the tariff on maple sugar and
maple sirup
Mr. AUSTIN. No; that is not a conclusion that can
logically follow my remarks.
Mr. HARRISON. Would the Senator mind telling me
whether he agrees with the Tariff Commission in that find¬
ing?
No; I prefer not to state.
Mr. AUSTIN.
Mr. HARRISON. Why does the Senator refuse to tell us
that?
Mr. AUSTIN. Because it is entirely irrelevant and not
germane to my argument.
111644—7947
21
Mr. HARRISON. Is it not a fact that the reason why
the Senator does not want to tell us is because his State
is very much interested in maple sugar and maple sirup,
and the Tariff Commission has reduced this duty per¬
ceptibly, and the Senator does not feel like getting into a
controversy with anyone in his State with reference to his
views?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I will answer that question.
The Senator does not feel that way about the matter. For
the present, in this body, and on the substitute which is
under consideration, the Senator views the situation to
be this:
Whatever may have been the facts which moved the
Tariff Commission to reduce the rates on maple sugar and
maple sirup, the Senator from Vermont has no doubt of
the good faith and the intent of the Tariff Commission to
do justice and is not going to stand in this body and under¬
take to criticize the judgment of that commission.
Looked at from the point of view of the learned Senator
from Mississippi—namely, political interest—I should say
that it appears to me like this: It is quite a significant pic¬
ture. Apparently the advocate of the interest of the man
who makes a rich, juicy, sweet chew of tobacco to obtain a
nice, fine profit from the sweetener that is obtained from
the green hills of Vermont is at least more powerful than
the advocate of the interest of the hardy farmer up there,
slushing around the melting snows of the mountains in
his rubber boots, who manufactures that sweetener. I am
for that farmer, and when the time comes the Senator
will hear from me on this tariff question. But I am not
debating an item of the tariff; I am dealing with a prin¬
ciple—namely, Shall we remove the only means we have
of restoring that tariff if it is correct that it should be
restored?
Mr. HARRISON. Will the Senator permit me to con¬
gratulate him on the clarity of his answer to my question?
Mr. AUSTIN. I thank the Senator. I appreciate his
generosity, Mr. President.
Mr. HARRISON. It is just as clear as mud.
Now, I should like to ask the Senator a further question
without desiring to get him into a controversy with his con¬
stituents, as to whether or not he approves of the Tarifi
Commission’s finding reducing the tariff duty on maple
sugar and maple sirup. He says he favors the present plan
because of its flexibility, and that there would have been
delay if we had not had such a law. That is right, as I un¬
derstand. Then, the Senator says that if this recommenda¬
tion had come back to Congress there would be some
logrolling and swapping, and that is a thing we want to get
away from.
111644—7947
22
The Senator has studied this substitute and the House
bill. Under the present law, of course, a tariff bill comes
in here. We have seen some swapping, some logrolling; but
we prevent that in this substitute by saying that no subject
shall be considered that is not germane to the particular
subject matter of the bill. Now, I want to ask the Senator
this question: Suppose this report had come in on maple
sugar and maple sirup. If this bill were being considered
then in the Senate, does he know of any other amendment
that might have been offered as to any other product that
would be germane to the particular subject matter?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I will try to answer that
question. I tried to answer the other question. Perhaps
my answer was not complete enough, and after answering
the pending question I will go back and add to my former
answer.
Mr. HARRISON. If the Senator will just answer the
last question as to what amendment would be germane to
the consideration of any other question, I shall be satisfied.
Mr. AUSTIN. I will try to do that.
It would make no difference whatever whether it were
germane or not upon the question of “back scratching ” in
Congress. It would make no difference whether any other
amendment were pending than the single one spoken of by
the learned Senator from Mississippi, for this reason: There
is nothing to prevent the genial Senator from Mississippi
from saying to the genial Senator from Massachusetts IMr.
WALSHI,
“You help us in that bill and we will help you by
and by with such and such a thing in which you are
interested.
The measure does not have to be immediately pending in
Congress in order to have the wildest sort of back scratch¬
ing and logrolling; and it is that very thing which both the
great parties have declared against and which they have
sought to obviate in their platforms when they have de¬
clared for a scientific method of adjusting rates. It is
really an astonishing thing to see the leaders of the Demo¬
cratic Party standing up here to-day against the solemn
declaration of their entire organization in their last national
convention upon this subject.
Now, returning, as I intend to do before finishing, to the
former question of the Senator from Mississippi, I will add
something. I thought I had completely answered him; but
if it interests him more to know what my constituents think
about this matter than I appeared to understand, I will read
this telegram from W. L. McKee, president of Associated
Industries of Vermont. This is dated January 5 and ad¬
dressed to me:
Newspaper reports Representative GARNER is proposing a change
in administrative section of tariff bill requiring Tariff Commission
report to Congress instead of to the President, and that such bill
111644—7947
23
The prosperity of Vermont farmers
is expected to pass this week.
and industry is absolutely dependent upon tariff protection.
Canadian farm products and manufactured articles are now injur¬
ing Vermont industries more than people realize under present
tariff. The proposed change apparently places this question in
politics and would practically nullify the workings of the flexible
section of the tariff act and render impossible adjustments neces¬
sary to protect Vermont industry against changing Canadian con¬
ditions. Firmly of belief that the administration of this act
should not be subject to political quarrels or delay. Hope that
your judgment and knowledge of Vermont conditions will lead
you to oppose this strenuously and completely. Believe our asso¬
ciation would oppose change almost 100 per cent.
W. L. MCKEE
President Associated Industries of Vermont.
Mr. President, that is some evidence that the constit¬
uency which I represent is being represented in respect to
the preservation of the flexible feature of the tariff law.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President¬
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. HARRISON. I want to get back to the question I
asked the Senator. He cited the illustration that if a bill
reducing the tariff on maple sugar and maple sirup were
here, nothing would prevent me from going over to the Sen¬
ator from Massachusetts or some other Senator and saying,
“ You vote with me on this bill, and I will vote with you on
some other bill.” Of course, that could be done if we would
be guilty of such nefarious conduct; but will the Senator now
admit that if a report under this substitute for the House
bill should come before the Senate for consideration, the sub¬
ject being merely the reduction of the tariff on maple sugar
and maple sirup, an amendment to put a tariff on some other
commodity in that particular bill would be subject to a point
of order, and would not be germane? Will he admit that?
he question of
Mr. AUSTIN. I will not admit that.
what is germane will prove to be one of the most trouble¬
some questions the Senate will have to deal with if this act
ever becomes a law.
Mr. HARRISON. Now, I will ask the Senator, what prod-
uct he would suggest as the subject of an amendment touch¬
ing the tariff that would be germane to the tariff on maple
sugar and maple sirup?
Mr. AUSTIN. I think I do not understand the question.
Will the Senator state it again?
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator from Vermont says that
other matters could be offered as amendments that would
be germane. I am asking him to state one that would be
germane in the consideration of the tariff on maple sugar
and maple sirup.
Mr. AUSTIN. The Senator from Vermont did not so
state; and, so far as he is informed at the present moment,
he would feel great hesitancy in undertaking to define what
is germane, and to make an example of a germane item.
That was not the point, in any event.
111644—7947
24
Mr. HARRISON. That is what I am asking the Senator¬
to state one product that would be germane in the considera¬
tion of the tariff on maple sugar and maple sirup
Mr. AUSTIN. I should be glad to do so, but it is entirely
irrelevant to anything I am debating here. I am not here
for the purpose of answering questions of that character. I
think it would be just as sensible to ask me what I know
about white mice as to ask me a question like that, when I
do not claim and have not claimed that any action could be
taken by the Senate which would not be germane, or which
would be germane, to a pending bill.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, with all deference to the
Senator, I know that he wants to debate this question in a
very fair way, and I am trying to reach the same result.
The difference in the viewpoint of the Senator and myself
and others is that he is arguing that the substitute will not
clarify the matter of writing a tariff bill from past procedure
He has condemned the logrolling and the swapping of votes
process which we have seen in tariff legislation. We con¬
tend that under the substitute no amendment that is not
germane to a particular subject matter would be considered.
I am asking the Senator if he can state a single proposition,
when we were considering a report of the Tariff Commission
on maple sugar and maple sirup, that would be germane,
and he does not tell me, he does not answer the question.
Yet he says that that has nothing to do with the question.
It has a great deal to do with it.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I will be pleased to accord
to the Senator from Mississippi the privilege of allowing his
statement just made to stand without contest, for I am mak-
ing no argument based upon the thing he is talking about
none whatever. The point I am trying to make—perhaps I
am doing it so abstrusely that I am misrepresenting my own
thought—is that this substitute should not be agreed to
because of the fact that it would destroy the speed with
which correction of errors could be made, because it would
stroy the flexibility of the present law.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield
for another question, on the question of speed?
Mr. NORRIS. Before the Senator goes on to the question
of speed, I want to ask something pertaining to this par¬
ticular subject.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. To whom does the Senator
from Vermont yield?
Mr. AUSTIN.
I yield to the Senator from Nebraska.
Mr. NORRIS
Will the Senator permit me to answer the
question propounded by the Senator from Mississippi?
Mr. AUSTIN.
I will be very grateful to the Senator.
Mr. NORRIS.
The Senator from Mississippi asks what
would be offered as an amendment that would be germane.
I will say to the Senator from Mississippi that an amend¬
111644—7947
25
ment putting a tariff on tooth paste made out of maple
wood would be germane. ILaughter.)
Mr. HARRISON. I might agree with the Senator in that.
Mr. NORRIS. It comes from maple.
Mr. HARRISON. Getting back to the question of speed,
I want to ask the Senator from Vermont a question. As I
understand him, he is arguing that we get more speed by
leaving to the Tariff Commission the power to fix rates, to
reduce them or increase them. That is right, is it not?
Mr. AUSTIN. That is correct. I do not know that is the
whole question I would want to assent to.
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator will recall that under the
Fordney-McCumber law the tariff on maple sugar and
maple sirup, getting back to the matter the Senator is
discussing, was 4 cents a pound, and the Tariff Commission,
while President Coolidge was President, recommended a
reduction of the tariff on maple sirup to 3½/ cents and an
increase to 5.3 cents on maple sugar. Instead of getting
speed, you did not get it. The President, who came from
the State represented by the Senator, refused to ratify or
proclaim the rates promulgated by the Tariff Commission,
and you did not get any speed at all. You did not get a
reduction on the maple sirup and you did not get any in¬
crease on the maple sugar. What has the Senator to say
about the speed of that incident?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I have this to say, that
section 336 of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which we are
discussing and which is the only thing we are discussing,
was not in existence at that time. We are not dealing with
the same things whatever, and the endeavors to drag me out
of a discussion of the pending question will not be suc¬
cessful.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, the Senator does not
want to fall into error that way. The Tariff Commission
had practically the same power under the Fordney-Mc¬
Cumber law, which was the law when Mr. Coolidge refused
to accept the findings of the Tariff Commission, as under
the Smoot-Hawley law. Will not the Senator go back in
his recollection and agree with me in that statement?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I am not discussing the law
as it stood before the Smoot-Hawley tariff law was enacted.
We are not dealing with anything here but section 336, for
which the Senator has offered a substitute, and the question
before the Senate is not what the condition of the law was
before the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was passed.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President¬
Mr. AUSTIN. I do not care to yield further if we are
going off from the pending question.
Mr. HARRISON. I just wanted to correct an error the
Senator has gotten into. Under the Fordney-McCumber law,
passed in 1922, the power of the Tariff Commission under the
111644—7947
26
flexible provision was practically the same as under the
Smoot-Hawley law, and I think my friend the Senator from
Utah will nod his head in assent to that proposition. I just
want to keep the Senator straight on that matter.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I understand the very fine
intentions of the senior Senator from Mississippi, and thank
him fully, as much as the occasion deserves. I now wish
to proceed with my argument.
he PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator declines to
vield further.
RECORD OB TAEIEN COMMIISSION
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I might call attention at this
moment, in passing, briefly to the achievements of this
Federal commission which is under attack here. Since its
reorganization, in September, 1930, the commission has dis¬
posed of 113 cases, with increases in duties on 12 commodi¬
ties, decreases on 17 commodities, and no change recom¬
mended in 39 other cases. Four cases were returned to the
commission by the President for further investigation. Eight
investigations ordered by the Senate were dismissed by that
body. Five applications were withdrawn by proponents, and
20 applications were dismissed by the commission itself after
careful preliminary investigation.
It seems to me that when we consider the period involved,
namely, from September, 1930, to January 1, 1931, when
this report was made, the record of action of the Tariff
Commission is a voucher of its usefulness and an argument
for its maintenance and preservation for the benefit of the
wage earner, for the benefit of labor, and for the benefit of
the employer, and the man who is forced in this depression
to seek out new avenues for enterprise, in order that we may
maintain or restore that degree of prosperity which tends
to the high standard of living to which our people are
educated and to which they aspire.
It seems to me—and I will make this brief—that this is
the poorest time when any such attack as this could be
offered against the tariff act known as the Smoot-Hawley
tariff law. When, in all the experience of the American
people, could it be more inappropriate to offer in Congress a
measure which is replete with promises of concessions, tariff
concessions, mutual concessions to our competitors; replete
with promises of taking out of the taxable list and putting
on the free list other commodities; replete with suggestions
of reductions of tariff rates? When in all our history could
such a proposition be more injurious to the wage earner
than it is to-day
We see labor all over the United States, organized and
unorganized, standing up in solid ranks against this sub¬
stitute, because labor sees that if the tariff wall in this
emergency is broken down, if foreign competition is admitted
to a greater extent than we have it to-day, our depression
111644—7947
27
will be given a further impetus downward; and those who
are at the bottom of the scale will suffer the most when that
takes place.
THE VERMONT FARMER
Of course, in my own State the farmers about whom I
have talked feel it keenly. Ask one of them about the
human side of the tariff law, and you will get a picture.
You will see something that will stand out in your imagina¬
tion with more persuasive eloquence than all the reasoning
that could be indulged in here by anybody. Live in a border
town on the Canadian line, spend you boyhood there, back
and forth from Canada into Vermont, and witness what we
have witnessed there, the difference in the standards and
conditions of living between the American farmer and the
Canadian farmer.
We have seen the day when there was not a range in a
dwelling house north of the line, and the bread was baked
in an outdoor oven. We have seen water taken with a well
sweep for lack of a pump. We have seen their fields tilled
with old-fashioned machinery. We have seen their grain
garnered with the scythe operated by hand. We have seen
their pigs and their cattle and horses, their sheep and
poultry, all pastured together in the front door yard and
back. We have seen every member of the family having to
go into the fields and work and toil by hand—mother, sons,
and daughters—in order to eke out a living on those rich
farms, whose opportunity, however, was as different as you
can possibly imagine from the opportunity of those sturdy
farmers just across that imaginary line in the State of
Vermont, who enjoyed modern machinery, whose house-
wives had a range, whose well contained a pump, whose
farms were tilled by men, whose cows were milked by milk-
ing machines and men, not by the girls of the household.
Then we saw a thing take place. The Canadian farmers
began to move out of Canada across the line and pay huge
prices for farms in Vermont, and the value of land in Ver¬
mont went up. Not only did we see the standard of living
better, the luxuries and comforts of life taken to the farmer
on the hillside there, but we saw values go up, and to-day
you will find the Canadian Frenchmen—a mighty fine type
of humanity, let me say in his praise and to the glory of
ruth—extending all the way through the State of Ver¬
mont, and occupying and tilling our farms. That is what
you find there to-day. You see the human effect of a pro¬
tective tariff. In the early days there was §4 a ton on hay.
It is now $6, made so because of the changed value of hay.
But I want to state that the tariff on hay alone had the
greatest reflex on the people on both sides of that line, and
could be known and observed by every boy who was growing
up on the line. Perhaps that is one reason why Vermont
is Republican. The Republican tariff came from Vermont.
111644—7947
28
Justin S. Morrill, that great statesman, the founder of the
land-grant colleges, which are enjoyed by every State in
this Union, wrote the first Republican tariff act. He re¬
ceived his high inspiration from his experience on the
border, and that had been quite a varied experience which
taught those Republicans to believe that they were op¬
posed to an embargo, that a tariff that was so high as to
amount to an embargo was bad. They saw that also from
their lives and experience there.
During the administration of Thomas Jefferson the Ver¬
monters organized a rebellion against the Jefferson embargo
of 1808 which resulted in armed force and the shedding of
human blood and the loss of human lives. Vermonters do
not insist upon an embargo or rates high enough to pre¬
vent the proper exchange of business between countries,
but they have learned from experience the indispensable
value of a tariff that does protect in order to raise up and
keep raised up the standard of living for them and their
posterity.
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President¬
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from New York?
Mr. AU
TIN. I yield.
Mr. COPELAND. I am in the greatest sympathy with
what the Senator said about the value of the tariff. I am
one of those on this side of the aisle who believe in it,
properly applied. But I want to ask the Senator if it is not
possible at least that the Tariff Commission, dealing with
matters as it does under the present law, is excluded from
taking into consideration the human element mentioned by
the Senator? On the other hand, if we could bring here
the subject about which the Senator spoke a little while ago,
the maple sugar tariff, after the commission had considered
it thoroughly from the legalistic or statistical standpoint,
we could have the human side presented here. But as I
understand the Senator he is satisfied to have it as it is now
because, he says, we get immediate action and we do not
have all the possibility of logrolling. I could have answered
the question a little while ago propounded by the Senator
from Mississippi [Mr. HARRISONI about subjects germane to
it. We might have brought in the subject of chewing to¬
bacco, which is sweetened, and of cheap sugar and refined
sugar. I could have brought in, too, the matter of saccha¬
rin. Those matters might properly be considered as ger¬
mane, but there could not be brought in all of the 21,000
items embraced in the tariff act.
As I said, it would be much better, if I may say so with
all courtesy to the Senator, to adopt the plan proposed in
the Harrison substitute because after the Tariff Commission
had developed the legal side and the statistical side, the mat¬
ter would come here for consideration of the human side.
111644—7947
29
I honor the Senator for what he has said about that side of
the question. I was born on a farm and know something
about farm conditions. I know how trying they are. But
the Tariff Commission does not consider that element. I
think really the Senator, if I may say it, is mistaken in his
opposition to this particular feature of the bill. I think it
would be far better to have the report brought to us from
the Tariff Commission in order that we might inject into it
the human element and make it a human thing instead of
just simply a statistical thing as it is under the present law.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I appreciate the point of
view of the distinguished senior Senator from New York
and his very excellent statement of his attitude toward the
pending legislation. It is natural, since the proponent of
the measure is a leader in the great Democratic Party and
the senior Senator from New York is likewise such a leader.
But we differ, and we differ with respect for each other. I
may comment, however, upon what the distinguished Sena¬
tor said in this way. He said,
“Why not bring the human
problem into Congress where we have a flow of the milk
of human kindness and have action upon it here?
I say.
do so, by all means do so, but do not destroy the other
agency of speedy remedy.
I do not need to repeat what I have stated several times
yesterday, and to-day that Congress still enjoys its consti¬
tutional right to entertain the tariff on maple sugar even
though the Tariff Commission made a decree yesterday.
That is just the point. We may bring the human problem
to Congress whatever the judgment of the Tariff Commis¬
sion may be, and we may bring it here at any time. We
may bring it while they are considering, we may bring it
before they consider, or we may bring it after they have
considered the matter. Under the Constitution of the
United States this is the place where we can bring the
human problem and bring it many times, whether it bear
upon the tariff question or not. We enjoy that privilege,
and I would join the Senator from New York any time that
I thought a project of his involved justice or humanity even
though it did run counter to the judgment of the Tariff
Commission.
So the point I discuss is, Why lose this valuable machine,
why wreck it in its infancy, as it were, and while it has just
begun to get its stride? Preserve it. It is a benefit to us
all the time. We do not have to ask the Tariff Commission
to change a rate to have it benefit us. It is at work all the
time, and when next we come to review the general tariff law
we will have the benefit of its special skill and knowledge
and experience, and we will also have the human side of
the question as we always do when we have hearings on a
tariff measure.
111644—7947
30
Mr. President, I shall pass from this phase of the subject
and take up the second feature of the proposed measure.
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President, before the Senator does
that will he yield further
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield further to the Senator from New York?
Mr. AUSTIN. Very well; I yield.
Mr. COPELAND. The Senator is very patient, and I have
such high respect for him that I do not want to interrupt
him unduly, as he knows. But I feel really that the Senator
or else I do
has a misconception of the purpose of the bill
not understand it myself. As I understand it, the bill pre¬
serves the Tariff Commission with all the functions it has
now. Am I wrong about that?
Mr. AUSTIN. The Senator is wrong, in my opinion.
Mr. COPELAND. May I ask the Senator from Mississippi
whether I am in error about it
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President¬
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from Mississippi?
Mr. AUSTIN. Certainly.
Mr. HARRISON. What the substitute does, as I tried to
point out in detail the other day, is this: We have taken
away from the Tariff Commission very few powers. The
major power we have taken away from them is the right to
write rates. We have divested them of that power and
placed it in the Congress.
We lay down specifically—not in general language as in
the present law, but specifically—the factors the Tariff Com¬
mission must consider in ascertaining the cost of production.
For instance, we give a definition of transportation. While
the Senator from Vermont says in a general way they can
study the economic location and efficiency of a particular
plant, we say specifically that they shall do it—and so on
down through the list. In other words, we particularize
wherein the present law is general. We have not divested
the Tariff Commission of any power they have now except
the power of fixing rates finally.
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President¬
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I should like to continue,
but I will yield in a moment. However, before yielding again
to the learned Senator from New York, I wish to invite at-
tention to an error in the statement of the proponent of the
subject. One of the important and eventual requirements
in section 336 which will be abolished, wiped out by the
substitute, is that which deals with the wages of capital.
Is not that so? That is washed out and destroyed entirely.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. AUSTIN. Not at this point.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont
declines to yield.
111644—7947
31
Mr. AUSTIN. I want to prove my statement. I have
only made the statement, and before yielding I want to
prove it.
On page 126 of the present law, section 336, paragraph
(h), subsection (4) (b) reads as follows, and it is washed
out very quietly, with no discussion of it at all:
(4) The term “ cost of production," when applied with respect to
either a domestic article or a foreign article, includes, for a period
which is representative of conditions in production of the article.
(b) The usual general expenses, including charges for
depreciation or depletion which are representative of the equip¬
ment and property employed in the production of the article
and charges for rent or interest which are representative of the
cost of obtaining capital or instruments of production.
I submit that when we strike out a section which includes
that provision and replace it by a section which does not
include it, we have struck out of the law one of the most
important protections that the wage earner and the farmer
can possibly have. Why? The American wage earner and
the American farmer have that differential to overcome.
A tariff that does not take into consideration the wages of
capital is a tremendous burden and hardship upon the wage
of labor, because it is labor that has to compete in the end.
Over there the price is fixed by the cost of production, and
it takes into, account overhead and the wages of capital,
for capital will not work without its wages. But over here
we must not, we can not, after this measure becomes a law,
take into account the wages of capital in fixing the protec¬
tion which our wage earners shall get from the products of
that capital or the instruments of labor.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President-
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from Mississippi?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator, of course, has read, on
page 3, subsection 1, as follows:
The differences in conditions of production, including wages,
costs of materials, and other items in cost of production of like
or similar articles in the United States and in competing foreign
countries; costs of transportation; other costs including the cost
of containers¬
And reference is then made to numerous other items that
must enter into the cost of production.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, all those features are in
the Hawley-Smoot Act as well as the feature which takes
care of the wages of capital. Now I should like to pass on.
I fear I am wearying the Senate with this prolonged debate,
and I should like to conclude.
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President, will the Senator from
Vermont yield to me?
111644—7947
32
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from New York?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. COPELAND. I hesitate to interrupt the Senator, but
I am just as anxious to ascertain the true inwardness of
this bill as is he. I did not write it; I never saw it until
it came on the floor; but I have gone through a general
tariff revision, I want to say to the Senator, and I never
want to do it again. That is not the way to make a tariff
law. It keeps us here for months at a time, and unques¬
tionably logrolling enters into a general revision of the
tariff; but, as I see it, if, as to a given item, we could have
from a scientific body, an impartial body, a nonpartisan
body, such as is the Tariff Commission, the facts regarding
the cost of production here contrasted with the cost of pro¬
duction abroad, then we could honestly and calmly deter¬
mine a proper tariff rate.
I can not see what there is in the Harrison proposal that
is in the least dangerous. It proposes to bring to us all
the information on maple sugar, for instance, and then we
shall be as well qualified, with that information before us,
as are the tariff experts themselves to determine what the
rate shall be. Then, as I said a little while ago, we can
add to it the human element, involving the interests of the
people. I may be wrong, and I am usually convinced by
everything the Senator says, but, frankly, I remain uncon-
vinced in this particular matter.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I am very sorry that the
learned Senator from New York is not convinced by what
I have said to-day. Perhaps if he had been here yester¬
day and had then heard my discussion of the very questions
mentioned to-day, he might be convinced.
Mr. COPELAND. I shall read the RECORD, so that I may
know what the Senator said on yesterday.
Mr. AUSTIN. On yesterday I tried to dissect the meas¬
ures and show the fact that Congress, under the present law,
can do exactly the thing which the learned Senator from
New York wants to do, and that the substitute is not neces¬
sary for that purpose. One may now call on the Tariff
Commission—
Mr. COPELAND. Will the Senator yield to me at that
point?
Mr. AUSTIN. I should like to finish my statement, but
I will yield to the Senator from New York.
Mr. COPELAND. But that is not the way we do it. A
tariff bill is brought in here with 21,000 items. I can get an
increased rate on crin vegetal if I will agree to an increased
rate on cottonseed oil. That is the way it is done. I do not
want to be personal about it, and perhaps that is a bad ex¬
ample, but, after all, that is what happens when we have a
111644—7947
33
general revision of the tariff.
However, under this proposed
plan there would be brought before us one item at a time.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, my observation, of course,
has not been so great and my experience has not been so
ample as has that of the senior Senator from New York; but
I will say, from such observation as I have had of the work-
ing out of the great tariff measures such as the Smoot-
Hawley Tariff Act, that every item that was controverted
was singled out and thrashed out, and evidence afforded,
and the helpful contributions of the Tariff Commission
and the Treasury attachés and the departments who were
interested in the particular item were all brought in. As the
result of that process, the Smoot-Hawley tariff bill, which
represents the wisdom and the probity of a great number of
experts, and which has not yet been assailed in any single
item by Congress, was passed. And the Smoot-Hawley tariff
law permits to be done just the thing which the great Sen¬
ator from New York, whose heart always reaches out to the
needy and who is always looking out for the humanities,
desires to have done. He may have confidence that he can
bring into Congress by his own act at any time any item of
the tariff measure and have the entire force and skill and
knowledge and special information which this proposed sub¬
stitute undertakes to tell us that it gives us, but does not
give us, and which gives less than section 336 and other
provisions of the Hawley-Smoot tariff bill give.
Mr. COPELAND. Mr. President, will the Senator from
Vermont yield just this once, and then I shall stop asking
him to yield?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from New York?
Mr. AUSTIN. The Senator from New York need not stor
asking me to yield. I am glad to yield to him.
Mr. COPELAND. I thank the Senator.
Mr. President, I feel that the Senator from Vermont is
wrong in one respect at least. He is right, of course, when
he says that any tariff item may be presented at any time,
but the minute it is presented additions may be made to it.
Suggestions may be made to add pig iron and wool and
cotton textiles. That is the trouble. The proposal of the
Senator from Mississippi is that when a report comes in on
maple sugar nothing else may be considered except some
subject absolutely germane to that particular item. So the
Senator is quite wrong, if I may be permitted to say so,
when he says that single items may be brought before Con¬
gress and given consideration, because that is not possible.
In the case of maple sugar, I was given the credit in the
Senator’s State and mine of having instituted the hearing
before the Tariff Commission. As a matter of fact, I asked
for a hearing on pig iron, but on motion of the Senator
from Mississippi, my resolution was amended so as to in¬
111644—7947
34
clude maple sugar. The RECORD, therefore, shows that I
asked for a hearing on maple sugar, although I would have
been the last man in the Senate to ask for it, but by reason
of the fact that my resolution was thus amended I was given
credit for the investigation of the rate of duty on that item.
I should like to have an increased rate on refined sugar,
but if I were to bring that question up there would be a
hundred amendments offered to it relating to other sub¬
jects, and then we would have a general revision of the tariff,
or at least a discussion of the tariff.
Mr. SMOOT. Mr. President¬
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from Utah?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield to the Senator from Utah.
Mr. SMOOT. The closing statement of the Senator from
New York perhaps is correct. However, under the proposal
of the Senator from Mississippi the question of germaneness
is raised. Maple sugar as an item, as the Senator from New
York has said, was not germane to the resolution he origi¬
nally introduced in regard to pig iron, but maple sugar was
put in the resolution on motion of the Senator from Missis¬
sippi. Maple sugar, however, is used in connection with a
number of commodities; it is used, for instance, in the manu¬
facture of tobacco; it is used in certain candies; it is used in
frosting; it is used in connection with many other items,
perhaps, which would be germane under the provisions of the
pending substitute to the items of maple sugar and maple
sirup.
Pig iron, to which the Senator from New York referred,
goes through the whole metal schedule. There is hardly
anything in the metal schedule that would not be germane to
pig iron.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. SMOOT. I yield if I can.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont
has the floor. Does he yield to the Senator from Mississippi?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield to the Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. HARRISON. Of course, I agree with the Senator
from Utah that, in the case of certain kinds of tobacco,
maple sirup enters into its manufacture, and so an amend¬
ment regarding tobacco might be germane. Germaneness,
however, would depend upon whether a commodity was a
substantial part of the original item. Of course, no one
would contend that pig iron would be germane to maple
sugar or maple sirup.
Mr. SMOOT. Oh, no.
Mr. HARRISON. But the point is—and the Senator from
Utah will agree with me, I think—that the provision as to
germaneness would restrict amendments to a limited number
of items.
111644—7947
35
Mr. SMOOT. Of course, it would restrict the action of
the Senate, in that it would prevent the Senate going into
every item in a tariff bill; there is no doubt about that; but
there are hundreds of items in the tariff bill which are
germane to other items.
Mr. HARRISON. Oh, yes.
Mr. SMOOT. And all those would be open. I suppose
the Senator from Mississippi will agree to that statement.
Mr. HARRISON. If a certain commodity were a substan¬
tial part of another commodity or a principal ingredient, it
would be germane; otherwise it would not be.
Mr. SMOOT. I think no one could claim that if one com¬
modity was even a relatively small proportion of another
commodity the rate on which it was proposed to change
that it would not be germane.
Mr. HARRISON. In the case of leather, for instance, I
think boots and shoes would be considered as being germane
to leather, and in the case of pig iron, of course, the big
cylinders into which pig iron goes would be germane.
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I am very reluctant to stop
this interesting debate between the learned Senators; but I
decline to be lured into a strange field on the subject of
germaneness, which I consider entirely irrelevant to the
point I am trying to make.
CONSUMERS' COUNSEL
Now, I should like to pass on and consider that feature of
the pending bill which provides for a consumers’ counsel.
That is not such a terrible thing. The creation of a con¬
sumers’ counsel, with all his retinue, with all his assistants,
with all his activities, involving a duplicatiton of the work
of the investigatorial body, would not be so terrible except
that in this great depression, when we are trying to prevent
the creation of additional bureaus, when we are trying, in
fact, to cut down bureaus and to reduce expenses, anything
that would add to the expense of government in an unneces¬
sary way ought to be frowned upon.
I do not care to spend much time upon this objection to
the proposed substitute. It is, however, an objection to the
substitute that this feature of the consumers’ counsel is in it.
We know perfectly well from experience that the consumer
is always there, always represented when there is a con¬
troverted item before the Tariff Commission. We have
heard allusions to the World Trade League of the United
States, an organization or association which has great re¬
sources to influence legislation with respect to the tariff; and
we know if we define the consumer as the importer or the
man who sells the foreign product in competition with the
domestic product, that he does not need subsidizing by the
United States Treasury; he does not need a force of trained
investigators to go abroad and to go about America to fur¬
111644—7947
36
nish him facts with which to come in and beat down the
protection of the wage earner, the farmer, the manufacturer,
and the private individual whose enterprise and capital have
tended to improve the standard of living. I venture to say
that once this new bureau were well established we would
find this strange situation—a jealousy, a rivalry, a conflict
between that new bureau and the old bureau, which has been
doing the same thing for the benefit of the people, with dis¬
astrous effect upon the wage earner, upon the farmer, and
upon the man who provides for the overhead.
Mr. GEORGE.
Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from Georgia?
Mr. AUSTIN.
I yield.
Mr. GEORGE.
Has the Senator read the findings of the
Tariff Commission on cement?
Mr. AUSTIN.
The Senator has not.
Mr. GEORGE. I wanted to ask the Senator where the
consumers’ counsel appeared in that hearing. If the Sena¬
tor is not familiar with the hearing, or the findings based
upon the hearing, of course I will not pursue my question;
but he had just made the rather broad and sweeping state¬
ment that in all instances the consumer was always present
and always represented at the hearings on the question of
rates before the commission. The Senator is not able to tell
me, is he, who represented the consumer in the cement hear¬
ing before the commission?
Mr. AUSTIN. I think I answered that question a moment
ago, and I think the learned Senator from Georgia is not
quoting me correctly. The record will show that I made
no such general statement. The statement I made, and
which I repeat, is that in every contested item you find the
consumers' counsel figuratively represented. That is, the
interest of the consumer is represented; and then I want to
ask, Mr. President, who is the consumer? Is he the man
down in Mississippi or Virginia who makes a nice plug of
chewing tobacco, the most desirable constituent of which
came from the rock maple of Vermont? Is he the person
who has moved over from Canada into the United States and
erected a packing concern, and who takes maple sirup and
adulterates it with water and with other things and puts a
label on it which deceptively represents it to the public
Are these consumers? And yet they are the men who be¬
siege the Senate for a resolution to excite the Tariff Com¬
mission to review the tariff on maple sugar. Are they not
represented? Do they need any counsel provided by the
Government of the United States? No; and every dollar
spent for that purpose is a wasted dollar, and, worse than
that, it is a destructive dollar, because it immediately creates
a competing interest, a great jealousy, and upsets the smooth
111644—7947
37
working of an investigatory body, and sets up a parallel
bureau to spy upon and to create the impression that this
great Tariff Commission, which is designed to be a non¬
partisan body, is not really a nonpartisan body, and that its
findings are not findings, but are fabrications. The idea of
our setting loose any such warfare as that seems extraordi¬
nary.
Now I pass on to the last feature of this bill.
In a sort of apologetic manner, the distinguished Senator
from Massachusetts [Mr. WALSHI referred to this inter¬
national economic conference by saying, “ What harm can
come from foreign commissions sitting in on our tariff
policy
Mr. President, I fear that nothing but harm could
follow such a practice.
This last feature of the Harrison amendment provides:
That the President is respectfully requested to initiate a move¬
ment for an international economic conference with a view to
(a) lowering excessive tariff duties and eliminating discriminatory
and unfair trade practices, and other economic barriers affecting
international trade, (b) preventing retaliatory tariff measures and
economic wars, and (c) promoting fair, equal, and friendly trade
and commercial relations between nations; but with the under¬
standing that any agreement, treaty, or arrangement which
changes any tariff then in existence, or in any way affects the
revenue of the United States, must first be approved by the Con¬
gress of the United States.
AMERICAN TARIFF AUTONOMY
There is another section to which I will refer later.
Mr. President, the reason why that ought not to be made
law, the reason why that ought not to be substituted for sec
tion 336 of the Smoot-Hawley law, is that it tends to destroy
American tariff autonomy, and that it tends to a complete
departure from our ancient and traditional foreign policy
Other reasons could be set forth, but those two reasons
are sufficient. They are fatal, it seems to me, to that
provision.
Would not this provision tend to destroy our tariff au¬
tonomy? Think of it for a moment—creating a bureau
which shall go out into the rest of the world and confer
with all of the great trading nations of the world who are
our competitors, and submit to them “ concessions ”—“ mu¬
tual concessions ”—“ tariff concessions.” Think of Ameri¬
cans doing that! The instant we step out with any such
general organization and policy as that, we have departed
from American independence; we have sold our peculiar
privilege of protecting our own people with an American
tariff, and we have entered upon an international tariff,
which, of course, means this: That whenever we face the
foreigner, whether he is Great Britain, France, Germany, or
any of the Scandinavian countries, and a proposal is made
to us that we reduce the tariff on iron or any other thing,
we must be prepared, if we are going to carry out the spirit
111644—7947
38
of this thing, to say “yes ”; and, if we do, that means the
destruction of the American tariff and the establishment of
the European tariff, the American tariff being molded and
dictated and animated by the wage earner, for the wage
earner, and for the uplifting of ordinary people, whereas the
foreign tariff is dictated by a ruling class, an entirely differ¬
ent type of government, and has the effect of maintaining
there a lower standard of wages and a lower standard of
living.
Mr. CONNALLY. Mr. President—
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield to the Senator from Texas.
Mr. CONNALLY. The Senator was inveighing against this
section of the substitute on the ground that it was a de¬
parture from the traditional policy of the United States
with reference to its dealings with foreign countries regard-
ing tariffs and trade. Does the Senator know how many
treaties we now have in force with foreign countries relating
to commercial practices, trade, most-favored-nation clauses
relating to tariffs, and other matters!
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I hope the learned Senator
in asking this question is qualified to answer it himself. I
will say that I do not khow, and that although I have
studied diligently I can not find out how many such there
are. I do know, however, that from earliest times this
country has monkeyed with reciprocal tariff treaties and
has learned the fallacy of them, and that the only one that
was preserved by the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was the
reciprocal treaty with Cuba, and there was a special reason
for sustaining that.
It is an old practice. It is out of date. It is not beneficial;
and the Smoot-Hawley tariff law has a command in it that
the Tariff Commission shall investigate and find out how
many we have and what ought to be done about them.
Mr. CONNALLY. Mr. President¬
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont further vield to the Senator from Texas?
Mr. AUS
IN. I vield.
Mr. CONNALLY. How does the Senator reconcile his
statement now that the country has indulged for many,
many years in that sort of thing, and now it is a worn-out
practice and ought to be discarded, with his statement a
while ago that this was a departure from the policy in the
pas
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I will try to explain that.
The old practice had to do with nothing but reciprocit,
treaties. Never in all our history has anybody undertaken
such a sweeping proposition as this which is embodied in
he Harrison amendment—that is, that we shall undertake,
by this international economic conference not only the low-
ering of tariff rates and elimination of certain trade prac¬
tices but that we shall start out to prevent retaliatory meas¬
111644—7947
39
ures and economic wars, and to promote a certain attitude
in foreign relations, fair, equal, friendly trade and commer¬
cial relations with nations, and that we shall engage in the
removal of any other economic barriers to trade.
Mr. LOGAN. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from
Vermont yield to the Senator from Kentucky?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield to my friend the Senator from
Kentucky.
Mr. LOGAN. I understood the Senator to say awhile ago
that any concessions that might be made to foreign coun¬
tries would be greatly detrimental to the interests of the
wage earners in the United States. If I recall correctly
President Hoover two or three years ago made the statement
that the production of goods sold in foreign markets gave
employment to more than 2,000,000 wage earners in the
United States. If the concessions would build up our foreign
markets, would not that help the wage earners somewhat?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, that is true. I would say
“ yes” to that question; and, of course, that is an objective.
We always, I believe, try to build up the foreign market to
take care of surplus here; but the primary objective, and
therefore the primary concern of any tariff law and there¬
fore of any subsection of it such as we are considering is the
domestic market; and the question and the test of the effi¬
ciency of such a provision as this international economic
conference is, Does it tend to the destruction or greater
harm of our domestic market than it tends to the upbuild¬
ing of a foreign market?
Mr. LOGAN. Would not that be a question to be deter¬
mined by some body similar to that which is created by this
bill? And do we not have new conditions that require a
departure?
We have a tariff war on now. Retaliatory rates have been
put up against us. How are we going to build up our for¬
eign trade unless we can reach some agreement with foreign
countries about those rates?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I am obliged to accept the
statement of the learned Senator from Kentucky that we
have a tariff war. Such study as I have made does not con¬
vince me of that; but I am not willing to contradict the Sen¬
ator. Assuming, however, that what he says is sound and
true in every particular, and that we.have on our hands a
tariff war, what we say is that it would be the height of
cowardice, it would be a forsaking of American principles,
it would be a forsaking of the women and children of the
wage earner of America to go out and say, “Now, in order
to pacify you and in order to get you not to fight us any
more we will let down our tariff so that it will be no longe
protective, and you can push your goods into our market.
I think that would be the height of injustice to our people,
111644—7947
and would be a particularly wrong thing to do in the midst
of depression.
Mr. LOGAN. Does not the Senator believe that there is
some point which might be reached by agreement where it
would be for the best interests of the American people,
although it might be a concession on our part, in order to
obtain a concession from the other countries?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I would answer that ques¬
tion in the negative. There is no point for agreement.
There is a point which the learned Senator has in mind,
undoubtedly, to which a reduction of the tariff could be
made in some instances with advantage to the foreigner,
which might attract him to make similar concessions to us.
But the thing which we object to is a law which binds to
enter into any such agreement.
We object to the surrender of the American right and the
American duty of making our own concessions for the Amer¬
ican people, after we have learned what that point is, and
making them unilateral, without any agreement, without any
trade and upstanding, as a great, dignified, leading Nation
of the world which says,
his is a domestic concern, this
is not an international concern. We are captains of our
own fate. We will decide for ourselves what tariff wall
shall be erected against you, but we will make it so-and-so.
That is the difference. I think there may be a point, just
as the Senator from Kentucky suggests.
Mr. LOGAN. Mr. President, I want to find out just what
the Senator has in mind. As I understand him, he adheres
to the doctrine of national economic self-sufficiency, with
our foreign business merely an incident to our national life.
Is that the Senator’s view of economic matters?
Mr. AU
IN. Mr. President, that is a very fine state¬
ment, a better statement than I have ever contemplated for
our position. I do not know that I have ever put it in
such crystallized, beautiful English as that. It is so com¬
plete and so significant that I would hesitate on my feet
to make an offhand answer one way or the other to that
question. That is a very fine question.
Mr. LOGAN. I thank the Senator.
TARIFF A DOMESTIC PROBLEM
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I need only remind the Sen¬
ate of the discussion on the League of Nations to prove the
assertion I have made that the tariff is not an international
matter, but is a domestic question.
In the Sixty-sixth Congress the tariff was dealt with in
connection with reservation 5, proposed and discussed in
connection with the consideration of the protocol for the
League of Nations, connected with the treaty of peace with
Germany. We find the following:
111644—7947
41
RESERVATION 5
The United States reserves to itself exclusively the right to
decide what questions are within its domestic jurisdiction and
declares that all domestic and political questions relating wholly
or in part to its internal affairs, including immigration, labor,
coastwise traffic, the tariff, commerce, the suppression of traffic in
women and children, in opium and other dangerous drugs, and
all other domestic questions, are solely within the jurisdiction
of the United States and are not under this treaty to be sub¬
mitted in any way either to arbitration or to the consideration
of the council or of the assembly of the League of Nations, or
any agency thereof, or to the decision or recommendation of any
other power.
Again, on the fact that the tariff is a domestic and not an
international question, and that it should be kept strictly
within the control of the United States and not submitted
to the chiseling down of our competitors and other great
trading nations is the following. Reservation No. 5 was
agreed to, and then an amendment was proposed. This
was the amendment proposed as a substitute for reserva¬
tion No. 5:
That no member nation is required to submit to the league, its
council, or its assembly, for decision, report, or recommendation,
any matter which it considers to be in international law a
domestic question, such as immigration, labor, tariff, or other
matter relating to its internal or coastwise affairs.
Many other such citations could be referred to, but they
are unnecessary. For the purpose it is sufficient in passing
it seems to me, to say that it is proposed that we utterly
ansform our foreign policy, that we enter upon a new
venture, and not merely a question of reciprocity agree¬
ments about the tariff, but the whole field of our economic
relations is involved in that resolution. Any economic bar¬
rier can be considered and must be considered if this bill
should be passed; our monetary standard, a very contro¬
versial question. There are Senators in the Chamber who
hold very positive views on that subject, and yet that would
be one of the things which would be involved. Immigration
would be another; foreign loans in the future; world debts.
This is not merely a reciprocity arrangement on the tariff.
This would open up the whole matter of our foreign relations
and start us out on a new policy, in which we would no longer
adhere to the principle of independence, though not
isolation.
In this year, when we are celebrating the two hundredth
anniversary of the birth of the father of our country, it
will not do us any harm to remember three lines of his
precept to us. The outstanding thought in the farewell
message of the father of our country was the element in
this policy which might be regarded as a negation. He
said:
It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with
any portion of the foreign world.
111644—7947
Thomas Jefferson, another great authority, wrote to his
friend President Monroe:
Our first and fundamental maxim should be never to entangle
ourselves in the broils of Europe; our second never to suffer
Europe to intermeddle with cis-Atlantic affairs.
We set right about it here with a Democratic proposition
to invite Europe to the American table, to invite Europe to
meddle with cis-Atlantic affairs, to meddle with one of the
most fundamental things affecting our prosperity and our
safety.
Mr. TYDINGS. Mr. President¬
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the genator from Maryland?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. TYDINGS. I take it that the Senator is opposed to
importations of any character coming into this country
where similar articles are raised or produced here. Is that
correct?
Mr. AUSTIN. I could not hear the Senator’s question.
Mr. TYDINGS. I take it that the Senator is opposed to
importations from foreign countries coming into the United
States:
Mr. AUSTIN. If the Senator had been present during my
remarks, he would not be asking that question, for it is so
entirely inconsistent and contrary to what I have stated
here over and over again that it is not necessary to do more
than refer the Senator to the RECORD.
Mr.
YDINGS. Then I take it for granted that the Sen¬
ator is in favor of importations coming into the United
States. Certainly he is on either one side or the other of
the question. I think my question is a courteous one, and
susceptible of an answer.
TRIBUTE TO SENATFR MORRILL
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, for the sake of the use of the
Senator from Maryland—for I judge he wants to make use
of it in some way at this time—I will say to him that I have
stated that I am in full sympathy with my constituents in
their being opposed to an embargo; that our ancestors en¬
tered into an armed rebellion against the Jefferson embargo,
and thereby we put upon the record an ineffaceable page of
our objection; and we brought into this Congress, through
our great Senator, Justin S. Morrill, the first Republican
tariff. This was not an embargo but a protective tariff. We
have always been against an embargo, and we are now.
Mr. FESS and Mr. TYDINGS addressed the Chair.
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Vermont
yield; and if so, to whom?
Mr. AU
TIN. I yield to the Senator from Ohio.
Mr. FESS. Mr. President, as long as the Senator has
uttered such a fine encomium on Justin S. Morrill, I hope
111644—7947
43
he will permit me to read an eulogy pronounced here in the
Senate by a famous Senator from Massachusetts, George F.
Hoar.
Mr. President, I will very much appreciate
Mr. AUSTIN.
the reading of that encomium.
Mr. FESS. Mr. President, speaking of Justin S. Morrill,
Senator George F. Hoar, of Massachusetts, said:
He never committed himself to the popular currents, nor studied
the vanes to see how the winds were blowing, nor sounded the
depths and the shallows before he decided on his own course.
Mr. Morrill was a brave man—an independent man. He never
flinched from uttering his thought. He was never afraid to vote
alone. He never troubled himself about majorities or administra¬
tions; still less about crowds or mobs or spasms of popular ex¬
citement. His standard of excellence was high. He was severe,
almost austere, in his judgments of other men. And yet, with all
this, everybody liked him.
Further
Neither ambition nor hatred, nor the love of ease nor the greed
of gain, nor the desire of popularity, nor the love of praise, nor
the fear of unpopularity found a place in that simple and brave
heart.
If we do not speak of him as a man of genius, he had that abso¬
lute probity and that sound common sense which are safer and
better guides than genius. These gifts are the highest ornaments
of a noble and beautiful character; they are surer guides to suc¬
cess and loftier elements of true greatness than what is commonly
called genius.
Mr. President, when the Senator from Vermont a short
time ago paid a beautiful tribute to Justin Morrill, these
words, which I read years ago, came to my memory, and I
sent to the Library for the volume containing the eulogy in
order that I might add it to his address.
Mr. TYDINGS. Mr. President¬
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Vermont
yield to the Senator from Maryland?
Mr. AUS
TIN. I yield.
YDINGS. What I am interested in ascertaining
Mr.
in my first question is preliminary to my second question.
Suppose America produces through her industries and
on the farm more than she can consume, and if protection
carried on to the extent provided by the Smoot-Hawley bill
will curtail our imports, where will we find a market for
our exports:
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I suppose the learned Sen¬
ator from Maryland will tell us about that when he has the
floor. For my part I am content with the observation which
any man who resides near the Canadian line will make,
that the rates now fixed on agricultural products do not
keep out farm products of Canada from the United States,
and it is not necessary to have an international treaty in
order to try to get from Canada or any other country on
earth a market for our surplus of agricultural products.
111644—7947
44
Our theory is, and it differs from the Democratic theory
and one of its merits is, that its objective is not the develop¬
ment of a foreign market so much as it is the development
of the domestic market. That is the great support of pros¬
perity in this country, as history, speaking with venerable
accent, has proven to us; and we adhere to our experience
upon that subject.
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield to the Senator from Mississippi?
Mr. AUSTIN. I yield.
Mr. HARRISON. I judge from the discussion by the
Senator of the international economic conference and the
reciprocal trade agreement proposal that he is opposed to a
reciprocal trade agreement?
THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE PROPOSAL
Mr. AUSTIN. That was not my discussion and that is not
what the substitute provides. The substitute provides for an
international economic conference, which goes far beyond
reciprocal-trade agreements and involves fundamental rela¬
tionship between the nations of the world, and invites to
America our competitors to sit down at our table and tell us
what our tariff rates shall be. That is what I have been
arguing and it is that to which I object. Whether I might
object to a particular reciprocity treaty would depend upon
the terms of that treaty and upon the conditions which
formed its setting. I would not have the boldness to stand
here in the Senate and make a sweeping declaration that I
am for or that I am against reciprocity treaties. Such a
treaty when under consideration might appeal to my sense
of what is right and what is expedient, and then I would be
for it.
Mr. HARRISON. I am glad to get the Senator’s viewpoint
on that matter. Of course, all of us would want to see the
treaty before we voted for it. Then I understand the Sena-
tor is not opposed to that provision in the substitute, which
provides
That the President is respectfully requested to initiate a move¬
ment for an international economic conference,
but
with the understanding that any agreement, treaty, or arrange-
ment which changes any tariff then in existence, or in any way
affects the revenue of the United States, must first be approved by
the Congress of the United States.
Mr. AUSTIN. I am opposed to it. I have tried to say
that I am opposed to the entire measure, that there is no
virtue in it which I wish to have implanted in the Smoot¬
Hawley law, not one thing.
Mr. HARRISON. I understood the Senator to say that
he is not opposed to the policy of reciprocal trade agree¬
ments, but that he would want to consider the particular
trade agreement after it came to the Senate. Now, I under-
111644—7947
45
stand him to say that he is against the policy and that he is
against any such agreement.
Mr. AUSTIN. I have been misinterpreted, if I under¬
stand the Senator from Mississippi. I think I declared very
positively that I would not like to state that I was for or
against such a treaty, and that I reserve the right to be
for or against it, according to the specific circumstances of
the proposal. This idea of saying I am for or against
reciprocity agreements is entirely irrelevant and has noth¬
ing to do with the discussion of the pending measure.
In
fact, whether I am for or against it should not influence a
single Member of the Senate.
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator must realize that the pro¬
posal I have urged in the substitute, if it has anything to
do with the discussion of the question, is now before the
Senate for discussion, and if that question is to be raised
at all it is relevant to the discussion now proceeding.
Mr. AUSTIN. As the measure is framed, I have stated
repeatedly that I am against every part of it and all of it,
jointly and separately. That ought to be clear.
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator is against it, and that is
all. Does the Senator think that provision is un-Repub¬
lican?
Mr. AUSTIN. I think it is fairly Chinese. ILaughter.1
Mr. HARRISON. All right.
Mr. AUSTIN. Now, Mr. President, let me occupy the
floor if I may.
Mr. HARRISON. Will the Senator yield for one more
question?
CHINA'S EXPERIENCE WITH TARIFF
Mr. AUSTIN. No; I want to finish my answer to the
other question first.
I recall that in 1842 the British Empire reached around
the world and throttled China. After the opium war she
throttled China and said, “You can not fix your own tariff
rates hereafter. We must be consulted respecting your tari
rates.” Ever since 1842 that poor benighted but great coun¬
try of China has been enslaved to the great treaty powers
and the great trading nations of the earth. To-day the
is no appeal which comes to the heart with more urgency
than the appeal of the Chinese people to the American
people to do what can be done to relieve them from the
thraldom of international treaties to regulate tariffs. I say
that when we start out with this thing in the manner that
we.are asked to do by the proposed substitute we are doing
a Chinese thing; we are voluntarily submitting ourselves to
that which China suffers because she was a conquered
country.
In 1925, after the Washington conference, 15 powers went
to China and examined that situation for nine months with
the hope of getting themselves and China out of that en¬
111644—7947
46
tangling situation and freeing China and putting her in
the place which America occupies to-day. It could not be
done. Once we launch upon the policy of letting all our
competitors in the world come in and have something to
say about the tariff which we shall erect as a protection to
the industry, the agriculture, and the wage earning of this
Nation, we have launched upon a policy from which we
will have great difficulty in retreating, and we will have
started upon an objective which seems exceedingly strange
in the face of history
Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, will the Senator now
yield?
The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Ver¬
mont yield further to the Senator from Mississippi?
Mr. AUSTIN. Very well; I yield.
Mr. HARRISON. Let us get back from Chiną for a mo¬
ment. The Senator has said that the provision asking the
President to negotiate reciprocal tradé agreements for the
purpose of building up our trade is Chinese and the Sena¬
tor has condemned it in strong language. Would the Sena¬
tor say that it was Chinese upon the part of the Republican
organization of the House in 1922 when Mr. Fordney, a
very distinguished Republican and very illustrious citizen,
was chairman of the Ways and Means Committee and they
brought in and passed a provision, section 301 of the Ford¬
ney-McCumber bill, which authorized the President, with
the approval of Congress, to enter into reciprocal trade
agreements with foreign countries? Would he think that
was Chinese
Mr. AUSTIN. That is rather a catechism than an in¬
terrogatory affecting the debate here. That is just a ques¬
tion to try to disqualify me as a witness. I am not posing
as a witness. I am making claims here and arguing them
as a Senator representing the Republican view of this Demo¬
cratic proposal here. I would not be so foolish as to answer
that question, although I am but a newcomer to the Senate
and have great inferiority to the senior Senator from Mis¬
sissippi, whose dignity, whose frankness, whose seniority ex¬
cite most considerate responses from me to most of his
questions. Being a newcomer and admiring him so greatly,
yet even I, a novice, would not answer that question.
Mr. HARRISON. The Senator can see how badly I would
feel when in a tariff measure that was written by the Re¬
publicans there is incorporated a provision that should be
called Chinese.
I want to ask the Senator another question. Would the
Senator say it was Chinese upon the part of his Republican
colleagues in 1922, when Mr. Fordney was chairman of the
Ways and Means Committee of the House, to have written
another section in the bill, section 303, authorizing the
President to conclude trade agreements with foreign coun¬
111644—7947
47
tries within a period of three years, the approval of Con¬
gress not being required? In my proposed substitute we re
quire the approval of Congress, but there was a case where
the Senator’s Republican colleagues wanted to give the
President the right to do it for three years without any ap¬
proval of Congress. Were they Chinese?
Mr. AUSTIN. Mr. President, I think it will be possible
for the learned Senator from Mississippi to talk about the
Fordney-McCumber law if he wishes to do so by taking the
floor and discussing it. I am not talking about that law.
It is not pertinent to this discussion. I respectfully suggest
that an effort to drag me out into a discussion of that mat¬
ter will not be successful.
But assuming that we have returned to America from
China, as suggested by the Senator from Mississippi, I wish
to conclude my remarks upon the measure, which I hope
may furnish for the record some very sound reasons why
the substitute should not be adopted, with this suggestion:
With the machinery provided by the Smoot-Hawley Act
and specifically by section 336 of that act, the American
Congress in an American way can establish American
rates of tariff for the protection of the American people
much better and to the far greater benefit of American
wage earners and farmers than can an economic interna¬
tional council under the proposed substitute.
111644—7947