TARIFFS FOR SALE

President Roosevelt, in a message to Congress, will ask for power to regulate the tariff on the basis of reciprocal agreements with other nations. The immediate importance of this request is whether or not it will cause dissension among the leaders in Congress. The Democratic Party has long favored a reduction of the tariff, and, although their agitation for lower schedules has been on the wane, it is extremely doubtful that any increase would be tolerated. The Senate, moreover, has been rather balky for the last few weeks, and has passed a bill restoring veteran's pensions and salaries to the government officials in spite of a threatened veto. If there is any power of which the Senate is jealous, it is their power in foreign affairs, and any attempt of the President to take upon himself part of this power will be strongly opposed.

This bill, then, will be greeted with much resentment, and it is possible that it will cause a split between the President and the Senate. All the measures which have brought about our partial recovery have been effected through the complete acquiescence of Congress, and at a time when these measures, good or bad, have reached the stage where the discontinuance of any part of them would jeopardize the welfare of the country, it is imperative that Congress agree with the President. The country will watch this new bill to see whether it will be added to the emergency powers of Roosevelt as is necessary if the United States is to keep itself economically independent, or whether it will cause a rift which would destroy the benefits of the great work already accomplished.