PARAGRAPH 269-VEGETABLES N. S. P. F. The entire importations under this section of the tariff act of 1909 are rated by the Bureau of Statistics as follows: The figures for the years 1909, 1910, and 1911 are taken from the report for 1911 of the Bureau of Statistics; those for the first 10 months of 1912 are taken from the preliminary statement of commerce and finance issued by the same bureau for the month of August, 1912. The figures for the years 1909, 1910, and 1911 are taken from the report for 1911 of the Bureau of Statistics-those for the first 10 months of 1912 are taken from the preliminary statement of commerce and finance, issued by the same bureau, for the month of August, 1912. Later reports were not available to the undersigned. It will be seen that the importations under this clause are apparently decreasing, as it is hardly possible within the last two months of the year to bring up the importations for 1912 to the figures for 1911. Even at the figures for 1911 the item is not a very considerable one measured by the standard of our national finances. The tariff is certainly not "necessary" for revenue purposes. Second. Fresh vegetables are necessaries. We mention this circumstance for the reason that the country stands committed to the doctrine that tariff should be for revenue only, and that "import duties on the necessities of life" should be "materially reduced-thus to reduce the high cost of living." (Baltimore platform.) Our representatives having been elected on that platform we feel at liberty to call this matter to their immediate attention. For the average American family at the present time fresh vegetables are necessaries of life. Such is our present standard of living, and we trust it may never be reduced by reason of import duties. Third. Imported vegetables seldom come in competition with home-grown products. This is an important point, showing that our farmers would not be materially or directly damaged by permitting the free importation of fresh vegetables. The reason for this state of affairs is that when there is any home produce the importers can not afford to pay freights and sell the goods at the same price (or lower prices) that the fresher home products bring. For example, we, importers from Mexico, can not pay freights from the State of Sinaloa, Mexico, to Chicago and sell our tomatoes on the Chicago markets at a time when Michigan tomatoes are on sale. When Michigan tomatoes are ripe, the price of tomatoes fresh from the vines would not pay the freights alone on our tomatoes coming from Mexico, to say nothing of cost of raising the tomatoes. Fourth. The importation of fresh vegetables tends to increase revenues of American railroads. The greater portion of the purchase price of imported vegetables represents the freights paid the American railroads. The sums so paid do not go out of the United States to the foreign countries from which the importations are made. Fresh vegetables must be moved rapidly-by rail, and not by water. They must be moved long distances in order to find markets large enough to absorb any great amount. Our country is enriched, and not merely the foreign country from which importation is made. Fifth. No logical reason exists why tomatoes should pay more duties than cantaloupes. At the present time cantaloupes are admitted free under section 571 of the tariff act of 1909, while tomatoes are taxed 25 per cent under section 269. Cantaloupes are held to be fruits under section 571, while tomatoes are "vegetables" under section 269. This is a little discouraging to the grower of tomatoes. He sees his neighbor pick cantaloupes from vines, pack them in crates, and ship them to the United States free of duty, while he picks his tomatoes from vines, packs them in similar crates, and has to pay 25 per cent ad valorem. PARAGRAPH 269-VEGETABLES N. S. P. F. We respectfully urge that it would be much more logical to include both cantaloupes and tomatoes in the same free list than to try to distinguish them on some such fanciful ground that one is a fruit and the other a vegetable. ESTIMATE OF INCREASED IMPORTATIONS IF CHANGES ARE MADE AS RECOMMENDED. Immediate effect.-We believe that the immediate effect of the removal of tariff on fresh vegetables would be insignificant. The reason for this opinion is that the only time when vegetables can be profitably imported is the winter and early spring, and for this winter and coming spring it is now too late to plant a greater acreage even though the tariff were removed. Effect in future years.-For the winter of 1913-14 we believe the importations of fresh vegetables would be at least quadrupled. Possibly importations would come in tenfold quantities. The importer could (and would) seek to enlarge his market The acreage to be planted would be greatly increased for the coming years, due to the prospect of increased profits. The result would soon be that prices here in the United States would soon fall, the amount of decrease being commensurate with the duties taken off; the number of consumers at the lower prices would be greatly increased, and eventually and within a very few years we would find the importations greatly increased in amount, and prices in this country reduced by the amount of the present 25 per cent duty. This we believe would inure to the benefit of our people by reducing the cost of living. The absorbing power of the American markets would increase, subject, however, to the following limitations: First. In time, the foreign vegetables will be in demand only from December to June. They must be winter grown, practically. After that the home product will drive imported fresh vegetables entirely out of the market. Second. Railroad rates. The price of imported fresh vegetables can not fall below the freight rates (plus cost of growing and packing) from the foreign lands. At the present time there is a practically uniform rate of $1 per hundredweight on all fresh vegetables moved any distance between the Pacific and the Mississippi River, with addition of about $0.25 to eastern markets handicap, as well as the doubtful "freshness" of imported vegetables will be sufficient protection to save the American horticulturist from any harm even if the tariff is taken off, and all the rest of the population will certainly profit by the change. BASIS OF OUR ESTIMATES. The basis of our estimates is our experience as importers of tomatoes and our frequent consulations with growers and shippers, especially in Mexico. We feel sure that with the tariff removed the acreage would at once be doubled; in fact, the acreage has already been increased somewhat in anticipation of what is expected from the next Congress. The market would soon be educated to use more tomatoes at lower prices, and in a few years the acreage would be tremendously increased and importations would still be profitable. Tomatoes are usually imported in "four-basket crates." These weigh about 25 pounds. The importers calculate about as follows: We respectfully urge that all parties, and especially the consumer, will be benefited by the removal of all tariff on vegetables and that no one, not even the American farmer, will be injured thereby. Respectfully submitted. CHARLES HUDSON. PARAGRAPH 269-VEGETABLES N. S. P. F. BRIEF OF THE CUBAN NATIONAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. THE CUBAN NATIONAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, THE CHAIRMAN OF THE COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS, Washington, D. C. SIR: Inclosed herewith I beg to hand you copy of a memorial which the Cuban National Horticultural Society desires to present, relating to United States customs duties on Cuban fruits and vegetables, which I would ask you to kindly place in the hands of the appropriate subcommittee. Yours, very truly, CHAS. A. BEATLEY, Secretary. THE CUBAN NATIONAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, THE CHAIRMAN OF THE COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS, Washington, D. C. SIR: In view of the meeting of the committee to consider duties on fruits and vegetables from foreign countries, to be called January 20, it is the wish of this society to ask your attention to certain facts bearing upon this subject, as far as Cuba is concerned, which are not generally known or understood in the United States and which, in the adjustment of tariff duties heretofore, have not received the consideration which we think should be given them. We will endeavor to show that the cost of production of both citrus fruits and vegetable crops is greater in Cuba than in the United States, and that no tariff charges are necessary to protect producers here. In fact, if no tariff existed the growers in the United States would still have material advantages over those of Cuba. Besides a greater cost of production, the Cuban grower would have the added cost of transportation, more expensive packages, and the incidental expenses of shipping. The greater cost of production in Cuba results from the cost of labor and of the supplies required in the planting and care of citrus groves, and in the cultivation of vegetable farms. Common, unskilled labor ranges from $1 to $1.50 per day, or about the same as in the United States. A man and team costs $5 to $6 per day, being more than the usual price in the United States. The Cuban through generations was chiefly employed in tobacco and cane fields, and accustomed to the use of oxen and implements of the most primitive character. He knew nothing of mules, American plows, cultivators, and other implements and machinery essential to the farmer from the United States, and his labor was, consequently, inefficient and expensive. It is only fair to say, however, that during the past five or six years Cuban labor employed by Americans has greatly improved, and many of them are now doing good work in the citrous groves. The skilled labor required in the citrous groves comes mostly from the United States, and costs more here than there. This is true on account of the greater cost of living in Cuba. It is no exaggeration to say that the cost of living in Cuba is more than 50 per cent higher than in the United States, when the food is of equal variety and quality. Flour, bacon, salt pork, potatoes, rice, beans, corn, hay, and enormous quantities of canned goods are imported, and come burdened with transportation charges, duties to the Cuban Government, and the profits of successive dealers, so that their cost is, in many cases, increased more than 100 per cent, and seldom less than 50 per cent. These imported goods constitute the great bulk of the foodstuffs consumed by the Cuban people. Clothing, drugs, dry goods, and hardware of all kinds are imported and similarly increased in price. Under such conditions cheap labor would be impossible without limiting the laborer to a very coarse and insufficient diet; and neither expert nor common labor can be obtained from the United States without being paid more than it receives here. Another consideration that adds materially to the cost of production is the cost of implements and all other supplies used in the growing of crops. All of our machinery, wagons, plows, cultivators, harrows, and all the various tools required are imported chiefly from the United States. Mules are used almost exclusively for the cultivation of groves and vegetable crops, and they are brought from the United States also, costing here from 25 to 50 per cent more than their value there. Immense quantities of fertilizers are used. They are brought from the United States at an increased cost of about 25 per cent. Even the boxes and crates in which our products are shipped are PARAGRAPH 269-VEGETABLES N. S. P. F. manufactured there, and duties are paid on them when they enter Cuba, and usually when they are returned to the United States. These indispensable supplies cost the Cuban producer in most cases from 50 to 100 per cent more than they cost the producer in the United States. When the present United States tariff was under consideration in the Ways and Means Committee of Congress, it was repeatedly stated and persistently urged by the agents of California and Florida interests that labor in Cuba costs only 25 to 50 cents a day, and that protection against it was essential to enable their enterprises to prosper. These agents are intelligent men, and they certainly knew that these statements were not truthful. What they evidently desired was, not protection, but prohibition. They knew that the general conditions gave them abundant protection, but they furnished the only statements of facts that were presented to the committee, and those statements were credited as reliable. But only one side was heard, and upon these misleading representations, and the lack of proper information on Cuban conditions, the present United States tariff is based in so far as it applies to Cuban products. While these duties have not effected prohibition, except as to a few vegetable products, they have greatly injured Cuban producers by making their business unprofitable. Hundreds of Americans who came here soon after the close of the War with Spain with high hopes of bettering their condition, after suffering annual losses have been compelled to abandon the struggle with adverse conditions and return to the United States. A number of settlements, or colonies, after discouraging efforts to overcome unfavorable influences, have entirely disappeared, while others have decreased in numbers, so that there are fewer Americans cultivating lands in Cuba now than there were five years ago. Those that remain do so, not because they are prosperous, but some of them because their characteristic American grit and courage will not permit them to surrender while the hope remains that better conditions may come, and others because they are not able to get away. The Cuban people have suffered greatly also. The same influences have burdened them, and they are far from prosperous. Some of their most important interests are reduced to a point where profits are irregular and uncertain. Cuba is dependent on the United States for a market for her products, and it is a large purchaser of goods from the United States, therefore it seems to us not only justice, but wise policy, not to cripple Cuban industry by oppressive tariff duties. Paying high duties to get their products into the market of the United States, and duties to the Cuban Government upon the necessaries of life which they must importtheir situation is not encouraging. The fruit and vegetable business in Cuba is chiefly in the hands of American citizens, except as to the growing of pineapples, which is to some extent a Cuban interest. A few Cubans have engaged in fruit and vegetable growing and more would do so if conditions were more favorable. The capital invested in these industries is mostly the capital of American citizens; most of its owners reside in the United States, and it contributes greatly to the employment of labor there in the purchase of the multitude of articles we have mentioned. That capital employed in Cuba is more valuable to the United States than if it had remained there, and the tax upon it is not a tax upon foreigners, but almost entirely a tax upon American citizens and American capital. The revenue derived from that tax by the United States is not large and might be surrendered with possible advantage. The friends of protection in the United States declare as their policy in the adjustment of tariff duties, that those duties shall be so regulated as to equalize the cost of production, and place American producers upon an equality with those of foreign countries in American markets. But under existing conditions this just and reasonable policy is denied to American citizens in Cuba, as well as to a large part of the Cuban people. The cheap production in most foreign countries against which protection is provided has no existence in Cuba, and the duties imposed are, in their application to most Cuban products, in the direction of prohibition rather than that of protection, and become an unjust burden upon Cuban capital and labor. No other country is so greatly burdened by the United States in the adjustment of her tariff duties as Cuba. If the policy of equalizing the cost of production were observed, there would be no tariff duties whatever on Cuban products. Cuban vegetable crops are grown during the winter months, and are marketed in the Northern States at a season when they do not come in competition with the products of those States. Only a strip of semitropical country along the Gulf coast and in California are in any way affected by the Cuban competition. If that strip of country needed protection against Cuba in order that it might prosper, we could not object to PARAGRAPH 269-VEGETABLES N. S. P. F. its being given. But it is not needed, and the imposition of duties for that purpose only inflicts injury upon the Cuban people and benefits nobody, for it neither prohibits nor protects. It may add a trifle to the revenue of the United States, but otherwise it works only hardship upon a people who deserve more generous treatment. It is also urged as a reason why production costs less in Cuba than in Florida and California, that land costs less in Cuba than in those States. To this contention we reply that the price of lands is chiefly regulated by the revenue they produce. If Cuba enjoyed equal opportunities with those States, her lands would yield greater profits, and there would be less difference in the land values; and the fact that their lands are higher in price, illustrates their superior advantages, and is itself suggestive of the fallacy that they need protection against Cuba. In view of the conditions that exist, as we have presented them--that is, that the cost of labor employed in citrous fruit and vegetable growing in Cuba is at least as great as that similarly employed in the United States, and that the Cuban producer must pay from 25 to 100 per cent more for his teams, implements, tools, fertilizers, and other supplies, than the producer in the United States, and that the general cost of living in Cuba is more than 50 per cent greater, we think you will recognize that no tariff on Cuban products is necessary for protective purposes; and we respectfully ask that in the arrangement of new treaty relations with the Cuban Government you concede to the Cuban people a greater reduction from the lawful tariff than is granted under the existing treaty. Respectfully submitted for the Cuban National Horticultural Society,. CHAS. A. BEATLEY, Secretary. LETTER OF B. M. STEELE, IN RE VEGETABLES. Mr. OSCAR W. UNDERWOOD, Washington, D. C. CHICAGO, November 20, 1912. HONORABLE SIR: Is it not possible to do something at this time to reduce the high cost of living by removing the duty from fresh vegetables? You know that the people are feeling the pressure very much; I am, and so are my neighbors. I believe the Democratic Party would do well to push through such a bill and receive the everlasting thanks of hundreds of thousands of workmen and those of the midddle class who find the prices of vegetables so high (especially during the winter months) as to make some kinds prohibitive to them. Free vegetables would be a grand move for everybody and would not inflict much, if any, hardship on the farmers, because about the only time vegetables could be imported with any profit to the importers would be when our farmers can not raise them or only in small quantities in small areas of the States. I trust you will consider the appeal, and in doing so keep in mind the value of nearly all fresh vegetables as a nation (brawn and brain) builder. Let free fresh vegetables be a Democratic slogan. I am so sure of the good you can render the people that I shall consider myself highly honored by learning from you that this will receive your consideration and such a bill your support. Yours, respectfully, B. M. STEELE. REQUEST THAT DUTY BE REMOVED FROM LENTILS. J. D. NORDLINGER, IMPORTER, Exporter, and COMMISSION MERCHANT. Hon. OSCAR W. UNDERWOOD, House of Representatives, Washington, D. C. NEW YORK, January 28, 1913. DEAR SIR: We, the undersigned, respectfully ask that the duty on lentils be taken off. Lentils are not grown in the United States, but are used for food by the poorest classes, and it will be of great benefit to them if this article is allowed to come in free of duty. Very respectfully, J. D. NORDLINGER |