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Mr. TEMPLE. A gentleman on the stand this afternoon referred to cultural cost, that meaning labor, fertilizer, and mules to produce it. Mr. JAMES. You read from the Democratic platform awhile ago and said you voted for an equivalent between the cost here and elsewhere. You did not read all of that platform?

Mr. TEMPLE. I read the portion of it that I was using as a basis for thinking this situation would be handled on the tariff principles in which I believe.

Mr. JAMES. I will read a part of it:

We declare it to be a fundamental principle of the Democratic Party that the Federal Government under the Constitution has no right or power to impose or collect tariff duties except for the purpose of revenue, and we demand that the collection of such taxes shall be limited to the necessities of Government, honestly and economically administered.

Do you not think the part you did not read is the reason why we ought to try to get a revenue out of a luxury?

Mr. TEMPLE. Mr. James, I am not here to question this committee, but am I to believe that you believe if you cut the tariff off of citrus fruits altogether that you would get a revenue from importation of citrus fruits?

Mr. JAMES. No; and I am not talking about taking it off altogether. We are considering where we can get revenue, and we want to get revenue from those things that are not needed by the poor people upon which to subsist.

Mr. TEMPLE. Is it merely a sparring in logic that you are indulging in or are you seeking information?

Mr. JAMES. No, sir; I want the information.

Mr. TEMPLE. I will answer that by saying the average price for which we have sold for the last three years is 65 cents per box at the port of New York more than foreigners even now can bring their citrus fruits in and pay the present duty. Under present conditions they have not brought their products in here in quantities. Now, if you cut the tariff it may be that you could induce them to come in, having a greater leeway, even equal to our entire profits. I have a quarter of a million dollars invested in this industry, and while to do this would not ruin me, perhaps, yet there are thousands upon thousands of people who have their all invested in or are dependent upon this industry who would be ruined.

tell

Mr. JAMES. What returns do you get on that investment?

Mr. TEMPLE. I am under oath and rather not answer, but I will you if you insist.

Mr. JAMES. Oh, no.

Mr. TEMPLE. I will say this, it is less than 1 per cent.

Mr. KITCHIN. You are an agriculturist?

Mr. TEMPLE. No, sir; I am a philanthropist.

The question was asked awhile ago about the difference between wholesale and retail prices of oranges. I have had prepared this information for Chicago, New York, Philadelphia (the cheapest place

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on earth in which to live), and Pittsburgh, on Wednesday of last week. I will give them to you:

Wholesale and retail prices of oranges, per dozen, Jan. 16, 1913.

The CHAIRMAN. Just a moment, if you will allow me. I do not want my good Democratic friends in Florida to misconceive our position. We are going to put some of these things on the free list in order to give the people of the United States some of the real necessities in life. We have got to make up that revenue.

Mr. TEMPLE. I am willing to contribute from my income tax, and that would make up my portion of the amount quicker than the oranges would.

The CHAIRMAN. We want to try to make it up. There are a good many items in the tariff bill that will pay a fair proportion of revenue, but at the present the tariff bill is like a mountain, with high peaks and low valleys, and through some of the low valleys there are good revenue producers. But the high peaks, like the duty on oranges, ought to be cut down to a reasonable limitation, so that we can get some revenue from this. Looking at it from a Government stand-. point, is that not correct?

Mr. TEMPLE. Mr. Chairman, of course we realize the uselessness of your endeavoring to go through in detail all of these matters that are before the committee, and I do think if you had the time or desire to go into this citrus business somewhat in detail that you would find that if you cut this tariff in half you would not succeed in increasing your income on the imports of citrus fruits because of the short production of citrus fruit in this country now, and probably for the next year or two, owing to the recent disaster in California, even at the present rate, you will have an income from citrus fruit. In that case you will get the revenue, because the demand will have to be supplied by importation, so that you will get your revenue from that.

Assuming that California is producing at her normal rate, you could not get a revenue from citrus fruits until you had bankrupted the citrus industry of America, because we are producing more than the demand. If you would take the time and had the opportunity to go through this brief of mine some time and look up the facts, I think you will see what I mean. Our crop coming in is so heavy we have got to advertise, we have got to go into every nook and cranny in this country and build up a consumption in order to take care of our present and coming production, and you can not permit this outside fruit to come in without bankrupting us, because we will have

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to go down and meet the price of the outsiders, even at a dead loss. so long as we can do so because you can not store this stuff. If it is ripe now, it has got to be sold now, and if it is not sold now 90 per cent of the growers will be bankrupt.

Mr. HILL. I fully agree with you in a good many respects, but it is not only the tragedy with regard to the citrus fruits with which we are confronted. Standing right where you are standing now, a week ago a gentleman made the same argument, saying that it is a tragedy for the iron and steel industry. The sugar men from Louisiana are making the same claim. The citrus fruits people from California are making the same claim, and they all base it on the quotation which you read from the Democratic platform, which says "We favor the ultimate attainment of the principles we advocate by legislation which will not injure or destroy any legitimate industry.' Have you heard the definition which has been given by this committee of the word "legitimate" in that connection?

Mr. TEMPLE. No, sir; I would not presume to ask this committee to give me any definition. I presumed to ask the committee where they stood on the point concerning which I read from this document as being quoted from Mr. Underwood. I will say, in answer to your other questions before you ask them, as I suppose you will ask them, that I will stand on my original proposition as laid down here, as applied to every proposition in that connection.

Mr. HILL. I do not want to ask you your politics. I am a confirmed believer in protection, measured by the difference in cost, of production at home and abroad, but the definition which has been given of the word "legitimate" has no relation whatever to the product or to prices, but purely to an industry which is on a sound economic basis, and a great authority has said that that is one which is not sustained by a tax, so that under that authority and under that definition your industry is not a legitimate industry because it is sustained by a tax. Now, would you approve of that solution of the question, with the full understanding of the word "legitimate," as you may read it here in the very beginning of the Democratic platform on the tariff question:

We recognize that our system of tariff taxation is intimately connected with the business of the country, and we favor the ultimate attainment of the principles we advocate by legislation that will not injure or destroy legitimate industry.

That is in the very beginning of the tariff plank in the Democratic platform.

Mr. TEMPLE. That is right. There is nothing in that to take away from the force of what I read.

Gentlemen of the committee, I am not going to take up any more of your time this late. I will say to you that I would not presume to address this committee and ask you to put a tariff on these products if I did not think they needed it and were entitled to it on your platform, and if you will just read page 10 and the following two pages of my brief in regard to the Florida citrus industry, I am sure you will be convinced of the justice of our claim.

We believe that very shortly we can be in a position where we can do with half the tariff, not to give you revenue, because as I said to you before, you will never get revenue out of the citrus industry as long as the present citrus development in this country continues, but

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we can stand taking off half the tariff and later all of it, without any wrecking of the industry. When we get our groves in better condition, in as good condition as they have them in Spain where, owing to the older condition of their trees, they can produce 300 boxes to the acre on the average; when we get our groves in such good condition with the addition of our more skillful management, I believe we can bid defiance to the world at the gates of New York without any tariff.

Mr. HARRISON. Do you not think the fact that the exports are 30 times the amount of importations would indicate that we have already reached that point?

Mr. TEMPLE. I do not think so, for the reason that we export almost entirely to Canada, and for the reason that Mr. Skinner tried to tell you that they have no direct steamship lines from Valencia to Canada and can not lay the stuff in there, and when it does come it is only spasmodically sent there now and then, so that we never have sold a box in Canada from Florida, except in Toronto, to my knowledge. Mr. HARRISON. The gentleman who preceded you said they had a cheaper freight rate from Spain.

Mr. TEMPLE. When they have a boat going. This business is all done on tramp steamers.

Mr. HARRISON. What about these shipments to Australia?

Mr. TEMPLE. Mr. Harrison, Florida is engaged in a good many land deals at the present time, but we have never had to complain in Florida of the land boosters and the local newspapers evolving wonderful announcements as to marvelous happenings affecting their local enterprises any more than has always been the case in California, of which I am inclined to think the newspaper statement read by you is a sample.

Mr. HARRISON. I think there is something in what you say, but that does not dispose of the fact that there are also great quantities shipped to Australia.

Mr. TEMPLE. Do you suppose they really did that?

Mr. HARRISON. I have no reason to doubt it. I believe what I read in the Treasury reports, that the exports from the United States are 30 times the imports.

Mr. TEMPLE. I will tell you another thing. That we have shipped to Canada in the last year

Mr. HARRISON. You have exported $3,000,000 worth, and you have imported $100,000 worth.

Mr. TEMPLE. In the last two years we have only exported 9,000 boxes.

Mr. HARRISON. Where did the rest of the $3,000,000 worth come from?

Mr. TEMPLE. I do not know. A great deal is sent from California to Canada out through the Northwest. We can not touch the northwestern part of Canada. California has that all her own way, and she has practically no competition up there.

Mr. HARRISON. Have you ever been in the Canadian Northwest? Mr. TEMPLE. Yes; I have been the full length of the Canadian Pacific.

Mr. HARRISON. You know that you could travel sometimes as much as 40 miles and never see a human being?

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Mr. TEMPLE. On the other hand, $3,000,000 worth do not mean a great deal, when you consider a community of 20,000 people will eat a carload of oranges a week, and a car of oranges is worth from $600 to $800.

TESTIMONY OF LORENZO GEORGE BRICE, M. L. A., REPRESENTING THE BAHAMA ISLANDS, NASSAU, BAHAMAS.

The witness was duly sworn by the chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Please give your full name to the stenographer for the record, Mr. Brice.

Mr. BRICE. I would just like to say, sir, that, as shown on the list of names of witnesses, that there are only three of us-two from the British West Indian Islands. I happen to be one, and my friends. Outerbridge and Sterling the others.

I want to thank the committee and the chairman for the privilege they have extended to us to appear here.

Honorable chairman and honorable members of the Ways and Means Committee, United States House of Representatives: I have been duly appointed by his excellency George B. Haddon Smith, governor of Bahama Islands, to represent that colony before your honorable committee in connection with your labors in preparing for submission to the honorable House of Representatives a new tariff act to supersede that passed in 1909, and have the honor to lay before you for whatever consideration you care to give them the following facts:

The Bahama Islands compose a colony of the British Empire and are self-governing. They lie off the southeast coast of the State of Florida, some of them not more than 40 miles from the American mainland. The people of the colony number about 55,000, most of whom depend upon the sponge, pineapple, orange, grapefruit, and salt industries. The commerce of the colony is conducted almost wholly with the United States, which nation is treated in regard to tariff duties on exactly the same terms as the United Kingdom, Canada, and the British West Indian colonies. The only tariff duties levied are those necessary for the general upkeep of the colony.

At present the Bahama Islands Government subsidizes two American steamship lines touching at Nassau, New Providence, the capital and principal port. Concessions have been granted by the Government to the American companies and American capital invested in the industries of the Bahama Islands aggregate from $3,000,000 to $4,000,000.

The Bahama Islands buy from the United States articles aggregating in value more than $1,104,000 annually. This foreign trade of the United States with the Bahama Islands is gradually increasing yearly. American exporters supply about seven-eighths of the import trade of the colony.

In return the United States buys from the Bahama Islands products aggregating in value $500,000 annually. This trade is composed principally of sponges, pineapples-raw and preserved grapefruit, oranges, and salt.