VETOED BY PRESIDENT.

METAL TARIFF BILL.

The house passed a bill Jan. 29 revising schedule C of the tariff law, relating to metals and manufactures of metals. Among other things it placed all machine tools on the free list. The bill was passed by the senate May 30 and was vetoed by the president Aug. 14. In his veto message the president said in part:

"There is nothing to show me that the duties provided in the bill will equal the difference in the cost of production here and abroad in the great lines of industries, and that the wages of workmen will not be reduced by a measure which avowedly discards entirely the principle of fair protection. It should be noted that the labor employed in the secondary industries, which has had so little consideration in this bill, is in a large measure high grade, skilled labor, commanding a high level of wages. * ** There is little logical relation between the reductions made by this bill in the schedule. For example, steam engines and machine tools in the present law are dutiable at 30 per cent. In this revision steam engines are reduced to 15 per cent and the whole machine tool industry is put on the free list, without any reason whatever being given in the report of the ways and means committee in either case for such action.

"It is further difficult to understand by what process of reasoning it is possible to justify a transfer to the free list of a great line of finished articles, while nearly every one of the crude products from which they are made is retained on the dutiable list. A bill for a complete revision of this schedule was presented to me a year ago in the extra session of this congress. Many increases and decreases of rates are now made from those named in the former measure. The changes are not explained and indicate the hasty method pursued in the preparation of both. Is it not fair to ask, either on the basis of protection or revenue, which was right?

"On the whole, therefore, I am not willing to approve of legislation of this kind, which vitally affects not only millions of workingmen and the families dependent on them, but hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of stocks of goods in the hands of storekeepers and distributers generally, without first providing for a careful and disinterested inquiry into the conditions of the whole industry.

"From the outset of my administration I have urged a revision of the tariff based on a nonpartisan study of the facts. I have provided the means for securing such information in the appointment of a tariff board. Their thorough work, already completed on several schedules, has justified my confidence in this method. The principle is indorsed by chambers of commerce and boards of trade in almost every city of importance in the country. The proposed bill has not been framed on the basis of any such study of the industry."

The house immediately passed the bill over the president's veto by a vote of 174 yeas to 83 nays. 134 not voting. The senate, however, by a vote of 39 nays to 32 yeas refused to override the veto and the bill failed.

WOOL TARIFF BILL.

The house April 1 passed a bill to reduce the duties on wool and manufactures of wool. It was practically the same bill as that disapproved by the president in August, 1911. It was passed by the senate July 25 and vetoed by the president Aug. 9. In his veto message the president said in part:

"On Dec. 20, 1911, I sent a message to the congress recommending a prompt revision of the tariff on wool and woolens. Í urged a reduction of duties which should remove all the excesses and inequalities of the schedule, but should leave a degree of protection adequate to maintain the continued employment of machinery and labor already estabfished in that great industry. With that message I transmitted a report of the tariff board, which furnished for the first time the information needed to frame a revision bill of this character, and recommended that legislation should be at once undertaken in the light of this information. De

spite the efforts which have been made to discredit the work of the tariff board, their report on this schedule has been accepted, with scarcely a dissenting voice, by all those familiar with the problems discussed, including active representatives of organizations formed in the interest of the public and the consumer. Importers and merchants, as well as producers and manufacturers, have testified to the accuracy and impartiality of these findings of fact. My position has been made perfectly plain. I shall stand by my pledges to maintain a degree of protection necessary to offset the difference in cost of production here and abroad and will heartily approve of any bill reducing duties to this level. Bills have been introduced into congress, carefully framed and based on the findings of the tariff board, which, while maintaining the principle of protection, have provided for sweeping reductions. Such a bill was presented by the minority members of the ways and means committee, which, while providing protection to the wool grower, reduces the duty on most wools 20 per cent, and the duties on manufactures by from 20 to more than 50 per cent, and gives in many instances less net protection to the manufacturer than was granted by the Gorman-Wilson free wool act of 1894.

"Instead of such a measure of thorough and genuine revision, based on full information of the facts, and with rates properly adjusted to all the different stages of the industry, there is now presented for my approval H. R. 22195, 'An act to reduce the duties on wool and the manufactures of wool,' a bill identical with the one which I vetoed in August, 1911, before the report of the tariff board had been made. The tariff board's report fully and completely justifies my veto of that date. The amount of ad valorem duty necessary to offset the difference in the cost of production of raw wool here and abroad varies with every grade of wool. Consequently an ad valorem rate of duty adjusted to meet the difference in the cost of production of high priced wools is not protective to low priced wools. In any case the report of the tariff board shows that the ad valorem duty of 29 per cent on raw wool, imposed in the bill now submitted to me, is inadequate to meet this difference in cost in the case of four-fifths of our total wool clip. The disastrous effect upon the business of our farmers engaged in wool raising cannot be more clearly stated. To maintain the status quo in the wool growing industry, the minimum ad valorem rate necessary, even for high grade wool in years of high prices, would be 35 per cent.

"The rate provided in this bill on cloths of all kinds is 49 per cent. The amount of net protection given by this rate, in addition to proper compensation for the duty on wool, depends on the ratio between the cost of the raw material and the cost of making the cloth. The cost of the raw material in woolen and worsted fabric varies in general from 50 per cent to 70 per cent of the total value of the fabric. Consequently the net protective duty, with wool at 29 per cent, would vary from 28.7 per cent to 34.5 per cent. In the great majority of cases these rates are inadequate to equalize the difference in the cost of manufacture here and abroad. This is especially true of the finest goods involving a high proportion of labor cost. One of the striking developments of the last few years has been the growth in this country of a fine goods industry. The rates provided in this bill, inadequate as they are for most of the cloths produced in this country, would make the continuance here of the manufacture of fine goods an impossibility.

"Even more dangerous in their effects are the rates proposed on tops and yarns. Tops are the result of the first stage in the making of raw wool into cloth. Yarn is the result of the second stage. Taken in connection with a rate of 29 per cent on wool and 49 per cent on cloths, the rates of 32 per cent on tops and 35 per cent on yarn, fixed in this bill, seem impossible of justification. They would disrupt, and to no purpose, the existing adjustment within the industry of all its different branches. It is improbable in the highest degree that raw wool would be imported in great quantities when the cloth maker can import his tops at a duty of

32 per cent and yarns at a duty of 35 per cent. The report of the tariff board shows the difference in relative costs to be uniformly greater than the amount of protection on yarns given by this bill. In a year of low prices the net protection granted by the proposed rates would not be more than half the difference in costs. The free wool act of 1894 gave a protective rate of 40 per cent on all yarns over 40 cents a pound in value, with free raw material. The present bill gives only 35 per cent on such yarns, with a duty of 29 per cent on the raw material. The great increase in the imports of tops and yarns which would result from the rates in the bill now submitted to me would destroy the effect of the protection to raw wool and at the same time would be at the cost of widespread disaster to the wool combing and spinning branches of the industry. The last fifteen years has witnessed a great growth of top making and worsted spinning in this country, and the capacity of the plants is now equal to domestic requirements. Under the rates proposed such plants could be continued, if at all, only by writing off most of the investment as a net loss and by a reduction of wages. To sum up, then, most of the rates in the submitted bill are so low in themselves that if enacted into law the inevitable result would be the irretrievable injury to the wool growing industry, the enforced idleness of much of our wool combing and spinning machinery and of thousands of looms and the consequent throwing out of employment of thousands of workmen. In view of these facts, in view of the platform upon which I was elected, in view of my promise to follow and maintain the protective policy, no course is open to me but to withhold my approval from this bill."

The bill was passed by the house over the veto Aug. 13 by a vote of yeas, 174; nays, 80; 136 not voting. The senate, Aug. 16, refused to pass the bill over the veto, 39 voting yea, 36 nay and 19 not voting. Less than two-thirds of those voting having voted in the affirmative, the bill failed.

TERMS OF CIVIL SERVICE EMPLOYES.

The bill making appropriations for legislative, executive and judicial expenses of the government passed by the house May 10 and by the senate June 14 contained a section (5) providing that every appointment in the classified service after Sept. 1, 1913, shall be for a term of seven years after the probationary period of six months has expired, and that at the expiration of each such appointment the employment of each person so appointed shall cease and determine; and that the employment of all persons appointed prior to Sept. 1, 1912, in the classified service at annual rates of compensation shall cease and determine within one year after Aug. 31, 1919, the date of termination during that year to be determined by the head of the appropriate department according to previous length of service.

In his veto message the president said he objected to the section because he believed it would prove ineffective in eliminating inefficient employes and also for the following reason: "It impairs that feature of the civil service which I regard as a most valuable one, to wit: The permanence of tenure on the one hand, balanced by a wide and almost absolute power of removal in the department head on the other. If at the end of each seven years it becomes necessary for one who has spent the best years of his life in the public service to ascertain whether he is to continue, it is certain that he will bring pressure to bear in every direction upon the appointing power to continue him in office. I am perfectly aware that the motive for not reappointing him will be much reduced by the fact that his successor must be appointed from the eligibles of the civil service commission, but the play which this will give for prejudice and arbitrary action in the appointing power will constitute a serious injury to the present tenure of office."

COMMERCE COURT.

The legislative, executive and judicial appropriation bill also contained a provision repealing the statute creating a Commerce court for the purpose of passing on appeals from the decisions of the interstate commerce commission. In his veto mes

sage the president took exceptions to this provision and gave it as an additional reason for disapproving the measure. He said in part:

"It appears from the decisions of the Supreme court of the United States that the Commerce court in several cases has amplified its jurisdiction beyond that which a proper construction of the statute justified. It also appears that in a number of cases the decisions were against the shippers and for the railroads when the Supreme court decided that they ought to have been the other way. On the other hand it appears that in a number of other cases the decisions of the Commerce court were in favor of the shippers and in favor of giving relief to the shippers, against the railroad companies, but that the Supreme court has since denied the existence of such jurisdiction under the statute. A series of decisions of the Supreme court has satisfactorily established the limits of the jurisdiction of the new court, and there is no reason to believe that those limits thus established will in future be exceeded. There is every reason to believe that the dispatch of business already promoted by the court will continue. And now the question is, why should the court be abolished? Because it has made some mistakes that the Supreme court has rectified? Lower courts, especially when exercising new jurisdiction, are likely to make errors to be corrected by the Supreme court. The presiding judge of the Commerce court was the chairman of the interstate commerce commission for a great many years. Three of the Commerce court judges before their appointment to the Commerce court had been United States district judges of long experience and one had been a state judge of standing and experience. The personnel of the court is to change from year to year by the assignment of one of the Commerce court judges to a Circuit Court of Appeals and the designation of another Circuit judge to fill the vacancy thus made.

"I have read the arguments upon which this proposed legislation is urged and I cannot find in them a single reason why the court should be abolished except that those who propose to abolish it object to certain of its decisions. Some of those decisions have been sustained and others have been disapproved or modified by the Supreme court. I am utterly opposed to the abolition of a court because its decisions may not always meet the approval of a majority of the legislature. It is introducing a recall of the judiciary, which, in its way, is quite as objectionable as the ordinary popular method proposed. Next to impartial and just judgment the great desideratum in judicial reforms to-day is the promotion of the dispatch of business and the prompt decision of cases. The establishment of the Commerce court has brought this about in a substantial way by reducing the average delay from two years to six months, and I doubt not that as time goes on and the procedure becomes better understood this period of six months will be further reduced. It is greatly in the interest of the shippers and therefore of the public that this means of reducing the time of effective remedial litigation against railroads should be preserved."

The house refused to pass the bill over the veto. but Aug. 17 it passed a new bill of substantially the same character. This was passed by the senate Aug. 19 and was finally adopted by both houses with the civil service tenure clause eliminated, but still containing the provision abolishing the Commerce court. The president therefore again vetoed the measure, which was then passed by both houses (Aug. 21 and 22) with the Commerce court provision omitted, and the bill was approved Aug. 23.

ARMY LEGISLATION.

The army appropriation bill, passed by the house Feb. 15 and by the senate April 24, was vetoed by the president June 17, chiefly because of a clause providing that after March 5, 1913, no officer should be permitted to serve as chief of staff unless he should also have served at least ten years as a commissioned officer of the line in the army grades below that of brigadier-general. This would have rendered ineligible after that date for service in the most important position in the army the present chief of staff (Maj.-Gen. Leonard Wood) and many other of the most efficient officers of

in

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