Staunton Spectator

Plans of Mr. Morrison's Committee.

Mr. Morrison proposes to call a meeting of the committee on ways and means on Wednesday (to-morrow,) when he thinks a sufficient number of members will be in the city to organize the committee and make preparations for proceeding to business. Mr. Morrison's own idea is to begin at once the task of drafting a new tariff bill, so it can be reported at a comparatively early period in the session, and thus give time for ample discussion and consideration. He favors a measure based on the general features of the proposition reported by him when chairman of the ways and means committee under Speaker Kerr, with such modifications as times and the changed condition of affairs may make desirable. Mr. Morrison favors a reduction in the sugar tariff, and placing lumber, coal and some other commodities on the free list. Horizontal reduction will be the main feature to be urged before the committee and before the House.

Mr. Morrison is quoted as saying since his appointment as chairman of the committee that had the recommendations of the tariff commission at the last session for a reduction of 25 per cent. been honestly carried out he and those who think with him would have been against any further agitation of the tariff at this session. It is very generally accepted that the policy of the Republican minority of the committee will be one entirely of delay and obstruction. They will do nothing to assist in the passing of a proper revenue reform bill such as the country needs and desires, but everything to make it obnoxious and susceptible of criticism. Already deliberate misrepresentations of the position of the majority of the committee and its purposes have been widely disseminated by the protection interests. It is the opinion of Mr. Morrison that the majority of the committee will act in harmony, so that he does not apprehend any difficulty beyond that of the ordinary character so far as they are concerned.