The Public Ledger

THE WAR AND THE TARIFF.
The financial editor of the Boston Post analyzes the effect of the war upon our industries in a way that must seem heretical to the editorial department of this typical Democratic paper.
Here is what the Post's financial editor says:
"When the first big shock caused by the outbreak of the great European war is over and the money situation can be brought back to anything like a normal basis, it is believed that certain industries which were in a way to suffer more or less from revised tariff schedules will—so far as the tariff is concerned—be restored to the same condition as prevailed prior to the revision. In a word, the outbreak of the war has practically nullified the revised tariff schedule entirely, and left the home market without competition from abroad. In the steel and iron and the textile industries, especially, it is believed that many concerns which were struggling to readjust their operations to the new tariff will be able to go ahead on their old methods. Of course a good deal will depend upon how domestic business works out with the big war going on, but the general impression is that in a short time the European nations with practically their entire productive forces under arms will have to depend on the United States for almost everything they wear and eat.
"It is true that our manufacturers are being handicapped by the fact that they are unable to secure certain products which enter into the process of manufacture, such as dyes in the textile field, hides in the shoe industry and ferro-manganese in the steel trade; but it is expected that this will be overcome in some cases by substitutions and by imports from neutral countries in others. The main problem is to get ships to carry on foreign trade and to clear the ocean so that such trade is safe and economical."