With the Iron and Steel Association taking the important place it did in the campaign of 1888, it was of course inevitable that the Allison Bill should recognize its demand for an advance on tin plate. Mr. McKinley found the duty then in the bill he inherited and Mr. Allison, who believed sincerely that the tariff on tin plate had justified itself, was sore to the day of his death because Mr. McKinley never credited it to the Allison Bill. It is doubtful if an important duty was ever laid on facts so distorted and in answer to pressure so questionable. The chief advocate was the American Tin Plate Association. Their circulars went out broadcast as appeals to patriotism. “If this little circular should fall into the hands of a patriotic lady or gentleman,” wrote the Secretary in a circular which was printed in 1888, “we ask that you kindly give this matter some study; it is a patriotic feeling and nothing else that instigates the members of this association.” The patriotic lady or gentleman who had given the circular study would have found it started with a statement so absurd that he would have only continued because of the amusement he might get from it. According to this circular we consumed about $35,000,000 worth of tin plate a year (the figure was greatly exaggerated), and “if it were made in this country several hundred thousand residents of the United States would gain a livelihood thereby.” If the value of the tin plate consumed were $35,000,000 and the sum was divided into one-third for materials and two-thirds for wages and the “several hundred thousands” were reckoned as 300,000, their annual wages would have been about $78.00 a year! Mr. McKinley saw a wonderful future for the industry—23,000 men employed directly in the business (in 1900 there were 4000; in 1905, 5000), $30,000,000 of capital invested (in 1905 it was $10,000,000). He did not seem to think there was any impropriety in a part of the capital ready to go into tin plate making, being that of a member of the House long a supporter of the duty, F. G. Niedringhaus, of Missouri. This gentleman wrote on November 27 a letter read in Congress by Mr. McKinley, saying one of his mills had been arranged for tin plate work and in case of a “proper duty,” he could turn out tin plate on short order, and “if the fact as I believe it to be can be generally established in the minds of the people, _that the Republicans will continue to govern this country in the future_, there will be plenty of money forthcoming to embark in the manufacture of tin and terne plate.”