It was not until March (1878) that Mr. Wood brought in his bill. He tabulated interestingly his objections to the tariff in operation. They were: Too many articles mentioned (2172); compound duties; ambiguity; the articles for the rich less highly taxed than those of the poor; encouragement of fraud; prohibitory duties, causing loss of revenue and enhanced prices to consumers; cumbersome machinery of operation; expensive collections. He confessed that the bill he presented did not deal with these demerits as they deserved, that he would cut the duties 50 per cent, if he could, instead of 15 per cent, as he had, but he had done the best he could. The features of the Wood Bill were novel and interesting. It had but one list—the dutiable; any article not mentioned there was supposed to be free. It reduced the number of dutiable articles from 1524 to 575. It put duties on many raw materials. It imposed but _one_ kind of duty on an article—ad valorem or specific as seemed to him best. It levied a retaliatory duty of 10 per cent on goods coming from countries which discriminated against the United States. It allowed a drawback on all exported goods containing foreign materials. It allowed the purchase of foreign-built ships by Americans and the free importation of ship-building materials. The general object of the bill Mr. Wood said was to revive commerce without materially affecting manufacturing interests whose right to protection for a still longer time Mr. Wood recognized. He considered his bill merely a beginning of a new policy in tariffs, looking toward the final complete withdrawal of the system of taxing consumers for the good of private individuals. From the first the Wood Bill was cursed by the indifference of a large number of his own party,—men like S. S. Cox and Morrison, who did not speak at all on it,—by the open opposition of the moderate Republican tariff men like Garfield and Kasson, and by the bitter condemnation of the Industrial League, which called it “blundering,” “ignorant,” “an attempt to overthrow the industrial system of the country.” Naturally, under these circumstances the debate upon it languished. Indeed, the only personal incident in the debate which is interesting from this range is that at this time William McKinley of Ohio made his first speech in support of protection of American industry. It was a strictly orthodox speech calculated to give comfort to Mr. Kelley, and it was used as an opportunity for presenting a petition which the Democrats had been trying to keep out signed by over 100,000 laboring men of seventeen different States, praying for a 10 per cent _increase_ of duties.