Crawfordsville Weekly Journal, Crawfordsville, Montgomery County, 15 October 1892 — Page 10

superiority. The inventive genius of oui people enables them to make things oi this class that beat the world in simplicity and effectiveness. Here is a list of exports of that kind for the last ral

icultural implem'ts

Clocks and watches. Steam and street cars Lecomotive engines. .. Sa\.\. :::id tools Sewing-machines Other machinery........

I11

'HX-

1.229.61 6

3.264,435

7-7' 5

1.900.44

3.M3WIO.229.293

:v 70-47^

By reciprocity. We can say to Cuba: "We will admit your sugar free if you will admit our products on the same or other favorable terms.'' Since the passage of" the McKinlev bill we have made such treaties with Brazil, Cuba. I'orto Rico. San Domingo. Salvador, British West Indies, British Guiana. Guatemala ami Austria-Hun-gary. Most of them have been in effect only a short time, but under them our exports to the countries south of lis

have increased $8,132.-52901-

23.7S

per

cent, over the corresponding preceding period. si s.

It is a fair, but a very feeble argument against protection that manufacturers take advantage ot it to form trusts and combines. The trouble with the remedy is. first, that it. is a thousand times worse than the disease second, that it isn't a remedy. They flourish on the general prosperity, whether that arises from protection or free trade. England has them as well as America. To fly to free-trade to get rid of them would be like burning one's house to kill the cockroaches in it. The way to deal with them is through the law and the

com ts. We have begun that process and knocked out some of the worst already.

Iltlkl s.

Strikes came with the organization of labor, and are its inevitable accompaniment. So long as large bodies

of men work for one employer, anil Ihere are causes of disagreement be

tween them, strikes will continue, unless they are obviated bv some practicable scheme of compulsory arbitration.

unprosperous times capital and labor disagree as to how they shall divide the losses which those conditions bring in prosperous times they disagree »as to how to divide the profits. These disagreements can not be prevented by cither free trade or protection they are one of the incidents of industrial development under either svstem.

I was never more astonished than to read Mr. Clevelanils's reference to the Homestead episode in his speech to the committee of notification from which I have already quoted. Does he believe that frej trade would prevent such

tumbles Would we not have great factories under that system, as under the present Would not the men resist reductions in dull time?, and fight for advances in busy times, just as thev do now And it he does not really believe that protection promotes strikes, or that free trade would prevent them—well, is it quite honest argument to throw out an innuendo which an unthinking hearer will naturally take to mean something which the speaker would not dare to say himself?

11 A WILL rr no

some way. That requires about a million dollars a day. I take it for granted that it will not. resort to the general taxation of lands and property, or to a tamp tax. and probably not to an income tax. The only alternative is a combination of excise taxes and revenue duties on the English model, which, for a country maintaining a policy of free trade is a verv perfect system. But. let us see how it would work with us.

TIIK ENGLISH RE VEN IE.V

The English government imposes duty on

110

011

articles produced with

in the kingdom except spirituous liquors and upon these it levies an excise tax equal to the duty tax, so that the home product and the imported article stand

011

ing March

Coflee at

The present industrial and commercial system of the United States is a complete and symmetrical structure.

It provides for the support of the Government and the protection of American labor upon a consistent plan. There may be a better plan but this is undeniably a complete and practicable one, for we have tried it. Now what will the Democratic party put in the place of it It declares that protection is unconstitutional,and that its first act will be to repeal the McKinlev bill. What •will it do then On this point we have

not a word from platform, candidate party organs or anywhere else. The Democratic party asks the people to put it in power upon its pledge to tear down the existing system without anv information as to what it ill give lis instead of it. Dare we trust it so far? Is it the part of prudence to trust any party so far Ought it not to give the people in advance some clear outline of its affirmative policy—what it will do, as well as what it will undo, so that thev can consider and discuss and judge of its programme for themselves i.f-'It will have to provide for the expense of running the Government in

the same footing in

the market. The only imports on which duties are levied are chicory, cocoa, coffee, dried fruits, plate, spirits, tea, tobacco and wine. Everything else comes in free. For the year end

31, 1891,

was as follows:

Customs

the English revenue

Excise taxes

Stamps

Land tax

$97,400,000

123,940.000

67,300,000

5.150.000

I louse duty .......... 7,850,000 Income tax ... ...

Miscellaneous

Total

66,250,000

79,555,000

$447,445,000

In constructing a revenue system upon that model,we could begin with the internal revenue tax 011 whiskey and tobacco, which yielded

1S91.

$146,035,416

Internal revenue...

The remainder would have to

be raised by revenue tariff on non-com

peting imports. And of these it would not do to include any that enter into the manufacture of goods, like India-

rubber. for that would interfere with the freedom of trade. We could include only those which enter into the manufacture of the human body, which is a thing of less importance than goods, according tolrec-tradc philosophy.

This would restrict us substantially to coffee, tea. sugar, tropical fruits,cocoa, spices, tobacco and spirituous liquors, which, at ten cents a pound

011

coffee,

twenty-five cents on tea, three cents on sugar, twenty-five per cent, on fruits, cocoa and spices, and a hundred per cent, on tobacco and spirits, would give us,

the basis of last year's importa

tions, the following:

cents.

Tea at

$63,294,291

cents

Sugar at

22,519,759

cents

Fruits at

3/5°o43

per ct. ..

Cocoa at

Spices at

2,412,394

per ct.

805,260

per ct.

Tobacco at

685,021

100

per ct.

Malt liquors at

13,260,025

100

per ct 1

Brandy at

,709,960

100

per ct. 889,883

Wines at 100 per ct. ,8

,944,254

Total duties ....

$238,171,390

146,035.416

Total revenue

$384,206,806

In the sugar item 1 have included our domestic product of

5S0,000.000

pounds, because to preserve the principle of free trade it must carry a tax equal to the duty on the foreign article.

This is, of course, only a rough outline, but I am candid in saying that it is in a general way the only scheme for raising revenue which the Democratic party can adopt consistently with its pledge to abolish protection. With the profits of jobbers and retailers added, these duties will double the present price of sugar and nearly double that of

tea and coffee. Our present annual consumption of sugar is about sixty nine pounds per capita of coffee, ten pounds of tea,one and one-half pounds. At that rate of consumption, these duties would add

$3.45,

net, per capita

to the food expense of the people, and, including the profits of middlemen, it

may be put at

$5.00.

Under our present

system, the total annual expenditure of the Government for five years ending

June

30, 1891,

averaged

$4.69

per capita.

But the poor man would have the consolation of knowing that, although his coffee was expensive, his coffee-pot was made of free tin.

There is one weakness in this scheme which ought not to be concealed in case the committee of ways and means should be inclined to adopt it. These estimates are based on the statistics of i89i-'92. when importation was free, prices low and consumption large. With the prices of tea, coffee, sugar doubled by a revenue tariff, our thrift American housewives might determine to use only half as much, which would

make a vawning deficit in the income.

To meet this we would be compelled either to increase the duties, which would be killing the goose that laid the golden egg, or to resort to a stamp or income tax. In fact, if we arc going to hav«: free trade we will find it hard to do better than to adopt the English system without substantial change.-

WAGES.

I have no quarrel with thosi who defend protection solely on the ground of its effect on wages. It is in the maintenance of higher wages here than arc paid elsewhere that its good effect is

expressed in most specific and tangible manner. But after all, that does not seem to me to be the strongest form of the argument. High wages are the result of high conditions of prosperity and an abundance of varied and profitable employments. Protsction contributes to the production of these conditions in the United States, and so produces high wages. But wages are higher in freetrade England than in protected Germany. This is because England offers a greater variety of prosperous and profitable employments than Germany. I believe, for reasons already stated, that free trade contributes to the number, activity and success of those employments in England on the same principles on which it would diminish them in the United States. I believe protection is the better policy for Germany, but its good effect there is diminished by depressing conditions which produce, upon the whole, a state of industrial prosperity, inferior, as yet, to

that found in England. Its gpod effect will be made clearly manifest later. The free-trade argument that wages are no higher in the protected industries than in others, is a shallow and foolish one. There cannot be one standard for one class of industries and another tor the others. What affects one affects all. Wages and prices depend on broad, underlying, far-reaching conditions and causes. It is through its effect on tliese that free trade and protection each works out its results.

THE PATH OF PROGRESS.

To desire all things possible, achieve all things possible and be all things possible, is the aspiration of progressive humanity. The doctrine that the highest good is to satisfy tfce present want with the least exertion, is the philosophy of an Indian in his wigwam. The path of advancing civilization, increasing wealth and higher happiness is to be found in fresh conquests over nature, more inventions, better machinery, new subdivisions of labor, wider diversity of

employment and more perfect organization. In all these things the people of the United States lead the world

to-day. And they have such advantages of soil, climate, country, government, brains, muscle and pluck that "they ought to hold that leadership as far into the future as human foresight can reach. To insure this result, one condition only is requisite. It is, that they shall continue to pursue, develop and perfect all useful industries that can be made to flourish within their borders. Not one can be spared.

Everyone of them is some man's opportunity, some man's inspiration, some man's success.

So shall we advance to greater and greater mastery over tlve forces of

nature, and cheapen production more and more by making the elements work for us in more and more ways. So shall we enlarge the basis of wages bjmaking labor more effective, awaken new desires by gratifying present onc6, and create new markets by creating new wants. To these advancing conditions wages and prices will adjust themselves.

As expressed in money they may rise, or they may fall. The world-round tendency is to decline. But real wages

will rise, and real prices will fall, and between the two the standards of living will advance, and the comforts of life be multiplied. Where all this will end we know not, but-we have followed the path long enough to know that it leads upward, and that in that direction lies the goal of the highest human destiny.

Paragraphs from President Harrison's Letter of Acceptance.

"Our money is all national money—I might almOst say international for these hills are not only equal!}- and indiscriminately accepted at par in all the States, but in some foreign countries. The Democratic party, if intrusted with the control of the Government, is now pledged to repeal the tax on State

WmSSiSmk

bank issues, with a view to putting into circulation again, under such diverse

legislation as the States ma}' adopt, a flood of local bank issues. Only those who, in the years before the war experienced the inconvenience and losses attendant upon the use of such money can appreciate what a return to that system involves. The denomination of a bill as then often 110 indication of its value. The bank detector of yesterday was not a safe guide to-day as to credit or values. Merchants deposited several times during the day, lest the hour of bank closing should show a depreciation of the money taken in the morning. The traveler could not use in a journev to the East the issues of the most solvent banks of the West, and in consequence a money-changer's office was the familiar neighbor of the ticket office and the lunch counter. The farmer and the laborer found the money received for their products or their labor depreciated when they came to make their pur

chases, and the whole business of the country was hindered and bnrdened.

Changes may become necessary, but a national system of currency, safe and acceptable throughout the whole country,

is the fruit of bitter experiences, and I am sure our people will not consent to the reactionary proposal made by the Democratic party.

AMKUK AX SHIPPING.

1 lie I ifty-first Congress enacted such a law (lor the encouragement of American shipping), and under its beneficent influence sixteen American steamships of an aggregate tonnage of

and costing

57,400

tons

$7,400,000

have been built,

or contracted to be built in American shipyards. In addition to this it is now practically certain that we shall soon have, under the American flag, one of the finest steamship lines sailing out of New ork for any European port. This contract will result in the construction in American yards of four new passenger steamships of

tons each, costing about $S,

RECIPROCITY.

The removal of the duty 011 sugar and the continuance of coffee and tea upon the free list, while giving great relief to our own people by cheapening articles used increasingly in every household, were also of such enormous advantage to the countries exporting these articles as to suggest that in consideration thereof reciprocal favors should be shown in their tarifl's to articles exported by us to their markets. Great credit is due to Mr. Blaine for the vigor with which he pressed this view upon the country. We have only begun to realize the benefit of these trade arrangements. The work of creating new agencies and of adapting our goods to new markets has necessarily taken time, but the results already attained are such, I am sure, as to establish in popular favor the policy of reciprocal trade based upon the "free importation of such articles as do not injuriously compete with the products of our own farms, mines, or factories, in exchange for the free or favored introduction of our products into other countries. The obvious efficacj- of this policy in increasing the foreign trade of the United States at once attracted the alarmed attention of European trade journals and boards of trade. The British Board of Trade has presented to that government a memorial asking for the appointment of a commission to consider the best means of counteracting what is called the commercial crusade of the United States."

The Democratic platform promises a repeal of the tariff law containing this provision and especially denounces as a sham reciprocity that section of the law under which these trade arrangements have been made. If no other issue were involved in the campaign, this alone would give it momentous importance. Are the farmers of the great grain growing States willing to surrender these new, large and increasing markets for their surplus? Are we to have nothing in exchange for the free importation of sugar and coffee and at the same time to destroy the sugar planters of the South, and the best sugar industry of the Northwest, and of the Pacific coast or are we to have the taxed sugar and coffee, which a tariff for revenue only necessarily involves, with the added loss of the new markets which have been opened As I have shown, our commercial rivals in Europe do not regard this reciprocity policy as a sham," but as a serious threat "to a trade supremacy they have long enjoyed. They would rejoice—and if prudence did not restrain, would illuminate their depressed manufacturing cities—over the news that the-United States had abandoned its system of protection and reciprocity. They see very clearly that restriction of American products and trade and a corresponding increase of European production and trade would follow, and I will not believe that what is so plain to ,»c

them can be hidden from our own people.

THE FREE-TRADE CRISADI.

This mad ciusade against American shops, the bitter epithets applied to sSy American manufacturers, the persistent disbelief of every report of the opening of a tinplate mill or of an increase of W our foreign trade by reciprocity, are as surprising as they are discreditable.

There is not a thoughtful business man in the country who does not know that the enactment into law of the declaration of the Chicago convention 011 4S& the subject of the tariff would at once plunge the country into a business convulsion such as it has never seen and there is not a thoughtful workingman who does not know that it would at once enormously reduce the amount of work to be done in this country by the increase of importations (.hat would follow and necessitate a reduction of his wages to the European standard.

TIN- PLAT P.

But, in spite of the doubts raised bv the elections of 1890, and of the machinations of foreign producers to maintain their nonopoly, the tin-plate industry has been" established in the United States, and the alliance between the Welsh producers and the Democratic party for its destruction will not sueceed. The official returns to the

,240.830

100,000,000

10,000

000,000.

and

will add to our naval reserve six steamships. the fastest upon the seas.

If the injustice of his employer tempts the workman to strike back lie should be

very sure that his blow does not fall upon his own yead or upon his wife and children. 'I he workmen in our great industries are as a body remarkably intelligent and are lovers of home and country. Thev may be roused bv injustice or what seems to them to be such, or be led for the moment brothers into acts ot passion but thev will settle the tariff contest in the calm light of their November firesides, and with sole reference to the prosperity of the country of which they are citizens and of the homes they have founded for their wives and children. *.

MARKETS OK 1HE WORLD.

-U

Treas- •5

ury Department of the production of tin and tcrne plates in the United States during the last fiscal year show a total production ot 13

pounds, and a

comparison of the first quarter.

pounds, with the last, S,

826,922

000,000

pounds,

shows the rapid development of the industry. Over

5,000,000

pounds,

during the last quarter were made from American black plates, the remainder from foreign plates. Mr. Ayer, the Treasury agent in charge, estimates as the result of careful inquiry, that the production of the current year will be

pounds, and that by the end

of the year our production will" be at the rate of

200,000,000

annum.

pounds per

IVORKIM.MrV,

The new Democratic leadership rages

".'ct.

at the employer and seeks to communicate its rage to the employe. 1 greatly regret that all employers ot" labor are not just and considerate and that capital sometimes takes too large a a share of the profits. But I do not see that these evils would be ameliorated bv a tariff policy the first necessary effect of which is a severe wage cut and the second a large diminution of the aggrcgate amount of work to be done in this country.

One of the favorite arguments against a protective tariffs that it shuts us out from a participation in what is called, with swelling emphasis, "the markets of the world." If this view is not a false one, how does it happen that our commercial competitors are not able to bear with more serenity our supposed surrender to them of the markets of the world," and how does it «tt happen that the partial loss of our

market closes foreign tin-plate mills and plush factories that still have all other markets Our natural advantages, our protective tariff, and the reciprocity policy make it possible for us to have a large participation in the markets of the world without opening our own to a competition that would destroy the comfort and independence of our people.

THE UNION VETERANS.

'The Union soldiers and sailors are now veterans of time as well as of war. The parallels of age have approached close to the citadels of life and the end for each of a brave and honorable struggle is not remote. Increasing infirmity and years give the minor tone of sadness and pathos to the mighty appeal of service and suffering. The ear that does not listen with sympathy and the heart that does not respond with generosity, are the ear and heart of an alien and not of an American. *.:'.•• .'••••

!X.:H THE DEMOCRATIC PROGRAMME.

(V 'J

./•

The Democratic party offers a programme of demolition. The protective policy—to which all business, even that ol the importer, is now adjusted, the reciprocity policy, the new merchant marine, are all "to be demolished—not gradually, not taken down, but blown up* To this programme of destruction it has added one constructive feature, the re-establishment of State banks of issue. The policy of the Republican party is, on the other hand, distinctively a poficy of safe progression and development —of new factories, new markets, and new ships. It will subject business to no perilous changes, but offers attractive opportunities for expansion upon familiar lines.

Vl*

mm*

1 I, S

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