Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 February 1888 — FARMERS AND THE TARIFF. [ARTICLE]

FARMERS AND THE TARIFF.

An Appeal Against the Protection of Monopolists and the Ruin of Agriculture. [Wajhington special.] The farmers and delegates to the Nebraska Farmers’ Alliance meeting have sent in a strongly worded petition to Congress asking for a removal of the duty on iron, lumber, sugar, wool, salt, and wooden goods. In the document, which is indorsed by the National Farmers’ Alliance and State granges of Illinois, Indiana and 'ennsylvania, the husbandmen point out that the statistics of Illinois show that from 1880 to 1886 eighty-seven of the richest agricultural districts of that State suffered an actual loss in population, and that $50,000,000 was lost on corn in the past five years, thus proving that the farmers worked without earning even a day’s wages. Under the present system the petitioners urge that farms are passing to mortgagees, and farmers are being reduced to the condition of the unhappy tenantry of Ireland. The existing state of affairs, they claim, is due mainly to the protective tariff system now prevailing, which taxes the farmers of the nation for the aggrandizement of manufacturers on the plea of protecting American labor, while white labor is left free to come from all parts of the world. In concluding, the farmers allege that the agricultural products are sold in the open markets of the world in competition with the cheapest labor, while the manufacturer, through the operation of the protective tariff, received a bonus of from 25 to 100 per cent, on his wares. Incidentally, the petitioners protest against the removal of the tax on whisky and tobacco, and express the hope that Congress will never pronounce in favor of freeing such articles from taxation and burdening the necessities o' life. The document has been laid before both houses of Congress.