Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 February 1888 — THE WORKMAN’S GAIN. [ARTICLE]

THE WORKMAN’S GAIN.

The man who chews t( bacco constantly in this country, we are reliably informed, uses about a pound a month. Some use much more, others considerably less, but it is certainly not an underestimate to fix the average at a pound a month or twelve pounds a year.The tax paid to the United States is eight cents a pound. Blaine’s great scheme to help the workingmen would thus save them eight cents a month or ni lety-six cents—less than a dollar a year. It wo’d not save working women, who do not chew tobacco, a cent; but t en women hava no votes, and Blaine and the Republican party seem to have no use for women. We do not believe there is a sensible workingman in the United States who does honestly believe that the tax of eight cents a month he pays for chewing tobacco is a burden. He knows it is a luxury and it is a luxury he takes no pride in. Now the tax on common window glass is eighty-seven per cent. If the child of a workingman breaks two panes of glass h? has to pay by way of tax aim. st double what the glass should cost him. If he bu ’s for his wife a woolen

shawl costing two dollars he has to pay almost a dollar in taxes owipg to custom house duties On a pair of common worsted stockings 'he tariff tax is over ten cents. On his stockings alone asorkingman who chewed tobacco would save more money if President Cleveland’s plan was adopted than h° would if Blaine’s scheme became a law. His wife would net save a cent by abolishi ?g the tobacco tar. 4 She would save in mauagirg the household for a year a month’s wages f r her husband, if the tariff w s properlv reduced, as President Cleveland recommends. —Albany Argus.