Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 April 1889 — BAGGINS AND TWINE. [ARTICLE]

BAGGINS AND TWINE.

f ute bagging and iron aes cr© essential to the proper an i eeonorriical marketing of cotton, th staple crop of th south. 1 wine is j ist as essential to th > proper harvesting f w ieat, the staple crop of the northwest. The protective tariff on bagging is fifty per cent ; on twine it is forty per cent. By the Mills bill bagging was placed on the free list, and the duty on twine was reduced to twentyfive per cent.

When this qestion came before the people tie cotton planters voted to sustain the Mills bill, but the whe.t farmers of the northwest were so afraid of the ‘•southern brigadiers” that they could not trust them even to reduce taxes, and so the Mills bill failed, and the farmers north and south were handed over, body and breeches, oxe to the twine trust and one to the bagging trust. Last autumn the bagging trust robbed “under the forms of law” the southern cotton planters of about one million dollars, and they are preparing to repeat the game when the-cotton-picking begins. The “twine trust” is now getting ready for its harvest It has not only secured control of th© twine product, but also of the r w materials from which it is' mad?. This raw material —hemp—is now taxed twenty-five dollars a ton; the “rebel el brigadiers” proposed to put it on the free lis*, but the Plutocr >ts defeated this proposition, and now no relief is possible. We do not think the trust will be able to put the price up to twenty-five cents, f*r such an advance would load to too heavy importations, and, as with copper, defeat the purpose of the combiner Still tlie tact remains that under the protection of the tariff a monopoly has been established, and he western farmers must pay the piper. From Sheldon Journal. Resolved, That ve view, with indignation, the formation of the binding-twine bust: we denounce it as an u righteous alliance to despoil the farmer and we hereby pledge ourselves to use no twine at all rather than to suffer sueh imposition and extortion. We are willing to pay fair prices, to live and let live, but we will buj no twine sold hy the trust, unless sup lied to us at a reasonable price.

Editor Journal: This resolution was adopted at the Fatmers’ Institute, at Watseka, February 27th, 1889.

Why should the farmeis remonstra.e at the extortions of high tariff monopolists? The question of all others, on which ihe two dominant parties voted last fall was, “Shall the high tariff, and the extortiorfs of the monopolists, which that tariff fosters and protects, he allowed to skin the producers?’ Jr, to put it plainly and truthfully, “Sh ,11 the manufacturers and importers be allowed to skin the produeers?” The verdict was, “Yes,[skin them all you wish.” Who gave this verdict? The farmers of the producing states, such as Illinois, Indiana, lowa, Nebraska, <fcc. Sixty-five Farmers’ Institutes in these states remonstrated against these abases, and then turned squarely around and voted to continue them.

It was purely a question of economy and common sense that was presented in that issue. It wa i free from all the old questions that had dividep ofar people heretofore, so rar as the main issues were concerned, and yet the farmers voted to continue the abuses like tiat covered by the resolution. Instead of 1 ©king to their interests, they seemed to vote as if ihe reselution read thus:— “Resolved, That the wa ’still continues; tnat sectional hatred sho’d be cultivated and handed down to our children as a precious legacy} that the democratic and prohibition parties are enemies of their God and their country and unwor[

the confidence of respectable people; and that all manufacturers of agricultural implements -hall continue to sell their goods to the accursed Evgli h cheaper than to the farmers of Illinois; t h «t the Louisian' l f-n ar producers shall receive a tuty of one cent a pound upon their|productions, and the producers of the great sb 11 receive not.uing on their productions.” M eanwhile twine continues at sixteen rets a pound, and corn at twenty-five cents a bushel! Great is Diana or Ephesus!

H. W. SNOW.