Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 October 1888 — BLAINE IN INDIANA. [ARTICLE]

BLAINE IN INDIANA.

A STATE DEMONSTRATION AT INDIANAPOLIS. A GatUertn* of Republican Club* from Krery Part of «.ho Slat*. A Magnificent Paralte, and Matterly by Mr. Blaine and Other*. Hon. Jame* G. Blaine came to Indiana, Wednesday* and was accorded a magnificent reception at Gos Ken-by anthnninatic people.- FjOU) Goshen to Indianapolis, where he arrived late at night, his trip was almost a continuous ovation. Large crowds had gathered at Warsaw, Wabash, Marion, Anderson aad many smaller places, and his appearance was greeted with tumultuous cheers. Arriving at Indianapolis he-was at once conveyed to the residence of Gen. Harrison, who warmly welcomed him. His appearance is improved over four years age, when his mind was troubled "With the details of the campaign. Both he and his son, Walker Blaine, express the greatest confidence in the outcome of the contest. He says the crowds which gather at stations along the route greatly exceed those of four years ago. .._ Thursday opened up somewhat drearily,, with a promise of rain, but it was soon observable or no rain the crowd was headed toward the capitol city. The Harrison residence, most certainly, was the center of attraction, and long before the General or Mr. Blaine had ended their slumbers a crowd began togathe - around the front door. The crowd in the city was rapidly augmented by heavily loaded incoming trains, and between 10 and II o’clock fully 15,000 people Jiad entered through the gate of the new station. By noon the streets were an almost impenetrable mass of moving humanity, slowly meandering to the" various points of interest. Possibly 1,000.000 would not he an over-estimate of the crowd on the streets. The procession was one of the largest and finest over witnessed in Indiana. Fully two hours were required for the passing of a given point, and the gaily uniformed clubs, bands and mottoes-made up a pageant

long to be remembered. There were probable 15,000 people who took part in the parade from nearly every part of the state. Gen. Harrison, Mr. Blaine, Gov Porter and other prominent people re. viewed the procession from the balcony of the Denison House, and the honors were warmly received by the marching thousands. The proceedings proper were held at the Exposition grounds. An immense audience awaited the coming of those in the procession*: and the speakers, and when their number was augmented by the procession it was an inspiring incenresponded to their cheers. The largeness and consequent turbulence trf the crowd in the afternoon made it impossible for Mr. Blaine to be heard. His speech on account thereof was-poetponded until night and was delivered in Tomlinson Hall. He spoke as follows: Fellow-citizens of Indiana—lt is the studied and persistent effort of tile Democratic party, in this presidential campaign, *to prejudice the West against the East on tbfc subject of the tariff, maintaining that the Eastern States get the benefits of protection and Western States get its burden. Now, ifthe tariff for protection so operates that one section gets the gain and the other gets the loss, then the whole system of protection ought to be abolished; and, if the advocates of a protective tariff cannot prove that it is of as great -advantage to the West as it is to the East, as great advantage to the South as it is to the North, and that if it a national and not a sectional policy—if, I say, they cannot establish those' points, then the poliev ought to be abandoned. But I maintain—and, in the few minutes I shall occupy your attention, I shall endeavor to prove—by figures and by facts, that the West, the great, growi ng teeming, prosperous West, has gained more out of the protective tarill than any section of the whole Union. [Applause.] Gentlemen, I know • that involves questions of-fact and not questions of fancy; and I call your attention to the census of IS6o—and if there be any Democrats present, they will not wish to dispute the correctness of that ministration of Mr. Buchanan. I quote the figures of that census as to the weatth of eleven Western Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, -Minnesota, lowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska and Colorado, The last two were Territories when Mr. Lincoln came into power, but were long since States. According to the census of IS6O the aggregate wealth of those eleven Western States was something under $4,000,000,000. and in 1880,twenty years afterward, by the national census, the wealth of those States was $16,50D,001,000. [Apfilause.] It had increased and grown our-fold in twenty years, and in the last eight years enough has been added to carry up the wealth of those eleven States for beyond $20,000,000,010 or a vast deal larger spifi than the whole wealth of the Unit'ed States the day Lincoln was inaugurated. [Applause.] You can test this question in another way. In IS6O these eleven States had ten thousand miles of railroad, or scarcely that, and to-day, twenty-eight years afterward, they have nearly eighty thousand miles of railroad. Mind you, these eleven Western States have almost, three times as much railway within their borders as the whole Union had before the civil war. Something or other has enabled yon Western people to get along pretty * rapidly; for these State have prospered in a degree far beyond that of the old Eastern States; * in a ratio for greater than the Eastern States have maintained. As another proof! of that progress I have here a angular table from the official census of 1860 I think you will agree with me that it is a very suggestive table. [Here a disturbance causedby the crowded condition of the hall interrupted the speaker for a moment] T. was calling the attention of the audience to a table in the census of 1860 in which the principal towns and cities in the United States are given. I will quote those of the eleven

Western States and give you their population at that time. Cleveland was 43,000. Toledo was not large enough to he included in the statement at all. Detroit was 45,000. Grand Rapids, that now has SO,OOO, was not mentioned. Chicago—what do you sav the population of Chicago was in I 860? 109,000. , Its growth does not seem to have been much impeded by the protective tariff, for it is now three-quarters of a million at least. [Applause.! Milwaukee was 45,000. St. Baal and Minneapolis bad n<4 grown to be enough consequence, in iB6O to b mentioned in this table At aIL Together thev now' contain nearly 400,000 people. Columbus, ()., had 18,000, now some 75,000; Cincinnati had 160,000; Louisville, 68,000; St, Louis, 160,000; Kansas City —Tlie census didn’t know there was such a place. Denver—lt had never been heard of in the census.' Indianapolis—How much do you suppose it was in 1860? Under 18,f00. Des Moines, something over 3,000. Omaha—Well, Oinaha had no mention at all. The aggregate of these cities was 670,000 in in 1860, and is to-dav three and a half millions." This is the way, Mr. Chairman, the protective tariff has been retarding the growth and development of. the- West. [Applause.l This* Hie great hardship that the Wests has suffered by reason of a protective tariff. When you drive the free-traders from every other ground they tell you that the protective tariff has stifled the export trade of the United States, that it has builtup alotof factories and railways but that the foreign commerce of the country has all gone to pieces. I again quote from the census, and show you that from the time the Declaration’ of Independence was made, down to the time Lincoln was elected President —I will go further back. From the time America was discovered by Columbus down to the election of Abraham. Lincoln the aggregate shipment of all those years and all those centuries from the United States amounted to nine thou?and millions of dollars in value. Now, mark you, that covered the entire history of the government down to 1860; and’ from 1869 to 1888, the aggregate amount has been seventeen thousand five hundred millions, almost double as much in the t wenty-eight years of the present protective tariff as it was during the whole previous history of the American continent. [Applause.] That is the way, gentlemen, in which protection has operated. , - .. I had occasion, in speaking of this same subject in the East, when contrasting what protection had done for the laboring men of America, as compared with the laboring men of Europe, to show what the laboring men of New England had in savings banks as compared with those of old England, and I saw in more than one Western Democratic paper the remark: “Oh, yes, you have got all the money in the East; it is w T ell enough for yoil to uphold protection.” But, gentlemen, you must re member the different conditions. The wealth of the West has been in growing towns, in settled farms, in great lines pf railway, in vast agricultural development, all of which goes forward more rapidly to the W T est. Those investments in the West take the place of the cash deposits which the laboring men of the East, have placed in savings banks. -But the ratio of increase of property under the protective tariff for the last twenty-seven years has been largely in favor of the West as against the East, so that the policy of protection has not proved a sectional policy. Why, gentlemen, there is no longer the old distinction between manufacturing States and the agricultural States. Do you reckon yourselves here in Indiana an agricultural State simply? Your manufactures this year in the State of Indiana have a larger cash value than your total agricultural product. [Applause] Manufactures are no longer concentrated an the

eastern side of the Alleghenies. The city of Chicago is the of run ahead of Pittsburg, and under the influence of this tariff the manufactarihg interest has spread each year further and further westward, bringing the home market nearer and nearer to the source of food supply: and proving all the while to every intelligent voter in the country that th'6 nearer you bring the food consumers to the food producers the more certain is the prosperity of both. I had an occasion to show the other day in Michigan, from indisputable statistics, that the little region of New England, with not so much population as Illinois and Indiana, with scarcely eo much area as Illinois alone —I had occasion to show that that little area with six small States takes more from these Western States than is shipped to* old England, and that those little States take from the other States of this Union every year in food and raw material for manufacture the enormous aggregate of over four hundred millions of dollars in money. [*4 ppiause.] Add to that the amount New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey take from the South, the Southwest and the great West and you have an aggregate of more than 6ne thousand millions of material [applause]; and this country will have realized the great objective point of the tariff system when every agricultural State shall have its market near to the producers. Farmers of the West, you have been complaining of the price of wheat, and erroneously charging the fall upon the protective tariff. Why has wheat fallen during the last ten years? Because you have to meet in the markets of Europe the wheat of Russia, that is raised in that vast country with labor that is not more tßan , eight to twelve cents per day; and, beyond that vou are meeting vast imports of wheat from India, where England has been expending hundreds of millions of dollars to cheapen and expedite transportations to Europe. Neglect your home market, and tne lareer the amount you will find unsaleable, and the harder will he your competition with these hard-worked wheat producers on the other side. Suppose you turn half the manufacturers and mechanics, under the basis of free trade—suppose you turn half of them into wheat producers and farmers, isn’t the market of the farmer cut off just that much and the surplus of his product increased? Suppose you add another hundred and fifty million bushels to the product of the West, where will you market it? Where will you find the r i that are able to pay . for it, who tto eat it? Remember, gentlemen, it is the home market of the United States that every day is affording more and more to the agriculturists of this country their best market, and the home market of the United States is the result, logically and indisputably, of the protective tariff. [Great applause. ] *