Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 53, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 September 1889 — An English Tribute to American Protection. [ARTICLE]

An English Tribute to American Protection.

The following eloquent tribute to our Protective Tariff is the more significant, coming as it does from an Englishman. It is taken from the Nineteenth Century, by Bobert Mackensie, chapter VIII, on the United States of America, pages 430-431:

The amount of her surplus products which America can sell to 4 other countries is growing with her ? population. In 1860 it was six 5 million sterling; in 1870 it was - ninety million; in 1884 it was 170 I million. Very different from this is the history of her imports. The Americans seek to be independent of supplies from abroad. A cen- • tury ago, in the well remembered i words of Lord Chatham, they were , not allowed to make so much as a nail for a horse’s shoe. Their revenge has been the adoption of a ■ policy of protective duties, under shelter of which all industries 1 shall strike deep root at home, and ultimately enable tiie country to ’ dispense with foreign supplies. 1 The system has been maintained 1 at enormCus cost, but it is visibly i serving the purpose for which it i was intended. Year by year, the imports of America diminish. Once she bought of England goods to the annual value of 40 million sterling; now she takes only 30 million. Formerly most of her iron and steel came from England;

,--- O now her own boundless stores supply nearly all her wants. Formerly she took largely of our cotton manufactures; now she competes with us successfully in foreign markets. Her exports of cotton goods rose during the years between 1868 and 1885 from rather less than one million sterling to million. In manufactures of iron and steel her exports have doubled; manufactures of copper and brass have trebled; in manufactures of leather the increase is six-fold. British manufacturers, who suffer from the diminution of American demand and the growth of American competition, are still able to persuade themselves that these disagreeable circumstances are merely accidental and temporary results of depressed trade. There is no warrant for this expectation . The dependence of America upon the manufactures of Europe is steadily diminishing, and mil continue to diminish until that country ceases to hear to us the endearing relationship of a customer and is knoum only as our most formidable competitor.

The Indiana Democratic Editorial Assuciation at its recent meeting, at Maxinkuckee, adopted this resolution: “This association is of the opinion that the city and county officials should purchase supplies for their offices from local establishments, when the same can be furnished at equitable rates.” And yet these same Democratic editors are frantically advocating a directly opposite National policy, insisting that the cheap labor manufacturers of the world shall be brought into direct and even competition with the better paid labor manufacturers of this country, and that sums of money shall be taken out of this country to pay for foreign goods that oould as well be made and bought at home. Such resolutions as the above put free trade Democratic editors in a deep hole. The procection doctrine is good for them and for their localities and a great deal better for the Nation at i large.—Logansport Journal. *