Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 June 1890 — Knowledge vs. Theory. [ARTICLE]

Knowledge vs. Theory.

It is common practice with a certain class of writers to denounce representatives of established domestic industries for occasionally appearing before Congressional Committees when legislation affecting their interests is under discussion. However wide the man’s experience, however long and unsullied his business life, for him to make protest against legislation inimical to any greatindustry is to call down upon himself the sneers and abuse of men as innocent of a knowledge of the influence of legislation upon a country’s industries as they are ignorant of the details of those industries. - - This wing of the free trade army might find it profitable to recall the at I mission of that good free trade authority, Prof. Sidgwick, of England, in laying down the proposition that “no mere theorist has the right to dispute the practical business man of affairs on the eftVct of .a hy.v enacted by a nation (.mi the industry and. labor of the country in question, unless the { said iheorist has an equal array of facts and statistics to sustain his j position.” Admitting the correctness of this view, but one conclusion is post Ale, when the tire fact is recalled that clouds of witnesses in behalf of protection have been forthcoming for a hundred years, backed up by figures from their business and facts within their experience—and that these are disputed almost -exclusively by men. who have Tcii her their-own experience rrar -that of practical producers to support their theories.

The history of manufactures the world over shows that not supremacy alohe, out the bare indepeud- | cnee of nations in the support of their pc. pies, so far as manufactures nrecoiicerned, lias disappear-ed-in the Dee of free trade with : e favorably circumstarced and [richer rivals. Irelandp -IVwtvig.-.l pgttfETnritey ■f m ms-1 rope an‘e x- ■ an.; U of industrial decadence resulting from dipliMimey ttirit gave to British mapufaclurou (he op- • > break down weak -r n ; ;.-! ■ us: v/iiih in taY-clf India. /. A :: , .■lion spi’-nin-r ami weav- . ;O: llorurishcTl a;: i gave (’l)i-;.ivi-.yn. to thousands of contenti ed natives, British guns compelled concessions to a free trade that \ d the prelude to disappearance of a prosperous textile industry. ' There is no more philanthropy. / behind present- efforts of British tradesmen and diplomats to get | control of American markets than inspired them to secure a monopoly |of the trade in the countries nam- ; ed; and if the result should prove equally disastrous to American industries, Great Britain -would have removed the most formid- ! able obstacle to her ambition to become the workshop of the world.