Rensselaer Republican, Volume 23, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 July 1891 — WHY FARMERS FAVOR PROTECTION. [ARTICLE]

WHY FARMERS FAVOR PROTECTION.

Free trade advocates vie with each other in magnifying the importance of foreign markets in face of the fact that, compared with the home market, either as to quantity of products they can consume or prices they can afford to pay, all the outside markets that by any possibility can be reached could not be forced to onequarter the magnitude of the home market that is ours so long as we care to hold it. The farmer is asked to believe that all that stands between him and uniformly high prices for his crops is the law requiring foreigers to pay for the privilege of selling their wares in this country. True the proportion of farmer voters who have been induced to act in accordance with such arguments has not been so large as to afford especial encourgementjbut unabated efforts to that end seem a necessity of the economic situation. The free trade propaganda is so nearly “out of meat” that help must be had from some quarter, or they must follow their whilom leader Cleveland into the shadows of “innocuous desuetude.” What is the true relation of the farmer to the question of a home market vs. a foreign market? All the money the farmer can hope to secure must come from the sale of surplus crops. No matter where the market for these is found, he either must take what he sells to that market or pay someone else for doing so. The nearer to his farm such market can be found the • less the expense in reaching it. Hence the one item of transportation really settles the question of economy in favor of the home market

But this is not the only or really the most important fact to be considered. The foreign market for farm products is exceedingly limited, and its marts are already crowded with competitors from every nation that produces a surplus over what is required for feeding its own people. Even by accepting such prices as buyers were willing to pay, a foreign market has been found for only one-tenth of our agricultural products. The remaining nine-tenths are taken by those of our own people who find employment in some business other than farming Not only are these people better consumers than foreigners, but they are in position to pay the farmer better prices by reason of his reduced expense in getting his products to a final market. In addition to this they are buyers of a long list of fruits, vegetables and similar products, that by reason of their perishable character could not be gotten in a foreign, market at any price. It is such solid facts as these that in the estimation of intelligent farmers outweigh all the bribes of cheapness in what they have to buy so presistently held ou| by the champion of free foreign trade. Experience and sound sense teaches them that it is quite as important t find customers able to buy

at paying prices afrit is to have products to sell. And in recognition of this, fact they decline to support a policy admittedly designed to shove the market of surplus products to the greatest possible distance from the farm, thus adding to the charges of carriers and middlemen, while crippling the resources of those who are now good customers, and inevitably forcing many from the ranks of consumers into that of raisers of farm crops. The only excuse the Democrats have to offer for the greatly increased taxation of real-estate for state purposes is the nped of the state for more revenue. But the need for more revenue did not require the double increase of a much higher levy for state purposes and a vastly increased assessment; and if they had taxed corporations and saloons in the same proportion as most other states do, no other increase in any way would have been necessary.

All the indications point to the conclusion that the approchingAlliance picnic and' mass-meeting to be held in Rensselaer, August 4th will be turned into a political rally in the interests! of the Anti-Republican combination. That the Democratic bosses' understand very well who the principal beneficiaries in the movement are, is evident from the names of the committee of three who solicited contributions from the merchants of Rensselaer for the expenses of the meeting. They were C. D. Nowels, E. P. Honan and Benj. Tuteur. When those |three rock rooted and time tried Democrats combine to work for a scheme, it it safe to assume that they see some advantage in it for the Democratic party. The evils resulting from habitual costiveness are many and serious: but the use of harsh, drastic purgatives is quite as dangerous. In Ayer’s Pills, however, the patient has a mild but effective aperient, superior to all others, especially for family use.