Rensselaer Union, Volume 3, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 January 1871 — Protection of American Industry. [ARTICLE]

Protection of American Industry.

Probably one of the moil difti- , halt questions of public policy offered fer eolation ia the subject of Vepost duty. Ia all ages of the world since commercial intercouse baa been carried on between peoples and cooimnoities, this problem baa vexed the statesman, the ruler and the trader. The arts have advanced with civilisation; mechanical, medicinal, theological and literary sciences have kept measured step to the music of progression; other problems of human government have been discussed, weighed, and their values decided; but whether nntaxed commerce is productive of most universal benefit to the inhabitants of a country, or whether manufacturing and agricultural industries should be encouraged at the expense of commerce, is yet an open question. Perhaps a practical solution of the subject eon bo nearest arrived at—at least ao far as affects the people of the United States—by adopting a policy that shall be a compromise between the two extremes and blending what may be advantageous in both theories. Our readers may perhaps remember that not long since we bad occasion to comment upon an article in advocacy of protection which appeared in the Indianapolis Journal. We have recently received from a respected friend a private letter in which occurs the following:

Our friend writes: “Some weeks ago (December Bth) the Union contained an editorial commenting on an extract from the Indianapolis Journal on the revenue tariff. 1 have no idea who wrote the article, but suppose it was done in Jour office. But the writer is not a profound statesman. lie is not acquainted with the revenue tariff law, nor with the monitor)- history of the country. The thirteen years of the old Confederacy were an era of free trade in which each State made its own revenue laws. It was a period of the hardest times this country oversaw. We must have revenue, but free trade supplies none. No government ever did, or probjably ever can, collect the necessary taxes for all purposes by direct taxatfon equally assessed upon real or personal property and the business of all occupations, without an army of collectors backed by a standing army of soldiers. Gen. Grant is right when he says revenue ought to bc’levied upon those articles of which we import and use more than we make, thus protecting home industry and building up home markets, and of consequence enriching the whole country. Break down our factories ao that foreigners would have no competition and they would at once charge double for their goods. A small party of Utopian empirics have always .wrangled for free trade, but the country has never s.ded with them and there is no prospect that the people ever will.” Our friend is in error, Ist in relation to the cause which occasioned the ‘‘hard times'Uof the old Confederacy; and Id. in relation to our position with regard to the tariff question.

Seven of the thirteen years that comprised the existence of the old Confederacy were years of the Revolutionary war, in which the whole resources of the country were either destroyed by contending armies or swallowed up to maintain troops in the field. For a period of quite one hundred years previous and up to that time the commerce of the colonies had been retarded by the protective tariff enactments of the mother country which provided that no imports or exports should be permitted but in vessels built in England or her colonial plantations, and navigated by crews of which the masters and three-fourths of the mariners should be English subjects; that none but 4atural-born subjects of the English crown, or persons legally naturalized, should exercise the occupation of merchant or factor in any English colonial settlement, and the penalty for violation of either of these provisions was forfeiture, in the former, of ship and cargo, f in the latter, of goods and chattels. Another provision of this protective tariff law Was, that no sugar, tobacco, eotton, wool, indigo, ginger, or woods used in dyeing, produced or manufactured in the colonies, should be shipped from there to any other country than England. To this list of “enumerated commodites” were afterwards added tbe_jice of Carolina and the copper ore of the northern provinces. Restrictions were also laid to compel the people of those colonies to purchase all their commodities and manufactures from English tradesmen. They were also subjected in trading with one another to a tax to levie<l oo of their peculiar

| commodities, iu • England. (bee Grahame’s Colonial History of tho United States, Vol. 1, pp. 81 and 92.) Thus their commerce was harassed, the development of the natural resources of their country was impeded, and their wealth was eaten up by the combined tyranny of protective tariffs and direct taxation. It was the crushing influence of this protective system that furnished one of the reasons given for the declaration of independence in 1770 expressed in these words: *Tor cutting off our trade with all parts of the world.” It will bo seen from this that the “hard times” were hot brought about by free trade, but rather from the "protective tariff” and “internal revenue” taxation of the mother country together with the devastations of wars, the Revolutionary and those against the Indians. In the article referred to by our friend, we did not lake grounds in favor of unrestricted free trade Neither are we ready to do so.— What we recommended was not that congress should repeal all tariffs, “but to reduce them to a revenue only.” In this way a healthy competition might be established that would break down the danger ous monopolies that now support salaried agents at the national and State eapitols who are supplied with money to corrupt public officers and procure the passage of laws that tend ip create an aristocracy of wealth whose derived from the pockets of the labor-, ing classes: an aristocracy the most detestable known, because the most heartless, the most arrogant, the most narrow-minded; and the least patriotic because usually ignorant and effeminate. If we understand the meaning of language, and the leaders of the republican party are honest in what they have heretofore advocated, our position is the position of the party. Senator Wilson, of Massachusetts, whose republicanism has never been questioned, in an article to be found in the Atlantic Monthly for January, 1871,says: “Neither he who desires protection nor those who believs in free trade should demand or expect their extreme opinion to be adopted as the policy of the nation.— Some common ground should be sought where existing burdens may be lightened and the great interests of the country may be cared fui;. — Both should concede soiqethir.g> in view of the mighty interests involved. The present revenue laws were formed in" time of war. The changed condition of affairs necessitates some modifications; and congress should speedily address itself to the task of finding some mode of adjustment that may be both satisfactory add enduring.” This article has not been written for the purpose of self-defence nor as an excuse for, or justification of, our personal views, but to call the attention of our readers to a subject that all tax-payers and consumers are directly interested in, that they may think it over in all ita bearings and be prepared when the "question cornea before them for their decision and suffrages—if it ever should come—to act advisedly and wisely.