Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 22, Number 71, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 May 1901 — LESSON OF THE AGE. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

LESSON OF THE AGE.

TAUGHT BY ENGLAND’S RECENT FISCAL CONDITION. The Leading Free-Trade Country of the World Finds Itself Getting Deeper Into Debt at the Kate of Over Half a Billion Dollars the Past Two Tears. England’s enormous deficit of $541.000,000 for the two years 19004)1, 190102, with its accompanying causes and effects, teaches one of the most important economic lessons of the age. In spite of the abandonment of protection in 1846, England seemed to prosper for nearly thirty years, a condition due to the impetus of her 400 years of protection, just as a ball propelled by force will roll up an incline till overcome by the law of gravitation. About 1874 England reached the point where she could no longer resist the inevitable law of commercial gravity, and, first coming to a standstill, slowly began rolling backward with increasing rapidity. Her enormous deficit has increased her debt to nearly $3,500,000,000, and with the anticipated new loans, it will soon approximate $4,000,000,000, or $lO per capita, as compared with sl4 per capita in the United States. Here alone is not only a continued interest burden, but a legacy to the next generation that will hardly be welcome. But this is not all. England is no longer loaning money to the world; she is borrowing abroad. She is passing from a creditor to a debtor nation. She is reaping in earnest the fruits of free trade and an adverse volume of trade. For the last few years she has been selling back millions of American securities, and her annual dividends and interest charges are decreasing. She has gone backward In everything but her shipping, and that is the only thing she protects. And it is needless to say that this plight in which England now finds herself Is due to the South African war. That might temporarily Increase expenditures and add to the national debt. But within the last three years the United States has conquered a much mightier nation and has overcome an insurrection. Yet we have a surplus in the treasury, and our financiers are lending money not only to England but to Germany and other European countries. Could we have done it In 1895? No. We had to borrow money then for ordinary expenses. Why could we do it a few years later? Because we substituted protection for free trade. Because we began again to manufacture for bqrselves. Because we employed our own people at American wages. Because an adverse balance of trade became a favorable balance to the amount of $50,000,000 and more annually. We have not only added to our material wealth, but we have acquired a credit of $2,000,000,000 on the world’s ledger, and a large part of it can be found in our account with Great Britain. And when we stop that little ocean freight bill of $200,000,000 a year we shall be still better off. It is now admitted that England was never In a worse plight and that she is drifting to financial ruin. Sir William Harcourt says she is worse off than at the close of the French war, and that the recent statement of Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, Chancellor of the Exchequer, was the most disastrous that the exchequer has ever made. We need not concern ourselves over the outcome; It is not our funeral. Let British economists and British parliamentarians find and apply the remedy if one is to be had. But the lesson should be heeded and studied. It is the more apparent because of the comparison with the finances of the United States. We are to-day enjoying the greatest prosperity ever known by our own or any other people. We are more fully employed, we are producing and consuming more, we are selling more abroad, we are increasing our foreign credit, we are reducing our national debt, we are loaning money to other nations, and, best of all, we are maintaining and Increasing the highest wage rate known to mankind. And yet only five years ago all these conditions were reversed. The time is too recent to need a reiteration of our condition. But the lesson to be drawn from a comparison of our national and Individual condition now and then and from a comparison with England’s pitiable plight Is only too full of meaning and moral. We do not have to reason from unsolved problems or guess at riddles. There are certain economic truths established beyond question. One is that if we buy more than we sell we shall in time become bankrupt. Borrowing and bonds do not pay the bill. Another truth is that an Individual or nation who is idle and does not produce an equivalent of what is consumed will soon be ruined. These two economic laws are the great lessons of the age, proved bej’oud question by actual results both at h6me and abroad. -There is no need to Study Adam Smith or John Stuart Mill to-day. Study the existing conditions of the past decade and the practical teaching will suffice for all. And It Is the more Important that we give heed to these great lessons, for there Is a certain class among us who will always Ignore truth and fact, and endeavor to teach precepts that lead to ruin. The free-traders, nbw combined Into their Immense trust, are scattering their pernicious doctrines over the land and boldly preparing to “capture Congressmen" next year and so bring about doubt and restlessness in business, even though no free trade bill could become a law. Protectionists must keep on guard.

Nothing is surer than that.— American Ecc aomlst. For the United States All the Time. The thought of protection is not excluded from a free list,, and if duties are lowered it will be because the higher duties are not required for protection nor for revenue. If freer trade will best protect and promote the industries of our own people we shall have freer trade under laws enacted by the Republican party, but it will never be the alm of the Republican party to legislate in behalf of foreign markets to the disadvantage of our own. Conditions change, and methods change with them, but it does not follow that the principle guiding action is not the same. It is a distinction of the Republican party that it has flexibility; that it is not hidebound; that it can deal promptly with new questions and adapt policy to new relations. But the Republican party is all the time for the United States of America.—Sioux City Journal. Unfair and injurious. The wisest man cannot balance varying exports and Imports accurately, but whatever the balance may be and on whichever side it may be found, the result, when obtained by means of a reciprocity treaty, will Involve the sacrifice of the weaker American interests for the benefit of the stronger. California may never hope to make the balance in her favor, and if it did turn that way the process would be none the less unfair and Injurious. The reciprocity treaties must be fought on principle, and with no dallying on our part with deceptive suggestions that we may profit by the robbery of others. We shall not so profit, and it is wicked to attempt it.—San Francisco Chronicle.

Lending- Money to Europe. Another step in the progress of the United States toward its destined position at the head of creditor nations Is indicated by the taking for this money market of the whole Issue of a loan negotiated by the city of Frankfort. The amount Is not so very great, $3,750,000, but it is the first time that the whole Issue of a long-term bond of a German municipality has been placed in New York. Money is cheaper here than there, and a portion of the large current Indebtedness of Europe to the .United States for manufactured goods, as well as food and raw materials, will be settled for by this bond issue In place of money.—Chicago Public Policy. Most Prosperous Business on Earth.

Uncle Sam—l guess I’d better give this business my most careful attention; for I find that my home trade is fifty to a hundred times bigger than my trade with all foreign countries put together.