Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 38, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 March 1906 — PROSPEROUS PEOPLE. [ARTICLE]

PROSPEROUS PEOPLE.

EXTRAORDINARY DEVELOPMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES. DlverHificatloA of Industries and. Occupations Have Brought About a Vast Production Which Finds u Sure Market. It will be admitted that we aye blessedwitii au abundance of diversified , resources suetr as no other country enjoys. But natural resources are almost Jf not quite valueless unless developed. Our ore and eoal are useless lying in the ground. Untilled land Is profitless. Even rich crops are Of no advantage till garnered and sold a$ advantageous prices. First, production must be applied on the farm, In the mine and at the’factory. But that in itself is not profitable. There must be a market. There must be a consumption equal to production, and good, profitable prices must be maintained year after year, season after season. A million tons of pig iron for which there was no demand would have Ji,ttle value. Bounteous crops unsold and left to decay would be a loss, not a gain, to the farmer. So with all our mines and our soil and our ability to produce —we should remain poor unless there were consumers With sufficient purchasing power to make production p'rofitable. Again, a large production and consumption of a single product would not long be profitable. We need diversity in our broad land. We need transportation and distribution in order that

our people in all sections of the country and with different abilities may be constantly employed at what they can do best. The miner cannot build a house, the farmer cannot work at the forge or the loom, the mechanic cannot sow and reap. We have during a century or more developed all our resources. We have for the most part been a nation doing its own work. We have by our tariff laws protected every industry, shutting out the competition of people who are satisfied with a low standard of living and low' wages. Little by little, year by year, we have Improved and developed our natural resources because of home consumption of home products. Let us take an example. We consume over $1,060,000,000 worth of Iron and steel products, practically all of which goes to labor. Suppose we import one-half of this at one-half the present prices. That would be $250,000,000 and we would lose $500,000,000 In wages, but we would have to adapt our wages for what we did produce to the foreign scale, and those wages would not be more than half what they are now, or $250,000,000. So that by purchasing abroad we reduce the purchasing power of our iron and steel makers from $1,000,000,000 to $250,000,000. i«it wo would have no fewer producers. Half of them would be idle, the other half working for half what they Rot before. Thej’ have only $250,000,000 a year to spend Instead of $1,000,000,000. So the farmer must sell less or reduce his prices; the woolen and cotton and shoe factories must sell less or reduce their prices. Every Industry In the land Is affected. Let us take our manufactures as a whole. Without any duplications we nre producing annually $10,000,000,000 worth of manufactures, about all of which goes to laltor. Supi>ose we were to import half of It. Our wages would then be only $2,500,000,000, for those engaged in the half we produced would have to work for foreign wage* If we continued to compete at all with foreign manufactures. And so we would lose $7,500,000,000 of purchasing power. The farmers would lose a home market for at least $5,000,000,000 of their products, and what they did sell would have to be at much lower prices than now. Again, every industry would Im* affected, and In a very few years mills and factories would close and millions of.men jvould become idle. It then be- ■* comes a struggle for mere exlstenpe. The farmer, without n profitable market for his surplus, simply Ilves nnd buys as little as possible. We would become an Idle, impoverished people from ocean to ocean. The picture Is not overdrawn. We hare had the actual experience. —. a- ■ . a > ...

But how different when vr» protect our labor and industries and 'So practically all our own work: We have welcoined nearly 25,000.000 .foreigners, made producers and consume?? of them, and with these added to Our nativeborn we have built up a bbrnp market of S0;000,000 consumers, the providers for whom are all busy at wages tfeice ami three times those paid abroad. What we canndt produce ourselves we buy freely from abroad and pay-our' bills with our surplus This is why we are prosperous. This is why TweTire fully employed and well paid, and this is why we can qfford to buyso much of ourselves ar profitable prices. This is why 1.000.000 people a year are eager to come to us and become free but protected Americans. It is not altogether,....a ' matter of resources or natural advantages or of chance ; jt is a matter of practical; scientific tariff legislation and applica-v tion.—American Economist. Tl»e South and the Tariff. While some New Englanders are demanding tariff revision, an Increasing number of enterprising and progressive men in the South are favoring adherence to the policy of a protective tariff. The change in Southern sentiment in this particular is very noticeable and highly significant. President Roosevelt’s personal popu larity in the South is no doubt working wonders among the people of that section in respect to their attitude toward political issues and parties. The fact that the Republican party advocates protection, and the further fact that its most conspicuous- representative at the present time is President Roosevelt makes many Southern men feel more

kindly toward the organization. They may not be prepared to announce themselves as Republicans, but they certainly no longer look upon a Southern Republican as a traitor to his section of the country. Industrial development in the South Is, however, chiefly responsible for the growing sentiment in favor of protection. Cotton manufacturing and the production of iron and steel have Increased enormously, and thus a manufacturing class eoinj>osed of both capitalists and laborers has developed In that section. It it but natural if these people are as much In favor of protee tion as their competitors in other parts of the country'.—Denver Republican. - Unconcerned. The Hartford Courant seems sur* prised that the farmers of the United States should manifest no concern over the German threat of excluding American foodstuffs. The farmer has little cause for worry on that account. To begin with, he has no idea that for any considerable length of time Germany Is going to cut off her own nose to spite the American face by shutting out a food supply which she needs and must have. German industrialists are up in arms against the threatened prohibition. They see as Its result a permanent increase in the subsistence cost of a vast army of wage earners‘who even now have meat on their tallies not oftener than once a week, and who scarcely know the taste of white bread. . Moreover, they see the prospect of being shut out of a market In which they disposc of manufactures amounting to about $120,000,060 a yeirr. The American fanner understands this situation perfectly. He also understands that in the 80,000,000 of Americans, each consuming SIOO rujcnr of his products, be has a better and safer market than In a country which at the l»est has never taken more than $2.50 jier capita of American food products. The American farmer can afford to l>e unconcerned.

Queer Sort mt I.oatlc.

Some of the lowa papers which tnke the Eastern view of the tariff—the selfish Eastern view, that is—employ a queer sort of logic. Discuwdng free bldea they naacrvnto that the value of the hides Is a matter of no concern to the farmers wlm produce them because tbb beef trust controls the hide market nnd the cattle market to such an extent that It can absolutely ignore the value of tlx* hides In buying cattle. Discussing steel rails these same papert reverse their logk- and declare with great posßlvCaeM that In the end the shipper pays for the Increased price of steel rails.—Creston (Iowa)