The spirit of democracy. [volume] (Woodsfield, Ohio) 1844-1994, 1847-04-03
Expressive Silence.

tarif,-an eloquencs of taciturnity-;
careful avoidance Of the subject, which
: carries more persuation in it than any
words they could write oruttsr.
We were told by the friends Of pro
lection, when we repealed the tariff
which they struggled to preserve, that
we had done what would lessen the
public revenue at the time when we
wanted money most. The fact has
contradicted their prediction. The
Treasury at this moment is receiving
more money from the new tariff than
accrued from the old. The cash receiy.
ed for customs in this port alone, in the
month of February last, under the ne W
tariff, was quarter Of a million more
than in the month Of February, in the
previous year, under the old; and in
the frstnine days of the present March,
| the receipts of cash at this port were
almost four hundred thousand dollars
more than in the first nine days OF
March last. There is now every
probability that the estimate of the
Secretary of the Treasury, liberal as
many thought it; will be considerably
exceeded in the income we shall derive
from the new tariff. By and by, after
we have concluded the Mexican war,
and paid its expenses, we shall proba-
bly, hear call made upon Congress
to lower the taxes and stop the exor.
bitant accumulation of money in the
treasury.
We were told by the same class of
men that the manufacturers would be
ruined by mitigating the duties on i'm
ported goods, and obliged to let their
mills for stables. The manufacturers,
instead of being ruinsd,are prosperous,
instead Of abandoning their factories,
they are building new ones. A new
manufacturing town has sprung up on
the Merrlmac, close to Lowell; new
woollen companies have been incorpo-
rated in Massachusetts,; new forges
and furnaces have been established in
Pennsylvania and elsewhere; new
cotton mills in almost every State from
Maine to Georgia, and capitalists in
this'city are only waiting for the en-
actment of a general law to govern
interpretations, IN order to invest their
funds in manufacturing enterprises.
Again, an attempt was made by the
friends of protection to alarm the work
people in the mills by telling them that
in consequence of the new tariff many
Of them would be turned out of employ
ment and the rest put on low wages.
They were answered on the part of
the friends Of free trade, that the new
tariff was warrant for steady employ
ment and increased wages. The result
has proved this to be true; the work
men in the iron mills very soon after
the passage of the tariff were gratified
by an increase oftheir wages, and we
now read In Springfield paper that
The wages Of the carpet weavers in
rhompsonville and Tariffville, Connec-
icut, have lately been raised. The
owners ofthe carpet mills, our readers
will remember, were among those who
umed and bounced most violently at I
he passage Of the new tariff. .. 1t
The silence that now prevails among {
he wings on this subject imports all S
hat we have said, it acknowledges
hat the new tariffs a productive one
o the manufacturer, and that it raises
he wages ofthe work people. Abbott
who wrote the famous let
ers threatening the whole commercial
world with ruin, and who is now lay e
ng the foundation ofa new Carthage on /
he Merrimac, admits all this in his un- I
written letters. Mr.. Clay, who wrote a
stters prophesying similar .calamities r
ndof whom the newspaper tell US that y
Q has just reached the end of his I
eyentieth year, in vigorous and lusty o
ealth, proclaims all this in reticence v
lore, eloquent than one ofhis speeches. Y
These predictions of mischief from t
he introduction of free trade were one a
{ the greatest political blunders oil G
he time. That they should have beenI
lade and vehemen,ly urged by selfish
len to preventive repeal Of the odi- il
US revenue law Of 1919, did not sur T
rise US; but we confess we were sur il
rised to hear the same persons, after b
he passage Of the new tariff, clamor- il
,g as if they believed, their own pre- a
lotions. INC, doubt some Of them sin c.
erely thought them true. and are very "
luch puzzled 10 account for the per-
ersity. of fortune in mot allowing them
, be verified. The revenue ought to [
of, they no doubt think; s.
ie mills ought to have stopped, and v
,e workmen ought to be starving o
IS this is not the case, and as the COM I