New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1854-12-18
TIE JEnEmAp OF INDUSTRY.

TIE JEREMIAD OF INDUSTRY.
We publish, to-day, a COLLATION. of facts, OBJ
tanned expressly for THE TRIBUNE from the vari-
GUS classes of mechanics and tradesmen of this
City, regarding the immediately dreary and pros
pectively desperate condition Of industry and
commerce. To such original statements are
added extracts from various journals in different
quarters Of the Union which, with hardly an ex-
ception, exhibit kindred distresses These all
have the force and invulr erableness OF arthmeti-
cal details. They prove that the chief industries
necessary to the life Of the nation are now par
tally or wholly collapsed; armies Of toiers are
hurled from the factory or the shop into the
street awakiDg in the morning to the prospect of
stealing for q subsistence or starving outright.
This may be matter ofindifference to the slave
drivers, who have shaped the national legislation
of this country from the start; but to the work
men of the North, who are not yet on chain-gangs,
it is question Of wild extremties-of life or
death. In keeping with this state of things gen.
orally this City, which, according to Secretary
Walkers Report in 1S47, With his British free
trade doctrines, was to advance msjestica1y in
Unbroken prosperity up to the time she became
- the clearing bouie Of the world, has, under
that system, fallen to condition which in Europe
s nsdered the attend OF revolutions for iusur-
rection there IS always accompanied by want Of
work.
Let us glance at the industries Of our cOmmu-
nifty; Iron for example, which is the base of civ
nizaiion. and without which no nation can be
great or independent, where is it, One-half of
the brswDy sons ofVucan are out of EN- ployment;
they are ready for hard blows and hot blasts but
the policy which looks to British free-trade as
papacea, has torn labor from their hands. The
ether half employed, have the same bright pros
poets as victims-condemned, though not yet
sacrificed Next, the Printers, the opponents of
civilization, are shown in our resume to be in
state as calamtous to themselves as injurious to
the country--wanting work and bread. And so
rups the story with almost every vocation neces-
cary 10 civil zed state. What picture is here
presented The same exhibition as in 1912, as
in 1924 and other periods, and the sane to %
shown at intervals until we alter our policy, and
give due protection to American industry, up to
the time when it has the age and strength neces-
sary for selfsustentation.
raere is one branch which, it is affirmed has
not suffered in common with other things, and
that is tie sale of costly knicknackeries, espe-
cially WON'T MS supeflative gear Taking this as
an exact presentment, it show that certain ii III
classes, including those who live upon shaving
paper at from 25 to 80 per cent, can afford to
spend money protusely for forei IN goods, though
tens of thousands Of native workIoen are wanting
the first necessaries of existence. These dele Il
able phenomena are also exhibited in Europe
startling contrasts of wealth and poverty of ease
and exhaustion. In a country whose Institutions
and legislation are adapted to produce the we'll
being of the greatest number, they can never
exist. 10 a word, these statements, dolefdl and
irrefraeable, are not to be sighted We call
upon the men at Washington who claim to
represent the people-and who are agisating
scheme Of increasing by fifty per cent, their own
salaries az we'll as those of some other Off ,ers
of Government, to heed such vast manifesto
tons Of want and woe. The time has
arrived when the execrable ignorance and pre-
sumption which broke down the barriers reared
for our native industry are producing their fruits.
The accident Of Californian aud Australian gol /,
which delayed the disaster for brief period, no
longer controls the world, and the country isnox
suffering forts sins oftransgression The nonsense
that We have lived too luxuriously as a nation, is
doctrine Of the right taste and shape to be swI-
lowed-and to become an apothegm. But we
have not lived too lu1uriOusy. Individual eI-
smples of expensive habits only show that the
possesors of means choose to spend rather than to
hoard, but the gross wealth, the labor. saving ms
chinery Of the country; considered with
the tremendous fact that our artificial forces
applied to production exceed the entire
strength of all the hands of the four continents Of
the globe q century since, it is q superficial,
vspid error to say that, IS people, We have spent
too much; on the contrary, our economies, means
considered, are quite as great as when Poor Rich
ard sang his lays of Pounds, Shillings and Pence.
Indeed, We have not spent enough, but We have
spent in the wrong way. We have supported
European manufacturers, and artists, and middle
men, to the neglect, loss and destruction Of our
own men of industry and talent, of whstever kind,
and that 10 the sole reason Of our difficulty. When
the great mass Of working. mon In cities get but
two dollars or less day; when the bulk of our
sQricultufists eat bacon instead Of fresh mat n