The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1866-02-22
Manufactures in Wisconsin.
Ed. Telegraph:

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and developing the manufacturing industry
OF our nation and that you have given your
readers so much information in the way of
reprlnting some of the most valuable PAM
phlets and letters on this great question. 1t
Is to our local papers that we must chiefly
look to supply the wants of the thinking
iaboring masses of the Northwest, for the
leading papers of our neighboring metropo
lis are so absorbed in money making and in
party politics, that they find little space or
inclination for giving the needed facts to the
working classes. We certainly have reason
to complain that the leading republican pa
pers of the Northwest should have so poorly,
not to say unjustly, dealt with this vital
question of manufacturing industry, which
is the most importan. subject now before
the people of this section
We have in Wisconsin the best wafer
power in the Union, and plenty of men, wo
men and children, who cannot live by ag-
rlculture alone, along with better land and
cheaper living than New England can afford.
but when we looked to our learned paper
to wake up our people to their true inter
ests and teach us how we could most speed
lily transform our vast resources into wealth
and comfort for the masses we were hushed
to silence by the very profound remark
That we at the west, are naturally an agri-
cultural people, and should therefore let
New England or some other naturaUq man
ufGct''rfng people, make all our goods for
uS.
If some editor who is in the interest of
British free trade, would be so kind as to
give US definition Of what constitutes a
natural manufacturing district, he would
confer favor upon many unfortunate indi
vlduals who cannot always make sense Ell
Their of their logic or their figures
i suppose that we should learn that New
England is more naturally adapted to man
ufactures than Wisconsin, e G. because they
have less of the ores, wood wool and vari-
GUS raw materials which are to be trans
formed, than we possess; because land and
living are there so high that the mechanic
cannot afford to buy homestead, whereas
the operatives in our factories often own
their homes, and because their best water
powers are more costly and less reliable
than ours. aee4ing steam power to take
their place during their frequent drouths;
whereas the manufacturer along our north
ern Fox River need spend no three millions
of money to build his dam, but has only to
throw wing dam out into the rapids and
see the wheels of his machinery revolve as
long as he lives, without the possibility of
losing dollar from freshets or moment
of time from lack Of water,
We should probably learn also that Great
Britain is naturally the greatest manufactu
ring nation on the globe, simply because
nature has given TO her less of raw materi-
ais anu less facilities for its manufacture
than to most of the nations with which she
trades, 1t is simply capital and brains that
give. to what the British free traders are
pleased to style naturally manufacturing
districts, their superiority over the more
highly favored regions of the West.
When we wished to learn the facts con-
corning the number and success of the vari-
Gus manufacturing enterprises through the
Northwest, such c. g. as were given in a
lat e number of the Chicago Republican con-
corning tn e manufactures at Elgin, we
were treated to few more statistics con-
corning the trade of Chicago, and reminded
for the thousand and first time that it was
the greatest market for lumber and provis-
ions in the world.
do not believe there is a single free trade
paper published in the Northwest, that has
in its office complete and reliable statistics
concerning the manufacturing and mining
industry of this section; and if one would
gain these most important facts he must go
to the factories and the mines and explore
for himself
If editors came in more immediate con-
tact with those who labor OH our farms aud
in factories and would reason from facts up
to conclusions, they would not SO often give
us theories which are fatty contradicted by
facts existing at their very doors. Thus rs
am penning these lines my eye rests upon
an article in the N. Y E0ening Post, which
under the title Of 1.-The GIories of Protec-
tion," ridicules the idea that protection gives
us cheap woolens and cottons 1t is not
long since the Chicago Tribune told us how
absurd was the idea of tariff for protection
and gave us once more that threadbare ad.
vice that we in the west shonld buy in the
cheapest market and sell in the dearest,
which means buy and sell in New England
or old England.
Yet find WOODEN factories springiDg up
all over the Northwest which would have
had no existence but for the protection al
forded since the passage of the Morrill, tariff,
and the farmers of Wisconsin never saw the
day when they could get as much cloth of
as good quality for pound of wool as
they can get at home factories Today, and,
this, you will bear in mind is the true way
to estimate cheapness.
When one of our leading wooden manufac.
turers wished to start his factory some years
since, he went to the wholesale merchants
of Milwaukee and asked if they would sell
his cloths for him. They laughed at the
idea. I'VE can get goods said they that
look as well as yours from the east, for less
money, and if they only look as well, that
is all we care for" He should have been
appalled, at once by this great argument of