The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-07-09
sPrR1r OF rnu PRESS.
Editorial Opinions Of the Leading Journals
upon Current Topios-Compiled Every
Day for the Evening Telegraph.
WHAT PROTECTION HAS ACCOM-
pIISHED

PDlSHED.
F,ou. the Chicago Republican
Listening to the everlasting grumblings of
the free trade theorists, one would be led to
believe that the policy of protection had never
vet accomplished anything either temporarily
or permanently for the good of the country
nor ever could. Nevertheless, whenever we
revert to the history of legislation, from the
foundation of the Union uutil now, we iud
abundant proofs of tue vast advantages which
the United States have derived from high
tariff enactments. For instance, if any one
will be at the trouble to examine the official
report of James Guthrie, President Piercs's
Secretary of the Treasury, as made for the
fiscal year 1915, the following very signif-
cant statement will be found:-
"Iet it be considered that we manufacture all our
furniture, a our carriages wagons, steam-engtnes.
machinery for our factories and machine-shop7,
most OF our leather and Shoes boots, hats, door
butts ana bolts of all descriptions, bells, balances,
buckles brads, wood-saws, horse-cards, castors,
curtain pins, curtain bands, metal cocks, jack
screws, Curry-combs, cOal-hods, candlesticks, gas
fittings and burners, coilee-mills, cadrons heavy
dge-t0ois, hay and manure forks gimlets hat an1 4
coat wardrobeh hooks, harrows OF all kinds, hoes
louoYWare, planes, poughs, sad-irOns, taiors' irons
doorknobs furniture knobs brass Kettles locks OF
IL Kinds, iron atches, lines lanterns, lamps levels
cad cut nails, cout nails, pins pumps, punches,
pekers, sand-paper, rulers, iron and copper rivets
saws, door-springs, window-springs, steeyards
scales OF all descriptions, steel and brass scales
thermometers tacks vises OF all descriptions axes
wrenches OF all descriptions, iron, brass and copper
WIRE with long list OF other articles to the eXcu-
sion OF the like articles from other countries"
This is the more valuable as being Demo-
cratic, free trade, admissions and testimony
What profuse variety of the necessaries of
life does the foregoing paragraph represent
as produced by home industry for home use,
with geodlsh margin for expectation to for
eign countries! What vast number of
laborers, artisans, and other employees must
earn a livelihood by the fabrication of such a
numerous list of articles, entering into daily
consumption in all parts of our widely-ex-
tended country! What contrast does such
diversity of productive forces aud internal
resources offer to the pinched wants and gall
ing insufhciency of the days which tried
mems souls-the days of the Revolutionary
era, when our patriotic forefathers marched
barefoot through SHOWS, leaving behind
bloody tracks! What an advantage it must
he to be thus independent of foreign nations:
to be thus able to retain within our own bor-
ders the vast sums that otherwise would 90
abroad to purchase and pay for indispensable
articles of constant use; to thus utilize our
own immense stores of coal, iron, copper
and other metals and minerals What bless
ing it must be to the farmer to have raised
up, almost at his DOORS at least within the
boundaries of his own country, such pro-
ulSlous NUMBER OF cuStomerS-perSons who
produce nothing he grows, and who. while
consuming his crops at prices which leave a
handsome margin for profit, in general, help
supply him with needed commodities, imple
ments, and utensils at a cost which, as the
years move on, gradually progresses more
and more nearly to the cost of the raw mate
rial.
Here the free trader frowns and saws s'No."
dogmatically and emphatically. To his eyes
there is no real, healthful, genuine prosperity
IN system which creates and fosters such
results The free trader would repeal the
laws which have made such surroundings
practicable, and let in upon us a flood of
foreign products to be purchased for season
at lower prices than now; and then, when the
fires of our furnaces have been extinguished
our forges enforced into silence our machine
shops rendered unproftable our mines left
to darkness, solitude, and ruin, and the
laborels who therein found employment
and the means of subsistence dispersed in
all directions, to till the soil or crowd the
avenues Of other occupations and we left. as
people, helpless before the grinding exac
tions of Transatlantic monopolists, who will
not buy five per cent. of our annual grain
crop, and not any of our turnips, potatoes,
beans, and other bulky products of the soil
formerly SO proftable-thus, we say, the free
trader will be ready to inaugurate hurricane
OF hand-clappings over the Paradise of his
utopian Imagination, thus reduced to prac
tice. Who wants to see such day besides
the emissaries of English capitalists, full of
mercenary instincts?