The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1872-05-22
THE INTERNAL FAxEs-sHALL THEY
BE PERPETUATED OR ABOLISHED?

May 1. 1879. a
Now, let us face these facts. Here is one
side of the proposition furnished by the
Census Bureau the gentlemen on the other
side present the other. They say we do
not export our productions as largely as we
did ten years ago. Then, what becomes of
them !? Where do they go? WHY. sir.
American laborers, enfranchised freedmen.
our better-paid mechanics, consume q
larger proportion of the four thousand
and odd millions produced in 1870 than
they were able to consume of the
one thousand and odd millions produced
in 1860. That is the whole of it. You,
free-trade revenue reformers, state one side
Of the sum, and hand you from the census
tables the other; and the great public will
work out the result and find it to be as |
have stated it.
Gentlemen talk about restoring things to
the ante-bellum condition, to what it was
in 1860 or 1861, and tell us what the
duties were then. National assessors,
collectors, and detectives were then
unknown. Which of them or can all
Of them by their combined power turn the
hands of time and the progressive tide of civ
ilization back and restore the condition of
things in 1861? Can they make American
laborers work for fifty per cent. of their
present wages without strikes and lock-
outs that shall suspend all our industries?
Can they make the freedmen work without
wages, dwell in unfinished huts, and wear
the coarse stoges made of horse hide that
they and their wives then wore? No, sir
and | accept the class of shoes just named
as illustrative of the general argument
They are no longer made in the shops of
New England they are things of the past
Those who produced them now make last
ing and calf skin boots and shoes on the
same large lasts on which they used to
make the coarse stogies. The slave of 1860
Is to-day planter or man who earns
wages, and whose family consumes dutia-
BILE and taxable commodities. BY spend
ing his wages for the comforts of life he
stimulates the general industry of the
country.
their own homes. Would that the gentle
man from Illinois (Mr. McNeely), who
spoke yesterday Of their hopeless condi-
ton and the squalor in which they dwell,
would spend week with me in my home
and look from my windows upon the clean
brick houses, with little gardens in the
ioue ahu iCdi, WIFI Weil lullllSlleU,
and many of them with piano or melode-
on, or other musical instrument; with
their rooms lighted by gas and heated by
patented processes /; with bathrooms sup
piled with hot and cold water flowing every
minute in the year. These, sir, are the
houses in which our working men
dwell, and thousands of which they
own many of them are under
the shadow Of the public school-house and
the church, to the support of which the oc-
cupants freely and literally contribute. A
visit to a few hundred such homes would
change many of the gentleman's opinions,
and convince even him that protection is
the right of the laborer and boon to the
consumer. Yes, sir our prosperous peo-
pie are the consumers of the four thousand
and odd millions of our productions. They
make such demands upon our industries
that their productions cannot be spared to
60 abroad to be sold in competition with
those Of the cheap labor of France, Bel
GUM. and other countries in which labor
ers are esteemed as of lower value than
cattle.
But, sir, Notwithstanding all that is said
to the contrary, our exports have increased
and are ncieasing, but net in proportion to
our productions. have before me table
from the Bureau of Statistics, showing the
imports and exports of the seven months
ending January 81, 1871, and the seven
months ending January 81, 1872. Our
imports of free goods increased in the
latter period $4,000, 900, and of dutiable
goods, s54 1850, 900. " . sa5
Sir, in view of facts like these, who will
say that ours is prohibtory tariff? Who
will so characterize tariff under which we
have in seven months made an increase of
imports Of $50, 9S6,65l What a COM
mentary is this upon the honesty of the
cry of ssprohibitory duties" which is ever
coming from the free-t trade revenue re-
formers
Mr.. Burchard-It is prohibitory on
some articles, not generally.
Mr.. Kelley-It thus appears that we
have resxported of free goods 81, S4S, 900
in excess of the seven months of the pre-
ceding year, and of dutiable, 1915, 73S,
making total increase of reexparts of
81, 134 GOO; and that the balance of do
nestle exports, inclusive of specie, in ex-
cess of the seven months of last year, is
81, 6l2 AGO. Our exports are growing in
spite of the inordinate increase of the home
demand for our varied productions.
Now, sir, let us see what each bill pro-
poses to do on the subject of internal reve-
nue.. What do the majority propose by
way of emancipating our domestic COM
merce? What do they propose to take off
in the way of internal taxes? Thirteen
million nine hundred and lightweight thou
sand dollars; while the protective minority
bill proposes to remove S27, 10000 of in
ternal taxes, so that we may get rid of as
SCISSORS collectors and other officers. so