Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1874-05-05

enables few protected monopolists 10
charge all consumers from ten to sixty
Der cent extra on homemade goods, not
to support government, but the favor
ties of corrupt legislation. This tact
is not, and cannot betruthfully denied.
Natures law is free trade and no favor
itism. Hitherto consumers have
had no protection" against Radl-
cal extortion and dishonesty. The
tariff proves the Republican party TO
be as unsound in theory as it is IN NOR
ais. We have three thousand miles OF
sheep-walks between the Atlantic IN
New England, and the Pacific IN Call
fornia, Oregon, and Washington Terri
tory. We have also the finest water
power In the world to drive wooden ma
chinery, and cheap grain and provis-
ions to match and feed operatives.
Why, then, do the people of this ocean
bound republic find it necessary to i'm
port sixty-two million dollars worth OF
wool and wooden goods yearP For the
simple reason that corrupt party has
placed the people, by law OF Congress-
wholly in the power of few wealthy
avaricious monopolists.
Last year tie nation imported OF
iron, steel, and their manufactures,
$40. 1888 Where the Federal Treas
ury received one dollar revenue from
imported iron, steel and their fabrics,
the people paid from three to five dol
lars extra into the pockets of the men
United states SAT and r pay p n5l a Se
of the money received from the extra
price Of iron to support the Govern
ment. Exclusive of gold and silver,
the whole imports of 1873 were $685.
247, 923-nearly six hundred million
dollars, The expenses of the General
Government are unavoidably large; but
that is no good reason why every hon
est Republican voter should pay ten dol
lars extra to the manufacturers of salt
in his own country, when his party in
Congress collects one dollar duty on
imported salt. This dishonest trick of
salt tax has the effect to raise very
much the market value of this article
in all parts of the United States, to
benefit the monopohsts who manufac-
ture it. The contrivance is a smutty
hybrid between politics and specula-
ton, to make at once dear salt and
cheap Republican votes.
A high protective tariff has all the
wisdom and all the consistency of SEN
atOr Brownlow's support of an inflated
paper currency of five hundred mil.
lion dollars" and his concurrent conf
dence In Gen. Grant and his veto of
the imitation bill. There must be
shocking errors and falsehoods some
where, when it is commendable in a
Republican President to crush with his
executive foot measure conceived and
matured by Republican Senators and
members of the House of Representa-
tives. Corruption breeds disturbance
in Washington, in Arkansas and else
where. The people must give more at
tention to public affairs, and compel
their servants in Office to obey instruc-
tons, or resign. 1t is reform or revo-
luton. The tendency toward the lat
ter increases every day, and sensible
men should take warning.
To give the official statistics before
us their plain meaning, we must say,
although with equal humiliation and
regret, that the national lack of self
denial, coupled with the boundless re-
sources of a continent, leads our peo-
pie into many temptations In eating,
drinking, and a thousand extraya-
gances, the like of which, to the same
extent, exists in no other nation. We
love and cherish mental and animal
excitement; and over-trading at home
and abroad is a symptom of increasing
weakness, In place of increasing
strength. Personal ambition and po-
itical recklessness are having a rapid
growth, like weeds in a cornfeld, from
sheer neglect.
For three-fourths of a century our
young and vigorous Republic grew in
numbers, peace, wealth, and the worlds
esteem, on the old Democratic plat
form, which, ikethe Declaration of In
dependence, was built for Immortality,
for the simple reason that truth is eter-
nal. By advancing beyond the truth, as
enumerated by Jefferson and other
founders of our system of government,
to greatly enlarge the powers of Con-
gress, and of the federal Executive,
the Radical party has plunged head
long into the mire of an un-American
despotism that Will prove not less dis
astrous to its friends than to its op-
ponents. Corrupt as Congress is, it
cannot easily tax Democrats outrage
ously without also taxing full
blooded Radicals as we'll If
Grant, like Caesar, is ambitious and a
tyrant at heart, his tyranny viii be
more national than sectional, as time
must prove. The majority in Congress
whose darling measure he vetoed, by
not daring to attack him openly, con-
fess their weakness and fear.
In Congress, Radicalism has made a
miserable record, while the industrial
and commercial statistics of the coun-
try bear witness against its financial
policy. Placing everything on stills,
and importing the products of foreign
labor TO the tune of six hundred million
dollars year, with an inflated paper
currency, our national industry is in
jeopardy, and at great disadvantage in
exchanging with foreign nations. 1t |