New Orleans Republican., 1875-11-18
from late number of the Liverpool Adler.

from u late number of the Liverpool Adeer
iiser:
| Our chief exports to the United Statel
have hitherto consisted OF manufactures
| and emIgrants; our principal imports from
the great republic raw cotton and food. Bu,
according to recent statistics q revolution II
| taking place, in which some OF these condi
| tjOns are likely to be reversed. Not that
| we shall cease to send innumerable chip
loads of the bone and muscle of the popu-
latiOn, the most spirited aud energetic OF
our labOrers, skilled and unskilled, to the
United States at all events until we en-
pioy them at home on our unreclafmed but
cultivable land to raise food for our people.
Indeed for the year ending last june We
exported $4,000 eDlgrants to the Union,
$4,000 of whom we're from England alone,
excluding Wales and the rest of the United
Kingdom. At the same time the United
States are not only exporting ironwork to
the United Kingdom, as We had occasion to
notice some time ago, but mirabiie dstu,
manufactured cotton goods, better and
cheaper than Manchester can pro-
duce. Most extraordinary of all, these
American cotton goods are sent to
Manchester itself, thus realizing the
proverb about sending GOALS to New
castle. To send cotton fabrics to Man
chester is. indeed, something more marvel
lous still. since "Cottonopolis'' is generally
supposed to be in chronic state of over
production; whereas the supply of coal has
been known to fall short of the deman so
that enterprisng Belgian coal owners have
found it profitable to export fuel to Eng
land. 1t appears that American bleached
cotton goods can actually be made
and sold at lower price than it
is possible for British manufacturers to
produce ever an inferior article, and
that fine shirtings are being exported from
the United States to England for the pur-
pose of being sold at Manchester where,
from the ruling prices of the market, they
realize good profit, after paying the costs
Of carriage and freight. There are not
wanting skeptics, however, who doubt if
the speculation will pay, except as regards
some particular kinds OF goods, thus show.
ing that there are descriptions of cotton
manufactures which, it is not disputed, can
beat the products of this country in British
markets.
1t has always been supposed that British
manufacturers could beat those of the
United States in American markets, unless
handicapped by protective duties and Nor
rill tariffs. 1t now appearsl that American
manufacturers can distance British manu-
tacturers in the home market, and we may
not improbably hear the Manchester
school" teaching the heterodox doctrine
that the State ought to protect its products
from foreign competition, and foster native
industry by the obsolete machinery of diff
ferential tariffs and prohibitory duties. We
are told that an American manufacturer
sent to Manchester tor piece of the best
bleached cotton to be procured in the mar.
ket and it was found to be thirty or forty
per cent dearer than American goods of su-
perior quality. The proportions in English
money are about three shillings for the
Manchester goods to about two shillings or
less for the American goods, even at the re-
tail price in the United States. The piece
OF Manchester manufacture cost at whole.
sale price in that town at the rate of seven
ty cents gold per pound, whereas we are
told that "Oetter made and better bleached
cotton goods could be sold in Boston retail
for forty-fve to fifty cents the pound cur.
rency," The oldest circumstance in the
case is that which explains how it came to
pass that Manchester sent to Massachusetts,
TOR cotton manufactures. That Cottonopolis
should import raw cotton from the Southern
States is in the natural course of things; but
that she should import manufactured cot
ton goods from the extreme North is rather
novelty. 1t appears, however, that
American ladies travelling in Europe, of
whom there are great numbers always on
this side, find it impossible to procure such
nice beached goods as they are accustomed
to at home; and that dry goods men ac-
quainted with Manchester products affirm
that the British fabrics are of a "hImsy and
sleazy" character, and in no wise to be COM
pared with those of American manufacture
And thus it has come t. pass that the Uni led
States are exporting cotton manufactures to
Manchester. 1t is TO be hoped that Cotton
opolis will not do as some foreign manufac-
turers are said to have done with reference
to English goods of celebrated guality-pass
them off as her own by means of false trade
marks and labels. The usual course in such
a case would be for Manchester, whose mo-
rality is quite equal to her politics, to pass
Oft the superior American goods as her owr,
and then to pass off some of her inferier
products under the stamp of American
marks and labels.
Meanwhile, in order that the United
States labor markets may be fully supplied,
we are exporting vast multitudes of hands,
the best and most vigorous to be found
among our work people, about $4,000 emi-
grants having, as we have said, been con.
veyed from this country to the Union
on the other side of the Atlantic; because
it would be seen that there is no place for
them here except the Union i'll very dit
ferent sense. Even as it is, home labor mar
kets seem 0vercrowded, there being more
people than there are places for them to fill;
and hence the fact that, as MIR. Bright COM
planned, the poor-rate averages some eight
or nine millions q year. And the worst of it
ia that tho labor we export to the United
States is of the primest quality, the very
pick OF the market, since it is the strongest
and most spirited and enterprising of our
work-people in the heydsy of youth or the
vigor of manhood. who emigrate, while it
ia the weaklings, the infIm the aged who
are left at home. The strangest feature of
the case is that American protection should
be found not only a match for British
tree trade, but actually beating it upon its
own ground. The Manchester schoolmasters
had always taught that the maximum of
production, both in quantity and in qua
lity, and, therefore, OF cheapness and good
ness combined, must necessarily exist and
flourish under free trade. They have never
ceased to preach the doctrine that, under
the protective system, all enterprise and
energy in produc ion must wither and die
out. 1t is the healthy stimulus OF an eager
manufactures to thrive, and that if this
beneficent influence be withdrawn they
must inevitably languish and decay. But
DO we not see the most convincing refuta-
ton of this, as q universal proposition, in
the TACT that protected American goods,
both hardware and cotton fabrics, are be-
ginning to compete with British goods, even
in our home marketsi
1t is quite true that, other things being
equal, the less artificial restrictions are i'm
posed upon the production and sale of
commodities. the better it will be for trade,
and the more equally will articles of use
be distributed. But the ideal of the Man
chester school was to reduce England to
the factory or workshop of the world, and
the world to granary and food store for
England. For this we neglected to culti-
the food Of our people from abroad, espe.
cially from the United States. But other
countries refuse to fall in with this view.
Tney are willing enough to sell us