Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-11-24

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have thought it either creditable or polite
to make such series of assertions as the
above. for as q matter OF fact every one OF
them is not only hagrantly false, but can
be shown to be false without the least dltti-
Guilty. The Chicago Tribune had the frat
opportunity to expose the falsity of these
dishonest and stupidity untrue statements,
and it has done the work in a thorough
manner: but as the assertions of the tax
eaters will 90 all over the country it is
necessary that the refutation of them
should also be undertaken everywhere by
those who have not yielded their intelli-
gence to the clumsy sophistries of these
people.
The pretense that protection provided
the revenue with which to subdue the
rebellion is one of the most preposterous
of the series, as the figures will instantly
demonstrate. The total revenue derived
from the tariff during the rebellion was
S305, 1863, 2l3, while the cost of the war
was So, l79, 372, 249. 1t therefore appears
that protection did not furnish one-tenth
of the money required to put down the
rebellion. In fact the internal revenue
taxes furnished in one year of the war
more than the tariff brought during the
whole four The means for putting down
the rebellion were in truth derived largely
from loans, of which great part came from
Europe. Had the country been forced to
rely upon protection it would have trusted
to broken reed. As to the claim that
protection ''revived the national credit, F"
nothing could be sillier or more untrue.
When protection was highest the national
credit was lowest. It rose when the
Federal armies stamped out the rebellion,
and when they made it plain to all the
world that the Union could not be
destroyed by it's enemies.
The claim that protection has eds
"charged in large part the national debt :"
is not true. No doubt it has contributed
to that end, by compelling the people to pay
higher taxes than were required for revenue
purposes, but the internal revenue taxes
have done very much more than the tariff
to this end, and that is precisely why the
protectionists, who do not want the debt
to be paid off, because they fear tariff re-
vision, are now working for reduction in
the internal revenue taxes. The statement
that the industries of the country have
"quadrupled since 1860 is, in the first
place, not true. In the second place, the
increase in the industries of the country
which has really taken place is accounted
for by the growth of population and es-
pecially by the extension of railroad build
ing and the consequent rapid development
of new regions. The claim that protection
has maintained the "unexampled and con.
"tinued prosperity :" of these industries for
twenty years, would seem to have been
made by foreigner who knew nothing of
American history during that period. We
do not know how else to account for the
almost miraculous forgetfulness which thus
ignores the panic of 1873, and the six sue
ceeding bad years which produced so much
alarm and gloomy foreboding throughout
the country.
| The truth is that the country has hardly
yet recovered from that prolonged depres-
sion, during which the buoyant influence
of the protective system was in vain
looked for. That panic, too, came in the
midst OF high tariff conditions, in fact the
highest we have ever had, and the true
reason why we were SO long in recovering
| from it was because the tariff was ali the
time preventing our merchants and manu-
facturers from relieving themselves by
seeking foreign markets for their goods.
As to the assertion that protection has
turned the balance of trade in our favor, in
the first place the phrase and the concep-
tion it embodies are alike erroneous, and in
the second place the change which has &C.
Cured has been the result of succession
of good harvests in this country, and of
nothing else. Whatever prosperity we
now enjoy we owe to the unprotected la.
Dor of the American farmer. But for him
the protectionists would still have been
struggling under the burden of the legacies
OF the panic of 1873 1t is the work of the
| farmer which has restored our industries,
raised our credit, brought gold and silver
into the treasury, reduced the public debt,
and made market for the abnormally and
unjustly expensive goods which the pro-
tected manufacturers produce.
Protection during all this time has been
doing the country harm and not good. It
has destroyed American maritime CON-
merce. 1t has made it almost impossible
to sell American goods abroad. 1t has
bled our farmers and mechanics at every
pore. 1t has forced the people generally
to pay forty or fifty per cent. more than
the things ought to sell for, for all the pro-
tected goods they use. 1t has more than
doubled the price of steel rails, and COM
PEELED the public to pay the difference. 1t
/
these evils, and after all we find its greedy,
impudent, and mendacious representatives
coolly psoposing that the American people
shall submit TO further robbery in the
shape of subsidies for ships which cannot
carry American goods abroad, because the
tariff renders it impossible for them to
compete with European manufacturers.
Assuredly it is time the people rose and
shook off the Old Man of the Sea, whose
modern name is Protection.
THE CONDUCT OF eUITEAU.
Some Eastern journals are much scan-
dalized at the behavior both of Guiteau
and of the audience in the Courtroom at
Washington. The behavior of Guiteau
! is no doubt very offensive and unbecominp.