The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1882-10-26

| not only give him all the results of it
instead of allowing his employer to get
them, as at present, but you must show
that the many and not the few work
men are benefited by a tariff which not
only rObs the consumer but plumbers the
treasury. Let us look into this a little
closer. How is it? Where one workman
Is employed in a protected calling, at
least ten, and often hundred, are EN-
plOyed in other callings, who being con-
sumers of his product are injured, and
he himself, protected in hisUWn calling
only, is robbed by protection placed upon
everything he consumes, so that even if
his wages are increased his living ex-
penses are so largely added to as to
leave him in the end worse off than
where he began. But let me illustrate
how protection in its effort to protect
the few Injuries the many. Let us look
at our railroads the outrageous tariff
of $28 per ton on rails adds about $1,000
to the cost of every mile of road built
with good 60 pound rail, and probably
decreases railroad building at least %
per cent; in other words, at least one.
fourth more railroads would be built if
we had constitutional Democratic tax
on steel rails, Now on the railroads al
ready built, "POOr's Manual" says that
100000 men are employed, and if %
per cent. more miles were in existence
100000 more men could have employ
ment. In other words, 100000 men are
not only injured, bvt absolutely kept out
of employment, and all for the benefit
of the men employed in steel rail mills,
who may possibly number ten thousand
men, so that it would be cheaper to let
steel rails come in free of all duty and
give employment to the 100000 and let
them pay each of the 10000 men, say
twice the wages they now make in the
steel rail mills and let them live life
of absolute idleness and ease. What
makes it eyed worse, however, is that
the wages of 100000 men thus stolen
and withheld, or that portion which goes
to the steel rail industry, does not 90 to
the men employed by it, but in the main
to less than one hundred central pocket
books, which care no more for their men
than fisherman does for the suffeTings
of lobster he bOils. To show how lit
tie they care for their wOrkmen, few
years ago one of the largest steel rail
mills in the country shut down and dis
charged its men and turned them, their
wives and little ones, adrlft for many
months, because the other steel rail
mills agreed to pay the company a GER
tain sum for keeping their mill idle a
certain length of time. This mill hav-
ing robbed the American people in the
most approved prOtectiOnist manner, and
in the name of its wOrkmen, drove its
wOrkmen, for whom it prOfessed so much
love and wept so many crocodile tears,
into the streets to starYe so far as it was
concerned. Before go an inch farther,
let me say that from the time of Moses
down to this hour human history records
no governmental outrage equalling the
steel rail monopoly tax of 1928 per ton.
We sometimes think it hard that mans
life should be taken at the stake for re-
ligiOus views, and we hear people talk
of one great tyrant and another, of how
King John when he wanted cash caught
Jew and pulled tooth after tooth with
that fun-prOducing instrument, the turn
key, until his victim gave him what gold
he demanded; every man who has been
to Fourth of July celebration knows
how OdiOus England made herself hun
dred years ago by her stamp and other
taxes, but we never hear in all the an
nails of crime by governments of any
thing which, all things considered, is
such an outrageous abuse of government
as the present tax of 1928 per ton on steel
rails. am not very rich man, but if
any Republican in Ohio or the United
States will bring me an equally out
rageOus instance or awful example, |
will send his executor my check for $lOO
to help erect a monument to him as the
greatest of modern discOVerers. But let
us see how a protective tariff affects the
stove business, the plOw trade, the car
Tiage and wagon industry, the great
reaper, mower, threshing machine, en-
gine, hay rake, boiler and other factO-
ries of Ohio, and which have made this
district, the 18th Ohio, and Speaker
Keifer's District famous. Thousands of
men find employment in these callings,
many thousands in fact in your district
alone. Protection does not supply mar
ket for these goods, but by increasing
their cost cuts off the market and de-
creases the demand, and in decreasing
the demand for the goods themselves de-
creases the demand for the labor with
which to make them, and the less the
demand the less the price, so that the
wOrkingmen of your city and district
are injured by protective tariff, and
everything they buy costs them more by
reason of such tariff. Surely the man
who finds his employment scarceT, his
wages less and the cost of living greater
because of the tariff, has reason to cry
out against it. 1t hurts your city, be-
cause without protection where 1000
men are now employed here 1,5OO would
be needed, and the men who are en-
plOyed getting less wages than they
would under a constitutional Demo
cratic tariff for revenue only, of course
have less money to spend in your midst.
If there is any town or city in this re-
gion which ought to send man to Con-
gress with liberal views, you are that
city, and if you break your legs OF lame
your backs running to the polls to vote
for any man who supports robbery by
taxation, you have less sense than you
are credited with, and l hope your
n, yhbors will refuse to sit up with
you, and that your doctor will refuse
to furnish you with splints and plas-
ters. But not only are your home mar
kets cut down, and the demand reduced
for the goods you manufacture, but Can
ada, actuated by greed not less selfish
and ignorant than your own, has placed
a tariff on them which cuts you out from
the great markets north and west of the
lakes.
Protective tariffs are also the source
of the most corrupt practices in Con-
gress. One Congressman is sent there
tn represent one interest, second an
other, a third another, and each is
obliged to rely upon bargain with the
others in order to get tax placed upon
the consumer of his own pet goods, and
they are all in turn egged on by paid
lobbyists, and outrageous as our present
tariff legislation is, L often wonder that