The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1883-06-02
THE TARIFF DISCUSSED.
Editor Exchange:


the polity Of our government, franz
ed for the welfare of the whole peo-
pie, supported and maintained by the
whole people, to do other than mete
out equal laws, equal protection to
all its people, equal protection to all
interests1 Does it comport with eq
uity to put down the many to put up
the few ?-to take money out of the
pockets of the masses to put money
into the pockets of few favored
manufacturers Let the laboring
men of this country, whose purses
have been depleted by this process,
answer these questions. Let the blood
of oppression, which cries out from
the earth all along the years, all
along the line answer these questions.
In the infancy of the manufacturing
interests of this nation, it was thought
expedient to extend to them inciden~
tai protection, by levying tax or
dutya on goods or merchandise i'm
ported into this country from other
nations. Tariff is rate or scale of
duties. There are two ways of inns
posing them, called advalorem and
specific duties. AID valorem, accord
ing to coss, and is calculated on the
cost in the country the article comes
from. Specific duties are SO much re-
gardless of cost. This tariff or duty
added to the cost of the articles i'm
ported into our country is paid by the
consumer, and the manufacturers here
being protected by this tariff, add
this tax or duty to the cost of their
manufactured articles, and sell to the
merchants, and the merchants to the
consumers, the consumers paying the
duty and the manufacturers reaping
the benefit. So one class, the large
masses of our people. pay another
small protected class large sums to
manufacture, which might be bought
with much less money were it not fop
this protection tariff is giving at
present to the manufacturers for ev-
cry article, for every yard they man.
ufacture for them by this incidental
protection. We remarked that it
was thought expedient to extend in
cidental protection to manufactures
while in their infancy; but. mark the
fact that it was in the minds of the
trainers of this enactment that this
expediency or necessity arose alone
from the fact of their then being in
their infancy, and was to last only dur
ing that infancy. With this view,
and this view alone, was it passed by
the Congress Of the United States.
Now, when they have passed infan-
cy, and have become fully grown and
of age years ago, they should receive
this protection no longer. How does
the matter stand to-day? The result
is, that what was enacted through
courtesy to the fewness and infancy of
the manufacturing interests of this
country, is now clamored for by these
fattened and fully-grown favori,es as
their prerogative, now and forever, to
feed upon the hard earnings of the
working men of this government.
And, in fact, this pampered monopoly
crying for protection, nourished and
protected by gratuity while in swad.
ding clothes, has grown SO large, its
heads of power so great and multitu-
dinous, and so towering and immense
in its resources, that to-day confronts
the American people an antagonist
that will test their best steel for con-
tinued supremacy. The friends and
advocates Of protection, and they
are dangerously numerous. will
always favor large disbursements,
large appropriations of the public
money to give support to their plans
for more revenue. under which they
cloak their schemes of incidental pro-