The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1882-1884, 1883-08-23
The Protective Tariff.

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How long will the people quietly
submit to being robbed under the
false pretext of protecting American
labor from the ravages of the pauper
labor of Europe? How long will they
permit the Shylock's gauze to blind
their eyes and his false reasoning to
darken their understanding? The
Tariff is discussed with an eye singly
to the few laborers in the factories as
though they constituted the body of
American labOrers, and their interest
and theirs alone were to be looked
after. And even this small fraction
of American labor is not cared for as
the Republican party would have us
believe.
Are not hundreds Of thousands of
what they term the pauper laborers
of the old world brought to this coun-
try yearly and put at once in compe.
tition with this class of laborers?
Who can deny this historical fact?
But our purpose in this article is to
show that there are other laborers
in the country whose rights are en-
titled some consideration from our
law makers, and some protection from
the monied Lords of the land. Does
the home supply and demand fix the
price of cotton, corn, wheat. meat and
beef9 Surely not. The price of every
bushel of corn and wheat, and every
pound of meat. beef and cotton is
fixed by the European markets. If
cotton is low in England, it is low
in the United States, and vice versa !;
and so it is with wheat, corn, meat
and every other article the farmer
raises or grows. So you see the pau.
per labor of England fixes the prices
of American production. Europe in
combination with the monled kings
of this country, sets the prices on
every article the farmer has to sell.
and the American manufacturer
through the Republican party estab-
fishes the price of every article the
farmer consumes. So it comes to this,
in plain English, the farmer is driven
by the Republican party to sell his
produce at the lowest prices and buy
his supplies at the highest prices.
And this is called protecting Ameri.
can labor.
Liverpool fixes the price of cotton,
the American spinner buys it at the
Liverpool price less the trausporta-
ton. The Liverpool man labors under
the disadvantage of three thousand
miles transportation, and yet he buys,
manufactures his goods, pays the
freight from America to Europe, and
then back to America, and then mn
steps the Republican party and says
you shall not sell your goods to
American citizens, unless you pay US
tariff of fifty per cent, and in some
cases over one hundred per cent. for
the privilege of selling at all, because
if You do you will come in competi.
ton with our spinners and thereby
reduce their profits. AS the Euro
pean must seek some other market
and allure the American to sell his
goods at his own price to the Ameri.
can consumer.
Now . Tariff for revenue is one
that encourages and induces impor-
tstion from other countries to this,
by making the tax reasonable and
just that foreign dealers can compete
with our home dealers. A protective
or prohibiting Tariff is one that
levies tax so heavy that all impor-
tation ceases and all traffic between
this country and others are private
thereby giving the entire CONTROL of
the markets and prices to home spec
ulators. Now all this is wrong in
principle and wrong in practice
! there is neither justice reason no,
common sense in it. 1t is the mean
est viilany on record. To hear thes.
protective Tariff men talk one voulf
suppose there was not laborinp mar
in America outside of these factories
> While. in fact, ninety GU: of ever,
hundred of the laboring men on this
e continent never were inside a facto.