Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1884-09-12

ship-owners, purchase vessels here at prices
greatly advanced. These high prices are
produced partly by the tariff on materials,
partly by the high wages paid, and partly
by the avarice of the ship building monopo-
lies who have the power to despoil, and fail
not to use it. The result of this policy is
that American shipping has been driven
from the seas, and our exports, OF which
agricultural products form 80 per cent,
are carried in foreign bottoms and under
foreign flags at rates fixed by foreigners to
suit themselves. Even if they were not dis
posed to take advantage of the absence OF
competition, a proper regard for their own
interests would compel them to charge high
freights, since, as Americans are prevented
by the tariff from buying manufactures
abroad, there can be no return cargo.
Thus handicapped, thus bled on every
hand, the farmers meet their competitors in
foreign markets Talk of the "prOtec ton" of
American labor! What protection" has
the farmer? He must compete with the cheap
"pauper" labor in the world. The recently
freed serfs of Russia, the down-trodden peas
ants of despotic governments, the naked,
half.staryed Hndsos of India-these are
his rivals. Yet maintain that the farmer
and the men he employs are just as worthy
the honorable title of American laborers as
are those who work in the factories or in
the mines The prices, forced down by
competition, at which the farmers sell in
foreign markets determine the prices at
which they sell at home. The market at
Liverpool regulates the market at Chicago
The blighting influence of the tariff ex-
tends still further. Because Americans can
not buy her manufactures, England is striv-
| ing to develop new fields whence she may
obtain her supplies of cotton and bread
stuffs. East India, Egypt and Brazil have
been SO stimulated as to produce quite a
large quantity of cotton, while the great and
fertile wheat lands of India and the Domin-
| ion of Canada menace the American farmer
with the loss of his entire foreign market for
wheat.
But whenever anything is said about the
| decline ofthe market abroad the stereotyped
reply OF the protectionist is that the high
tariff has made fine home market, for the
farmer This is not true. Under "protec-
ton" the proportion Of cereals for which
the farmers have been compelled TO seek a
market abroad has been very much large r
than under the revenue tariff which pre-
coded. The agricultural interests OF the
States that are the home of manufactures
have grown as manufactures grew, and are
now able to feed the whole population OF
|
for the luxuriant crops of the South or the
West, of the Northwest or the Southwest
When surplus of 100,000,000 bushels Of
wheat lies in their granaries it is mockery,
bitter, cruel mockery, to tell the farmers
that "protection" provides for them a mar.
ket at home. If there be not speedily a
change for the better, the price Of wheat will
90 down still further, down below n cents,
and its sale will not pay for its raising -
"When that time arrives" says Mr.. Hurd
"the farmers will be beggars in the midst Of
their own plenty and paupers by the side Of
their own golden sheaves."
Mr.. Yaple, in vigorous speech, thus
summed up the effects Of the tariff on the
farmer: "The farmer plows his field with q
protected pillow, sows his wheat with pro
tected drill, harvests and threshes it with
protected reapers and threshers, hauls il to
the ralraad in protected wagon, loads il
into protected car, and sends it over pro
tected rails to an unprotected market. When
he comes TO count his returns he finds tha
1t has cost him about two bushels of wheat
, to get one to market He works his own
land on shares, keeping one-third himself
and giving two-thirds to support the patri
otto policy of protection to home indus
, tries" So the monster OF protection
"Suchs, and drains
A peoples blood 10 feed its putrid veins"
Such are the evils, what are the remedies
They are two'iii .ndflBef and very simple
Our foreign markets should be enlarged by
: reciprocity treaties and the high tariff sh0ulC
he Immediately reduced Farmers of lht
United States, how long will you endur
this grinding oppression How long viii
you tamely submit TO this systematic pillage