The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1884-09-06
NUMBER %

forty cents per pound and thirty.two
per cent. Tins was declared by Mr.
Dorsheimer, the eloquent Democrat
ic member from New York, first,
firm step toward free trade" and all
the other free traders advocated it az
only beginning ofthe change which
they meant TO make.
The effect OF this bill can be under
stood If we remember that the tariff
mad just been revised with intent TO
make the duties just enough, and not
more than enough, to put our labor
on equal terms in competition with
iII-pald foreign labor. With great
care and labor commission of men,
skilled in different industries, had
devised plan to that end and, where
Congress thought the Commission
mad erred in proposing TOO high du.
ties, 1t enacted lower duties. Hence
II must be supposed that the balance
was as nearly level as men of great
Sklll could make it. If they found
that cheap British labor could offer
for sale here bar iron at two cents a
pound, or 81 per 100 pounds, whereas
like iron made by our own labor cost
$3.50 cents per 100 pounds. they fixed
the charge to be paid by foreign bar
iron at eighty cents per 100 pounds,
SO that 1t should have no advantage
in our market. If they found that
window-glass could be made here,
with decent living for the workers,
at $3.50 per 100 pounds, and that
foreign glass, made by cheap labor,
could be offered here at SO, they fixed
the charge for the privilege of com.
ing into our market at $3.50 per 100
pounds. This was the general intent
of the tariff As it stood.
To cut off one-fifth of the 81 so paid
by foreign glass of certain kind,
then, would give the foreigner an
advantage of thirty cents on every
100 pounds over the home producer,
provided the adjustment was correct
before, and wages were not changed,
But the maker could not get sand or
other materials any cheaper than be-
fore. Consequently he must pay thir-
ty cents per 100 pounds less for MAX
ing glass, or continue to run at loss,
or stop work. To cut off one-fifth Of
the eighty cents paid by a kind of
iron, in like manner, meant to take
sixteen cents per 100 poGnds from
the cost of materials, from profits, or
from wages. But this was proposed
at time when prices were very low.
and industries much depressed. Many
mines had closed, the miners being
unwilling to work for less. Few
mines were yielding profits. The
chance of getting cheaper materials
was slender. The manufacturers gen.
orally had been working ON exceed
ingly narrow profits, or no profits.
The saving of thirty cents per 100
pounds on glass, or sixteen cents per
100 pounds on iron, from the profits
of the manufacturer at that time, was
plainly not possible. The bill, there
fore, meant to take the thirty cents
| or the sixteen cents from the wages
of labor. And so it was of a great
number of industries. If the duties
had been rightly adjusted before, to
equalize foreign with home products
and the Commission of Experts and
Congress had tried to so adjust them
then, at a time when works we're
running without profits, cutting off
duties meant cutting down wages, or
the stoppage of the mines and mills,
the furnaces aud the factories, by the
purchase of foreign goods at less than
the cost of goods made at home.
That was the meaning of the Nor
rison bill. Had II been offered at
time when manufacturers were get
| ting good profits, the reduction might
have been taken from the profits. But
it was offered at time when the re-
duction must have come from the
wages of labor, or the work must
have stopped. ...
A great many works did stop, in
expectation of its passage. A great
many more did not dare to make con-
tracts for the future with a prospect
that loss would result if the bill
should pass. The disaster to industry
was great and general, and we have
not yet recovered from it. Yet the
very man who offered this bill to cut
down the wages of labor, Mr.. Morri-
son, was the Chairman of Committee
in Democratic Convention who re-
ported the platform on which Mr..
Cleveland is now running.
A IaWVpr,S 0niniOn nK Tufaracf IN ALI