Daily Republican. [volume] ([Wilmington, Del.]) 1874-1890, 1884-08-11
Deesptiens OF Free Traae

OAAAh6hlCii W hch dPIfCaAcu VI LII
favor OF free trade or something that
approximates it are influenced with
the argument that 1t will make what
they have To purchase much cheaper
than they have been paying for it under
projection. There can be no denying
the fact that if the duties on imported
goods were removed, the prices paid for
most Of the necessaries OF life would be
materially reduced This fact alone
seems to be the only one that strikes
the laboring population with favor who
are led away by this modern free trade
theory. Remove the tariff and all that
is needed to supply our wants in wear
ing apparel, and farm and manufacture
ing machinery will readily and gladly
be furnished by Great Britain, the most
extensive manufacturing nation OF Eu-
rope. This all seems to strike the
public eye fairly. The people want
cheap goods and free trade supplies
them, and they ask why then not have
free trade ?
Why not have these goods cheap. :?
We say the people can have absolute
free trade If they wish it. They can
have these cheap goods if they wish
them. But there is something else TO
be considered besides the mere abropa,
ton Of tariff duties, and the filling of
the country with manufactured articles
from Great Britain at a much lower
price than what we are now paying for
them.
Need we point out the other consid-
erations that sway the public mind ia
favor of protection ? Does it not occur
to laboring men who want cheap living
only in reduction of the tariff, that
even if those imported goods are low
that they cannot be bought without
some money? Does it not occur TO
these minds led astray by free trade
theorists that If even a steamboat
was selling at auction for ten cents,
1t takes ten cents to buy the steamboat?
Where is the money TO come from with
which to purchase these imported arti.
cles even if they are cheap? We think
we hear more than one say, why have we
not as much money from our labor then
as we have now ? No, indeed There
is where hundreds OF workmen are de-
ceived.
Is it possible that these laboring men,
led away into the seductive paths of free
trade by such illusory arguments, do
not know that their labor would not be
needed Do they not know that if
the protective duties from foreign i'm
ports were removed, Great Britain with
her system of low priced labor would
stock this country with all the manu-
featured goods Of all descriptions that
would be needed?
But we are told that American manu-
facturers should manufacture goods as
cheaply as they are manufactured in
Great Britain, and then the country
would not be stocked with English
manufactured goods.
To such proposition We have onl.
to say that as soon as labor is reduced
in price to level with the price OF
labor in Great Britain then the Ameri-
can manufac ;ories can be kept in ope-
ration. 1t requires but an ordinary
perception to see that if the tariff Oh
imported goods was abolished American
manufacturers could not afford TO pay
twice as much for labor as is paid in
free trade Great Britain View it as
they will laoorers can come to no other
conclusion than that reduction OF
tariff duties is blow directly at the
labor of this country already poorly
enough paid.