Morning journal and courier., 1884-10-20
How Protection Affects the Farmers

HOW FEOLectIOA 4AhecLA Ghc Address by Hon. T. H. Dudley Delivered in New Jersey in 1sS2.l
 The farmer should be protected Nothing should be left undone that would help en- courage him in his pursuits. Every possibl aid should be extended to him to stimulate his efforts and enlarge his capacity to pro- duce Safeguards should be thrown around him; and wherever a protective duty will help him the State should impose it for his benefit. Our present laws have been framed especially with this view. The present tariff laws impose the following direct protective duties on agricultural products; Rice, cleaned, 215 cents per pound; wheat, 20 cents per bushel; Indian corn, 10 cents per bushe3;oats, 10 cents per bushel; rye, 15 cents per bushel; barley, 15 cents per bushel butter, f cents per pound; cheese, cents per pound; pota- toes, 15 cents per bushel; poultry, 10 per cent in value; peas, from 10 to 20 per cent; tobacco, ,unmanufactured, 25 cents per pound, unstemmed, 50 cents, Tn addition to @ reve- nue duty of 24 cents per pound; sugar from to , cents per pound; on horses, COWS, bulls, oxen, steers, calves, sheep, lambs, goats, hogs, and pigs, exceDtf or breeding purposes, 20 per cent; those for breeding purposes are admitted free to benefit the farmers; beef
 
 per cent; wool, from 10 to 12 cents per pound and from 10 to 12 per cent. added and hay, 20 per cent. This is as it should be. These duties tend to keep out foreign com petitors and leave our own market almost exclusively free for our own farmers.
 As an illustration of the working of the American system of protection in the interest of the farmer, let us take example one of the industries of the country. We will l take the silk industry in the State of New 1 Jersey. There were last year Q8SD 14, 122 persons employed in this business; some in Paterson, some in Passaic, some in Hoboken some in Newark, and some in other parts o1 I the State. Many, indeed most, of those per sons have others dependent upon them l Men have families, and girls have parents t who live from the wages earned in the mills ] If you assume that each of these persons ha | two others dependent upon him or her, ant i who thus live from the wages earned, it vii | make 42, ,360 people who are living in Nev 1 Jersey from this one industry alone.
 | Now suppose all these people should b. l gathered in one town; they would make 1 large city of themselves. But when you pu 1 them together in a town you create the neces l sity for other persons living with them ] They would want churches for religious wor 1 ship, and clergymen to preach; school houses l and teachers to instruct their children; car penters, masons, plasterers and painters t 1 build and keep the houses in repair; cabinet makers to manufacture furniture; shoemak
 CTS, tailors and matters to make clothing
 wheelwrights, blacks1niths and carriage anc
 harness makers; storekeepers, butchers ant
 bakers to feed the people and supply tn
 necessaries of life; doctors and lawyers, hack
 men and day laborers, You must have bank
 and insurance offices. Nor is this all. Ther must be some kind of government and me
 to carry it on. Your police, fire, light, wate
 and tax departments would require man
 men. With all these and those dependen
 upon them you will swell your city to no
 less than 65, GOO people, all of whom, directl
 or indirectly, would be dependent upon thi
 one industry; aud all of whom, every man
 woman and child, whether working in tn
 mill, attending school, engaged in buildin!
 houses, making clothes, baking bread, tend
 ing the sto1es, ministering to the sick, Q
 performing police duty, would be fed by tn
 farmer. Now, although not all gathered I
 one city, so far as our State is concerned
 this one industry gives employment to ant
 supports, directly or indirectly, this 53sr ngmbe
 locations of the State. And the farmer feed them. And 50 with every other manu