The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1884-02-27

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and this freedom from hostile control
is what constitutes industrial indepen-
dence, without which no country can
be politically Independent. The
presence of towns and cities spread
over the country is the presence of the
market they need to make them pros
porous. IF we did not have the cen.
ters of population created by wide
ly diversified industry, the farmer
would have to depend for a market
for his surplus upon foreign coun'
tries, aud must take the price they
could get there and meet the expense
of expectation, and would thus be
iDdustrially dependent and of course
politically Independent T; for his will
as to the laws be would make to gov.
ern himself, would be modified by the
constraint put upon him by the inter
ests that could shut off his sales or
lower Ills price. Had we not adopted
and clung to the policy of protection,
we could not have had the Boston,
New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore,
Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, st. Louis,
Chicago, that we have now. There
weuld be few of the thousands of
towns of from ten to sixty thousand
population that are spread over the
country, and had we our great rail
roads stretched over the continent
they would not have been ours. ap.
piled to our benefit, but would have
belonged to our industrial masters to
benefit them and not us. The work
ingmen, tempted to meke our country
theirs by the better work and better
pay our protective policy enabled US
to offer, would not have come to us by
millions to melt into our general pop
ulation, become homogeneous and
build up our great national strength
of more than ffty-soon to be an
hundred millions. But the free trad
ers say, "This is all balderdash, you
cannot show that to tax imported
manufactures from thirty to sixty per
cent on their value is not making the
farmer pay that mnch more for all of
such goods as he uses" Let US see.
If the levying of such duties Gid not
alter the relations of ours to foreign
markets, it would be true; for then
we would be going on buying those
goods at that increased price year af.
ter year. But it does alter those re.
lations. With this protection the
owners of capital start mills here for
the manufacture Of such goods.
They call men about them to do the
work, and increase the population by
that much. The mills multiply, aud
soon the home competition reduces
the prices to the cost of production
and a fair profit, and the agricultur
ist has the advantage Of the same
goods at a lower price beside thu
mouths Of the thousands who pro
duce them, for a market for thei
products, and thus exchanging will
ourselves, we are industrially indie
pendent, and consequently unassaila
bly, independent politically. One fac
will serve to illustrate, better thar
reams of foggy theory. In 1887 tn
sliding scale tariff as it was called
forced upon the country, by the rea
father of the modern Democratic par
ty, John G. Calhoun, in his attempt t,
nulify the authority of the Unitet
States law, and which was the frs
distinctively Democratic tariff, hat
destroyed the cotton mills of thi
country and we had no skirting D
sheeting but English manufacture.
young man just out of his time 60
, his freedom suit, the muslin for tn
shirts of which his master paid II
cents for yard. In 1910 the Demo
cratic party was overthrown becaus
of the distress that tariff produced
In 1842 the protective tariff wa
) adopted. In 1914 that yonug ma
got married. and in preparing for hi
mechanics housekeeping bought mus
lin made in American mills quite a