Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1885-06-12
Agriculture and the Tariff.

iron foundry at mat pace ana VINO vas
Republican member of the last Legislature
from that county, has gotten himself into
the american Farmer in which he devotes
himself to the difficult task OF showing
that the present high tariff protects the
farmers nearly or quite as we'll as it does
the manufacturer. Mr.. Coffin endeavors
to make it appear that it is the small nom
inal tariff which is imposed on few ar
ticles of domestic agricultural production
which protects the tillers of our barren
and limited American fields from the com
petition which would otherwise exis- on
the part of the cultivaters Of the broad and
fertile acres beyond the seas, rather than
my natural and other artificial barriers to
to such competition.
He has put together with much Gaze
table of figures from the sta istical reports
in which it appears thai the receipts from
the duty on about fifty agricultural pro-
auctions of general or limited domestic
cultivation in this country, during the ifs
cal year 1888, including such as were re-
ceiyed for consumption and such as were
withdrawn from the warehouses during
that period for consumption, amounted in
the aggregate to the inconsiderable re a
tive sum of SIS, 100000 From these pre-
misses he argues, fallaciously enough, that
reduction of the present high tariff,
which bears so GENEROUSLY upon al con
sumers, would be nearly or quite as injur-
ious to the agricultural interest as he
himself
An inspection of Mr.. C)ffi1's table will
show that considerably over $4,000, 600
Of his aggregate sum was derived from TO-
bacco, fax, hemp, jute, wool, rice, barley
and oranges. None of these articles are
of general production in this country and
the reason of their large importa ion is
that the limited loca dnmes ic production
is not by any means adequate to the de-
luduu loT nome
Nearly all the tobacco grown in this
country and al OF hat prodGc ion in
Maryland is not suited to the home mar
ket; hence, while foreign producers If the
article are paying freight charges and tar
IF duties to get their produc ions to our
markets, our home producers are 1t the
same time paying freight charges aud for
eign tariff duties To get heir production
into the foreign markets. tbs Of self
is srong proof of the injustice ali i,ise
economy of tariff duties, except IN - far
as they are absolutely necessary for Feve-
nue. purposes.
The other SIX articles from wli,h Mr.
oifin figures up his revenue are on pro-
duced to an inconsid rable extern and, We
believe, of inferior quality 10 certain linn
tied localities in this country. Any arti-
fetal value. therefore, which the tariff
duties may impart to thes4 commodities
is an injustice to The grca' mass al the
country, agricul'urists an 1 others, " 50 are
consumers OF the articles.
The important ms OF the other thirty nine
articles he enuncrates are not worth con-
sidering The aggregate duty derived
from all u them is less than two millions
of GLARS. NJ one who considers FIR
moment the relativs producing and con-
Stunning capacity Of the United State as
compared with that OF al other countries
on the globe, will hest ate for one moment
to say that, all artificial barriers in the
way of tariffs and duties being removed,
it will not be possible for them to com
pete with the American producers in the
staple agricultural productions OF this
country in our home markets. Indeed, If
all artificial barriers are removed and
free and unhampered foreign commerce
established, there are few foreign coun ries
whose home producers could compete
with us in their onn mrkets in the staple
productions of this country. The limited
and inconsiderable importations of these
productions at present come for the most
part over the British American border
and the tariff upon those commodities
operates only to the benefit of American
farmers who live aong the border The
imposition of such duties only proyokes
the levyirg of reciprocal duties in foreign
countries and thereby operates injuriously
to our genera agricultural Interests.
These are patent fac 5 which no specious
arrangement of figures can obscure There
can be no doubt that the greatest good to
the greatest number of our American peo-
pie would be attained by the establish
ment of absolute free trade with all for
eign nations,and that this principle should
be contravened only to the extent that the
necessary revenues of the country absolu-
tely require. This is the Democr ,tc doc
trine on the question, which We hope and
believe will be fearless'y carried out by
The present administration.
At a meeting of the Maryland Academy
of Sciences held in Baltimore gu Monday
night of last week, the subject of Arbor