Iron County register., 1888-07-26
AS to Free Wool.

lay fOF Oh the WestoTu reserve, SJar-
fields successor in the house, said flip
PANTY in the discussion of the tree
wool clause of the Mills bill: 1.-THE
president knew no more why he recon-
mended it than Dickens fat boy knew
why he went to sleep SO much.o
When the president wrote the mes
sage of last December he INDUCED
! neither in sneers nor in dogmatics. He
presented reasons why the tariff should
be revised and incidentally brought up
the subject of free wool. He alluded to
the fact that agricultnrists manufacture
nothing but pay the increased price
which the tariff enforces upon every
agricultural implement, upon all he
uses and owns, except the increase of
his fiocks and herds and such things as
his husbandry produces from the soil.
Invited to maintain high tariff he is
told that high duty on imported wool
is necessary for the benefit of those
who have sheep to shear in order that
the price of wool may be increased. 1t
is odd, by the way, that high-tariff
| advocates constantly claim that the
effect of protective duties is to cheaper
materials, yet the farmer who raises
| wool is told that he can get only small
prices unless custom-house taxation on
wool is high. If the wool is high a
protected woolen-miil must pay the
enhanced tariff price on wool and then
make from the consumer Of his fabric
his own profit. This. however, is not
the present point. Did the president
have reasons for recommending that
wool be placed on the free list?
| He said in the message: IL think it
may be fairly assumed that large
proportion of the sheep owned by the
farmers throughout the country are
found in small fiocks numbering from
/ grade of imported wool which these
sheep yield is ten cents each pound il
of the value of thirty cents or less, and
| twelve cents if of the value of more
than thirty cents. If the liberal esti-
mate of six pounds be allowed for each
fleece, the duty thereon would be sixty
or seventy-two cents, and this may be
| taken as the utmost enhancement of
| it's price to a farmer by reason of this
duty. Eighteen dollars would thus
represent the increased price of wool
! from twenty-five sheep and $36 that
| from the wool OF fifty sheep, at at pres
ent values this would amount to about
| one-third of its price. If upon it's sale
the farmer receives this or less tariff
profit the wool leaves his hands charg-
ed with precisely that sum, which in
| all its changes will adhere to it until it
| reaches the consumer. When manu-
factured into cloth and other goods and
material for use its cost is not only in
creased to the extent of the farmers
tariff profit. but further sum has been
added for the benefit of the manufact-
urer under the operation of other tariff
laws. In the meantime the day arrives
when the farmer finds it necessary TO
purchase wonlen goods and material to
ciotbe himself AID family for the wint-
er. When he faces the tradesman for
that purpose he discovers that he is
obliged not only to return in the way
of increased prices his tariff profit on
the wool he sold, and which then, per-
haps, lies before him in manufactures
form, but he must add q considerable
sum thereto to meet a further increase
in cost caused by tariff duty on the
manufacture. Thus in the end he is
reused to the fact that he has paid up
OH moderate purchase as result of q
tariff scheme, which when he sold his
wool seemed SO profitable, an increase
in price more than sufficient to sweep
away all the tariff profit he received
upon the produced and sold. y
This excerpt from the message would
indicate that the president had given
the subject of free wool more atten ton
than Congressman Taylor thinks. II
the farmer who raises sheep gains moth
ing or next to nothing in the long run
by protection, what is the loss by that
device to the farmer who has no sheep?
What is its effect upon the mass of peo-
pie who raise no wool but must wear
woolens?-C Chicago Times.