New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1888-10-11
V4GES AND PROTECTION.


American workingmen are interested in
American wages, and know that these have
| advanced greatly under protection. But not
many have realized how great the advance has
been, and the compilation of returns published
by authority of Mr.. Lamar, when President
Clevelands Secretary of the Interior, proving
that the advance has averaged 1915 per cent
from 1860 to 1880, has completely Knocked
the Free Traders out of time. Not one Of
them has been able to dispute the official
record or to deny the correctness of the com
pilation, and thus far their only answer has
been an attempt to prove that protection has
not advanced wages in Germany. If that were
true. il would be of little account to American
workers, who are not just now about to decide
whether the scanty measure OF protection al
forded in Germany has been adequate or not.
To them the question is whether the protection
which has benefited American labor shall be
broken down by the Democratic party.
But THE New-York World' resorts to
fraudulent statements in order to make out its
case against German protection. 1t begins by
taking German wages in 1872, just when the
initiation of wages and prices in that country in
consequence Of the war with France was at
it's highest, and seven years before the pro-
tectiye system was adopted in Germany. This
is fraud on its face because prices and wages
afterwaid dropped severely, when the eX-
element had passed, that great distress re-
suited and it that very prostration and
the distress of working people which led to
the adoption Of the protective policy in 1871 q.
An honest reasOner would have tried to COM
pare present or recent wages in Germany with
those paid Immediately before or after the
protective policy was adopted, and not with
the wages paid in time Of unnatural and I'M
precedened imitation, seven years earlier.
Even this fraudulent comparison THE
World" is unable to make without perversOn
Of facts. 1t pretends to quote consular reports
of wages paid in Berlin for twenty-one occu-
pations, but for seven, Just one-thrd, inter
poates figures directly contradicted by the
consular report. for six more inserts figures not
contained in the consular report professedly
quoted. for two others inserts figures given in
the report, but not for Berlin. and thus gives
the correct figures for not one-third Of the oc-
equations. Moreover the figures which are
given in the consular reports for seventeen
occupations at Berlin are entirely omitted, and
also the wages there given for fifty to ffty-fve
occupations at Annaberg Barmen, Bremen,
Breslau, Crefeld. Dusseldorf. kehl, Leipsic,
Luneburg, Frankfort and the official statement
of the average for all Germany The simplest
reader must realize that a comparison pre-
pared is not merely worthless, but must have
been intended to deceive.
The consular table Of average weekly wages
in Berlin July, 1881, soon after the protective
tariff was adopted, and February 1884, given
in the report. " Labor in Europe" includes |
wages of forty-fve trades or occupations, and
of these seven had declined, thirteen had re-
manned unchanged, and twenty-five had ad
vanced. But much better test is aft Orded by |
he official reports of fortnightly wages of ali
classes Of cotton workers in the Rhine district
of Germany given on page 241, in the first
annual report of the United States Bureau of |
Labor. This shows an average Of So 4S each |
fortnight in 1873 the year before the tariff |
was enacted; IS 9 in 1879, the year Of its
adoption So "a the next year, and So IS in
1884 and So so in 1885. The average of
miners wages according to the consular re-
port for the four quarters of 1877 was go 1-2
cents per day. and for the four quarters Of 1892
il was 72 cents. The average of workmen's |
wages for the four quarters of 1877 8 was 4S.7 8 |
cents daily, and for the four quarters of 1882
it was So. IS cents. Later reports from official
sources are not at band.
But the German tariff has not yet been long
enough in operation to yield its best results, or
to demonstrate whether the measure Of pro-
lection afforded is adequate. That is not the
IL
to know this year. They want to know why
Mr.. Cleveland and his party propose to break
down tariff which has indisputably given
them an advance Of 1916 per cent in wages in
twenty years, besides reducing largely the cost