Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1888-08-10

try. 1t all came from England and cost
S4S ton. In that year company for
its manufacture was formed in New
York State, tariff of S5 a ton having
been imposed. The price soon fell to
S2S ton, thus saving to this coun-
try three millions of dollars. But
according to the President, soda ash after
the duty was imposed should have cost
S53 ton. We have heard good deal
about the tax on the poor mans blanket,
but after Mr.. Mills made his speech five
pound blankets were impoUed by way of
experiment. They cost at wholesale in
England S4.65; the duty was S425 and
the customs fees Go cents, making the
cost here $500 pair; while an equally
good article of precisely the same weight.
made in this country, was selling at SOU
pair. No petition had been received by
Congress from the laboring men asking
for reduction of the tariff. On the con-
trary, committee of laboring men who
wished to urge the retention of the pre-
sent duties were not heard by the COM
mittee on ways and means. They
wouldn't hear me when l wanted to APP
pear before them and urge the retention
of the duty on marble-an industry affect
ing my constituents. Such denial of the
night of a congressman to be heard was
never before known.
And now what is the origin of this
Mills bill? l am humiliated when | think
of the makeup of the committee which
framed it, and every northern Democrat
should be. Here is New England with her
great industries, built up under protec-
ton; and who are they that propose TO
cripple them? There is Mills of Texas,
a bright and capable man and good
talker; but he represents State which
has no manufactures and is still impreg-
mated with the ante-bellum ideas of Cal
houn and his school of economists.
There is Breckenridge of Arkansas, a son
of the Confederate vice-president; and he,
too, comes from State without manu-
factures. Then there is Breckenridge
of Kentucky, another Confederate,
and McMillen of Tennessee. These
are the men who control the in
dustries of the country; and yet 80
per cent of our industrial interests are
north of the Ohio and Potomac rivers.
The committee turned their backs on the
representatives of these Industries and
would not hear them. Who were heard
by them? j. 5. Moore, Parsee foreign
err a free-trade crank who writes for the
New York Times and is a partizan of
importing and British manufacturing in
terests; Henry WattersOn, editor of the
Louisville Courier-Journal, an intelligent
and honest man, but an out-and-out free
trader, who has pronounced unrelenting
war on what he styles the chariot of pro-
tection." These are the men who were
clOseted with the committee when the
incubation was going on which produced
the Mills bill. l saw it myself and know
that this is the fact. The great indus
tries of the nation were not represented
before them at all. The committee did
not dare to follow the President to the
full extent. Why? Because they were
afraid of losing votes. The tobacco
growers threatened to revolt and so the
internal tax was taken off tobacco. Salt,
lumber and wool, products of the North,
went on the free list because the COM
mittee cares nothing about the North.
But this didn't cut enough and they
made a few more slashes. Pulp went on
the free list, but was put back among
dutiable articles for fear of losing New
York. The administration does nothing
for Vermont because it expects nothing
of it. Mr.. Cleveland poses as a civil ser
vice reformer; yet no Republican office
holder, however capable, has been left
in office here. But in those doubtful
States where mugwumps are plentiful a
few Republicans are allowed to remain
in order to appease them. A Missouri
member got plate glass restored to the
dutiable list a man from Connecticut Ga
doubtful State) did the same for wood
screws, and so on. These revisions were
all made at the suggestion of Democrats,
and the Democratic caucus voted to al
low no notifications of the bill by Re-
publicans.
And who wanted this bill? The manu-
facturers: No. The farmers? No; all
their numerous petitions were for the
maintenance of the tariff. The laborers
didn't want it. Who did, then? The i'm
porters, the New York Times, the South
taken from the free list on account of
northern influence, but for the sake of
Georgia, where small amount Is quar-
ried. The committee would hear neither
Gov. Proctor nor myself when we wished
to urge the claims of Vermont marble in
terests.
Mr.. Mills says that the labOrers don't
get any benefit from the tariff; yet they
prosper under its operation. The great
er part by far of the deposits in savings
banks are made by laborers, and these
deposits in New England amounted, in
1887, to more than S500,000, 900, and
the deposits in northern savings banks
aggregate 81 100000 900, and this aside
from the money held In trust by c0mpan-
les and by various Pennsylvania institu-
tions for the wage-workers of that State.
This is business and not a sentimen-
tai or moral question. The question of
protection or free trade is on trial in this
campaign for If Mr.. Cleveland is re-elect-
ed it is decision for free trade and moth
ing else. What is the excuse for the
Mills bill? The reduction of the surplus.
But the Democrats don't want to reduce
the surplus. On the contrary, they have
deliberately allowed it to accumulate In
order that they might find pretext for
just this sort of legislation.
Democrats who laud the Mills bill as a
Jeffersonian measure are ignorant of the
subject. The second act passed by the
Congress of these United States was a
distinctively protection act. 1t was sign
ed by Washington and approved by JEFF
ferson, and no better statement of the
protection theory was ever made than
that put forth by the latter, who truly