The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1888-07-13

body wants visitors from among the home
less. And forsien nations never want the
goods OF manufacturer who are unequal to
the TAX Of supplying their own home
market. 49, ~
| b. In most lines of manufactured goods,
the portion Of the American market which
foreigners still supply, Notwithstanding the
tariff, would be worth moro to our manufac-
turers than the entire foreign trade. Thus
In cotton goods Europe's trade with us, not
| withdrawing all our duties, amounts to a
| larger sum every year than all the purchases
Of foreign cotton goods made by all the pop
ulations OF Mexico, South America and the
| West indies Hence the unappropriated por-
| ton of our home market will be worth more
| to our producers of cotton goods than it
| would be worth to them to have the monop-
oily of supplying the whole foreign supply
| for the balance of the continent.
| For It must always be borne I'm mind that
| Mexico presented cotton fabrics Of the finest
| texture to Cortez on his arrival four GEN.
| turtles ago, and has always since endeavored
| SO to shape her tariffs rs to produce her own
cottons, and has many hundreds of manu-
| featuring establishments for that purpose.
Each of the South American states has the
instinct Of protection natural to all free
governments, i. O., governments free from
foreign dictation. Each of the English colo
mics has the same, and hence English export
trade depends largely on the Turkish, Egyp-
tian, Hindoo and Chinese markets, which are
the only markets English goods can enter
without being met by protective duties. In
these markets England has-partly by past
wars, coercion, bribery and diplomacy-se-
cured a 8 to 8 per cent. duty, which is some
thing she cannot get from any of her own
colonies or from any nation which is free
from her coercive military power.
Our nominal privilege of selling goods in
these markets in rivalry with the English is
worth exactly as much as our equally avail
able privilege Of buying out the landed
estates of the British nobility, by paying
more money for them than their present
owners would be willing to forego to keep
them
C. To obtain these visionary profits of the
foreign markets we are asked to take off pro-
tective duties from all raw materials of man.
ufacture. As about every article Of food,
clothing, shelter or utility Is directly or indi-
rectly raw material of manufacture, this
amounts in principle and effect to taking
duties Off from everything. Food of every
kind is raw material Of the manufacture
Of iron and clothing and, contributes as
large a portion of the ultimate cost
Of producing either as wool or iron ore. And
yet, In their turn, clothing and iron and steel
implements are consumed In producing food.
Each is raw material Of the other. II free
| trade in wool Is the true route to cheap wool,
much more Is free trade In clothing, ready
made, the true route to cheap clothing, since
| by free trade in the finished product we save
at once all the saving there is to be made on
each of the raw materials and each Of the
intermediate processes which are essential
| to the final product. So il free trade in iron
ore, coal and lime Is the true route to cheap
iron, much more is free trade in all the fin
ished products of iron and steel the true
route to cheapness in them. The free traders
try to sneak and edge into free trade back
ward when they ask free trade on the fleece
and not on the coat, or on the iron and not
on the hoe, ak or pillow.
d. The withdrawal Of protection from a
product which the protecting country has
all the natural facilities to supply has been
tried repeatedly and has always resulted,
neither in increasing the permanent supply
nor reducing the permanent price, but only
in transferring the place Of production Of q
part of the supply to some other country.
Iron and steel in the United States were
brought to the highest gold prices they
have ever borne in 1887 and 1857 by q
few years Of free trade because free trade
30 far extinguished the sources OF domestic
supply as to bring the price of the foreign
supply, when we were brought to the
necessity of relying largely on it, up to a
higher price than the domestic supply had
borne. The foreign supply of most COM
modities is just large enough to agitate our
markets, but not to compensate for any shat
tering or cessation Of the domestic produc-
ton, which is usually from five to twenty
times the importation For this reason low
duties on wool in 1851 to 1860 made wool both
scarce and dear relatively to the protective
period from 1866 to 1883. The domestic sup
ply has been larger, more abundant and more
profitable to the wool growers and yet
cheaper and Of better quality for the wool
consumers. e., the wooden manufacturers
under protection than under free trade, for
the profits Of every industry depend much
more on the largeness or dimensions with
which it is carried ON than on the dearness
of its product It is far more satisfactory to
the iron and steel makers to make the 2, 1877, 200
tons yearly to which their product had risen
In 1887 under protection, though they sell it
at ST per ton, than to get the $3.50 per
ton for the small product C350, 900 tons) of
1854, or even $3.50 for the still smaller
product of 1887. Making twenty times more,
they can well afford price one-half less.
In England especially the withdrawal of
protection from the farmers in 1916 did
| not cheaper bread nor increase its guam
thy for consumption, but 1t did cause an
immense crisis in England and famine in
Ireland, and it caused $4,000 acres per year
for sixteen years in Great Britain, which
had previously been devoted to raising bread
stuffs, to go out of cultivation between 1852
and 1868. On this additional so, 900 acres per
year, il it had remained in cultivation, the
quantity of breadstuffs imported would have
been produced and the supply and the price
would have remained constant quantity.
Hence free trade in corn in England effected
displacement of the cultivation from do
nestle to foreign wheat fields, but no in
crease in the supply and no lowering in the
| prices In tho light Of these facts the pre-
lenses of the 'free raw material" school of
free traders is more disguised fraud and
imposition on the public gullibility than the
fallacies of the single tax school of Henry
George, but not a whit less mischievous.
TIL A third very numerous class of freq