Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1888-08-21

SI0,UUU,UUt or SZU,VOU,UUU, but they haY
, now a demand for the amount of on
whole consumption, which, making allow
ance for our diminished ability to pay
would probably still reach $4,000 900 pc
annum. This increased demand woul,
soon produce activity and buoyancy in tn
general market; and now the foreign man
ufacturers would say in sheir consultations
"We have sold some millions worth O
goods to America for less than cost, in or
der to obtain eontrol of thas market; nov
we have it, and must retrieve or lossss'-
and they would retrieve them, with inter
est. They would have a perfect right Il
do So | hope no man has misunderstood
me as implying any infringement of tbs
dictates of honesty en- their party, still
less of the laws of trade. They have q
perfect right to sell goods in our markets
on such terms as we prescribe and they can
afford it is We, who set up our own vital
Interests TO be bowled down by their riv-
airy, who are alone to be blamed.
| Who does not see that this sending out
our great industrial interests unarmed and
unshielded to battle against the mail-cfad
legions opposed to them in the arena OF
| trade is to insure their destruction L
people are brave therefore they shall repel
any invader without firearms, as to say
that the restrictions of other nations ought
not to be opposed by US because our arti-
| sans are skilled and our manufactures have
made great advances. The very fact that
our manufactures are greatly extended and
| improved is the strong reason why they
should not be exposed to destruction. If
they were Of no amount Or value, their
loss would be less disastrous; but now the
100000 or 100000 we should make
on the cheaper importation of goods would
cost Us 100000, 900 in the destruction of
manufacturing property alone.
Yet this is but an item of our damage.
The manufacturing classes feel the first
effect of the blow, but it would paralyze
every muscle Of society. One hundred
thousand artisans and laborers, discharged
from our ruined factories, after being some
time out of employment at q waste Of mill
iona of the national wealth, are at last
driven by famine to engage in other
avocations-of course with inferior skill
and at an inferior price. The farmer,
gardener, grocer, lose them as customers to
meet them as rivals. They crowd the la
Dor markets of those branches of industry
which we are still permitted to pursue, Just
at the time when the demand for their prod
ucts has fallen of, and the price is rapidly
declining. The result is Just what wehaye
seen in former instance; all that any
man may make by buying foreign goods
cheap he loses ten times over by the de-
cline of his own property, product or labor;
while to nine-tenths of the whole people
the result Is unmixed calamity. The
disastrous consequences to nation of
the mere arrangement and paralysis of its
industry which must follow the breaking
down of any OF its great producing inter
ests have never yet been sufficiently esti-
mated. Free trade, indeed, assures us
that every person thrown out of employ
ment in one place or capacity has only to
choose another; but almost every working
man knows from experience that such is
not the fact-that the loss of situation
through the failure of his business is often
er sore calamity. know worthy cit
izen who spent six years in learning the
trade of halter, which he had just perfect
ed in 1898, when an immense importation
of foreign hats utterly paralyzed the man
ufacture in this country. He travelled and
sought for months, but could find no en-
ployment at any price, and at last gave up
the pursuit, found work IN some other ca
pacity, and has never made a hat since
He lives yet, and now comfortably, for he
is industrious and frugal; but the six years
he gave to learn his trade were utterly lost
to him-lost for the want of adequate and
steady protection to home industry.
insist that the Government has failed of
discharging its proper and rightful duty to
that citizen and to thousands, and tens of
thousands who have suffered from like
causes. / insist that, if the Government
had permitted without complaint foreign
force to land on our shores and plumber
that mans house of the savings of six
years of faithful industry, the neglect of
duty would not have been more fragrant.
And l firmly believe that the people of
this country are S1,000,000,000 poorer at
this moment than they would have been
had their entire productive industry been
constantly protected, on the principles l
have laid down, from the formation of the
Government till now. The ..pteadiness of
employment and of recompense thus Sc
cured, the comparative absence of con-
strained idleness, and the more efficient
application of the labor actually performed,
| would have vastly increased the product
would have improved and beautifed the
whole face of the country and the moral
and intellectual advantages thence accru-
ing would alone have been inestimab.e A
| season of suspension of labor in COM
munity is usually one of aggravated dissi-
patton, drunkenness and crime
But let me more clearly illustrate the
effect of foreign competition in raising
prices 10 the consumer To do this, 1 will
take my own calling for an example, be-
cause understand that best; though any
of you can apply the principle to that with
which he may be better acquainted. | am
publisher of newspapers, and suppose l
afford them at a cheap rate. But the abil-
| ity to maintain that cheapness is based on
the fact that | can certainly sell a large
edition daily, SO that no part of that edition
shall remain dead loss on my hands.
| Now, if there were an active and formid-
/ able foreign competition in newspapers
if the edition which printed during the
night were frequently rendered unstable
| by the arrival of foreign ship freighted
with newspapers early in the morning
the present rates could not be continued
the price must be increased or the quality
would decline. l presume this holds
equally good of the production of calicoes,
| glass and penknives as of newspapers,
| though it may be somewhat modified by
the nature of the article to which it is APP
piled. That it does hold true Of sheetings,
nails and thousands of articles is abund-
antly notorious.
l have not burdened you with statistics
you know they are the reliance, thestrong-
hold, of the cause of protection, and that
we can produce them by acres. My aim
has been to exhibit not mere collections Of
facts, however pertinent and forcible, but
the laws on which those facts are based
not the immediate manifestations but the
everything necessity from which it springs,
The contemplation of these laws assures
me that those articles which are supplied
to us by home production alone are rela.