The Emporia weekly news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1881-1889, 1888-07-19


both in Massachusetts, and in England,
has written letter to Chairman Mills
regarding the effect upon labor in the
wooden industry that will result from
placing wool ON the free list. The let
ter is too lengthy to publish in full, but
we give an extract which will serve to
throw considerable light on the matter.
Mr.. Shaw says:
1 find in the text nf the tariff bill
which your committee has reported
clear indications that the majority of
your committee entertain the errone-
Gus view held by the editor of the PROV
ldence Journal and others. In the
text of the report accompanying your
tariff bill, as published, occur the
following: 1--WE say to the man
ufacturer, we have put wool on the
free list to enable him to obtain foreign
woods cheaper, make his goods cheaper
and send them into foreign markets
and successfully compete with the for
eign manufacturer. We must
find way to foreign markets for our
wooden goods. In the foreign mar
ket we must compete with the foreign
producers, and in order to do so success
fully we must produce our goods at a
lower cost to be able to under sell for
With free wool we ma, not
only supply the home market with the
greater part of the wooden goods now
imported, but we can begin to export
wooden goods and soon build up pros
porous trade" Here, it seems to me,
the item of labor has been strangely
overlooked or the fact of the very large
excess of the cost of labor in this coun-
try over that of the European coun-
IQ 1osSo
1t must be conceded that
Your intentions, and those of the ma
joFity of your committee acting with
you, are to propose such bill as would
be for the best interests OF this coun-
try, and that if you could clearly see
what would be for the best good of
the greatest number" you would be
only glad to propose that to the House
of Representatives.
1t is to give you the simple facts i'll
one of the industries to be affected by
the proposed legislation that this letter
is written, and the particular object in
view is to give you evidence which can
not be OVerted-because it is fact
that no manufacturer of wooden hos
ieTy in this country can compete in the
market with the English maker, even
if we have free wool, without reducing
the wages now being paid his employees
to the much lower level of the wages
paid abroad. The Shaw Stocking Com
pany is one OF the establishments in
this country that operate simulta-
neOusly, here and in England, machin-
cry of the same design and construc-
ton, in the making of textiles of var
ious sorts, and the circumstances are
such in the case of the Shaw Stocking
Company as to enable me to make a
comparison between the cost of produc-
ton in Leicester and in Lowell, in both
of which places the same automatic
machinery, the same staples,
and the same goods are
operated. operated upon, and mar
keted. Everything in both of these
places which enters into the cost of
production is the same. with the eX-
ceptiOn of interest, taxes and insur-
ance, and labor directly or indirectly
employed. IN presenting the short
tabulation hereinbelOw, the items of
interest, taxes and insurance have
been eliminated, so that the cost given
is that of the wool and charges, and
the labor directly and indirectly en-
ployed. Taking dozen pairs of
WOODEN and wOrsted stockings: The
wages paid for piece work amount in
Leicester to "a cents, while in Lowell
the amount is 80 cents, being about 81
per cent. more IN Lowell than in Lei
ceSter. Besides the piece work there
is day workys,fEDd very many other
items of expense entering into the
production, so that the cost of dozen
pairs of wooden or WOrsted stockings
weighing two and one-half pounds
would be in Leicester-S1. 80.
If we were to have free wool in this
country. the cost of these same goods
made on the same machinery, would
be in Lowell-S2.55, or 65 cents per
dozen more than the cost in Leicester.
Now, as before stated, the material
and the machinery being the same, the
hands there being able to turn cut the
same quantity of goods as here, and
actually turning out the same average
production daily, the labor item in the
Lowell mill exceeds that of the Leices-
ter mill; and the Lowell mill VsSuld be
unable to compete with the leicester
mill in the English market or any
other market until it had reduced its
labor cost from SLIT to sc cents per
dozen, and that means this: That
labor in our Lowell usili, earning at
the rate of one dollar per day, would
be reduced to about fifty cents per day.
What is true of the particular industry
in which this company is engaged
would be true of any other wooden in
dustry, for we must remember that the
English have machinery unsurpassed
in excellence, and that the skill of the
English operative is unexcelled, and
that we have no hope of making either
more or better goods than the English
are able to make in this branch of in
dustry.
1t is very pleasing to some persons
to say that the Yankee people, with
all their inventive genius, their skill
and their industry, can make enough
better goods, on a certain amount of
wages TO enable them to compete with
the Englishman who works for one
half the rate. / say it IS very pleas
ing; but only while the illusion lasts,
and the illusion does not survive in
Children Cry for Pitchers Casturia.