Press and daily Dakotaian. (Yankton, Dakota Territory [S.D.]) 1880-1889, 1888-08-09
SOME PERTINENT ANSWERS.
Questions by tho Labor Candidate for
President.

Questions by tho Labor Candidate for
President.
Mr.. Cowdrey, candidate of the Union
Labor party for president, Is a free trader
and asks some questions that are eagerly
quoted by Democratic free trade organs.
One of them is as follows:
tflaye you ever seen a protected manu-
f~acturer pay higher wages than he was
compelled tor
No, and we nave never heard that manu-
facturers in free trade countries paid more
for labor than they were compelled to.
Manufacture rs under any tariff system
will buy labor as cheaply as they can. But
1t is easily conceivable that manufacturers,
In consideration of IN assured home mar
ket protected from foreign competition, are
willing to pay the higher. wages which
such protection enables them to pay. They
make just as much money as if they paid
the European rate of wages, and are natu-
rally averse to, the labor troubles and
fierce competition in products that would
result from free trade aud the inevitable
reduction of wages. In that respect the
interests of manufacturers and working
men are identical. Here is another of Mr..
Cowdrey's questions:
tIf protection prevents us from selling
in foreign markets, does not protection
make less work instead of more"
Protection may prevent us from selling
some manufactures in foreign markets.
But it does not "make less work instead
of more" except for foreigners. 1t keeps
out foreign products and therefore makes
more work instead of less for American
workingmen. Free trade would food our
markets with foreign products, reduce
the amount of work to be done here, and
reduce the wages for what remained to be
done. We consume 90 per cent. of our
products and export only 10 per cent.
Our home market Is worth, therefore,
nine times as much to American working
men as the foreign market. What folly
1t would be to imperil or sacrifice the home
market for the uncertainties of foreign
tradel Mr.. Cowdrey continues his ques-
tioning:
'lf there is free trade in labor and high
protective prices for those things which
laborers must buyfs not the laborer being
robbed instead of benefited7"
Is not free trade in labor bad enough
without free trade in the products of
labor2 Would the evils of Unrestricted
importation of labor be made any more
tolerable by the unrestricted importation
Of the products of labor? The importa-
ton of foreign labor and the products of
foreign labor are one and the same thing
In their effects upon American labor, and
no man in his senses can argue that the
n can be o cure for the other.
We have not heard any complaint from
w~orkingmen as to the high prices of pro-
ducts, or of being robbed" in the pur-
chase of food, clothing or other articles.
Products of all kinds are cheap. A few
of them might be cheaper for a time under
free trade until our home industries were
destroyed, but we have not heard any
workingman say that he is willing to 40
cept a lower scale of wages on the chance
of getting cheaper products. If there is
any workingman who is willing to accept
lower wages for the sake of getting his
clothes a little cheaper let him speak up
Cheaper products means cheaper wages
and as little that the workingman buys il
affected directly by the tariff, he has Lit
, tie to gain and much to lose by d fre'
, trade tariff for revenue only policy. On,
more question from Mr.. Cowdrey and w,
have done:
|, "If unprotected industries pay the sam
8 wages as those that are protected, ar
4 they not as valuable, and, if so, VIII
4 burden them by making them pay heav
! taxes to the protected ones?",
: By unprotected industries Mr.. Cow
! drey refers to carpentry, bricklaying an
! other mechanical employments who's
!, products cannot, for obvious reasons, /
: imported. They are, In fact, protected b
o natural barrier that is higher than an
tariff, for we cannot import houses an
I. immigration does not at first. onset m,
terislly affect their ~employments, as in
migration is mainly Of unskilled labo
70 But close our mills and factories by fire.
trade, and the higher wages u buildin
mechanics enjoy would soon be brougl
a. down by enforced competition in their d
IL northumberland Leader.