The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1888-02-15
HIT the NAIL ON The HEAD.
Vigorous Speech by Senator Plat Upon
President Cleyeland's Free.
Trade Message.
Things Pointed Cut Which the Chief
Magistrate Should or Ought
to Know.

Is the President q free-trader?" asked
Senator Plat, OF Connecticut, ut the open
ing OF his speech on the Presidents mes
sage, in the Senate, the other day. If he
was lie ought to be willing to be called
one. He had sent TO Congress at its opening
the most remarkable paper ever submitted
to any Congress by chief executive. No
other President had ever ignored all ques-
tons but one. 1t was recognized at first
by the whole Democratic party as free
trade document, and the press rang with
statements that the President had forced
this issue of free trade versus protection
to the front and made it the issue of the
next Presidential campaign. The Repub-
hcans thought they Were going for once to
have fair fight In which there was to be
no evasion, a platform which was not to be
made to serve two purposes; that they
were not going to have a campaign in which
the Democratic party looking south was
to wear free-trade face, while toward
New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, it
was to wear protection mask. The Repub-
licans welcomed the issue. Eight weeks,
however, had passed since Congress as
sembled, and the exultaton of the Demo-
Gratis was somewhat tempered by sadness.
A few protection Democrats, after, the first
gush of admiration for the President, had
begun to realize that something had hit
them; they did not know exactly what it
was. There was no doubt as to what the
President would be understood to mean in
the Southern and Western States, but it
was seen to be necessary to convince DEM
ocratic protectionists in New York, New
Jersey, and Connecticut, that after all the
Presidents message was not n free trade
message but {. pretty good protection doc
ument. He challenged any of the thirty
eight Democratic Senators to rise In his
; place and say that the President of the
United States was. in his Judgment, pro-
tectionist. The President had referred
to import duties as being a scheme for
the benefit of manufacturers. The
protectionists denied it; and they insist
ed that whenever a duty was laid
it protected the American manufacturer.
Competition among home producers always
had brought down, and always would bring
down, the price of the foreign article. less
the duty. The President should have
known that. Did the President, or his bet
ter half, ever buy calico? and, if so. did he
not know that, while the duty on calico
was 6 cents abroad, the American article
could be bought at less than that in retail
stores in the city Of Washington? Had the
President ever heard of the manufacturer
of steel rails? Did he know that the duty
on steel rails was SIT ton, and that steel
rails had been sold in the United States al
low as $3.50? That made the price with
out duty S1l.50 a ton, and steel rails can
not be bought abroad at less than double
that price, or practically so. So it was also
as to clothing, and even as to blankets,
which seemed TO be the terror of free
traders. Medium qualities blankets could
be bought in this country Notwithstanding
enormous duty laid on the foreign article)
as cheaply as they could be bought any
where In the world.
He understood that there was a -'anding
offer in protectionist newspaper of New
York to any free trader to show that cloth
ing is not as cheap in the United States as
in England. The truth was, that every
body except the dude and the millionaire
could be clothed cheaper III this country
than in England-and in wooden clothing,
too-and he took it for granted that the
Senate was not particularly anxious to
leglslate for the benefit of the dude and the
millionaire. If anybody but the President
of the United States had made such state
ments as were contained in the message,
he (Platt) would apply TO him a characteri-
cation which it would not be proper to APP
ply to the President
The President had rolled "as sweet
morsel under his tongue" what he called
the immense profits of the manufacturer.
This attack on the manufacturers of the
country was too open, too plain, too Sc
we're to be allowed TO pass in lence. Were
the manufacturers realizing immense prof
it's? Were they the millionaires Of the land?
The manufacturers who had accumulated
fortunes equal to million dollars might be
counted on the fingers, and in nine cases
out of Ten these men, or their fathers, had
struggled up from the bottom. Who had
ever heard a manufacturer called q king?
Yet they heard OF cattle kings" and wheat
kings" and "iron kings" and cotton
kings" and railroad kings So, too.
they heard of trusts" and the President
had referred to them. But were they man
ufacturing trusts? There was the Standard
Oil Trust, the great Gogebic Iron Trust,
and the Coal Trust And yet there was
not a dollar of protection on anthracite
coal or oil, and none on iron ore that
would lead to the formation of trust. If
the sugar trust was manufacturing trust
it was the only one in the United States.
This was not the way in which manufac-
lures were developed. They were devel-
oped from humble beginnings by hard,
persistent labor and enterprise.
Mr.. Plat declared with n full under
u standing of what he said) that either the
VPresident III bis message intended free
trade, or else he was not dealing fairly
with the American people. The method
of reduction proposed by the President
meant the absolute and final destruction of
the protective system. 1t meant practical
and absolute free trade; so that the spirit
and result of the message led to the same
conclusion.
Mr.. Plat said he had shown that the
message meant absolute destruction of the
protective system; that it meant absolute
free trade. He now could not but assume
that the Democratic party intended to fol
low the recommendations of its COM
mander-in chief. He admitted the neces-
sity of some reduction of income, but he
was not to be frightened into an abandon
ment of the protective system by the Presi-
dents "raw head and bloody bones" figures.
AS to the surplus in the Treasury, he de-
MED that there was any necessity for such
an accumulation. The question of re-
dnction of taxation had very little to do