Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1888-08-24

times as much as the average wage-work,
under a mere revenue tariff.
But the Democratic advocate of Ere
Trade thinks that he can escape from tt
crushing force of these figures by his favoril
cry that these earnings of the laboring me
in New York and New England have bee
made at the expense of the agriculturl
States in the West. first ans yer that mar
ufactures are so rapidly spreading that ther
are no longer agricultural States in fh,
sense in which that term was use
generation ago. Under protective txri
manufactures are springing mp everywhers
and already some States in the West, (uota
bly, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois,) have a
annual product from manufactures amount
ing high up into the millions. But | have n
need to interpose the manufacturing interes
in stating the progress and development o
the West, for in the twenty Eight years o
protective tariff, wealth has increased in
far greater ratio in the agricultural States o
the West, than in the seven manufacturin
States which have adduced in the East. Ii
1861, for instance, the six Western States o
Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Kan
sas and Nebraska, had a population of tw,
and half millions, (2,500 600 aud an
aggregate wealth BY the census of 1860, O
eight hundred and seventy millions of dollars
(Ss10, ,oOo.000.) 70 day they have . popu
lxtion of perhaps eleven millions, al 600,
900, the equal of New York aud the Who'll,
of New England We cannot give the sta
tistics of aggregate wealth, either in th,
West or East, later than the census of 1880
but in the twenty years between 1860 aue
1880, these Western States had increased
their aggregate wealth from eight hundred
and seventy-fve millions, (SS7o, ,000, 200, J
to six thousand three hundred and
seventy millions, (S6 ,375 ,00Q, ,0o0) - al
increase of more than seven fold. New
York and New England had three times the
population of these Western States in 1850
with an aggregate wealth Of thirty sever
hundred millions, (s3, 700, 900 ,000.) Today
the population of these States is about the
same as that of the six Western States, while
their wealth in the TIVE enty years between ls6O
and 1880 increased only three fold amounting
in 1880 to eleven thousand two hundred and
eighty six millions, (Sll 1856 ,000,0 ,000.) The
ratio of development between the manufac-
turing States of New York and New England
has therefore not been one-half SO rapid al
the six agricultural States named. They
have not, it is true, the same amount in cash
W tlt tItuit VI tieL hSis, uut
have it in great and fourishing cities, in long
lines of railway an improved farms, in new
towns, in the prodigious products of grain,
in the countless increase of tiocks and herds,
the whole constituting an increase of agricul-
tural wealth to which the experience of the
West under Revenue Tariff bears SO slight
a comparison that it can hardly be stated in
figures.
Lastly the objection to the conclusions |
present comes from the Southern democrat,
who, forgetting the true interest of his sec
ton. is urging the revival of free trade.
He considers that his section has been robbed
for the benefit of the North and hugging
this delusion he strives to place the Union
back under the old Free Trade system of the
aute befium period and yet the benefcent
effect of protective tariff can be even bet
ter illustrated by the recent history and de-
velopment of the South than by the progress
of the North. BY the census of 1860, seven-
ty -one years after the Federal government
was organized, the Southern States, or to
more accurately describe them, the slave
holding States of the Union, had acquired
property amounting in the aggregate to six
eight hundred millions of dollars
{ Sc, 500, ,000,00O.) One third of this total
or certainly over two thousand mil
lions of dollars $4,000, ,000) was reck-
oned as the value of negro slaves. Eleven
of these States went into rebellion, at the
end of which they had lost the institution Of
slavery with all of its assumed money value :
they had used up four annual crops for war
purposes; they had lost all their ready money
and their stocks they had lost a quarter of a
million of the youth of their land and had
disabled as many more; they had subjected
all their fair and blooming section to the
the blighting and devastating influence of the
sword to as great degree as the Seven Years
War had afflicted Prussia or as the Napoleon
ic struggles had withered France.
Coming out OF the war in 1865 defeated,
almost destroyed, the Southern
people set to work under the influence of the
Protective system, made good the two thou
sand millions $4,000, ,000,000) which they
had lost IN slaves, repaired the ravages and
damages of war and in the short space of
fifteen years they had acquired, by the GEN.
sus of 1880, twenty-one hundred million dol
lars (S2, 100, 900, ,000) of property more than
they had possessed by the census of 1860.
If the financial and industrial condition of
the South could be ascertained today they
would be found to have two and half TO
three times as much property as they had on
that direful day when they rashly fired on
Sumter.
Nor must omit in this hasty review of
the condition of our common country under
a Protective system to call your attention to
our splendid States on the shores of the Pa
citc. In 1860 the mines of California had
greatly diminished in value, immigration had
fallen off, agriculture had not yet been large
ly developed, manufactures were not fairly
started. The total property of California
and Oregon was but two hundred and thirty
three millions of dollars (S233 900 ,000.) A
new career opened to them with the enact
ment of the Protective tariff in 1861. The
rancho, the farm, the vineyard, were every
where developed and cultivated. Manufac-
lures grew apace and the region which few
years before had been one great miners
camp became one of the most
prosperous and promising of the
whole Union. California and Ore
gon had in twenty years by the census
of 1880, added more than twelve hundred
and fifty million Of dollars, Isl $50, 200, ,000)
to their wealth and have been accumulating
in far greater ratio during the last eight years,
of whose results we have yet no official returns
Besides an immense product of cereals and
an enormous growth of wool, California il
entering upon the cultivation OF the tropical
fruits which have been borne to us over both
oceans, and if not arrested in her material
progress in the workshop and on the farm and
in the orchard she will acquire prestige and
wealth which will put her in the front rank
of the states of the Union. Imperial in eX-
tent our Pacific slope is destined to be i'm
perial in the strength and splendor of her full
development.
Fellow Citizens of Maine, have said
nothing as yet specifically concerning oul
own state 1t is not in fact needful to thou
sands of Witnesses to the progress which
she has made since 1860. Upheld encouraged
stimulated by the Protective system, Maine
has increased her wealth more than three fold
and is daily progressing in an even more rapid
ratio, But our progress is now to be arrest
ed. our prosperity threatened by the recon-
mendation of the President of the United
States and the action of the Democratic part,
in Congress.
The tariff bill which the Democratic
House has sent to the Republican Senate i'm
pairs every industrial interest in Maine, anc
even threatens the destruction o.
some. From the granite quarrie'
on our coast to the lumber
camps in our forests, from the cotton facto
ries Of York and Androscoggin 10 the starch
factories of Aroostook, from the wool-grow
ers of the hill country to the lime burner
on Penobscot bay, every pursuit of our peo
l.