The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1888-08-09
Talks on the Tariff.

There Is q good tariff talk in Mr. Charles
+. Buelrs letter in the New Haven Paliadi-
,m 1t shows how the Southern free traders
absolutely give their own case away when
their own industries are concerned
Henry Clay said, fifty years ago let
me fix the value of the foreign merchandise
and l do not care what your duty il
During the period irom 1910 to lSGo the
South managed TO keep the duty on foreign
rice at ~ per cent. ad valorem, which means
duty of - per cent. on price fixed by the
producer.
+" This would be satisfying protection to
any Northern manufacturer, but the South
had still an additional protection by the op-
Grafton of law Of nature that is immutabe
They had slave labor, which is positive
prohibition to foreign imports, and it takes
the place of protective tariff in every free
trade country, for only cheap labor can COM
pete with cheap labor on equal terms and
with equal chance for profits in the markets
of the world without the aid of legislative
protection.
This shows the character Of labor that is
best adapted to free trade
This years report of the Rice Association
Savannah lis this rice trust p gives points
of interest and shows how carefully the
ground was looked over by Solihern protec-
tionists before attempting to force reduction
OF tariff and free trade upon every Northern
industry.
The report says that the per diem Of
slave labor did not much. if at all. exceed
twenty cents. Again ]; says since the
/ emancipation of slaves the cost Of labor in
the rice district ranges from foriy to sixty
cents for field labor and 81 for skilled labor
per day. SO that at no time since 1855 could
rice have been cultivated a a staple product
without the protection afforded by import
duties upon the foreign grain
This is orthodox protection and Is COM
I mendable. Why The United States Minis
ter at Pekin in his report gives the reason.
I He says: Coming now to the field hand
whom the farmer hires, the average wages
Z for able bodied men is SIP per annum, with
/ food-rice,-s,raw and shoes. Here is the
terror to the Southern rice gardener He
knows that deadly law viii operate against
him if legal protection i not given TO his
| pet product. He shows some Of the same
I instincts of self preservation of his Northern
brother when pui face to face with rice
producer who can sc, labor at four cents
/ day. and this too, in presence OF u fact
which is affirmed by experience that slave
labor in the South, when the system was at
the zenith of its glory, exceeded twenty
cents per diem
The report goes on: In hurnel the high
est permanent wages are fifty cents a month.
On the basis of tweniysix working days in
month here is 8 rate of scarcely two cents a
day for rice producing
But this is not all This report reci,es
that, in Borat men employed by the year
get eighty pounds of rice month and for
,y-five cents to 50 per annum.'
The report concluses The contrast in
this element Of cost should render unneoes-
sary any further comment than that without
the intervention of the existing import tax
on Asiatic rice composition would seem inn
possible.
This is true and no fair minded person
in the North would objec; TO the protection
which this southern industry asked for. and
because it was Southern. obtained ii"