Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1888-08-27

AUGUSTA, August %, 1888.
Hon. ANDREW T. WIswELL, President Re-
publican State Convention:
Sir-Important and imperative engage
ments in closing my connection with the
State Treasury and subsequent personal ILL.,
ness have necessarily postponed my formal
reply to your letter advising me that | was
nominated by the Republican State Conven-
ton as the candidate of the Party for Cover
nor. My first duty on my restoration to
ination with deep sense of the honor con-
ferred, and with sincere appreciation of the
responsibility which it imposes if it
should be ratified by the free choice of the
voters of Maine. The duties of the position
are so plainly manifest under our Constitu-
ton that l need not dwell upon them at
length. My conduct in the important offices
with which | have already been entrusted by
the State will hope give sufficient guar
antee of the faithful and conscientious dis
charge of all duties that may hereafter be
devolved upon me.
| agree most cordially with every principle
set forth in the Resolutions adopted by the
State Convention.
In our Federal system of government the
questions which are at issue in National
election so directly affect the interests of
each State that it is practically impossible to
hold State election the same year without
having first and special regard to the ques-
tons involved in the choice of a President
and of Representatives in Congress. The
vote of Maine in September will be her ex-
preston of opinion on the weighty questions
which are to be finally settled in the National
election of November
make no apology, therefore, for directly
calling the attention of the voters of Maine
to the leading and absorbing issue in which
so many of her material interests are directly
involved In the changes of duties
embodied In what is known as the Mills Tar
if bill recently passed by the Demo
cratic House of Representatives and
now pending before the Senate, the
leading interests of Maine are seriously,
and it would seem recklessly injured. The
products of our extensive forests, in which
so large number of our citizens are direct
ly and indirectly interested, will be subjected
to rninous competition if the Mills bill
becomes a law. That bill places all kinds
of timber, all varieties of manufactured
wood, all sawed boards, plaDks and
deals, slaves of wood, pickets and palings,
laths and shingles, clapboards of either
pine or spruce, and all logs on the free list
and invites the lumbermen of Canada to
take possession of the American market.
In addition to this the bill declares that hubs
for wheels, posts, last blocks, wagon blocks
oar blocks, gun blocks, heading blocks and
all like blocks or sticks, rough hewn OF
sawed, shall be admitted free of duty. If
these provisions should be enacted into law
they would prove serious calamity to the
whole State, but especially to our frontier
counties. In Washington, Aroostook, Pc.
nobscot, Piscataquis, Somerset, Franklin, and
Oxford it would enormously diminish the val.
ne of property and prove disastrous to all
interests connected with lumber.
Nor would the lumbermen of the State
suffer any more seriously than the farmers
If this Tariff bill be passed and goes into
effect on the first of October, as proposed
by the Democratic party in Congress, all
woods aud woods on the skin will be ad.
mitted duty free from all parts of the world
So also will all roots, and grains and
vegetables and all fruits, and all meats and
tallow, and game and poultry and milk and
beans and pease and seeds. Farmers in every
part of the State can see at glance how
seriously and how injuriously it will affect
them to permit all these products of Cana
da to come into our own markets as freely
as their own products do.
As if especially bent on shifting the in
dustrial interests of Maine, the Democratic
House of Representatives declares that all
stones, free stone, granite, sand stone and
Maine has such endless variety, shall come
in freely from Canada, and in many cases
BY reason of the nearness to the sea, the
stone of the Canadian quarries could reach
the markets of the United States more cheap
ly than can the product of our own quar-
ries and thus continually undersell us in our
own markets. And in addition to stone the
Mills Bill freely admits brick, also extern
sively manufactured in many parts of Maine
All the articles have thus far mentioned
are put upon the free list and are given
equal right in the American market with the
articles produced by our own citizens Many
other articles while not made entirely free
are to be reduced TO so much lower duty
that our manufacturers and our laboring
men will inevitably be sorely injured. The
duty upon all fabrics of cotton and
wool, both so largely manufactured in
Maine that they have created
prosperous cities in our midst, is greatly re-
duced, and the same with slate roofing, slate
mantels and all other manufactures of slate.
The duty on potato starch is lowered to one
cent per pound, which will prove almost
fatal to that industry, already hard pressed
by competition. In fact there is scarcely an
interest among all the varied industries of
Maine which is not involved in the wide
sweep of destruction which the Mills Tariff
bill threatens.
Not satisfied with assaulting the agricul-
tural, numbering, manufacturing and graz
ing industries of Maine, the Democratic
party in power has contemporary refused to
aid our navigation interests in the slightest
degree. If certain products of iron. an.
giles, bars, etc., could be added to the arti-
cles made free of duty to aid
ship building, the industries of Bath and