Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1888-08-09
THE PROTECTION OF WOOL.
A Forcible Presentation by
HON. ]. D. TAYLOR, Of Ohio,
In the U. S. House Of Representatives,
July t2, 1888.

the state of the Union, and having under consider
alton the bill III r. 9O51) TO reduce taxation and
simplify the laws in relation to the revenue
Mr.. TAYLOR said: At no time since
the war has there been introduced into
the American Congress bill affecting
disastrously so many industries as the
present measure; and certainly no in
dustry can be more disaStrOusly affected
than the one now under consideration.
The motion now pending is to strike
out of the bill the paragraph which
places wool on the free list. If this mo-
ton prevails the law will remain as it is
now; but this motion viii not prevail.
THE PRICE OF WOOL.
The first inquiry is, what effect will
it have on the price of wool to place it
on the free list! The President in his
message, the majority of the Ways and
Means Committee in their report, and
nine-tenths of the Democrats in this
House in their speeches declare that
wool is to be placed on the free list for
the purpose of giving to the American
people cheaper clothing. This is the
admitted object of the present bill by
Mr.. Mills, the chairman of the commit
tee, and by all the leaders of the Demo
cratic side of this House. But the Dem
ocratic papers of my State and some OF
the gentlemen who have spoken on this
floor say that the effect of placing wool
on the free list will be to increase the
price of wool. and that the price of wool
will 90 up instead of down, in case the
duty is removed. If this is true, what
becomes of the Presidents message?
What becomes of the report of the Ways
and Means Committee? What becomes,
Mr. Chairman, of the great cloud OF
Democratic speeches that have been
made on this floor in favor of cheap
wool and cheap blankets and cheap
clothing? l honor the Committee of
WAYS and Means for its frankness in stat
ing to this House and to the country that
the object is to reduce the price of wool
This was the object of the Presidents
message, and this is the aim of the tar
iff committee, and this will be its effect.
The assumption of the demagOgue
that protection does not affect the price
of wool because the price went down
constantly after the passage of the law
of 1867, vanishes in mid air in face of
the fact that from 1867 to 1888 the price
of wool in the United States has always
been as much higher than it was in Lon
don as the duty and the cost of trans
portatiOn. including also the premium
on gold prior to resumption. matter
how low the price of wool went down in
this country, the reduction in London
was just the same, and you can always
get the London price of wool by sub
tracing the duty and cost of transpor-
tation from the American price; or you
can get the American price by adding to
the London price the duty and the cost of
transportation. The only exception to
this rule is in cases where importers have
defrauded the Government out of the
lawful revenue, or where the Treasury
Department has permitted undervalua-
tion or unjust classification.
The price of wool, like all other prices,
was high during the war and for long
time after the war. Imitation affected
everything. Finally war prices gave
way to peace prices. When resumption
came lower prices came. But the price
of wool was affected by an additional
cause, the same cause that now affects
the price of wheat. The wool product
of the world greatly increased, and the
law of supply and demand had its natur-
al effect. The wool clip in India in
1870 was 30,000,000 pounds and in 1880
it was over 50,000,000 pounds. The
wool clip in Australia in 1860 was 55,-
000.OO0 pounds and in 1885 it was over
455, 100000 pounds. Several other coun-
tries have increased their f1ocks in about
the same ratio, and it is the increase of
the worlds product that reduced the
price of wool in this country as it did
all over the world, and if we had no pro-
tective tariff wool would go down in
price in this country substantially as
low as it is abroad.
Every time the price of wool has gone
down in this country it went down be-
cause the price had gone down in Lon
don; and the only reason that the prices
do not go down in this country as low
as they do in London is because of the
tariff and cost of transportation. Lon
don has become the greatest wool mark
ct in the world, and the bulk of all the
wool grown in the world is shipped there,
and the wool markets of the world are
largely influenced by the price in Lon
don. You may follow these prices all
along during all these years and you will
see that one is the counterpart of the
other and controls it, and if wool is
placed on the free list why should man
pay 25 cents for American wool when he
can get the same kind at IA or Is cents
pound in London? All this talk about
free wool increasing the price of wool to
the farmer is utter nonsense.
l am frank to admit, Mr.. Chairman,
that my object in opposing this provis-
ion of the bill is that we shall not have
low priced wool. 1 want the price of
wool to be increased. l want the law
of 1867 restored. l want the price to |
be higher than it is now. l want it to |
be commensurate with the labor, capital, |
and expense in producing it. And
want to say in this connection that the
main object of life is not to have things |
cheap; that the object of protective
tariff is to build up industries to give |
prosperity to the country, to equaliZe |
values and prices, and to give just and
liberal compensation to all men, and not |
to grind them down to penury and want
We can not grow wool in this country |
in competition with the people in Aus
tralia, South America, Asia, Africa, Tur-
key, and other parts of the world, where
they have broad acres of cheap lands,
where they have pastures which last all
the year through, where labor costs but
little, and where the people are only a
little more than half civilized. We on
ly grow about one-sixth of the wool |
grown in the world.
X
The talk that we need foreign woods
to mix with ours in order to improve the |
value of both is the merest twaddle |
There is no article worn by the sons or
daughters of Adam that can not be