The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1888-09-27
FIFrY CENTS A DAY;
Or, Letter to WOrklngmen, by S. ii,
NJ. Byers, Late Consul to Switzerland
and Consul General to Italy

/ some other things in free trade cour
! tries that are worthy the sober conslC
! Grafton of an American voter, II tha
q voter be wOrkingman.
o | seldom or never saw carpets In Tn
: homes of the working people, or pic
! lures, or cushioned furniture, or eve
table cloths at the dinner time. Yet a
= these articles are fifty per cent cheape
there than with us.
Why then are they not in use there
Because the wages paid in free trad
L countries will not permit it.
Fifty cents day is a good averag
. there, and you can't support famil
I and buy any luXuries with SO littl
. money.
The American voter is told that h
can buy all his clothes, furniture, etc.
much cheaper if he hal free trade thai
with tpriif. So he can, that is if h
, has anything to buy them with. FREE
trade don't make bread and butter ant
meat cheaper. and, with 5O-ccnt wages
there is nothing left after paying TO
these necessities of life to buy clothes
= furniture, etc, with, no matter how
cheap they are. 1t helped little that thu
fox offered the crow some fine chees,
for 4 song, for the crow couldn't sing
What gain is it to a workingman to ge
a suit Of clothes at half price and loose
two-thirds of his daily earnings
Clothes we buy occasionally only. Mea
and bread and butter we must buy
daily, and the 50-ccnt earnings are
quickly gone.
| never saw single workingman in
free trade countries ride in lirst-class
railway carriage, nor even in second
class carriage. Low wages won't allow
it. | believe | never saw a working,
mans wife own Il sewing machine in
free trade countries. They were very
cheap, too, owing to lOU-priced labor
there. but working people could not aI-
ford them. The Singer Sewing Ma
chine Company has Il factory in Scot
land, where it makes machines for less
than halt of what the same machine
costs made by the same company in
New York. But the Scotch working
woman can't own one, in spite OF It's
cheapncSs.
| never saw workingman's wife in
free trade countries wear silk dress or
a silk bonnet, and yet silk is made cheap
or there than anywhere else in the
world. 1t is made so cheap, indeed,
that were we to take 20 per cent off
| from our silk tariff this country would
be flooded with foreign silk made by
5O-ccnt labor, aud $4,000 American silk
operatives would be out of work in a
| fortnight.
Why, ! have seen $4,000 silk weavers
in Switzerland work for thirty one
Ccnts-a day. | have seen women spin
silk in Italy for fifteen cents Il day. The
| United States consumes hundred mil
lion dollars worth of silk every year.
We make less than half of it. The
cheap labor Of Europe makes the rest.
Knock off the duty, just a few per cent,
and cheap labor abroad will make 1t all.
In the meantime what becomes of
American wcavcrs? They don't know
how to farm, but they can become
tramps; that's all 1t is just so with
many other articles of merchandise
which we now manufacture by the mil
lions and pay good wages for the labor.
Knock Of the duty, let the j0-cent work
in, we can't compete with that, and our
factories will close up, our people be
out of a job. That's all there is to the
question.
The cheap laborcrs of Europe never
put a yard Of the silk on their backs
they make with their own hands Fif-
ty-cent wages won't permit it, 1t is a
matter for reflection. | rarely saw a
wOrkingman in free trade countries
carry a watch. Yet. owing to low
priced labor, watches are so cheap there
that, were our duty on imported ones
removed they could in six months
break up every watch factory in the
United States, and tens of thousands of
skilled American workmen would be
out Of job. They too, could com
mence tramping. An American watch
manufacturer pays his hands ) to SO,
and even 81 day. A Swiss or French
matchmaker pays fifty cents. Who
could stand competition like that?
! have attended public meetings
abroad where the universal prayer was
that the United States might adopt free
trade. Why? Simply that they might
kill Us with cheap labor,
All the magnificent machinery ever
invented in the United States canno'
compete with the under paid hand labor
of the Old World. We have been try
ing it for twenty years. There is
scarcely an article made by machinery
in this country that is not made almost
as chcaply by hand in Europe or, if
machinery is advantageous, they sim
ply initiate our inventions, make them
for half what we can. and so beat us in
the end.
There is no puzzle about it, The
men who do good work for the lowest
wages get the job. Europeans can
work for fifty cents a day and live, in a
I',.,, A,,,,,i.nn
would mean starvation.
The workingman in free trade coun-
tries is homeless. 1t was an eXtraord-
nary case when | saw workingman
living in his own house. How could a
man earning but fifty cents day buy
home' The savings of twenty-five
years would not make it possible. In
fact there are no savings as Il rule.
Workingmcn in Europe are not trou-
bled much with the "surplus,n and
savings banks and deposits" and
al. that. They hardly know what the
words mean.
Two hundred dollars a year is a very
big average for mechanics abroad. A
family averages five persons. support
that family with the bare necessities of
life, and what remains over to buy a
home with? Not a red cent. We are
told that free trade would not. in itself,
reduce wages in this country to fifty
cents. Why not? Won't the world buy
its goods in the cheapest markets?
What man will pay from two to three
dollars to have an article made at home
when he can have the same article
made abroad for fifty cents? If made
abroad, where is the employment for
the man at home? He, too, must make
that article for fifty cents or do without
work. lie, too, must work for low
wages or he must work for nothing
We imported last year 100000, 900
worth Of merchandise from abroad, I'll
we did that under a high tariff what
would we do under free trade2 An
swcr; We would swamp the whole in
dustries Of the United States. And
then what? Answer: Fifty cents day
or nothing Probably nothing.
There is great question staring us
in the face. 1t is not Republican prob
lem, nor Democratic problem. 1t lisa
question Of simple business. DO we
want to risk fifty cents 4 day? That's
all there is to it. Low wages, besides,
means low living. 1t means poverty
and it means ignorance; and these two
things put man at the foot of the ladder.
and there hc will stay. No European
workingman, with his free trade and
low wages, thinks Of getting up in the
world. Who ever saw workingmen in
Europe filling offices, aud their wives
and daughters in society, or themselves
respected and honorcd? Nobody.
WOrkingmcn are not respected there.
Cheap labor is not respected anywhere.
Ihnre Is lhn Mnrsl Hmm of Ill nhnml