New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1888-01-17
WOOL IND WOOLLENS.

The woolen manufacturers are cruel After
the organs Of British opinion in this country
had displayed, in nearly every issue for five
weeks, many columns of interviews and re-
ports intended TO show that these manufacturers
were fairly wild with enthusiasm and delight
over the Presidents frce-trade message. the
manufacturers themselves have expressed
their opinion. The National ASSOCIATION, it
must be remembered, recently appointed a
committee to confer with similar committee
on behalf of the National Association of Wool
Growers, and, il possible. to unite in recon-
mendations regarding the tariff. The compo-
sition of the manufacturers committee was
hailed with Joy by Free Traders, who. not
realizing how some of these gentlemen had been
misrcpresented by "The Ncw-YorS Tines
and other such sheets, believed that clear
majority Of them would favor free wool, or at
the very least free carpet wool. 1t was dis
gushing to the friends of British trade to
learn on Friday that the two committees were
progressing harmoniously, on Saturday that
they had nearly completed their work without
the expected explosion or split. and on Sunday
that the two committees had unanimously
agreed to recommendations which, in effect,
The combined interests ask several changes
which are not in form provisions of the act of
1867, but which arc designed to restore in
practical working the measure of protection
which those industries enjoyed under that act
1t was shown by comparison Of figures on Sat-
ulday how grandly both industries had pros
pered under that tariff how the growers were
induced to increase production from less than
pounds per capita in 1860 to 5.4 pounds in
1882 and the manufacturers to increase their
production from 50 81 for each inhabitant to
SIS % for each inhabitant, imports meanwhile
declining from 81 90 to II cents per capita.
II would be strange indeed if growers and
manufacturers to whom these facts are per-
fectly familiar should fail to attribute the
great depression of the past four years to the
true cause-to the reduction Of duties and
laundering misadjustments Of the tariff Of
1883, foisted thereon by free-trade clamor
and mainly by Democratic votes
Having suffered from that change, having
seen imports of wool more than double while
home production and consumption both Of wool
and Of goods have declined. growers and man.
ufacturers unite in asking restoration of the
protection which Republican policy gave to
both. Changes in modes of manufacture. in
The Australian supply and the foreign price of
wool, In the means devised for evading duties
and most of ALL in the rulings Of Depart
ment all the time hostile instead Of friendly
to the act and to home manufacture, have made
il impossible to attain the defence once given
by the act of 1867 through rc-enactment in
terms Of that act without modification. The
changes proposed by the associated growers
and manufacturers. as set forth in Washington
dispatches arc framed to bring back precisely
the measure OF defence for home industries
which that act formerly gave and they form
high compliment to the wisdom of those who
more than twenty years ago. so adjusted duties
as to secure for growers and manufacturers
sixteen years Of wonderful development and
prosperity. If it were not folly to look for any
wisdom in Democratic House, it might be
hoped that the recommendations. supported
by such experience Of prosperity under efficient
protection, and of prostraton without it,
would have great weight