The National tribune., 1888-07-05
WHY WE ARE FOR PROTECTION.

sions, bounties and other allowances justly
due thN soldier.
2. Because it needs it to pay off the pub
lie debt, and relieve the people of the burden
of that enormous obligation, as well as of
the immense expenditure for interest. The
failure of the present Administration to de-
vote the surplus to this purpose forms grave
Indictment against it.
3. Because we believe the nurture and
development of all our industries is the
highest patriotism. We believe this to be
a duty of the same exalted nature as that of
entering the army to suppress the rebellion,
and that it is equally incumbent upon all
citizens. The suppression of the rebellion
gave us National unity, internal peace, and
the conditions requisite to allow every man
to win happiness and prosperity. Proper
protection against the pauperizing influ-
ences of Europe and Asia is highly neces-
sary in order to insure all our people receiv-
ing the full fruits of their labor, and their
development in material comfort and to the
highest grade of civilization.
All the rich and varied resources of this
country, with all their possibilities of wealth
and happiness belong to the fullest possible
extent to our own people-to the men and
women who have toiled and striven and
suffered to develop the country, who have
shed their blood in its defense, and to their
children, forever
We owe no obligation to any people under
the sun to enrich them at our expense, by
selling them our own crude materials at
starvation prices and buying their manu-
factured products at highly remunerative
rates.
Just as firmly as we believed that the
rebellion should be suppressed, at whatever
cost of blood and treasure, even so firmly do
we believe that every dollar of the $60O0Oo,-
600 which we send abroad every year for
manufactu ed goods, which we can produce
as well at Iome, and for farm products which
can be grown on our own acres should be
kept at home and paid out to our farmers,
mechanics and worBingmen.
If employment is to be given by us, or
money made from US to or by anybody, we
,rvo,,+ - -, T,o or,,- 49,, ,,.orJa
This is a matter of the same intense in
terest to every class of our people. Every
dollar that is kept at home and expended
for wages instead Of being sent abroad, helps
everyone of us alike.
No one has OF can have deeper interest
in this than the farmers, and especially the
farmers of the West, who are remote from
market. Since the first settlement of the
country the farmers have been the ones who
have suffered most severely from the alb
sence of home market for the consumption
Of their products. They have constantly
/ had to send the results Of their toll to dis
tant countries, at great expense, in order to
trade them for the goods that they needed
The greatness of this burden was continu-
ally in the minds of the far-seeing men who
founded and developed our Nation. Wash
ington, the Adamses, Jefferson, Madison
Monroe, Jackson, Henry Clay, and others oi
equal ability but lesser fame, necessarily
urged the necessity Of developing, by legisla-
ton and otherwise, that variety of produc
tiOn, which by supplying every need of Oul
people would increase the wealth of all, and
give every man higher return for his labor
There is no stronger Protection doctrine
taught anywhere than is found in tht
speeches and messages of Andrew Jackson
and the basis of his argument was alwayi
that it would enrich the farmers as a class
No one can successfully deny that to-da.
all that is best and most profitable in agri
culture in this country is the direct resul
of Protection and the development of hom
market, and all that is disastrous and un
profitable results from the insuficiency 0
that protection and the ruinous competition
which our farmers encounter in endeayorinI
to market their supplies in Europe. France
Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Ital
have shut out American pork and its prod
ucts on the most transparent of pretexts
the real reason being that it is the produc
on which there is most chance for profit, an
this they desire for their own citizens.
Germany Discriminate against our grair
but this is small matter compared wit
the competition that our farmers must Ell
counter wherever they try to sell their whea
and corn in foreign markets There the
meet the grain raised by the degraded SER
of Russia and the down-trodden peasants
Hindustan-men who are not so well fed {
, cared for as our cattle-and must take th
same for it after transporting it thousand
{ Of miles that these viii sell theirs for. 1t
l .l,is conn,etifion which denrasees the vaIr