National Republican., 1888-05-03
FACTS FOR FREE TRADERS.
Representative McComas Emphasizes
the Protection Theory ana Practice.

that II any articles Of common use which
our farmers could not proiitably grow ~
our miners or worl,men produce was not
already ON the free list, he would vote TO
put It ON.
If any duty on amy home product were
higher than the conceded higher wages rate
Of this country, he would vote TO reduce n
TO the protective level, because he believed
the tariff was simply question OF wages
If 1t were clear that any clause fostcrcd only
monopoly, he would vote to strike II out.
If the majority would suffer the Rcpubl-
can minority to deal for one day only with
the problem Of the surplus he believed thcy
would, In that single day, reduce our annual
revenues SO, 900 by rcpcaling the inter
nal revenue tax on tobacco-a burden on
the farms IN 1900 counties and fifteen
states-hv repeating the internal revenue
tax on alcohol used In the arts, manufactur-
ing medicines aud drugs, aud by reducing
the tariff on sugar to q minimum, yielding
revenue enough to pay bountes to home
producers of sugar from cane. sorghum,
corn. and bcets.
The reduction Of the surplus was the pre-
text hut not the motive of the pending bill.
Mr.. ClcNclnnd's message and this found
ling, now called the Mills bill had q com
mon purpose. Both used the surplus Us the
fulcrtlm whclewith to apply the free trade
lever to dislodge the protective system.
Every free trader applaidcd both Every
protcctionist denounced both The De-
mocracy had under Cleveland, after forty
| years, renewed its allegiance to English free
/ trade. This fight was not over the details
| of this bill, but on the broad issue of free
| trade or protection.
Dared gentlemen 30 home and tell the
| people Of our land how thirty years of a free
! tradc tariff for revenue only had prospercd
| Great BntainY Even after three years of
| Democratic incompetent administration We
| had nothing like the industEal distress eN-
istiug in England. There was a wolf at the
| door Of the English wage Garner and an
| enemy at his ilrcsdr There was the figure
| of the luhorcr badly clad In his hovel living
| in want and Ignorance. Wages all over
| England were low and decreasing. Her in
dustIics were depressed by competition
some Of them could not survive Eighty
| thousand people were ont OF employment IN
| London alone. Women were selling their
| life blood working at half-penny an hour in
making cheap clothes and lately the count
less army Of the unemployed crowded Hay
market. Tens of thousands marched through
London strecte to Westminster Abbey call
ing for "Brcad or work"
The land was rapidly going out of cult
vation, and free trade had made wheat
| growing Improbable TO the English farmer.
! Within ten years 10000 acres, one-fourth
of the whole wheat area Of Britain had
! gone out of cultivation. Dairy farming
was eXtingislcd. The best of the farm
| population was crowding into the great
cities, no longcrcustomers. but competitors
| To the dOctrinaies II was pretty pastoral
scene: free trade England, a grass country
without gates, cropped tail horses and foxes
and bounds running on forever and ever
The bowling dervish of free trade, with
his cpilcptic froth over the mortgages on
western farms, should remember that while
mortgages on farms here were twenty per
cent. of their value, the mortgages on En-
glish lands were over 5S per cent. of their
value IN 1876, aud since then the value aud
income Of these lands had fallen of from
30 to 80 per cent. The number of farming
bankruptcies in Britain had increased six
times In ten years. The foreign trade might
enrich the Mugwump importers of New
York or Boston, hut II was home production
and consumption that enriched the farmer
Foreign importation enriched the few at the
expense Of the lnauy by gathering the profits
IN few hands-thc bankers, the merchants,
the agents, the shippers, those who dealt in
money and exchange. Home trade was ten
fold more profitable than foreign trade.
The American farmer has for years heard
the Democratic leaders dcnounce the tariff
as the bulwark of monopoly, the enlichcr
of a favored few whose products ought to
be on the free list. lie would read the
Mills bill to find that the farmer was the
robbcr baron whose products now went to
the free list, The raiser of sheep and the
grower Of wool was now the chief of sin
ncrs, and wool must be made free.
With dcmagogic zeal, salt, which costs 6
cents per capita, was hurried to the free
list, while sugar, which costs S257 per
capita, escaped lightly. The speeches for
this bill were the eXtrayagant speeches OF
forty years ago. The nccessares and con
vcnenccs of life were never so plentiful or
so cheap as to-day. The wages Of labor
were never so high in our country. The
poor mans blanket never was so cheap as
now, hut the poor mans wages were the
lowest in the states where most Of the mem
bcrs who support the Mills bill hail FROM
Cheap blankets and cheap salt were a
mockcry, If labor was cheaper still. Free
trade meant untaXCd foreign competition,
II chcapened a few things the workmen
consumed, but cheapens everything that he
produced Protection raised the price OF q
few things the worimcn consumed, but
raised the price of everything he produced,
and higher wages FOR what he produced
means higher standard Of life for home
wife, and children.
Since all foreign countries save England
mad adopted the protective system, free
trade for us could not open single port OF
market not now open TO us, but simply
opened our market to all foreign wares. w
would fall before the combined efforts Of
protective tariffs abroad and foreign com,
pettors at home. II was amazing TO hear
representatives from the southern states
unite to denounce the tariff when the soutl
most needed protection. New England anC
Pennsylvania, rich with the fruits of a gen
cral system Of manufactures, might wei
smile at the folly of these southern leader,
blinded by prejudice. The war cry of the
old south was slave labor and free trade
Slavery had gone, but these leaders of tn,
old south here on this floor fought for th,
English alliance and free trade once more
Free trade was still the dream of the ole
. south, whose cornerstone was the planta
tion idea, wide lands, an accomplished few
enriched by the ignorant many toiling fo
bare subsistence.
Passing to consideration of the Mill
, ill upon coal and iron, he said that the
simple device of emitting to specif,
bitumnous coal, repeating the law whicl
did specify ii and putting il on the free lis
. as "mineral substance In crude state,
would not long lie hidden from the new
south, concerned for its coal and iron.
He charged that since this bill was intro
duced our free trade treasury chiefs had
, by mere ruling, repealed the tariff Law
which protected coal. For n hundred o
/ years since George Washington signed tin
, first tariff act bituminous and semi
, bituninous coal of commerce had been pro
tected, All the semi-bituminous coal Of tn
Atlantic slope-the coal Of Maryland, Vir
, ginia, West Virginia, and much of the Goa
, Of Pennsylvania-ha been protected. Sud
denly in March the secretary declared tina
all coal with less than 90 per cent. OF vola
tile combustibc matter is anthracite, an,
therefore free.
. For the first time the Cumberland coal o
his state and the POcohantas coal of Vil
ginia were declared to be anthracite hy tn
treasury, though still called semi-bituminou
by all mankind.
+ He would vote to impeach the Secretar
Of the Treasury who had dared to usurp th
functions of Congress- who has boldly pu
bituminous coal on the free list in deilanc
of the law.
believe that the vast majority of our peC