The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1889-09-26
UNPRINoIPLED POLITICS.

UNPRINCIPLED POLITICS.
The country is now witnessing a deg
rading and shameful phase Of our poll
tics. Smarting under the crushing de.
feat of Cleveland aud the Mills bill, the |
free-trade leaders are attempting to di-
vide the friends of protection by desper-
ate falsehoods and reckless misrepresen-
tatious. Taking advantage offs few fail |
ures in the wooden and iron trade, they |
now assert that protection is running the |
wooden and iron business; from which |
there is no relief or escape except by
putting wool, iron ore and crude iron on
the free-trade list. 1t is now known to
all intelligent men that wooden failures
we're caused by bad management and
not by the tariff; that other and large
wooden mills are running with success
and earning handsome profits; that the
most serious danger and dlthculty the
wooden mills have met was the unjust
ruling of the Cleveland administration,
which admitted a flood of worsted and
wooden goods; that since that ruling
was reversed the wooden trade has re-
ceived a new impetus and brighter
prospect. The free trader claim that the
wooden business is being ruined by the
tariff on wool is an essential falsehood
contradicted by twenty years expert
ence and the testimony Of majority of
manufacturers, who refuse to join in the
cry for free WOOL" knowing well that
this clamor against the wool tariff is
raised to destroy the tariff policy and
not to help the manufacturer. To un
derstand and appreciate the hypocrisy
of thissympathy with the manufacturers
and the double game the free-trade lead
ers are playing, our readers should re-
call the last presidential canvass and
the stump speeches made by the Cleve-
land speakers. They sung different
tune then, Then, the manufacturers
were denounced as "monopolists, tar
if robbers, " "millionaires," privileged
plutocrats, who were amassing large
fortunes at the expense of the consumer
and the farmer. They appealed to the
farmers and the wool growers to join
them in reducing the tariff on wooden
goods to secure cheaper clothing for all
the people. Cleveland in one of his let
ters denounced the tariff because it
enabled the manufacturers to make ex-
cessive profits and fortunes, They made
these false representation to reconcile
the wool growers to the Mills bill, which
put their wool on the free list. They
also claimed that the tariff had reduced
the price of their wool and that free
trade would restore its price. This was
the attitude and argument of the free
trade speakers one year ago. The manu-
facturers, they claimed, were enjoying
an Legitimate prosperity produced by
unjust favOritism, were growing rich
and powerful, while the poor man was
becoming poorer. Prominent among
these free-trade advocates, who uttered
these ACCUSATIONS against the manufac
turers in that campaign of falsehood and
fraud, were the mugwump leaders,
the especial champions of reform" and
purity" They we're furious against
the tariff robbers" and the "woolen and
iron kings" and the protective system
that allowed the manufacturers to &C.
cumulate enormous fortunes by taxing
the people, This style of falsehood and
abuse has been kept up for fifty years
by the Southern leaders and echoed by
their northern allies" in every presi-
dental contest. Now, if the accusations
made year ago were true, then what
shall be said of the character of the men
who to-day are declaring that "protec-
ton does not protects" that the tariff is
running the wooden and iron man ufac
lures; that they cannot make money be-
cause "raw materials" are taxed; that
they are always struggling against the
fatal effects of wicked tariff system.
II these men told the truth in the presi-
dental campaign then they are lying
now, for both positions cannot be main
tanned. The tariff system is the same
the wool tax has not been changed /;
the wages of the workingmen
have not been raised. Yet, one year
ago, the manufacturers were rolling in
wealth and pilling up enormous profits
rung out of the people, while to-day
these same manufacturers are running
behind and losing money; are sinking
into bankruptcy and ruin. Then, the
manufacturer was a "bloated arristo-
crat" and tariff baron" unworthy of
sympathy and add now he is a suffer.
ing patriot and martyr, crushed by the
cruel wool and iron taxes. How are
these Inconsistencies and dishonest posi-
tions to be explained The explanation
is obvious. These leaders are hardened
partisans of the rankest type. They
spoke in the presidential canvass, as re-
tanned attorneys on the free-trade side.
The mugwump leaders added to the
crusade the bitterness and rancor which
apostates always feel toward the cause
they have betrayed, These advocates
spoke for effect and not for truth; they
appealed to the farmers with one argu-
ment and to the manufacturers with an
other and different one; they spoke t o
gain political victory by dividing the
protective forces. They speak now with
the same purpose-to break the union OF
the farmers and the manufacturers,
They want to put wool on the free list
not 10 help the manufacturers, but to
use free wool as a wedge to destroy the
tariff system and establish free trade.
The same men, who are now pleading
for free wool to help the manufacturer
as soon as that end was gained, would
turn around and strip the manufactures
of all protection and leave him at the
mercy Of European competition. This
free-trade crusade has been constant
deception from the FIRST full of lodges,
sophistries, Inconsistencies, brazen m ls-
representations and sectional animosi.
ties. Conspicuous in this campaign OF
duplicity and malice are the mugwumr
advocates of "reform !"~Norh adams
Transcript.