Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1889-11-05
MISCELLANEOUS.
Protection and Agriculture.

The farmers throughout the icountry are
finally waking up to the fact that they are the
chief victims of the tariff robbery.
AT the last election, contrary to popular ex-
pcctation, the Democrats made large gains on
the tariff issue in the manufacturing centors
and lost in the agricultural districts. The
q tariff scare failed to work in the cities; but
it seemed to have had considerable effect in the
country.
Since the election, however, the farmers have
been studying the tariff question, and have
learned great deal about it, The more they
learn about 1t, the more clearly they sec that
the protective tariff Is a great injury to them.
= IN tho agricultural department OF tile Vsr-
mont Wdtchnidn. weekly Republican paper.
published at Montpelier, Dr. T. II. Hoskins
prints significant article ON tho low price of
butter. The doctor says that the butter mar
ket could only be improved by increasing the
export trade. But, hc says, IF we export
butter, we shall have to take our pay, directly
or indirectly. in the products of the nations to
which we sell it. No notion can or will uay
cash. and cash only, for staple foreign pro
products. for this tends to exhaust the store of
coin and bullion upon which the financial So
idity of all trading nations mast be sustained.
As the present commercial policy of the Union
is Que of high protection, we cannot take for
cign goods in payment for butter without al
lowing for the duties we must pay on those
foreign goods before we car put our hands on
them here. This viii reduce the returns of
foreign butter shipments very materially"
The writer says he is a protectionist. but
that he 'cannOt deny that protection is not
only favorable to the interests of the exporters
of farm products. 1t is not intended to be
that" he continues. :" but to give us good
and handy home market among our own in
dustrinl classes"
These remarks move the Eoening Post, of
New York, to present the farmers some facts
showing that the handy home market" is a
delusion. If It says with great truth
there is any farming district in this country
where according TO the protection theory, the
farmers onght 10 be accommodating wealth from
the good aad handy homfe market among our
own industrial classes, tits certainly the region
within range of City miles from Pittsburg
and its sister city of Allegheny" correspond
ent of the EceIling Post wished to buy farm
for relative in this very region-in the
southern part of Allegheny county within a
range of, say, twenty miles from Pittsburg.-
lie advertised in a Pittsburg paper. aud was
overwhelmed with replies. receiving commune
cations from no fewer than one hundred and
twenty eight persons by mail, TO cay nothing
of many personal solicitations. large por-
tion, If not majority Of these farms were en-
barrassed either with mortgages or Judgments
as shown 10y the county records, and the own
ers of the rest seemed generally TO be apprc-
hensive of similar troubles unless they sold at
ridiculOusly low prices While everybody ap-
peared to be clamorous TO sell, the intending
purchaser could not hear OF single sale that
had been made in msny months. Prices are
steadily shrinking, and farms have shruken in
value from 20 10 33 per cent. during the past
ten years. in what should be. according to the
protective theory, the most hourishing agricul-
tural district in the entire country.
The E1ening Post shows that q similar con-
dition of affairs exist in other eastern States.
Recently correspondent OF that paper de-
scribed the condition of some farming towns Of
New Hamphire. near the chief manufacturing
cities on the Merrimac river Within a few
miles of each other. around fhe great bend of
the river, from south 20 cast, are the cities of
Nashua, Lowell, Laurence and Haverhill Tie
farming towns Of Windham. Pelham and Hud-
son, n. b.. are situated within the bend. and
so within easy reach Of more than one good
aud handy home market But instead Of pros
porous farms. the correspondent counted on,
( the main road from Lowell to Wfndham, six
deserted sets offarm buildings. besides several
which had already gone 10 ruin. 'Fields and
pastures" he wrote, ere growing up to wood
houses in which generation ago sturdy man
hood and wommhood Hourished are gone TO
utter ruin in many school districts there are
NOT sufficient children to have a school. The
/ appearance is one of poverty and decay In
no part of New England with which am ac-
I quainted is the decay of the farming interests
so obvious and so complete as here by the man
ufaeturing cities.
( Col. T. W. Higgiuson bears similar tesd-
mony as to the statspf agriculture in Sfassa-