Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1890-01-24


The steel rail and other metal connected there
with involved so vast a sum Of money that 1t
could not have been raised to send out Of the
country in gold coin. The total cost could not
have been less than g., 000, 000, 900 We had
large interest to pay abroad on the public
debt, and for nine years after 1870 gold was
at a premium in the United States. During
these years nearly 10000 miles of railway
were constructed, and to import English rail
and pay for it with gold bought at large
premium would have been impossible. A
very large proportion of the railway enter
prises would of necessity have been aban-
doned if the export of gold to pay for the rails
had been the condition precedent to their
construction. But the manufacture of steel
rails at home gave an immense stimulus to
business Tens of thousands of men were paid
good wages, and great investments and great
enrichnents followed the line of the new road
and opened to the American people large
fields for enterprise not heretofore accessible.
The grain growers of the west and the
cotton growers of the south will observe that
Mr. Gladstone holds out to them cheerful
prospect They SHOULD produce more cereals
and more cotton at low prices"i Mr. Glad
stone evidently considers the present prices
of cereals and cotton as "high prices"
Protectionsts owe many thanks to Mr..
Gladstone for his outspoken mode of dealing
with this question of free trade. He gives
us his conclusions without qualification and
without disguise. The American free trader
is not so sincere. He is ever presenting half
truths and holding back the other half, thus
creating false impressions and leading to false
conclusions. The western farmers instinct
is wiser than Mr. Gladstone's philosophy.
The farmer knows that the larger the home
market the better are his prices, and that as
the home market is narrowed his prices fall.
Mr.. Gladstone makes another statement Of
great frankness and of great value. Com
pairing the pursuits in the United States
which require no protection with those that
are protected, he says mo adversary will,
think, venture upon saying that the profits
arr larger in protected than in unprotected
industries" This is very true, and Mr.. Glad
stone may be surprised to hear that the con-
slant objection made by American free
traders against the protected industries" as
he terms them, is that the profits derived
from them are ilegitimately large.
Mr. Gladstone makes another contention
in which, from the American point of view,
he leaves out of sight controlling factor,
and hence refers an effect to the wrong cause
Regarding the advance of wages in England,
he says; Wages which have been partially
become both generally and absolutely higher,
and greatly higher, under free trade" do
not doubt the fact, but venture to suggest
that such advance in wages as there has been
in England is referable to another and pal
pablo cause-namely, the higher wages in the
United States, which have constantly tempted
British mechanics to emigrate, and which
would have tempted many more if the induce
ment of an advance in wages at home had not
been interposed
ENGLAND EMPLOYS PROTECTION WHERE
NEEDED.
The zeal of Mr. Gladstone for free trade
reaches its highest point in the declaration
that AL protection is morally as well as eco
nomically bad" There is protection on sea
as well as land. Mr.. Gladstone, while
chancellor of the exchequer, carried through
parliament a bounty of 91SO,OOO to a line
of steamers running between England and
the United States-a protection that be-
gan six years before free trade was pro-
claimed in English manufactures and con-
tinued nearly twenty years after. In the
whole period of twenty-five years an aggre-
gate of many millions of dollars was paid out
to protect the English line against all com
petition.
Does not this justify the opinion that the
English policy of free trade is urged where
England can hold the field against rivals and
that when competition leaves her behind she
repudlates free trade and substitutes = most
pronounced form of projections
1t will not escape Mr.. Gadstone's keen OBJ
servation that British interests in navigation
flourish with less rivalry ami have increased
III greater proportion than any other of the
great interests of the United Kingdom. | ask
his candid admission that it is the one interest
which England has protected steadily and
deterninedly, regardless of consistency and
regardless of expense. Nor will Mr.. Gladstone
fail to note that navigation is the weakest Of
the greatest interests in the United States,
because it is the one which the national gov
eminent has constantly refused to protect
We really feel much afraid of protec-
ton al sea as Mr. Gladstone is of protection
on land. The positions of the American con-
gress and the English parliament on this sub
ject are precisely reversed. England has
never been aifrghted by the word subsidy,
and, while we have stood still in impotent
fear, she has taken possession of the seas by
the judicious and even the lavish. inter-
position of pecuniary aid
FARMER AND LABoRER GET THE BENEFIT
Mr., Gladstone feels sure that, though the
protected manufacturers in the United
States may flourish and prosper, they do so
at the expense of the farmer. Both Mr.
Gladstone and the American free trader
have, then, the duty of explaining why the
agricultural states of the west have grown
in wealth. during the long period of protec-
ton at more rapid rate than the manu-
featuring states of the east.
In 1850 eight manufacturing states of the
east returned an aggregate wealth of S., 1884,
0OO,OOO. Twenty years afterwards, by the
census of 1880, the same states returned an
aggregate wealth of Sl62 100000 The
rate of increase for the twenty years was
slightly more than 2l6 per cent In lS6O
eight agricultural states of the west illinois,
Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Mime
sofa, Nebraska and wisconsin, returned an
aggregate wealth Of 81, 27l 900, 900 Twenty
years afterwards by the census of 1880 pro
lection all the while in full force, these
same states returned an aggregate wealth Of
81 ,26S, 100000. The rate of increase for the
twenty years was 1876 per cent.
The case will be equally striking if we take
the fifteen southern states. The rate of in
crease for the twenty years was 50 per cent