Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1890-08-15

obstacles, and afford them a good
profit. In this case the farmers will
be worse off than before, in two differ
ent ways. Through withdrawal of
capital and labor they will raise smaller
crops; and it will take larger guam
tity of this smaller total to procure
the same quantity of this manufact-
ured commodity. The community
will be poorer, by the difference be-
tween what y could have obtained,
by means of exchange, when all of
its membIs were profitably employed;
and that lesser quantity that it pro-
cures by diverting part of its ener-
gies to the production of this commod-
ity at an increased expenditure of
labor There could be no increased
home market in any locality; for each
would have its own population, only;
and if it should obtain laborers from
adjoining communities, whatever in
creased market it would gain, the
others must lose. In the case sup
posed, should the labor needed for
manufacturing be imported, then the
community must support these work
men; all the latter car have must
come out Of the labor of the commu-
nifty; and all they can give in return
for it, will be the thing they manu-
facture; but since this will cost a
higher price than before. it must,
necessarily, cost larger share of the
produce of the community, to OBJ
tain it in the same quantity with the
result, that everybody in the commu-
nifty except the immigrants, will be
poorer by the operation. The garden
truck advantages would be utterly
insignificant. Such, then would be
the consequence of this alleged oper-
alton of protection, were its imagin-
airy benefits as impartialiy distributed
as its actual burdens.
Everybody knows that this is not the
case; the great majority of the villages
and smaller cities have no manufact-
uring; and if there is any such profit
resulting to manufacturing commu-
mites as is alleged, it is enjoyed by
the few at the expense of the many,
whose losses are actual, and whose
DlOllJ0 dlt ElCll DCllltll luCdllllCD
"home market argument"
If "protection tends IN any de-
gree to establish Industries in places
unsuited to them, it must be product
i've of general if not local loss.
Should it be contended that it pro-
notes their growth only in places
adapted to them; then the reply is, that
it is an unnecessary burden on the
people; for the industries could live
and flourish without it.
There can be no such thing as get
ting rich by increasing the cost Of
things; increasing the cost Except by
legalized theft is the result of in
creasing the amount of labor expended
in producing them; and when it costs
more labor than formerly, to make
an article, then not only the first
owner, but every subsequent one must
exchange more labor, or labors product,
to get it. If more labor than neces-
sary is expended in procuring any
commodity, then it is self-evident that
more Of the commodity could be had
if that wasted labor were properly
utilized.
In regard to the saving of trans
portation charges, it is enough to say,
that if the cost of carriage, in any
locality, is more than enough to over
come the disadvantages of manufact-
uring, and marketing the commodity,
procured by the payment of their eX-
cessive charges), by enough to afford
Il profit in manufacturing it in the To-
cality where needed, then some one
will go to manufacturing it, in order
to get that profit. In other words, if
it is found cheaper to manufacture a
commodity in community than to
import it, then it will be manufactured
there; otherwise not. When the nat
ural conditions for profitable manu-
featuring are present it needs no pro-
lection; when they are absent "pro-
lection spreads the losses over all
the people, makes them in-conspic-
uous; and its interested advocates
and delUded victims imagine they
have got rid of them, and transformed
them into profit.