The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1890-09-26
MORRILL, ON THE TARIFF.
EXTRACTS FROM THE SPEECH OF
THE VERMONT SENATOR.

The Pending Bill Designed to Give EN-
ployment to Larger Number of Labor
ers-A Large Free List-Protection for
the Farmer as Well as the Manufacturer.
The speech of Senator Morrill, June
80 was a most pleasant relief from the
time killing TRADES of the Free-traders.
1t is full of facts and figures sustaining
our Protective policy and favoring the
provisions of the pending bill. We ex-
tract as freely as our space will permit:
The bill now under consideration, in
several instances, as conspicuously in that
of tin, offers an increase of the duty, and
for the purpose of giving employment to
larger numbers of laboring men, for the
purpose of keeping at home and paying
out many millions of money which now
is sent abroad to the neglect of our own
natural resources, and which require no
more DAYS of actual work than an equal
product requires in any foreign country.
We have the tin ore, we have the iron,
and we have the coal. Then why should
we annually send abroad $29, 900, 900 in
gold for tin? / have no idea that the in,
crease of the duty will cause much, if
any, increase in the cost of sheet tin, and
feel assured that in no long time after it
takes effect it will be much lower in
price than it ever has been. Protection
will serve, as in the case of Bessemer
steel, to vastly cheaper the article.
1t appears, by adding to the free list
of the importations for the last fiscal year
the articles proposed to be placed upon
the free list by the present bill, that just
about one-half of our importations from
foreign countries will be absolutely free
from all customs duties-that is to say,
the dutiable importations will be dimin-
ished from $4S4, $50, 1877 to 1915, 1886, 1850,
and will increase those of the free list to
1856, 494 ,537 No other government that
relies upon revenue from imports for
its support makes so large share
nearly -half-free to all the world.
If the rate of duty covered the entire
importations it would be an average
duty of 81 per cent. Making SO large an
amount exempt from duty it becomes
necessary to impose higher rates upon
foreign articles Of luxury and foreign
fashions requiring skilled labor and con-
sumed by those able to support the bur-
den.
High as our customs duties may APP
pear to be they have not and will not
shut out the foreign merchandise of ma
lions where labor commands much less
wages than it does in America, nor
will they shut out the fact that our
American people never obtained general
merchandise at less cost. The i'll nat
ured denunciations poured out upon
manufacturers by our oratOrical Free
traders indicate that they prefer the
prosperity of the foreign manufacturer
to that of their own countrymen; and
they would compel the latter to manu-
facture as cheaply as any foreigner, pay
no higher wages or abandon their bust
ness. The real purpose is finally to
break down and degrade the present
scale of wages of the American work
ingman throughout the United States.
If our manufacturers were destroyed
VI SOulOC Cl4C LII Pun UCIo anu
manufacturers would prosper, though
American citizens should have to quit
their trades and learn to raise their own
breadstuffs or starve. How much would
farmers be. benefited by large increase
of their products with no increase of
consumers?
The leverage that lifts up Protection is
not really the demand of the manufac-
turers, which might perhaps be disre-
garded, but it is that of their workmen,
who must be paid the American rate of
wages, or their employers must abandon
their business Even the Democratic
national platform Of 1883 declared that
''our established domestic industries"
were not to be endangered, and that the
revision of the tariff should be done with
''due allowance for the difference be-
tween the wages of American and for
eign labor" This discussion thus far
does not show that any Democratic SEN
ator has the slightest sympathy or regard
for the doctrine set forth in their own
platform, and yet the facts remain that
there are such industries and such differ
ences of wages. Wherever they see Pro
lection they strike at it with Free trade
club
X
There has been a glut of misinforma-
ton disseminated concerning the cause
of low prices Of farmers products in the
United States, concealing the fact that
prices are depressed throughout the
world, and some robust Free-trade par
tisans have been reckless enough to
charge it to aProtective tariff, with the
vain hope of concealing the obvious re-
suit Of Free-trade, or of a revenue tariff,
which could not fail to sink the prices of
agricultural products to lower deep, as
the bitter experience of British farmers
abundantly proves. The only possible
remedy within reach of the American
farmer is positive Protection against
foreign competition, and such encour-
agement to other avocations as will in
crease the consumers of their products.
In England the opinion of those compe-
tent to judge is that one-half to two
thirds Of the lands under cultivation are
heavily mortgaged.
Farm labor, except in the time of