Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-01-01
Roger Q. Mills Addressed it at the Ban
uuaf Table

Roger Q. Mills Addressed it at the Ban
quet Table.
Boston, December 31st-Members of the
Massachusetts Tariff Reform League dined
this evening, the occasion being the annual
dinner of the organization.
Among those present were: Hon. Roger
Q. Mills, of Texas; Hon. Thomas G. Sher-
man, of New York; Edward Atkinson,
President G. w. Eliot, of Harvard College /;
Charles Francis Adams Hon. John E. An
drews, Hon. Robert Treat Paine, Hon. P.
A. Collins, and others.
President Pierce, of the League spoke at
some length on tariff reform, concluding as
follows:
In the light of what has been presented,
is it not reasonable to conclude that the
leaders of the political party whose corner
stone is protection are ready in its int er-
est, to sacrifice one industry after another,
and as many industries as may be neces-
sary, to cement an alliance which they
have formed with the wool-growers, the
iron masters and the coal barons of the
country?
1T is no small advantage that in the
struggle before US we have for our leader
man of moral courage, sterling honesty aud
straightfor wardness, the most Interesting
personality in American life Grover Cleve-
land"
Hon. Ed. Atkinson in his remarks said:
"All the reasonable advocates of protection
consider free trade the objective point
of their system, to be attained when the
time has come to make it safe. All reas-
enable free traders claim that true pro-
lection to domestic industry is what they
aim at. The only difference is on the time
of the concession. Why not begin now?
When mutual trust and confidence in the
sincerity of purpose of all who engage in
the work shall have been established in
the progress of legislation, we may then,
for the first time since 1861, be III a posi-
ton in which the true tariff question itself
can be entered upon by reasonable men, in
a manner consistent with common sense
and common honesty
More than one-half of the subjects of
taxation under our present tariff could be
put into the free list without diminishing
our revenue from the customs fifteen per
cent. in what they have yielded up to this
time.
II refuse to believe that representatives
of the great National Republican party, TO
which l was proud to belong for so many
years, have become so narrow and so
bigoted in their sectional feeling as to be
incapable of rising to the level of the pres
ent responsibility in a time of danger.
lican party who saved the country
from what, / think all reasonable men
now admit, would have been a politi-
cal convulsion, when they voted on their
personal convictions, but not with their
party, against the impeachment of Andrew
Johnson. Are there not now seven men
in the Senate and relative number in the
House who may at the present time be
capable of the same independent judg-
ment who may unite with theiI
party opponents in such a reasonable
and judicious reform of the tariff? ~
Among the utterances of Mr.. Mills were
these: History repeats itself, and we are
here tonight demonstrating with our Gov
ernment for its wrongful interference with
our private business; depressing our indus
tries, paralyzing our labor, impoverishing
our people, and cutting off foreign trade,
and tonight we say to Mr.. Harrison and
Mr.. Blaine, as our fathers said to King
George and Lord North, You have no
right 10 close our ports Grover Cleve-
Land. at the head of the Mohawks in De-
cember, 1887, threw the tea overheard and
called on the battle for the vindication of
the right. We had our Lexingtons and our
Bunker Hills in 1888, we had our Sara
toga in 1889, we shall have our Yorktown
in 1892. If restricting the purchase and
sale of our products to American markets
stimulates industry, cheapens production,
and increases wealth and WAGES, why
should it not be a wise policy to apply
the principle 10 each one of our States?
If it is productive of good TO forty-two
States it ought to be good to each one of
them. II is q question of political economy,
not of patriotic sentiment. If the principle
is correct, it will apply to small COM
munilv as well as large one. Why not
carry it to its logical conclusion and have
a Chinese wall around each State and
stimulate 1t to build up its industries, in
crease its wealth, and give better employ
ment and higher wages TO its own people
within each township, and trade among
themselves. To bring the home market to
perfection of the principle would be to wall
every man into himself and thus foster and
encourage him TO develop his own re-
sources.
in short time he would be sufficiently
developed to raise his own grain beef and
hogs, manufacture his own clothing, set
his own hens, and hatch his own chickens.
This policy means that man rises TO the
highest happiness when he expends the
largest amount of labor and obtains the
least amount OF product. When followed
TO its last analysis it is popular work and
no product. The best home market is the
one to which is admitted the largest i'm
portauon, because the largest Importation
means the largest expectation, and that
means an active demand for the articles
exported, and that means increased prices,
and that means increased wealth distrib-
uted among the consumers, and that will,
in turn, create an active demand for those
products which supply 80 per cent. of the
home consumption. An active demand
for home products creates a demand for
raw material and labor and raises the price
of beef and gives constant employ yment to
all classes of labor"