The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1890-09-19
A PLEA FOR PROTECTION.
WHAT 1T HAS DONE AND is DOING
FOR THE UNITED STATES.

Why Do People Come Here from Other
Countries?-W What Free-trade Is Doing
for Observation-Disclosures and Agri-
culture Bound Together.
The Free-trader asks, "How long shall
protective duties last?'-as if they were
evils to be put aside, or burdens to be
put IF as soon as possible, instead of ben
efits to be maintained so long as neces-
sary. A protective tariff discriminates
in favor of the people of the country
where it is framed, while tariff for rev.
enue only discriminates against them
and in favor of foreigners. The latter is
premium of discrimination in favor of
foreign manufacturers and foreign pau
per wages, and against our own manu-
facturers and farmers and better paid
workmen.
Protection does not establish monop-
oily, but breaks down foreign monopoly
by encouraging home competition. We
have already made our labor more pro-
ductive, elevated its character and made
the workman's life larger and richer
than any other nation in the world. All
the people in Europe feel and know this
to be the fact, and what is the practical
result? The total immigration from
the United Kingdom for 1887, accord
ing to the Statistical Abstract" of the
United States, shows 161, 748 people
who came here to better their condition.
l,n
106, 1865; Austria, &c, 430; Hungary, 10, 256;
Sweden, 1886; Norway, 1920; Italy,
1852; Russia in Europe, 2S,944; Poland,
6,12S; France, 5,034; Switzerland, 1914;
Belgium, 1858; Denmark, 1924. Total
Europe mot United Kingdom), including
many other countries whose immigra-
ton we do not here give, 9,705.
Why do these people come here? Be-
cause they expect amelioration of their
estate. Because they expect to be, and
know that they will be, better fed, bet
ter clad, better sheltered, with more
books, newspapers and public libraries,
and better common schools for their
children. Our savings banks are princi-
pally patronized by our working popula-
ton. What do they show? That in
1867 the amount of deposits in the
savings banks of the United States was
81 1886, 247 ,371; that the number Of de-
positors was 3,418,O13, with an average
to each depositor Of 1851.
Now how about British Free-trade?
Is it Free-trade2 For centuries England
was rigidly protective. Forty years ago
she adopted an inconsistent and decep-
tive approach toward a theory which no
tice, and she now says to America, "Adopt
Free trade, as we have, to improve your
material prosperity" That prosperity
would result we don't doubt, but it
would be British and not American pros
perity, as they would get the monopoly
of our markets and break down our
manufactures.
In 1S42 the noted tariff of Sir Robert
Peel was enacted. How much Free-trade
was there about it? Mr.. Gladstone,
chancellor of the English exchequer,
said of it: "It was an attempt to make a
general approach to the following rules:
First, the removal of prohibitions;
second, the reduction of duties on
manufactured articles and protective
duties generally to an average of 20 per
cent. ad valorem; third, on partially
manufactured articles to rates not ex-
ceeding 10 per cent; fourth, on raw
materials to rates not over per cent"
Peel himself said: 81 do not abolish
all protective duties. On the contrary,
the amended tariff maintains many du-
ties that are purely protective. as distin-
guished from revenue duties" The
tariffs of 1916 and 1916 were similar in
their general tenor, but of less conse-
quence; carefully protective when neces-
sary, reduced where no home interest
was hurt thereby, reduced indeed some
times to benefit home interests by giving
raw material cheaper to the manufact-
urer.
They levy duties on the goods Of other
countries, the tobacco of the United
States, etc., when brought into their
ports, and then ask that those countries
shall levy no duties on their goods. This
is beautiful freedom of commercial in
tercoursel There is today decided re-
action against the policy of Free-trade in
England, and Sir Edward Sullivan in his
work Protection to Native Industry"
severely criticises the present state of
affairs in England, and says Of the Brit
ish workingmen: ''The value of their
wages is diminished by the amount of
the customs duty charged on the neces-
sary articles of food they consume; and
the amount of their wages is reduced by
the free admission of foreign articles of
manufacture to compete with those they
produce. There cannot exist
the least doubt that our manufacturing
position is on the wane," etc.
With such testimony direct from Eng
land we are not very bright if we cannot
see that our American manufacturing
and agricultural industries are insepara-
bly, bound up together, and that prosper
GUS manufactures mean prosperous agri-
culture, and vice versa; that each con-
sumes what the other produces, and that
each is the best customer to the other.
Today the low price of labor and the
high price of living is driving the best
workmen in iron from England to com
pete with her in the labor markets of the
world. Of course the policy urged by