Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1891-09-30
HOW EUROPE BEATS US.
ART AND SKILL, NOT "PAuPER
LABOR"

How Art Schools Are Kept by European
Manufacturers - Our Competition Is
from Educated Labor-American Man
ufs cturers Do Not Train Laborers.
"I5 is entirely question of labor"
say the high tariff advocates in pointing
out what they consider to be the reason
why we need protection from Europe.
1t is The ''pauper labor of Europe" which
they hold up as the one thing to be
dreaded above all others by American
manufacturers.
But it is not so much the cheapness of
European labor as its skill and intelli-
gence which makes competition from it
formi liable. That skill is the result of
careful training in technical schools,
where the arts of designing and finishing
are taught by the best authorities.
What has been done in Europe in the
line OF industrial art education may be
seen from the following words from
French writer in Revue des Mondes:
Belgium has founded thirty-six in
dustrial schools, in which are given
every evening and on Sundays the ele-
ments Of a scientific and artistic knowl
edge corresponding to the profession of
those who frequent them. The number
attending exceeds $4,000. In both Eng
land ard Belgium the number of pupils
in proportion to the population is about
the saIne-that is, forty-two to each
1000. In Holland there are thirty-two
industr al and twenty-five professional
schools, attended by about 1000 pupils.
Switzerland has no less than eighty
seven schools, giving to apprentices and
workmen professional instruction. The
pupils number 5000.
I'm Denmark, a country of 1905, 461
inhabitants, there are seventy-seven
schools for professional instruction of
workme1, with more than 5000 pupils.
The technical school of Copenhagen
alone numbers no less than 1000 In
Sweden there are twenty-eight industrial
schools: that of Stockholm has 800
pupils. nore than per cent. of the pop
ulation of the town. Italy, which in
1885 had 1876 industrial and art schools,
with 6,274 pupils, has since then made
great pro gress, but she is suffering, as
England sometimes suffers. from an ex-
CESS Vi dIllCItS, anu THESE
must be disposed of at any price in or
der to avoid ruinous embarrassment
While the manufacturers of Europe
have thus been Strengthening themselves
by developing artistic tastes and skill i'll
their employees, ours have been relying
upon the strong ann of the law to hold
the precious home market for them
against all corners. AS yet they have
done nothing to educate their labor,
choosing rather TO copy the patterns and
designs OF goods which they import
from Europe for this very purpose.
The whole tendency of protection has
been to make these men, who are for
ever talking about our commercial in-
dependence of Europe" the most de-
pendent creatures in all the land. Our
best trade papers complain that our
manufacturers merely initiate European
designs and patterns, that they originate
little or nothing. Is not this because
protection has guaranteed them the
home market without a struggle: If
they had to stand on their merits, rather
than lean ON Mckinley, they would
have to meet European competition with
European weapons, those of training,
skill, art.