The record-union., 1891-02-19
AN IMPORTANT ISSUE CLEARLY
DEFINED.

average free-trader recognizes as protec-
ton is the kind that levies import duties
for the benefit of home industries This
favor Of We are in favor of that degree
OF protection which modifies the effect of
the industrial and financial conditions of
the older countries Of the world upon our
own. This modification must be reason
able in order to be just to unprotected in
dustries in our country. We therefore
levies import duties for the benefit of
home industries, and when such home
industries have received an adequate pro-
lection, that is, protection that will af-
ford reasonable guarantee of ordinary
profit, the rights of the manufacturers
cease, and the rights Of the purchaser of
his wares begin.
The Chronicle, however, proceeds to
say: ''If high tariff is imposed on an
article of foreign manufacture, the free
trader sees at once that that is protection
and he sets up wall proportioned to
what he conceives to be the ignorance or
credulity of his audience" The reader
should understand that the Chronicles
characterization of ''free-trader'' is in
tended to apply to all those who are op-
posed to the corporations and monopolies
of this country. 1t is the corporation and
monopoly demand that the tariff shall be
high, that is, that protection shall be af-
forded, not on the basis of giving the
manufacturer living show, but on the
basis of guaranteeing to him vast profits
at the expense of non-protected indus
tries, of enabling him in short to rob his
fellow-countrymen. The corporation
hirelings who masquerade under the
guise of protecting American industry
and incidentally protecting American
labor are fond of presenting the assurance
that domestic competition will take care
of exorbitant charges. This is the sheer
est nonsense. There is no such thing left
in the commerce of America as domestic
competition. Throughout the entire
realm of manufactures and commerce, in
stead of domestic competition there is
domestic combination, with rings, pools
and trusts. 1t is in order to make these
trusts effective that high protection is
sought.
Thus the issue clearly defines itself.
hut fo1 - 81, -, f.a-
traders in America. Some modification
of the effect of the industrial systems of
one country upon another is necessary,
and the American people are a unit on
the proposition that protective tariff is
the most convenient method of raising
revenue for the Government, and at the
same time modifying the effect of foreign
conditions upon domestic conditions. AT
this point loose-thinking people on the
one hand and the friends of monopoly on
the other join together and part company
with those who have some regard for the
rights of citizens not engaged in the man
ufacture of fabrics and wares. The farm
ers of this country have been absolutely
robbed by the high tariff highwaymen.
A reasonable amount of protection would
find ready assent among all classes of our
people, but when combinations, pools
and trusts eliminate the modifying influ-
ences of domestic competition, they nat
urally seek for unreasonably imposed
rates that their combination and trasts
may be made more effective; and it
is in the interest of such rings and trusts
that our pretended Republican contempo-
raries of San Francisco have been so solic-
itous in regard to high tariff
When, therefore, the Chronicle says
that the free-trader wants that kind of
protection which levies import duties for
The benefit of home industries, it states
the position of the so-called free-trader
fairly. When they indicate that high
tariff is protection, they state the position
of the trust people fairly. The Chronicle,
Immediately after this clear definition of
the issue involved, proceeds to take the
side of the rings and trusts, and yet it
has the temerity to pretend that it is
solicitous for the general welfare and is in
no sense the slave of the corporations.
Senator Stanford the head of the Re-
publican party in California, never said a
truer thing than when he declared the
issue between the two parties in this
country to be one merely of modification.
The Chronicle admits this when it says
that the free-trader recognizes that kind
of protection which levies import duties
for the benefit of home industries. That
is what the tariff modifiers ask for; but
the Chronicle, and few extremists of its
kind, oblivious to the fact that the election
of 1890 was clear and unmistakable
Waterloo, still contend for very high pro-
lection, and in that contention perform
the Office of menials for the American
trusts, which are impoverishing every
industry connected with the soil and
pauperizing the farm labor of this
country.
THE PAROLE SYSTEM.
Tt is gratifying to learn that as legisla-