Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1891-04-28
MARKETS OF THE SOUTH.
THE SOUTHERN TRADE AND REcE
PROcrTY.

Some Facts That VIII Interest.
Are American manufacturers wide
awake, enterprising class of men: The
current boast is that they are, that they
are the greatest on earth in that respect.
We fancy that the American bird-o'- free
dom spirit hes put rs beyond the 'efTete7
nonarchies and worn out nations of the
Old World.
Yet after indRlging our patriotism in
flights of tins kind we hear our manu-
facturers pleading that we cannot com
pete with these same .'effete" PEOPLES of
the Old World. We need protection.
they tell rs, else we shall have TO shut
up shop and starve because of the flood
Of cheap goods coming in here from
Europe.
But dc American manufacturers lack
enterprise: The assertion las often been
made authoritatively that they do. Only
last Iall. when the Mckinley law went
into effect, with very high duties on
stockings and other knit goods and many
idle knitting mills were starting up 10
get the benefit Of these high McKinley
duties, the New York Dry Goods Econo-
Erist warned the manufacturers that
many Of them were Cc5nei u failure
unless they got nd Of tae.r old 1ca-
chinery, that competition: at home from
the few mills that had modern first class
machinery would inevitably crowd these
Anticipated establishments 10 the wall.
and all the Mckinley protection could
not save them. This same journal.
which. however. Is an advocate OF pro
lection, has more than once complained
that our manufacturers look too little 10
the foreign market, seeking only 10 IN
load their surplus there when the home
market is glutted and when they wish
TO prevent break in prices here.
The manufacturers are occasionally
| told the same thing in their meetings.
| Not long ago there was a meeting Of the
| Boston Shoe and Leather exchange, at
which Mr.. D. F. Murphy, an enterpris-
ing Yankee merchant, now doing a
| wholesale business at Kingston. Jamaica.
made a highly interesting address on
| trade with neighboring countries south
of US, and showing why We have so lin
| tied a commerce there.
! Mr.. Murphy, in pointing out the reason
| why we sell so little TO those countries,
made first rate tariff reform argument,
exploding some Of the pet notions of the
protectiouists. He ridiculed the asser-
tion that we cannot compete with the
''pauper labor Of Europe, and gave ex-
amples to show its falsity. For years"
he said, 1--WE have raised in our magma
tons obstacles in our way of doing this
southern trade. First is, cannot COM
pete with the 'pauper labor of Europe.
l have sold crimping machines for TWEEN
| ty-fve dollars to thirty dollars made by
our high priced labor, as You call it, and
made a good thing. The pauper crimping
machine from Europe is not sold for less
than forty dollars. Boston letter copy
ing presses pay well, selling them at five
dollars each. Pauper made ones from
England cannot be sold less than seven
dollars. Boston stationery is now sold
where l am as cheap at retail as it is in
Boston The pauper stationery from
! England costs 20 per cent. more"
Mr.. Murphy gave the reason for this,
boldly asserting that we have the cheap
est labor on earth. He said: "In ous
! system of manufacturing our operatives
| perform but one part; that they learn
quickly. Machinery is well made and
nicely adjusted for that part; it runs
swiftly, but there is no changing of it.
On that special style man gets enough
to do month after month. The maxi
| mum amount of work is thus obtained
from the operatives and the maximum
output from the minimum cost of plant
each year. This is the case in shoes. in
cottons, Ill castings, glassware, furni-
! ture, agricultural tools. hats. leather. and
in the production of such goods / tell
you we have the cheapest labor per cent.
on cost of production there is on earth,
and we have also untaxed or Indigenous
raw materials for everything of our man
ufacture which the southern countries
consume"
Another claim of the protectionists
which was heard so frequently in behalf
of the subsidy and bounty bills at Wash
ingtOn was no less effectively disposed Of
Want of steamship communication
is another supposed obstacle 70 our doing
southern trade. The fact has been for
some years that to all the countries, say
as far south as the mouth Of the Amazon,
within that limit the steamship com
munication with the United States is
six times greater than that with all the
countries of Europe combined. | shall
venture to say that three-ffths of the
mails for Great Britain from that terri
tory now pass through the New York
postoffice Previous to the first of Jan
uary last postage to the United States
by unsubsidized steamship lines going
once or twice or three times week was
five cents per one-half ounce. Postage
by the contract mail lines of Great
Britain, going to Great Britain every
ten days, was eight cents per one-half
ounce"
Mr.. Murphy also denied the oft re-
peated assertion that English manufact-
urers have decided advantage over
those of the United States in the shape
of much lower rates of interest from
banks and could thus carry longer
| -.