The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1892-04-13
TALK FOR THE INFANT CLASS.


Whilst controversy with a man or an
editor who does not know anything about
what he talks or writes about may be at
times diverting, it is by no means edifylng
Therefore, when we have 10 deal with one
OF these who contends that There is no
manufacture in Rhode Island that would
not pay just as well or better in Nebraska"
as is remarked with a very wise air by the
Tribune OF yesterday, we don't know
whether to smile or to lament.
There was reason for establishing man
ufacturing concerns in New England,
which was that New England was adapted
TO that business, rather than to farming
lhere Is reason why the great west is de-
voted to agricultural pursuits, which is that
1t is adapted to that business, rather than
to manufacturing. In Rhode Island only
per cent. OF the people are agriculturists
ana IN Nebraska smaller per cent.
than that even are manufacturers. A
man In Nebraska has as good a
right to engage in manufacturing cotton
goods as man in Rhode Island has; but he
does not do it because even with the pro-
tective tariff in his favor, he could not com
pete with the Rhode Island factor. Why!
he Doesn't possess the facilities He is too
lar from the cotton market. and freights
would eat UP more than his profits. Be
sides, TO say nothing of the labor question,
the questions Of fuel and motive power
would alone decide the matter of COMPETE
ton. If manufacturing would ''pay just
as well or better in Nebraska, as in Rhode
Island, the Tribune may depend upon it
Rhode Island capitalists who. as our neigh
Dor admits, are filled with aggregated
wealth. would be on hand to engage in it.
"On the other hand,'' as our contemporary
just as truthfully acknowledges, me
braska is covered all over with mortgages. %
Nebraska is not adapted to manufac-
lures, as THE HERALD has said: It's water
courses are full of snags or are of shifting
channels, so they are unavailable for navi-
cation, flowing as they do through valleys
of loose soil. And so 1t is with the
streams of the west generally, whereas,
the New England rivers, though small,
have considerable fall and are sufficient to
turn the heaviest machinery. The Pawca-
tuck of Rhode Island, for instance, is
strung along its banks with Furnishing
mills and manufacturing villages. So with
Fall River and Pawtucket whose names
are SO familiar to western women as the
eat Of the sheeting and calico industries
OF the northeast. Massachusetts and
New Hampshire are similarly blessed, and
underneath the soil of each are extensive
coal measures, used for factory fuel, so
scarce in the trans-Mississipp region.
In Kansas, in 1889, there were $50, 600
farmers, whose earnings averaged $3.50
In 1883 the earnings of $4,000 persons en-
gagged in manufacturing employments in
Massachusetts were $780, 100000 or an
average of over $500. So it takes three
and one-half persons raising unprotected
wheat, corn and cats in Kansas, to equal
one person making protected cloth, blan-
kets and buttons in Massachusetts.
Our contemporary follows up its display
Of wisdom by this statement:
manufacturers son in Rhode Island takes
the means supplied him by his parent invests
it in a mandatory. and the best he can do is
not to make TO exceed or 10 per cent on the
capital invested. The boy in Nebraska takes
up 100 acres of land. He borrows money to get
team, a little seed and feed and utensils;
makes mortgage on his land, and it is not
strange that the boy in Rhode Island gets
along the faster of the two. But it would be
most difficult for THE HERALD or any other
newspaper TO show where. because of the man
ufacturers OF Rhode Island, tue farmer in Ne
4 braska has been wronged. or to show how,
could the manufacturers be burned up in
Rhode Island, the farmers of Nebraska would
be benefited.
The Tribune put very good case-the
Rhode Island rich manufacturers son
against the industrious farmers lad of
Nebraska; and it IS pretty rough one on
the latter. It is hard that the Nebraska
boy, IN addition to his toll against mort
gage, should be compelled to contend also
against a protective tariff, framed
to make the rich mans son richer
by the tolls be takes from the poor boys
clothes, his tools, his implements, his
knives and forks, his cups and saucers, the
plates be eats from, the sheets on his bed,
the glass in his windows, the lumber and
nails in his house, the shingles on his roof,
his harness, his shoes and almost every
thing that is his" The farmer in Nebraska
is wronged because he sells in an unpro-
tected market, and buys In protected one
and he can't help himself There's where
ne is wronged, Mr.. Tribune!