The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1892-08-25
PROTECTION AND STRIKES.
Congressman Dingley on the Homestead
Trouble.-Wages There and Wages in
England.--A Democratic Speaker An
swered.-The Tariff Question in Nut
shell,
fAuburn Gazette.l

A Gazette reporter called this morn
ing on Congressman Dingley who return
ed home last evening, and left today to
continue his speaking in the campaign,
and asked him to be kind enough to
state the Republican view of the Home
stead troubles.
''To what phase OF those troubles do
you refer?'' asked the congressman.
81 refer to the Democratic claim that
these troubles are the result of the pro-
tective tariff, and that this tariff gives
Mr.. Carnagie power to fix high prices for
his products and then to compel his en-
ployees to accept low wages"
'Obviously," replied the congressman,
s'protection lessons the incentive to
strikes in this country because wages are
much higher under it here than in free
trade England. The Homestead men
were offered more than 70 per cent in ex-
cess of what similar men receive in
Great Britain. When the troubles arose,
the lowest wages offered were $1.40 per
day, and the average was over So. 90 per
day. For every $1.70 paid at Home
stead, similar working man in England
receives only 81.
s'Truly the fact working man who
receives ST. 70 here under protection, for
doing what is paid only 81 for in Eng
land under free trade, strikes for higher
wages by no means show that protection
provokes strikes-as the free traders
contend. It simply shows that strikes
are the Internationally blindly pur-
sued-of that laudable ambition of every
man to do still better for himself than he
is doing. AS matter of fact strikes are
proportionately much more numerous in
Great Britain than in this country.
Indeed Col. Oates, the Democratic
chairman of the committee, sent by the
house to investigate the Homestead
troubles, told me that he was amazed to
find the wages at Homestead so high and
the condition of the workingmen SO
good; that the real cause of the trouble
was not SO much wages as the want OF
exercise of reasonable Cancellation.
'sAs to the claim that the tariff gives
the Homestead owners the power to fix
their own prices for their products and
to pay what they choose for their labor,
it is sufficient to say that there are thous-
ands of establishments in this country
making the same articles that the Home
stead mills make, and competing with
those mills, and any one with grain OF
business sense knows that this sharp COM
petition forces prices down to the lowest
possible figure If the manufacturer of
such articles got more than capital re-
ceives in other industries, there would
be thousands of new mills start at once
and force prices down to the lowest llv-
ing standard. 1t isn't in the power OF
the Homestead owners to fix the prices
of their goods, any more than 1t is the
power of one Auburn shoe manufacturer
| to fix the price of his boots and shoes.
One must sell as low as another will,
and all must sell at the lowest possible
margin OF else not sell at all under the
fierce conflict of competition.
''The duty on competing Imported
| products does not determine the price of
similar American products. There is
duty of 80 per cent on imported Gotten
prints but the American manufacturer
sells his prints as low as they are sold in
| England because home competition com
pels him to do SO.
ssThe duty simply holds the home mar
ket for our own Industries, but the price
is made by domestic competition regard
less of the duty where it is protective.
81 notice that some Democratic
| speaker is reported as having cdAeu dl-
tention to the fact that the duty on i'm
ported steel rails is about s14 per ton,
and that the digerence in labor cost of
production is less than that. and then to
have trinmphantly asked, WHO gets the
rest of the duty?'' The truth is, that no.
body gets it, for the reason that domestic
steel rails are frequently within $5 per
ton of the English price, and never $40
more. OF course. if there was no duty
on imported steel, then we should have
to either force our wages in that industry
| down to the English standard, or else
give up the industry.
again, any rejecting man with bust
ness experience knows that it is not
| in the power of the Homestead Co. to
obtain labor for their mills unless they
| pay American wages and not English
wages. Every manager of an industry
| must pay our standard of wages or else
| 90 without men. If the Homestead mills
were not to-day Offering as high wages
! as similar skill obtains in other employ
ments-70 per cent more than is paid in
similar mills in Great Britain-they could
| not obtain man.
II know very well that Democratic
free trade orators are trying to appeal to
the natural resentment of men to vote
| AGAINST protection on the ground that