The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1892-09-02
A HARD BLOW FOR FREE TRADE

Democrats said: eve denounce
protection as fraud robbery of the
labor of great majority of the Ameri-
can people, for the benefit of a few "
Following this up the Democratic
press and speakers declare that the
consumer is being plundered in the
interest of the manufacturer, in that
he has been obliged to pay more for
manufactured articles since the Nc
Kinley law took effect. The FREE
PRESS last evening gave list of arti-
cles with their prices in 1857, 1889, land
at the present time, showing that
there had been steady decline in the
price of such articles and that the
claim of the free trader is without
any foundation whatever.
Another claim that has been
put forth is that the new tariff law
has been of no benefit to labor; that
wages have been reduced rather than
increased, and even young Mr.. Law
Ter, the Democratic candidate for
governor of Minnesota, asks if there
is laboring man in America who
can say that the wages of the class of
workman to which he belongs have
been raised.
But in this respect the free traders
are as far out of the way as they are
in the matter of prices. To prove
this the friends of protection are fur
nished with plenty of testimony from
Democratic source which cannot be
charged with being at all partial to
Republican interests. And this tes-
timony is the report of Labor Com
missioner Peck of the state of New
York, who says that he commenced
his investigation in 1890, and had
great hopes that the results would be
favorable to the position taken by his
party.
But Mr.. Peck has found several
things that are not at all favorable to
the free trade position taken by De-
mocracy. To find out the effect of the
Mckinley law upon wages, Commits
sioner Peck addressed questions in
that line to 5000 wholesale manufact-
urers of that state engaged in sixty
seven different kinds of business and
in their replies to his question con-
corning the prices of goods and of la
Dor during the first year Of the oper-
tion of the Mckinley law and
the last year of the
operation of the old law he finds these
facts to be true:
During the first year of the McKin-
ley bill there was net increase of
money paid for wages in the state of
New York to the extent of $6,377, 1925,
as compared with the last year of the
old tariff.
In the same year there was a net
increase Of money representing the
value of articles produced by the six
ty-seven industries to the extent of
S31 ,315, 100.
That during the first year of McKin-
ley law there had been among these
5000 firms S9,77I andiuidatal instances
aUhere aoages had been increased.
Here is complete refutation of the
free trade claim that there has not
been case where wages have been
increased. They cannot avoid this
confession. 1t is foolishness upon
their part to claim that this is blow
prepared and aimed at Grover Cleve-
land by Senator Hill. Six thousand
firms could not be so represented
without bringing down upon the
heads of those who made the report,a
perfect storm of disapproval, any
more than their replies could have
been suppressed or misrepresented
without calling out protest.
In regard to this report Mr.. Peck in
an interview said:
l rather expected my report would
cause some comment, but it
is all nonsense to call it
political document. I started this
inquiry in December, 1890, so you
see there was no thought of thepreSent
campaign in laying out the work.
The tariff question was taken up be-
cause it has become one Of the great