Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1892-03-01
why protection is Ubiquitous.

Chicago Herald.
The orIsn OF the American Protective
Tariff league is delivering q series of
"short sermons" on the tariff. In its last
discourse the organ reaches the conclusion
that raw material" is material upon
which labor has been expended; there
fore to make raw material free is TO leave
the labor expended in its production I'm.
protected. Free ore and coal mean ruin
TO the miner. Free wool means ruin to
the sheep raiser. Free lumber, free salt,
free this and free that each means ruin to
some American industry" The conclu>
sion is that protection protects every>
thing from the moment the hand of man
FIRST touches ii up TO its highest and most
finished manufacture
Very good. The intelligent free trader
will not deny that the producer of raw
material is as much entitled to protec-
ton as the producer of anything else, but
he does most emphsticslly deny that
protection protects everything" There
are many things, including some of the
most important products of American in
dustry, that tariff protection does not and
cannot protect. The Mckinley econo
mists now make it their boast that under
the new tariff more than so per cent OF
our imports are admitted free. Tina,
does not lock ike protecting everything G.
1t will not do to say that the free i'm
ports are not produced IN the country
and therefore there are no home produc.
ers TO protect. Many free articles are
produced in the country. There is raw
cotton, for instance. There is no tariff
tax on that, and no protection fol-
those who produce from $3.50, 900 ,OOC
TO $500, 100000 worth of cotton
every year. Why do the Mckinley
economists refuse to protect the produe
ers of this valuable crop by means of q
tariff tax? The only answer they can
possibly make without confessing their
injustice to Gotten growers is that tariff
tax would not protect these producers,
And the answer is true. Protection moi
only does not but cannot protect the cot.
ton grower. The reason is because be
always produces more than he can sell tc
the home market. He must sell large
part of his product In foreign markets
and what he can get there, less freight, ht
can get at home. He can get no more a
home, because no one will pay him II
cents bale more for cotton to be WORKED
up in American mills than for cotton t.
be worked up in foreign mills. He car
get no more than the price resulting from
worldwide competition.
But while he had no protection he j.
forced to contribute to the protection o.
those who do not produce surplus fel
export and who can therefore add a par
or all Of the tax laid on the imported ar
ticle to the price of their own product
In like manner the producers OF wheat
corn, pork and other exportabe article,
get no protection from the tariff, anC
cannot get any, because, no matter wha
the tariff, they must sell at the world
prices made by world wide competition
They are not protected, but they, like th,
producers of cotton, must pay exho.bi
tsnt prices for the protection of other
who are necessarily less important pro
ducers because they do not produc
enough to supply the home demand.
Protection does not and canuet protec
all alike and that is why it is iniquitou
and utterly out of place in countrl
which processes to extend equal right
and privileges to all and special fsvors /,
none.