Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-04-02


st
the nnnu of tie 49,.
disorder, and undermines the ivu,--as,, 80 ui
the State.
The Tariff u Governmental Policy.
The tariff question is one of ofGovernmental
policy, business question which is capable
of and merits calm and logical discussion.
1t is not new question. The protective
system is not, as one gentleman uncovered
his ignorance in declaring, zone created by
the necessities of war and continued by
favoritism," but system reaching far back
into the worlds history and capable of being
tested and weighed in the light of its expert
ence.
There is no man within the sound of my
voice who does not Know that q revenue
tariff would strike down American manu-
features, in which millions Of money are in
vested and hundreds OF thousands of men
employed; would shut furnace, doors and
make their smokeless stacks the sad monu-
ments of industrial ruin; would still the
music of the loom and the spindle, bankrupt
American capital and put out the fire upon
the hearthstone of American labor. For
many a workman without work it would
give the alternative of starvation or beg
gary. 1t would crowd our farms with Super-
fluous laDorers take from the farmer his
without multiplying the mouths to feed.
Over and above and beyond all, it would
strip us of our Independence and make US
the hewers of wood and drawers OF water
for all the world besides.
l appeal to history. might summon as
witnesses many men and appeal to the rec
ords OF many years A single man and
1857 we had had revenue tariff for II years.
James Buchanan, from his chair in the
White House, thus pictures its effects:
President Buchanan's Pen Picture.
"The earth has Welded her fruits abun-
dainty and has bountifully rewarded the
toll of the husbandman. Our great staples
have commanded high prices, and until
within a brief period our manufacturing,
mineral and mechanical occupations have
largely partaken of the general prosperity.
We possessed all the elements Of material
wealth in rich abundance, and yet. notwtth-
standing all these advantages, our country
in its monetary interests is at the present
moment in deplorable condition. In the
ductions and in all tIe elements of natural
wealth we find our manufac actures suspended,
our public works retarded, our private en-
terprises of different kinds abandoned. and
thousands of useful laborers thrown out of
employment and reduced to want"
And four years after this declaration the
crisis came, when, in the hour of its supreme
throat, the nation found its Treasury empty,
its Obligations scorned in the money mar
kets of the world and its credit gone.
between Une MOrrul Cdrlu Dill OF lSol,
passed to recuperate a treasury bankrupted
by the free trade system of the Democratic
party, and the Mckinley bill of 1890, passed
to relieve the surplus in treasury filed by
the protective system of the Republican
party, what q change, my countrymen.
Our present tariff law is drafted consist
emily and logically upon the lines that dis
tinguish protective from revenue tariff.
1t aims to give to US, free of tax, all those
articles necessary to our comfort that we
either do not or cannot successfully pro-
duce at home. It gives'to US y tree list un-
precedented in the history Of tariff legisla-
tion.
Big FREQ List OF the Present Law.
The revenue tariff OF ls48, the idol Of
Democratic worship, gave us but u per cent
of our importattons free. The tariff Of 1857
gave us but 1s per cent Of our fmportations
free. The present law gives US in the neigh
borhood OF one-half Of all that we import
unburdened by any tax, for, as I have
already said, revenue tariff, unlike pro-
tective tariff, is tax paid by the consumer.
dutiable imports published by the Treasury
Department for the II months ending with
February, 1881, and February, 1882, respect
lively, which will not read, put will print
as an appendix, shows that whereas for the
frst-named year our free imports aggregated
36 81 per cent, for the year just ended they
aggregated IS. 10 per cent.
A single item, that of sugar, transferred by
the Mckinley bill from the dutiable to the
free list, relieved the taxpayers of this coun-
try of burdens to the amount of $50 0O00, 600.
1t effected reform that reached into every
home, lofty OF humble. A hundred years or
more of expense and experiment had de-
that for the present, at least, we
could not raise more than one-eighth of our
was therefore a revenue duty and
tax affecting the price OF both the foreign
and the domestic product.
The Growing Tin Plate Industry.
For years we have been dependent upon
England. without reason and against reason,
for that which, by proper protection, we
have the ability to make with profit to our
selves. The total quantity of tin plates i'm
ported into this country in the 20 years from
1871 to 1891 was 3,622,75 gross tons, and the
total foreign value s307 S41, ,404. In addition
we paid freights and importers profits. As
to prices, England has dealt with us as she
would for as to this article we have been ab-
dependent upon her. Can any man
assign any reason why this .princely sum of
money should have been diverted from the
of our domestic trade to enrich for
eign manufacturers and feed foreign work
men instead of disseminating its blessings
among our own? There are to-day in this
county established and projected, over 20
tin plate establishments. They have capi-
tai of $4,000, 900. They have an estimated
capacity OF Sc, 500 boxes per week.
Prior to 1870 we had no steel rail industry,
but were wholly dependent on England for
our supply. She charged us for steel rails
$3.50 per ton in gold. Congress put on tariff
duty of $28 per ton. Mark the result. We
now produce more steel rails per annum
than does England, and the cost is nearly
the same in New York as in London.
Close of Remarkable Speech.
MI. Dalzel followed with a similar array
of figures in regard to cotton ties, binding
twine. ETC., and closed as follows:
Mr.. Chairman, have said nothing. except
incidentally, OF the results of the legislation
now so unscientifically attacked by these
measures, representing a
policy, nor do propose to do so. 1t
Is sufficient to say that every promise made
for it by its friends and champions has been
fully realized in practice, and every calami-
tous prophecy of its opponents proven false
and unfounded. Under its beneficent in
fuence our foreign trade, instead OF dimin-
lshing. has grown as it never grew before,
and to proportions magnificent to con.
template.
In the aggregate of the worlds traffic an
balance of profit has come to us,
home industries have been revived and new
ones have sprung up, labor has continued to
receive its fair share OF reward, and the
country has in comparison with others,
kept It's place in all that contributes to the
national and individual welfare. All
things have combined to indorse, as wise
md benefcent, the economic policy which
Is linked with every prosperous period in
Dur history and with its honored names,