The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1892-03-11
TIE WEST UNDER M,KINbEY.


The great tariff debate of the present
session of Congress was opened in the
house of Representatives on Wednesday, |
Mr.. McMILLIN, from the ways and means
committee, leading off. Though the imme-
date text was the wool bill, his speech
took wide scope and embraced the whole
range OF the MCKINLEY tariff, which he
showed up in all its euormity. With the
high rates OF duty on wool, there has been
q great reduction in the number of sheep
and about 80 per cent in the price of the
product. And yet to encourage the manu-
iacture of wooden goods our tariff law COM
peis the people to pay Sl.5O to $3.50 for
dollars worth. The high duty does not
keep out foreign wooden goods. They con-
ttnue to pay the duty and undersell the
home manufacturer in his own market.
Ioe manufacturers are the victims of their
own policy; they are injured by too much
protection. Protection therefore discour
ages wooden manufactures by increasing
the cost of the materials of them On this
line Mr.. MCMILLIN proceeded to a reYiew
OF the general workings of the existing
law, the merest summary of which is given
by the press reporter.
Mr.. DINGLEY followed on the other side,
seeming to find his best argument in the
fact that the Democrats are attacking the
MCKINLEY law in detail instead Of in toto,
as though this policy conceded that the law
is detective In only q few particulars.
From his argument it might be supposed
| the chief reason of the existence of the
farmers of the United States is that they
and their products may be taxed. This
taxation is to enrich the manufacturers of
the east and enable them to rake in their
annual dividends of ten to thirty per cent,
whilst the farmers aforesaid scratch along
with four or five per cent profits, and fire.
Quently on no profits at all. Mr.. D. is evil
IDENTIFY one Of those who are coming to the
front with figures to prove that the COM
planning farmers of the west are not half
so bad off as they pretend to be; that they
are not bad off at all; that, indeed, their
condition is very satisfactory and they
ought to be contented. Our western
country, they assert, can serve Europe
with wheat at a profit even if the price
falls so low as to diminish the supplies
from Russia and India. This means that
a western farmer can afford to be taxed
for the lumber in his house, the fencing
wire around his field, the implements
he works with, the clothes on
his back, the shoes on his feet, the hat on
his head, the glass in his windows, the
dishes in his cupboard, and still send his
wheat to Liverpool and undersell a wheat
crop raised in India by ryots, working fol
| seventy five cents week. Let them then
raise wheat at 60 cents oushel, burning
their corn for fuel, paying tribute to our
favored manufacturers of the northeast
and promptly meeting the per cent. inter
est on their mortgages held by these same
manufacturers, and stop their grumbling
Western farmers have borne their bur
dens patiently and without murmur o.
complaint for thirty years, but they are
growing restless and Disconnected at last
They think they have borne them Ions
enough, and that it is high time they were
removed. They do not ask favors from
their government, but they have right Il
demand and do demand, that the favors 81
J long extended to the eastern man
ufacturers shall cease, and that al
classes and sections be put upol
the same footing. It is not fai
nor reasonable to require every farmer t.
take $50 every year out of his slender earn
! ings and pay it over to manufacturing cor
porations at the northeastern corner of tn
country on the false pretense of encourag
ing home Industries. Raising hay and cat
tie in the west is just as much home in
dustry as making cotton clothes and but
/ tons in New Hampshire is, and any specia
: favor granted the latter must be at the cos
of the former.
If all the states were engaged equally i
manufactures and agriculture protectio
9 would be Ineffective, but nine of the state
are engaged largely in manufacturing an
have no agriculture to speak of, whilst tn
I rest of the country is engaged chiefly
farming. The statesmen of New Englan
therefore invented the scheme of taxin
: agriculture for the benefit of manufacture
of taxing the west and south fc
the benefit of the northeastern tai
a ing a Utah cattle raiser for the behoC
g of g Massachusetts, tton-spinner-an
forcing Nebraska and the territories
contribute millions of dollars to build U
= large and profitable industrial establish
= ments in Connecticut, New Hampshire an
s Rhode Island. This is what protectic
means, and all it means. Western Pres
dents, Secretaries, Senators and Repr
:, sentatives, too, bave done little else ths
"a support the system. Protection to mort
ID eastern manufacturers; enormous lar
grants to western railroads owned /
eastern capitalists; protection to Atlant
p coast fishing waters; demonstration
/ silver; exemption of favored industri
'e from internal revenue taxation-this b,
been the sum and substance of nation
legislation since 1851 Only the Dem
to cratic party of the country can put stC
r to the injurious and ruinous polio
D. Therein is the only hope for the west al
at south.