The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1892-04-27
Tarin Oues,ions An.wered.

primary euect OF protective duty may
be to increase the price of the article to
the consumer; but he also claims that
this increase of price, If it does occur,
prices will fall And why? Because of
home competition, which begets
skill, leads to the introduction of
better methods, and often to the
invention of improved machinery.
In state of active competi-
ton, with each manufacturer strain
ing every nerve to get his products on
the market before his brother manufact-
urers, these results cannot but follow.
American labor once given a chance to
exert itself, soon becomes more skill
fun, American ingenuity devises new
processes and better methods, and
American inventive genius having a
field for application mas ever given us
improved machines and laDor-saving
devices. In this way protection tends
to lower cost of production, and thus
that same competition, which of itself
leads to higher wages because of in
creased demand for labor, also leads
to lower prices because of better meth
DDS and greater skill.
The second reason why manufacturers
can exist In the face of rising wages and
falling prices is because protection, by
the safeguard it places around the
American market, insures continuous
production, although on a lower scale OF
p rofts. Ii, under free.trade, Ameri-
can manufacturers could live at all,
their existence would be at best but
fitful one. Exposed at all times to the
danger of being swamped by the sur
plus production of other countries,
their own production would be fluctuat-
ing and unsteady; and, as result, they
could only resort TO one expedient-to
charge higher profits in times of COM
parative prosperity, in order to
which might occur at any time,
and which they cannot foreseo.
Under protection, on the other
hand, our market is safe. The manu-
facturer does not need to charge higher
profits at one time to make up for loss
at another, end he can well afford,
therefore, TO reduce the rate or scale of
his profits, because his total earnings
are greater on account Of the steady
production, which is the result of pro-
lection. So we see that the condition
which exists all around us-that of ris-
ing wages and falling priests not an
anomalous one, but is the natural and
logical result Of the home competition
started into being by the protective
tariff, which guards alike the interests
of manufacturer, laborer and consumer
of the first, by increasing his total
earnings; of the second, by arising the
wages received for his work, and of the
last, by reducing the prices Of the arti-
'cles he buys.
Question No 81. How are American goods to
find any market abroad from their cheapness
60 long as tax is imposed on the materials of
which they are made?
If by "tax," tariff is meant, we reply
that any manufacturer who is ambitious
to try his hand at capturing the worlds
markets can get free raw material for
that purpose now under the drawback
provision of the Mckinley tariff. 1t is
not the duties on raw materials that
keep him out of those markets. 1t is
the high price paid for American labor
which is entirely responsible for what
ever American products cost above the
price of foreign goods. That free raw
materials would do no good is strikingy
proved in tho case of cottons. The raw
material is free, vet we export less
manufactured cotton than we import.
The same is true of manufactures of
silk, paper stock and hides, although
the raw material in each case is abso-
lutely free. We must reduce wages
DoIOIc ludhlIS any very cAt6USlNe cap
lures of foreign markets at present.
Question No S9. Why take the duty off sugar
TO make 1t cheap and place IL on tin plate to
make Ii cheap?
9 To remove a duty like that on sugar
always lowers the price, because we
could not supply more than one-tenth
of the quantity needed. The duty was
put on tin, because we have the re-
sources for producing all the tin plate
this country can consume. The princi-
pie ls this-to admit free what we can't
produce; and to protect what we can
produce in abundance.
Question No. 40 Would free trade be more
advantageous to the ca pitalistthan Il protective
tariff IN the sense of making the poor poorer
and the rich richer?
Capital, which is rich, buys labor,
which is poor. Free trade reduces the
price of labor, about the only thing
the poor have to sell, and In
creases the purchasing power Of capital,
thus giving 1T more control over labor.
Free trade makes the rich richer and
the poor poorer. The monstrous i'll
equality OF wealth in the United King
dom, where under free trade thousands
starve in the very shadow of the gor-
geous palaces of the wealthy, is stand
ing proof of our statement. Ninety
nine per cent. of the great fortunes that
do exist here have been amassed in
pursuits that are not touched by the
tariff.
Question No. Al. In what way docs the tariff
benefit the farm laborers that work by the
month?
1t keeps the swarms of laborers in the
cities employed in factories and else
where who otherwise would descend on
the country districts in countless num-
bers, each in search of a job. Cultivat-
ing the land is the ultimate refuge of
men when they are driven from other
employments. With three men look
ing for one job on every farm in the
country, how would the farm laborer
fare?
Question No IL Why does my tailor charge
more for my suit now, made OF English goods,
and insist that American goods of as fine quail
lily cannot be had
1t is notorious fact that even the
foreign goods are imported just about
as cheaply into this country under the
new tariff as they we're before. And
most of the clothing goods sold as i'm
ported are made here. There is fasci-
nation about the word Imported"
which, as a rule. will beguile the pur-
chaser into paying more literally for an
inferior article than he would be willing
to pay for a better domestic fabric