The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1893-08-25
McKinleyism VS.. Clevelandism.

From the New York Press
Some of our free trade contemporaries
| are squabbing over the definition of Nc
Kinleyism. The Press will gladly define
McKinleyism, and we hope that the defni-
ton will be accepted.
McKinleyism, as applied to the tariff legis-
ation formulated by William Mckinley,
chairman of the Ways and Means Commit;
| tee of the Fifty-first Congress, represents
the most advanced tariff bill ever enacted by
an American Congress.
The act as it stands on the statute books
today.represents the broadcast craftsmanship.
1t extended the free list, reducing the
average ad vaorem rate on all imported
merchandise to trfe over 20 per cent.
1t gave the masses of the people the great
boon of free sugar.
1t gave the manufacturers free raw mate
rial wherever this could be done without
| destroying an American industry or inn
poverishing American labor.
1t reduced duties wherever it was posi-
BILE to do so without injury to American
manufactures.
1t fearlessly increased duties wherever by
so doing it was possible to establish on this
side of the Atlantic an industry employing
American labor and American capital.
1t strengthened the administration of the
customs laws by substituting specific for
ad va!orem duties, thereby decreasing the
possibilities of fraud.
| 1t adjusted rates of duties to the needs of
| plOying the largest amount of American
capital or the greatest number of American
| artisans for the benefit of the home market.
That in brief, is McKinleyism. What
what were the results?
No sooner was the law enacted than the
current began to run in our direction-the
direction of the United States. Mills, fac
| tories and workshops began to spring up
all over the country. Many large indus
tries moved their entire plants to this coun-
try. The manufacture of tin plate, various
other metals, of pearl buttons, of lace, of
plush, and hundred other commodities
was established. Wages stiffened. Addi-
tonal hands were employed. New factories
were built. The country was prosperous.
The working classes were employed. To
say that Mckinley SIN increased the cost of
anything cannot for an instant be sustained,
for even such a rabid free trade organ as
the New York Evening Post, i'm an article
elsewhere reproduced, admits that never in
the history of the country has the American
workman been able to purchase so much for
given sum of money as during this period.
Had McKinleyism been allowed to stand,
this prosperity would have continued. The
present depression and industrial ruin
would have been averted. In place of Nc
Kinleyism, with its prosperity, its high
wages and abundant work, the nation is
now threatened with the blight of Cleve-
landism. The very hearts core of the
country-its industries-are to be destroyed.
The wages of labor, so free trade organs
coldly announce, must be reduced. They
are too high, they proclaim. If the passage
of these free trade laws means ruin, why
ruin it must be. Cleve,andism means
broken financial institutions, shrlnkage of
values, reduced wages, men and women out
of employment, ruined manufacturers,
closed workshops.
1t won't take long, if matters continue as
they are just now, for the wage earners of
the United States to obtain very clear and
very emphatic definition Of the difference
between McKinleyism and Clevelandism.