Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1894-07-26

Up TO 1888 We manufactured in this
country, said Senator Frye in his re-
cent speech in the senate, no mohair
pushes at all. We used immense ouan-
titles for car seats, for furniture GOV
ers, and all that sort of thing. We
bought it all of Germany and Of
France. They made it all, using hand
looms. Having control of our market.
they had the control of the prices
winch we were compelled to pay.
IN 1888 the GOOdallS, manufacturers
III the state of Maine, and as skillful.
as Sagaclous, as determined as anv
who can be found in any country,
thought that, under the duty which
had been placed on mohair plushes at
that time, they could transfer that in
dustry from Germany and France 10
the United States. They built a mill.
Before the mill was completed and
the machinery was in, Germany and
France made a cut on those plushes
OF 10 per cent. for the purpose of
breaking down this industry which
was just coming into existence in the
United States. They did not succeed.
After the machinery was in the mill
they made another cut of 10 per cent,
making % per cent; and within a
year thereafter they made another Is
per cent, 40 per cent in all. They
came very near destroying this indus
try, struggling into life; and if these
men had been ordinary men with
mere ordinary determination and
pluck, they would have succeeded. But
they were not. They proceeded ait
once to see whether or not they could
discover or invent some new dives
which would be better than those
used in foreign countries, those fading
rapidly. They succeeded in that. Then
they started on the question of max
Ing these pushes by power machin-
cry instead of by hand-looms. and in
two years they had invented and per-
fected, at cost of $4,000, a power
loom for their manufacture.
From that time up to one year ago
they ran their mill on full time and
made a fair profit. Six other mills
came into existence in the United
States, and they had not only the
competition abroad to contend with
but the competition at home. The
result has been that today we are
buying our mOhair pushes 40 per cent.
less than we were when we had no
mills in this country. Besides, we are
making better pushes with faster col
OrS, and have compelled these foreign
ers to take our power looms to run
their mills with Thus therc has been
reduction in price to the world as
we'll as to the United States, and to-
day we are supplying nine tenths of
all the pushes used in this country
at 40 per cent. less than they formerly
cost Is not that an object lesson per-
fectly plain to anybody? Surely my
farmer friend, the Senator from Miss
lSslppi, can see in this case how a
duty, or as he calls it a tax, resulted
in a lOwer-priced product to the con-
sumner.
Let me illustrate the same thing by
another industry; also the danger of
reducing duty below the protective
point. We did not make any worsted
goods in the United States until after
1864, and everybody wore them. We
bought them from England largely
and from Germany. We placed what
the Senator from Mississippi would
call a heavy duty on worsted goods,
and in a few years made nearly all
we used. In 1881 the entire importa-
ton Of WOrsted goods into the United
States was just 1920 worth, and
before we started that industry we
imported them by the millions Of
dollars worth.
What was the effect upon prices Z?
WOrSted mills started all over the
United States; they became competi-
tors with each other That required
them to study every possible economy
in manufacture, to close up every Loop
hole for loss, to reOrganize their mills
in the best possible manner so as to
produce the largest product from a
given amount of power; that COM
PEELED them to call on the inventive
genius Of the United States for new
machinery, and the. senator knows
that that genius responds here as it
does not in all the world outside. 1t
did not fail this industry. We were
making, as [ say, all the worsted
| goods we required, and they were 46
| per cent less in cost to the people of
! the United States than when they
were being manufactured abroad.
Now see what is the effect Of too
great a reduction Of duty upon an in
dustry. In 1888 we revised the tariff,
! and made use Of such words in plac-
! ing the duty on worsteds that the
! treasury department made ruling
and I think it was sustained after
! wards by the cOurt-by which these
! goods did not bear the duty of other
wooden goods, though they were made
| of the finest wool, but were dutiable
at a much lower rate. WHAT was the
result? In 1884 one-half Of the WOrsted
| mills in the United States were shut
| down and one half of the other half
were running on half time. Those
| that shut down went into the general
wooden industry Of the country, which
| over-crowded that. The entire wooden
industry Of the United States was SO
! crippled that there was hardly, a
manufacturer, except of special goods,
who was making a dollar. What was
the result? The very next year we i'm
ported 100000 worth of worsted
goods, and it ran on from that up TO