Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1894-05-21

| country with but sixteen people to the
square mile), but never do they compare
the wages of free trade England with
those of any of the other old countries,
all of which have high protective tariffs.
If protection, as our later-day protec-
tionists assert, advances wages, then
let them compare the wages paid in
China, the most highly protected coun-
try on earth, with those paid in Eng
land, the freest trade country of the
world.
But we are digressing and now return
| to Clay. In 1888 he said
| Now give us time; cease all fluctuations or
agitatOns for nine years. and the manufac-
turers in every branch will sustain themselves
| against foreign competition. The degree
| of protection which will be required for domes-
| tic industry beyond 1912 depends npon the re-
ductiOn of wages, the accumulation of capital
the perfection of machinery, and the cheapen-
ing of the price ut home of essential articles
[raw materialsl such us fuel, iron and so forth.
We know that in all human probability our
numbers will be increased by an addition of
one-third at least to their present amount, and
that may materially reduce wages.
Clay was the protectionist leader from
1910 to 1850. In his day England was
protection country. He noted the ex-
cessive pauperism, as result of the
policy, and, as strange as it may appear,
actually argued as one of the benefits of
protection that it not only made paupers
but made the rich wealthy enough to
support them!
You doubt us-March 80, 1924, he said:
As to the poor rates, the theme of so much
reproach without England and so much regret
within it among her speculative writers, the
system was a strong proof no less of her un-
bounded wealth than of her pauperism What
other nation can dispense, in the form of re-
quested charity, the enormous sum, | believe,
of ten or twelve millions sterling? The num-
Der of British paupers was the result of pressing
the principle of population to its utmost limits,
| by her protecting policy. in the creation of
wealth, and in placing the rest of the world
under tribute to her industry. Doubtless the
| condition of England would be better without
paupers if in other respects it remained the
| same. But in actual circumstances, the poor
system has the salutary effect of an equalizing
corrective of the tendency to the concentration
of riches, produced by the genius of her poiti-
! cal Institutions, and by her prohibitory system
The war Of the rebellion broke out in
1861. Every possible sort of tax that
could be devised to meet the expenses
of the government was put into force.
In speaking of the internal revenue act
OF July l, 1862, James G. Blaine, in his
Twenty Years of Congress" eloquently
describes the system, as follows:
| Even in the second year of the war in which
we were struggling for life rather than glory
we had come to realize every exaction ascribed
| to the British system. We were levying taxes
upon every article which enters into the mouth,
or covers the back, or is placed under the foot;
| taxes on everything which is pleasant to see,
| hear, feel, smell or taste; taxes upon warmth
| light and locOmoton; taxes on everything on
earth and the waters under the earth; taxes on
everything that comes from abroad or is grown
at home; on the sauce which pampers mans
appetite and on the drug that restores him to
health; on the ermine which decorates the
Judge and the rope which hangs the criminal;
on the poor mans salt and the rich mans spice;
on the brass nails of the coffin and the ribbons
of the bride.
The system of revenue of which the forego-
ing is no exaggeration, proved in all respects
| effective. Congress rendered the taxes more
palatable and less oppressive to the producers
[manufacturersby largely increasing the duties
on imports by the tariff act of July IA, 1862,
thus shutting out still more conclusvely all
competition with foreign fabrics. The increas-
| ed cost was charged to the consumer.
The tariff act of July II, 1864, was the
one in charge of Mr.. Morrill,, of Yer
mont We extract the following from
his speech in presenting the bill to the
house:
The treasury requires a larger supply of
means, and such sources of revenue as have
not already yielded their maximum contribu-
tons must now be sought, so that we may fill
the measure of our wants. This has made an
| increase of internal duties necessary, and that
| increase, to considerable extent imposes upon
us the duty as well as affords us the power of
obtaining an increased revenue from duties on
| imports from abroad. The withdrawal of the
large number of men now in the field from in
dustrial pursuits leaves paucity of numbers
ut home, thereby advancing wages and the cost
of living, so that bushel of corn, Il pound of
wool, yard of cloth, or ton of iron cannot
now, even reducing the currency to a specie
standard, be produced at the same cost that
they were three years ago. With the tariff
considerably increased, and even if we had no
internal taxes to pay, our people will hardly find
1t less dlhcut to compete with foreign produce
tions and manufacturers than they did in time
oil peace without any increase of tariff. And
when we impose Il tax of five Der cent upon
our manufacturers, we leave them upon the
same relative footing they were at the start
See the cat? There was tax of five
per cent. upon manufacturers, but that
was offset by an increase of tariff duties
and the manufacturers were left upon
the same relative footing they were at
the start" and the whole blamed tax,
as they have SO often stated before,
shifted to the shoulders of the people.
And the tariff is tax; that it is so, we
refer you to the last sentence of the quo