The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1894-03-02
Highest of all in 4 eavening Power.-Latcst U. S. Govt Report
R@a! a! B Bs%5sz
ABSOLUTELY PURE
ABSOLUTELY PURE

ing had been dispersed by a cavalry charge.
The fight for free trade was fought n won
by the English working masses against the
ruling and upper classes. Reading the ac-
count these many years distant, we thrill
even now with alarm at the terror that inn
pended; only to be reminded by our Maine
Congressman, with cool presumption, that
Great Britain's free trade policy arose from
the deliberate judgment of her captains of
industry thai she was now in a position to
compete with the world, owing to her long
years of protective policy. 1t would have
been in keeping with the tenor of Mr., Reeds
utterances had he also included the muse of
history in the general contempt with which
he regards whatever confutes the protective
theory.
1 must now conclude this criticism. 1t
does not exhaust all that might be said with
reference to this extraordinary, but un-
doubtedly ingenious evasion of fact deliver
ed in the closing hours of the tariff debate.
The best that can be said for the Republican
policy by its most clever and agile champion,
has been spoken. And how easily have its
inherent weaknesses been laid bare, its con-
tradictions revealed, its maize assumptions
disclosed. Place it, as the best that can be
uttered for Republican policy, side by side
with the speech of Tom johnson. How clear,
calm and logical is the one, closing with that
clarion call to battle for a principle larger,
wider and deeper than tariff; a speech in
stinct with crude. but passionate conviction;
hour No 1frr in 1icor, coarnS tho cf11dipd
eloquence of the otheri
A word more. Protectionists accuse free
traders of wishing to surrender our markets,
assuming that protection preserves them.
The protectionists claim for themselves on
this account peculiar distinction as Ameri-
cans-asa advocates of an American policy.
They talk of the necessity of legislating for
our own country, and not for the benefit of
foreigners, which may be cheerfully granted,
without admitting the conclusions sought to
be established by such differences, This con-
clusion is the reverse of patriotic-is, indeed,
utterly un-American, unworthy of liberty,
unworthy the citizens of a country in which
the last and best of the fruits of time have
blossomed and ripened.
In the gain or loss of one race all the rest have
equal claim,
sings the most distinctively American of our
national poets.
Contrast this with the narrow, partisan ut
t~erances, the contracted vision of Mckinley,
the following from one, than whom no more
passionate American has ever lived-the
keen, clear sighted, Yankee witted Sage of
Concord.
1 wish to see America, not like the old
powers of the earth. grasping, exclusive and
narrow, but a henefactor such as no country
ever was, legislating for all nationalities.
as families were, and all advancement is by
IDEAS. and not by brute force, or mechanic
force.
Which Is the best doctrine for patriots,
who desire to see u country foremost in
the van, leading the way to freedom, erect
and stately at the gateway Of a continent,
like Liberty with her torch, flashing the
signals of hope and refuge for humanity, the
stern conservator of all that is good in the
Past, the fearless interrogation of all the new,
yet despised truths of the Present. Who is
the most truly prophetic of our country's
destiny-he who would hamper her with
bonds, OF he who, dauntless, bids her go
free-the McKinleys, the Reeds, distrustful
of Liberty, or the Johnsons and Champ
Clarks, who, seeing Freedom face to face,
fear not to trust her wholly and with single
heart?
JOSEPH DANA MILLER.