The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1894-03-02

decrease is about one-tenth in a generation.
Mr.. Reed finds fault with the distinction
which free traders draw between producer
and consumer. OF course, there is no such
distinction as Mr.. Reed implies. Every pro-
Queer is, at the same time, a consumer. The
difference is in the aspect in which they are
regarded by the two schools of political
economists. The protectionist ignores the
consumer altogether; the free trader draws
attention to him as representing, by far, the
larger interests of society, and as being found
for and the major part among the employees of
industries without governmental protection
carpenters, masons, bricklayers, store
keepers, car drivers, ETC., etc. OF course,
the protectionist replies that the tariff bene-
fits these classes by securing property for
whole country. But this is an example Of
the process of petitio principit with which
the protectionist logic is full. Not only
that, but it is a change in the basis of the
argument which has hitherto pro-
ufacture, the usual, indeed the chief
defence of the protectionists. 1t is only by
assumption that the classes who are unpro-
tected can be held to be benefited by duties
upon imports which do not come into COM
petition with the products of their labor,
and these are the great ~masses-almost the
entire 65, 600, 900; in short, the consumers.
Even for the seventeen per cent. engaged
in manufacture, the articles of which are
protected by duties, they sell their labor in
markets that are unrestricted / in competition,
and the wages of which are not the objects
of legislation. The object is to raise prices,
in which operation the raising of wages is
supposed by protectionists to be the chief in
eident; but this is to be followed by reduc-
ton in prices through domestic competition
in goods. The competition in goods is con-
fined to the home market; the competition in
labor is world wide. Mr.. Reed replies that
this argument is not tenable, because the la
borer does not bring his rate of wages with
him. But he does. Let Mr.. Reed consult
the labor and trades unions for the proof.
The influx Of the baser immigra-
ton tends to the reduction of
wages. That the immigrant employee
does not work for as low wages as he received
at home, is not due to the tariff, since the
phenomenon may be observed elsewhere.
For example, laborers, among the steady
German immigration into England-from a
protective tariff country into a free trade
one-do not continue to work for the same
wages, since they are at once brought under
the influence of superior industrial condi-
lions. But they bring their rate of wages
with them nevertheless-their standard of
living having been lower, they are c%ontented
with less. If they now receive more, it is
because they are compelled to turn out a
larger product. It is the same in the United
States; the foreigners standard of living
being lower, he is q dangerous competitor
with the native workman; but the influence
keep his wages-measured not by his pro-
duct, but by his days pay-somewhat higher
than at home.
This is clear to whatsoever will consider.
1t is a fact to which all labor and trades or
CARNATIONS will bear witness. In the mighty
struggle that is everywhere being waged by
ORGANIZED labor against organized capital,
the depressing tendency of the lower immi-
grafton upon wages is keenly felt. The rem
edv lies in other directions away from the
EauestionI am now discussing, and cannot be
Eentered upon here. But not to recognize it,
to calmly ignore it, as of no moment in a dis
E~cussion of wages and the tariff, is a proof how
\ fafsaway lies one Congressional district of
Maine from the busy. active, discordant
world of labor, harassed by the most stu
pendous and momentous problems that
threaten the very life of the Republic-aye,
even the perpetuity of civilization itself.
Mr. Reeds Specie, contains, among the
neutrality-suspicious. of history already re-
viewed, These several fallacies:-
First. The claim implied rather than as
serted that wages absolutely, and relatively
of falling.
Second. The claim especially asserted
that the immigration of the Chinese at a
lower level of civilization, acts upon the
labor market precisely as the free importa-
ton of goods made by cheaper labor.
Third. The denial of the preceding claim
in the statement that the foreigner does not
bring with him his rate of wages, which
nulliies the identity sought to be established
between the free importation of Cinnamon
and Chinese goods, or goods made by cheaper
labor.
Fourth. The distinction drawn-for no es-
special purpose as representatives, 'consum-
able and unreasonable wealth" all wealth,
in truth, without distinction, being not only
consumable, but in constant process of con-
sumption. The gentlemen whom Mr.. Reed
sneers at as s'fuller of political economy than
sense might have invented such a fantastic
distinction, but Mr.. Reed, while including
the science in one magniicently contemptu-
GUS reference, should not have stopped from
his lofty pedestal whence he looks down up
on Adam Smith and his successors, to formu-
late an essentially politico-economic defini-
ton, however defective and shallow. 1t was
an unconscious homage to the learning he
derides.
Fifth. The fallacy, which is too polite a
term for this especial misrepresentation,
that free trade was adopted by Great Brit
ain deliberately, because Of her knowledge
that she could compete with the world. The
student Of the English free trade movement
knows that there was no such consciousness
on the part of the British people. That
which dislodged the lie of protection was no
settled conviction touching the competitive
power of the country's industry-nor was it
apa,, +ha alo1,anoa IF Cohdop py;nht ou1