The record-union., 1895-07-24
WHAT ARE HOME MANUFACTURERS

The Manufacturers Association OF
San Francisco is just now engaged in
creating q broad public sentiment in
favor Of home manufacturers. The pub
lie are asked to patronize home indus
try. There is enough patronage in every
community the size of Sacramento,
Fresno. San Jose and other cities to
support manufactures OF various kinds.
But the question each community has
to ask itself is Where is home P' The
Manufacturers Association of San Fran
cisco understand home" to mean San
Francisco. That association will of course
ask that the people of Sacramento pat
ronize San Francisco manufactures. But
the propriety of patronizing home in
dustry, from the standpoint of q citizen
OF any of the cities of the interior, ap
plies to Los Angeles SO far as the oiti-
zens OF Los Angeles are concerned, and
to San Jose, Stockton, Sacramento,
Marysville, and every other interior city.
We have here $4,000 Inhabitants. If
the people of this city were to resolve
that they would not buy one pair of
shoes not manufactured in the city of
Sacramento their shoes would be manu-
featured here. Likewise, if the people of
Oakland, Alameda, Stockton and other
cities were to form a similar resolution
their shoes would be manufactured at
home.
Thus the doctrine of the patronage Of
home manufactures, carried to its logi-
cal conclusion, means that no city in
California will buy anything that is not
manufactured within its corporate linn
its, and if the doctrine is worth any
thing at all its logic would lead to this
outcome
We agree most heartily with the idea of
patronizInR home industry; but the
word "home" should have very limited
Significance. If village of 500 inhabit-
ants would give to the local shoemaker.
tailor, milliner and wagonmaker all its
patronage 1t could make quite a showing
In the direction of sustaining home in
dustries. The idea may be still further
elaborated. We believe it to be the duty
of the people of Sacramento to buy every
dollars worth OF merchandise possible TO
be purchased of home merchants. There
Is profit arising out of mercantile trans
actions, and that profit can be kept at
home by patronizing the merchants who
do business in our own city. Still fur
Their we do not believe in patronizing any
merchant who has not permanently
identified himself with the destiny of
our city. If merchant amply able to
do otherwise is here doing business in
rented store and living IN a rented
house he is sutlsr. and as soon as he
has acquired money enough will seek
q broader field.
Sacramento has lost millions of dollars
by the wealth acquired in this city hav
ing been taken to the metropolis. In its
turn, San Francisco within the past ten
years has lost TO the city of New York
over SS0.000,000 by actual ascertainment.
In the way of the removal of the people
who acquired their wealth in that city.
The people of every city and town, If
they desire community growth and
prosperity. should patronize the mer-
chant who proposes to identify himself
with all the history of the city-to become
per manent resident. To avoid the i'm
poverishment which comes from patron
izing transient merchants and outside
manufacturers, let the people of every
considerable town and city in California
resolve to do its own manufacturing and
patrenize Its own merchants.
The agents of the Manufacturers Asso-
citation Of San Francisco should meet
with no encouragement for the sale Of
their wares when they visit interior
cities. This advice will sound very self
ish to the people of San Francisco, but it
is the logic of the doctrine of pstronizing
home industry, and we believe in that
doctrine most firmly, and we desire to
give it its only logical application.