The Indianapolis journal., 1895-06-28
AMERICAN BOOTS AND SHOES.

Inc chicago RECORD, Wnlcn aHectS
free-tradesm as it now does free silver,
in a mild manner. prints an interview
showing that boots and shoes are made
cheaper and better in this country than
in Great Britain. and then comments as
follows:
the putting of hides on the free list, SO
that American manufacturers can import
them free of duty. Free hides have gwen
the American boot and shoe trade a Won
derful impetus and have enabled the manu-
facturer TO drive the Eneiisfman even out
of his own market. Americas chief COM
petitors are Germany and Austria, but in
appearance the American-made goods are
superior.
The assumption in the foregoing is
that hides were put upon the free list
for the first time in the Democratic
tariff law, when, as matter of fact, IT
was done in the act of June. 1872. or
twenty-three years ago. Before that
the duty on hides was 10 per cent. ad
valorem. 1t is not free hides which has
given the Americans the -ascendency in
the shoe trade, but the fact that they
are the only manufacturers who have
carried the factory system into the man.
ufacture of boots and shoes. That is,
the American manufacturer is the only
one who has availed himself of labor
saying machinery in large shops in
which the employees work. Thus far in
Great Britain the factory system, which
has been carried to the extreme in all
other industries, has not extended to
boot making. The English shoe manu-
facturer has been resisted by the hand
workers, who continue TO take parts Of
the shoes to their homes, where the work
is done by hand. earning miserable
wages, working by the piece. Here
everything is done in the factory, and
machinery is applied to nearly every
part Of the work. In England the en-
ployes go to the shops and take out
work to do by hand, virtually the sweat
ing process of some of the clothing max
ing and cigar trade in the United States.
No hand labor, no matter how skillful,
can compete with that to which the
machine is applied. For that reason we
shall have the lead In shoemaking until
the English manufacturer shall adopt
the factory system and all the machin-
cry which is exclusively used in the
American shoe factory. When he does
this. il he pays his labor no more than
at the present time, he will capture the
market, as labor makes the cost. The
difficulty has been that the British shoe
manufacturer has not been able to per-
suade his employees to use the machine.
For the same reason the Americans lead
the British in many special manufact-
ures. The nonprogressive insists that
the method of his father is good enough.
The shoemakers of this country are
among the best paid workmen, and their
wages have increased in the proportion
that machinery has been introduced.
Since the war the prices of shoes have
been reduced from 40 to so per cent.
and, because Of the fall in prices, twice
as many shoes are made and sold. With
the machinery the American man or
woman in the factory can make three
or four times as many shoes in the same
time as the man or woman in England
makes by hand, and gets three times as
much wages.
In this connection, it may be added
that the export of American boots and
shoes is not SO large as the paragraph
quoted would indicate. We export large
quantities of sole leather, $5,23S, ,91S
worth the ten months which ended with
April, while the exports of American
boots and shoes amounted to but $811,-
277. the price of 652.5S0 pairs. This shows
that, after all this chatter about the
sale of American shoes abroad, the home
market, with the superior capacity of
the American people to purchase shoes,
is the market of the American shoe
| manufacturer All the outside world
probably does not purchase one-eighth
as many Amercan-made shoes and
boots as does Indiana alone