The herald., 1896-09-30
TO HIM THAT HATH SHALL BE
GIVEN

In the commercial conditions review
sent out by the Associated Press and
published in Saturdays Herald, appear
the two following items:
Exports of 10000 tons of rails at prices
far below those current here, and 25,-
900 tons of pig iron to England at sS.sS
at Manchester, freight being at least
sS.15,indicate unloading surplus abroad
to avoid weakening markets here"
This first item follows the significant
statement that all the iron combines
are maintaining prices here" The sec
ond item is apropos of wool:
'The demand from England remains
noticeable, but is offset by high rates of
freight and scarcity of ocean ROOM"
1t is well known by every observant
traveller that American manufactures
and products in the protected classes are
generally cheaper in foreign countries
than they are here. The reason of this
is that the tariff gives the
trusts cinch on the American
home market which these COM
bines for monopoly work to a point
injurious in the end to both themselves
and to this country. Whereas when
their products go abroad they meet an
open free competition and sell on their
merits.
The other day The Herald published
similar series of facts of export pro-
tected products. notably of iron, around
the Horn to cheap labor Japan.
All these facts are frank confessions
of the fraud underlying protection.
These millionaire monopolists use the
patriotism of the people by plausible
pretext to rob the American people.
They procure protection and bounty on
the plea that they cannot compete with
'pauper labor" The fact that they do
compete with "pauper labor" is notified
to the world by every trade bulletin.
1t is only the millionaire who ever gets
protection or bounty. The talk about
labor is transparent fraud introduced
merely to make the robbery under the
forms of law possible. These Carnegies.
Huntingtons and Hannas care nothing
for labor.
Carnegie brings in Welsh or Hungar-
ians and puts brass tags on them; Hunt
ington brings in Chinese as long as he
can and then turns to the Mexican peon
and Hannas hand is against all men.
The reduction on dried fruits to Eu-
rope ought to open the eyes of the Cali
fornia farmer to the folly of restricting
a trade that must exist to take his sur
plus.
The gross frauds of the corrupting
Washington lobby by which every
bounty and tariff is passed is enough in
itself to show that it is only the unprin-
cipled and corrupt who ever have or
ever can obtain tangible results by leg
islation that rests upon the idea of get
ting fist into. the public purse.
The protective doctrine can never. be
honestly and impartially administered
There is no case of record where a
bounty has been granted to any but the
very rich. There is no case where a
bounty has been granted after judi
cial Investigation to determine what it
should be or whether there was any
reason for it at all.
The hotel business or the grocery busi-
ness in Southern California could either
one show more reason and more need
for a government bounty than Carne-
gie's Homestead fraudulent armor
works Besides, the iinpossbility of an
honest administration of bounty sys-
tenn using the public taxes for private
gain, the whole business rests on fall
acy.
The very first pretense about an inter-
est in human labor, the point the pro-
fessional patriots harp on. is denial
of hope to. humanity. They say a cheap
wage laborer can produce cheaper than
a high wage laborer. If this doctrine is
t,Irn tho clio ,Ia
must be the cheapest laborer. Free
labor could never compete with slaves.
Slavery is, then, the ideal of large pro-
duction at the lowest cost. The slave
country, then, should be the great man
ufacturing country, and the nearer the
approach to no wages the cheaper would
be the product and the more complete
the command of the worlds commerce
The facts are in all cases against this
inhuman conception. There is no pro-
duct so little affected by invention in
its cost as cotton, and there is nowhere
more complete demonstration of the
fact that slave labor cannot compete
with free labor in the cost of production.
The wage paid laborers in the south
produces cotton today at far less cost
than was ever possible under the no
wage slave.
If this folly of an inhuman lie invented
by corrupt bounty seeking lobbies, was
true, the lowered cost of all products
could never have been accomplished by
rising scale of wages.
If it were true no civilized country
could compete with barbarism. If it
were true the successful business man
and the sensible citizen, instead of seek
ing capacity and paying according to
product or result as the ultimate basis.
would be seeking out tramps to work for
their board. We would, under this mis-
cradle theory that cheap men are bet
ter than good men at good wages, be-
looking for the cheapest farmer
the cheapest lawyer, the cheap
est doctor, the cheapest every
body. Some men do this, but they are
not the leaders of the world nor the sue
cessful men. Pick up the history of any
one outside of three-ball Shylock, and
you will find that the successful seek
capacity, pay to get it and pay to hold
1t.
The faulty of the American people
to sit under this notorious fleeing under
notorious lobby, done in violation of
the plainest principles of justice against
the fundamental principle of free gov