The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1896-08-01
Group.


Animal and fish pro-
ducts, 1856. 81 $50. IS
Southern products,
ETC., 49, 4 l34. Al
Tropical products 1882 l19. 81
Minerals and metals. 80. AZ 81. 90
Textile materinIs, l29. II 80 90
Miscellaneous, l05. 80 VI. IL
Fourteen British man
ufactured articles, 1887 lO3. 20
The Soetbeer tables evidently do not
warrant the statement so often made
with them as alleged authority, that
There has been q general fall in
prices" if by that expression is meant
that all articles or groups OF articles have
fallen largely, and III measure equal
ly.
Dividing the above table into two
equal parts, we observe that the prices
of the first four (Which are chiefly food
products) were maryelously sustained:
while the prices of tho second four lin
the production of which labor--saving
machinery could largely be used) show n
marked fall.
SOME PRICES THAT Do NOT NEED
RESTORING"
The United States Statistical A bstraot
deservedly ranks high as an authority.
Opening the latest edition Qo9D at
page AIT, find the export price of mess
beef quoted at cents in 1872, at S9 cents
in 1882 and ST. cents in 1892. Butter in
1872 is given at 10. 4 cents, in 1882 at 1876
cents, and in 1899 at 10 cents. Prices of
eggs for the same dates are 203 cents in
1872, 20. 9 cents in 1882, and 1872 cents in
1892. Other great staples, like corn,
pork, and lard, show equal frmness.
bo af hos fa1a dnn't fo
need any RESTORING"
But perhaps the free silver men would
like to apply their ''restorer" to the price
of refined sugar, which cost r. cents a
pound in 1872, and only At cents in 1892.
Or perhaps they would ike to relieve the
poDr suffering oil magnates whose pro-
duct was quoted at 1916 cents a gallon
in 1892. 1t may be that their tender SYM
pathies go out to the manufacturers of
bar iron, whose product { Abstract. page
412) commanded $97. CD ton in 1872 and
only $29 90 in 1894.
Perhaps they don't want poor men to
be squandering their substance in build
ing homes and to that end would ire
store the price" of nails, whose Philadel-
phia price fell from s.. 46 a keg in 1872 to
ST. in 1894; and of window glass. which
fell from S.. 40 a box in 1878 to S1.70 in
1891. And possibly their philolophic
souls rebel at the idea of q poor man
having a carpet on his floor, SO they
would remove temptation by restoring
the price" from As cents yard in 1899
to 81. IA, as it was in 1878. Then, if the
poor fellow in whose interest they are
working is not completely happy, they
might restore the price of his wife's cali
CD dress from cents yard in 1892 tol2
cents as it was in 1873
And while they are in the restoring
business they might come to the rescue
of the poor manufacturer of steel rails,
whose product began to be mado here
in commercial quantities In 1867, at
whion time it commanded $l66 ton,
but in 1894 had fallen to $24 a ton. This
would enable the railway companies to
find some justification for restoring their
freight rates from 92 OF one cent per ton
per mile in 1891 (ths lowest rate in the
world) to two cents per ton per mile, the
good old rates. that prevailed in 1873.
Nor would these restorers of prices over
look the steamboat men who, though
they now haul wheat by lake and canal
from Chicago to New York at profit for
4 "A cents per bushe, were in the habit
of receiving a. cents per bushel, in
1873.
Here is revealed, Mr.. Chairman, the
delusiveness of an argument founded on
'ayerages;" it fails to discriminate the
individual facts that go to make up the
average. applause
THE INCREASE IN WAGES.
There is another serious omission in
my colleagues allegations of fact.
There is one commodity which stands
out by itself so pro-eminent that even
his disdain of details should not have
ignored it, commodity which is the
rruest and best measure of value ever
discovered, surprising in this respect
wheat or cotton. iron or copper, silver or
gold, and that is O given unit of human
labor. And my colleague was somehow
blind to the fact, though it is exhibited
In one of the tables to which he referred
that the wages of labor have been on the
average largely increased in the last
third Of century, the increase from the
old "bimetallic" wages of 1860 to those
Of 1890 being 58 per cent. i'll money and
u per cent. in purchasing power.
In 1892 days work of skilled labor
would buy more of any staple commodity
of human desire, more and better food,
more and better clothing, more and bet
ter transportation, more and better tools
and machinery. more and better heat and
light, more comforts and luxuries of
every kind, more silver and more
gold than at any time before
1873 in the history of the world. GAP
plause.) More than that, there never
was time in the history of the world
when man who really wanted work
could more easily find 1t than in 1891 and
1892 (Applause.) One evidence of this
is
THE HIGH WAGES PAID.
above shown. And during the fall of
1892 I examined, day by day, the want
columns of the st. Paul Pioneer Press
and Minneapolis Journal, two represen-
tatiye dailies of the Great Northwest,
and found on the average four times
as many places seeking persons to fill
them as there were persons seeking en-
ployment. (Applarse.)
Mr.. Hutoheson. Why, then, did the