The Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Or.) 1862-1899, 1896-10-09
M'KINLEY ON WOOL
Free Wool Means Ruin to the
Great Industry.
The Wilson Bill and What 1t Has
Done-The Remedy.

1SuS INV
Major Mckinley spoke to the farmers
and wool growers of Ohio on September
14th, as follows:
Ladies and Gentlemen, My Fellow Citi-
zens: I count it a very special honor to
receive this visit from my fellow citizens,
composed. for the most part of the farmers
of Harrison county. / would have been
glad to have had with you that venerable
citizen and statesman John A. Bingham,
whose message of cheer and congratula-
ton and good will you have brought me.
(Great applause) l beg that you will
carry back to him my best wishes and
my earnest prayer that his life may be
long spared to enjoy the respect and hon
or given to him by his admiring coun-
trymen everywhere. (CheerS.) l know
| of no man in public life to whom great
er opportunity was given and who more
admirably improved those opportunities
than your distinguished fellow citizen in
the mightiest crisis of our countrys his
tory, and l needed no assurance from
him that he stands now as he has always
stood in the past, for his country and his
countrymen, for his .country's honor
and for the prosperity of the people.
Great applause)
1t is especially gratifying to me to re-
ceive visit from so many of the farmers
and w0el growers of Harrison county
There is scarcely county in the state
which is so essentially agricultural as
yours. You have no large towns. You
have but few factories, and your occu-
pations are almost exclusively rural Your
county has long been noted as one of the
great agricultural sections of the state,
and especially devoted to that branch of
agriculture known as sheep raising and
wool growing. There is probably no por-
ton of the country Of the same area that
has supported so many sheep as yours,
and for many years at least this was the
most profitable industry of your farmers.
His Prediction In 1890 b orne Out.
1t is not so good, I believe, now as
formerly. daughter and applause, and
cries of 81 guess not.'o The last three
years have been years Of great trial, not
only to the wool growers of your county,
but to the entire country. You have seen
/ your f1ocks disappear and your f1eeces
diminish in value to an extent that prior
to 1892 you would not have believed was
possible. | remember in 1891 to have de-
livered an address in CadiZ to the as
sembled farmers of Harrison county, in
which l undertook to predict what would
happen if we had free wool in the United
States. There were few men in that
great audience who believed my predic-
ton then What do you think of it now,
farmers Of Harrison county? (Cries Of
"We think it is right.'o
In 1901 vOI1 had aocOrdinp t0 VOI1r
banners displayed here to-day, 153,503
sheep of an average value Of So per head,
In 1896 you have but $4,000 sheep, worth
only $1.5O per head. In 1891 you re
ceived from thirty to thirty-two cents per
pound for your wool; in 1896, for the
same grade of wool, from four1sen to six
teen cents per pound. This enormous loss
to q great industry is truly astonishing,
and calls for serious consideration and
prompt remedy, if one can be found, and
the only remedy we have in the United
States is by the ballot, and if it is pro-
lection you want, you know what party
carries the banner of protection. en-
/ thusiastic cheering)
Prior to the enactment of the Wilson
tariff law you had enjoyed, almost with
out interruption. from the beginning of
the government a tariff on your product
the cheaper lands and the cheaper labor
Of other countries. BY that act your
product was made free and opened up to
the unrestricted competition of all the
wool of the world What makes that aci
more indefensible is, first that it was
wholly unnecessary, and, second, that it
was singing out one of the greatest in
dustries of the country for immediate
sacrifice, leaving other industries having
no greater claim upon the consideration
of the government practically unharmed.
{Cries of ''That't rightly
Bill Denounced by MT. Cleveland.
No class of our citizens have suffered
so much from the tariff as the wool
growers of the United States, and none
were more deserving the generous treat
ment than they. So inexcusable was this
duction of the tariff all along the line
and believed in free raw material. was
unwilling to sign the bill, and used these
characteristic words against it: SIT may
well excite our wonder that Democrats
are willing to depart from this free raw
material doofrine), the most democratic
of all tariff principles, and that the in
consistent absurdity of such a proposed
departure should be emphasized by the
suggestion that the wool of the farmers
be put on the free list and the protec-
ton of tariff taxation be placed around
the iron ore and coal of corporations and
capitalists" But this did not avert the
fatal blow. Less organized than other
industries in the country, you were un-
able to secure the recognition to which
you were justly entitled and your prod
uct was made the victim of free trade
(Cries Of ''That's right.)
In all the years in which the Republi-
can party was in power, you know that il
gave protection to wool, and in the act oi
1890 gave to this industry increased pro
lection. That law, the law Of 1890, gave
to every agricultural product of this coun
try, every farmers product of this coun
try, the best protection ever had. Every
protection that could be given to then
against outside competition and to pre-
serve the home market was always cheer
fully and generously accorded by the Re
nrhIicaD marty (Great aDDlauSe an(