Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1896-03-06
PROSPEROUS MILLS.
COTTON FACTORIES EMERGE FROM
THE GLOOM OF M'KINLEYIeM.


Their Dividends the Largest for
Many Xears-Low Tariff Brought
Bigger Profits-High Tariff Adyo-
Gates Suppress the News.
The New York Tribune published
on December 80 the annual statement
OF dividends paid in 1895 by the cot
ton mills of Fall River, Mass, the
centre OF the cotton industry in the
Eastern States. The report shows that
the average dividend paid by the vari-
Gus mills was 500 per cent, larger
amount than was paid for many years
past. In 1892. the year OF which the
McKinleyites always boast as the most
prosperous period under high tariff,
the average was 1856 per cent, but
this has been considerably exceeded
IN 1895. In addition to the unusually
high dividends paid large sums have
been put by as reserve or surplus cap
ital, 81 that in reality the record for
last years business is even greater
than the above figures would show.
1ha Bourne Mills, for instance, paid
a profit sharing dividend to its en-
pIoyes of seven per cent, in addition
to a stockholders dividend of thirteen
per cent, a total profit for the year of
twenty per cent. Other mills were only
a degree less prosperous, O number of
them making extensive additions and
repairs out of last years earnings, af-
ter paying above the average dividend
on their stock. It is further reported
that four new mills will be erected
this year, which will give employment
10 several thousand operatives.
The Republican readers of the Tri-
bune, who have been accepting as
gospel that papers statements that
under the Wilson tariff the country
was being ruined, industry going to
the dogs and business standing still,
must have rubbed their eyes on read
ing this official record of the most sue.
cessful year in the history of the
American cotton industry. Had they
not seen daily in editorials, and
cooked news articles, that the country
was still in the slough of despondencv
into which it had been plunged by
four years of McKinleyism? Was not
the Tribune insisting that Congress-
should promptly restore the high
tariff law repealed in 1894 by the
Democrats, as the only means of start.
ing up our closed mills and factories?
Did not that paper eoiemnly assert
that 'free trade" had brought low
prices, idleness aud stagnation? How
then could it be possible that ono of
our great Industries should have been
so prosperous, its dividends so large,
ITS output so great, its employees
wages so high?
The answer is simple. ''The little
boy lied. >" The organ Of protected
trusts had deliberately suppressed the
news OF busy mills, wage advances.
new factories started and general pros.
perity, which had been recorded bv
the Democratic and independent
papers during 1895. Not only that.
but it had asserted the reverse of the
truth, and by false representations
had led its readers to believe that the
condition of the country was worse
than when the Mckinley law was in
force. Each business failure, no mat
ter what the cause, was ascribed to
the Wilson tariff, and magnified for
beyond its Importance. The smallest
sign of calamity of depression was
eagerly welcomed aud commented on
in partisan editorials.
But when authoritative statements
are issued from the centre of a great
industry, showing an unexampled
condition of prosperity, the Tribune
merely records the facts. But that is
enough. With better business than
ever before 70 argument is needed to
convince the Fall River manufacturers
and workers that they have been
helped, not ruined, by the Wilson
tariff. The mere statement of these
facts condemns the calamity walters,
and proves their bluster about the
injury of lower taxes to be mere bun
come and falsehoods.