The McCook tribune. (McCook, Neb.) 1886-1936, 1896-09-25
Statement by q Practical Farmer Which
Is Worthy of the Considerations Of
Every Tiller of the SoN-Condition
81 Theory.

lHlS SUBJECT may be answered to per.
feet satisfaction, il people will only
look at facts. A practical farmer once
said he would rather own a good farm
in the vicinity of a mine than to own
the mine. He said if the mine was
worked he could make more money
selling produce to the miners than the
owner of the mine could make; that if
the mine was not worked it was not
worth anything, and he could always
make a living out Of his farm.
statement of this practical far
mer is worthy of serious consideration.
The farmer a always do well if there
Is a demand for his produce. When he
makes a crop he wants somebody to
buy it. Look now at the facts; if the
mills and factories are not running.
the mines are less worked. If the
mills and factories are idle many other
Industries stop. Activity in manufac-
turing begets activity in many other
things; railroads, steamboats, and
wagons all have more to do; merchants
have more to do; everybody has more
to do. The more there is to do the
more people are employed to do it.
All who are employed get wages. What
they get they can pay put for what
hey want. The more people there are
at work and getting pay the more mon
ey is in hand ready to be expended for
the farmers produce.
But some one will say all these peo-
pie have to live anyway and have to
be fed. Yes but this difference ap-
pears: People may live very economi-
cally and cheap; they would like to
live better, but they have no money
unless they have work, and they do on
just as little as possible. A family can
live, if one member gets as much as a
dollar a day, but if two or three mem
bers of the family each gets two dol
lars a day that family will live just
that much better.
Some will now say it is -extravagant
for people to live liberally-that they
ought to be economical and all that.
Let the man who says this reflect on
how much his family expends. He per-
haps thinks his income of one, two, or
three, or five thousand dollars a year
is little enough. Why does he not live
on a dollar a day?
The truth is it is but a natural privi-
lege that a man wants when he wants
to live better than merely keeping
alive. If the people can get good pay
it is their privilege to want to use it
for home comforts. A man naturally
wants his wife and children to have
some of the good things of life-a car
pet, rocking chair, some boci.s, some
nice clothes. Nobody wants to be
cramped down to the bare necessities
of life.
If people have work they will live
more literally and in greater COM
fort, and thereby they will spend more
money, and the farmer will have more
people to sell to, and get more money
for what he has to sell.
Now, we had just as we'll try to make
water run up hill as to try to have
busy factories in the country without
Free trade says the people OF the old
world can make all sorts of goods and
bring them to this country free of
duty. If that is done of course the
people of this country will be out of
a job. What u people want is the
job. They want the work.
Free trade says let any man have
lives in. Protection says we will give
work to our own people. We will run |!
factories and mills in this country, and
this will open the mines, and this will
make work for railroads and steam
boats and wagons, and everybody else
will have more to do. Men will have
to be employed and they will get pay,
and they will have money to spend for
the farmers produce.
The pitiful cry of the free trader is
that a man ought to be allowed to buy
his clothes for just as little as possible.
Suppose it would be true that protec-
ton would cause a man to give a lit
tie more for his coat, and cause a
farmer to give a little more for his
pillow, or a rake, what does this amount
to when a man has work at good wages
and the farmer has somebody to sell
ais stuff to-?
Is it not perfectly plain that the in
terests of the farmer and the mechanic
are Just the same. The farmer wants
more money for his wheat. Why does
not somebody say the mechanic wants
to buy his flour just as cheap as he can
get it? What comfort is that to the
farmer?
The farmer wants good prices, the
manufacturer wants good prices, the
mechanic wants good prices, everybody
wants good prices. Free trade, by
taking the work out of u own hands,
strikes a blow at all alike.
Put protection duties on foreign man.
%ufactures and give IL W people a
chance to work is the policy of protec-
ton. We want division of labor in u
country. While some raise crops, 9TH
ers want to work in factories. This
will make a home market. and it will
not only give work and employment to
our people, but raise the price of prod