Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1901-06-22
AIDS SMALL DEALER.
PROTECTIVE TARIFF A DIS
TINCT ENEMY OF TRUSTS.
The Future of Protectfon-Its Real Con-
Is for the Well Being of Smaller
and Weaker EnterprIses-A Chiu for
English Free Traders.

Charles A. Moore, president of The
American Protective Tariff League, in
a recent interview published in the
New York Mail and Express made
some statements regarding the tariff
situation which will have a tendency
to chill the ardor of those Free-Traders
who have hoped to make a diversion
in favor of their ism" by girding at
trusts. Mr.. Moore, who has an incisive
mode of expression and who thorough
~ understands the subjects he discus
ses, points out what every American
who has the interest of his country at
heart should continually keep in mind,
that it would be impossible to devise
any legislation which could destroy the
steel trust that would not at the same
time destroy every smaller and indi-
vidual concern engaged in the same
business.
These smaller makers of steel prod
ucts. he says, have their specialties
in manufacturing. Some of them prob
ably will sell their output to other con-
Germs that have been amalgamated in
the steel trust Others will continue to
retain their customers at home and
abroad. But If steel goods were placed
on the free list these individual manu-
facturers would be forced to the wall,
because the steel trusts of Great Brit
ain, France and Germany, if our tariff
barrier were removed, would dump
their surplus product upon our market
at prices that the smaller manufacture
ers could not meet Only the big cor
poration could survive; and that COM
bination of men, who are kings in the
several branches of their business, be-
ing united, could compete successfully,
I believe, at home and abroad, in any
part of the world, with any foreign
Unsupported foreign governments
do not erect prohibitive tariff barriers
against u.s.
There is no one in the United States
better qualified to express an opinion
on this point than Mr.. Moore. He has
long been a student of the workings of
Our protective system, and brings to
his studies the experience gained in
the conduct of great manufacturing
industry. His opportunities to get at
the true inwardness of the situation
are unrivaled; therefore when he
warns the country that an assault on
the steel and other great trusts would
be an attack on the weaker concerns
his warning should not go UNDECIDED.
No one will doubt what he says re-
garding the ability of the steel trust
to compete with the manufacturers in
the same line in the old world. That
has been made clear to US in many
ways, not the least significant of which
is the changed attitude of such men
as Carnegie and others toward protec-
ton. They openly say they do not need
it longer, and the free traders have
regarding them as an indication of a
coming division in the ranks of Ameri-
can protectionists.
Mr.. Moore, therefore, has rendered a
distinct service to his countrymen by
pointing out to them the danger to
which the minor industries of the ma
ton would De subjected by abandon
ing protection. That policy was never
adopted, as free traders charge, for the
purpose of benefiting .'robber barons,"
by which title they are pleased to
designate the manufacturers of the
United States, but to build up an Amer
lean industry, the workers in which
would not be subjected to a fierce
worldwide competition in which the
standard of living of the masses would
be reduced to the level of that of the
toilers of less favored lands. 1t is be-
cause this is true that it may be as
serted with confidence that Mr.. Moore's
argument will carry weight. If pro-
lection only considered the interests of
the great establishments which can
stand alone it would have precious lit
tie support in this country; but as its
real concern is the well-being of the
small and weaker concerns, whose ag-
gregate productions really exceed those
of the combinations, it is sure to re-
tain the support of the people, who are
not willing to jeopardize their chances
of future comfort by assisting in the
promotion of an industrial rivalry, the
outcome of which would inevitably be
the lowering of the American working
mans standard of living.-San Fran
cisco Chronicle