Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1901-07-06
PRODUCER AND USER.
THEY ARE
UPON EACH OTHER.
How the Practical Operation OF the
Protective Principle Meets the Re-
quirement OF Legislation for the Great
est Good of the Greatest Number.

]. D. Wilson of Randolph, Mo-, re-
Gently addressed the following to the
editor of the American Economist:
Conceding that the tariff on wool
makes the grower money, who pays it
in the end, the man who wears the
wool or who? Seems to me that legis-
lation should be for the greatest good
to the greatest number. In other words,
don't more people wear wool than
grow it,"
Answer: Questions of this sort the
Free Traders have been asking for
many, many years, always answering
them to their own complete satisfac-
ton. In their way of looking at it
protection benefits the few at the ex-
pense of the many. Our western friend
has got it all figured out in the same
way. Pity it is that his talents should
be wasted away out in Darkest Miz-
zouryi" He should have been col
lege professor. But we shall take him
as he is and endeavor to solve his
cOnundrum.
Conceding, as he says-and this is an
important concession-that the tarin
on wool makes money for the wool
grower, who pays it? Principally the
foreign wool grower, who is compelled
to accept a lower price for his product
in order to sell it in the United States
after the duty has been added Possib-
ly the man who wears clothing made
of wool pays some of the tariff, but not
much. Clothing is little or no higher
in price than it was in days of non
Protected wool under the Wilson tariff
law. If suit of clothes could be
bought trifie cheaper, then the wage
Garner and the farmer were none the
better off on that account, because
neither the wage Garner nor the farm
er had nearly SO much money to buy
clothes with as they have now. If you
could buy an overcoat for dollar and
didn't have the dollar to pay for 1t,
you wouldn't be anything like SO well
off as though overcoatS were selling
at $40 apiece and you had SIS in your
pocket with which to buy.
But the pivotal thought-the great
Free Trade conception-of our Mis-
souri, friend is to be found in his con-
Guiding proposition that
Legislation should be for the great
est good of the greatest number In
other words, don't more people wear
wool than grow it?"
Most assuredly legislation should be
for the greatest good of the greatest
number. Most assuredly more
wear wool than grow it. Right
here is the strength of protec-
ton and weakness of Free Trade. Not
only does protection call for legisla-
ton that involves the greatest good
to the greatest number; it legislates
for the greatest good of the whole
number. There is today in this coun-
try no individual-not one-who is
not in some way distinctly the gamer
by the policy of protection. Even the
importer or the American agent for
foreign merchandise is the beneficiary
of state of prosperity which has in
creased the demand and likewise the
purchasing power of the most liberal
body of purchasers and consumers the
world has ever known. The use in the
United States of foreign made articles
of art, luxury and fashion was never SO
great as now, while the production and
consumption of domestic articles of all
sorts chat is to say, the gross volume
of internal trade) and the sales to for
eigners of articles of domestic produc-
ton are so much greater than ever be-
fore that for the first time in its his
tory the United States has become the
leading nation of the world alike in
domestic and foreign trade, and, in
stead of being in debt to the money
centers of Europe, is now a creditor
nation. The economic policy that has
brought all this to pass may surely
be considered as productive of the
greatest good to the greatest number.
But our Missouri friend needs some
light on the question, Don't more peo-
pie wear wool than grow it?" AS we
have said, this question must be an
swered in the Affirmative. So do more
people eat wheat and corn and beef
and mutton and pork than raise those
articles. A thousand times more peo-
pie use nails than those who make
nails. So with every article of use
and consumption The users and con-
sumers outnumber the producers many
times over. Protection takes account
Of this condition and by diversifying
production alike in the factory and on
the farm calls into being tremendous
army whose needs and requirements
are mutual and interdependent. 1t in
sures to the American farmer a profit
able market for his wool by insuring
steady demand on the part of per-
sons who wear but do not grow wool,
and by taking care that the cheaper
woods Of foreign countries shall not
come in and break down the price of
home grown wools- Otherwise the
American wool grower would have to
go out of business. as so many thous-
ands did when wool was deprived of
protection in the Free Trade tariff law