The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1902-09-03

bill of supplies. A days work meas
ured by the cost of the necessaries of
life today is cheaper than at any time
since the first day of July, 1896. A bill
of supplies including the necessaries of
life costing $4,000 in 1897, cost in 1901
| SIG so which is an increase to the con-
sumer of 2S per cent. Paid forjn wheat in
| 1897 it required rs bushels, when in 1901
| it required 105 bushels to pay the bill.
Paid for in cotton in 1897, it required
| S39 pounds, while in 1901 it required
| 895 pounds
Coming to the subject of trusts, Mr..
| Webb said:
'The chief cause for the increase in
| the cost of living is the tariff fostered
trusts. These trusts sell almost every
| article which we eat and wear, and al
most every farm implement cheaper in
| foreign countries than to our own peo-
| ple denying us the right to buy as
! cheaply as Arabs, heathens and aliens.
THE Republicans denounced trusts in
| their platform, but let us see their sin
| cerity on this vital question. In the
! Fifty-sixth Congress, they pigeon -holed
! an antitrust bill rather than let it come
| to a vote. In the last Congress the Sen
| ate killed an antitrust amendment by a
strictly party vote, the Democrats vot-
| ing for the amendment and the Repub-
licans against it. This amendment too
was in accordance with a recommends
tion of the President in his message to
| Congress-"
IF when Adam was created the AL
mighty had given him salary of $22,-
| 900 a year. and Adam had been Sc
| frugal as not to spend one cent of his
income, these six thousand years of
salary would mot make him worth as
much as this steel trust has made off
the people in one short twelve months
$40 900, ,O00."
"a few months ago one man conclud-
ed TO raise the price of beef and upon
his assessment of the American people
! millions fell into his Golfers, while ir
the shadow of this great trust. starva-
tion and despair stalked among the peo-
pie. and fought with increasing keen
ness against the citadels of human
life This robbery fiourished in the
| city of Washington, in the face of an
antitrust law, while Republican
President and Attorney General sal
quietly by, and watched the spolatioI
go on. never suggesting to a Republi-
| can Congress, then in session, that this
! infamy could be stopped at once by
abolishing the tariff on the product.
which the beer trust controlled"
The Republican Protective Tariff was
next shown up in it's true colors, in par
as follows:
1.-The most prolific breeder of these
vampire combi4ations is the Republi.
can Protective Tariff. We demand thai
every trust controlled article shall bt
put upon the free list This will dc
more to dissolve trusts than all the civi
suits that can be brought, but the Re-
publican party refuses to reduce the
tariff on such articles and hence W,
must suffer and be patient A protective
tariff is an unconstitutional tax bur
dening every citizen and enriching only
a few 1t restrains every man from
buying in markets to his best advan-
tages and compels him to purchase
where prices are highest
"Our Southern farmers are compelled
to sell their cotton in foreign markets
where they compete with the world. Our
cotton manufacturers sell their product
in China and other foreign countries
a.
every manufacturing nation of the
earth; but most of the articles which
we buy from Northern manufacturers
and trusts are on the protected list
which enables them to fix prices for us
at whatever figures their greed may
dictate or their conscience permit. The
Souths commercial existence depends
upon free and open markets, for botf
our raw material and our cotton manu-
factures."
The Philippine question was touched
upon in vigorous, virile way:
Last February the Republican party
in the United States Senate voted
against a resolution declaring our op-
position to holding the Philippine Islands
permanently or to annexing them as &
part of our country, which leaves the
policy of the Republican party in the
Philippines a matter of open conjecture
Their policy now seems to be to hol(
them indefinitely as conquered prov
inees, and to overrun them with carpet.
baggers of the civil war type. The
Democratic party demands that as sooI
as a stable government is established
there, we shall take our hands off the
islands and bid them Gods speed, re.
serving to ourselves proper and ample
coaling stations, and commercial treaty
relations.
From a financial point of view
holding these islands is and will be
colossal failure. Already they have
cost us more than a half million dol
lars, not to speak of the pensions fol
soldiers who have lost their health, anC
wives who have lost their husbands il
the islands. To hold them, would cos
in the future as much as fifty million
dollars annually, and we would not re-
ceive in return more than 100000. i
is not necessary to hold them to obtaiI
markets, although this argument is
J made by Republican speakers for the
purpose of misleading the unwary
manufacturer, and enlisting his sym
pathies on the side OF Republican
policies.
Cotton is cheaply and easily raised
over there. and to hold the islands per-
manently would mean their exploitation
by enterprising Americans and syndi-
Gates, and very soon cotton mills would
spring up all over the island, operated
by labor which can live in luxury on
cents nor uapxr COON those