Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1906-09-27

began and we have the figures which de-
scribe our situation now.
when Mckinley was chosen president
he had no great assortment of ambitions
to work out. He had been all his life
a student of those matters which are
connected with the daily life of our peo-
pie. He had mastered only few sub
jects and these concerned mainly the oc-
equations, the home life, the wages and
the happiness of the unnumbered millions
of his countrymen. He was no dreamer,
deceiving himself with sounding phrases
made familiar by the professor and
economists; he was a matter of fact stu
dent of every day affairs. In his early
manhood, living in community where
great variety of industries had secured
foothold, he had gone into the factories
and found out what men were doing for
a living, and into the homes of the peo-
pie to find out how they lived He had
studied the conditions of life in other
countries and the activities of their COM
merce and when he entered congress he
was confirmed in the conviction that if
the American people were to fulfill the
promise of their industrial development
they must find a way to produce in our
own couAry, within the range of our re-
sources, the things which we consume, re-
lying on other countries only for what
we cannot ourselves produce.
And so we find him in the first act of
his administration, oblivious to the fact
that the paramount issue had been the
free coinage of silver summonng con-
gress in an extraordinary session, not to
establish the gold standard, but to repeal
the poverty breeding session of 1894, and
to give back to the industries of the
tl,a nl,.a Il h,r
ness in our market place without en-
countering ruinous competition from
other countries.
The DingIey Law.
II had the honor to sit as a member of
the ways and means committee during the
entire winter following that election, as
ISOLATED with Governor Dingley in the
preparation of the tariff law of 1897. and
whatever may be the viccisstudes of my
political life / will always be grateful for
that opportunity to serve my fellow citi-
zens i'm the hour of their calamity.
There are two things about the Ding
lev tariff law which especially commended
1t to the people when it was enacted and
are yet it's most admirable Characters
tics In the first place, it is national in
Its application to the business of the
American people. No question was ever
raised when 1t was framed as to where
an industry was located, provided it
was inside of the United States. Sec
tonal lines were ignored, and the doc
trine of protection for the first time in
it's history made national in its
actual operation. Again, the doctrine was
applied to our Industrial life without in
curing whether the occupations affected
were great or small. Never before was
such an elaborate study made of the
conditions surrounding the occupations
of American labor, and when the law
was framed even the humblest of our in
dustries found themselves under the
shield of It's protection.
at is unnecessary to speak of the
operations of the act of 1897. Abraham
Lincoln's platform looked forward to the
collection of revenues TO support the gov
eminent The Dingley tariff law, not
withstanding the extraordinary Increases
in our expenses, has fulfilled all the pre-
dictions which were made for 1t as a
revenue measure. Abraham Lncoln's
platform aimed to secure to the working
men liberal wages The act of 1897, by
multiplying the occupations of our peo-
pie Notwithstanding an addition 10 our
population from foreign lands, averaging
nearly a million every year, has not only
maintained the scale of American living,
but lifted up the level of American wages
until today a spectacle of happiness and
| ent in the statistics of our industrial life.
Farm and the Market.
| Abraham I.incolns platform sought to
| secure to agriculture remunerative prices
for products of the farm. Every home
| stead in Iowa Is today witness that the
| act of 1897 has revolutionized the rela-
| ton of the farm to the market place in
| which nearly all its products must be
| sold If they are sold at all Abraham
| Lincoln's platform looked forward with
| confidence to the commercial prosperity
| and independence of the nation; the act
/ of 1897 has not been the least essential
among the mighty forces which within
| ten years have delivered the American
| people not alone from the bondage OF
! poverty and debt, but from that financial
/ stIbordination which from the beginning
/ of our history as people has made the
! banking houses of the old world silent
4 partners in our commercial and Industrial
| enterprises. Our debts have been paid
our railways are now owned at home, and
we have such an accumulation of capital
| i'm city and village and township alike. as
| to make our experience of ten years age
seem like an incredible nightmare.
The Record Good.
| "As the election of 1906 approaches the
/ republican party of the United States il
| getting ready to stand trial upon the
| record we have made We have differ
| ences among ourselves. minor in char
4 acter, as to some of the details of tariff
| legislation to be undertaken in the fu
/ ture These differences are not vital Il
the success of the protective tariff sys-
| TEN and they are not such as ought Il
! engender within our own ranks acrimo
| NOUS contention Of any sort. If there ever
| was a period when the selfish activity OF
| q few manufacturers could dicta Il