Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1907-05-02
MERELY THEORIZING
REFORMERS WHO ARGUE FROM
A FALSE STANDPOINT.
Contending for the Abolition of Pro-
tective Tariff They Exhibit Com
pIete Ignorance of Facts and
Conditions Relating to
American Industry.

|
more, perhaps, than any other state
of the union, Woodrow Wilson, presi
dent Of Princeton college, seems un
able to shake off the effects of early
training sufficiently to grasp the fact
that the world has moved since he
sat at the feet of free trade college
Gamaliels. Accomplished facts, the
actual results of nearly half cen
tury of protection, are to him as moth
ing when they conflict with the the
ory that protection was wrong in the
first place. and is all the more un.
moral in it's marvellous fruition of eff
fects. Speaking not long ago at the
dinner of the South Carolina society
in New York to the congenial toast
John c. Calhoun the Princeton
president deeply deplored the "stimu.
lation" of the tariff, the artificial ad.
vantage" which has made 1t possible
for many people to thrive and make
money. Said he:
Congress became the general
foster mother-and that in a country
whose rich and almost boundless
natural resources made such fosterage
absolutely unnecessary beyond the
initial point where industries had
once been assisted to get on their
feet as against foreign competition"
Duly appreciative of the implied ac-
acknowledgement that there was once a
time in the history of the republic
when Industries needed assistance to
get on their feet as against foreign
competition, we would like to know
upon what state of facts and condi-
tions Mr.. Wilson bases his hypothesis
that such fosterage has become abso-
lutely unnecessary. How has he ar
rived at the conclusion that protec-
tion is no longer needed in this coun-
try? We are aware that this is the
general free trade view and aver
ment, but we do not recall that any
among the free traders has in recent
years come forward with a bill of
particulars.
Take, for example, Mr.. Woodrow
Wilson's own state and the city Of his
residence. Is he, perchance, aware
that Trenton's pottery payrolls carry
per capita wage rate three times the
pottery wage rate of Germany, Aus
tria and Hungary? Does he know,
further, that five per cent. of produc-
ton cost would more than cover the
cost of laying down Saxony pottery at
New York? AS a matter of closer de-
tail, does he know that crate of pot
terry can be freighted more cheaply
from Hamburg to Chicago than from
Trenton to Chicago?
Whether or not Mr. Wilson knows
these things, they are all true. Being
true, how does the gentleman get
over them? How does he figure that
fosterage has become unnecessary;
that in the absence of a protective
tariff Trenton could continue to make
and sell pottery in competition with
a foreign production cost one-third the
Trenton production cost?
What is true of Trenton's pottery
industry is relatively true of all manu-
featuring industries in this country.
Outside of a few establishments
whose products are by patents or
pubCllICu plOCtoSCS SttuIcu dS1lHSl
foreign competition, it would be hard
to name any American industry which
would thrive and make money as
we'll without as with the fosterage of
a protective tariff. AS a matter Of
fact, it would be impossible to name
a single industry that would be as
we'll or better off without such foster
age, for the blow that hurt those de-
pendent upon protection would un-
failingly injure those which do not
depend upon the tariff to hold the
American market. Not even the few
would thrive when the many were
prostrated.
Calhoun was for many years a pro-
tectionist. He did not become a free
trader until the south jealous and ap-
prehensive of the growth of northern
industries, decided that it would be
better to sell its raw cotton in the
dearest market and buy it's manufac-
tures in the cheapest market. To-day,
thanks to projections fosterage,
southern Gotten mills keep at home
more cotton than they send to New
England factories. To-day the south
has grown rich at an enormous rate
through its own industrial develop
ment. To-day. if alive and better in
formed as to facts and conditions
than Woodrow Wilson appears to be,
John c. Calhoun would probably be
a protectionist.
IL Woodrow Wilson should be the
presidential nominee OF the Demo
cratic party in 1908, he would receive
the electoral votes Of all the southern
states; but it is questionable whether
his chances are going to be improved
by the advocacy of free trade as the
American policy.
Neither Long Ncr LOUD.
The call for tariff ravicirn 81 tLie |