Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1907-10-03

tion and Wage Paying.
For the ability displayed in the edi
torial columns of the Washington Post
we have always had a great deal of
respect. But the line must be drawn
somewhere. For example:
by reciprocity and truly protective
duties we will protect our trade abroad
as well as at home and greatly en-
large our foreign markets."
Truly protective duties are duties
that protect, are they not? Assuming
an affirmative reply, we would like to
learn from the Post how it is possible
to maintain duties that truly protect
and at the same time carry on sys-
TEN of reciprocity in competing pro-
ducts. Duties that protect hold the do
mestic market for domestic labor and
industry, do they not? If they do not
do that, then they DO not protect. If
they do protect, then they do not and
cannot invite and promote a larger in
flow OF commodities that compete with
and displace their equivalent of do
'A'N'NiN ploudNJlbu anu ldDOI-
There can be no competitive rect
procity with duties that are truly pro
tective. The duties that protect and
the duties that increase our foreign
trade III competing articles on the in
coming side must of necessity be two
entirely different sets OF duties. They
cannot be the same.
1t is perfectly apparent that the
truth of this maxim in economies is
wholly ignored and disregarded by the
free traders and tariff wreckers who
dominate the National Association of
Manufacturers They may and prob
ably do know that adequate protec-
ton for all domestic industry and free
trade reciprocity in competing pro
ducts cannot exist side by side To
them that fact is not material. Their
purpose is to market abroad increased
quantities of their manufactures-
manufactures which, by reason of pat
ents or patented processes, do not re-
quire tariff protection. They are not
troubled by the consideration that
their scheme of sacrificing protection
for reciprocity would work disaster
to many industries that do require pro-
lection.
They put it this way: we know
that reciprocity in competing products
will hurt some Industries while bene-
filing others; but the gain to those
which are benefited will be greater
than the loss to those which are in
iured.' These words are quoted liter
ally from a speech made in 1901 by an
advocate of reciprocity at a national
convention of manufacturers in Wash
ington nearly six years ago.
1t was very much as though the
thief should say 10 the man whose
| pocket he had just picked: Il know
you will feel somewhat the loss of this
| money, but its possession will do me
far more good than its loss can do you
harm" At least this seemed to be the
| conventions view of the ethical sound
ness of the proposition, for the reci-
procity scheme was voted down at the
rate OF hundred to one.
Confident that the Washington Post
entertains no approving opinion of the
policy of fattcning some industries at
the expense of other industries, we
would in all sincerity be glad if the
| Post would tell us just how reciproc-
ity in competing products and truly
protective duties" can possibly go
hand in hand.
| No it will not do. What the foreign
er wants and must have ii he is to get
more OF his goods into the American
market is a system of duties that do
! not truly protect. Any other duties
| duties that do prOtect-Will not do
him particle of good. TO him that
would mean bogus reciprocity, a conf
| dence game, a gold brick. The foreign
! manufacturer is not a fool. He wants
/ to get into this market, the best II;
/ the world, and he is going to do it if
| he can get enough American co-opera-
! ton. Perhaps he will succeed. We do
! not know. But if he does succeed it
will be because the American people
! want to do less of their own work
/ and want more of it done by foreign.
| ers, In that event, don't let us talk
/ amy more about truly protective du.
ties They will have gone out of
| fashion.