The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1910-05-27
THE TRUTH ABOUT PROTECTION.

ROBERT Fullerton, one u lHc iceuiA 8
business men of Iowa, in Des Moines
Capital: Insurgent Republicans adj
vocating lower duties on foreign inn
portations cynically inquire Wien
will our infant industries attain their
majority and become self-sustaining
without the aid of tariff protection
/ This cheap disingenuous witticism so
long repeated by Democratic political
free trade theorists and partisan
writer's on our industrial policy, re-
veals simple ignorance or misleading
demagogism.
Tariff equalization will be neces I
sary to the continued existence of all t
American industries competing with
the outside world just so long as the
American scale of wages continues to /
be so to 100 per cent higher than our |
! foreign competitors have to pay their |
workers.
Tariff protected industries are no
more prosperous than enterprises
whose profits cannot be affected by
| foreign rivalry
| The retail department store returns
as good dividends on its capital as the
tariff protected cotton or wooden mill
! that makes the goods sold over the
unprotected counters of our Marshall
Fields and Wanamakers.
| There is just as large profits in OPP
Grating railroads, managing banks.
I newspapers and real estate. as there
/ is in investments in factories and
mills making tariff protected articles
of merchandise, and mechanics and
artizans in our non-protected indus
tries are in position to secure high
er wages than the workers in our fac
tories making world-competing arti-
cles.
Bricklayers. carpenters and plumb
ers command better wages than the
skilled workers engaged in making
tariT-protected fabrics of our cotton
and wooden mills.
people. The American citizen is free 10
engage IN any occupation he desires.
protected or non-protected, with this
difference, that the tarif-protected
manufacturer must sell his goods in
competition with his fellow citizens
and all the world besides, while the
non-protected business, from its ma
, ture, cannot be affected by foreign
rivals. his competition being purely
local or confined to our own country.
The builder of store, hotel or office
block tas no fear that his income viii
be reduced by cheap corner lots in
( Toxic or slump in office rents in
Paris or London The millionaire AS
tors and Hubbeils have absolute and
prohibitory protection against a for
eign invasion. as in no event can We
import brick buildings or real estate
/, The Chicago Tribune or The New
: York Evening Post care nothing FOL
5 cut rates for advertisements in the
London Times or the Berlin Gazette
The grumbling economically inclinet
guest at our city hotels cannot scare
: the landlord o. the diamond-studdet
, room clerk to reduce his rates by quot
ing the price of hotel accommodation
in Naples or Pekin.
n But our American cotton and wool
S en- mills. hosiery and glove factories
g and in fact. all tariff-protected manu-
y facturers come into competition Will
every like industry at home ans
- abroad. Our tarif-tax on foreign
r made goods is purely wage equaliza
# ton.
le If the European and oriental wag'
O. scale prevailed in this country. Amer
ar can manufacturers would need no pro
e lection to enable them TO sell taei,
products in competition with any PEG
IA pie or country in Christendom.
Our standard of decent living de
We mands scale Of wages that enable
ON our working men and women to en-
icy Joy many Injuries and comforts i'm
.lu. possible Of attainment by the foreigl
nat wage Garner.
eN' Our Republican policy Of tariff pre-
lection enables manufacturers and en-
.ck- ployers Of labor to pay higher wage
the than prevail in any other country i
in the world and distinguishes toe Unite
of States as the workingman's paradise
aoe which is demonstrated and confrme
slae by million foreigners that annual
e ~, leave home and kinsmen and nativ
dad country to come to the United state
in drawn TO our shores by the magn.
york of high wages and enlarged onno
tunity for social and financial betta
ment which this country affords eve,
t of capable, industrious citizen willing
ools work.
h Our tariff schedules have long I,
race nished material for partisan and q
ne. tional controversy Our present .
q