The times and democrat. [volume] (Orangeburg, S.C.) 1881-current, 1910-11-08
ROBBER TARIFF
How The Farmer is Ileeced by it With.
out Getting any Benefit
HERE ARE some FACTS

HERE ARE some FACTS
The Farmer Sells His Staples at
Prices Fixed by World Wide COM
petitions And Then Buys the
Things He Needs In q Market from,
Which Competition Is Barred.
!One day last week Benjamin f.
Shiyely, Democrat!c Senator from
Indiana, made some telling remarks
in speech on the tariff as 1t relates
to the farmer. He made it just be-
fore the close of the campaign but
it reads just as well now, whatever
the result of the election. Here 5
his remarks on the tariff, which ey-
cry farmer should read:
In these closing days Of the cam
paign Republican leaders are max
ing frantic appeals to the farmers to
come to the assistance of the RepuD-
lican ticket against the rising tide OF
revolt in the cities. Why should the
farmer vote to vindicate the Payne
Aldrich tariff? Or why should he
give countenance to that cunning dii-
ference-in-cost, plus-a-profit evangei
in which panic-stricken statesmen
are seeking shelter? Government
has no fund out Of which TO guar
antee profits. 1t can legislate prof.;
to one man only as It legislates
losses to another.
American agriculture is a nonpro-
tected and nonprotectable industry.
The genius of man can not devise
a system of import duties that could
protect the farmer. Every year mil
lions of bushels Of his wheat and
corn and millions Of pounds of his
hogs, cattle and cotton go out to
the great surplus markets of wes-
tern Europe. Would single bushel
or pound go there but for the fact
that it brings a higher price there
than at home?
Duties OF $100 per bushel of $40
per pound could not help the far
mer to the extent Of a single penny.
He stands between two markets.
neith-l Of which he controls. He
makes his sales at prices fixed 1y
others. He makes his purchases at
prices fixed by Others. He sells his
staples at prices fixed by worldwide
competition and thsa buys the
things he needs for self and family,
under what conditions? Under the
same conditions on which he sells
his products? No. He buys in a
market from which foreign compe-
tition is barred by prohibitlve tariff
schedules, and from which domestic
competition Is removed by domestic
combinations organized under the
shelter Of such schedules.
A protective tariff protects the
woolen and cotton goods the farmer
must buy, but can not protect the
cotton, corn and wheat which he ha1
to sell. 1t protects the farm machln.
cry, the furniture, the ironWare,
woodenware. glass and glassware,
carpets, paints and dozens of other
things which he must buy, but can
not protect the oats, rye, cattle or
hogs he has to sell. It protects the
things he must buy by enabling the
trusts controlling them to write up
artificial prices on them.
Thus the farmer sells at normal,
competing prices and buys at hign.
ly abnormal and flcticious prices
written up by greed without refer
ence to cost. So situated, the far
mer for 40 years has been the spe-
cial vistim of the srstem. All this
time he has been exchanging a part
of his annual output for watered
prizes instead of for the goods.
For 40 years the farmers have
been making millionaire by the
thousands. But how many on the
farm? BY the medium of watered
prices the locusts Of monopoly have
eaten away the natural rewards os
agriculture and fattened into enor-
nous wealth the interests thus pen
stoned on this oldest occupation Ct
history. The Payne-Aldrich act, as
have all kindred acts before it, helps
the farmer just as does the fly in his
wheat, the smut in his corn, the rusT
in his oats, the weevil in his cotton,
and the bots in his horses; save only
that it loses him more than all these
combined.
The duties on his farm products
are worthless to him. They gre pure
~ political duties which can not
protect and were intended only 10
hoodwink, deceive and cajole him
into voting for other duties that ROB
him on all he brings on to the farm
or into the home. No, the farmer
is the choice victim of the system
and always has been. At every turn
he has been handed the redhot end
hog never becomes 35-cent bacon un-
hog never becomes 3g-cent bacon un-
| til after it leaves the farm.
/ confess to not little feeling
and sentiment on whatever effects