The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1910-09-27
WHY THE COTTON INDUSTRY Is
DEPRESSED

cotton in the open market OF th7
world, gets no protection or SUBSIDY,
asks none and he is more prosperous
thar for years, and nobody even pre-
tends that the protective tariff affects
the price Of his product.
The cotton manufacturers and en-
ployes in cotton mills in North Caro-
lima are having a hard time under
the best tariff law ever enacted ~
quote Taft. Mills a been smut
down or closed part OF the time. Capt.
turn. To add to the bur
dens of the employee, everything
he buys has gone up in price, ana
the increase IN his hats, shoes, cioln-
ing, hardware and other articles he
must buy is due to the tariff and th5
fairfield trusts protected and en-
riched by the Taft administration.
Morehead has been writing to mill
men urging them to vote "for the Re
publican party and Prosperity Some
Of the mill men took Morehead's ad-
vice in 1908 but the Prosperity prom
ised then has not yet reached them.
Instead the cotton mill industry has,
according to Mr.. w. A. Erwin, the
States biggest cotton mill man, been
worse depressed his year than in any
previous year in q quarter of a cen
fury.
Why Is this 50? And what is the
remedy? The Monroe Journal of this
week has two editorials that throw a
f1Ood Of light upon these questions,
An Example, Mr.. Cotton Manufac-
turcr.
Some time men will wake up to
the farce of protection. The law of
complete free trade betWeen h
United States and the Philippine Is
lands had been in effect just one year
on August first. During those twelve
months our imports from the stands
increased fifty per cent.
During the same time our exports
to the islands Increased 20 per cent.
One Of the chief articles of export
showing his increase is cotton goods,
and since the natural demand of that
country would be the simpler man
ufactures OF this trade, and since the
South principally produces these, it is
fair to assume, in the absence of
figures, that the South has been The
largest gamer.
Yet Republican spell-binders are
trying TO commit the South to the
dead body of protection, and Just at
a time when the balance of the coun-
try IS beginning to see it's rotten
MISS"
Two Things That Won't Go Together.
In an address before the National
Association of Cotton Manufacturers
w. -
on the subject, Foreign Markets for
Cotton Textiles Said:
Our facilities for the pro-
duction of goods have multiplied
SO rapidly during the past few
years that we lave overtaken our
capacity for consumption great as
it is. 1t IS an undeniable fact that
the need for a more extended
market for our textile produc-
ions exists and it seems TO me
that h real safeguard for your
ind ustry lies in getting those
South American) markets.
And here is where protection will
finally destroy itself in this country
We can't sell to those people because
We won buy from them. Some
things We can produce cheaper than
they cam; such things We ought to
sell them. Some things they can
produce cheaper than We can; such
things they ought TO sell US. That
would be the natural. profitable or
der of things. Thus they would have
something to pay for our goods with.
We would make a profit on what we
sold them. and also a saving on what
they sold us, because they produced
it cheaper than we could. They
would do likewise, and the people
Of both countries would have more
OF the things OF life than either would
alone under protection.
"Instead of the natural, profitable
course above. we pursue the opposite,
and our hoggish desires will be their
own defeat. instead of following the
laws of and trade, we say
NO, Well protect ourselves, Wen sell
all and buy none Then we pro-
ICED to tax all our people n give it
to a few manufacturers to pay them to
make something that the people Of the
Of her country can make better or