Norwich bulletin., 1914-09-14
BRANDECEE'S KEYNOTE SPEECH
Stirring Aess in Republican State Convention Setting Forth Issues of Campaign Democratic Promises Fai-Lack of Charlottesville Remedy.

ducts is the wages of labor and the wages of the labor in manufactures in this country are double or treble those paid for similar labor by our obvious that the tariff for revenue only policy. which is one of the funda- mental articles of the democratic creed. means, when finally executed that the educated, skilled mechanics of America must consent to have their wages reduced until the article upon which their labor is expended can be produced in this country as cheaply as it can be produced by the foreign competitor. allowing only for the cost of transportation.
 Democratic Promises Not Kept.
 The people of Connecticut will re- member that the democratic campaign orators, generally, two years ago pro- tested vigorously that they did not intend to injure any legitimate Amer ican industry, that they were simply import duties as they thought afford ed excessive protection. They de- nounced the republican tariff as the mother of trusts by reforming the tariff.
 President Wilson right after inaug.. uration called for the whetting of American wits by contest with the wits of the rest of the world.
 The "w1etting" has been in pro- cess for less than year and we all know the results. Honest American laboring men. whose only capital was the knowledge of the trade which they had learned healthy body and desire to earn an honest living by daily toll have lost their only means of sustaining themselves and their families by the hundreds of thousands. Many mills and factories have had to ;< running their plants four days a week with reduced numbers of operatives. Many of those which continue to oper- ate are running at a loss, and many others are making the contest without profit. The charity committees of all cants for assistance. Mechanics who have lost their positions are travelling from place to place seeking employ ment
 Whether the manufacturers of Con- necticut and their employees have yet become Accustomed to the excite ments and responsibilities of greater freedom" and to the heroic remedies administered by the president and his subservient majority in congress can best be left to them to narrate from their experiences. As indicating the United States is living I quote the closing sentence of his tariff message, as follows:
 For the present. put these mat ters on one side and think only of this one tfing-of the change in our fiscal system which may best serve to open once more the free channels of prosperity to a great people whom we would serve to the utmost and throughout both rank and file"
 Where is Promised Prosperity?
 Nnuy hes rocy ,rocnoofue hae,, fulfilled? Where have the free chan nels of prosperity been opened to the people? When the last presidential campaign opened, less than two years ago. we had at the head of this nation great, wise and experienced presi- dent in the person of William Howard Taft. The country was everywhere in the heighth of prosperity, labor was well employed at good wages, the na- tional treasury was filled-the repub- lican party was in power and, there fore, business was good. In the short space of year and half, since the inauguration of MT. Wilson, how all this has changedi No business man can look back over this period of re- stricted business, of shrinking values, of doubt, apprehension and distraction without feeling that he has been liv- ing in a nightmare. No employe has whether or when his wages were to be reduced or whether he was to be laid off his work part of the time.
 When business men ventured to ap- proach the capital of their own coun- try for the purpose of protesting against the enactment of legislation