Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1916-07-25
ruEAEreR-wAR PROBLEM

THE AEreR-WAR PROBLEM.
Students Of history and OF economies
are issuing warnings to the ha'ion ~
heware Of after.war conditions lhes
contend that when the great struggle
n rurope ends, this country will race
an economic problem greater than any
4 has ever had. One authority says
"There are special reasons why 'he
renub,ican party should be at this time
restored to power. When the preseii'
horr;d war ceases, there will be reVo-
,,t,on IN industrial conditions. All
Errone will produce more food pro-
ducts than now, each country VIII 'on
sumo ,ess and, therefore, Will import
,oss from the United States. Few lac
+or,es IN Europe have been Destroyer
Whom the boys return from 'ne
trenches with all adolescent 1oolish'
moss gone trained and disciplined tnes
vi,, nromtplv restore these factories
e. their maximum capacities. But the
raon,e. IMPOVERISHED by war ana our
dened with war taxes, equailns MY
- cont If even moderate incomes
will he unable to consume hor'h"''S
Tho economies which have been en-
forced during the war will rehain
Naturally and inevitably they Will eA'
port, regardless Of price.
"A great many naturally optinlis'.'
merchants and bankers and most oroA-
ers and promoters, ten us that "neh
the war ceases we will enter upon a
neriod of unprecedented prosperity
49,, ond common sense indicate
otherwise.
"This is not the first time Europe
heen de1used in blood. If we con-
sn,t conditions that ensued 1mmeola'e-
~ after the Napoleonic wars, we Will
cot some faint conception of what we
nov reasonably expect when this war
ends,. In 1912 congress passed a hlgn
nro+ ectiye tariff law. 1t revised THIS
downward in 1916, accomplishing what
the Payne-Aldrich bill attempted to do'
Tho tariff law as it existed after the re-
vision, was a thousand per cent better
than the present revenue tariff, The
result is-history.y Thomas Benton, VINO
should be an authority, at least with
democrats, describes conditions In this
graphic language: NO price for proper
a.. M sales except those of the sheriff
and marshal; no purchaser at execu-
+ion sales except the creditor or some
hoarder of money; no employment for
industry; no demand for labor; no
sales for the products of the farm; no
sound of the hammer except that or
the auctioneer knocking down prop
srty. ......- .......
Horace Greeley describes TINS
period in this language: Great Britain
poured her fabrics, far below cost, up
on our markets in perfect deluge.
Our manufactures went down IKE
grass before the mower; agriculture
and wages for labor speedily followed
Financial prostration was general and
the presence, Of debt universal. In
New England fully one-fourth Of all
property went through the sheriff
mill and the prostration was scarcely
less general elsewhere In Kentucky
the presence of debt was unbearaole'
In New York the leading merchants
united in a memorandum to congress
to save our commerce as well as our
manufactures from utter ruin by In
creasing tariff duties
But the political optimist and the
broker tell us that after the war
Europe will need, and will consume
steel, cement and all budding materials
IN great quantities. Yes, Europe Will
need these things, and, if able to pay
for them, will doubtless secure them
. but ask yourselves-don't ask me or a
hroker-whether they are likely, to Is
sue additional bonds with which to buy
them elsewhere or will they let their
own people produce them?
AT the close of the civil war the
south needed everything that the hand
of man could produce, but for quar-
ter of century it was scarcely worth
while to send a salesman for anything
beyond the barest necessities OF life'
for the people were unable to buy. If
anyone sees visions of foreign trade
as soon as this war ends. or thinks
he can sell anything to Europe until
those people have time to recuperate
from the war, he is welcome to the IL
fusion and to the delusion.
God pity us when the war is over,
and God pity the rest of the world I'M ..
4 til 1t is over. In order to save our
VA rs Il