, 1922-11-23

derstood. that the foundations of our code are
viewed from the wrong angle
Today there is no educated person, perhaps few
among the nliterate, without some knowledge of
our great industrial plants. The names OF our
leading establishments and of the men who found
ed them or direct them are better known than the
names of jurists and statesmen. Hence, naturally
but incuriously, many grow up with a vague no
tion that from the beginning a manufacturing
class or even a caste ruled the country, and SAat
commerce and agriculture were forced 10 go when
IL said Go and to come when IL said Come"
We know such names as Carnegie, Disston. Bald
win, Schwab, Ford, and Packer, as possibly bet
of the agricultural interest. But who can offhand
name twenty or ten manufacturers of the young
republic. OF the first five presidents four were
southern planters, and the other was the son of
those days generally had land Of his own.
Thomas H Benton was early schooled to the Ia
bors of the field. Physicians were apt TO speak
of their crops. Almost invariably the country
pastor was more or less of a farmer. or IL he be
came a circuit rider he passed from farm TO farm
over n distance Of from 30 to 200 miles. No occu-
patton today has or can have the preeminence
that agriculture had in the first thirty years of
the republic.
Half a century after washington's death. yes,
and half a decade later the issue on which the
sharpest words were said was-should the planter
who bought his laborers or the farmer who paid
wages rule in the territories? The underlying
struggle was between two landed interests-making
allowance for homestead laws and measures to
increase the number of land owners. One landed
interest was eager to secure a higher boundary line
for Oregon, and was proud to sec California a free
state. The other repealed the Missouri Compromise
and thought of re-opening the African slave trade
Forcible If coarse was the speaker who said TO
congress, "The real fight is over land for the land
less, or niggers for the niggerless." II was on the
free soil issue that the Democratic party, r~esistless
when united, broke in twain in 1s4S and broke a
wider cleavage in 1860. When that cleavage came
one landed interest rallied around Abraham Lin
coin who had sought TO be Commissioner of the
Land Office, and the other around jefferson Davis
who was n planter to the end of his days
This is not a philosophic deduction; il is a state
ment of elementary facts known to at least 800 out
of every thousand of, native born voters and yet
forgotten because somebody says that, he read that
somebody thought that a manufacturers combina-
ton had always been in the saddle.
Well known as it is that our first tariff act was
introduced by James Madison, and signed by
George Washington, both Virginia planters, it is
not always said that unless such a measure had
been supported by a powerful agricultural interest
it could not have passed. Look then at the first
great champion of protection, Alexander Hamilton
"a gallant aide, a lawyer of distinction, a publicist
of unsurpassed ability, but a man whose political
status was higher because he was the soninlaw OF
a well-known landed proprietor. Note how gravely
Hamilton discusses the question whether manu-.
~facturers would draw too many laborers from the
soil, and how respectfully he meets all who dwell
on the importance of opening new lands to the
pillow.