200 



CONGRESS. (TnE TARIFF MEASURE.) 



gether, they were in the midst of them under- 

 taking to console the distress of the farmer by 

 telling him : " We propose to give agriculture 

 protection ; we intend to put a protective duty 

 on hides. We intend to pull the agriculturist 

 out of the swamp in which he has been strug- 

 gling. We do not intend to submit to the dicta- 

 tion of these Eastern felfows who have been lead- 

 ing so long." 



" But where now are protected hides ? Echo 

 answers 'where?' They are out in the cold 

 world and no friendly hand to shelter or protect 

 them. Hides bobbed up a while and appeared 

 on the bill with a -little sickly duty of 15 per 

 cent, and then serenely bobbed down again. 

 Sometimes you saw them and sometimes you did 

 not, and after they had played through several 

 acts to the great delight of the audience, the bell 

 rang down the curtains and hides bowed them- 

 selves back to the green room and took their 

 Elace on the free list, where our Republican 

 iends always designed they should. 



" Why did you not protect hides ? If you had 

 put a duty on hides as high as you put on tin 

 plate and cotton ties, over 100 per cent., you 

 could have excluded all the foreign hides and 

 increased the value of all the hides in the West- 

 ern States. Why did you not do it ? You never 

 intended to do it. They are not the folks you 

 are after, except to fool them. 



" Now, I do not believe in protecting hides or 

 anything else against competition. I am for free 

 raw material, and I am for putting a low reve- 

 nue duty on the finished product that goes to 

 the consumer, for that is the cheapest taxation 

 you can impose upon him. But you increase 

 the duty on wool, and you take camels' hair off 

 the free list and put it upon the dutiable list, 

 and you do that because you say it displaces a , 

 certain amount of wool, and you put the duty 

 on to check its importation. You increase the 

 duty on wool in order to develop the shoddy in- 

 dustries of the country, and judging from the 

 price you put upon wool and woolen goods in 

 the judgment of the Republican party to wear 

 a piece of woolen goods is a crime in this 

 country. 



"Two years ago a gentleman made a state- 

 ment to our committee remonstrating against 

 putting wool on the free list, which we were pro- 

 posing to do, in order to give greater employ- 

 ment and cheaper clothing to our people, because 

 the duty on wool, he said, had developed a great 

 American industry in this country, which was 

 the manufacture of shoddy. He said we have 

 $15,000,000 of capital invested in manufacturing 

 shoddy goods and employing in that branch of 

 labor 100,000 hands. And, Mr. Chairman, just 

 in proportion as we have developed the shoddy 

 business we have destroyed the woolen business. 



" What other article of agriculture have you 

 taken care of! There is $19,000,000 worth of 

 silk, and that is counted in making up the three 

 hundred and fifty-six, I suppose. That is a part of 

 the enormous sum which threatens destruction to 

 American agriculture. Why did you not put a 

 duty on it and prohibit its importation? Why 

 do you dodge the quest' on by putting a bounty 

 on raw silk ? A prohibitory duty is a thing that 

 would have brought it to its feet if anything 

 could have done it. Exposed as it is to the most 



damaging foreign competition, you turned your 

 back upon it and left it on the free list. 



" You leave tea on the free list. If it is im- 

 periling the agricultural interests of the coun- 

 try, why did you not protect it ? Why not put 

 a prohibitory duty on tea and develop the sassa- 

 fras industry in this country. But you did not 

 do it. You "have got five or six million dollars' 

 worth of tropical fruits on the free list. Why 

 did you not put on a prohibitory duty, stimulate 

 domestic production, and protect it against dam- 

 aging competition ? 



"We have $3,000,000 worth of live animals 

 that come in competition, you say, with our 

 stockmen and farmers. But you walk away 

 after telling the farmers all about their damag- 

 ing competition and leave them on the free list. 

 You found some of them on the free list and 

 you left them there ; and you found some horses 

 coming over from Mexico.' The import value of 

 each was something over eight dollars, and you 

 have put a duty of over thirty dollars a head on 

 them. You do not mind per cents., nor care how 

 high they are upon the ponies with which the poor 

 cattle men of Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas 

 have to herd their stock ; and you call that pro- 

 tecting American industries. They will have too 

 much sense to believe you when you go to talk 

 any such music as that in their ears. 



"The committee are greatly alarmed about 

 our wheat growers. That great industry is im- 

 periled by ' a most damaging competition.' The 

 American market must be kept for our own farm- 

 ers and it must be held at all hazards ; and, like 

 heroes advancing to the attack, they have scaled 

 the walls, entered the city, and spiked the ene- 

 my's guns. They have increased the duty on 

 wheat and that great product is safe. How 

 many bushels of wheat are imported into this 

 country ? We exported last year 90,000,000 bush- 

 els in wheat and flour. In 1880 and 1881 we 

 exported 150,000,000 bushels ; but since then our 

 importations have been falling off, and that has 

 caused a reduction in our exportations ; and last 

 year we exported only 90,000,000 bushels and 

 imported the inconsiderable amount of 1,946 

 bushels of wheat. And that duty has been put 

 on to protect American farmers against the dam- 

 aging foreign competion from India and Russia. 



"What did that 1,946 bushels of wheat cost? 

 Our wheat was at an average export price of 89 

 cents per bushel, and the average price of the 

 1,946 bushels which we imported was $2.05. 

 Seven hundred bushels cost in Germany $3.20 a 

 bushel. What do you suppose that wheat was 

 imported for? Do not all speak at once, please. 



" It was seed wheat, imported by the wheat 

 grower of the West to improve his seed. Docs 

 not every man know that ? And you have made 

 it cost him that much more to improve his agri- 

 cultural product so that he can raise a better 

 character of wheat and better compete in the 

 markets of the world, where he has to meet all 

 comers in free competition. He knows that the 

 man who can produce the best article and sell at 

 the lowest price will drive his rival out of the 

 market. You have tried to fool him by telling 

 him you are securing him in the enjoyment, of 

 the home market. 



" One thousand nine hundred and forty--;ix 

 bushels of wheat ! 



