64 PROTECTIVE TARIFFS AND PRICES. 



per cent. Is that an illustration of the way in which Western 

 farmers are literally fleeced by our Protective system, and forced by 

 it to accept one-third less in quantity of woolen cloth in exchange 

 for their produce than under the policy of partial Free Trade? 



Take another example. High-grade English steel is to-day sell- 

 ing in the Chicago market at 21^ cents per pound, while the 

 American article of equal quality is selling at 15 cents, both cur- 

 rency, and American manufacturers are supplying from three-fourths 

 to seven-eighths of the home demand with increasing patronage, 

 and are rapidly crowding their foreign competitors out of this 

 country. Is that a further illustration of the way in which West- 

 ern farmers are plundered by our Protective system, and compelled 

 by it to take one-third or one-quarter less in pounds of steel in re- 

 turn for their breadstuff's than was the case under the tariffs of 1846 

 and 1857? 



Here is still another example. Since the manufacture of porce- 

 lain has been established in the United States, the price of porce- 

 lain door-knobs at the factory has fallen from $12 to $3 per 

 thousand, and the American article is now crowding Great Britain's 

 product out of her colonial markets, where she has had a monopoly 

 of the supply. Is that another illustration of the way in which 

 Western farmers are robbed by our Protective system, and driven 

 to take one-third less of porcelain wares in exchange for their grain 

 than would have been the case between 1846 and 1861 ? 



Next, let us turn to the phase of the subject presented by the 

 following extract from the Finance Report of the United States for 

 *%55> Page 15: 



Let it be considered that we manufacture all our furniture, all our carriages 

 wagons, steam-engines, machinery for our factories and machine shops, most of 

 our leather and shoes, boots, hats, door butts, and bolts of all descriptions, bells 

 balances, buckles, brads, wood-saws, horse-cards, castors, curtain-pins, curtain 

 bands, metal cocks, jack-screws, curry-combs, coal-hods, candlesticks, gas-fittings 

 and burners, coffee-mills, caldrons, heavy edge-tools, hay and manure-forks, gim- 

 lets, hat and coat wardrobe hooks, harrows of all kinds, hoes, hollow- ware, planes, 

 plows, sad-irons, tailors' irons, door-knobs, furniture-knobs, brass kettles, locks of 

 all kinds, iron latches, lines, lanterns, lamps, levels, lead, cut- nails, clout nails, 

 pins, pumps, punches, pokers, sand-paper, rulers, iron and copper rivets, ropes, 

 rakes, oil-stones, wrought iron spikes, door-springs, window-springs, steelyards, 

 scales of all descriptions, steel and brass scales, trowels of all descriptions, 

 spoons of all descriptions, thermometers, tacks, vises of all descriptions, axes, 

 wrenches of all descriptions, iron, brass, and copper wire, with a long list of 

 other articles, to the exclusion of the like articles from other countries. 



