Free-Trade Would be all Right if Wage Rates were Uniform.

Give us a uniform wage all over the world, and I will be a FreeTrader. But we haven't this uniform wage and can't get it. It is not within the scope of possibilities. There are no two countries in all Europe that have a uniform wage, and every country over there, except England, has a Protective Tariff against the others, and against all the world. The sentiment for Protection in England has so developed within the last half-dozen years that it now pretty nearly possesses the country. England is certain to become a Tariff country unless all the other nations of the world suddenly become Free-Trade countries.

The Tariff between these European countries is relatively small as compared with our own Tariff. The reason for this is obvious. The difference in the wages of the various countries over there is slight, consequently there is no need for a high Tariff.

We Must Level Up Wages by Means of

the Tariff.

We, too, should have no need of a high Tariff if we were to reduce our wages to approximately the European scale. In the absence of a uniform wage all over the world, and because of the fact of our high rates, we are compelled to level up the wages of Europe with our wages, which we do by means of the Tariff. It is either do this, or meet them on their wage scale.

Europe, with water communication, is very close to our doors. It is much nearer to New York, as concerns freights, than is Chicago. And freights have a very important bearing on this whole problem now under discussion.

For example, I can ship magazines by freight to London at about two-thirds the cost of shipping them by freight to Chicago, and Chicago is almost a suburb of New York as compared with the vast stretches to the west of that city.

The water communication between here and Europe makes so low a freight charge that, in the transportation sense, it is almost like shipping freight from New York to Connecticut, two adjoining

states.

The Man Who Paid a Dollar a Day Would Make All the Plows.

As an example of what high and low wages would mean in adjoining states with Free-Trade between them, let us suppose that Smith is a manufacturer of plows in Connecticut, and that Jones is a manufacturer of the same kind of plows in New York State. Furthermore, suppose that each is buying his materials at approximately the same price, and that Smith, in Connecticut, pays his employes one dollar a day, while Jones, in New York, pays his men three dollars a day. How long would Jones be likely to lasthow long would he hold out in competition with Smith and his lower wage-scale, each having the same markets for their products, and Jones of New York in no way Protected against Smith's immeasurable advantage in the matter of wages? Low Tariff and Low Wages Advantageous to the Rich Non-Producers.

This is, of course, a somewhat exaggerated illustration made intentionally with the purpose of giving a vivid picture of what high and low wages mean in competitive industries, with no considerable differential in the matter of freights. The relative wages in this illustration may not be strictly accurate as compared with the European and American wages, but they are near enough for the purpose of illustration, and in this illustration it seems to me we can see pretty clearly the real issue as concerns the Tariff problem.

A low Tariff and low wages are of distinct advantage to the rich men and to the men living on their income, be it large or small. And so, too, are a low Tariff and low wages a distinct advantage to the non-producers of this country.

But do we want laws that will be in the interest of the non-producers, the idlers, and the rich men of this country, or do we want laws that will foster industry and Protect that industry-Protect the wage-worker from the hostility of foreign countries?

consideration, the compromise course would have far less show.

What We Want is a Tariff That Will Protect the American Wage

against the lower wage of the rest of the world, and we want nothing more. We want this, and we must have it. Our industries need no Protection beyond the difference in wage, and they should not have it. We have arrived at a point where this is not necessary and should not be continued. Wherever the Tariff is in excess of the difference between our wages and foreign wages, it should be lowered, and wherever it is below the difference it should be raised.

If this isn't going far enough in point of legislating downward to suit the Democratic party, then I am opposed to its policy. If this isn't g ing far enough to suit the Insur

of the Tariff.

Personally, I am emphatically opposed to another general upheaval of the Tariff. A race of men might perhaps have been created who in a few months could have drafted and enacted into legislation a perfect Tariff bill, dealing with several thou sand individual items, but no such race ever was created. Such an ac

complishment is not possible, and never has been possible, to the human men with whom this world is peopled. No first-rate business organization, with a wise administrative head, would ever consider such an undertaking. A few hundred items can be handled annually, and handled wisely, with plenty of time for investigation, and plenty of time for Congress to know what it is doing. With so few items under

then I am equally opposed to its policy. And if it is going too far to suit the other wing of the Republican party, then I am quite as strongly opposed to its policy.

I have no fear for our industries with a Tariff that will level up the wages of the world with our wages. I have every confidence in the ingenuity and the energy and the intensity of our people to compete with the world on equal terms, and with equal wages they will have equal terms.

America, a Nation of Money-Spenders, is the Best Market in the World.

To feed and house and clothe and finance and transport on our railroads and our sea-going craft over ninety millions of people is a big business in itself. America, with its enormous population-a nation of money-earners and money-spenders -is the biggest and best market in the world, a big enough market to work for and to fight for on the part of our factories and our farms.

Our markets are the envy of all the countries of Europe, who view our Tariff with a bitter hatred. They are greedy for our money, but our Tariff stands as a mighty wall against them.

We are a walled-in nation, and we might as well recognize it at one time as at another. The markets abroad are not for us. Our wages are on too high a level to make competition practical, or to any considerable extent possible, except on certain specialties and on certain products that are favored by our soil and our sunshine.

Isn't It Wise to Protect Our Own Markets Against Foreign Invasion? We can compete in these foreign markets if we reduce our wages to the wages of Europe. Without this reduction, we cannot compete, and the sooner we recognize it, the better. Isn't it a good deal more worth while to command our own trade, to Protect our own markets against foreign invasion, than to make a feeble attempt to secure foreign trade? The consuming power of America is beyond all conception. In aggregate it is well-nigh as much as all the markets of Europe, save in the matter of foodstuffs.

This is the greatest Free-Trade nation in the world-Free-Trade among ourselves, Free-Trade among people with a substantially uniform wage-allowing, of course, for differences between city and country rates. Right here at home we have the best example in the world of what Free-Trade means

with a uniform wage, and it is the uniform wage that makes FreeTrade among our various states possible. The Protection of our own markets against foreign invasion gives us a market that merits all the thought and genius of our industries.

Are Men as Well Off with Low Wages and Low Cost of Living as with High Wages and High Cost of Living?

The non-producer and the theorist argue for Free-Trade on the theory that men are quite as well off with low wages and a low cost of living as they are with high wages and a high cost of living. This may be true, and it may not be true.

The fact is, however, that we are on the higher scale, and it is a practical certainty that no argument or legislation can ever reduce the wages of this country to the wages of Europe. Such an attempt would mean a revolution, and a revolution on a question of this kind, in a democratic government, would have things pretty nearly its own way.

The only way to introduce the European wage in this country, to substitute it for our present high wage, would be through a process of idleness and starvation. Legislation cannot do it. Starvation could, and idleness and starvation would be pretty likely to come in on the heels of Free-Trade or a low Tariff.

We Have Never Tried Low Tariff Without Running Into Hard Times.

It is a fact that at no time in the history of this country have we tried a low Tariff without running into hard times. In view of this and of the common-sense simplicity of the matter, it is amazing to me that the low Tariff people and the FreeTrade people still continue their fight. An ounce of experience is worth a ton of theory, and all our experience points to the Protection of the American wage and to the Protection of our markets against European encroachment as the only practical and sensible course for us to follow.

Every man in this country except the non-producer is helped by our Protective Tariff, and in many cases the non-producer is indirectly helped to a much greater extent than he is injured by it.

A Market for His Products is to the Farmer the Most Important Thing.

The granger states are more or less skeptical and always have been about their share of benefit in our Tariff laws, urging that the Tariff is made for manufacturers, not for

farmers.

On the surface this would seem to be true, but as a matter of fact it is wholly untrue, and for the reason that a market for the products of the farm is of much more importance to the farmer than the question of a few dollars more or less on the supplies for his table and his home which he might buy at a lower price if we had no Tariff. The farmer's greatest asset is in the market for his products, and the market for his products depends upon the buying capacity of the people in our towns and villages.

Close Down Our Industries and the Purchasing Power of Our People Vanishes.

The consuming power and moneyspending habits of our people are increased according as our industries flourish and our wages range high.

This matchless market of the American Republic is the result of

an immeasurable and incomparable prosperity. All this prosperity, in turn, is the result of an economic system which has protected us from the competition of the low wage of Europe, and which has developed a scale of wages and a standard of living of which the Old World knows nothing.

The farmer is not only directly benefitted in the possession of this market, the result of Protection, but reaps another very large benefit in the increase in the value of his land. Land increases or decreases in value as its earning capacity is increased or decreased. The prosperity of the farmer within the last few years, and particularly of the Western farmer, who does things in a big way, is one of the most extraordinary recent developments.

All labor is interdependent. We cannot raise the wages of one class of workers without the effect being felt throughout the entire fabric of cur institutions, and without its having a direct effect on our cost of living.

For example, when the bricklayers were getting, we will say, two dollars a day, and all labor was paid relatively, a normal and equable condition of things prevailed. But the bricklayers concluded that they should have more wages, and in combination, or as a union, they demanded three dollars a day and secured the advance.

At the new scale of three dollars a day, with all other trades and classes of labor paid on the old scale, the bricklayers had a good thing. Their cost of living was no more, the fifty per cent. advance put them in a position where they could indulge in comforts and some luxuries that were formerly beyond them.

Up to this point it was very well for the bricklayer, but hard on the plasterer, and so he and his fellow craftsmen got together and advanced their wages proportionately. And in turn this advance swept through the building trades, covering every phase of human effort that was expressed in the construction of a building, from the cellar to the roof, resulting in an increase, for labor and for materials, of perhaps fifty per cent. in the cost of a house in which these same mechanics lived.

It Would Be Wiser to Go Slowly in Assailing Our Tariff System.

If I am right in my analysis, should we not be wise to go slowly in the matter of assailing our Tariff system, which makes progress possible in this country at wages which, at all events, are a satisfaction to us, even though the net results are not

so much better than lower wages would be with a lower cost of living?

I somehow fancy that bigger wages and a more generous expenditure tend to shape up a bigger race of people, a race of greater confidence and of more self-respect -which means a better citizenship.

I want to say one word more about the Tariff. The special session of Congress called by President Taft two years ago to frame a new Tariff bill, got pretty badly tangled up in its effort to reduce the Tariff and at the same time increase the revenue with a view to meeting expenses of the government from this source. If Congress had forgotten all about revenue and had started out with the single purpose of creating a Tariff that would Protect our labor from the cheap labor of Europe and would do no more, all this row and mania about legislating

downward would have been obviated. We cannot mix up the problem of raising revenue with that of merely Protecting our labor, and make a good job of it.