^ »..' \ ^-^ ^-TTT' o»- 'o -- . l^' V^ .^r^'. <^ "oV^ ^0' v> ^^d* 4-°-n*.. .0' ^' <. "^ a\ ^*^ 0°, ^°-^-*-. ■ Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from The Library of Congress http://www.archive.org/details/truecauseofeveryOOdean !i/t-<0 THE TRUE CAUSE EYEEY AMERICAN PANIC, AND DEPRESSION OF LABOR AND BUSINESS AND THE Remedy Thekefoe, AS GIVEN BY GEOKGE W. DEAN, of Kew York, Before the United States Congressional Committee appointed to Ascertain (he Cause of Depression of Labor and Business, AND ON THE DEFECTS OF THE PRESENT TARIFF SYSTEM, As OIVEN BErORE THE TARIFF COMMISSIONEBS. S^I^r^^'^ NEW YORK; TROWS PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING CO., 201-213 East Twelfth Street. 1884. Copyright, 1884, by Gbokge W. Dean. \S' VIEWS OF GEORGE W. DEAN, OF NEW YORK, On the Caiise of Panics^ and the Depression of Labor and Business^ as given hefore the U. 8. Congressional Oom- mittee^ ajppointed to Ascertain the Cause of Depression of Labor and Business, FORTY-SIXTH CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION. Congress of the United States, In the House of Bepresentatives^ April 11, 1879. The Speaker announced the appointment of Mr. Hendrick B. Wright, of Pennsylvania ; Mr. H. L. Dickey, of Ohio; Mr. M. P. O'Connor, of South Carolina ; Mr. T. H. Murch, of Maine ; Mr. J. C. Sherwin, of Illinois; Mr, Calvin Cowgill, of Indiana; and Mr. J. J. Martin, of North Carolina, on the Select Committee to inquire into the causes of the present depression of labor; which committee was au- thorized in the Forty-fifth Congress, and (not having made a report) was continued. The following is the resolution for the creation of the committee ; FORTY-FIFTH CONGRESS, SECOND SESSION. Congress of the United States, In the House of Bepresentatives, Ju7ie 17, 1878. Mr. Thompson submitted the following, which was agreed to : Whereas^ Labor and the productive interests of the country are greatly depressed and suffering severely from causes not yet fully understood ; and 2 VIEWS OF GEOEGE W. DEAN. Whereas, Our real and permanent prosperity is founded and de- pendent upon labor as the source of all wealth ; that when labor suffers from any cause which may be removed or its rigor mitigated our national harmony and prosperity are thereby imperilled ; that it is, therefore, the solemn duty of Congress to inquire into and ascertain the causes of such prostration and to devise proper measures for their relief, that labor may be restored its just rights, to the end that Jabor and all our varied interests may be encouraged, promoted, and pro- tected by liberal, just, and equal laws ; therefore. Besohed, That a committee, consisting of seven members of this House, be appointed, whose duty it shall be to inquire into and ascer- tain the causes of general business depression, especially of labor, to devise and propose measures for relief, and that to enable said com- mittee to perform its important duties hereby conferred, it has leave to sit during recess, to employ a clerk and such other assistance as may be needed, to examine witnesses, and to report at next session the re- sult of its investigations and the measures for relief it may recommend by bill or otherwise. Attest : (Signed) Geo. M. Adams, Clerk. This Committee examined in Chicago 40 persons San Frau Cisco 29 " Des Moines 3 " New York 2 " (Dr. Peter Cooper and G. W. Dean) Boston 7 " And views of George W. Dean, given before the Tariff Commission- ers, on defects of our tariff system. DEPRESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. :N'ew York, October 28, 1879, Views of Mr. George W. Dean. Mr. George W. Dean came before the Committee at its invitation. He stated, in answer to preliminary ques- tions, that his age is fifty-four ; that he was born in Bos- ton, but has been a resident of New York for the last fifty-four years ; that he has been thirty-three years in business, principally dealing in real estate. The Chairman : Have you any clear and regular idea of the causes that have produced the disasters to the busi- ness affairs of the country and the depression in labor during the last ten years ? . Mr. Dean : Yes ; I think I have. The Chairman : State what, in your opinion, has been the cause of the disasters to business affairs and of the de- pression of labor for the last ten years. Mr. Dean : The cause of our country's poverty in em- ployment and gold, statistics prove, was the adding of an overwhelming balance of trade debt from the year 1863 to the panic of 1873, which amounted, according to official re- turns, to over ten hundred million dollars ($1,000,000,000), an unnecessary burden and loss in employment, gold, and United States bonds, added to our great war debt. This trade debt and stagnation of business is the result of low^ering duties to suit importers, as was the case in the years preceding the bankruptcies of 1837 and 1857, which DEPEE8SI0N IN LABOR AND BIJSINESS. should have been averted by increasing duties, reducing imports below trade exports. See excess of imports over exports as foilov^s : Year. Losses in balance of trade against our country. Gain in balance of trade in favor of our country. Loss in excess of specie exported in settlement of balance of trade. 1863 ... $39,370,818 157,609,295 72,716,277 85,952,544 101,256.959 75,483,541 131,388,682 43,186.640 77,403,506 182,417,491 119,656,288 $)6,571,956 92,280 920 1864 1865 57 833 154 1866 75,343,979 38 797 897 1867 1868 79,595,734 37,330,504 31,736,486 77,171,964 66,133,845 1869 1870 1871 1872 1873 63,127,637 38,175,499 71 231 425 1874 $18,876,698 1875 19,563,725 $1,106,005,766 18,876,698 $18,876,698 People mortgaged for $785,331,000 301,798,068 Total loss $1,087,129,068 $1,087,129,068 The way Congress restored business after the bank- ruptcies of 1837 and 1S57 was by a very large increase of duties on imports of our kind in the years 184:2 and 18G1, which immediately gave confidence and employment to our producing and laboring classes. This country's market is worth more to our industrial manufacturing interests than all the other markets in the world. Give them this, their own market, which belongs to them by right and reason, and they will have no longer DEPEESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. 5 anj" want of business and prosperity. Then the nation will save the money ($300,000,000 per annum) now foolishly paid abroad to create over-productions of goods in our market which can be as well made at home, without the loss of paying the foreign cost, as we do now. At home, the cost of production is to our country labor alone. Foreign manufacturers desire low duties upon their goods, and are willing to pay to cause a reduction of du- ties for them. No tariff is practically protective that does not give our country a favorable balance of trade, and when it does so, don't destroy that balance in our favor by reduc- ing duties. All creditor nations are great manufacturing nations, while debtor nations are not manufacturing nations, but borrowing and dependent nations. Low or non-protective duties are only suitable for a people who can afford to work for the lowest earthly wages, and whose country's industries cannot be usurped by foreign competition. The overwhelming balance of trade debt created from 1863 to the panic of 1873, amounting to over $1,000,000-, 000, is fast being liquidated by a favorable balance of trade in our country's favor. The tariff duties, if now reduced, will again turn against our country an adverse balance of trade, with all its attending evils, and before we have gained in the total amount the sum our people lost in the above-named years, by a tariff too low then to check ex- cessive imports over our exports. All tariffs are too low 6 DEPRESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. which do not give onr country a favorable yearly balance of trade, whatever the rates of duty may be. The higher the duties the more completely are American industries protected and developed, to the advantage of our working classes and producers of all and every other kind of American growth or production. When the mining and manufacturing industries tlirive, the farmer finds better prices for his products at home than abroad and a quicker market. When either suffers from the want of demand from the othei*, both are made to suffer, and all American industries should unite together as one man in defending any American interest against all foreign combinations in Congress to usurp and destroy either American employ- ments or productions. The free-trade league now assert and proclaim that the United States must bu}^ of other nations if we wish to sell them our exports. This is silly argument. The United States bought from the years 1863 to 1873 (panic) over one thousand million of dollars of foreign nations more than foreign nations bought of us. . We then bought more than we should, but they did not commit the same folly, and would not if we committed the same folly over again. This doctrine is better answered now by our in- creased sales of exports, and our large decreased purchases of imports, now giving our country a favorable balance of trade, which alone checks the foreign demand for gold, and thereby destroys the premium by rernoving the cause. The Chairman : State the causes of the destruction of American commerce. DEPRESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. 7 Mr. Dean : My answer is : 1st. The acknowledgment of belligerent rights by England to the South, which permitted acts of war upon our ocean commerce, and partly destroyed it. 2d. The revolution from wood, to iron for ship-build- ing. 3d. The want of patriotism and statesmanship in our nation's law-makers in not paying a sufficient sum for mail service, as other nations have done, to sustain their shipping interest. 4th. To remedy the above misfortunes I would recom- mend a law to be made favoring American shipping by differential duties upon imports carried in American bot- toms ; this law to be guaranteed to our shipowners for a certain number of years — for instance, ten years. This, I hold, would quickly restore our ship-building industries and restore our ocean tonnage. The Chairman : What is your idea as to the policy of an income tax as a source of revenue? Mr. Dean: I favor an income tax, because it is just, and falls only on those who are the most able .to con- tribute to the support of the Government ; they being the ones who have received the most favors under our laws, and are the ones who really have more use of the Govern- ment, because possessing more of value which needs tlie most protection, and for the further reason that taxation should be uniform, and operate equally on all trades, oc- cupations, businesses, and incomes. 8 DEPEESSION IN LABOE AND BUSINESS. The Chairman : What would be your remedy to pre- vent a recurrence of the disasters alread}^ experienced? Me. Dean : The remedy to prevent the country's past ills from occurring in tlie future will be in always having tariff laws that encourage economy in our imports, and encourage all kinds of industries at home; in other words, a tariff that will give the American working- people a preference in their own market over the pro- ductions made abroad, thus keeping the cost of foreign imports largely below American exports. Gold and bonds will flow from abroad in settlement of the balance of trade in our favor, creating a supply of gold greater than our needs and demand, removing permanently the cause and complaint of a superior value of gold over United States notes, and which w^ould probably in time place gold, like silver, at a discount. Tariff protection to one or many of our labor indus- trial pursuits against foreign competition is not (as as- serted) at the expense of any other American class or section of our country, for what benefits one State or class as a member of the whole country prospers the entire nation. Protection to American employments is wholly at the expense and loss of the foreign producer, w^ho is deprived of sujpjplyiiig our market, which is that much gain to our employments — for be it remembered what would have been the foreign cost, if imported, would have been our country's loss, in money and em- ployments, as a penny saved is a penny gained. The South and West, more than any other section of DEPRESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. 9 our country, should demand a protective tariff for its own "welfare and interests, to develop its yet undeveloped resources. The South and West, by 7nanufacturing the raw products now produced hy them^ would every year more than double the value of their present production ; capital would seek them — but not until then — as capital seeks only that part of our country which possesses enter- prise. The Eastern manufacturers dread higher duties, as they would develop the South and West at the cost and loss of their trade, as living and wages are higher in the East. A government that will not protect and develop its country's industries is cither corrupt or imbecile- Let our Government give to our miners and manu- facturers the same practical protection which the farmer has, and which commerce enjoys upon American waters. Both are free from foreign competition by law and cir- cumstances. Our country's gain by exports would then exceed our needed imports by three or four hundred mil- lions of dollars per annum. In five or ten years our people and Government would be out of debt by the old- fashioned way — increase of employments and industries and saving by reduction in money costs for imports. • It will reduce the amount of work now unnecessarily done abroad for our market two hundred million dollars annually, and increase ours correspondingly, making a gain to our people of that amount annually. Our country has the greatest natural resources of any in the world, and is deficient in statesmanship in making it productive. 10 DEPRESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. When either of the real producers of our country's wealth, manufacturers, miners, or farmers, are impov- erished by foreign competition, then all are made to suffer, because each one's productions add to the one total production of our country. St. Paul tells us, " If one member is sick the whole body suffers." A large increase of duties on foreign industries of our own kind is no increase of taxes upon our own people, but the reverse, being an increase of wealth to them, as oar Gov- ernment requires only a certain amount of revenue for its support, which is as large under low as under pro- tective duties. The difference and gain to our people is the increase of employment and gold, corresponding with the reduction made in the# amount and gold cost of our imports. The more free our communists in Congress are to give other nations our trade, by low duties, the less business, employments, and gold we will have for ourselves. The Chairman : State your opinion as to the currency. Should it be increased ? Should the national bank-note issues be withdrawn and legal-tender money substituted ? Mr. Dean : The currency of the people should be in- creased to aid and provide means to distribute a growing volume of productions and business, and to aid in develop- ing our country's undeveloped resources, to the same amount jyer capita that France enjoys, which country pos- sesses none too much business capital. The national bank-note issues should he withdrawn to prevent either contraction or inflation of our paper currency, and legal- DEPEESSION IN LABOR AND BUSINESS. 11 tender or United States certificates of dejjosit made a full legal tender substituted in their place. The national bank charters should be left undisturbed, and left to per- form only their legitimate business — that of banks of dis- counts and deposits. The amount of currency j!?6^ capita in the United States is less than in any other commercial country in the world. This being a younger and more extensive country, for many reasons sliould have j)er capita the greatest amount. In France it is $36.85 ; Great Britain, $23.66 ; German Empire, $20.64 ; and in the United States, $15.06. With $500,000,000 the per capita would be but $12 a head. The Chaikman : State whether, in your opinion, it would be right and proper for Government to tax incomes as a source of revenue. Mr. Dean : I answer to that, yes. Tpie Chairman : State whether, in your judgment, it would not be a wise policy for the Government to furnish means and facilities for the poorer classes of the popula- tion of the country who are out of employment to settle upon and occupy the public domain. Mk. Dean : Yes. I am in favor of all that ; in favor of it heartily. Only I do not know that the community is ripe for the question at present. I think that the peo- ple are greatly in want of education on that subject. The Government should aid the poor as well as it does the rich. It aids railroad corporations. The Pacific Railroad would not have been built for a good many years had it not been for Government aid. When the Government stepped 13 DEPRESSION IN I.ABOK ANP BrSINES?. ill with gniiits of money and laiui, and with the loan of its ciwiit, the work was done rapidly. TwK Chairm.v:^:: Po you regard the agricultural in- terest of the country as paramount to any one particular iuteivst i Mk. Dkan: I think that the agricultural question tiikes care of itself. It cannot be "sold out*' as the mannfacturei^ can be sold out Xo Europe^m intei'ests would care to lu\^*e a law to have farming products from abroad admitted here free of duty as they would like to have forv^ign manufactures admitted. I think that our manufacturers need assistance and protection; but in- ste^id of having it they an> ""^ sold out.*' TiiK Chaikma:^ : What I wish you to answer directly is whether the agricultural interest of the country is not of more imjv>rtani'C thai\ any other one brancli of industry, and whether it ought nor therefore have tlie piv^per means of development i !\ru, Pkan : Yes : i: is the paramount interest of the country. But you cannot xery well legislate so that the land will not prvxiuce. You cannot very well place other coautries in competition with onis in r^aid to the pro- dacts of the eoil. But manufacturers need laws to prvv teot tiieir iuterests. Adjoaraed DEFECTS IN OUR TARIFF SYSTEM. 13 VIEWS OF GEOr.GE W. DEAK, Given lefore the Tariff Commissioners^ on the Defects of our Tariff Systewj and the Remedy tlierefor^ at the Windsor Hotel, New York, OctoherZ, 1882. Mr. George "W. Dean, of New York, addressed the Commission as follows : Gentlemen of the Tariff Commission : I am not here to represent any particular American interest, bat to give niy views on the defects of the present tariff system, and the remedy therefor, by a new amendment or section added to our tariff laws for self-adjusting duties, to pre- vent a continued yearly adverse balance of trade with other nations, and its disastrous effects upon our country, as in former times. Having given from my youth a great deal of time and thought to the very important subject of our tariff laws, being the laws having a direct bearing upon our wliolc country's prosperity, and being a subject of paramount importance to every American business, farmer, trade, or industry, and to wages of workingmen, which interests so many for good or evil ; and as the country looks to your Commission for judicious recommendations in relation to the defects in our present tariff, I take the liberty to recommend to your Commission a new amendment or section to be -added to our tariff laws, to remedy what I have deemed for many years a vital defect in said laws, 14 DEFECTS IN OUR TARIFF SYSTEM. and it would be, in my opinion, greatly to our country's advantage to adopt the same ; which new section, in my judgment, would be a perfect preventive against a con- tinued yearly adverse balance of trade to our country (as in former times), and of great panics, affecting all businesses, such as occurred in the years 1837, 1857 and 1873, with the succeeding years of depression to employments and wages, and the suspension of specie payments. Statistics of our trade imports and exports (if referred to) will prove foreign competition and over-importation to be the true and only causes of all our former panics, being disas- trously large and in excess of our exports, with a loss to our country in both gold and labor, employments amount- ing to many hundred millions of dollars for imports in competition with our own kind of products, for the years just preceding each and every panic, which our exports of merchandise could not liquidate and balance, as would have been done if our imports had been in value curtailed to that of our exports by defensive duties in amount to equal the real difference of foreign and American wages, which would have increased American productions and made our country the creditor in place of the debtor na- tion, being made thus by excess of imports alone. In other words, by the tariff our liabilities for mer- chandise imports were allowed to largely exceed our assets for merchandise exports, which is sufficient evi- dence that our country was unnecessaril}^ and disastrously running in debt by buying more from other nations than, they bought of iis, or was good for our labor employments DEFECTS IN OIJR TARIFF SYSTEM. 15 or financial interests. For ours is not an old-established and wealthy country like that of England, living partly npon its money investments abroad, and on other nations by its vast ocean shipping interests and carrying trade. One nation doing business with other nations is, by its follies and extravagance, subject to the same law of panic and failure from adverse trade as are separate individuals in trade; and our nation, to have its own States and people thrive, must be encouraged by its own revenue tariff laws to patronize its own country's productions in preference to all others, that w^e may in turn be em- ployed, prosperous, and self-sustaining, to that extent at least of preventing ours from becoming the debtor people and nation by an unfavorable adverse balance of trade with other nations, as in the years just preceding our panic times ; and by so doing would save and economize to our country in the total foreign cost for imports of a kind we produce to sell, adding by this means to our total wealth in productions and to our people's prosperity, in which, be it remembered, we directly or indirectly share more or less, in whatever business, vocation, or part of the coimtry we may live, as we all do share more or less in the suffering from. adverse business times. A judicious tariff, in my opinion, should be a self- adjusting one, and contain an element within itself to immediately check, at the end of any fiscal year, an ad- verse balance of trade, without waiting, as we did under the old tariff system, for a panic, suspension of specie payments, and depression of business and wages to come 16 DEFECTS IN OUK TARIFF SYSTEM. upon lis, and tlien, for the want of a remedy at hand, take years to care by a starvation and bankrupt process. The remedy I offer (or one to the same effect) is in the following' section, and should be embodied in our tariff lawSj viz. : Section — . And he it further enacted. That at the terraination of any fiscal year that the total imports of merchandise shall for the year amount in.value to over five-sixths of the total value of our country's merchandise exports for the same year (not counting- or including money or gold and silver bullion as an export or import), then the Sec- retary of the United States Treasury is empowered and duly authorized and directed by Congress to immediately increase the duties one-sixth in amount upon all present dutiable imports, Congress retaining the right to reduce or increase all or any of the duties so increased by said Secretary at any time. KoTE. — The difference of one-sixth allowed in mer- chandise in our favor is not equivalent to our losses to foreign nations for our ocean-carrying trade ; American interest-bearing obligations held in Europe, and the loss to oar coantry by expenses of American toarists abroad, being together estimated at over $200,000,000 in gold per annum. The above new tariff section for our tariff laws is for the important purpose of avoiding future panics, farther depression of oar country's total production, labor, and basiness, and to keep our coantry by home production a creditor nation, with favorable balances of business trade. And it will also cause our coantry to retain and gain in its gold reserve to our advantage, as our then greater ex- port value over import cost would be ample to pay for all DEFECTS LN^ OZR TAEIEF SYSTEM!. 17 foreign taxation for imports, without exporting gold for that purpose. To some persons it may at first sight ap- pear hke instability in tariff rates, but upon reflection and application would not be found so, as the duties are only to be changed by the United States Treasurer in a certain emergency of ruinous excessive cost for imports, and is not likely to change the duties more than once or twice in twenty years. To those who object to a change of duties when required to continue our country having a favorable balance of trade, I would say they choose of the two propositions the most disastrous one to our people's prosperity, that one of a debtor people or nati(m, as in the preceding years just before every former panic. Then the question of the rate of duties upon imports will be decided alone, and fairly, by the total relative value of imports and exports, and by the balance of trade with nations ; and, better yet, be removed from the pre- judices of partisans and politics, placing, as it would, our country's prosperity upon a permanent, self-sustaining basis, by a continued favorable balance of trade, which should be paramount to all other single interests, either American or foreign. The following are the official statistics of imports and exports and losses for the year and preceding years to each panic which occurred in the years 1837, 1857, and 1873, showing each year's loss to our industries and w^ealth by adverse balance of trade taxation, and being the only true and svjjicient cause for our country's former im- poverishment and panics ; 18 DEFECTS IN OUR TARIFF SYSTEM. Years. Foreign taxation merchandise. Imports. American merchandise. Exports. Yearly loss by- adverse trade or foreign taxation. 1831 $82,808,110 75,327,688 83,470.067 86,973,147 122,007,974 158,811,392 113,310,571 $59,218,588 61,726,529 69,950,856 80,623,662 100,459,481 106,570,942 94,280,895 $28,589,527 1832 13,601,159 1838 13,519,201 1884 6,349,485 1835 1886 21,548,498 52,240,450 1837 19,027,676 Panic of 1837, caused by seven years of adverse balance of trade or f or- picrTi t'.nYn.t.ioTi fiOta.l loss $149,675,991 $29,183,800 1850 $164,034,033 200,476,308 195,387,814 250,157,145 275,991,779 231,650,340 295,650,938 338,511,295 $134,900,233 178,620,138 154,931,147 189,869,162 215,828,200 192,751,185 266,438,051 278,906,713 1851 21,856,170 1852 40,456,167 1853 60,287,983 1854 60,663,579 1855 38,899,205 1856 29,212,887 1857 54,604,582 Panic of 1857, caused by eight years of adverse balance of trade or for- $335,018,573 $157,609,295 1864 $301,113,322 209,656,525 423,470,646 381,043,768 344,873,441 406,555,879 419,803,113 505,802,414 610,904,622 624,689,727 $143,504,027 136,940,248 337,518,102 279,786,809 269,889,900 275,166,697 376,616,473 428,398,908 428,487,131 505,033,489 1865 72,716,277 1866 85,952,544 1867 101,256,959 1868..' 75,488,541 1869 131,388,682 1870 48,186,640 1871 77,408,506 1872 182,417,491 1873 119,656,288 Panic of 1873, caused by ten years of adverse balance of trade or for- eign taxation, total loss. $1,047,070,223 Total foreign taxation losses $1,531,259,687 DEFECTS IN OUE TARIFF SYSTEM. 19 I further recommend, believing it wise and judicious, a change in the valuations of imports from foreign to home valuation upon all imports of a kind which we pro- duce to sell. In our country's earlier days, we then not being a manufacturing country, foreign valuations were necessary, but this necessity no longer exists and should be changed, being now more convenient to ascertain the true value at home than the true one abroad for merchandise in competition with home productions ; it will tend greatly to correct the growing evil of foreign undervaluations, which undervaluations are directly acts of smuggling of part of the imports, and practically annulling our tariff laws by defrauding our Government of its just revenues. As to the fruits of protection, and of a revenue free- trade tariff, the former makes our country a prosperous business nation and a creditor one, the latter a failing and debtor one. Protection increases the total wealth and value of our country's production. Revenue free-trade tariff reduces it. Protection is at the expense of foreign industries, by their loss of the American market. Eev- enue free-trade tariff is at the expense of American in- dustries, they being wrongfully deprived of their own market. Protection will establish industries South and West to their advantage. Revenue free-trade tariff will prevent them. Protection destroys foreign monopoly of our market. Revenue free-trade tariff protects it. Pro- tection builds silk, woollen, cotton, and other factories. Revenue free-trade tariff, like an incendiary, destroys them. Protection economizes imports and saves in the 20 DEFECTS IN OUE TARIFF SYSTEM. cost for them, which is equivalent to an increase of our exports. Revenue free-trade tariff increases imports and the foreign cost, which is equivalent to a reduction of our exports. Protection opens new mines and in new locali- ties builds foundries, rolling-mills and machine shops, and gives employment and good wages to thousands. Eev- enue free-trade tariff discharges them ; puts out the fires in the furnaces, silences the anvils and trip-hammers, stops the busy whirling wheels, the spindles, and drives hundreds of thousands of honest, industrious employees to idleness and want, and some to suicide and crime. Pro- tection creates a demand for labor and enhances wages. Pevenue free-trade tariff destroys both. Protection com- pels gold to flow into our country, to our • advantage. Pe venue free-trade tariff to flow out, to our ruin. This country can always have a large business balance of trade in its favor if Congress chooses to give to our own in- dustries their own home market, being a question of labor only, which our tariff wholly controls by duties on imports. I hold that no tariff is a protective one that does not pro- tect the whole country's business from an adverse balance of trade. The so-called protective tariffs may protect one special interest, or more, but does it protect the whole coun- try's interests from becoming the debtor nation ? If not, then it is not a protective tariff, but one that leads our coun- try to panics and bankruptcy, as in former times. Pros- perity to the whole country's business should be paramount to either the importer's or foreign manufacturer's business, or any other single unproductive interest of our country. .■ 7 40. ^ c ^ ^ ^* «,^ ^