33T1 
 D86 5(J 
 
 THE COBDEN CLUB OF ENGLAND AND PROTECTION IN 
 THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 A SPEECH 
 
 -\l 'l 1 y 'V* l 
 
 MADE AT A REPUBLICAN MEETING, 
 
 HELD AT 
 
 ASTORIA, NEW YORK, 
 
 October 23d, i884. 
 
 by 
 
 THOMAS H. DUDLEY, 
 
 0 / Camden, New Jersey, late United States Consul at Liverpool, England. 
 
I UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS j 
 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 
 | Class 
 
 Book 
 
 Volume 
 
 33 7.3 
 
 33 S (o 5 c 
 
 ~ - 4ft 
 
 Ja 09-20M 
 
 
 ECONOMICS 
 
 DEPARTMENT 
 
A 1 1 
 
 r 
 
 r HE COBDEN CLUB OF ENGLAND AND PROTECTION IN 
 THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 • . \ i; v a \ ft 
 
 C;)0 K'lVlf M il VMJ 
 
 A SPEECH 
 
 MADE AT A REPUBLICAN MEETING, 
 
 HELD AT• 
 
 ASTORIA, 4NTEW YORK, 
 
 October 23d, 1884. 
 
 by 
 
 THOMAS H. DUDLEY, 
 
 Of Camden, New Jersey, late United States Consul at Liverpool, England. 
 
lit 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 OF 
 
 Hon. THOMAS H, DUDLEY 
 
 \l V fc i 
 
 DELIVERED BEFORE 
 
 A Republican Meeting held Thursday Evening, October 
 23d, 1884, at the Assembly Rooms, Astoria (L. I.), N. Y. 
 
 Mr. Dudley, being introduced to the audience by the 
 chairman of the meeting, after referring to James G. 
 Blaine, the Republican candidate, and Grover Cleveland, 
 the Democratic candidate, and discussing their qualifica¬ 
 tions and characters, spoke as follows:— 
 
 I regard this election as one of the most important that 
 has ever taken place in the history of our country—scarcely 
 second to that which elected Mr. Lincoln ! [Applause.] 
 
 The great question at issue is that of the tariff. It is a 
 question whether you will adhere to the American system 
 of protection, or whether you will adopt, in its place, the 
 English system of a tariff for revenue only, or, in the words 
 of the Democratic platform, a tariff exclusively for revenue. 
 
 That phrase, a tariff for revenue only, is not an Ameri¬ 
 can idea; it did not originate in this country; it is an Eng¬ 
 lish idea, and was borrowed by the Democratic party from 
 W\ England. It is the English system, and not ours. And 
 the Democratic party in this country, to-day, is doing all 
 
 £~GObE) 
 
4 
 
 in its power to foster and fasten upon us the English sys¬ 
 tem. 
 
 And you will have to decide this question at the election 
 about to take place; every man here, when he goes up and 
 puts in his ballot, will vote either in favor of the American 
 system of protection, or the English system of free trade. 
 James G. Blaine represents the former, and Grover Cleve¬ 
 land the latter, system. 
 
 The issue is well defined. The Republican party hold 
 that our tariff should be sufficient in all things to protect 
 the labor of the country, and to develop the resources of 
 the country. [Applause.] 
 
 The Democratic party are somewhat divided upon the 
 question. The great mass of their party, headed by Henry 
 Watterson of Louisville, by Morrison of Illinois, by Car¬ 
 lisle the Speaker, by Tucker of Virginia, and by Frank 
 Hurd of Ohio, who has just been defeated! [applause] 
 are in favor of the English system or free trade. 
 
 Mr. Randall of Pennsylvania, and a few other Demo¬ 
 crats, are not in favor of direct free trade, they favor a tariff 
 for revenue so adjusted as to give slight incidental protec¬ 
 tion. And they differ with their fellow Democrats to this 
 extent. 
 
 If you take up their platform, adopted at Chicago, you 
 will find that the word “ protection ” does not appear in it, 
 but is excluded from it. They were thirty-six hours in 
 forming the tariff plank in their platform, and they pur¬ 
 posely excluded the question of protection from it; but 
 they did frame it in such a way as to sanction the ideas of 
 Mr. Randall to enable him to go before his constituents in 
 Pennsylvania and say, “ I am in favor of a tariff so framed 
 as to give incidental protection;” whilst Mr. Morrison, 
 Frank Hurd, Mr. Carlisle, and Mr. Randolph Tucker of 
 Virginia, and the rest of them, could go before their con¬ 
 stituents East, West, North, and South and proclaim that 
 the Democratic party favored “a tariff for revenue exclu¬ 
 sively, or free trade.” 
 
5 
 
 I think I have stated their position correctly. I do not 
 want to do them wrong or place them in a false position. 
 y We differ from them. They make the revenue of first or 
 
 primary importance. We do not. We make the protec¬ 
 tion of labor of first or primary importance, before revenue. 
 [Applause.] 
 
 We demand a tariff, sufficient in all things to protect the 
 laboring people of our country, and to develop the resources 
 of the country. [Applause.] And this, if necessary, with¬ 
 out regard to revenue. 
 
 But we contend that if the tariff is properly adjusted, so 
 as in all things to protect labor, it will yield sufficient reve¬ 
 nue to carry on the affairs of the Government without 
 leaving a surplus. And we say that no tariff ought to be 
 adopted unless it will properly protect labor. 
 
 This is the difference between the two parties. It is 
 clear and well defined ; one is a tariff for revenue only or 
 free-trade, with a small fragment of the party desiring a 
 tariff for revenue so adjusted as to give slight incidental 
 protection—that is the Democratic side; our side is for a 
 tariff sufficient to protect the labor of the country and to 
 develop the resources of the country, without regard to 
 revenue. [Applause.] 
 
 We had, by the last census, seventeen million and three 
 hundred thousand (and a fraction over) of people who were 
 earning wages in this country. And there were over thirty- 
 two millions of people who did not earn wages. 
 
 Now it is these seventeen million three hundred thousand 
 people who labor that the Itepulican party propose to pro¬ 
 tect, and we think they are entitled to more regard and 
 more consideration in the adjustment of the tariff than the 
 mere question of revenue. Take care of the people, and 
 the people will take care of the revenue. 
 
 Labor builds the towns, develops the country, and pro¬ 
 duces all the improvements and commodities which you 
 W see and have around you. It is labor that has piled up the 
 wealth of our country; it is labor that has given us our pros- 
 
6 
 
 perity as a people and our power and greatness as a na¬ 
 tion ; it is labor that is now, either in the mill, the mine, 
 work-shop, or the field, producing and developing our in¬ 
 dustries, and driving what we call the business of the 
 country. 
 
 This being so, is not labor entitled to protection ? What 
 can be—what should be of more importance to a govern¬ 
 ment than the happiness, welfare, and prosperity of the 
 people, and especially those who have to toil. 
 
 The English system of a tariff for revenue only does not 
 look at or consider the question of labor; it is indifferent to 
 the laboring class and their wants. 
 
 The American system regards labor as of primary impor¬ 
 tance—as above everything else. 
 
 And this is the difference between the two systems; and 
 when you come to vote, you will vote for one or the other 
 of those systems; and }mu can not very well escape it. 
 
 It is a question that comes home to every man and 
 to every woman in our land. It is a question of bread and 
 butter, as I shall show you before I get through. 
 
 Now, we have had the American system of protection 
 since 1861, and permit me to show you what it has accom¬ 
 plished. 
 
 In 1860, before the adoption of the protective tariff, the 
 commerce of our country—I mean, the foreign commerce, 
 exports and imports—was less than $700,000,000. Last year 
 it amounted to over $1,500,000,000. 
 
 In 1860 we had about thirty thousand miles of railway 
 in operation. We have to-day over one hundred and 
 twenty-four thousand miles. Nearly if not quite as many 
 miles as they have in the whole of Europe together. 
 
 Our population in 1860 was thirty millions and a frac¬ 
 tion over; to-day, I suppose, it amounts to fifty-six 
 millions. 
 
 The internal commerce of our country to-day amounts 
 to over $10,000,000,000, an amount about equal to the ex¬ 
 ternal commerce of all the nations in Europe put together. 
 
7 
 
 The manufactured commodities of our country, in 1860, 
 amounted to $1,800,000,000. To-day they amount to over 
 $ 7 , 000 , 000 , 000 . 
 
 The material wealth of our country, in 1860, was com¬ 
 puted to be $16,000,000,000, about $10,000,000,000 less than 
 that of England. To-day it is computed to be over $50,000,- 
 000,000, about $10,000,000,000 more than that of England. 
 
 The manufactured commodities of our country are stated 
 to be about $7,000,000,000. That is over $1,000,000,000 
 more than are made by England or any other country in 
 the world. 
 
 You may search history, either sacred or profane, mod¬ 
 ern or ancient, and you will not find one single example of 
 a nation that has ever made progress equal to ours, during 
 an equal period of time. 
 
 And to-day, among the nations of the earth, in wealth , in 
 power , in grandeur and in civilization , the United States of 
 America stands the first in the world. [Prolonged applause.] 
 And when you take into consideration the fact that for 
 more than four years of this time we had a great civil war 
 which almost paralyzed every kind of business and industry 
 and spread ruin and desolation over a large portion of 
 the country, our progress is almost marvelous. 
 
 But this is not all the benefits protection has given us. 
 In producing these manufactured goods—those $7,000,000,- 
 000 worth—the profits have been retained here at home; 
 the wages for producing them have been paid to our people 
 and also retained here; these profits and these wages hav¬ 
 ing thus remained at home and heaped up in this country 
 instead of being spent in Europe in the production and 
 purchase of the goods there, have had the effect of causing 
 the balance of trade, for the last nine years, in our country, 
 to be in our favor, without one single intermission; and it 
 amounts in the aggregate, in the nine years, to $1,380,000,- 
 000. This, with the profits from our industries, has made 
 money cheap; and by money becoming cheap you have 
 reduced the interest on all the indebtedness and borrowed 
 
8 
 
 money in the country, National, State, municipal, and in¬ 
 dividual. 
 
 Have you taken this matter into consideration and seen 
 its effect upon society and the business of the country? 
 
 Why! The National indebtedness, the State indebted¬ 
 ness, and the municipalities’ indebtedness, in this country, 
 by the last census, amounted to $3,321,718,547. And in 
 consequence of this accumulation of money in this country, 
 and its cheapness, it has reduced the rate of interest at least 
 two per cent., not only upon the National indebtedness, but 
 upon individual indebtedness in every State in the Union. 
 
 I have looked into the matter myself, and I have found 
 this to be the case, whether it is in New York, New Jersey, 
 Ohio, California, or any other State. 
 
 Well, two per cent, on our National indebtedness, and the 
 State indebtedness, and the municipality indebtedness, 
 amounts to $66,000,000 a year, and in taxes you save that 
 amount every year. 
 
 Then the funded railway indebtedness of this country 
 amounts to $3,455,040,383, and two per cent, on this sum 
 is over $69,000,000 every year. 
 
 And if you take the indebtedness of individuals on bonds 
 and mortgages in the country, and put it at $6,000,000,- 
 000, (and, I suppose, it is very much over this), two per 
 cent, upon that sum is $120,000,000 a year. 
 
 Now, these three sums when added together make $255,- 
 000,000 a year, which is the saving to our people who have 
 to borrow money and pay interest. And generally this re¬ 
 duction and saving is to the industrious and laboring classes 
 of our country. As a rule, it is this class that receives the 
 most benefit from cheap money. 
 
 It is the men who borrow the money who get the benefit 
 of the reduction; the capitalist loses it! The rich suffer 
 the loss, and the poor who borrow, are the gainers! I do 
 not pretend that we have as yet realized the full benefit of 
 this cheapness of money. There is much of this indebted¬ 
 ness upon bonds—railroads and others—that are long 
 
9 
 
 bonds and have not yet matured, and the effect of this re¬ 
 duction has not been realized; but these long bonds are day 
 by day maturing. Upon the individual indebtedness be¬ 
 tween man and man upon bonds and mortgages, in most 
 cases, it has taken effect already; and the farmers and 
 laboring men, and the business men of the country at this 
 time, are receiving the benefit from it. 
 
 Now, when the Democratic party tell you that you are 
 being robbed by the protective tariff in the duties you 
 have to pay on imports, just tell them that the saving on 
 the money loaned in this country amounts to more than all 
 the duties we collect under our tariff. 
 
 Do you know what the largest amount of revenue is that 
 we have ever collected from our tariff? Outside of ton¬ 
 nage dues it has been only about $216,000,000 in a year, 
 and last year it only amounted to one hundred and 
 ninety millions and a fraction of dollars, while this re¬ 
 duction in the interest on the indebtedness of the coun¬ 
 try amounts to over $255,000,000, and the laboring men 
 and the business men of the country generally get the 
 benefit of it. It is difficult, if not impossible, to esti¬ 
 mate or compute the benefits of this cheapening of money 
 and the reduction of interest. It stimulates all kinds 
 of business. There is not an industry but what is affected 
 by it. Its effects are felt in the shop, in the mill, in the 
 mine, and on the farm. This is one of the causes for the 
 most extraordinary progress and development of our coun¬ 
 try since 1860. 
 
 But this is not all the benefit that we have received from 
 our protective system. 
 
 I have told you that the manufactured products of this 
 country amounted to $7,000,000,000 last year. Well, the 
 agricultural products of our country amounted to not less 
 than $3,000,000,000 outside of tobacco and cotton; and 
 therefore those two industries alone, without the products 
 from the mines and forests, amount to $10,000,000,000 a 
 year. Of the manufactured products used in this country 
 
10 
 
 last year, over ninety-two per cent, were made in this 
 country and less than eight per cent, imported. 
 
 And of the agricultural products, I mean outside of to¬ 
 bacco and outside of cotton, amounting to about $3,000,- 
 000,000—over ninety-two per cent, of these products are 
 now consumed in this country, and less than eight per cent, 
 exported. 
 
 The manufacturing industry and the other industries of 
 the country consume of the farmers’ products over ninety- 
 two per cent. That, of itself, has a most important bearing 
 upon our progress, and, when taken in connection with our 
 making of over ninety-two per cent, of the manufactured 
 commodities which we use or consume, accounts in a large 
 measure for the marvelous development and progress we 
 have made. 
 
 Now, with all these most extraordinary results from our 
 protective system, such as the world has never before seen, 
 we are called upon by the Democratic party to abandon it, 
 and adopt or take in its place the English system of free 
 trade. I say we are called upon by the Democratic party; 
 but not by them alone, for England is also demanding of us 
 the adoption of their system, and is working and doing all. 
 she can in connection with the Democratic party to force 
 their free trade system upon us. 
 
 England takes a deep interest in this question. You 
 have all heard, because you all read, the expressions that 
 were made by the English newspapers and by the English 
 people when Grover Cleveland was nominated. 
 
 There is not to-day a single English newspaper that is in 
 favor of Blaine; there is not a single English newspaper 
 to-day but what is in favor of Cleveland. There is not a 
 prominent Englishman to-day who is not anxious to see 
 Cleveland elected and Blaine defeated. 
 
 I was in England myself last December when Carlisle 
 was elected speaker over Randall, and if I had been a free 
 trader and there had been nothing else to move me I 
 should have abandoned free trade and become a protec- 
 
tionist. Their rejoicing over this election would have been 
 quite enough to have driven all free trade ideas out of me. 
 
 England, in order to carry out this work of breaking 
 down protection, has formed the Cobden Club; and for 
 wealth, for power, and for the influence of its members, I 
 know of no political organization that is equal to it. It 
 includes among its members statesmen, politicians, bankers, 
 merchants, manufacturers, the legal profession, ministers of 
 the gospel, and even the Lord Chief Justice of England— 
 Lord Chief Justice Coleridge is a member of it. It in¬ 
 cludes among its members two hundred and nineteen (219) 
 members of Parliament, and every member of the present 
 English Cabinet—save Lord Selbourne. It has its agents 
 all over this country with its pamphlets and other docu¬ 
 ments, and now has as its chief agent the Democratic party 
 of this country to assist it in its work. 
 
 Why, my fellow-citizens, they have distributed in this 
 country over seven hundred thousand (700,000) copies of 
 their documents and pamphlets to influence our people, 
 with the intent and for the purpose of breaking down our 
 protective system. 
 
 I am not speaking from rumor; I am not speaking from 
 what the newspapers say, but I am speaking facts which I 
 know to be true. I hold in my hand a copy of their own 
 minutes for 1883, with a list of their members, that came 
 directly from the Cobden Club to me, in the month of 
 February of this year, whilst I was in London ; I also hold 
 in my hand a copy of the minutes of their last public 
 meeting, which took place on the 19th of July of the pres¬ 
 ent year; and I do not intend to misrepresent them, nor do 
 I intend to state anything that I do not believe to be true. 
 
 The London Times in an editorial proclaimed this :— 
 
 “ It is to the New World that the Cobden Club is chiefly looking as 
 the most likely sphere for its vigorous foreign policy. It has done what 
 'it can in Europe, and it is now turning its eyes westward, and bracing it¬ 
 self for the struggle which is to come, hut cannot rest while the United States 
 are unsubdued.” 
 
12 
 
 That foreign institution, that foreign club, formed on 
 English soil, sustained by English wealth, by English in¬ 
 fluence and English power, cannot rest until the United 
 States are subdued! and they are now working to subdue us. 
 
 I have said they have agents all over this country ; I 
 have told you that they distributed seven hundred thou¬ 
 sand (700,000) copies of their circulars in this country; 
 I now tell you that they are very busy, that they are in 
 your towns, and even in your colleges, your institutions of 
 learning. This being so, Professor Elliott, of Harvard Col¬ 
 lege—the president of that institution—was quite justified 
 in saying that every student they turn out was in favor of 
 free trade. 
 
 Why ! the Cobden Club of England is there, giving silver 
 medals, to-day, to students who write essays upon free trade. 
 They are in Harvard College, they are in Yale College 
 they are in Williams College, and I do not know in how 
 many other institutions of learning, distributing their 
 medals. 
 
 Let me read an extract from their minutes. It is the 
 minutes of the annual meeting of the Cobden Club, held 
 at the Century Club Rooms on Saturday, July 19th, 1884, 
 entitled, “ Special report for the Club. For the members 
 of the Club alone.” It reads as follows:— 
 
 “ The Cobden medal for 1883 at Harvard University, United States of 
 America, was awarded to Mr. Theodore L. Frothingham, for an essay on 
 the decline and future of the American shipping. At Williams College, 
 Massachusetts, United States of America, the Cobden medal for 1884 was 
 won by Henry H. Wentworth, of Niagara Falls, N.Y., and the 1884 medal 
 at Yale College, Connecticut, United States of America, was won by 
 Robert Monro Boyd, of Mount Clair, New Jersey.” 
 
 But they are not only giving silver medals to the stu¬ 
 dents of our coljeges. This is not all, but the man who 
 teaches political economy in Yale College, Professor Sum¬ 
 ner, is a member of the Cobden Club of England, and the 
 man who teaches the students political economy in Wil¬ 
 liams College, Professor Perry, is also g member of the 
 
13 
 
 
 Cobden Club. Their names appear in the list of members 
 of the club. 
 
 Now, what else are they doing? I have told you that 
 they are at work here among you. I might say, and with 
 truth, that this institution—this English institution—to¬ 
 day lies intrenched behind the Democratic party, and 
 that the Democratic party is aiding them in their work, is 
 aiding them as far as it can to break down our system of 
 protection, with the view of substituting in its place the 
 English system of a tariff for revenue only. 
 
 Let me read you from their minutes of 1883. I read 
 from page 18 of their proceedings :— 
 
 “ In the United States the events of the last few years, the efforts of 
 many able and active free traders, and the exertions of your committee 
 in disseminating 'publications , have had the effect of bringing free exchange to 
 the front as one of the great questions of the day.” 
 
 The exertions of the committee of the Cobden Club , the com¬ 
 mittee who control their doings, and do their work, has had 
 the effect to bring this question before our people in the front! 
 And at their meeting held on the 19th of July of the pres¬ 
 ent year, since the nomination of James G. Blaine as the 
 Republican candidate [applause] and since the nomination 
 of Grover Cleveland by the Democratic party [applause] 
 they in their report say :— 
 
 “ Your committee continues to afford all the assistance in their power to 
 those who are laboring in the free trade cause in foreign countries. In 
 America, in the course of political events there is great promise. Within 
 the last three or four years the attention of the American people has been to 
 a large extent directed to this question, which has long been kept very 
 much out of sight by considerations arising out of the effects of the great 
 civil war. The result of the turning of public attention in this direction 
 is seen in the fact that revenue reform is becoming a leading question in 
 the presidential contest, and is on the winning side.” 
 
 They say revenue reform is becoming a leading question 
 in this contest, and is on the winning side!” This is the 
 Cobden Club at its last session, and since the nominations 
 for President were made. 
 
14 
 
 Now, when I look over the country and see prominent men 
 who are working with the Democrats to elect Cleveland, I 
 naturally suppose that they are free traders, and if they are 
 free traders they do not belong properly to the Republican 
 party; and therefore, when I come to look at the list of 
 members of the Cobden Club, and find Henry Ward 
 Beecher among them [hisses and applause], I can under¬ 
 stand why he supports Grover Cleveland. He ought to do 
 so. He is a member of the Cobden Club, was elected in 
 1869. Probably with such a candidate as he (a teacher of 
 Christianity) now supports, common charity would demand 
 of us that we should throw a veil over him, and attribute 
 his conduct and his action more to his attachment to free 
 trade and the Cobden Club, than to any love, regard, or re¬ 
 spect that he entertains for the character of the man for 
 whom he is going to vote. [Applause.] 
 
 When I find the name of Carl Schurz, as I do, in the 
 official list of members of the club, I can understand why 
 he, too, intends to vote for Grover Cleveland, and is work¬ 
 ing to elect him. [Applause.] He became a member in 
 
 And that is not all; you have the name of Samuel S.‘ 
 
 Cox, who is running for Congress in New York, and W. R. 
 Morrison of Illinois, who introduced the Morrison bill 
 last winter, and Frank H. Hurd of Ohio, who has just been 
 defeated, and J. Randolph Tucker of Virginia, and 
 Henry Watterson of the Louisville Courier-Journal, and 
 Horace White and Parke Godwin of New York, as mem¬ 
 bers of the Cobden Club, and when you find these men 
 voting for or advocating the Morrison bill as they did, 
 they were but carrying out the instructions of the Cobden 
 Club. What are the instructions of the club ? I have 
 shown you, by re*ading the extracts, how busy they are in 
 this country to-day, using their influence, using their 
 power, and it may be their means also to elect Grover ( 
 Cleveland, the candidate of the Democratic party. I will 
 read from another of their books, which I also procured 
 
from the Cobden Club in England, in February this pres¬ 
 ent year. It is an address written by Mr. Mongredien, one 
 of the men they employ to write for them, and it was 
 issued by the Cobden Club and addressed directly to the 
 farmers of America. Ay ! they have the audacity and im¬ 
 pertinence to come here, this English institution, and to 
 take part and interfere in our elections, by making direct 
 appeals to our people. 
 
 And now what are their instructions? I wi f ll ^egd jtheip: 
 
 “Let the American farmers give their support to no candidate for a 
 seat in the House of Representatives who does not pledge himself, if 
 elected, to propose, or at least to vote for, a reduction of five (5) per cent, 
 every successive year on the import duties until the whole are abol¬ 
 ished.” 
 
 Let no farmer vote for any member of Congress until he 
 has first pledged himself to vote for a reduction of five (5) 
 per cent, from it until all the duties are abolished. 
 
 These are their instructions; and Mr. Cox, the member 
 from New York, and Mr. Morrison, Frank Hurd, and Mr. 
 Tucker, and the other members, have been doing what 
 they could to carry them out. Ay! they have gone be¬ 
 yond. The instructions were only for five per cent, reduc¬ 
 tion every year, but the Morrison bill, which they did all 
 in their power to pass, proposed a reduction of twenty per 
 cent. It may be that new instructions have been issued,, 
 and that these members have them. If this is so, they can 
 explain what they are. 
 
 Now all these prominent men, being members of the 
 Cobden Club, you can not expect them to vote for James 
 G. Blaine [applause]; you can not expect Henry Ward 
 Beecher to do this; you can not expect Carl Schurz, 
 Horace White, or Parke Godwin to do it; and I say to 
 you all, if you want to repeal the American system, if you 
 want to adopt English free trade, then it is your duty to 
 vote for Grover Cleveland [applause], and by voting for 
 him you can possibly accomplish your desires, for he and 
 the Democratic party are in favor of free trade. 
 
16 
 
 If, on the other hand, yon are in favor of protecting the 
 laboring men of this country, and the laboring women of 
 this country [prolonged applause], then vote for James G. 
 Blaine. [Applause renewed.] 
 
 It is for you; it is not for me to decide for you; and 
 every man who is here is directly interested, and must de¬ 
 cide this question for himself, for it comes home to every 
 one of you individually, for the prosperity of the country 
 and the welfare of our people depend upon it. 
 
 But the Democrats will .say: “ Why, you are paying too 
 
 much for the coat you wear; you could buy it in England, 
 under free trade, much cheaper than you can buy it here; 
 therefore take off the duties, repeal the tariff, and buy it 
 there.” 
 
 Now let me call your attention to this fact: I state it 
 deliberately, that there is not a single protected article, so 
 far as I know, but what is cheaper to-day in the United 
 States than it was in 1860 before the protective tariff was 
 passed. Cotton goods are at least twenty (20) per cent, 
 cheaper than they were in 1860; woolen goods—dress 
 goods—to-day are twenty-five (25) per cent. less. And silk 
 goods, taking them on an average, are from thirty (30) to 
 thirty-five (35) per cent, less in price than they were in 
 1860 before we had a protective tariff; and so with all kinds 
 of machinery, edge tools, ironware, crockeryware, house¬ 
 hold goods, furniture, &c. 
 
 Whilst I was consul at Liverpool I invoiced steel rails to 
 the amount of thousands, if not millions, of dollars’ worth, 
 at $130 per ton. You can buy them now at the Penn¬ 
 sylvania Steel Works, or at the J. Edgar Thomson Steel 
 Works in Pittsburg, and other works, for twenty-eight dol¬ 
 lars per ton, and probably less. George B. Roberts, the 
 president of the Pennsylvania Railroad, told me recently 
 that he had made a contract at twenty-seven dollars per 
 ton. A reduction from $130 under our protective system 
 to twenty-seven dollars ! Will any one pretend to say that 
 we have been injured by this—that we have been injured 
 
17 
 
 
 1 
 
 9 
 
 by the protective system of our country ? Has it been the 
 laboring man, or has it been the non-producers, the thirty- 
 two millions of people that do not earn wages in this coun¬ 
 try, who have been injured? Everything that a man buys, 
 whether he is a farmer or a mechanic, everything that he 
 buys in the way of manufactured commodities, he can buy 
 cheaper to-day than he could in 1860. What has caused 
 this decline in prices ? Why is it that since we passed our 
 protective tariff the prices of all manufactured commodi¬ 
 ties have gone down ? The answer is, domestic competi¬ 
 tion and machinery, with the inventive genius of our 
 people, and their versatility of character, have done it. It 
 is the natural outgrowth of the American system. Just 
 what you might expect from such a nation and people as 
 ours. Give our people proper protection, and they will out¬ 
 strip the world in production. 
 
 But they say you can buy your clothes and manufactured 
 commodities cheaper in England than you can in this 
 country. For argument’s sake admitting that we can, is 
 it policy to do so ? Is it to the interests of our people and 
 to the working people of our country that we should go 
 and buy there ? 
 
 I told you that more than $7,000,000,000 worth of goods 
 were made here last year, and that we paid to the labor¬ 
 ing men and women of our country in the manufacture of 
 those goods $1,500,000,000 in wages. [Applause.] And the 
 question—the great question—before the people is whether 
 we shall continue to manufacture these goods in our own 
 country, and pay the wages to our own people, or to man¬ 
 ufacture them in Europe, and pay the wages for manufac¬ 
 turing them to the people of Europe ? That is the question. 
 We want the goods; we must have them; they must be 
 made either here or else in Europe. If we make them here 
 we give employment to our own people, and pay the wages 
 for producing them to our own people; if we make them 
 in Europe we give employment to the people of Europe, 
 and pay the wages to their people. In which country will 
 
18 
 
 you have them made ? Shall we continue it here, or shall 
 we break down our own system, take away the work from 
 our people, and give it to the people of England, and pay to 
 them what we are now paying to our own people? 
 
 There is another solution or theory. Some of these free 
 traders say we will not transfer our industries to England ; 
 we will retain a large portion of them by reducing the 
 wages of our working people. And they propose to reduce 
 the price of manufactured commodities, including the coat 
 and clothes you wear, by reducing the wages of our people. 
 
 Those are the two alternatives—the reduction of wages 
 here to the standard of the pauper labor of Europe, or else 
 to transfer our industries there, and pay the working people 
 of Europe the $1,500,000,000, or such portion of it as may 
 be required to produce the goods—one or the other. Are 
 you ready for this? These wages—$1,500,000,000, which 
 we now pay, do not all remain in the pockets of the labor¬ 
 ing people to whom they are paid; a part goes to the store¬ 
 keeper, to the butcher, the baker, the tailor, the bootmaker, 
 &c., &c. And it is this that makes and constitutes business, and 
 which has added so much to the prosperity of our country. 
 
 I told you it was a question of bread and butter to the 
 working people of our country, and that every man and 
 woman in this country would be affected by it, and you see 
 that this is so. 
 
 Why! you have labor organizations to keep out foreign 
 labor; to prevent it from competing with you; and this is 
 all done in behalf of labor, to protect the laboring peo¬ 
 ple of the country; and here the Democratic party, to help 
 England, propose with one fell swoop either to reduce the 
 price of labor to the standard of the ill-paid labor of 
 Europe, or else to transfer our manufacturing industries to 
 that country, and give the work to the work people there. 
 
 We pay in this country in wages to our people, on an 
 average, about double what is paid to the laboring people 
 of Europe, and in some instances three times as much as is 
 paid to the laboring people there for the same labor or 
 
19 
 
 I 
 
 work. I know what I am speaking about. I lived eleven 
 years in England, as consul for my Government, and I 
 know that it is true. 
 
 In 1867 the Government sent David A. Wells to Europe 
 for the purpose of investigating the questions of production 
 and labor in England, in France, in Belgium, and in Ger¬ 
 many. One morning when I went to my office I found a 
 dispatch from Mr. Seward, stating that at the instance of 
 the Secretary of the Treasury I had been detailed to ac¬ 
 company Mr. Wells ; and when Mr. Wells arrived in Liver¬ 
 pool he called on me, and we started on our trip. I there¬ 
 fore have been in many of the manufactories of Europe, 
 and had an opportunity to study them, and learn the 
 wages and the condition of their working people, and I 
 know of what I speak. 
 
 On the journey we were at the town of Wendsbury, in 
 what is known there as the black country, and as we were 
 going along I saw a girl, apparent^ about twenty-one 
 years of age, with a good face. She was unloading coal 
 from a canal boat into a wheel-barrow, and then wheeling 
 it up an inclined plane, and shooting it into a furnace. I 
 said to Mr. Williams, the proprietor of the works, “Will you 
 permit me to ask that girl a question or two ?” He at first 
 hesitated, but seeing I was in earnest, said, “ Certainly, if you 
 desire it.” I said to her: “ My good girl, how much do you 
 earn here?” She looked up and said, “When I have full 
 work I can earn five shillings a week ” (less than a dollar 
 and a quarter of our money); “but I do not always have full 
 work, and then I can’t earn so much.” “ Well,” I said, 
 “ how much do you call full work, and how long have you 
 to labor for that five shillings ?” Her reply was, six days in 
 a week, and twelve hours in a day. “ Well,” I answered, 
 “ I suppose you live with your father, and are not entirely 
 dependent on your wages ?” Her reply was, “ Sir, I have 
 no father, but I live with my mother, who is an invalid.” 
 “ Oh ! ” I said. “ Then probably you have somebody else 
 who helps you?” She said, “No, but my mother gets 
 
20 
 
 eighteen pence per week from the parish.” I remarked 
 that this made but six shillings and six pence, and said, 
 “ I supposed they had a room ?” Her reply was “ Yes,” and 
 that they paid two and six pence per week for it. I re¬ 
 marked, “This leaves you but four shillings ” (about ninety- 
 seven cents of our money.) She said, “ That was all.” I re¬ 
 plied, “ Do you tell me that you and your mother warm 
 yourselves, feed yourselves, and clothe yourselves out of 
 that four shillings ?” Her reply was, “ Certainly; we have 
 to do it.” I then asked her to tell me how they did it. 
 Her answer was, “We get bread every day, and potatoes 
 generally every other day; a few potatoes; and we get a 
 piece of meat once a month.” 
 
 That night at the banquet given to Mr. Wells and my¬ 
 self by Mr: Williams, the table was loaded with every lux¬ 
 ury that England could afford. I took to the table on my 
 arm his wife, one of the most accomplished women in Eng¬ 
 land ; but I say to you that I did not take one single 
 mouthful of food without thinking of that poor girl who 
 had bread every day, potatoes every other day, and a piece 
 of meat once a month. 
 
 Now I do not mean to say that every laboring man or 
 every laboring woman in England is reduced to the 
 straits that this woman was, but I will say that I have 
 seen thousands that were receiving no better wages; and I 
 further say to you that the laboring people of England and 
 the laboring people of Europe are not receiving half the 
 wages that we pay to our people. 
 
 Now, if you will look at this question as I have presented 
 it to you, based upon the facts which I have given, and 
 which I know to be true, I ask again and in all earnestness 
 whether you are willing—you laboring men and women— 
 I do not care what your politics may be, whether you are 
 willing to vote on the 4th of November to transfer all our 
 industries to Europe or else to reduce the wages of our la¬ 
 boring people to the same low standard as are paid in Eng¬ 
 land or Europe? 
 
21 
 
 Yon Irishmen, you Irish Americans, if you want to do 
 that, why, vote for Grover Cleveland. [Applause.] If you 
 wish to aid England, vote for Grover Cleveland and you 
 will do it. You have just cause of complaint against 
 England, who has tyrannized over Ireland and done many 
 things she ought not to have done; and to take vengeance 
 against her, some of you at times improperly resort to 
 dynamite, by which you damage a few buildings and it 
 may be destroy the lives of a few innocent people. To you 
 I say that you have no necessity to resort to dynamite. 
 You hold in your hands an agency and power ten hundred 
 times more powerful and effective against England than all 
 the dynamite in the world, if you will but apply it. It is the 
 ballot. [Applause.] And it is for you Irishmen, you Irish 
 Americans, to say whether you will continue to do in the 
 future as you have done in the past. Vote for free trade, 
 and help and benefit England by doing so. If you want to 
 transfer our industries to England; if you want to reduce 
 the wages of the laboring people of our country to the same 
 standard as the pauper labor of Europe; why, then vote as 
 you have voted heretofore, for England and free trade. But 
 if you desire to sustain American labor, if you want to 
 maintain wages at the present standard and continue the 
 prosperity of our country, then vote for James G. Blaine. 
 [Applause.] 
 
 When I tell you what I know, that in consequence of the 
 high wages paid to our people under our protective system 
 the laboring people of this country are better fed, are 
 better housed, are better clothed, are better educated, have 
 more not only of the necessaries, but luxuries and comforts, 
 of life than the laboring people of any other country in the 
 world, I only tell you the truth, and I am rejoiced that it 
 is so, for I contend that this is as it should be, and that we 
 should continue so far as we can to pay our working people 
 the same wages we now pay them, without reduction or di¬ 
 minution, for by so doing it enables them to live and have 
 some of the comforts of life about them; to live as human 
 
22 
 
 beings ought to live. Ay, to live as God intended they 
 should live. 
 
 Now let us look further into this question. They tell you ( 
 that you are overtaxed by the duties imposed by our pro¬ 
 tective tariff; they tell you that the laboring men and farm¬ 
 ers Of this country are being imposed upon and robbed by 
 having to pay more than they ought to pay for the goods they 
 have to buy. Is this so? Is there any truth in this charge? 
 
 Why, in answer just look at the condition of the laboring 
 people of this country. They are, as I have told you, better 
 clothed, better fed, better housed, and better educated than 
 any other people in the world; and how could this be if 
 they were being overtaxed and robbed ? If it was true, how 
 could they live as they do? It is not true, my fellow-citi¬ 
 zens; and I will tell you some facts which probably may 
 astound you, but which give the lie to all these assertions, 
 yet are as true as the gospel itself. 
 
 To-day nine-tenths of the manufactured commodities used 
 by our farmers and laboring people either in their houses, in 
 their workshops, or on their farms, nine-tenths are cheaper 
 to-day in the United States than they are in England. And 
 in proof let us look into the matter. We exported during the 
 fiscal year ending in 1883, over one hundred and thirty 
 millions of yards of cotton goods; of these twenty-eight mil¬ 
 lion eight hundred and fifty-one thousand yards went to 
 England. And in addition to this, we sent of other manu¬ 
 factured cotton goods to England $334,793 worth, as ap¬ 
 pears by our trade reports issued by the Government that 
 year. Now how much is one hundred and thirty millions 
 of yards of cotton goods, do you know ? If you will go to 
 the equator } r ou will find that it will wrap around the earth 
 three times and leave a large margin to spare. 
 
 When in England in the month of March last, I found 
 our cotton goods being sold in Liverpool; I found them be¬ 
 ing sold in London, and I found them being sold in Man¬ 
 chester itself. And whilst in Italy in the month of De- ^ 
 cember last, in the city of Milan, my family wanted a 
 
few yards of cotton goods, and my wife and daughter 
 went to one of the best stores in that city, and found for 
 sale there cotton goods made in the United States. They 
 gave as a reason for keeping them, that they were better 
 and cheaper than they could get elsewhere. I want to call 
 your attention to the fact of how largely cotton goods enter 
 into domestic use in a family. Cotton goods are used for 
 the underwear of yourself, your wife, and your children; 
 the sheets on which you sleep ; the ticking on your beds; 
 the curtains in your rooms; and it may be the table cloths 
 as well as the towels you use, as also the calico dresses 
 you sometimes put upon the female members of your 
 family, are cheaper here than they are in England. That 
 is not all. There is not a single article of wood furniture 
 that is used about your houses but what is cheaper to-day 
 in this country than it is in England. This includes your 
 bedsteads, your bureaus, your tables, your wash-stands, sofas, 
 and chairs, as well as wash-tubs, pails, trays, churns, &c., 
 about the house. 
 
 We sent to England during the fiscal year ending in 
 1888, over $145,000 worth of edged tools. Why did we 
 send them ? Why did we send our axes and our carpen¬ 
 ters’ and joiners’and other tools? Simply because they 
 are cheaper and better than theirs. The ordinary white 
 crockeryware that is used on our farmers’ tables, is made 
 and sold in Trenton to-day—in my own State—cheaper 
 than it is made in. England. I will give you the prices: 
 In the United States, at Trenton, we sell plates at eighty 
 cents a dozen; in England the same plates cost three shil¬ 
 lings and nine pence, or ninety-one cents in our money. 
 
 The pressed glass that we make and use here is cheaper 
 in price and better in quality than that which is made in 
 England. All the kitchen furniture, pots, pans, and 
 kettles, &c., are cheaper here than they are there. We 
 sent to England during the fiscal year ending in 1883, 
 $740,838 worth of mowers, reapers, plows, and agricultural 
 implements; $221,510 worth of carriages and carts; $618,- 
 
24 
 
 551 worth of clocks; $100,505 worth of watches; $159,123 
 worth wearing apparel; $964,279 worth furniture and wood- 
 ware; $41,145 worth glass and glassware; $26,020 worth 
 stoves; $867,902 worth machinery ; $519,458 worth manu¬ 
 factured iron, &c.; $480,302 worth musical instruments; 
 $777,067 worth sewing machines, and $65,182 worth lamps, 
 besides other manufactured commodities. 
 
 But when we come to the farming implements and tools 
 that are used on the farms, they are much cheaper and bet¬ 
 ter than those in Europe. In March of this year I visited the 
 Agricultural Fair in France (and a magnificent exhibition 
 it was). They had not less than fifteen acres of ground 
 covered with agricultural implements, tools, and machinery. 
 The cheapest mower that was on that ground was 510 
 francs, which in our money is about $102. You can buy 
 just as good a mower here or in any town in the United 
 States for $65. The lowest reaper that was there (without a 
 binder was 925 francs, or in our money about $185. You can 
 buy as good a one in the United States for $110. The lowest 
 priced horse rake that was there, was 250 francs, or $50 of our 
 money. You can buy as good here for $27. The plows, 
 harrows, cultivators, were twenty per cent, dearer than they 
 are in the United States. There was not a fork, hoe, shovel, 
 or spade there, in the whole exhibition, but what w T as 
 dearer in price and, most of them, inferior in quality to 
 those which we make in this country. [Applause.] And 
 so with carriages, wagons, carts, barrows, &c. 
 
 Therefore I repeat to you what I have said before to other 
 audiences: That nine-tenths of the manufactured commod¬ 
 ities used by the working people and farmers of this 
 country, are cheaper to-day here than they are in England. 
 This being so, how can it be pretended that our people are 
 being overtaxed, much less robbed, by our protective tariff? 
 How much better off would our people be if our tariff was 
 repealed, and they compelled to go to England and buy 
 there these things ? All these commodities are dearer there 
 than they are in the United States, and our people would 
 
have to pay more for them there than they can buy them 
 for in this country. 
 
 Now, understand me. I do not pretend to say that silks, 
 laces, and cut glass, and the higher descriptions of woolen 
 goods, decorated china, &c., are cheaper here than they are 
 there. This is not so; but the lower grades of woolens, 
 and boots and shoes, &c., are just as cheap here as they are 
 in England. 
 
 Now you may ask me the question, if we can compete 
 with England in manufacturing these commodities, why do 
 we require protection? 
 
 I had a committee in Ohio once to wait upon me and ask 
 that question. 
 
 I will tell you why we require protection where we can 
 compete with England. We want it to keep the manufac¬ 
 turing industry of these commodities here in our own 
 country; so that we can pay the laboring people of this 
 country the wages for producing them. [Applause.] 
 
 We believe it more important and more to our interest 
 to pay these wages to our own people than to pay them to 
 the working people of Europe. [Applause.] 
 
 That is one reason. There is another reason. We re¬ 
 quire a protective tariff to prevent our country from being 
 flooded by over-production. In Europe this is of frequent 
 occurrence, and arises sometimes in this way: Three men, 
 or more, if you please, are manufacturing fancy woolen or 
 any other-goods; one may be at Huddersfield, one at Man¬ 
 chester, and another at Bradford, in England. Neither 
 knows what the other is doing. They have to manufacture 
 in advance and upon their own judgment as to style and 
 the demands of the market. For instance, for winter goods 
 they begin to manufacture the spring before. 
 
 And these men and possibly others—not knowing what 
 each other are doing, or intend to do—in the exercise of 
 their wits as to the class and style of goods which are likely 
 to be salable in the market the coming autumn or winter, 
 all hit upon the same class or style, and when the season 
 
opens for putting them on the market, find they have made 
 more than the market requires. 
 
 There is over-production, and they have got to submit 
 to a loss, and the question with them is the extent of the 
 loss and what is best to be done. They very naturally come 
 to the conclusion not to break down their own market, and 
 resolve to keep up the price at home and realize the profits 
 there as far as they can, and send the surplus to the United 
 States and throw it upon our markets at whatever price it 
 may bring, and in this way break down the market here, 
 and bring ruin and disaster upon our manufacturing and 
 business men. 
 
 Whilst I was consul at Liverpool, I invoiced hundreds 
 of invoices, to the amount of millions of dollars, at about 
 half the price it cost to make the goods in England. This 
 was done in consequence of over-production, and the goods, 
 in most instances, were sent to break down our market; 
 to produce, as it often did, consternation and ruin among 
 our merchants and business men. 
 
 All of our business men suffer from this, and none more 
 than the industrial and laboring classes of our country. 
 
 We therefore want a protective tariff, even where we are 
 competing with Europe in producing, to protect our own 
 industries and our own people from over-production in 
 Europe. 
 
 But let us go a step further, and in order to see the effect 
 of protection take an example. We will take the silk in¬ 
 dustry in New Jersey. We made last year, in New Jersey, 
 over $22,000,000 worth of silk goods on a capital invested 
 of nearly $9,000,000, and employed in that industry over 
 eighteen thousand work-people; to whom we paid over 
 $5,500,000 in wages. The eighteen thousand people em¬ 
 ployed directly received the five and a half millions of dol¬ 
 lars in wages. 
 
 Well, most of these operatives had others who were de¬ 
 pendent upon them, and who lived off of the wages earned. 
 But this is not all. These wages did not all remain in the 
 
hands of the operatives, but a part were paid to the store¬ 
 keeper, the butcher, the baker, the tailor or dressmaker, 
 the bootmaker and other mechanics, and a part, it may be, 
 to teachers, clergymen, doctors, as well as the tax- 
 gatherer. All these people and hundreds of others, directly 
 or indirectly, live off of the wages thus paid. Now, if you 
 were to put all of these people together in a town, you 
 would make not less than ninety thousand people, all of 
 whom would live directly or indirectly off of this industry. 
 
 Now, if the Morrison bill had passed last winter, taking 
 off twenty per cent., as it proposed to do, of the duties im¬ 
 posed on silk goods, every one of those silk manufactories 
 would have had to stop, and the eighteen thousand people 
 employed, and those dependent upon them, and those liv¬ 
 ing indirectly off of them, would have been thrown out of 
 employment and their living in this way injured, to say 
 nothing of the capital that would have been lost or sunk. 
 
 Who would that have benefited ? Would it have bene¬ 
 fited the laboring people thrown out of employment, or 
 those directly or indirectly dependent upon them ? They 
 all would have been injured. 
 
 Would it have benefited the farmer? No! The farmer 
 feeds all these people, and to this extent is benefited. If 
 you break them down you destroy his market and he is in¬ 
 jured. It is the money that is earned in the mills that 
 pays the farmer for his products, either directly or indi¬ 
 rectly, and if the money ceases they cannot buy, and the 
 farmer loses his market. Who would have been benefited? 
 England, France, and Belgium—these countries that man¬ 
 ufacture silk goods—they would have been benefited, not 
 our country, or the people of the United States; but the 
 people in these countries in Europe, they would have been 
 benefited by it. 
 
 And what I say with regard to the silk industry—I onty 
 introduce it as an example—will apply to every other in¬ 
 dustry in our country ; to the manufacture of metals as well 
 as textile goods. All to a greater or less extent would suffer. 
 
But the free trader brings forward this argument—the 
 doctrine of reciprocity; that is, if you don’t buy of me, I 
 won’t buy of you. And they say if we will but repeal our 
 tariff and admit English goods and French goods and 
 German goods into our country free of duty, that our trade 
 would be greatly increased. That these countries in Eu¬ 
 rope would buy more of us, and we more of them. That 
 every import would bring a corresponding export. We 
 certainly would have to buy more of them if we destroyed 
 our own manufactories. Suppose we were to do this, w T ould 
 they buy or take more of us? They would buy then just 
 as they do now. Would take what they required and 
 nothing more. 
 
 My fellow-citizens, I tell you there never was a greater 
 fallacy attempted to be imposed upon an intelligent people 
 than this doctrine of reciprocity. 
 
 You may search the commercial history of the nations 
 of the world for the last hundred years, as I have done, and 
 you will not find a single instance in trade between any 
 two nations of Europe, during this period of a hundred 
 years, where this principle has ever applied. Not one! 
 and there is nothing whatever in the doctrine. 
 
 If you will look at it one moment for yourselves, you will 
 see the utter fallacy of the argument. There is no such 
 thing as national wealth, in the ordinary acceptation of 
 that term—I mean, as government wealth. When we speak 
 of national wealth it is the aggregate wealth of the indi¬ 
 viduals comprising the government. Nor is there any 
 such thing as dealings between one nation and another 
 nation. All transactions in the way of trade and business 
 are done by the individuals of each nation—an American 
 dealing with an Englishman, and an Englishman dealing 
 with an American. And in their dealings they never look 
 or take into consideration the balance of trade—whether it 
 is on the one side or on the other. 
 
 Why, this will come home to every practical man in this 
 meeting if he will consider it for one moment. My friend 
 
29 
 
 John Patterson is a corn merchant in Liverpool; suppose 
 he wants to buy ten thousand bushels of wheat, what does 
 ^ • he do? Does he examine to see whether the balance of 
 
 trade is in .favor of the United States or against the United 
 States before he buys ? Not at all! If a merchant were to 
 do this he would be called a dunce or fool. What he does 
 is to telegraph to New York to learn the prices there, and 
 to the Crimea or other wheat market to get the prices 
 there, and he buys wherever he can purchase at the lowest 
 price. It is a matter of business, and he buys where he can 
 make the most money; he does not care about the balance 
 of trade. So with a broker or merchant who wants to buy a 
 thousand bales of cotton, he buys wherever he can get them 
 the cheapest. 
 
 So does Mr. Vanderbilt if he wants to buy a thousand 
 tons of steel rails. Do you suppose he looks at the balance 
 of trade between the United States and England ? Not for 
 a moment. If he can buy them cheaper in New York than 
 England he buys them in New York, but if cheaper in 
 England than in the United States he buys them there. 
 
 What does he care about the balance of trade? It is 
 a question of price and nothing else; and as a general rule, 
 all these contracts between the individuals of the different 
 countries are for cash or money, and there is no barter or 
 exchange of different commodities in them. The individ¬ 
 ual buys where he can obtain the commodities the cheap¬ 
 est, and pays for it in cash or money. This is the rule. 
 And there is neither exchange or barter in it. 
 
 Therefore I say there is nothing in the doctrine of reci¬ 
 procity, as put forth by the free traders, and never has 
 been. 
 
 Now, there is another matter. I have told you what the 
 Cobden Club, working in behalf of England, is doing to 
 break down our protective system. 
 
 You may ask the qestien: Why is England doing this? 
 
 ^ Why is she making such herculean efforts to break down 
 our protective system, and introduce her own lystem of 
 
30 
 
 free trade in its place ? You certainly will not pretend she 
 is doing it for love! I do not mean to say that she is any 
 worse than other nations, or that she is more selfish than 4 
 others; but she is certainly not less so. No, my friends, it 
 is not for love. 
 
 I will tell you why they are doing it. I have lived 
 among them eleven years, and know them well and know 
 their motives. England to-day does not raise sufficient 
 food to feed her own people! She cannot do it! 
 
 For ten articles of food which I can name to you—live 
 animals, meat, breadstuffs, butter, cheese, lard, fish, eggs, 
 potatoes, and rice, she paid last year over $600,000,000. 
 
 In 1870, thirteen years ago, she paid for those ten articles 
 of food $276,000,000—less than half wdiat she is paying now. 
 
 And if you look over her statistics for the last twenty 
 years, you will find that there is a gradual increase year 
 after year for these products; and, if she continues to in¬ 
 crease as she is now doing, in the year 1900 she will 
 have to pay for those ten articles of food not less than 
 $1,500,000,000. 
 
 No nation in the world can stand this for any great 
 length of time. No people understand this better .than the 
 English themselves. And the question with her statesmen 
 and politicians is, how to provide cheap food for their 
 people. 
 
 I do not state these facts from hearsay. I take them from 
 their own published records. I get them directly from 
 their parliamentary proceedings. 
 
 Therefore you can see it is for the interest of England to 
 get food cheap to feed her people. 
 
 Now, if she can break down our protective system, she 
 knows very well that the greater portion of our laboring 
 men now engaged in manufacturing would be driven as a 
 matter of necessity into agricultural pursuits, and that this 
 would result in over-production of agricultural products, 
 and tend to put down prices, it maybe—indeed, most prob- v 
 
 ably would put down prices of agricultural products fifty 
 
31 
 
 per cent.—possibly even more than this. The farmer would 
 then have to sell for fifty cents what he now gets a dollar 
 for. Who would be benefited by this ? The farmer could 
 not raise one single bushel more of grain per acre than he 
 does now; but he could then only get half the price he now 
 receives for what he would have to sell. 
 
 England would be benefited by it. She could then 
 buy her food for half she now has to pay, and the farmers 
 of our country would be the losers. What England would 
 gain we would lose; and the loss would fall on the farmers 
 of our country. 
 
 That is not all. There is another matter connected with 
 this. You talk about depression here ! Why ! there is five 
 times as much depression in England as there is here. 
 You talk about a few men that are turned out of work here. 
 Where there are five men turned out here, there are ten 
 there; while there is one mill stopped here, there are two 
 stopped there. 
 
 England wants a market for her manufactured commod¬ 
 ities. She cannot sell what she is now producing, and this 
 makes the depression she is suffering. Now, if she can 
 break down our manufactories, or even one-half of them, 
 she expects that we will buy from her what we are now 
 producing, and in this way that she will make a market for 
 all her manufactured commodities, and increase her busi¬ 
 ness to this extent, and no doubt this would be the result, 
 unless we reduced the wages of our people to the same 
 standard of the pauper labor of Europe. 
 
 She understands this; every newspaper in England 
 understands it, and every statesman in England under¬ 
 stands it. 
 
 What would be the effect of this? It would be loss to 
 us, and gain to her! She would gain on both ends of the 
 stick. 
 
 She would be able to get her food which she is compelled 
 to buy—it may be at half the price she is now paying—and 
 at the same time create a market for her manufactured 
 
32 
 
 commodities in this country. This is what England is 
 driving at; this is why the Cobden Club is doing what it is 
 in this country, and you see they are working for them- f 
 selves—for England, and not for our country. They are to 
 make by it, we to lose; and the loss would fall upon our in¬ 
 dustries and our laboring people. 
 
 Now, I feel that I have trespassed upon your time longer 
 than I ought to have done ; but before I close I want to say 
 to you that if any man asks you upon what ground you jus¬ 
 tify protection, tell him this :—That the Deity has impressed 
 upon all animated matter the principle of protection. The 
 bird of the air is protected by feathers, the beast that 
 roams over the plain with hair, and the tortoise and the 
 snail that crawl upon the ground are protected by shells. 
 
 That man, possessed of a higher intelligence, protects him¬ 
 self from the cold by garments, and protects himself from 
 the storms by a house which he builds. And the bird that 
 builds its nest, and the beaver that builds the dam, do so 
 but in obedience to that great and universal law which the 
 Deity himself has stamped upon matter. And if it is the 
 duty of a man to protect himself; and if it is his duty to 
 protect the family which God has given him ; how much 
 more is it not the duty of the Government—a Government 
 of the people, for the people—to protect the people who 
 have formed it! [Applause.] 
 
 And in conclusion, permit me to say, that this country— 
 if we continue to adhere to the American system of protec¬ 
 tion—stretching as it does from the Atlantic Ocean to the 
 broad Pacific, and from almost the frozen regions of the north 
 to the sunny regions of the south; with every description of 
 soil and with every variety of climate to excite and foster pro¬ 
 duction ; with inexhaustible beds of coal and unbounded 
 mineral resources; when filled, as it soon will be, with a free 
 people, educated, intelligent, and industrious; with an in¬ 
 ventive genius not surpassed, if equaled; with its free and 
 liberal institutions, is destined to become the great manufac- C 
 turing country of the world. [Prolonged applause.] 
 
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