Speech #510106263

It is true that the farmer has been deluded to believe that the tariff levied upon foreign agricultural products is of some bengfit to him. but he is now beginning to learn that if the rate of duty upon wheat. corn. oats. barley. and meat products were $1 per pound instead of the rate now fixed it would not increase by a single farthing the value of.any product raised in excess of home demand. and the price of which is fixed by foreign demand. Therefore. the American farmer must needs meet in competition with his labor the labor of the Indian sepoy who fares sumptuously on 10 cents per day while growing wheat on Government land the rental of which is only what he can afford to pay. We hear much of the need of protective tariffs to protect our manufactures against the pauper labor of Europe. but not a word for the protection of the farmer against the barbarian of Asia. Moreover. the manufacturer is protected by a Government tax exacted upon the foreign manufacturer. which enables the home manufacturer to levy a like tax upon consumers of the domestic product. whereas if the same goods are sent abroad they are sold in foreign markets at lower prices than they charge at home. The farmer can buy a sewingmachine for his wife. or any agricultural implement of American manufacture. in almost any country in Europe 20 per cent. lower than they charge for the same thing at home.