Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 36.djvu/43

Rh . It is the result of a soil and climate different from ours. It goes to France because, though France is a protected country, they do not think it economy to tax the raw material of manufacturing, and they consider it wise to so draw the line of protection as to preserve commerce with nations producing raw material. They exchange goods for wool, they make the freights, commissions, and profits of shipping, and we pay them for manipulation of the wool."

"Question 5.—If the effect of the tax on foreign wool has been to put down the price of domestic wool and to put up the cost of woolen goods, who gets any benefit from it? Is it the farmer, who gets less for his wool and pays more for his clothing?"

"Answer.—The benefit of this tax accrues to the politicians and to other enormously protected interests. The tariff on wool is the key-stone of the wide arch of protection, because it binds the farmer to the support of the whole system. Without his support the tariff would be reduced to a tax that would raise only what is required by the Government economically administered, with incidental protection. How the farmer is deceived may be further explained by a calculation of what he gets even if he makes all that is promised him. The duty upon unwashed wool that comes in competition with ours is ten cents a pound, the average number of sheep in a flock upon the older Western farms is not over thirty, and the average product of wool on such a farm would be about one hundred and eighty pounds. If the duty increased the price of this wool ten cents a pound, it would be but eighteen dollars to each flock, or less than the enhanced cost of the clothes of his family. It gives him nothing to pay the increased cost of lumber, salt, tin, crockery, implements, fence-wire, etc. The fact is, that his protection fails to protect, and he gets nothing but the privilege of carrying the load. He is a victim of those who cut straps out of the hides of the poor to make stirrup-leathers for the rich."

The next question of importance is number 9. It is as follows: "Is not the farmer misled when, under pretense of protection to wool, the price of his wool is reduced and the export of his wheat and cotton is partly stopped, because by way of a tax on foreign wool we prevent in part an exchange of wheat, cotton, and flour for wool? Answer: 'Misled' is a weak term to use under the circumstances. We might say he is in the same position as the man who votes for high taxes to keep up his wages!"

If there is any farmer in the land who can read these undeniable facts, and, after doing so, is still willing the "wool" shall be "pulled over his eyes," he, at least, deserves little pity for his fate. Sheep ought really to be a profit to the farmer, as they are an important factor in soil enrichment. They ought not to be unprofitable if they grew hair in place of wool. But our law-makers have doomed them. The only "protection" they ever were in need of is protection from dogs and tariff-mongers.

There is really no probability that we can ever have a "farm-protecting" tariff, for obvious reasons. One is, the farmers are too numerous to organize efficiently. They lack the massed capital and commercial skill necessary to maintain a lobby at Washington. They are too vast and minutely divided a body to be thrown into any efficient cohesion. To move Congress and compel politicians, you want just the sort of conspiracy that exists and