Press enter after choosing selection

Republican Free Trade

Republican Free Trade image
Parent Issue
Day
6
Month
August
Year
1891
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

Republican free trade is quite diíerent from the Democratie kind. lts fundamental doctrine In that any article required in tbis country, and which can be produced here with the expenditure of no raore hours of work than it would require to make it elsewhere, should lic made in this country in preferenee to De ing imported and paid for in If it takes an h: ur's work to make ten pounds of ixn in America and hs long a time to make it in Kngland or Germany, thcii il would be economie to make that iron here, even though an hour's work costs in money wages more here than it does ili Germany or Britain. Fur the higher wage scale of America means that the American workingman is betterclothed, fed and housed than the Germán or British. That distinctiou is deemed worth jreserving, but it cannot be preserved without protection against low wage goods of Kurope. But if it takes twiceas much labor to make a square foot of glass here as In Belgium, then it is not economie to make glass in this country, any more than it is to raise bananas, tea or coffee. Republican free trade relates to things which cannot be economically produced at home. It finds most of these on this hemisphere, especially in the countries to the south of ours. Those products should be admittedfree, but the greatest reciprocal advantages should be secured by reason of their free admission. And as the nterests of the other republics of the western isphere are non-competitive with us there should be unfettered reciprocal trade between them all. Intercourse between them should be as free as between American states. The Republican motto is, then: "Reciprocity with the western republice; protection against cheap labor of Europe." If Mr. Blaine ere to be president, with a friendly congress behind h:m, Repubiican reciprocity ideas would be realized. An intercontinental railroad would traverse Mexico and the isthmus into South Americaand unitethesouthern with the northern railroad systems. ihe Nicaragua ship canal would be cut across the neck of the "hour glass," so that the products east of the Rocky Mountains could be carried by water to the western coast of Souih Atnerica, and the Gulf of Mexico would be filled with American vessels laden with the exchange goods of two continents. The currencies of the western republics would be unifled. Their laws and institutioDS would be harmonized. Though there would be twenty república, there would be but one commercial policy for them all. The New World would be at peace. It would leave the Old World to itshugestanlingarmiesand wars;itsdevouring taxes and the widespread poverty of its masses. These things would follow In the wake of Repúblicas reciprocal free trade. Is not this program to be preferred to the uneconomic, wasteful, destructive thing which the Demócrata cali Tree trade, which means only the perpetual vassalage of America to Europe?

Article

Subjects
Old News
Ann Arbor Register