| Show The Tariff Argument Some of the Republican journals of the west have been copying with glee a paragraph para-graph from a letter to the American tariff league written by Sir EDWARD SULLIVAN as follows The tariff argument is the same in all countries it is very simple It is that employment is of more value than mere cheapness Employment means wages wages means money money means the power of buying Want of employment means no wages no money no buying it means in fact going without Everything is cheap comparatively for the man who has money to buy nothing is cheap to the man who has no money with which to buy This is called forcible and axiomatic and is supposed to be a settler for free traders that is tariff reformers So that is the tariff argument Well it does i not amount to a row of protected buttons I Is there no employment except under an exorbitant tariff Is there no employment employ-ment when there is cheapness Does everybody IIgO without under a tariff for revenue As an example of begging the question the axiomatic paragraph is II forcible But it hits nothing proves nothing ana as an argument is nothing Cheapness of goods creates a demand for them That stimulates their production pro-duction This increases employment and then follow the wages money power of buying and all the rest of the good things that it is assumed are the special result of dearness the fruit of protection In order to make anything out of the paragraph as an argument for a protective protec-tive tariff it has to be presumed that there is no employment under a revenue tariff That is to say there is no employment em-ployment in England was no employment employ-ment in the United States before McKin leyism came into vogue Fudge People will have just as much money to buy with when the excessive duties on articles of common necessity are lowered low-ered as they have now and will have to pay less for several commodities Employment Em-ployment will be had wages will be received re-ceived money will be spent and nobody will object to I cheapness when folks go to market to buy anything The tariff league will have to trot out a more I forcible paragraph or they will not startle the world by making converts to protection |
