Mr. Blaine’s Answer to Cleveland.
By Cable to the N. Y. Tribune.
Paris, Dec. 7, 1887.—After reading an abstract of the President’s message, laid before all Europe this morning, I saw Mr. Blaine and asked him if he would be willing to give his views upon the recommendation of the President in the form of a letter or interview. He preferred an interview, if I would agree to send him an intelligent shorthand reporter, with such questions as should give free scope for an expression of his views. The following lucid and powerful statement is the result. Mr. Blaine began by saying to the reporter:
“I have been reading an abstract of the President’s message and have been especially interested in the comments of the London papers. Those papers all assume to declare that the message is a free trade manifesto and evidently are anticipating an enlarged market for English fabrics in the United States as a consequence of the President’s recommendations. Perhaps that fact stamped the character of the message more clearly than any words of mine can.”
“You don’t mean actual free trade without duty?” queried the reporter.
“No,” replied Mr. Blaine. “Nor do the London papers mean that. They simply mean that the President has recommended what in the United States is known as a revenue tariff, rejecting the protective feature as an object and not even permitting protection to result freely as an incident to revenue duties.”
“I don’t know that I quite comprehend that last point,” said the reporter.
“I mean,” said Mr. Blaine, “that for the first time in the history of the United States the President recommends retaining the internal tax in order that the tariff may be forced down even below the fair revenue standard. He recommends that the tax on tobacco be retained, and thus that many millions annually shall be levied on a domestic product which would far better come from a tariff on foreign fabrics.”
“Then do you mean to imply that you would favor the repeal of the tobacco tax?”
“Certainly; I mean just that,” said Mr. Blaine. “I should urge that it be done at once, even before the Christmas holidays. It would in the first place bring great relief to growers of tobacco all over the country, and would, moreover, materially lessen the price of the article to consumers. Tobacco to millions of men is a necessity. The President calls it a luxury, but it is a luxury in no other sense than tea and coffee are luxuries. It is well to remember that the luxury of yesterday becomes a necessity of to-day. Watch, if you please, the number of men at work on the farm, in the coal mine, along the railroad, in the iron foundry, or in any calling, and you will find 95 in 100 chewing while they work. After each meal the same proportion seek the solace of a pipe or a cigar. These men not only pay the millions of the tobacco tax, but pay on every plug and every cigar an enhanced price which the tax enables the manufacturer and retailer to impose. The only excuse for such a tax is the actual necessity under which the government found itself during the war, and the years immediately following. To retain the tax now in order to destroy the protection which would incidentally flow from raising the same amount of money on foreign imports, is certainly a most extraordinary policy for our government.”
“Well, then, Mr. Blaine, would you advise the repeal of the whiskey tax also?”
“No, I would not. Other considerations than those of financial administration are to be taken into account with regard to whiskey. There is a moral side to it. To cheapen the price of whiskey is to increase its consumption enormously. There would be no sense in urging the reform wrought by high license in many States if the National Government neutralizes the good effect by making whiskey within reach of every one at twenty cents a gallon. Whiskey would be everywhere distilled if the surveillance of the government were withdrawn by the remission of the tax, and illicit sales could not then be prevented even by a policy as rigorous and searching as that with which Russia pursues the Nihilists. It would destroy high license at once in all the States.
“Whiskey has done a vast deal of harm in the United States. I would try to make it do some good. I would use the tax to fortify our cities on the seaboard. In view of the powerful letter addressed to the democratic party on the subject of fortifications by the late Samuel J. Tilden, in 1885, I am amazed that no attention has been paid to the subject by the democratic administration. Never before in the history of the world has any government allowed great cities on the seaboard, like Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Baltimore, New Orleans, and San Francisco, to remain defenceless.”
“But,” said the reporter, “you don’t think we are to have a war in any direction?”
“Certainly not,” said Mr. Blaine, “Neither, I presume, did Mr. Tilden when he wrote his remarkable letter. But we should change a remote chance into an absolute impossibility. If our weak and exposed points were strongly fortified; if to-day we had by any chance even such a war as we had with Mexico our enemy could procure ironclads in Europe that would menace our great cities with destruction or lay them under contribution.”
“But would not our fortifying now possibly look as if we expected war?”
“Why should it any more than fortifications made seventy or eighty years ago by our grandfathers when they guarded themselves against successful attack from the armaments of that day. We don’t necessarily expect a burglar because we lock our doors at night, but if by any possibility a burglar comes it contributes vastly to our peace of mind and our sound sleep to feel that he can’t get in.”
“But after the fortifications should be constructed would you still maintain the tax on whiskey?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Blaine, “So long as there is whiskey to tax I would tax it, and when the National Government should have no use for the money I would divide the tax among the Federal Union with specific object of lightening the tax on real estate. The houses and farms of the whole country pay too large a proportion of the total taxes. If ultimately relief could be given in that direction it would, in my judgment, be a wise and beneficent policy. Some honest but misguided friends of temperance have urged that the government should not use the money derived from the tax on whiskey. My reply that the tax on whiskey by the Federal Government, with its suppression of all illicit distillation and consequent enhancement of price, has been a powerful agent in the temperance reform by putting it beyond the reach of so many. The amount of whiskey consumed in the United States per capita to-day is not more than 40 per cent. of that consumed thirty years ago.”
After a few moments’ silence Mr. Blaine added that in his judgment the whiskey tax should be so modified as to permit all who use pure alcohol in the arts or mechanical pursuits to have it free from tax. In all such cases the tax should be remitted without danger of fraud, just as now the tax on spirits exported is remitted.
“Besides your general and sweeping opposition to the President’s recommendation have you any further specific objection?”
“Yes,” answered Mr. Blaine; “I should seriously object to the repeal of the duty on wool. To repeal that would work great injustice to many interests and would seriously discourage what we should encourage, namely, the sheep culture among farmers throughout the Union. To break wool-growing and be dependent on foreign countries for the blanket under which we sleep and the coat that covers our back is not a wise policy for the National Government to enforce.”
“Do you think if the President’s recommendation were adopted it would increase our export trade?”
“Possibly in some articles of peculiar construction it might, but it would increase our import trade tenfold as much in the great staple fabrics, in woollen and cotton goods, in iron, in steel, in all the thousand and one shapes in which they are wrought. How are we to export staple fabrics to the markets of Europe unless we make them cheaper than they do in Europe, and how are we to manufacture them cheaper than they do in Europe unless we get cheaper labor than they have in Europe?”
“Then you think that the question of labor underlies the whole subject?”
“Of course it does,” replied Mr. Blaine. “It is, in fact, the entire question. Whenever we can force carpenters, masons, ironworkers, and mechanics in every department to work as cheaply and live as poorly in the United States as similar workmen in Europe, we can, of course, manufacture just as cheaply as they do in England and France. But I am totally opposed to a policy that would entail such results. To attempt it is equivalent to a social and financial revolution, one that would bring untold distress.”
“Yes, but might not the great farming class be benefited by importing articles from Europe instead of buying them at higher prices at home?”
“The moment,” answered Mr. Blaine, “you begin to import freely from Europe you drive our own workmen from mechanical and manufacturing pursuits. In the same proportion they become tillers of the soil, increasing steadily the agricultural products and decreasing steadily the large home demand which is constantly enlarging as home manufactures enlarge. That, of course, works great injury to the farmer, glutting the market with his products and tending constantly to lower prices.”
“Yes, but the foreign demand for farm products would be increased in like ratio, would it not?”
“Even suppose it were,” said Mr. Blaine, “do you know the source from which it will be supplied? The tendency in Russia to-day, and in the Asiatic possessions of England, is toward a large increase of the grain supply, the grain being raised by the cheapest possible labor. Manufacturing countries will buy their breadstuffs where they can get them the cheapest, and the enlarging of the home market for the American farmer being checked, he would search in vain for one of the same value. His foreign sales are already checked by the great competition abroad. There never was a time when the increase of a large home market was so valuable to him. The best proof is that the farmers are prosperous in proportion to the nearness of manufacturing centres, and a protective tariff tends to spread manufactures. In Ohio and Indiana, for example, though not classed as manufacturing States, the annual value of fabrics is larger than the annual value of agricultural products.”
“But those holding the President’s views,” remarked the reporter, “are always quoting the great prosperity of the country under the tariff of 1846.”
“That tariff did not involve the one destructive point recommended by the President, namely, the retaining of direct internal taxes in order to abolish indirect taxes levied on foreign fabrics. But the country had peculiar advantages under it by the Crimean War involving England, France, and Russia, and largely impairing their trade. All these incidents, or accidents, if you choose, were immensely stimulating to the trade in the United States, regardless to the nature of our tariff. But mark the end of this European experience with the tariff of 1846, which for a time gave an illusory and deceptive show of prosperity. Its enactment was immediately followed by the Mexican War; then, in 1848, by the great convulsions of Europe; then, in 1849 and succeeding years, by the enormous gold yield in California. The powers made peace in 1856, and at the same time the output of gold in California fell off. Immediately the financial panic of 1857 came upon the country with disastrous force. Though we had in these years mined a vast amount of gold in California, every bank in New York was compelled to suspend specie payment. Four hundred millions in gold had been carried out of the country in eight years to pay for foreign goods that should have been manufactured at home, and we had years of depression and distress as an atonement for our folly.”
“Then do you mean to imply that there should be no reduction of the national revenue?”
“No; what I have said implies the reverse. I would reduce it by a prompt repeal of the tobacco tax, and would make here and there some changes in the tariff, not to reduce protection, but wisely foster it.”
“Would you explain your meaning more fully?”
“I mean,” said Mr. Blaine, “that no great system of revenue, like our tariff, can operate with efficiency and equity unless the changes of trade be closely watched and the law promptly adapted to those changes. But I would make no change that should impair the protective character of the whole body of the tariff laws. Four years ago, in the act of 1883, we made changes of the character I have tried to indicate. If such changes were made, and the fortifying of our sea coast thus undertaken at a very moderate annual outlay, no surplus would be found after that already accumulated had been disposed of. The outlay of money on fortifications, while doing great service to the country, would give good work to many men.”
“But what about the existing surplus?”
“The abstract of the message I have seen,” replied Mr. Blaine, “contains no reference to that point. I, therefore, make no comment further that to endorse Mr. Fred. Grant’s remark, that a surplus is always easier to handle than a deficit.”
The reporter repeated the question whether the President’s recommendation would not, if adopted, give us the advantage of a large increase in exports.
“I only repeat,” answered Mr. Blaine, “it would vastly increase our imports while the only export it would seriously increase would be our gold and silver. That would flow out bounteously, just as it did under the tariff of 1846. The President’s recommendation enacted into law would result, as did an experiment in drainage of a man who wished to turn a swamp into a productive field. He dug a drain to a neighboring river, but it happened, unfortunately, that the level of the river was higher than the level of the swamp. The consequence need not be told. A parallel would be found when the President’s policy in attempting to open a channel for an increase of exports should simply succeed in making way for a deluging inflow of fabrics to the destruction of home industry.”
“But don’t you think it important to increase our export trade?”
“Undoubtedly; but it is vastly more important not to lose our own great market or our own people in vain effort to reach the impossible. It is not our foreign trade that has caused the wonderful growth and expansion of the republic. It is the vast domestic trade between thirty-eight States and eight Territories, with their population of, perhaps, 62,000,000 to-day. The whole amount of our export and import trade together has never, I think, reached $1,900,000,000 any one year. Our internal home trade on 130,000 miles of railway, along 15,000 miles of ocean coast, over the five great lakes and along 20,000 miles of navigable rivers, reaches the enormous annual aggregate of more than $40,000,000,000, and perhaps this year $50,000,000,000.
“It is into this illimitable trade, even now in its infancy and destined to attain a magnitude not dreamed of twenty years ago, that the Europeans are struggling to enter. It is the heritage of the American people, of their children, and of their children’s children. It gives an absolutely free trade over a territory nearly as large as all Europe, and the profit is all our own. The genuine Free-trader appears unable to see or comprehend that this continental trade—not our exchanges with Europe—is the great source of our prosperity. President Cleveland now plainly proposes a policy that will admit Europe to a share of this trade.”
“But you are in favor of extending our foreign trade, are you not?”
“Certainly I am, in all practical and advantageous ways, but not on the principle of the Free-traders, by which we shall be constantly exchanging dollar for dime. Moreover, the foreign trade is often very delusive. Cotton is manufactured in the city of my residence. If a box of cotton goods is sent 200 miles to the province Of New Brunswick, it is foreign trade. If shipped 17,000 miles round Cape Horn to Washington Territory it is domestic trade. The magnitude of the Union and the immensity of its internal trade require a new political economy. The treatises written for European States do not grasp our peculiar situation.”
“How will the President’s message be received in the South?”
“I don’t dare to answer that question. The truth has been so long obscured by certain local questions of unreasoning prejudice that nobody can hope for industrial enlightenment among the leaders just yet. But in my view the South above all sections of the Union needs a protective tariff. The two Virginias, North Carolina, Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia have enormous resources and facilities for developing and handling manufactures. They cannot do anything without protection. Even progress so vast as some of those States have made will be checked if the President’s message is enacted into law. Their Senators and Representatives can prevent it, but they are so used to following anything labelled ‘democratic’ that very probably they will follow the President and the progress already made. By the time some of the Southern States get free iron ore and coal, while tobacco is taxed, they may have occasion to sit down and calculate the value of democratic free trade to their local interests.,”
“Will not the President’s recommendation to admit raw material find strong support?”
“Not by wise Protectionists in our time. Perhaps some greedy manufacturers may think that with free coal or free iron ore they can do great things, but if they should succeed in trying will, as the boys say, catch it on the rebound. If the home trade in raw materials is destroyed or seriously injured railroads will be the first to feel it. If that interest is crippled in any direction the financial fabric of the whole country will feel it quickly and seriously. If any man can give a reason why we should arrange the tariff to favor the raw material of other countries in a competition against our material of the same kind, I should like to hear it. Should that recommendation of the President be approved it would turn 100,000 American laborers out of employment before it had been a year in operation.”
“What must be the marked and general effect of the President’s message?”
“It will bring the country where it ought to be brought—to a full and fair contest on the question of protection. The President himself makes the one issue by presenting no other in his message. I think it well to have the question settled. The democratic party in power is a standing menace to the industrial prosperity of the country. That menace should be removed or the policy it foreshadows should be made certain. Nothing is so mischievous to business as uncertainty, nothing so paralyzing as doubt.”
G. W. Smalley.