of the duty would mean either a
heavy reduction of wages or a stopping of existing industries with the
rise of prices consequent upon the withdrawal of the United States
from the world's competition, then the removal of the duty would be a
misfortune. It would be a misfortune not only to the industry which
was ruined and to the wage earners who were reduced to idleness or
poverty, but it would be an injury to the consumer because it would in
a short time raise the price of the world's production diminished by
our withdrawal. In industries where no such results could possibly
be feared, or where the production of the article is not possible in
the United States, it would certainly be wise to remove duties, and
this has been the purpose of the protectionists and of the Republican
party.

The policy of protection has received its most recent expression in
this country in the tariff of 1890. It is a truism that no tariff
bill, whether passed by free traders or protectionists, can hope to be
perfect. It is sure to have defects in detail and some inequalities.
The McKinley bill was not exempt from error, but the question for the
people to decide now is whether it is well to abandon the protective
policy and substitute that of free trade. In 1888 the cry was that we
must get rid of the surplus revenue and that that necessity made a
revision of the tariff imperative. The Republican party since it has
been in power has taken two hundred and forty-six millions of the
accumulated surplus and paid off the bonded indebtedness of the
country to that amount. It has also, by the removal of the duty on
sugar and other articles, reduced the annual surplus revenue some
fifty or sixty millions. The danger from the surplus, therefore (and
it was a very real danger), is at an end. No party need be called upon
now to dispose of the annual surplus which was taking so many millions
out of the channels of trade. The question between the parties and
before the country on this issue is very much simpler than it was. It
is whether we shall repeal the tariff of 1890, abandon the protective
system and take up free trade, or whether we shall maintain the
protective system, making such amendments to the law as may from time
to time seem necessary.

I have tried to state the general argument upon the question of free
trade or protection in its broadest way. It only remains to bring
forward so far as possible the facts which show, in part at least, the