ntry has there been a time when the proceeds of one day's labor
or the product of one farmed acre would purchase so large an amount of
those things that enter into the living of the masses of the people.
I believe that a full test will develop the fact that the tariff act of
the Fifty-first Congress is very favorable in its average effect upon
the prices of articles entering into common use.

During the twelve months from October 1, 1890, to September 30, 1891,
the total value of our foreign commerce (imports and exports combined)
was $1,747,806,406, which was the largest of any year in the history of
the United States. The largest in any previous year was in 1890, when
our commerce amounted to $1,647,139,093, and the last year exceeds this
enormous aggregate by over one hundred millions. It is interesting,
and to some will be surprising, to know that during the year ending
September 30, 1891, our imports of merchandise amounted to $824,715,270.
which was an increase of more than $11,000,000 over the value of the
imports of the corresponding months of the preceding year, when the
imports of merchandise were unusually large in anticipation of the
tariff legislation then pending. The average annual value of the imports
of merchandise for the ten years from 1881 to 1890 was $692,186,522, and
during the year ending September 30, 1891, this annual average was
exceeded by $132,528,469.

The value of free imports during the twelve months ending September 30,
1891, was $118,092,387 more than the value of free imports during the
corresponding twelve months of the preceding year, and there was during
the same period a decrease of $106,846,508 in the value of imports of
dutiable merchandise. The percentage of merchandise admitted free of
duty during the year to which I have referred, the first under the new
tariff, was 48.18, while during the preceding twelve months, under the
old tariff, the percentage was 34.27, an increase of 13.91 per cent.
If we take the six months ending September 30 last, which covers the
time during which sugars have been admitted free of duty, the per cent
of value of merchandise imported free of duty is found to be 55.37,
which is a larger percentage of free imports than during any prior
fiscal year in the history of the Government.

If we turn to exports of merchandise, the statistics are full of
gratification. The value of such exports of merchandise for the twelve
months ending September 30, 1891, w