CRISP
responsibility for that which you are clearly and undeniably responsible.
Our friends of the minority say: The con- sumer will take care of himself, if you look after the producer; for he is one and the same indi- vidual.
The audacity of the statement is only equaled by the inconsistency of this whole report. As- suming, if you please, for the purposes of the argument, what these gentlemen claim, that a protective tariff gives higher wages in protected industries, and still your proposition is wholly without foundation. The consumer and the pro- ducer the same! Why, Mr. Speaker, do you know the proportion the producers or protected manufactured products in this country bear to the producers of all other products? You do not pretend that your tariff raises the price of the farmer's wheat, or his cotton, or his corn, or his meats; yet in spite of this great class, which is as three to one or more against the other, you gravely say that the producer and the con- sumer are the same !
Will you tell me how your protective tariff benefits the man who raises cotton, or corn, or wheat, or meats? The producers of those great staples are forced to seek their market abroad. A hundred years of this fostering system has not yet built up a home market for more than one-third of the cotton produced in the United States. Our market is abroad. Will you tell how this protective tariff benefits our agricul'
189
�� �
