following figures will show the value of our own market to our producers

Little hope

foreign markets.

American market,

Foreign markets,

7,569,000,000

American over all available foreign markets, . $8,429,451,918

It will be seen that the American market is worth more than twice of gaining as much to us as all foreign markets combined, even if we could possess them exclusively. It would be the height of folly, then, to sacrifice our home market to gain the foreign. But can we gain any more of the foreign market than we now possess? Surely we have gained nothing so far under a year of free trade. On the contrary, we have lost to the extent of over $200,000,000. We can look for no increased sales of manufactures to Great Britain, "the workshop of the world," where the cost of production is but little more than half of ours, and as for increased sales of agricultural products a study of Table No. 31, on pages 760-1, will show the growing competition our farmers are now having from all parts of the world. Although the table has been confined to English imports of agricultural products a similar exhibit could be made for France and Germany. It will be seen to what extent our exports of wheat and corn to England have fallen off, while her purchases from Russia and the Argentine Republic have increased. The following table will show the competition of wheat in recent years:

France grew more of her own wheat supply in 1894 than in 1892, buying 25,000,000 bushels less from the United States and more from Russia and the Argentine Republic.

Germany bought 12,000,000 bushels less from the United States in 1894 than in 1892 but bought considerably more from Roumania, Russia, and the Argentine Republic, her purchases from the latter country increasling by about the same quantity as her purchases from the United States

decreased. France and Germany too are competing successfully with England in manufactures as are other countries. This has been proven conclusively in preceding pages. We cannot then hope to sell to countries whose own productions are increasing, whose wages are less, and hours of labor longer.

Go where we will under present conditions there is no market to gain on the face of the globe. Other nations are not only producing for themselves, but are also looking for foreign markets, and particularly for a portion of the greatest market on earth, the American market. This market has been created and built up under protection and can be retained only by a continuance of protection. Already in a single year of partial free trade we have lost over $100,000,000 of it, which has been gained by foreign producers. If we had gained foreign markets to the extent of our loss it would not have been so great a sacrifice, but we lost $200,000,000 worth of foreign markets while losing $100,000,000 of our own.

In the words of Lord Salisbury in a speech made in Hastings, England, in May, 1892:

markets.

We live in an age of a war of tariffs. Every nation is trying how it can, by agree-The strugment with its neighbor, get the greatest possible protection for its own industries, gle for and at the same time the greatest possible access to the markets of its neighbors. The weapon with which they all fight is admission to their own markets-that is to say, A says to B, "If you will make your duties such that I can sell in your markets, I will make my duties such that you can sell in my market." But we begin by saying we will levy no duties on anybody, and we declare that it would be contrary and disloyal to the glorious and sacred doctrine of free trade to levy any duty on anybody for the sake of what we can get by it. It may be noble, but it is not business. On those terms you will get nothing, and I am sorry to have to tell you that you are practically getting nothing.

And yet this is precisely what our free traders would do. They would take our only weapon and put us at a disadvantage with all the world. A disadvantage that cannot be overcome except in one way by reducing our wages to the level of our competitors. Even that would not gain for us the foreign markets so much sought after. It would only enable us to hold our own. It is a most serious matter to contemplate, and it concerns the wage-earner and farmer far more than the manufacturer. The question of a home market is of paramount importance to the American agriculturist. He can find no increased market abroad. The world has been searched in vain. He must therefore depend on the home market, and to be of value that market must be maintained by American wages. But President Cleveland and other free traders have raised a doubt of the worth of our home market by asserting that we have already shown a capacity for producing far more than there is a home demand for. It is not difficult to ascertain the truth about the matter. We have but to go back to the year 1892, the year of greatest production the

Great

extent of

the home

market.

The home

market.

United States has ever known. In that year every manufacturing establishment in the country was running at full time, and many night and day. Not a cotton mill was idle. New ones were built, and old ones extended, and yet we could not supply our own wants, but bought $30,000,000 worth of cotton goods abroad. The year was the most prosperous the woolen industry has ever known, and yet we had to buy $38,000,000 worth of woolen goods abroad. Our silk mills worked to their full capacity, and yet besides the home production we bought $33,500,000 worth from Europe and Asia. Our iron furnaces were in continuous operation, yet we used not only our own product, but bought $33,000,000 worth of the product of foreign mills.

Our leather establishments produced the largest amount of goods in their history, yet we went abroad and purchased $14,000,000 worth more. Our glass and glassware factories never knew a greater output, yet it was not equal to the demand, and $8,500,000 worth was bought abroad; and so we might go through a list of hundreds of articles including woodenware, earthenware and pottery, chemicals, paper, tin, clocks and watches, furs, garments, etc., till we found that in 1892, the year when our mills were worked as they had never been worked before, they were not able to supply the demand, and we bought nearly $400,000,000 worth abroad. To be sure some of the products of our mills in 1892 went abroad. We exported $158,000,000 worth of manufactured products, but much of this was oils and flour, leaving considerably less than $100,000,000 worth of factory products. So that we bought nearly $300,000,000 worth of manufactures in addition to what we made.

Had the McKinley bill remained in force till now we should no doubt be able, nearly or quite, to supply our wants. The new and extended mills would have taken men from the farms, and labor would have been so adjusted as to give the greatest advantage to all. The increased number of mill⚫hands would have given the farmer a greater and better market, and he would not have to consider as a competitor, the wheat grower of Russia or the Argentine Republic. More of our cotton would have been consumed at home to the triple advantage of planter and manufacturer and consumer of the fabric. Our sheep would have increased in number, and a ready market for our wool been found in the increased production of our mills. The increased transportation for cotton and cotton goods, for wool and woolen goods, would have resulted in increased railroad facilities, creating a demand for rails and other iron products, which in time would give added employment to the miner. And so we might go through the interminable network of our interdependent industries, showing how each strengthens the other, how each added fabric of the factory makes a demand for the product of the farm, the latter in turn demanding increased employment at the mill and mine.