M R. W E i. U E t'. /»-T. 
 
 / * 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 ION. WILLIAM D. KELLEY, 
 
 OF PENNSYLVANIA, 
 
 DELIVERED 
 
 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 
 
 JANUARY 11, 1810. 
 
 > 
 
 WASHINGTON: 
 
 F. & J. RIVES & GEO. A. BAILEY, 
 
 REPORTERS AND PRINTERS OF THE DERATES OF CONGRESS. 
 
 1870. 
 
^ ^ \ \ te V ■ 
 
 V&^OA, 
 
 
 
MR. WELLS’S REPORT. 
 
 Tho House being in the Committeo of the Whole 
 on tho state of tho Union— 
 
 Mr. KELLEY said: 
 
 Mr. Chairman : I have more than once 
 endeavored to impress upon Congress the fact 
 that fire is the material force or nervous power, 
 and iron and steel the muscles of our more 
 modern civilization. The trip-hammer, with 
 its wonderful power and more wonderful pre¬ 
 cision and delicacy of stroke, has supplanted 
 the sledge-hammer, and circular and gang- 
 saws do in a day the work at which the hand¬ 
 saw labored for months. Machine tools, such 
 as lathes, drills, planers, and shaping machines, 
 impelled like the trip-hammer and the saws 
 of which I have spoken by the unwearying 
 steam engine, itself a mere embodiment of 
 coal and irou ore, increase the perfection and 
 amount of the artisan’s product and relieve him 
 of the exhausting toil which shortened the life 
 of his father and made him prematurely old. 
 
 Nations, too, are subject to these new con¬ 
 ditions. However free their institutions may 
 be, a people who cannot supply their own 
 demand for iron and steel, but purchase it from 
 foreigners beyond seas, are not independent; 
 nor is their dependence merely commercial; 
 they are politically dependent; and if the nation 
 on which they depend for these essential ele¬ 
 ments of modern warfare be arrogant and 
 t reachero us, as England proved herself during 
 ouriate civil war, they must endure contumely 
 ai *d outrage with unresisting humility. Com¬ 
 merce and war both demand iron ships; we 
 tell the weight of our guns, whether of steel 
 or iron, by the ton, and that of our steel-pointed 
 shot by the hundred weight; and while we 
 depend upon her for the material of which to 
 construct ships, guns, and shot, the statesmen 
 -ot Lngland know they can trifle with and post- 
 P® * l ] e l be settlement of the Alabama claims. 
 Able as we were to crush with irresistible power 
 a gigantic rebellion, they know that until we 
 shall have furnaees, forges, rolling-mills, ma¬ 
 chine-shops, and skilled artisans enough to \ 
 produce and fashion a supply of iron and steel I 
 
 sufficient for our wants in peace and war, we 
 cannot engage in war with England because 
 we depend on her for these primary essentials 
 to successful modern warfare. 
 
 I am impelled to renew these suggestions by 
 the report of David A. Wells, esq., Special 
 Commissioner of Revenue, which abounds in 
 propositions inimical to the best interests of the 
 country, and which if adopted by Congress will 
 compel us to occupy a subordinate position 
 among nations, though our population may 
 equal that of all Europe, as our territory already 
 does that of the whole family of European 
 Powers. As I read page after page of this ex¬ 
 traordinary paper I became more earnestly 
 anxious to detect tho full force of its sugges¬ 
 tions, and, if possible, to divine the motive or 
 spirit that prompted them. As an expression 
 of the opinions of Mr. Wells this paper can do 
 but little harm, but its circulation in Europe 
 under the sanction of Congress will impair our 
 credit and arrest the tide of emigration now 
 flowing in upon us in unprecedented volume. 
 It is in the nature of a notice to tho capitalists 
 of Europe that as a people, notwithstanding 
 the amazing expansion of our country, we are 
 tending toward bankruptcy; and to the op¬ 
 pressed laborers of other lands, that our work¬ 
 ing people are becoming not only relatively 
 but absolutely poorer from year to year, and 
 that this is therefore not the country to which 
 poor but aspiring men should emigrate. It 
 demonstrates to the satisfaction of Mr. Wells’s 
 admirers and clients that though our wealth 
 increased during the last decade one hundred 
 and twentysix per cent., its utmost increase 
 
 I during this decade can be but sixty-five and 
 eight hundredths percent.; and that instead of 
 the census of 1870 showing, as it is universally 
 conceded it will, largely over forty-three thou¬ 
 sand million dollars, that the grand total can 
 by no possibility be over $23,-100,000,000. 
 
 I Time will not permit me to point out the 
 fallacies in this portion of his report, as I would 
 gladly do; and I proceed at once to invite the 
 attention of the committee to points which seem 
 I to require more special animadversion. But, 
 
4 
 
 before turning to these, let me request gentle¬ 
 men from Massachusetts, Ohio, Indiana, and 
 New York, if they have not already done so, 
 to turn to pages 24 ei seq ., and learn how rap¬ 
 idly their respective Suites are sinking into 
 poverty, and how much poorer their people are 
 per tapila than they were in I860. The sug¬ 
 gestion wiil doubtless surprise them ; yetso cun¬ 
 ningly does Mr. Wells present it that foreigners 
 who are not familiar with the truth so patent 
 to every observer will be deceived by it and 
 feel they had better— 
 
 "Bear those ills they have. 
 
 Than fly to others that they know not of." 
 
 One of the processes by which Mr. Wells 
 sustains his theory, though not wanting in 
 ingenuity, is very simple. It is to assume that 
 everything is now worth from thirty-five to 
 thirty-nine per cent, less than it was at the 
 time with wnich he proposes his comparison. 
 We know that wheat and flour and every 
 variety of cotton and woolen goods are cheaper 
 now than they were in 1860. But Mr. Wells’s 
 theory is, that as there is a difference in the 
 market value ofgold and greenbacks, commodi¬ 
 ties of domestic production ought to be dearer; 
 and applying this theory to such facts as he 
 sees fit to present, he assumes that they are, 
 and so establishes the melancholy warning to 
 all persons proposing to emigrate that this is 
 not the country to which they should come. 
 No demonstration of the falsity of his theory 
 or of its absurdity induces him to halt, but in 
 spite of these he presses onward and applies it 
 in every case. When examining his last annual 
 report 1 confronted him with the large accu¬ 
 mulation of deposits in the savings-banks as 
 evidence that the workingmen of the country 
 were not then, as he asserted, “growing poorer, 
 while the rich were growing richer,” and, after 
 a year’s reflection, he answers my array of facts 
 in this wise: 
 
 “Again, the returns of savings-banks arc often re¬ 
 ferred to as showing a highly prosperous condition 
 of the masses. Properly considered, howovor, they 
 indicate a very different stato of things. Thus, the 
 first and almost the only fact which attracts the at¬ 
 tention of a mere superficial observer in examining 
 these stal istics is a large apparent increase tn depos¬ 
 its from I860 to 1868 or 1869. But an intelligent ex¬ 
 amination will at once show that a very great part 
 of the apparent accumulation referred to is mere 
 inflation. For example, let us take the ease of Mas¬ 
 sachusetts, where the conditions for increase would 
 seem to bo most favorable: 
 
 Inl860 the savings-banks deposits in this State were. 
 
 in round numbers. $15,000,000 
 
 In January, 1869. in currency, §95,000,000, 
 or in gold at 133 . 71,000,000 
 
 Increase in eight years. §26,000,000 
 
 or $6,000,000 less than the aggregate deposits of 1860 
 would have amounted to in the same time at a com¬ 
 pound interest of seven percent.; or in other words, 
 the deposits of 1860 wore not made good in 1860,with¬ 
 out reference to tho increase of population, even if 
 werockon only their natural increase at compound 
 interest. It is evident, therefore, that some cause 
 has eaten into the accumulation which existed eight 
 years previously, and has occasioned the withdrawal 
 of a portion of that accumulation.” 
 
 If this statement be fair the deposits in the 
 savings-banks of the country fluctuated fearfully 
 on the 24th of September last, when gold ranged 
 
 from 123 to 165 in an hour, and such of the 
 depositors as were in that end of the New York 
 gold-room where it was selling at 135 were 
 vastly richer than those who were at the same 
 moment in the other end at which Albert Spires 
 was buying it for 160. A story told in connec¬ 
 tion with Mr. Spires’s operations on that occa¬ 
 sion seems to me to illustrate the value of Mr. 
 Well’s theory. It is said that a young man 
 without capital who had found his way to mem¬ 
 bership of the gold exchange, but had been 
 bankrupted'even of credit by the operations 
 of the preceding day or two, stood near Mr. 
 Spires, and as that gentleman cried “ Oue sixty 
 for one million,” tapped him on the shoulder 
 and said, “Taken.” “Same price for two 
 millions more,” cried Spires. “Taken,” said 
 the young bankrupt,- and so until Spires had 
 bid, aiuLho taken bis bids foe $13 ,000 ,000. 
 They then separated, and the young Bankrupt 
 drawing aside, with a pencil upon the back of a 
 letter calculated his profits, and turning to a 
 friend triumphantly exclaimed, “I have just 
 made$750,000outofoldSpires.” “Why,”said 
 a by-stander, “you do not expect to get any 
 of it. do you?” “No; certainly not,” said he, 
 “but, blast him, I thought I would give him 
 gold enough.” This operation between a luna¬ 
 tic and a bankrupt, neither of whom owned a 
 dollar of gold, aud by which neither forfeited 
 a cent, had about as much relation to their 
 fortunes as the market price of gold has upon 
 the price of domestic commodities, or deposits 
 in tho banks to which Mr. Wells applies it. 
 
 In further proof of its absurdity I invite at¬ 
 tention to the fact that if his theory be correct 
 the depositors in the savings-banks of Massa¬ 
 chusetts have since the preparation of his re¬ 
 port, by no effort of their own, without increase 
 of industry or unusual economy on their part, 
 but .by his magic power, acquired more than 
 $0,000,000, as gold is now not at 133 but at 
 120; and that they will, if they do not make 
 haste and withdraw their deposits, aud we go 
 on as we have gone for the last tw® or three 
 months under the financial management of 
 Grant and Boutwell, soon make $15,000,000 
 mare in the same easy, and, I fear, unhallowed 
 way; for when gold comes to par even Mr. 
 Wells, with all his ingenious effrontery, will not 
 deuy that having been able to maintain a deposit 
 of but $45,000,000 in 1860, they have in eight 
 years become able to maintain one of $95,000- 
 000, which amount they will be able to draw 
 in gold or redeemable currency, thoughtlxjy 
 deposited greenbacks when gold was nore 
 than 200. Before parting with thh» subject I 
 beg leave to inform the committee and Com¬ 
 missioner Wells that at the close of I860 the 
 aggregate deposits at rest in the savings-banks 
 of Massachusetts were not as he.states $95,000- 
 000, but $112,000,000, showing that the labor¬ 
 ing people of that State, who he says are eating 
 up their former savings so rapidly, have added 
 $17,000,000 to their interest bearing invest- I 
 ment in the last year. 
 
 The prominent characteristics of Mr. Wells’s , 
 report are audacity and advocacy o f the interests 
 of .England and her American colonics. That 
 
it is ingenious and plausible cannot be denied ; 
 but that it is so does not in my judgment fur¬ 
 nish proof of the Commissioner s ability or 
 evidence of his possession of well-grounded 
 
 convictions on industrial questions. Indeed, 
 
 the fact that many of the suggestions which arc 
 most earnestly pressed contravene those em¬ 
 bodied in his former reports, and his avowal 
 that in offering them “ he has placed himself 
 in antagonism to many with whom he was 
 formerly inclose agreement,’’ afford ample 
 ground for doubt on both points. 
 
 “Remember, gentlemen,” said the expe¬ 
 rienced merchant who now so ably fills the office 
 of collector of the port of New York, when 
 conferring with the Committee of Ways and' 
 Means, ‘i that the legal ability of England and 
 the continent is constantly retained by foreign 
 manufacturers to indicate the means by which 
 
 your tariffs may be evaded . ’ ’_ Mr. We lls visited 
 
 our transatlantic rival's TulnS official capacity, 
 and while among them doubtless availed him¬ 
 self of the ability of their large array of able and 
 well-paid counsel. Whether lie also was retained 
 is for the present the subject of conjecture. But 
 that he enforces as “ opinions and recommend¬ 
 ations which have been forced upon him by 
 conviction’ ’ the wishes of the English manufac¬ 
 turers there is abundant evidence in the report, 
 as I propose to show. 
 
 The most audacious of Mr. Wells’sassertions, 
 and one that pervades the whole report, is that 
 customs duties are always a tax on the con 
 sumer, increasing the price of the imported 
 article on which they are levied and enabling 
 the home producer to realize undue profits by 
 keeping production steadily below the current 
 demand for the commodity he produces. Were 
 Mr. Wells a tyro, and this report his first pub¬ 
 lication, charity would deem this a blunder 
 and ascribe it to ignorance; but he is a man of 
 large experience, and has written much, and 
 reference to any of the publications which led 
 to his appointment to tne commissionership, 
 or to his preceding reports, will convict him of 
 basing this official paper on a principle the fal- 
 sityof which he has time and again abundantly 
 established. His bad faith in this is proven, 
 I think, by a single extract from his report 
 made December, 18G7, in which, ‘speaking of 
 the higher duties he then advised Congress to 
 put on steel, he said: 
 
 “On steel much higher rates of duty than thoso 
 recommended upon iron are submitted. Although 
 those rates scciu much higher, and nre protested 
 against by not a few American consumers of steel, yet 
 the evidence presented to the Commissioner tends to 
 establish the fact that if any less are granted the de¬ 
 velopment of a most important and desirable branch 
 of domestio industry will, owing to the present cur¬ 
 rency derangement and the high price and scarcity 
 of skilled labor, bo arrested, if not entirely prostrated. 
 This is claimed to be more especially true in regard 
 to steel of the higher grades or qualities. It is also 
 represented to the Commissioner that since the intro¬ 
 duction of the manufacture of these grades of steel 
 in the United States, or since 1359, the price of foreign 
 steel of similar qualities has been very considerably 
 reduced through the effect of the American compe¬ 
 tition, and that the whole country in this way has 
 gamed more than sufficient to counterbalance tho 
 tax levied ns a protection for tho American steel mnn- 
 - ufacturc, which has grown up under its influence.” 
 
 Mr. Wells can dispute none of the facts 
 asserted in the foregoing extract, which prove 
 that prior to the close of 1807 highly protect¬ 
 ive duties on steel had not been a tax on but 
 aboon to the consumer; sogreata boon,indeed, 
 that by enlarging the supply and increasing 
 competition they had so far reduced the price 
 of steel that, to quote his words again, “the 
 whole country in this way has gained more 
 than sufficient to counterbalance the tax levied 
 as a protection for the American steel manu¬ 
 facture, which has grown up under its influ¬ 
 ence.” 
 
 You, Mr. Chairman, and many of our cola¬ 
 borers on this floor, are interested in the exten¬ 
 sion and improvement of our magnificent rail¬ 
 road system, and I propose to illustrate the 
 treachery of the Commissioner by briefly refer¬ 
 ring to the effect of high productive duties on 
 Bessemer steel rails. In 1804 there was no 
 establishment in the United States for the 
 manufacture of such rails. The lowest price 
 at which an American company could buy 
 them in England was $150 per ton cash, gold, 
 including freight to New York or Philadel¬ 
 phia. No English maker would sell them at 
 ess. Agents of the Pennsylvania Central, 
 and Philadelphia, Wilmington, and Baltimore 
 roads went abroad and canvassed the market, 
 and having been assured that such rails could 
 not be produced and sold at a living profit for 
 a lower price than this, purchased a small 
 quantity for each company. The duty was then, 
 as now, an ad valorem duty of forty five per 
 cent., which at that price was equivalent to 
 about three cents per pound. Gold was then 
 above 200, and each ton of rails had cost when 
 on the wharf in Philadelphia $390, currency. 
 Our country abounds in the materials from 
 which to make not only Bessemer rails, but 
 every quality of steel, and the wages paid to 
 American workmen are high enough to tempt 
 skilled workmen from England and Germany. 
 
 In view of these facts several enterprising 
 railroad men determined to establish Bessemer 
 rail works. This was not to be done in a day. 
 It required the selection of a judicious site, the 
 erection of extensive buildings, the construc¬ 
 tion of a large amount of machinery, which con¬ 
 sumed considerably more than a year. During 
 all this time the price of English rails remained 
 at $150 cash, gold, per ton delivered on the 
 wharf in America. But at length the Freedom 
 Works, at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, so called 
 in commemoration of our partial enfranchise¬ 
 ment from the grasp of foreign monopolists, 
 were ready to take orders, and another estab¬ 
 lishment for their production was erecting at 
 Troy, New York, when lo ! the same English 
 manufacturers, who had been unable to sell at 
 less than $150 per ton, canvassed our market 
 to find buyers at $130. What wrought this 
 great change ? Had the Commissioner’s English 
 friends been making profits off our railroad 
 companies greater than he ascribes to our 
 producers of salt, pig-iron, lumber, and other 
 things essential to national independence; or 
 were they willing to sacrifice the profit on a 
 small part of their annual product in order to 
 
6 
 
 crush an infant rival whose development they I 
 feared? Be this as it may, in less than four I 
 years competition has brought the price of Bes- ! 
 seiner rails down so rapidly that orders are now i 
 taken in England at eleven pounds sterling, or j 
 about fifty-five dollars, deliverable at Liverpool j 
 or Hull. Meanwhile the mills for their pro¬ 
 duction at Troy, New York, and others at 
 Chester, Pennsylvania, Cleveland, Ohio, and j 
 Detroit, Michigan, have been completed ; and 
 the plans have been adopted for others at Mott 
 Ilaven, New York; Pittsburg, Johnstown, and 
 Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; Baltimore, Cincin¬ 
 nati, and St. Louis; but their construction 
 awaits and is dependent on the action of Con¬ 
 gress on the tariff. These facts are known to 
 Mr. Wells, yet he endeavors to persuade the 
 country that a protective duty is always a tax 
 on the consumer, and labors to induce Con¬ 
 gress to reduce a duty which was at the rate of 
 three cents to one anil a half cent per pound; a 
 change which he well knows would close all our 
 Bessemer rail works and restoi’e to his English 
 friends the monopoly of our market. What 
 can have brought him to such a conclusion? 
 What is to be las reward for such a consumma¬ 
 tion ? 
 
 If gentlemen will turn to page 125 of the 
 report they will find a schedule presenting a 
 classification of steel, and proposed rates of 
 duty on each class. It purports to be Mr. Wells’s 
 own suggestion, and is submitted with all the 
 emphasis that the abundant resort to italics 
 can give. I hope gentlemen will examine it, for 
 I think that with its private history it furnishes 
 a clew to his change of views on the question 
 as to whether a protective duty that develops 
 a great industry is a tax, and his Saul-like con¬ 
 version on the steel question. For nearly a quar- 
 terofacentury ourduties on cast-steelhavebeen 
 assessed upon the value ofthe commodity, or ad 
 valorem ; and recent investigations by an agent 
 of the Government has shown that throughout 
 the whole of the period the steel-makers of 
 Sheffield, by refusing to sell directly to Ameri¬ 
 can purchasers and consigning their goods to 
 their agents in this country for sale, by which 
 cunning arrangement they could successfully 
 practice a system of undervaluation, have been 
 defrauding the Government of a large portion 
 of its dues. 
 
 The Sheffield steel-makers are men of wealth 
 and social position, and this discovery of their 
 long-continued and systematic fraud upon our 
 Government has not been a pleasant thing for 
 them. The charge is distasteful to them. A 
 combination to cheat and defraud has an ugly 
 sound. They squirm under it and admit that 
 steel has beeu invoiced to the United States at 
 lower rates than those at which they sell in 
 England or to the people of the Continent, but 
 assert that, low as the invoice prices are, they 
 are the prioes at which they sell in this country. 
 Good, kind-hearted, benevolent people! How 
 they do love the Yankees! To be willing to 
 sell them their wares cheaper than they will to 
 their own countrymen or to any of the people 
 of Europe! Have they any reason for doing so, 
 or do they pretend to have any ? Yes; they are 
 
 not without a show of reason. They say—and 
 11 their letters are on file in the Treasury Depart- 
 !,' ment, and their agents have appeared there 
 to enforce the statement—that our market is 
 essential to the maintenance of their works 
 and that such is the competition they encoun¬ 
 ter from our steel-makers that they are forced 
 to sell to us at lower rates than they do to the 
 English or any other people. In a letter to our 
 consul at that city, dated July 10,1869,Thomas 
 Firth & Son, of Sheffield, say: 
 
 “We have a very large steel trade in America, 
 amounting to a largo proportion of our whole busi¬ 
 ness, and in that market there is from various circum¬ 
 stances much competition; and these two causes— 
 large trade and competition combinod—have inducod 
 ns to bo satisfied with a smaller averago profit there 
 than wo have realized on the average in our other 
 markets." 
 
 Mr. Wells has seen the report of Mr. Far- 
 well, the Treasury agent referred to, and has 
 examined*-^ uuglit to have exatuined, all the 
 papers in this controversy, and might' have 
 cited them as proof of his assertion that the 
 reduction in the price of steel has more than 
 compensated the American people for all the 
 duty paid on that article since the establish¬ 
 ment of our first successful steel works in 1859. 
 But I have been led into a digression. 
 
 I had said that the discovery of their sys¬ 
 tematic frauds was not a pleasant thing to the 
 English steel-makers, and was proceeding to 
 say that foreseeing it would probably lead to 
 the abandonment of ad valorem and the levy¬ 
 ing of specific duties on steel they have over¬ 
 whelmed the Secretary of the Treasury and 
 other official personages with unsolicited, and, 
 of course, disinterested advice. That we should 
 not suffer for want of their experience, the draft 
 of a bill providing a scale of duties on steel was 
 prepared,as I am informedand verily believe, by 
 or in consultation with a member of one of the 
 leading firms of steel-makera of Sheffield, and 
 sent over to a gentleman specially connected 
 with legislation on financial subjects. I have 
 examined the original draft as it came from 
 Sheffield, and have a copy of it before me. 
 It is a proposition by the vulture to protect 
 the dove. It is plausible in its minute classi¬ 
 fication. It would, had it been honestly 
 named, h^ve bceu entitled a bill to prohibit the 
 manufacture of steel iu the United States. 
 It is, however, entitled “ A bill to amend an 
 act entitled ‘ An act to increase duties on im¬ 
 ports, and for other purposes,’ ” approved June 
 30,1864.” It furnished Mr. Wells ms schedule; 
 and that gentlemen may see how completely 
 he has adopted it, how entirely his views on 
 this important subject are in accord with those 
 of the steel monopolists of England, whose 
 interest it is to hold us in commercial and 
 maritime dependence, I will ask the reporters 
 to put the two schedules in parallel columns. 
 It is, perhaps, due to Mr. Wells, in this con¬ 
 nection, that I should mention the fact that he 
 so far exercised his own judgment in making 
 this recommendation as to modify two or three 
 unimportant rates and to change the order from 
 that in which the items stand in the bill; and 
 that to make the comparison easy for the read- 
 
7 
 
 3 $ 
 
 ers of the Globe, I have arranged them in the 
 order chosen by Idr. Wells : 
 
 Wells's schedule. Sheffield bill. 
 
 ’■ On scrap steel, i cent On scrap steel, I cent 
 
 >pcr pound. . , per pound, 
 
 An hi ’ 
 
 On blister steel in bars On blister steel in bars 
 ■broken up for molting, 1J broken up for melting, li 
 
 ..jeents per pound. cents per pound. 
 
 On German steel in On German steel in 
 '.bars, 2 cents per pound. bars, 2 cents per pound. 
 On shear steel in bars, On shear steel in bars, 
 2b cents por pound. 2} cents per pound. 
 
 " On oast-steel ingots and On cast-steel ingots, 1 
 
 fi vli Utwi-atooj ujftuw iiuu oaat’otfft 
 
 . on all rough and unfin- cent por pound. I I 
 
 ' ,ashed castings in steel, 1 
 
 ? 'cent per pound. 
 
 , . c s On castings in steel, On castings in steel with 
 drilled, bored, or hum- holes drilled or bored, 
 '. \ mered cold, li cents per hammered or turned or 
 s *pound. planed in parts, but in no 
 
 u. “ case hammered or worked 
 
 HBHt] ... , AoMi cents per pound. 
 
 On east-steel in bars, 2i On east-steel in bars, 2J 
 v -. cents per pound. cents per pound. 
 
 ’ ... ... On east or Ger man steel On cast or German steel 
 
 X^inc?u^ive,°2 coats per 23 wire caugo, cents 
 
 pound; lrom 17 to 24, 2* por pound, 
 cents per pound: above 
 '24, 3 cents per pound. 
 
 . ■ - On cast or German steel On cast or German steel 
 
 • in form ofwire and sheets in form of wiro or strips 
 which aro drawn or rolled which are drawn or rolled 
 cold to 16 wiro gauge, 3 cold to 16 wiro gauge, 3 
 .. cents per pound. cents per pound. 
 
 ' Thinner than 16 wire When drawn or rolled 
 gauge,3ioentsperpound. smaller than 16 wire 
 gauge,3i cents per pound. 
 On cast-steel tires for On cast-steel tires for 
 ' . rolling-stock for rail- rolling-stock for rail- 
 • roads, 2 cents per pound, roads, 2 cents per pound 
 On cast-steel straight On cast-steel straight- 
 ./ axles,shafts, piston-rods, axles, piston, connect- 
 ‘ and general forgings to ing and coupling - rod* 
 pattern, 1 cent por pound, crank - pins, slide-bars,’ 
 and general forgings to 
 
 .4 cents per pound. 
 
 Do. do. finished ready 
 for use, 2cents per pound. 
 On cast-steel crank 
 
 pattern only, li cents per 
 pound. 
 
 If forgod to shape and 
 rough-turned or planed, 
 li cents por pound. 
 
 If finished ready for 
 uso. 2 cents per pound. 
 
 On cast-steel crank- 
 
 t0 shlip< ?’ shafts, if forged to shape 
 p °P n _ d ; on j,y- i* cents per pound. 
 
 : -9“ cast-steel crank On cast-steel crank 
 
 •axles, forged to sbapo, shafts, if forged to shape, 
 'Planed, rough - turned, planed 
 
 K±t ttCd ' U cents 1)0r lind sl , otted * U ce nts poi 
 ..pound. pound. 
 
 " fl T hcd roa d,y On cast-stool crank 
 
 •for use, 2 cents per pound, shafts, if forged to shape, 
 i* finished ready for use 21 
 
 On cast-stool crank 
 lafts, if forged to shape, 
 nshed ready for use, 21 
 a- ... .... cents per jTOurrd.- 
 
 oast-steel rai 3 ’ ^ tin cast-stool rails, 1 
 C °On 8 ifnoi P n U i ld ’ti • cent per pound. 
 
 5 - Gn steel not otherwise On steel or mannfne 
 >POMd dSd for> 2cent3 J,cr tores of steel, not othor- 
 ■ J °* nu - wiso provided for, 21 cents 
 
 per pound. 
 
 It will be observed that the foregoing sched 
 £5 a , re ’ as 1 HUlma ted, not absolutely idem 
 
 Mr We! t r ey S0 - so as l <> prevent 
 
 Mr. Wells from denying that they sprangfrom 
 
 tntwT 6 bra "} a i nd P !eadi "g possibility of 
 coincidence—I do not sav the nrohahilitv i,„* 
 
 n °t sav the probability, but 
 the possibility of coincidence—< 
 
 ;„r ^nciaence—on so many 
 
 ants of rate and general and technical 
 
 tbatwb^rffhpsr'u be ^ urtber noticed 
 inan v nno l . bes 'test departure in rate occurs 
 : ' !m yo “ e * tera > as J s the case in two or three 
 
 peSdfor L n r ce8 ' is im,nediato! y com- 
 E,' i r a the next item by a correspond¬ 
 ing change the other way. Thus, Mr. Wells is 
 
 more generous to his countrymen in the matte 
 of Bessemer rails than their Sheffield rive 
 would be. He proposes to kill them instant! 
 by putting the rate at one cent a pound ; whil 
 Mr. Wells is willing to give them breathing tim 
 in which to put their houses in order by lettin, 
 them die slowly at one and a half cent. Am 
 in the next item the Englishman proves th 
 more generous; for he proposes two and a hall 
 cents on all steel and manufactures of steel no 
 provided for, and Mr. Wells would crush hit 
 countrymen instantly by making the duty or 
 those articles but two cents. 
 
 I cannot leave this branch of the subjec 
 without saying that I believe gentlemen gen 
 erally who compare these schedules will agree 
 with me in thinking that Mr. Wells’s SliHlieli 
 employers have treated him badly, scurvily. 
 Having induced him to father their project, sc 
 prejudicial to his country and so destructive tc 
 the business of many of his countrymen, the} 
 violated faith with him when they made thoir 
 paternity of the scheme known by sending a 
 copy of the bill to official quarters in this coun¬ 
 try in advance of the publication of his report. 
 riO-IKOJT. 
 
 With all the zeal of a new convert or coun¬ 
 sel laboring to secure a contingent fee, Mr. 
 Wells applies his assumption that a protective 
 duty is necessarily a tax on the consumer to 
 pig-iron, and by the plausibility of his argu¬ 
 ment would make innocent and inexperienced 
 people believe that he really hoped to secure 
 cheap pig-iron by reducing the duty on that 
 article from nine dollars a ton to three dollars. 
 Could he close our steel works, as the accept¬ 
 ance of the Sheffield schedule recommended by 
 him would do in three months, and arrest the 
 progress we are making in the increased pro¬ 
 duction of pig-iron, he would dp more to retard 
 the progress of his cotnTry toward commercial 
 prosperity and national supremacy than Davis, 
 Lee, and all the heads of the rebellion accom¬ 
 plished. I cannot conceive the single cause 
 that would do more to depress and impoverish 
 our people and retard the growth of our coun¬ 
 try than the sudden prostration of these great 
 interests at a time when the English or con¬ 
 tinental manufacturer will purchase none of 
 our grain for which he has to pay a penny in 
 advance of the price for which he can buy 
 from the peasants of Austria and Russia. 
 
 But this recommendation with reference to 
 pig-iron is consistent with the rest of the report, 
 throughout which the desire is manifest to make 
 the United States as commercially dependent 
 on and tributary to England as though they 
 were s ill part of her North American colonies 
 He cites pig-iron, coal, salt, aud lumber as 
 illustrations of a class of cases where excessive 
 and unnecessary duties have been imposed and 
 maintained wdh a view of enhancing the cost 
 of articles indispensable to many other branches 
 
 I?ref_ e l 3e " h . nre *V* ,'k*‘ 
 
 only reply offered to his assaults upon this great 
 and essential interest “ is that a continuance 
 
 P f nt duty 0,1 P'g' iron « necessary to 
 insure employment to American labor.” 3 
 I pause to notice his assertion, that Con- 
 
8 
 
 gress ia the midst of a great war imposed un- r 
 necessary exactions in order to increase the i 
 cost of an article so essential as iron to the jj 
 life of the nation, simply to remark that such ji 
 an intimation is worthy the man who can sap 1 
 and mine the great interests of his country as ji 
 Commissioner Wells is doing. The present jj 
 duty on pig-iron was imposed for two pur- j 
 poses, both of which were patriotic. The tirst | 
 was to raise additional revenue, and the other i 
 to stimulate the conversion of ore, coal, and I 
 limestone, of which in almost every part of the I 
 country we have inexhaustible supplies, into a j 
 material the increased production of which jj 
 was a prerequisite to the general extension of ji 
 our industries and the maintenance of the 
 dignity and rights of the nation, which were I 
 then being violated by the armed cruisers of jj 
 the country to which we looked for a supply jj 
 of pig-iron and Bessemer rails. And, sir, I j 
 am happy in being able to show that it has j 
 accomplished both these objects, and that if I 
 permitted to stand for five years it will, while | 
 contributing largely to the reduction of our debt, 
 insure us not only a home supply of pig-iron, 
 but such ample means of producing it as will 
 enable us to enter the markets of the world in 
 competition with England. 
 
 What has it done as a revenue measure? 
 During the year that ended on the 30th of June, 
 1808, we derived from this duty $1,011,109 9G ; 
 in the succeding year, closing on the 30th of 
 June, 18G9, $1,109,702 55; and in the current 
 fiscal year will give us a still larger income, with¬ 
 out in the slightest degreeimpairing the revenue 
 derived from oar consumption of foreign iron in 
 more advanced condition. This is shown by 
 the following statement of the quantities of the 
 various kinds of iron and steel exported from 
 Great Britain to the United States during the 
 ten months ending October 81, of the years 
 1808-09, in tons of 2,000 pounds : 
 
 Iron, pig and puddled. 
 
 Iron, bar, angle, bolt, and rod. 
 
 Iron, railroad, of all sorts. 
 
 Iron castings. 
 
 Iron hoops, sheets, and boilerplates, 
 Iron, wrought, of all sorts 
 
 To Ul.. 
 
 Steel, unwronghf. 
 
 . 84,564 
 . 38,200 
 ,255.462 
 .. 1,213 
 ;, 15,999 
 4,020 
 
 ...399,458 
 
 ... 14,817 
 
 Has not the duty of nine dollars per ton on 
 pig-iron been eminently successful as a revenue 
 measure? 1 think it has; but its most abundant 
 success has been in its power to increase the 
 supply, improve the quality, and lessen the 
 cost of domestic pig-iron. The Commissioner 
 raises no question as to the relative quality of 
 British and American iron, nn.d does not, as I 
 remember, slate the quantity of our annual 
 production, except that in one of his hypo¬ 
 thetical calculations of the values realized from 
 different departments of industry, to state 
 which he was required to assume some quan¬ 
 tity, lie places the annual product for 1809 at 
 1,725,000 tons, or just about 175,000 tons below 
 the ascertained production of that year. That 
 tlie average quality of American pig, bar, and 
 
 railroad iron is superior to the average of the 
 same descriptions of English iron is an almost 
 universally-conceded fact; but to blazon this 
 to the world would not serve the interest of the 
 Commissioner s British friends, and he is there¬ 
 fore silent upon this aspect of the question also, 
 lie tells us with much elaboration what he has 
 been told has been the cost of production per * 
 ton at several points in this country,* and the 
 market price per ton during the year in Eng¬ 
 land ana here. 
 
 But though his report abounds in hypotheses 
 and calculations based on estimates and sup¬ 
 positions, he nowhere tells or attempts to tell 
 us what we would have been made to pay the 
 British iron master for his inferior pig, bar. 
 sheet, and rails if the American production of 
 pig-iron had not been more than doubled since 
 the establishment of this duty, and if the man¬ 
 ufacture of cast-steel and Bessemer rails had 
 not alsp. been established at so manyjjoints 
 within our limits. He is not ignorant of the 
 fact that in little more than a year past sixty- 
 five new blast furnaces have been erected, 
 and that they are to employ a portion of the 
 people of fifteen States, Six of them are in 
 New York, one in New Jersey, nineteen in 
 Pennsylvania, one in Maryland, four in Vir 
 ginia, six in Ohio, five in Indiana, three in 
 Illinois, five in Michigan, two in Wisconsin, 
 six in Missouri, three in Kentucky, one in 
 Georgia, two in Alabama, and one in Ten¬ 
 nessee. These furnaces have increased our 
 productive power to nearly two million five 
 hundred thousand tons per annum. Arrange¬ 
 ments are also making for the erection of more 
 
 *Thi8 portion of the Commissioner’s report has 
 elicited the following memorial: 
 
 To the Senate and House of Representatives 
 
 of the United States in Congress assembled : 
 
 In the late report of Hon. David A. Wells, Special 
 Commissioner of the Revenue, the following para¬ 
 graph appears: 
 
 “ In the valley of the Cumberland and in the an¬ 
 thracite districts of Pennsylvania, and at Scranton, 
 tho Commissioner is informed by those conversant 
 with tho business that the average cost of manufac¬ 
 ture in the case of furnaces favorably situated, under 
 good management and with coal at ordinary prices, 
 is not in excess of from twenty-four to twenty-six 
 dollars per tou, and in some instances is much less 
 than this figure. These estimates, furthermore, it 
 should be observed, includtnt liberal interest on the 
 capital invested, which is turned on an average from 
 two to threo times per annum.” 
 
 Your memorialists, representing thirty-seven fur¬ 
 naces in the Lehigh, Schuylkill, and Susquehanna 
 regions, producing annually in tho aggregate over 
 270,000 tons of pig-iron, respectfully express their be¬ 
 lief, based upon personal knowledge, that tho above 
 statement of tho Commissioner will be found upon a 
 critical examination erroneous, and if accepted by 
 Congress a most dangerous guide to legislation. Upon 
 tho authority of our personal knowledge we beg leave 
 to state that tho average cost per Ion at tho furnaces 
 wo represent, exclusive of any interest on capital 
 and tho expenses of moving product, from tho fnr- 
 naees, in the year 1868 was S29 161, and in the first six 
 months of 1869, $29 63; while wo believe tho cost for . 
 tho last six months will not materially vary there a 
 from, these prices being the average cost of the’ 
 product, embracing tho three qualities of iron, 
 namely, Nos. 1, 2, and 3. 
 
 Wo respectfully express tlio conviction that the 
 foregoing average cost of the product of tho furnaces 
 we represent is below the average cost of the product 
 of American furnaces collectively; it being ourbolief 
 
9 
 
 than fifty other furnaces during the year upon 
 which we have just entered, many of which 
 have been commenced. The estimated prod¬ 
 uct of pb'-iron for this year is two million two 
 hundred and twenty-five thousand tons, orabout j 
 fifty per cent, of the annual average produc- | 
 tion of Great Britain. . n 
 
 These facts are, I repeat, known to the Com¬ 
 missioner ; and he knows also that by a law as : 
 inevitable as that of gravitation domestic com¬ 
 petition increasing in such a ratio must at an 
 early day bring down the price of iron as it lias 
 that of wheat and flour, and of knit and other 
 cotton and woolen goods, to a point beyond 
 danger from foreign competition ; and by thus 
 relieving us from dependence on England for 
 the first essential in a great war, will aiso make 
 us her competitor in the markets of the world 
 in a field her supremacy in which has hitherto 
 made her the commercial mistress of the world. 
 
 I will not .offer -aa -e-slimat&-flf..what would 
 have been the price of pig-iron had not the 
 necessities of the Government compelled it to 
 impose a duty that was protective and which 
 justified men of enterprise in opening coal , 
 mines and ore-beds and erecting furnaces ; but ! 
 to enable gentlemen to judge for themselves, I 
 submit the following. On page 85 of the report 
 I am considering the Commissioner says: 
 
 “How great the demand of the future is likely to 
 prove may bo inferred from the circumstance that 
 while the per capita consumption of Great Britain 
 and Belgium, after allowing for exportation, has 
 reached ono hundred and eighty-nine pounds per 
 annum, tho present annual consumption of tho Uni- 
 
 j tod States is not in excess »>f one hundred pounds 
 per capita. No nation, furthermore, at tho present 
 time, with the exception of Great Britain, is pro¬ 
 ducing pig-iron in sufficient excess of its needs to 
 allow of a surplus for exportation: and in Great 
 Britain the prospect of any future increase is entirely 
 dependent upon tho uncertain condition of her being 
 
 | able to supply coal on a scale of consumption that is 
 |j already in excess of one hundred and four million 
 tons per annum.” 
 
 On page 3 of his report made January, 18G9, 
 i Mr. Weils tells us that— 
 
 “Tn France tho annual product of pig-iron was in 
 18661.253,100 tons, and in 18671.142,800 tons, showing 
 a decline of 110,300 tons. 
 
 “In Austria tho official returns of the iron trade 
 show a diminution of forty-two per cent, in 1866 as 
 compared with I860, and of sixty per cent, as com¬ 
 pared with 1862.” 
 
 And in that valuable paper, the report of 
 A. S. Ilewett, esq., United States commis¬ 
 sioner to the Paris Exposition, we learn that 
 ours is almost the only country in the world 
 that can largely expand its production of iron. 
 Mr. Ilewett agrees with Mr. Wells that it is 
 problematical ns to whether England can for 
 the present increase her production mate- 
 i rially. He thinks she may maintain her present 
 
 osition among other continental producers; 
 
 ut beyond this he does not think she can go, 
 by reason of the depth of her mines and the 
 “intrinsic difficulties of producing the re¬ 
 quired supply of materials and labor, without 
 an enormous increase of cost.” 
 
 The iron production of the world for 18GG, 
 as stated by Mr. Ilewett, was as follows: 
 
 that wo represent interests having important e 
 nomic advantages. 
 
 In view of the foregoing statements we respect¬ 
 fully ask as an act of justice to the Commissioner, to 
 the producer of American pig iron, to tho public and 
 to its Representatives in Congress, that you will make 
 a special and searching inquiry for the data on which 
 tho Commissioner has based his statements, and into 
 tho accuracy of our statements as above, that tho 
 truth may bo made public and error, however strongly 
 indorsed, bo effectually confuted. 
 
 LE1IIGII CRANE IRON COMPANY, 
 
 Catasauqua, Lehigh county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 ALLENTOWN IRON COMPANY. 
 
 Allentown, Lehigh county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 SAUCON IRON COMPANY. 
 
 HellerUnon, Lehigh county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 andover Iron company, 
 
 Phillipeburg, Ncio Jersey. 
 
 MONTGOMERY IRON COMPANY. 
 
 Montgomery county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 J. B. MOORHEAD & CO., 
 
 Montgomery county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 ROBERTS IRON COMPANY. 
 
 Allentown, Lehigh county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 REPPLIER. LANIGAN & CO.. 
 
 Montgomery county, Pennsylvan in. 
 
 CHESTNUT HILL IRON ORE COMPANY. 
 
 Columbia, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 E. HALDEMAN & CO.. Chickies Station, 
 
 Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 C. B. GRUBB & SON. 
 
 Columbia, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 C. S. KAUFFMAN, 
 
 Columbia, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. 
 ATKINS BROTHERS. 
 
 Poltsville, Montgomery county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 |k CARBON IRON COMPANY. 
 
 Parrjiville, Carbon county, Pennsylvania. 
 
 HENRY S. ECKERT, Heading, Pennsylvania. 
 
 G. D. A WSON CO LEMA N. 
 
 Lebanon, Pennsylvania. 
 
 Countries. 
 
 Pig-iron. 
 
 Wrought 
 
 
 Tons. 
 
 Tons. 
 
 England. 
 
 4,530,051 
 
 3,500,000 
 
 Franco. 
 
 1,200,320 
 
 844,734 
 
 Belgium. 
 
 500,000 
 
 400,000 
 
 Prussia. 
 
 800,000 
 
 400,000 
 
 Austria. 
 
 312,000 
 
 200,000 
 
 Sweden. 
 
 226,676 
 
 148,292 
 
 Russia. 
 
 408,000 
 
 350,000 
 
 Spriin. 
 
 75,000 
 
 50,000 
 
 Italy . 
 
 30,000 
 
 20,000 
 
 Switzerland. 
 
 15,000 
 
 10,000 
 
 Zollverein. 
 
 250,000 
 
 200,000 
 
 United States. 
 
 1,175,900 
 
 882,000 
 
 Total. 
 
 9,322,047 
 
 7,205,026. 
 
 Thus it appears that with a production of less 
 than ten million tons for the world’s supply no 
 other country than ours is in a position to make 
 a large and immediate addition to its annual 
 production. The difficulties in the way may 
 be briefly stated thus: Sweden possesses ex¬ 
 haustless supplies of the richest primitive ores, 
 but she has no coal, and her annual production 
 of charcoal-iron is believed to have reached its 
 limit. Her function will henceforth be to mine 
 and export ore. liussia has ample supplies of 
 ore, but so far as exploration has yet discov¬ 
 ered is deficient in coal. She can, however, for 
 some time somewhat augment her production 
 of charcoal-iron. Austria, Italy, Spain, and the 
 States of the Zollverein have ore, but little or 
 no coal available for iron-making, and are 
 unable to extend, if they can maintain, their 
 pres<*** production of charcoal-iron. Franca i 
 
10 
 
 has neither coal nor ore sufficient to supply her !j 
 wants. England furnishes her with one third I 
 the coal sho now consumes in the manufacture 
 of iron. Little Belgium has both coal and ore, j 1 
 and they are advantageously situated, but the jj 
 field is so contracted that she cannot increase 
 her production beyond her own wants, and |j 
 Prussia is a large importer of coal and pig-iron 
 from England. So much for prospective in- 
 crease of supplies; while, as illustrative of the 
 growing demand, I need only allude to the Jj 
 gigantic systems of railroads building in Russia jj 
 and India, the latter at immense cost by Eng- j 
 land, in the hope of impairing our supremacy 
 as producers of cotton. 
 
 Had we continued to rely upon England for 
 pig-iron in excess of our capacity to produce 
 it at the time of fixing nine dollars as the duty, 
 and also to draw our supplies of cast-steel and 
 Bessemer rails from her, the extension of our' 
 railroad system must have been checked and 
 the per capita consumption of iron in this coun¬ 
 try been much restricted. For nine years 
 before the imposition of that duty our annual 
 production had been less than 800,000 tons, 
 and that of England had not increased at the 
 rate of 100,000 tons per annum. Our demand 
 increases at the rate of from 170,000 to 200,000 
 tons per annum. Whence but from our own 
 ore beds and coal mines could the supply have 
 been drawn? The production of pig-iron in 
 England and the United States from 1854 to 
 18G2 inclusive was. as follows : 
 
 United 
 
 England. States. 
 
 1854 .3,069,838 716,674 
 
 1855 .3,218,154 754.178 
 
 1856 .3.586.377 874,428 
 
 1857 .3.659,447 798,157 
 
 1858 .3,456,064 705,094 
 
 1859 .3,712.904 84Q.427 
 
 1S60.3,826,752 913,774 
 
 1861 . 3,712,390 731.564 
 
 1862 .3,943,469 787,602 
 
 These figures show that the two great iron- 
 producing countries of the world, England 
 and the United States, increased their joint 
 production less than one hundred thousand 
 tons per annum for nine consecutive years, 
 while we alone demand an increase of at least 
 one hundred and seventy thousand tons, and 
 prove the assertion that but for the applica¬ 
 tion of an incentive to the production of iron 
 in this country the expansion of our railroad 
 system and our general material progress 
 must have been impossible. Was there any 
 charm by which an increased supply could be 
 evoked ? Was there any means by which the 
 disparity between the wages of English labor¬ 
 ers in iron-works and such as were essential to 
 the support of American citizens who might 
 engage in similar employments could be coun¬ 
 terbalanced? Yes, Mr. Chairman, there was 
 one, and that was applied. It was such a duty 
 as would give capitalists and men of enterprise 
 a guarantee that if they paid workmen fair 
 American wages for building furnaces, digging 
 and hauling coal, ore, and limestone, and con¬ 
 verting them into pig-iron they should not be 
 undersold in our own markets by the produc¬ 
 tions of underpaid British workmen. Nine dol¬ 
 
 lars per ton it was believed would give then# 
 j i hat guarantee, and yet leave our markets so 
 largely open to English competition that w e 
 should derive more duty from pig-iron thanwe 
 had done under lower duties. 
 
 I have spoken of the difference between the 
 wagesof English and American workmen. L e t 
 me show how great it is. The English shilling 
 is twenty-five cents of our money. Commercial 
 men know this; there are, however, many of 
 our people not familiar with the details of com¬ 
 merce and the exchangeable value of money to 
 whom it may be proper to state the fact. Turn¬ 
 ing again to the report of Mr. Hewett, which I 
 recur to frequently and always with a renewed 
 sense of obligation, I find the rates of wages 
 paid in England in 18GG to have been as follows: 
 
 Wages paid in South Staffordshire, England in 1866. 
 
 Common laborers. 
 
 Puddlers. 
 
 Puddlers’ helpers. 
 
 Puddle rollers. 
 
 Heaters. 
 
 Heater helpers. 
 
 Finishing rollers.. 
 
 Shinglers. 
 
 Machinists. 
 
 Blacksmiths. 
 
 Masons. 
 
 Per day. 
 
 ■ 6 d. to 3«. 0 d. 
 g to 7 10 
 
 6 to a n 
 
 0 to 15 
 0 to 16 
 0 to 5 
 6 to 8 
 
 The average price of skilled and unskilled labor 
 at the iron-works in England docs not exceed 4s a 
 day. 
 
 At the coal and iron works of Creed & Williams, in 
 Belgium, the wages paid in 1866 were as follows: 
 
 Per day. 
 
 Common laborers. Is. 2d. to 3s. 6 d. 
 
 Loaders of coal. 2 6 to 2 11 
 
 Wood-cutter3. 2 6 to 2 11 
 
 Wood or tree-setters. 3 1 to 5 0 
 
 Miners. *2 11 to 4 2 
 
 Exceptional men. 5 0 to 6 0 
 
 At the Blast Furnaces. 
 
 Fillers. 1 1 tc 
 
 Box fillers. 1 4 tc 
 
 Common laborers. 1 5 tc 
 
 Furnace-keepers. 2 1 tc 
 
 In the Rolling-Mill. 
 
 Puddlers. 4 2 tc 
 
 Helpers. 2 3 tc 
 
 Rollers. 4 2 tc 
 
 Ilolpors. 3 4 tc 
 
 Shearers. 1 10 tc 
 
 Common laborers. 1 5 tc 
 
 In all other Europoan countries wages c 
 than in England. 
 
 These figures are worthy of the study of the 
 workingmen of this country, whom Mr. Com¬ 
 missioner Wells is persistently striving to array 
 in hostility against those whose interests, for 
 the present at least, are identical with their 
 own—the men who have embarked their capi¬ 
 tal in an attempt to make the United States 
 commercially and politically independent of 
 Great Britain, and who, if sustained in good 
 faith, will not only accomplish this, but enable 
 us to meet her in the markets of the world 
 with pig, bar, and sheet-iron,with steel in all its 
 forms, including cutlery, and with irou ships 
 carrying a commerce as extended as her own 
 upon every sea. 
 
 Having shown that the experiment of nine 
 dollars per ton has been successful as a rev¬ 
 enue measure, now let us see what effect it 
 has had in stimulating production without 
 
11 
 
 i;: . . t,- t i 1P wattes of labor. When it was J 
 d Ked English iron-masters saw that with ; 
 jSwhaustible fields and rich vanet.es of 
 S and ore we must soon become competitors 
 Sfh them for our home market, and at no d.s- 
 S day a formidable rival in the general mar- 
 [tets of Ins continent. This it was tho.p .Dter- . 
 est to prevent if possible, and though their 
 fncrease of production had been less than || 
 100 000 tons per annum for the preceding nine 
 vears they added 500,000 tows the next year, ; 
 and in 1865 produced nearly 900,000 tons more 
 than they had ever done before. I have sho wn 
 the production of the two countries from 18u4 
 i&W The Morrill tariff, which raised the 
 duty to'$6, went into effect in 1861. In 1864 
 the duty was raised to $9. The results have 
 been as follows: 
 
 1808.... 
 
 1864.. . 
 
 1805.. . 
 
 England. 
 ... 4,510,040 
 .74 7 Ai 7 , trn " 
 ... 4,819,254 
 ... 4,523,807 
 ... 4,761.028 
 
 United 
 
 States. 
 
 047,004 
 
 1,135.497 
 
 031,582 
 
 1,350,943 
 
 1 , 401,020 
 
 1.003,000 
 
 1 , 000.000 
 
 I regret my inability to ascertain the Eng¬ 
 lish production for 1868 and 18G9 ; but in view 
 of the average of the five years quoted, and the 
 fact that the production of 1865 exceeds so 
 largely the years that succeeded as well as those 
 that preceded it, it is fair to assume that it 
 has not been in excess of that year in either 
 of those omitted. These figures confirm the 
 impression that England has attained her 
 maximum production; while her increase since 
 1863 has been scai^ely appreciable, ours has 
 increased about one hundred and ten percent. 
 In view of all these facts I think that it appears 
 again in the matter of pig-iron, as it did in that 
 of cast-steel and Bessemer rails, that a protect¬ 
 ive duty has not been, as Mr. Wells asserts, a 
 tax on, but a boon to the American consumer. 
 
 COAL AND THK BRITISH NORTH AMERICAN COLONIES. 
 
 I have said that the report is devoted to the 
 promotion of the interests of England and her 
 North American colonies, and have, I think, 
 shown that if its suggestions were carried into 
 effect it would arrest the rapid increase we are 
 making in the production oi iron and steel and 
 remand us to commercial and political depend¬ 
 ence on our haughty and faithless rival. 1 pro¬ 
 pose now to illustrate Mr. Wells’s palpable de¬ 
 sire to promote the interests of England’s North 
 American colonies—the new dominion, that 
 asylum of our foes in war and base of illicit 
 operations against our revenue system in peace. 
 
 The sea board provinces, whether on the 
 Atlantic or Pacific ocean, are suffering discon¬ 
 tent that is rapidly becoming chronic. From 
 1854 to 1866 the colonists were more than con¬ 
 tented, they were proud and joyous; emigrants 
 Mlowed in and settled among them. They con¬ 
 trasted their condition with ours and plumed 
 themselves upon their superior prosperity. 
 Their clip of wool aud crops of cereals increased 
 annually, their fisheries were increasingly prof¬ 
 itable, and theircoal mines yielded unparalleled 
 
 profits—in one year one coal company having 
 paid its stockholders the almost fabulous profit 
 of one hundred and seventy-five per cent. They 
 were more thanhopeful of the future; they were 
 confident and arrogant. W ith them the southern 
 confederacy was a foregone conclusion, and with 
 it as an ally and England as their sponsor they 
 saw the near approach of the day when this triple 
 alliance should hold the Yankee States as in a 
 vice and crush or strangle them at pleasure. 
 This was in 1864. Their tone is less joyous 
 now. Indeed, it is sad unto wailing. Listen 
 to one of them, a Nova Scotian, as he pours the 
 story of their wrongs and sufferings through 
 the columns of Lippincott’s Magazine for July . 
 last: 
 
 ‘‘But the petition of three hundred thousand good 
 subjects was treated with indifference, and even an 
 inquiry into their grievances was refused. Then it 
 was, in the bitter sorrow and indignation that iillod 
 us at that time, that we turned our eyes to the great 
 nation beside us for assistance. But even there no 
 I help was to be had. The reciprocity treaty had been 
 abrogated in return for tho sympathy and assistance 
 which Canada had given to tho South ; and tho only 
 thing which could support our commerce and en- 
 | courage our industries under tho heavier duties of 
 I Canada was thus denied us and continues to be de¬ 
 nied us. At the present moment we are in a sad 
 I case. The duties and taxes of tho Canadian admin- 
 j istration bear heavily upon us; our coinmerco is 
 languishing, our industries are all but paralyzed. 
 Tho markets which nature intended for us, and which 
 commerce had marked out for her own, aro closed to 
 us, and in consequence we fish less, mine less, manu¬ 
 facture less, export less. Our political position is as 
 bad as perplexing. We will not continue in our 
 present union with Canada if we can help it. Wo 
 have laid our grievances before England. England 
 refers us to Canada; Canada refers us to England. 
 England truststoour loyalty, Canada to our cupidity 
 or our fear, to keep us in the union. If even we 
 succeed in getting repeal we cannot stand alone with¬ 
 out a treaty with the United States. If that is denied 
 us—and loho can doubt it?—wo must even seek our 
 own good in transferring our allegiance.” 
 
 This is a faithful portraiture of the condition 
 of the British provinees on the Atlantic coast: 
 and that of British Columbia on the Pacific and 
 Puget sound is quite ns hopeless. It was once 
 the base of an extended system of smuggling 
 over our borders, but the provincial Govern¬ 
 ment being unable to support itself by internal 
 taxes was compelled to raise revenue by a 
 tariff almost as heavy as our own. This de¬ 
 stroyed the profitable business of smuggling 
 across onr borders, and brought Victoria, the 
 city which it had been fondly hoped would be 
 the commercial rival of San Francisco, to 
 absolute despair. It is a deserted city. 1 n July 
 last, as my colleagues on the Committee of Ways 
 and Means can attest, more than half the build¬ 
 ings within its limits were tenantless and for 
 rent or sale, and at high noon its streets were as 
 deserted as though pestilence had scourged it. 
 
 Let me pause, Mr. Speaker, to ask what has 
 wrought this wondrous change, and why more 
 than one hundred thousand of the people of 
 the provinces during the last year caine to 
 dwell among us and share the burdens of our 
 great war debt? These results are the legit¬ 
 imate consequences of wise and patriotic 
 legislation by Congress. Commissioner Wells 
 understands it as well as the rest of us. He 
 knows as well as the Nova Scotian I have just 
 
quoted that the repeal of the reciprocity treaty 
 wrought the rum of the provinces. That treaty, 
 winch was forced upon us by our old southern 
 masters, was designed especially to promote 
 the prosperity of the British North American 
 provinces at the cost of the northern States of 
 the Union. It was specially designed by the 
 planters of the South as a blow at the prosperity 
 oj the farmers and stock-breeders of the north¬ 
 west. It went into effect in June, 1854, and 
 expired, or I may properly say was rescinded 
 by Congress, in March, 1806. 11 was admira¬ 
 
 bly adapted to accomplish its purpose, and the 
 period of its duration was that of the greatest 
 growth of Britain’s power along our borders, 
 inat gentlemen who represent the grain-grow¬ 
 ing otates may not suspect me of misstating the 
 objectof the reciprocity movement, I beg leave 
 to invite their attention to a few words from 
 pages 9;) and 90 of that remarkable book called 
 Cotton is King, the politico-economical text¬ 
 book of the authors of the late rebellion : 
 
 m !3;'V S li \ 0 ,,rc90 1 nt aspect [1853] of the provision 
 question as it regards slavery extension. Prices are 
 .ipproxunmin- the maximum point beyond which 
 our pi ov isions cannot be Fed to slaves unless there is 
 a corresponding increase in the pricoof cotton. Such 
 a result was not anticipated by southern statesmen 
 ' “?• ha ' succeeded in overthrowing tbo pro- 
 tet hc policy destroying the United States Bank, and 
 establishing the sub-1 reasnry system. 
 
 And why has this occurred? The mines of Cali¬ 
 fornia prevented both the free-trade tariff and the 
 sun- treasury scheme from exhausting the country of 
 the precious metals, extinguishing the circulation 
 ot bank notes, andreduemg the prices of agricultural 
 Vt l r -W c \ At, , ho dat0 of the pas- 
 ■ a„e of the Nebraska bill the multiplication of provis¬ 
 ions In, their more extended cultivation was the only 
 measure (eft that coutit produce a reduction of prices 
 .uul meet the wants of tho planters. The Canadian 
 reciprocity treaty since secured, will bring the prod- 
 ucb. ot tho British Aorth American colonies, free 
 «f duty, into competition with those of the United States 
 when prices with us rule high, and tend to diminish 
 their cost.” 
 
 But this treaty has been rescinded. Why 
 refer to it? Does the Commissioner propose 
 to renew it? No, sir; that would be frank, 
 and not in accordance with his practice. He 
 moves stealthily toward his sinister objects, 
 lie is a protective free-trader, a free-trade pro¬ 
 tectionist, a disciple of Ilenry Clay but an 
 advocate of the free-trade dogmas of John C. 
 Calhoun. He does not propose a renewal of 
 the reciprocity treaty; but asserting that all 
 customs duties arc taxes and increase the price 
 of the article on which they are levied, he de¬ 
 mands cheap fuel, food, and beer, and proposes 
 to secure these desirable objects by removing 
 all duties from articles the production of the 
 North American provinces. Nor doc 3 hc do 
 this in terms. Taking the leading staples of the 
 provinces separately he submits specious but 
 false reasons for the removal of all duties from 
 ea'ch of them. He would give the people of the 
 provinces the benefits they derived from the 
 reciprocity treaty without stipulating for any 
 of the few benefits it brought his countrymen. 
 To adopt bis recommendations in this behalf 
 would be to pay from the Treasury of the Uni¬ 
 ted States annually to the colonists from six 
 million to ten million dollars as a consideration 
 for their continued submission to British legis¬ 
 
 lation and colonial policy. They are tnn,r I 
 toward the Union. They were alien enf 1 " 8 
 during the war, but millions of them nlw 
 sire to be friends and fellow-countrymen ami 
 the way to promote this consummation so d e 
 voutly to be wished is to let them know that tho 
 avenue to free trade with us is through annex 
 
 aucm, 1 his accomplished they would share Sr \ 
 
 prospenty and our responsibilities, and their 
 country would cease to be a base of hostilitS 
 as it now is in peace and war. 
 
 Let me not be suspected of misrepresenting 
 the position of Mr. \vells. The principal arti¬ 
 cles the provinces export are lumber, wool, 
 coal, barley, and the other cereals, and from 
 these he would remove all duties though they 
 during the year which ended June 30, 
 18G8, $4,3o2,770 49 in gold, or about six mil¬ 
 lions in currency. It is true some of the wool 
 which contributed to this amount came from 
 other countries and some of the coal from Eng¬ 
 land, bat m order to restore prosperity to the 
 trade of the provinces lie would admit their 
 staples free, even though other countries might 
 share the advantage. 
 
 Though very urgent that the duty should be 
 taken off Canadian barley he makes no specific 
 recommendation as to the removal of duties 
 from the other cereals. He merely speaks of 
 the “extreme emergency” that can “justify 
 a tax on the breadstuffs and food of a nation.” 
 Ilis argument in favor of free grain and pro¬ 
 visions from the provinces is enforced in this 
 wise: 
 
 Coal is a necessity of life next in importance to 
 food; indeed, as both arc in our climate absolutely 
 indispensable, it cannot bo said that either is more 
 or less needful than tho other, for life cannot besus- 
 tained without both. Tho universally recognized 
 pnnciplo of taxation that a tax should be taken 
 trom what can hc spared forbids the laving of a tax 
 upon that which is indispensable to rich and poor 
 
 ^ A free translation of all which is, that as New 
 England has no coal and cannot raise her own 
 supply of grain and provisions, and can get both 
 cheaper from the British colonies than she can 
 from the prairies of the northwest or the coal 
 fields of Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, or 
 North Carolina, itisacrime against nature and 
 the British Government to lay duties on the 
 grain and provisions »f4he provinces. 
 
 Leaving the question of the propriety of re¬ 
 taining duties on grain, live stock, and provis¬ 
 ions to the consideration of gentlemen from 
 the West, I propose to examine what the Com¬ 
 missioner has to say on the subject of coal. 
 But before entering more fully upon this sub¬ 
 ject let me apply to grain and provisions the 
 argument he makes for free provincial coal, 
 associating them with it in his text, that we 
 may see whether it does not apply to them with 
 greater force in proportion as Wisconsin, Iowa, 
 Minnesota, and Kansas are more remote from 
 “the northeastern sea-board ” than the coal- ! 
 fields of Virginia, North Carolina, Maryland, 
 and Pennsylvania: 
 
 “ If the enhanced price paid by the consumer forhis 
 coal,” wheat, corn, or provisions, “in consequence 
 ofthoexisteiiBoofthisduty.weroallpaidtothoPonn- 
 
13 
 
 sy 1 r patitUos tice fbut theooumry Would be none : 
 
 Sdgavo u to 1 i'i iiiw. ;,vi;. o,:'. 
 
 theconsumer i>.os t-it Hu . 
 
 SsUWS-JSr^^® ~ t !' 
 
 8ary ^uff&ram 'cVn Change tW. It 1 'fixed by 
 
 fh^awsof nature. To the end of time i. will cost 
 W, it will take more labor to brnur every ton 
 “Vf®in or provisions from western IVnn.-yl- 
 
 °«n?a’’’ Wisconsin, Iowa. Minnesota. Missouri, or 
 kan“v "across the Alloglmny mountains or the 
 £k«C ? to the northeastern sea-board iban to brute t; 
 from Nova Scot in. So longasa duty makes it Djjssiole 
 to “ringcoal.”grain, or provisions Iron, the termer , 
 source so long that unnecessary work wi 1 be done; 
 
 but the price do ^? not re P rc = cnt a 1,rotlti but thccost ; 
 
 of useless labor.” ,, 
 
 Is not this argument conclusive? Does it 
 not prove Majesty’s liege 
 
 cbjoou of the now Dominion should grow our 
 
 grain and stock, and grind our flour, as well 
 as mine our coal as long as their freedom from j 
 our war debt will enable them to do it more ; 
 cheaply than we can? If this be not the con¬ 
 clusion to which it leads I hope some gentle- ' 
 man from a grain-growing or cattle raising dis- j 
 trict will show us why. 
 
 Mr. Wells does not like Pennsylvania, and 
 throughout his report ignores the essential 
 facts that Virgiuiaand North Carolina have tide- ! 
 water coal-fields of better quality and greater 
 extent than those of Nova Scotia, from which ; 
 New England can be more cheaply supplied 
 than from the provinces: and that Maryland ' 
 sends more bituminous coal from her mountains 
 to the “northern sea-board ” than Pennsylvania 
 does or ever did. In this, however, he is as 
 frank and truthful as in other respects. I 
 do not wonder that he dislikes the people of 
 Pennsylvania. By their persistent energy, as 
 the letter of Thomas Firth & Son shows, they 
 have so increased the supply and reduced the 
 price of cast-steel as to seriously affect the 
 profits of his Sheffield clients; and by the large , 
 increase they are making of blast furnaces 
 threaten to enter the markets of the world at an 1 
 early day against all England with pig-iron. Nor t 
 do I forget that it was Pennsylvania Iiepresenta- j 
 tives and economists that bnstefied to bring to ! 
 the attention of the country the equivocations, i 
 duplicity, and falsehoods with which his last ! 
 annual report abounded. 
 
 Speaking of the duty on coal he says “ it is i 
 urged as a protective measure, 1 ’ and refers to I 
 it as a “ tax on fuel.” This involves but two 1 
 misstatements of fact, namely, that the duty is 
 urged or levied for protection, and that it is a 
 taxonanyAmericanconsumerofcoal. Neither ; 
 of these allegations is true. The protectionists 
 of the country do not regard the question of j 
 the duty on coal as a politico-economical ques¬ 
 tion, and the New York Tribune advocates its j : 
 repeal as a means of proving the absurdity of 
 the free trade argument. They do not urge it ' 
 as ^protective, but as a revenue measure, and, ! 
 in view of the present condition of the prov¬ 
 inces, as eminently a political question. As a 
 political question it has great significance, as | ; 
 every provincial! exporter of coaf knows ex- 1 
 
 perimentally that the duty is not paid by the 
 American consumer, but is deducted from the 
 extraordinary profits he would realize if the 
 duty were removed, and which he did realize 
 during the continuance of the reciprocity 
 treaty. As an economical or protective meas¬ 
 ure it is not worth consideration ; as a revenue 
 measure it involves the receipt by the Treasury 
 of less than five hundred thousand dollars gold 
 annually, a comparatively small matter but of 
 some importance ; but it is as a political ques¬ 
 tion that it is most worthy of consideration. 
 As Mr. Wells and the free-trade league have 
 industriously promoted ff general misapprehen¬ 
 sion of this subject I propose, as 1 have said, 
 to devote a few minutes to its elucidation. 
 
 1 propose to show, first, that as an econom¬ 
 ical question it is not of sufficient importance to 
 deserve consideration. This can be done by 
 inviting attention to the relation of the total 
 amount of foreign coal imported from all 
 sources to the amount consumed in the north¬ 
 ern Atlantic States alone. Were the whole 
 amount involved it would not be sufficient to 
 affect the supply or price, as the grand total 
 imported from all countries on both coasts has 
 exceeded 600,000 tons in but three years, and 
 500,000 in but three others, and’ the con¬ 
 sumption of coal east of the Alleghany mount¬ 
 ains and north of the Potomac will be about 
 20,000,000 tons this year. What the con¬ 
 sumption is on the Pacific, where coal from 
 British Columbia ivas until within a few years 
 the sole dependence, I have no means of 
 making an accurate estimate. Whatever the 
 amount is it should be deducted from the total 
 in estimating the percentage of supply de¬ 
 rived bv New England from Nova Scotia and 
 England; the balance, whatever it may be, is 
 assuredly not sufficient to affect either the 
 price or supply. 
 
 But the question does not relate to the whole 
 of this balance, but only to so much as would 
 be the amount imported if the duty were off in 
 excess of that brought in under duty. As Eng¬ 
 lish coal has always been subject to duty we 
 have no means of ascertaining how much the 
 repeal of the duty might increase importation 
 from that country; but as her scientific men 
 have admonished her of the danger of exhaust¬ 
 ing her supplies of coal—and even Mr. Wells 
 agrees with recognized authorities in believing 
 that her production has reached its maximum— 
 and as she has more advantageous markets 
 nearer home, the repeal of the duty would not 
 probably affect perceptibly the importation 
 from that quarter. 
 
 How much the imposition of the duty on pro¬ 
 vincial coal has affected the total amount im¬ 
 ported we can ascertain, but unfortunately the 
 Treasury reports do not enable us to distinguish 
 between the amount imported on either coast. 
 The Pacific States, as I have said, formerly 
 depended on British Columbia ; but since the 
 opening of mines at Mont Diablo, Seattle, and 
 other points within our territory, the quantity 
 of provincial coal imported is said to be dimin¬ 
 ishing. But assuming that the whole amount 
 received on both coasts came from Nova Sc6ti& 
 
14 
 
 and was consumed in New England, the repeal 
 of the treaty and imposition of the duty cannot 
 have had an appreciable effect on the price or 
 supply in the markets of that section, as will 
 appear from the facts I am about to submit. 
 
 Theamounfcof provincial coal imported into 
 the country, on both coasts, has exceeded 
 400,000 tons in but two years; and the largest 
 amount imported in any one year was 465,194 
 tons, which was in 1865. With one other excep¬ 
 tion, that of 1866, when the amount reached 
 404,254 tons, the total import on both coasts 
 never reached 340,000. It is to be regretted 
 that the proportion of these amounts that went 
 into California and Oregon cannot be ascer¬ 
 tained. Could this be done it would make 
 the pretense that the duty on Nova Scotia coal 
 affects either the price or supply of coal in New 
 England so supremely absurd that Mr. Wells 
 himself would abandon it. But the sum in con¬ 
 troversy is less than this; it is the difference 
 between the average amount annually imported 
 free under the treaty and the amount which 
 comes to our markets and pays a duty of $1 25 
 per ton. 
 
 The duty, as I have said, came into effect on 
 the expiration of the treaty in March, 1866, 
 so that the year in which the largest amount 
 was imported was that immediately preceding 
 its repeal. I propose to ascertain the amount 
 about which this wide-spread controversy has 
 been raised, by contrasting the average import¬ 
 ation for the three last years of free coal under 
 the treaty, including that which so far exceeded 
 all others, with the three years immediately 
 succeeding the repeal of the treaty, during 
 which it paid $1 25 duty. During the last three 
 years in which it was free from duty the aver¬ 
 age annual importation was 355,490 tons, and 
 during the three succeeding years in which it 
 aid duty the average annual importation has 
 een 326,626, showing an annual difference of 
 but 31,864 tons. Surely no man with less 
 effrontery than Mr. Wells will say that the 
 deduction of 31,864 tons from one of many 
 sources from which a supply ranging at about 
 20,000,000 tons are derived can have affected 
 either the supply or price of the commodity. 
 But if we assume that one third of the import¬ 
 ation of provincial coal is upon, the Pacific 
 coast—which I think we may safely do—we 
 will see how utterly inappreciable must be the 
 effect of the maintenance or repeal of the duty 
 on provincial coal. 
 
 Thus, Mr. Chairman, it must become appar¬ 
 ent that the maintenance of the duty is not, as 
 Mr. Wells asserts, “urged as a protective meas¬ 
 ure.” Surely those who have the machinery 
 to bring 20,000,000 tons to market annually 
 need not shrink from .the effect of a cause which 
 increases or diminishes the total amount twenty 
 or thirty thousand tons per annum. 
 
 1 propose next to show the falsity of Mr. 
 Wells’s other proposition, namely, that this 
 duty is a tax on the consumer. Happily, this 
 is susceptible of demonstration. The Pictou 
 coal is of a lower grade, and consequently of 
 less value than the Cumberland coal of Mary¬ 
 land or the tide-water coal of Virginia. Its 
 
 price is always lower than these in any market 
 The average price of Nova Scotia coal by cargo 
 at Boston per ton of 2,240 pounds during 1861 
 the first year of the war, as shown by weekly 
 quotations in the Boston shipping-list and 
 price-current, was $4 67. It was then dutyJ 
 free, and so continued for more than five years. * 
 The war did not inflict greenbacks and an 
 inflated currency upon the coal operators of 
 Nova Scotia. It did not create an enormous 
 system of internal taxation to oppress them. 
 Their laborers were not tempted by patriotism 
 or offers of bounty, or taken by draft to the 
 battle-field to bleed and die for their coun¬ 
 try, as were those of the American operator. 
 Nor did all these causes combine to make an 
 increase of wages necessary to the support of 
 the laborer and his family. No, sir; their 
 wages remained as before, or were reduced by 
 the fact that thousands of able-bodied sympa¬ 
 thizers with the rebellion sought safety and 
 employment in the provinces; and British emi- ' 
 gration, that but for the war would have come 
 to us, flowed in upon them. Our emigration 
 which for the six years preceding the war had 
 exceeded an average of 140,000, fell off to less 
 than 92,000 in each of the years 1861 and 1862, 
 although the emigration from Liverpool to 
 America w’as notdiminished during theseyears; 
 while therefore we suffered for the want of labor, 
 it was from these causes for a time redundant 
 in the provinces. All the conditions were such : 
 as to enable the provincial operators to produce ! 
 and sell coal cheaper during the war than they 
 had done before. But was the price in Boston 
 regulated by its cost? No, prices never are: 
 it depended on our necessities, and followed 
 the price of American coal. Thus the average 
 price in 1862, as shown by the authority 1 have 
 already quoted, was $5 60; in 1863, $7 40; 
 in 1864, $10 40; in 1865, $9 60. In March 
 of the next year the treaty expired, and it 
 became subject to duty, ana according to Mr. 
 Wells’s theory must have gone up $1 23, or to 
 $10 85 per ton. But in this case his theory is 
 in conflict with the facts, as it is so frequently, 
 for in that year coal sold, duty paid, at $8 54, 
 netting the exporter and foreign carrier but 
 £7 29, and in lb69 it gave them forty-four cents 
 less, having averaged but $810;.ami in 1808 It 
 averaged $8 16, so that in each and every year 
 it bore the same relation to Cumberland coal 
 that it has always borne since the latter was 
 introduced to the New England market about 
 twenty yeai'3 ago, and sold at about a dollar 
 a ton lower. 
 
 These facts, in my judgment, prove two 
 things; one of which is that the Acadian coal 
 operators do not send us coal as a benevolent, 
 but as a commercial operation, out of which 
 they make all they can at the prices current in 
 our market; and the other is. that they can A 
 afford to pay the duty and make a living profit * 
 by selling us the very limited amount they can 
 mine at the rates current in our markets. In 
 this they obey the law which is now teaching 
 our western producers of grain by a most pain¬ 
 ful lesson the importance of a home market; 
 that is, that he who has to carry his commodi- 
 
15 
 
 ties to a distant market must pay all the charges 
 thereon, while he whose goods are sought by 
 customers fixes his own prices and makes the 
 
 purchaser pay all charges. 
 v I t thus becomes apparent that the repeal of 
 the duty on coal would not reduce the price of 
 that article in New England one cent, per ton 
 or increase the amount brought to market 
 appreciably ; its only effect would be to take 
 from the Treasury an average of from four to 
 five hundred thousand dollars in gold annually 
 and give it to the colonists as a reward for 
 remaining contented subjects of her Britannic 
 majesty; a proposition at which my patriotism 
 revolts, though it be ever so earnestly recom¬ 
 mended by Mr. Commissioner Wells. 
 
 UOW TIIE SOUTH SHOULD DIVERSIFY ITS INDUSTRY. 
 
 I think I have sufficiently disclosed the de¬ 
 votion of our Specia l Commi ssioner of Rev¬ 
 enue to the interests of England; "but I cannot 
 refrain from inviting the attention of gentlemen 
 from the South to the treacherous suggestions he 
 offers them on the subject of the proper means 
 of diversifying their industry. On this subject 
 he says: 
 
 "The large amount of capital thus becoming annu¬ 
 ally available at the South will undoubtedly seek in 
 great part investment iu domestic and local enter¬ 
 prises and speedily lead to tho establishment of man¬ 
 ufactures on an extensive scale. The truo diversity 
 of employment whieh results from freedom has now, 
 therefore, become to tho South for the first time pos¬ 
 sible; and southern capital can soon bo advantage¬ 
 ously applied to the manufacture of agricultural 
 tools and implements, leathor, wagons, wooden-ware, 
 soap, starch, clothing, and similar articles. Those 
 are manufactures in which iron, steol, and cloth arc 
 raw materials. They omploy the largest amount of 
 labor in proportion to product and capital and war¬ 
 rant the payment of high wages. On the other hand , 
 what arc commonly called manufactures, namely, iron 
 and steel, and cotton and woolen cloth, are examples of 
 concentration. They require large capital, employ but 
 few hands, and would naturally come much later. IV’c 
 already have in the United States an excess of cotton 
 and woolen spimiles, and to invest capital in more woidd 
 be simply a waste when there are vast needs at the South 
 requiring far less capital and warranting much greater 
 compensation for labor than can be paid in textile fab¬ 
 rics.” 
 
 Most of the southern States abound in coal, 
 varieties of iron ore of very high quality, lime¬ 
 stone, and water-power. Inaccessible as then- 
 interior districts are from the sea-board, freight 
 adds heavily to th e cost of iron purchased either 
 fioui tho Atlantic "States or England. They 
 need preeminently among the States of the 
 Union an extension of railroads and the estab¬ 
 
 lishment of founderies, rolling-mills, locomo¬ 
 tive works, and machiue-shops. The primary 
 prerequisite to the ample development of the 
 great resources of the southern States is an 
 adequate supply of cheap iron and the means 
 of shaping it for use. They have few skilled 
 laborers, and the manufacture of pig-iron and 
 the rolling of rails require but comparatively 
 few skilled men. The digging and hauling 
 of coal, ore, and limestone require no special 
 preparation. It is work for the unskilled 
 laborer at which freedmen can succeed, and 
 they are therefore in a condition to engage in 
 the production of this article of primary im¬ 
 portance, though they may not have the trained 
 artisansfor the introduction ofsimpler branches 
 oimechanics. 
 
 The cotton-growing portion of the United 
 States is the proper locality for cotton facto¬ 
 ries. The South can spin yarn and produce 
 unbleached fabrics at from fifteen to twenty 
 per cent, less than the same work can be dono 
 m New England, and cheaper eveu than it can 
 be done by the underpaid laborers of Great 
 Britain. Will gentlemen from the South con¬ 
 sider that what the picking-room is to the 
 English or northern factory the gin-room is to 
 the factory near the cotton-field, and that all 
 charges incurred between the two would be 
 saved by the southern manufacturer? Before 
 cotton reaches either New or Old England it 
 must be pressed and baled and hooped and 
 marked and transported, losing interest and 
 paying freight and commission, at each stage 
 of the transportation; and when it has armed 
 at the threshold of the distant factory it must 
 bo freed from its hoops, stripped of its bagging, 
 and put through the processes of the picking- 
 room to restore it with as little damage as pos¬ 
 sible to the condition in which it was when it 
 left the gin. From all these charges the manu¬ 
 facturer in the cotton district is free; and to¬ 
 gether they amount to what would be a profit 
 which in connection with the improvement in 
 quality from tho use of the unbroken fiber he 
 would use would enable him to spin yarns for 
 all tho northern States and England too. 
 
 But this would hurt the English cotton-spin¬ 
 ner; this would advance the interests of the 
 United States to the detriment of England, as 
 would the establishment in the midst of the 
 coal and iron fields of Virginia, Tennessee, 
 Arkansas, Alabama, and Georgia of furnaces, 
 founderies, rolling-mills, and steel-works. For¬ 
 tunately, the people of the South are deeply 
 impressed with the importance of the early 
 introduction of these branches of manufac¬ 
 tures; and amongthe sixty-five furnaces erected 
 during the last year four are in Virginia, six in 
 Missouri, three in Kentucky, one in Georgia, 
 two in Alabama, and one in Tennessee. It is 
 not. therefore, probable that very general heed 
 will be given by the people of the South to the 
 advice offered by Mr. Wells, or that they will 
 abandon the hope of exporting their cotton in 
 yarn and fabrics, the manufacture of which will 
 give employment to and improve the condition 
 of their now unemployed men, women, and 
 children, or will forego the privilege of an ade¬ 
 quate supply of good and cheap iron manu¬ 
 factured in their midst, in order to turn their 
 attention to making *• wooden-ware, soap, 
 starch, clothing and similar articles.’ 1 They 
 will not, I apprehend, he willing to forego their 
 greatest source of profit in order to oblige him 
 by permitting England still to retain her su¬ 
 premacy as the cotton-spinner and principal 
 iron manufacturer of the world. 
 
 WIIAT TAXES SHOULD EE REPEALED. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, permit me to reiterate the 
 fact that duties which serve to develop the 
 resources of a country and cheapen commodi¬ 
 ties, by inducing home competition, the diver¬ 
 sification of labor and the opening of new 
 sources of employment, and increaso the gen¬ 
 eral stock produced, are not taxes even though 
 
16 
 
 they fail to reduce immediately the price of 
 the commodity on which they are imposed, as 
 adequate duties on cast-steel and Bessemer 
 rails have done. They are during the interim 
 the price paid for establishing the commercial 
 and political independence of the country : or 
 may rather be regarded as a temporary advance 
 to be reimbursed in the near future by pro¬ 
 ducing a sense of national security, a wider 
 field of profitable employment for the people 
 at large, and an adequate and cheaper sup¬ 
 ply of better goods through the long future. 
 But such is not the case with all duties. 
 There are duties that are taxes and must re¬ 
 main so forever, or into that far future whose 
 possibilities we cannot foresee. Such are duties 
 imposed on commodities which we do uotand 
 cannot produce, but which enter into the daily 
 life of the people, either directly as food, or as 
 the raw material of articles we are producing in 
 competition with countries whose laborers re¬ 
 ceive not a moiety of the wages paid for the same 
 work in this country, and which are necessary 
 for the support of a family whose children are 
 to be educated for future citizenship. We raise 
 no tea or coffee, and the duty of twenty-five cents 
 a pound on tea, which is at the rate of seventy- 
 eight and a half per cent, on the cost of our 
 whole importation for 1868, and of five cents a 
 pound on coffee, or at the rate of forty-seven 
 and'ahalf percent, on the importation of 1868, 
 are taxes—purely and simply taxes. Yet the 
 Commissioner does not propose to repeal or 
 abate these, and why should he? Neither 
 England nor her North American colonies 
 produce tea or c®ffee. Not only does he not 
 propose to repeal these taxes now, but in his 
 “schedule of a tariff constructed with a view 
 of obtaining from the smallest number of im¬ 
 ported articles an annual revenue of $150,- 
 000,000” he retains them both and proposes 
 to raise $22,000,000 a year from them, namely, 
 $12,000,000 from cofTee and $10,000,000 from 
 tea. We now impose a duty of fifteen cents 
 a pound on pepper. As we grow no pepper, 
 this is a tax—a tax at the rate of two hundred 
 and ninety-seven per cent, on the entire im¬ 
 portation for 18S8, and which extracted from 1 
 the people in that year $792,490 45. The like j 
 duty on allspice is a tax. ft is at the rate of | 
 three hundred and seventy-six and a half j 
 per cent., and drew from the people in 1868 
 $142,981 50. These duties and many scores ! 
 of such that I could indicate are all taxes, as j 
 they stimulate no industry, but tax the food 
 
 ii of the laborer: but they do not move the 
 . sympathies of the Commissioner. He does 
 ; not propose to repeal them, for the articles 
 they burden are not produced in England or 
 her North American colonies. They were im¬ 
 posed as revenue measures during a great war. 
 and have been cheerfully endured by a patriotic 
 j people, but they increase the cost of living, 
 operate as a burden on our laboring peoplej 
 and should be repealed at the earliest day the 
 financial condition of the country will permit. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, thergare other taxes, of some 
 j; of which the people justly complain—taxes that 
 
 j burden our labor, consume the profits of capi¬ 
 tal, and paralyze the energy of the most enter¬ 
 prising among us. They add to the cost ol'our 
 : gasandofourtravel, whetherby railroad, stage, 
 
 | or steamboat. We cannot draw our own money 
 from bank or make a payment to our creditor 
 without feeling them. They loucli and prick us 
 at all points. Their enforcement retjuirestne 
 maintenance of a special department of the 
 Government, the agents of which penetrate 
 inquisitorially every home and workshop in the 
 laud. They increase the cost of all our pro¬ 
 ductions and restrict the limits of our commerce 
 by shutting our over-taxed goods out of markets 
 in which but for them we might compete with 
 our foreign rivals. They, too, were the product 
 of the war. The necessities in which it involved 
 us gave rise to the system of internal taxes with 
 its Commissioner, assessors, collectors, super¬ 
 visors, detectives, and thousands of subord¬ 
 inates ; and sound policy requires that those 
 duties which, while they protect the wages of 
 the laboring man and develop the resources 
 of the country, supply the Treasury with large 
 amounts of revenue should be retained, and 
 that these direct and inquisitorial taxes which 
 so oppress and annoy us should be removed as 
 rapidly as possible. The repeal of these would 
 animate all our industries ; but the repeal of 
 the duties recommended by the Commissioner 
 would flood our country with the productions 
 of the underpaid laborers of Europe, silence 
 countless looms and spindles, closVour fac¬ 
 tories, extinguish the (ires in our furnaces and 
 rolling-mills, and leave the grain of the hus¬ 
 bandmen, for which there is now no market 
 in Europe, to rot in Eire' field or granary, while 
 their countrymen and former customers starve. 
 However ardently Mr. Commissioner Wells 
 may desire this consummation, I trust that 
 Congress, by protecting the wages of the 
 American laborer, will forever avert it.