THE Grey River Argus. PUBLISHED DAILY. SATURDAY, NOVEMBERS!, 1885.

Grey River Argus, Volume XXXII, Issue 5350, 21 November 1885, Page 2

THE Grey River Argus. PUBLISHED DAILY. SATURDAY, NOVEMBERS!, 1885.

It is becoming clearer every day that the great issue next session will be Protection or Freetrade. 'Hitherto our politicians have fought shy of facing either in a direct manner. But t^e days of toying with the problem are now over ; and there is very little doubt that the direct quesI tion will be raised as soon as the House meets. Even Sir Julius Yogel has thrown aside the "Hve and live" mask under which lie sought to force a policy of Protection on Parliament. On that occasion, although the attempt was frustrated, the defeat was an indirect one, in the same way that the attempt was an insidious effort to foist an immorai policy on the country under the guise that it was for revenue purposes only that it was done. It is exceedingly gratifying to see that Sir Julius has at last come out in his true colors, and the colony has reason to be thankful to the deputation of Dunedin manufacturers for raising the enthusiasm of the Treasurer to the extent that he wasinduced to avow hV belief openly. That, then, may be regarded as the great card he holds in reserve to win the game with, and send the country along by "leaps and bounds," to use his own picturesque phrase. ' So far all his oth r efforts h-ive been rank failures, and we have ver/ little doubt that hia new

panacea of Protection will prove as ineffectual as all his other schemes j for the House can scarcely help rejecting any direct proposal in thu direction of Protection in the same summary fashion with which they rejected the outrageously protective tariff brought down last session. It is true that the Premier and Treasurer are under the impression — or profess to be — that had they submitted the items in detail a large proportion of them would j have been carried. But that is merely begging the question. There is nothing j to warraut such a belief. At the interview that the representatives of the Manufacturers' Association had with Sir Julius one enthusiastic Protectionist spirit said that at the next election they, that is, the', I Protectionists, would made the candif dates declare for either protection or Freetrade. That is likely to be a twoedged sword, and in so far as it may lead to the fair and full discussiou of the subjects Free-traders have nothing to fear. : It is only a couple of weeks ago since Mr J. M. Ritchie read a most exhaustive paper on Freetrade v. Protection at the public meeting held under the auspices of the New Zealand Manufacturers' Association, for the purpose of discussing the causes of the existing commercial depression. Mr Ritchie bearded the lion in his den, and his boldness was well rewarded,' for the manufacturers were so taken aback by the overwhelming array of facts and figures, all marshalled in logical order and sequence, in support of Freetrade, that nothing in the nature of a reply was attempted. Mr Hallenstsin and Mr Downie Stewart, and one or two other gentlemen tried to say a good word for protection, but the best and most effective argument used by any of them was the admission that although protection wao undoubtedly a doctrine Gf selfishness, it was still a national and noble selfishness, f not an individual selfishness. There is no surer way of closing the eyes of people to foolish and insidious arguments than by getting hold of their patriotism. Under that gnise, and the plea that it is all for the greatness and glory of a country, men are capable of more injustice, folly, and shortsightedness than under any other stimulus. Nine-tenths of the abuses of protection in the United States of America are due more to the patriotism of the American people than to any other cause. But they are beginning to see the folly of their ways at last, though Imw to shake this " Old Man of the Sea"—Protection — off the shoulders of the country is the. most difficult problem that country has to face. America has been transformed from a purely agricultural into a great manufacturing country, but without making the enormous masses of men in the towns who are dependent on manufactures for a living any better off. They are in fact very much worse off than they were 20 years ago, and the conditions of life are becoming harder and more precarious every year. Mr Bradshaw cited a few hard and telling facts in support of this view. He said that there are at present two million people out of work in the United States, 100,000 being recently out on strike in the iron trade alone, and added that were it not for the enormous number of people settled on the soil in that country the industrial portion would haye 1 ruined the country. "In six years in the most favored district in the United States there were 78,000 women and children killed by overwork ; and, more than that,; there were 150,000 people sick in bed from overwork in the mills." It seems to be overlooked that this colony has already travelled a long way on the protection road, and that if we go any further in t^at direction we not only inflict .a direct iujury upon the arts and manufactures that have taken root amongst us, but we run a very great risk of developing rings, as ha? been done in America to a disastrous extent, by shutting out foreign goods entirely. There is one inovi'able danger f rom high protective duties, apart altogether from their flagrant dishonesty in robbing the many for the benefit of the few, that should be vigilantly guarded against by all working men who value the boon of the eight-hour system. High protective duties, by giving a delusive appearance of prosperity for a time develop a keen "competition, which is always accompanied by an almost irresistible tendency to lower wages and increase the hours of labor. That is the effect of protection duties in America, Franc*, Germany, or wherever else protection has been tried.