tlement of our foreign debts. These debts he estimated at $250,000,000, most of which had been incurred during the preceding seven months. It is now known that this estimate was none too high. Here was a revelation indeed. It was a startling "expose" of the absurdity of Senator Shaffroth's theory that the gold exports prior to May 27 represented loans of American capital to Europe. The financial experts of the Free-Trade papers that had indorsed the Senator's theory were just as ignorant as he was of the real cause of the outflow.

But

Trade Balances Were Not Big Enough. The notion that we were lending this gold was based on the assumption that our big trade balances were more than big enough to offset our annual foreign debts for interest dues, immigrants' remittances. tourists' expenses and ocean freights. this is a mistake. These debts are now estimated at about $1,000,000,000, and as our trade balances have never reached that figure, we are constantly exporting gold and peddling securities, short term notes and finance bills abroad to stave off larger exports of the metal.

Our Ability to Pay Foreign Debts Reduced. In the calendar year 1913, for instance, our trade balance netted $692,000,000, and yet we had to export over $100,000,000 gold and silver, besides which we did an enormous amount of borrowing on securities and finance bills. For the first seven months of this year our trade balance amounted to only $59,000,000, as against $308,000,000 the year before. Here was the cause of a good part of the borowing referred to by Mr. Schiff. Our ability to pay our debts abroad was reduced by $249,000,000 in this period, and only Europe's willingness to take securities instead averted the loss of this amount in gold instead of the $130,000,000 which we did lose.

Heavy Gold Exports Have Always Followed Tariff Reduction.

This changed situation was entirely due to the new Tariff, and as most of it took place a month before the outbreak of the war it is ridiculous to say that this latter event caused the crisis of July 31. The truth is that if it had not been for the war embargo on foreign commerce it is pretty certain gold would have gone abroad on a much heavier scale and the strain on credit would have been still greater.

The belief that the new Tariff is responsible for this disaster is strengthened by the fact similar results (heavy gold shipments and panics) have followed every other such reduction in Tariff rates in our history. And by way of contrast it can be said that no such results ever followed the adoption of higher Tariff

rates.

They Tried Currency Inflation as a Remedy.

A curious fact about the present precarious financial situation is that the Tariff tinkers fondly imagined that they

had contrived a plan whereby such a situation would be impossible. Knowing that former Tariff reductions had been followed by larger imports of goods, increased exports of gold, and financial disturbances, they planned a currency law under which exports of gold would not have any serious effects. This law, which has been called a buffer for the Tariff law, provided that the banks could inflate the currency with safety and with much smaller reserves of gold. By this "economy of gold," as Editor Willis, of the Journal of Commerce, phrases it, it was confidently expected that we would have millions to spare for purchases of foreign goods or for investment abroad. We stood to Lose $500,000,000 in Two Years. Under the head of "A Year of Heavy Gold Shipments," the Brooklyn Eagle (February 8, financial article) quotes a statement by a leading authority to the fact that by the enactment of the new law "we stood to lose $500,000,000 in the next two years." Lest this prospect should cause uneasiness, the Eagle quotes John E. Gardin, vice-president of the National City Bank, as follows:

Americans, however, should not be frightened at the prospect of losing great quantities of gold during the next two years. Taking our present stock of $1,600,000,000, on a basis of 40 per cent. reserve, we shall have between $2,000,000,000 and $3,000,000,000 expansion. What is, therefore, a little matter like $400,000,000 of gold exports to this large sum?

Tariff Tinkers Lacking in Financial
Knowledge.

In view of the appalling collapse of credit which resulted from the loss of only $130,000,000, it is quite evident that Mr. Gardin (great banker though he is) was grossly ignorant of underlying financial conditions. And the important fact to remember is that the Free-Trade Congresssmen and college professors were Senator just as slack as Mr. Gardin. Shaffroth's claim that we were lending gold to Europe in May, when Schiff's statement proves that we owed Europe $250,000,000, is a good illustration of the kind of financial knowledge on which the Tariff tinkers were basing legislation for a hundred million people.

Signs of Disaster in June.

The argument that the crisis was due to the outbreak of war is refuted by the fact that money and business conditions showed unmistakable signs of approaching disaster in June, a month before the outbreak of war, and when only $80,000,000 gold had been exported. Furthermore, it should be remembered that under the new Tariff the imports of foreign goods were steadily increasing. This was bound to cause heavier exports of gold. and hence a crisis was inevitable even if there had been no war. By checking imports of goods and exports of gold the war undoubtedly saved us from a worse disaster.

The Public Should Not Forget. Seeing the trouble that has come from

the loss of only $130,000,000 gold up to July 31, the Free-Trade party is anxious to have the public forget that in February they were boasting that they had framed a law which would permit us to lose half a billion in gold without inconvenience. But the public should not be allowed to forget this boast. It should be repeated far and wide so that people can judge whether the present conditions of trade and finance are due to war or to the blunders of a Free-Trade Congress.

W. H. ALLEN.

"Made in America."

The Baltimore News has gone strongly and eloquently into the "Made in America" movement. The clause in our Tariff law which requires that imported goods be stamped with the name of the country in which they originate has rendered the legend "Made in Germany" a household legend. We find it on our cutlery, on our toys, on a thousand kinds of specialties. It has been a magnificent advertisement of expanding German industry and commerce. The very protests that, especially in Great Britain, have from time to time been voiced against the "German irvasion" have served chiefly till now to advertise the successes of the Teutons. The News says:

This is the accepted time for such an American campaign. We are the friends of all the world; almost the only friends of everybody. The world turns to America to supply it with all manner of necessaries. There will be no effort to arouse resentment against an invasion of American commodities because that invasion just now will be welcomed with open arms. Put the legend on everything from America, and it will advertise American wares for the future.

accus

Make what the markets want, what the customer wants, in the way he wants it; pack it as he wants it; defer to local conditions and prejudices; sell on tomed terms. These are the secrets of the triumph of the "Made in Germany" crusade-little arts which the American. manufacturer is rapidly learning. "Made in America," in short time will assert itself in every European and Asiatic country. The trade, welcomed there because of war conditions, goes there to stay.-Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle.

Prices Higher Under Low Tariff. Before the European war commenced, and before the world thought such a war was probable, or even possible, the prices for meats were 15 per cent. higher than they were in 1912 when the Democrats from Woodrow Wilson down the line to the store-box spellbinders insisted that the high prices were due solely to the Protective Tariff. If there has been a single prediction made by the Democratic leaders in 50 years that has come true, a single promise made by them that has been redeemed, we would be pleased to know what it is.-Marion (la.) Register.

Thankful for What?

"Thank God for Woodrow Wilson!" That is the keynote of the Democratic Campaign Text-Book for 1914. Politically, this might seem to be an effective slogan. The Democratic party has something, politically, to be thankful for. For one thing, it didn't get Bryan in 1912. For that, great volumes of thankfulness might well go up.

But, economically considered, is there really so very much to thank God for in the case of Woodrow Wilson?

Shall we be thankful because Woodrow Wilson dictated and by the force of executive power and patronage urged upon and jammed through Congress, against the wiser and better judgment of many of his party leaders, the most drastic and injurious Free-Trade Tariff law ever enacted?

Shall American farmers be thankful for free sugar, free wool and foreign Free-Trade competition in practically every product of American farms?

Shall American wage earners be thankful because two or three millions of them are either working reduced time or have no employment at all?

Shall American industrial producers be thankful for a falling off of fully 40 per cent. of normal demand and production?

Shall American merchants be thankful for diminished sales and profits resulting from thinner pay envelopes and no pay envelopes?

Shall American railroad officers, workers and shareholders be thankful for hundreds of thousands of idle cars and hundreds of thousands of train hands and other employes laid off?

Shall the friends of our American merchant marine be thankful for the black eye of the Canal Tolls Repeal Act?

Shall American financiers be thankful for disappearing trade balances, heavy gold exports, and the general demoralization of credits which has followed larger imports and smaller exports under the Free-Trade Tariff?

Shall American business men, generally, be thankful for the hostile attitude toward business that the present administration has maintained so persistently?

A thankful spirit is most commendable -to the extent that there is anything to be thankful for. This thought is well brought out in the following letter to the New York Herald of October 18:

I am not a Democratic politician, yet I "thank God for Woodrow Wilson." I have been a railroad employe for 24 years and a Democratic voter for 21 years. I was laid off last June for the first time in 20 years-thank God for Woodrow Wilson. With my savings I bought five shares of the preferred stock of the New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad. month, for the first time since I have owned the stock, my dividend was not paid because the road did not earn it-thank God for Woodrow Wilson. Last January the interest on my savings bank's deposit was cut from four per cent. to three and one-half per cent.

Last

But still I thank God for Woodrow Wilson,"

Albany, N. Y., Oct. 16, 1914. On reflection, it seems that there is a possible reason to "Thank God for Woodrow Wilson!" Let us all be thankful that things are no worse, and that Woodrow Wilson has shown us how to make things better, namely, at the polls in November, by casting millions of ballots that will give the country a Protection Congress and point the way to a complete Protectionist landslide in 1916. that will forever do away with Woodrow Wilson and all that he represents.

Don't Forget It.

Some excellent things to remember when the ballots are cast on the 3d of November are suggested by the New York Press:

Don't forget that while we are now exporting heavily to foreign countries which can no longer supply themselves because of the war we are also increasing our home business because those foreign producers much less can supply us. Don't forget that it is only the war which restores to our mills and factories the business and to our breadwinners the wages which the Tariff took away from them; that though the war starts up again those mills and factories and fills up again those payrolls to supply American consumers, when the war is over the Tariff will knock off the wage-earners again and close up the mills and factories again just as it did before.

And don't forget that in this State election here in New York the Democratic candidate for United States Senator, Ambassador Gerard, is for the Tariff which takes work away from American mills and factories and gives it to foreign mills and factories. Mr. Wadsworth, rival candidate for Senator of Mr. Gerard, is against that Tariff.

We wish there were more anti-FreeTrade newspapers which saw so clearly There are so many into the situation. things that ought not to be lost sight of merely because the European war looms up so large. The biggest thing not to forget is that if this country, after the war is over, is to travel the road of prosperity once more, it will be because of the downfall of the present Free-Trade administration and Congress, and the restoration of the Protective policy. Don't forget that!

Horace Greeley's advice was, "Go West," and the wise father who sent his son out there said, "Jack, I am your father; go West; but remember, paddle your own canoe, and don't paddle some other man's." Free-Trade not only paddles the foreign canoe, but has chucked the American paddles into the current, and left the American crew to drift into the rocks of poverty and distress.

Back to Nature.

Thrown from occupation

A "Rural Vacation"

The workman's invited to take.

And, having no money,

To live on wild honey

And all for the Free-Trader's sake.

The College Professor's Bad Guess.

It was a theorist, a doctrinaire, a dogmatist, who in September, 1912, said:

If the Protective Tariff were relieved at a great many points American industry would take on a new size and speed. There would be a bigger market for American labor than there is now. There would be a greater variety of enterprises and the skill of American workmen would dominate the markets of all the globe. I would hesitate to advocate radical reductions in our Tariff schedules if I thought those radical reductions were going to interfere with the prosperity of the average man in America. But I don't. I believe they are going to double and treble his prosperity.

shown yesterday by the report of the Lackawanna Steel Co. for the quarter and the nine months ended September 30, 1914. The total income for the quarter was $303,835, as compared with $2,007,724 for the corresponding quarter of last year, with a deficit for the quarter after the payment of interest charges, sinking funds and other items of $457,210, against a surplus of $1,109,202 for the same period in 1913. The total income for the nine months was $651,845, as compared with $4,965,466 last year, with a deficit for the nine months of $1,240,890, against a surplus of $2,864,398 for the nine months ended September 30, 1915.

The unfilled orders, gross tons, on September 30, 1914, were 166,344, as compared with 255,945 on September 50, 1913.

Here is a drop of more than $4,000,000 in nine months in the net receipts of one

How They Have Served the Country.

President Wilson's letter of October 18 to Mr. Underwood, chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means, is admirably phrased and strongly put. He certainly does know how to write good English. One cannot help wishing that he was equally expert in his perception of fact and his knowledge of cause and effect. Frank in his purpose to do what he can toward helping the re-election of as many as possible of the Free-Traders of the present House, Professor Wilson says of the long sitting just now closing that it is A session singularly rich in thoughtful and constructive legislation.

Woodrow Wilson is the man who predicted that radical reductions in our Tariff schedules would double and treble the prosperity of this country. And it was no longer ago than September, 1912, in a speech in Union Square, New York, that this college professor, deeply learned out of FreeTrade text books, advanced the preposterous proposition that greater prosperity would come through granting to foreign producers larger opportunity of underselling American labor and industry in the American market.

Since this utterly absurd proclamation of Free-Trade faith was promulgated, two years ago, how has the visionary prophecy worked out? Exactly the contrary of the prediction, as any sane and fairly intelligent man, not wholly blinded by theory and dogma, might have known it would work out. The prosperity of the average man has been re

duced fully 40 per cent. below the normal average of Protection prosperity. Producing industries, railroads, merchandising, and, in fact, practically every line of business has fallen to 60 per cent. of the normal. Two or three millions of wage earners have either had their working hours reduced or else have lost their jobs entirely.

The following, from the New York Sun of October 15, is a vivid illustration of the manner in which the average man has "prospered" through the practical workout of the college professor's FreeTrade theories:

Just how severely the depression in business resulting from the Tariff reduction and the European war are affecting certain industries was

G

PROTECTION SURPLUS.

of the largest steel works in the country. Other steel works and other industries make a similar showing since the Underwood Free-Trade Tariff, prompted and urged by the college professor, became a law. Yet the voters of this republic are urged to show their confidence in and approval of the wisdom of the college professor by electing another Democratic Congress next month. Is it possible that the American people have so little sense as to do that?

Ir requires American wages to buy and gradually pay for the American home of your own. Free-Trade takes away not only the American wages, but likewise the American home.

same way! The FreeTrade members of this Congress found the country at 100 per cent. in respect of business prosperity; of labor employed; of wages earned and wages spent in the channels of trade; of production, distribution, sale and consumption. After one year and eight months of Free-Trade Tariff bungling and of general antagonism toward business, the members of this Congress find the country 40 per cent. below par of production and consumption, of wage paying and wage spending; of merchandising; of transportation; 40 per cent. below par in practically every line of business activity.

That is how the members of this Congress have served the people of this country. In the face of such a record, Professor Wilson's elegant rhetoric loses much of its intended effect.

The War-and After the War.

With the commendable design of placing before its readers facts and conclusions which should influence the minds of voters at the congressional and senatorial elections of November 9, the New York Press of October 15 prints an able editorial under the caption, "Trade Balances Turn Our Way Again-for a While." It is a distinct and valued service that the Press renders to the interests of the American people in thus pointing out the need of keeping in view the fact that it would be a mistake to acquit the party of Free-Trade of its full responsibility for the injurious effects of bad Tariff legislation merely because the unlooked-for and

unprecedented conditions brought into play by the great war in Europe have helped to minimize those injurious effects. Wisely and well the Press urges that the unforeseen cataclysm in Europe ought not to mitigate or condone the blame which rightly rests upon the political party that is responsible for the Underwood Free-Trade Tariff law.

Immediately following the enactment of the Underwood law our credit balances abroad, the result of a healthy excess of exports over imports through the operation of a Protective Tariff, began to dwindle. Exports fell away and imports increased. At the end of the calendar year 1913, three-fourths of the year being a full Protection period, we had a foreign. trade credit of $691,421,812 with which to offset the bills for our overseas freight carried in foreign ships, the dividends and interest due foreign investors in our securities. the spendings of American tourists abroad and the remittances of our alien population. But a radical change soon became manifest under the operation of the Underwood Free-Trade Tariff. That monstrous measure began to transfer big credits into big debits. The Press says:

Our excess of exports amounting to almest $64,000,000 for January of last year, became a little more than $49,000,000 in January of this

year.

The $44,000,000 of February last year was trimmed to less than $26,000,000 in February this year.

The $32,000,000 of March last year shrank to less than $5,000,000 in March this year.

The $53,600,000 of April last year disappeared entirely this year and became an excess if imports amounting to more than $11,000,000.

May last year was nearly $61.000,000 in our favor; May this year was more than $2,500,000 against us.

a

debit of

June last year gave 1'S a foreign credit of more than $32,000,000: this year nearly half a million dollars. July last year left 115 to the good nearly $22,000,000; July this year to the bad more than $3,500,000.

That was all before there was any war. Ther came the war and we saw a trade balance of more than $50,000,000 in our favor in August a year ago changed into a balance of more than $19,000,000 against us in this August.

The Press, as we have said, does well to emphasize this alarming reversal of our fiscal standing with the rest of the world. It is a record which ought to con

sign the party of Free-Trade to everlasting shame and defeat; a record which American voters should keep in plain view and not allow it to be obscured by the changed conditions resulting from Europe's industrial and trade paralysis. It is true that the great war shut off the exportation to this country of a large volume of the competitive merchandise that was flooding our market after the Underwood Tariff had begun its deadly work and before the war broke out. It is true that the war brought on a bigger demand for some of our exports. But, says the Press:

Suppose the war hadn't come to check the rising flood of our imports and to revitalize our sinking exports.

In September last year we had a foreign trade balance in our favor of more than $47,000,000. Wiping that out as it had been wiping out previous trade balances the Tariff would have added still further to our foreign indebtedness.

In October last year, because of all manner of readjustments with the beginning of the new Tariff, chiefly a waiting of imports to get the benefit of lower duties, there was a balance in our favor of nearly $139,000,000. Think what wiping that out this October and scoring in its place a balance against us would have done to sink us still further in foreign debt.

In November last year there was a balance in our favor of more than $97,000,000; in December of more than $49,000,000. Think what wiping out those balances in our favor and replacing them with balances against us next November and December would have done to us in the way of foreign debt!

War, and only the war, saved us from being buried at the end of this year under a foreign debt vastly greater than the one which, in the earlier days of the war, almost crushed us until could begin to make payments with gold and, better still, with wheat and corn and provisions and all manner of supplies for the belligerents and for the neutrals no longer getting their supplies from the nations now at

we

war.

But the war will not put an indefinite embargo upon the shipment of foreign products drawn into the United States by our Tariff. The war can nullify the Tariff, the war can dig us out of foreign debt, only, only so long as the great powers of Europe are on the battlefield.

Once the war is over the Tariff, now suspended, goes into operation with its old force.

It is on this basis that the American people should determine their votes for members of the House of Representatives and the United States Senate at the Congress elections next month.

Here in this State, for example, Mr. Gerard, the Democratic candidate for the United States Senate, is a member of the party whose Tariff plunged us into foreign debt. If Mr. Gerard should be elected he would stand with his party in the National Legislature, and in standing with his party he would stand for this Tariff now virtually out of business, but ready to resume full business as soon as the war ends.

Mr. Wadsworth, who must defeat Mr. Gerard if he is to be defeated, is against this Tariff which the war has suspended for the time being. but which Mr. Wadsworth, as a United States Senator, would strive to end permanently.

In quoting thus freely we wish to extend as far as possible the valuable effects which the New York Press aims to produce upon the intelligence and patriotism of American voters. Our only regret is that we cannot insure that it shall reach 15,000,000 voters in time to bar fruit at the polls on the 3d of November. If all the anti-Free-Trade newspapers would emulate this good example and place before their readers the hard. practical truth, the verdict of next month would be overwhelmingly against the party of Free-Trade.

What Must the People Think?

Referring to the increase of exports from the United States to Canada, largely due to the cutting off of supplies of hosiery, silks, gloves and toys, heretofore obtained from France and Austria, the Philadelphia Inquirer says:

Most of these things are manufactured in the United States, and since the war began we have been selling more or less to our Canadian neighbors. Thus, solely by reason of international complications, we are gaining business that was not seriously considered heretofore. It is an opportunity that is likely to be eagerly accepted by our own people. For one thing, it may help the hosiery mills, whose very existence has been threatened by a Tariff law framed in the interests of European countries and against our own workingmen and women. But what must the people of the United States think of a law whose worse hardships may be averted only through the unexpected war in Europe?

The Free-Traders of the United States are the only people in the world who have reason to be glad that nearly all Europe is engaged in the slaughter of human beings. They expect to profit at the polls next month by this dreadful destruction of life and property. They see in the horrid havoc of war a piece of political luck for themselves in averting some of the iniquitous consequences of Free-Trade legislation. What do the American people think of the deeds of a political party the evil effects of which can only be modified by the horrors of war? The answer should be at the polls next month in the shape of a verdict of ejectment and dispossession of the present Free-Trade majority in the House of Representatives. Glad to Reciprocate.

THE

AMERICAN PROTECTIVE TARIFF LEAGUE is in receipt of the following complimentary letter regarding Document No. 33, PROTECTIVE TARIFF CYCLOPEDIA, from Charles Gray, editor of the Adams County Union-Republican. Corning, Ia., dated October 5, 1914:

Thanks for the copy of "PROTECTIVE TARIFF CYCLOPEDIA." I am very glad to receive it. and shall be pleased if you will remember me in future with publications of this nature. You may be sure I shall be glad to reciprocate by publishing the notice concerning the work.

Editors throughout the country will find the cyclopedia of direct and permanent value. No similar publication is now or is likely to be in existence. Business men generally can find in it all they want to know about the Tariff: what the present rates of duty are, and what the rates were under the last of Protective Tariff of 1909.

NEW industries in the United States to take the place of those cut off abroad need a new Republican Protective Tariff.

A PROTECTIVE TARIFF triumph next month will point to future confidence for American work and American wages.

THERE is very little to eat on the FreeTrade table.

It Ought Not to Save the Free-Traders.

The Free-Trade party is congratulating itself upon being pulled out of a hole by the European war. The Free-Traders consider themselves in great luck. Perhaps they are. Perhaps a very widespread revolt against the record made by the FreeTrade party since March 4, 1913, will be in some measure checked and diminished by the totally unlooked-for circumstance of the outbreak of the European war. It is possible that such may be the result. It is possible that the slaughter of a million. human beings on the European Continent may save the Free-Trade party from annihilation at the polls next month. It

is possible that absolute paralysis of industrial and other forms of production among the nations of Europe will so diminish the injurious effects of a FreeTrade legislation in this country as to turn aside the wrath of the American people for the time being.

The

But such ought not to be the case. accident of war in Europe ought not to save the Free-Traders from the consequences of their own sins, and it will not if the American people will stop to consider that the evil consequences of bad Tariff legislation would have occurred, indeed had begun to occur before the war broke out.

It would be wise for the American people to remember that the European war is only a temporary conditon of things. That war is not going to last forever. It may and probably will be ended within a few months. When the end of war shall

have come and the millions of

the beneficiary of this awful slaughter on the Continent of Europe.

It is true that the paralysis of industrial production abroad has greatly diminished the sale of foreign products in the United States. European factories are idle because their operatives have been drafted into military service, and their ocean carrying trade has been for the time being put out of business by the risks of war. So it happens that through no fault of the Free-Trade party in this country there has been a great falling off in the volume of competitive imports that began to flow into our markets immediately following the enactment of the Underwood Tariff law a year ago.

To this extent the Free-Traders are in luck. The unexpected has happened in their favor, but that does not excuse the monstrous wrong inferred upon the industries and the agriculture of the United States by the Underwood Free-Trade Tariff law of October 3, 1913. The wrong and injury of that miserable enactment have been temporarily set aside in some degree. But the time is near at hand when we shall need to repair that wrong and injury by a sane return to the policy of Protection which has made our country the most prosperous among the nations of the world. The verdict of disapproval and condemnation of the party of Free-Trade is as much deserved as though there had been no European war.

Suffering from Free-Trade Depression.

carners shall have been returned to their ordinary pursuits Europe will resume its industrial production and be more than ever before under the necessity of finding larger markets for its surplus products. The wages of labor will have to go down to the black bread and water level. Production cost will be lower than ever. In the effort to recoup the tremendous loss inflicted by the war, these European countries will be compelled to export every possible dollar's worth of their products at the best prices they can get. The competition between them to find foreign markets will be the fiercest ever known. They must get money, and they must get it from countries not impoverished by a dreadful war, and they will look chiefly to the United States of America, with its 100,000,000 of the mos: liberal buyers and consumers known throughout the universe. They will hope to dump upon American markets a greater surplus than ever before. And they will succeed in doing it, unless steps are taken by the American people to Protect their own market from this enormous dumping

process.

The Free-Trade party ought not to be

ers of Illinois, blames the Free-Trade administration and Congress for one of the worst years ever faced by the coal miners of Illinois. Mr. McDonald declares that the mines of the State are working only two or three days a week. Fifteen mines of the State have not yet opened for the winter's business. Mr. McDonald is quoted as saying, further:

At this time of the year the mines should be working full time, but they are only working two and a half days a week on the average throughout the State. Fifteen mines have not reopened.

This is the boom season of the coal year, and with conditions bad now they are certain to become worse. Generally the work falls off about Christmas. Conditions are bad now and likely to be much worse.

The Democratic administration is largely responsible for the conditions. The factories are not working full time: the demand for commodities is light; the railroads are consequently having a slack year; and all these combine to affect the coal business.

The Illinois miners are a link in the endless-chain of misery forged by FreeTrade blacksmiths. If they and a million or more like them shall act wisely in voting Free-Trade congressmen out of office next month, they will have taken the first step toward a better condition of things. Turn the rascals out!

Free-Trade and the American Farmer.

ers.

In the eight months ending with August, 1914, our imports had increased $114,000,000 as compared with the corresponding eight months of the preceding year, while our exports for the eight months of 1914 were $204,000,000 less than for the same period of the preceding year. The great bulk of this enormous increase of imports under the Free-Trade Tariff has fallen heavily upon American farmFree-Trade in agricultural products has been a great benefit to the farmers of foreign countries. How the American farmer fared? To the extent that the people of the United States consume the agricultural products of foreign countries they do not consume the agricultural products of its own country. A pint cup holds only a pint. It is one thing for an American farmer to fill that cup, and a totally different thing for a foreign farmer to fill it. When the foreigners are sending their products to this country the American people are buying less of American farm products, and to that extent American farm hands are being put out of business for the benefit of foreigners. How has this worked under the FreeTrade Underwood law in the eleven months ending August 31, 1914. There was an increase in the value of cattle imports amounting to $9,000,000; an increase of corn imports amounting to $10,000,000; an increase of $8,000,000 in oats of imports; an increase of $13,500,000 in hides and skins imports; an increase in dairy products imports of $30,500,000; an increase in vegetables of nearly $5,000,000; an increase of manufactured wool of more than $30,000,000; an increase in imports of wheat of $1,500,000; an increase of butter of $1,500,000; an increase of egg imports of $1,000,000.

Of

The total imports of foodstuffs in crude condition and food animals was in round rumbers $160,000,000, which was an increase of $37.000,000 as compared with the corresponding eight months of 1913. foodstuffs, partly or wholly manufactured, the imports amounted in 1914 to $181.000,000, as against $134,000,000 in the eight months of 1914. There is an increase of nearly $88,000,000 of imports of articles which could and should be produced by American farmers and sold to the American consumers. In the same period mentioned there was a decrease in 1914 of exports of foodstuffs in, crude condition and food animals amounting to more than $15,000,000, while in exports of foodstuffs, partly or wholly manufactured. the decrease in 1914 amounted to more than $32.000.000. Thus the American farmer got it coming and going. He sold less to the American people and less also in foreign markets. Like a two-edged sword Free-Trade has cut into the prosperity of the American farmer.