OSSIBLY no State in the Union is so deeply interested in a protective tariff as California. The very large variety of California products, added to the fact that most of them are peculiar to that State and are produced nowhere else in the United States, renders a protective tariff a necessity. The orchards and vineyards are especially affected by it. For instance, raisins, figs and olives are produced in no other State in the American Union, while oranges, lemons and prunes are also exclusive California products, if Florida is excepted. The raisin industry is now a large and flourishing one. It is estimated the amount of capital now invested in California in that business alone exceeds ten million dollars. The production of raisins in quantities was commenced in 1880, and California soon became a competitor in American markets against the European productions. It followed that as our productions increased, the prices of Spanish raisins decreased. The fact is that so long as there was no home competition the American people were compelled to pay Spanish prices for their raisins; but when California entered the market, the prices of raisins declined, and especially so after it became known that California produced a fine article, and thus became a positive and active competitor. It is an axiom in business, hardly worth repeating here, that the price of a commodity is regulated by supply and demand. We increased the supply without largely increasing the demand; and although the foreign producer, and in some instances the New York importers, talked down the quality of our raisins, yet they have held their own in the home market, and in this respect California, as well as the rest of the country, has been benefited. It was not at first believed that raisins could be successfully produced in the United States, because of the difference 686 EFFECT OF FREE TRADE ON PACIFIC COAST INDUSTRIES. in the price of labor here and in Malaga. The California producer pays four times the amount for labor that is paid in Spain; yet the advantage of climate, the richness of our soil, the abundance of our crops, added to the two cents a pound tariff, made it possible for our producers to compete with foreigners in the same line. We submit, then, that the American people are deeply interested in maintaining this and other industries peculiar to the Pacific Coast; for the reason, if an American competitor is in the field there is home competition, which, like a home market, is beneficial both to producer and consumer. The Mills Bill utterly disregards this self-evident truth, and cuts down the tariff on raisins 25 per cent., or one-half a cent a pound. In 1887, there was imported into the United States 40,660,603 pounds of raisins, valued at $2,297,469, on which a duty was collected amounting to $813,212. Assuming that next year there shall be imported an equal amount of raisins, there would be a decrease in the duties of only about $200,000. Now, in order to lower the surplus in the National Treasury $200,000, the Mills Bill imperils ten millions of dollars of American capital, throws thousands of American people out of employment, and destroys a new and valuable industry; for when a business does not pay to the party engaged in it, it is practically destroyed. I am aware that it may be claimed that a reduction of one half a cent a pound on raisins is very slight, but it is just the difference between success and failure. It does not begin to make the difference that actually exists between the expense of producing raisins in California and in Malaga. It must also be noted by our friends in the East that the transportation from California to New York is more than double what it is from any Spanish port to New York, and we are thus again placed at a disadvantage. And in this connection, I am reminded that a vineyard is a thing of slow growth; that it must be planted, pruned and cultivated at least four years before it produces any thing, and that it is not in full bearing until it is eight or ten years old; and thus it becomes a very expensive and dangerous piece of property to hold, if the market value of the product is constantly menaced by national legislation. The questions of supply and demand, good or inferior crops, should be the only ones that imperil the producer. Nothing in the world but the abundance and quality of our production has sustained this industry with the present tariff duties. The next attack made upon the California fruit-raiser in the Mills Bill was upon prunes. These were placed upon the free list, although finally restored by vote of the House to the old rate. But the attack was made, and the injury done. The menace was given, and the industry imperiled. Like raisins, the production of prunes is confined to the Pacific Slope. There are over forty thousand acres of prunes now planted in California. It has only The peculiarity of our soil and climate is eminently adapted to prune cultivation. The American people consumed in 1887, of imported prunes, 70,808,853 pounds. Every pound of these could be and ought to be raised on the Pacific coast. But like all new and struggling industries, this requires the fostering care of the government. been a few years, since California became an active competitor in the sale of prunes in the American markets. Note the result: prunes have decreased in value just as California has increased in production; and this in the face of a one cent a pound duty, which is now imposed by law. It is an undoubted advantage to the whole nation, for us to produce what we consume. By the Mills Bill, figs are placed upon the free list, which is another one of our infant industries. Figs have hitherto borne a tariff of two cents a pound, and the total duty on figs last year collected by our government was only $175,057, an amount that could make no appreciable effect upon the surplus in the National Treasury. But with California it was about all of the profits, and even more than there was in the business; for California figs were just come into the market, and very soon would have driven Smyrna figs out of it, by reason of quality, abundance and price of the home production. California is so re mote from the seat of government, small in population, that its voice could not be heard, and was not heard in free trade circles in Washington; indeed, no opportunity was given our people to be heard. We were commanded to remain silent while our property was destroyed, our homes desolated and our laborers turned out of employment. The right of petition was, in effect, denied us, for our petitions were unheard, and unheeded. in a star-chamber proceeding, and we were not heard. Note the result: olive oil was placed upon the free list. It certainly does not seem to us that it was necessary to destroy an important industry simply for the purpose of cutting down the surplus $163,000. But, be that as it may, it was done; and the people of California as producers, and the American people as consumers, will be the sufferers. There are a few date trees in California, very few, indeed, and the amount of tariff duties was only one cent a pound upon dates; yet dates were also placed upon the free list. So with currants, so with beans, beeswax, salt, lumber, copper, quicksilver, feathers, fresh vegetables, etc. In this connection it may be said, that the most striking and inexcusable blow given to California industries was in relation to olive oil. California stands alone among the American States as a producer of olive trees. For thriftiness of growth and abundance of fruitage, no place in the world, not even Italy, While California is one of the largest can begin to equal California. It is the producers of wool of any State in the home of the olive. To-day there are Union, yet wool is produced in nearly more than thirty-five thousand acres of all of the Northern States. The Mills olive trees planted in our State, and Bill affects all wool-men alike. But it the acreage is increasing at the rate may be noted in this connection that of twenty-five per cent. a year. We the Pacific States were peculiarly the have, at a vast expense, imported the object of attack. Whether this arose best and rarest varieties of that fruit; from the reason that ours is looked upon but the tree produces but little or no as a Republican community, and like fruit until it reaches the age of from six Dakota, out of the Union, or whether to twelve years. our interests were so insignificant we were forgotten, is a matter which the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives can alone answer. As is well known, California orchards require cultivation, at least, two to four times a year; so the expense of maintaining an olive orchard, or, indeed, any other orchard, is very great, especially during the non-productive period of its existence. Within the last four years we have commenced to make olive oilin a small way, it is true, but still we made it, and made the best. Very little had reached the Eastern market, yet not less than five millions of dollars have been invested in California in this peculiar and most interesting industry, and nearly all of it is invested by people of small means. 1n 1887, the government collected in duties from imported olive oil, $163,648, the duty being 25 per cent. ad valorem. It would seem that so insignificant a sum would not have tempted the reformers to strike it from the list of protected articles, but the tariff tinkers were engaged In conclusion, let me add, the average price of unskilled farm-labor in California is one dollar a day and board; in the Southern and Democratic States, farm labor is from $8 to $12 and $14 a month. In California, planting and much of our cultivation is done in winter; thus work continues the year around. In harvest, farm laborers get $2.50 a day. In the South the leading industries are not affected by the Mills Bill; here they are destroyed. Why is this? Will our Democratic friends answer, and will they let us know what the Mills Bill means, if it does not mean Free-Trade? When articles are placed on the free list, it is certainly free trade as to those articles, and many of our leading products are so placed. M. M. Estee. ALL roads lead from New York, especially on a hot sultry day in July, with the thermometer at 97° in the shade, as it was on the afternoon when our three artist friends found themselves on the deck of a Sound steamer, brightly anticipating a two months' trip through the valley of the Connecticut to the Green Mountain State, Lake George and beyond. They had agreed to meet at the metropolis from afar, to share in the pleasures of a vacation in the mountains, which was to result in rest, recreation andsketches; and, although men in middle life, were looking forward with all the ardor and much of the impatience of schoolboys to the coming days, for the consummation of the hopes and anticipations of many months. The sail up the Sound, and up the Connecticut river to Hartford, supplemented by a run by rail along the banks of that beautiful stream to Springfield and beyond, was a delightful prelude to the pleasures of a drive through the upper valley, which was to begin at Northampton and end whenever and wherever fancy dictated. Stopping at Mount Holyoke, in order to take a bird's-eye view of the promised land before they entered upon it, we find them, upon the second day of their travels, standing in the shadow of Mount Tom, on the platform of the little station of that name, where the train had left them a few moments before. The VOL. VIII.-44 |