estroys that right. It ought
to be destroyed, until every American freeman can spend his money where
it will be of the most service to him.

To illustrate the cost of protection to the consumer, consider its
operation in increasing the price of two or three of the leading
articles protected. Take paper for example. The duty on that commodity
is twenty per cent. ad valorem. Most of the articles which enter
into its manufacture or are required in the process of making it are
increased in price by protection. The result is that the price of paper
to the consumer is increased nearly fifteen per cent.; that is, if the
tariff were taken off paper and the articles used in its manufacture,
paper would be fifteen per cent. cheaper to the buyer. The paper-mills
for five years have produced nearly one hundred millions of dollars'
worth of paper a year. The consumers have been compelled to pay fifteen
millions a year to the manufacturer more than the paper could have
been bought for without the tariff. In five years this has amounted to
$75,000,000, an immense sum paid to protection. It is a tax upon books
and newspapers; it is a tax upon intelligence; it is a premium upon
ignorance. So heavy had the burden of this tax become that every
newspaper man in the district I have the honor to represent has appealed
to Congress to take the duty off. The government has derived little
revenue from the paper duty. It has gone almost entirely to the
manufacturer, who himself has not been benefited as anticipated, as will
presently be seen. These burdens have been imposed to protect the paper
manufacturer against the foreigner, in face of the confident prediction
made by one of the most experienced paper men in the country, that
if all protection were taken off paper and the material used in its
manufacture, the manufacturer would be able to successfully compete with
the foreigner in nearly every desirable market in the world.

Take blankets also for example. The tariff on coarse blankets is nearly
one hundred per cent. ad valorem. They can be bought in most of the
markets of the world for two dollars a pair. Yet our poor, who use the
most of that grade of blankets, are compelled to pay about four
dollars a pair. The government derives little revenue from it, as the
importation of these blankets for years has been trifling. This tax
has been a heavy burden upon the poor during this severe winter, a tax
running into the millions to support prot