“DEAR MR. MCKINLEY:—It is a great mistake to take hides from the free list, where they have been for so many years. It is a slap in the face of the South Americans, with whom we are trying to enlarge our trade. It will benefit the farmer by adding five to eight per cent to the price of his children’s shoes.
“It will yield a profit to the butcher (Beef Trust) only, the last man that needs it. The movement is injudicious from beginning to end—in every form and phase.
“Please stop it before it sees light. Such movements as this for protection will protect the Republican party only into speedy retirement.
This letter was dated April 10, six days before Mr. McKinley reported his bill. It was effective. Hides were kept on the free list in 1890.
As the debate on the bill went on, Mr. Blaine appears to have become more and more uneasy as to its effect on foreign trade, and to meet the difficulty he proposed a system of what might be called forced reciprocity with the countries of the American Hemisphere. So long as they admitted free to their ports all the products of the United States our market should be open and free to their products; but if they applied their tariffs to our goods or put export duty on their own, they should not enjoy the advantages of our free list. This proposition was made in a report to President Harrison and by him sent to Congress. It caused much discussion and Mr. Blaine was obliged to explain himself repeatedly. On July 11, he wrote Senator Frye, saying:
“The charge against the protective policy which has injured it most is that its benefits go wholly to the manufacturer and the capitalist and not at all to the farmer. Here is an opportunity where the farmer may be benefited—primarily, undeniably, richly benefited. Here is an opportunity for a Republican Congress to open the markets of forty millions of people to the products of American farms. Shall we seize the opportunity, or shall we throw it away?
“I do not doubt that the tariff bill pending in the Senate is a just measure, and that most of its provisions are in accordance with the wise policy of protection. But there is not a section or a line in the entire bill that will open the market for another bushel of wheat or another barrel of pork.”