"You have a tariff system, which for unrighteousness in the cruelty of its exactions, is without a parallel in modern times. It is unjust and oppressive; wholly indefensible, and with scarcely a palliating feature. My circumscribed power in communicating will not allow me to argue the question _in extenso_, or as I would like to. Your tariff is not only unjustly discriminative, but painfully oppressive in its operations, especially so far as the interests of the consumers are concerned. Why do you not honestly examine the subject in its bearings in the laudable endeavor to ascertain to whose benefit it inures. The government to some extent is benefited in the matter of revenue, but the capitalists are more largely the beneficiaries, and it is for them and their interests that you legislate. Have you not yet discovered, if not by close and analytical reasoning, at least by an observance of its practical operations, that the poor artisans, skilled mechanics, and other labors immediately connected with your manufactures, are not favored by high rates of tariff, and that protection to home manufacturing by imposts on imported commodities does not enhance the interests or confer blessings upon the consumers of your manufactured articles. Have you not yet realized the fact that exorbitant and restrictive protection fosters only the interests of invested capital, with no real advantage to the toiling operatives and to the oppressive detriment of consumers? If the operatives in your manufacturing establishments were benefited by high tariffs it would be manifested and plainly discernible in prosperous accumulations and in their happy contentment. The opposite of all this is true, and it does not require a philosopher to discover it. Why trades unions, repeated and frequent strikes, and an unmistakably unhappy condition of unrest, if the benefits accruing from the system beneficially inured to the workmen? The masses of your toiling people are inclined to suffer and bear injuries and injustice with a patience and forbearance not characteristic of any other people under the broad canopy of heaven, and when they protest by strike or otherwise you may safely assume that they are in the right, and have just grievances. The people not directly connected with the manufacturing interest, but who are the purchasers of its products, have exhibited a still more remarkable degree of patient forbearance, for they are much more numerous and less directly dependent. They have been sorrowfully blinded to their true interests by unconscionable politicians and political tricksters, and most dearly have they paid for their confidence and ignorance. We see signs of the awakening of the hitherto slumbering sensibilities of the people, and feel assured that in the not remote future will be aroused a sentiment among the masses that will compel a change of front on this subject in the meting out of even-handed and impartial justice." August 24, 1882: