Practical Argumentation by George K. Pattee (books for new readers .txt) 📕

of the distributor, and liberty of the consumer. The first two need no discussion—they have been long, thoroughly, and brilliantly illustrated by the political economists of Great Britain, and by her eminent statesmen; but it seems to me that enough attention has not been directed to the third, and, with your patience, I will dwell on that for a moment, before proceeding to other topics.

It is a necessity of every manufacturing and commercial people that their customers should be very wealthy and intelligent. Let us put the subject before you in the familiar light of your own local experience. To whom do the tradesmen of Liverpool sell the most goods at the highest profit? To the ignorant and poor, or to the educated and prosperous? The poor man buys simply for his body; he buys food, he buys clothing, he buys fuel, he buys lodging. His rule is to buy the least and the cheapest that he can. He goes to the store as seldom as he can,—he brings away as little as he can—and he buys for the least he can. Poverty is not a misfortune to the poor only who suffer it, but it is more or less a misfortune to all with whom they deal.

On the other hand, a man well off—how is it with him? He buys in far greater quantity. He can afford to do it; he has the money to pay for it. He buys in far greater variety, because he seeks to gratify not merely physical wants, but also mental wants. He buys for the satisfaction of sentiment and taste, as well as of sense. He buys silk, wool, flax, cotton; he buys all metals—iron, silver, gold, platinum; in short, he buys for all necessities and of all substances. But that is not all. He buys a better quality of goods. He buys richer silks, finer cottons, higher grained wools. Now, a rich silk means so much skill and care of somebody’s that has been expended upon it to make it finer and richer; and so of cotton, and so of wool. That is, the price of the finer goods runs back to the very beginning, and remunerates the workman as well as the merchant. Indeed, the whole laboring community is as much interested and profited as the mere merchant, in this buying and selling of the higher grades in the greater varieties and quantities.

The law of price is the skill; and the amount of skill expended in the work is as much for the market as are the goods. A man comes to the market and says, “I have a pair of hands”; and he obtains the lowest wages. Another man comes and says, “I have something more than a pair of hands—I have truth and fidelity”; he gets a higher price. Another man comes and says, “I have something more; I have hands and strength, and fidelity, and skill.” He gets more than either of the others. The next man comes and says, “I have got hands and strength, and skill, and fidelity; but my hands work more than that. They know how to create things for the fancy, for the affections, for the moral sentiments”; and he gets more than any of the others. The last man comes and says, “I have all these qualities, and have them so highly that it is a peculiar genius”; and genius carries the whole market and gets the highest price. So that both the workman and the merchant are profited by having purchasers that demand quality, variety, and quantity.

Now, if this be so in the town or the city, it can only be so because it is a law. This is the specific development of a general or universal law, and therefore we should expect to find it as true of a nation as of a city like Liverpool. I know it is so, and you know that it is true of all the world; and it is just as important to have customers educated, intelligent, moral, and rich, out of Liverpool as it is in Liverpool. They are able to buy; they want variety; they want the very best; and those are the customers you want. That nation is the best customer that is freest, because freedom works prosperity, industry, and wealth. Great Britain, then, aside from moral considerations, has a direct commercial and pecuniary interest in the liberty, civilization, and wealth of every people and every nation on the globe.

You have also an interest in this, because you are a moral and a religious people. You desire it from the highest motives, and godliness is profitable in all things, having the promise of the life that is, as well as of that which is to come; but if there were no hereafter, and if man had no progress in this life, and if there were no question of moral growth at all, it would be worth your while to protect civilization and liberty, merely as a commercial speculation. To evangelize has more than a moral and religious import—it comes back to temporal relations. Wherever a nation that is crushed, cramped, degraded under despotism, is struggling to be free, you, Leeds, Sheffield, Manchester, Paisley, all have an interest that that nation should be free. When depressed and backward people demand that they may have a chance to rise—Hungary, Italy, Poland—it is a duty for humanity’s sake, it is a duty for the highest moral motives, to sympathize with them; but beside all these there is a material and an interested reason why you should sympathize with them. Pounds and pence join with conscience and with honor in this design. [Footnote: The World’s Famous Orations, Vol. X, p. 12. Funk and Wagnalls Company.]

EXERCISES

A. In the following passage point out all assertions that are made, note whether the source of the evidence is definitely stated, and test the witnesses that give the evidence.

Reciprocity is the only remedy for the commercial antagonism which is fast separating Canada and the United States. Canada has long waited in vain for the culmination of treaties whereby she can trade with us on equal terms. Now, angered by our long evasion of the question, she is, according to prominent Canadian statesmen, contemplating the passage of high protective tariff laws, which will effectually close the doors of Canadian trade to us. Canada is young, but she is growing fast. The value of her imports is steadily growing larger, and if we do not make some concession to her we shall lose this vast trade. She makes and sells many things of which we do not have a home supply. Why not then open our doors to her and admit her products? Would it not be of distinct advantage to us?

The American Press is almost unanimous in declaring that the sum of the advantages attending this step would far offset any disadvantages. For instance, the supply of lumber in the United States is fast becoming exhausted; experts say that in fifteen years we shall have a lumber famine. If we turn to Canada, however, we see her mountain slopes green with trees and her wooded valleys covered with millions of feet of lumber. Why, then, not get our lumber from Canada and preserve what few forests we do have? Because of the exorbitant tariff on imported lumber. Lumber at its present high prices is even cheap compared with the price of imported lumber. Moreover, lumber is not the only article that is expensive here, though it is cheap just across the line in Canada. The World’s Work, Vol. V, page 2979, says that reciprocity with Canada would cheapen many articles that are now costly.

B. Point out the kind of reasoning found in each of the following arguments:—

1. The wholesale destruction of the forests in many States portends the loss of our whole timber supply.

2. His faithful performance of every duty assures him an early promotion.

3. Since he succeeded well in his college work, it is an assured fact that he will make a brilliant reputation for himself in business.

4. Caesar had his Brutus, Charles I his Cromwell, and George III—may profit by their example.

5. The well-tilled fields, the carefully-trimmed hedges, and the sleek appearance of the stock bespoke a thrifty and industrious farmer.

6. You tried in Wales to raise a revenue which the people thought excessive and unjust: the attempt ended in oppression, resistance, rebellion, and loss to yourselves. You tried in the Duchy of Lancaster to raise a revenue which the people believed unjust: this effort ended in oppression, rebellion, vexation, and loss to yourselves. You are now trying to raise in America a revenue which the Colonists disapprove. What must be the result?

7. Then, sir, from these six capital sources: of descent; of form of government; of religion in the northern provinces; of manners in the southern; of education; of the remoteness of situation from the first mover of government—from all these causes a fierce spirit of liberty has grown up.

8. Collective bargaining is an advantage to working men; it tends to give them some share in the control of the industry to which they contribute.

9. That a free labor union is not the impractical dream of an idealist is to be found in the fact that some of the greatest and most successful of the labor organizations have always adhered to the principle of the open shop. In the Pennsylvania coal-mines union and non-union miners labored together in the same mine and reaped the same benefits from the collective bargaining carried on for them by John Mitchell. In the recent anarchy in Colorado, the one mine which went on with its work peacefully, prosperously, and without disturbance, until it was closed by military orders, was a mine which maintained the principle of the open shop, and in which union and non-union men worked peacefully together.

10. Suppose that all the property you were worth was in gold, and you had put it in the hands of Blondin, the famous rope-walker, to carry across the Niagara Falls on a tight rope. Would you shake the rope while he was passing over it, or keep shouting to him, “Blondin, stoop a little more! Go a little faster!” No, I am sure you would not. You would hold your breath as well as your tongue, and keep your hand off until he was safely over. Now the government is in the same situation. It is carrying an immense weight across a stormy ocean. Untold treasures are in its hands. It is doing the best it can. Don’t badger it! Just keep still and it will get you safely over.

C. Prove or disprove the following statements, using, wherever it is possible, argument from antecedent probability, sign, example, and authority. Give references for all evidence except generally admitted facts.

1. The negro is not prepared to receive the same kind of education that the white man receives.

2. Railway pooling lowers freight rates.

3. The election of Senators by State Legislatures is undemocratic.

4. The present commercial relations between Canada and the United States are detrimental to the industries of the United States.

5. The influence of labor unions has greatly diminished child labor in the United States.

6. Woman suffrage would purify politics.

7. Egypt is benefited by the control of England.

8. Strikes benefit the working man.

9. The municipal ownership of street railways is a financial failure.

10. Lumber companies threaten the extermination of the forests in the United States.