PROTECTION V FREETRADE

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1742, 17 January 1888, Page 3

PROTECTION V FREETRADE

The Australian " Star," the organ of the Protectionist party m New South Wales, remarks : — Not one foreign trade j urnal has ventured to assert that the prosperity enjoyed by Viotorla daring the whole of the year Is In any waj unreal. Two or three years ago we had a boom m this colony. Trade was brisk, speculation was freely indulged m, and the working clbbbbs were constantly employed and bad good wages. We enjoyed the b:om, and gave no thought to tbe morrow ; bat all the oame we knew that it rested upon a very unsatisfactory bails, and that at any moment it might collapse almost as suddenly as a prioked bladder We were prosperous because we had borrowed extravagantly, and were speeding the prooeeda freely. Bat ilia Victorians have not borrowed largely during recent years, nor have they squandered thei? public eitate. Tbe prosperity they have has been caused by the legitimate development of their resources, and particularly of their agricultural and manufacturing resources, for the mining industry has suffered a decline. Now this is really disgraceful. Aooordlng to the foreign-trade theory, Viotoria ought to be going to tho dogs with constantly acoalerating rapidity. Agriculture should be languishing, manufactures decaying, property unsaleable, the cities tumbling Into rn'ns, and the working olasses starving. The foreign trade journaln are so paralysed by the assurance of Yictotia ; In arraying itself m the garment of oom | fort, when it should be clothed m shoddy or rags, that they are unable to utter a word of rebuke. They mourn over the decaying commercial oondltlon of New South Wales, but they wont adopt the policy I that has given prosperity to Viotorla. Ob, no! At all ooofrs their theory must be maintained. Though the heaven. W\, they must atand. Aspeotacle for gods and men are tbe forelgn*tra<)e journalists who publish m one of their columns tbe story of Victoria's sound and constantly Increasing prosperity, and In another oolumo bewail tbe commercial stagnation of New South Water, and spit venomously at Protection.