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Les diagrammes suivants lllustrent la mAthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 The EDITH and LORNE PIERCE COLLECTION o/CANADIANA ilueen's University at Kingston m M M mar Geo writ poin who fore thor M M disci I del pen Hen booli Ml Ml disct inRi thinl ^" Ml tenti paR« berc man amir inclu also from Rent and publi Illin< John of tt simp bers deba marl suffic prim have I SU| tOlKIl court wep lican Th a m Chai Chai nott fran ^'Tb* f ood doetrliM, which ia wund itmeener.**-Ji!tu./0it^ X. fyaskf^Um. " If the Republicana don't Uke it, it ia because it hurts."— /Tm. Tom L. Jekntom, ** It «iM(tf take natold Toluaes to reply to W^—Hon.J*f.-j, Simfttn. PROTECTION OR FREE TRADE P HENRY GEORGE. #' In the House of Repreientatives March il, March 31, April 6 and April 8, 189a. Speech of HON. TOM L. JOHNSON, of Ohio. Speech of HON. WILLIAM J. STONE, of Kentucky. Speech of HON. JOSEPH E. WASHINGTON, of Tennessee. Speech of HON. GEORGE W. FITHIAN. of Illinois. Speech of HON. THOMAS BOWMAN, of Iowa. Speech of HON. JERRY SIMPSON, of Kansas. Mr. JOHNSON of Ohio said : Mr. Chairman— I desire to have printed with my re- marks the following, being an extract from Henry George's book, " Protection or Free Trade." This book, written by a man who views the matter from the stand- point of the interesU of the great laboring masses, and who is acknowledged through the civilized world as the foremost of political economists, is the clearest and most thorough exposition of the whole subject ever yet made. Mr. STONE of Kentucky said : Mr? Chairman— As going to the very root of the Uriff discussion, and setting forth in Uie clearest of language, I desire to make a contribution to this debate from the pen of a world-famous writer on political economy, Henry George. I quote the following from bis celebrat«l book, " Protection or Free Trade." Mr. WASHINGTON said : Mr. Chairman— I wish to contribute as my .art to the discussion of the general subject, of the tariff the follow- ing interesting thoughts from the pen of one of the ablest thinkers and writers on economic subjects of the day. I will print a few pages from a work by Mr. Henry George. Mr. FITHIAN said: Mr. Chairman— I desire to have printed as my own re- marks the following from the pen of Henry George on the tariff question. Mr. BOWMAN said : Mr. Chairman— I desire to have printed, as expressing very ably my views on the subject of this bill, the follow- ing, being an extract from Henry George's writings. It is the ablest paper that I know of in opposition to the theory of protection. Mr. SIMPSON said : Mr. Chairman— There is no l)etter way of getting at an understanding of the justice of the bill before the com- mittee than by examining the first principles of trade and of taxation, and to tliat end I offer as my part in this de- bate the following from the pages of a work quoted in every land where the English tongue is spoken, namely, " Protection or Free Trade," by Henry George. Congressional Record, April 15, 1892. Mr. Burrows. Mr. Speaker . . I desire to call at- tention of the Chair to the Rteord of this morning. On page 3s<(6, there is a speech of Henry George, not a mem- ber ofthis House, supplemented by n ve lines of the gentle- man from Kentuclcy [Mr. StoneJ. If the Chair will ex- amine the matter he will see that chapters from a i to 25 inclusive are atuched to these four lines. . . I desire also to call attention to the fact, that while the gentleman from Kentucky embraces chapters from st to 35, another gentleman [Mr. Bov/manl, embraces from 16 to sio, and the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Washington] fublishea chapters from 11 to is; the gentleman Trom llinois [Mr. Fithian] publishes chapters 6 to 16, and Mr. Johnson of Ohio, publishes chapters i to 5. . . The title of this book is, "Protection or Free Trade." . . It is simply a question whether under leave granted to mem- bers of the House to extend their remarks on the tariff debate, it is in order to embody, without making any re- marks of your own whatever under that order, except ■ufHcient to constitute a peg to hang it on, to publish a Einted volume in the Rtcordtot distribution. . . They ve got chapters now, from i to as, and the next Record, 1 suppose, to-morrow will complete the volume. I wish to know whether that is in order, and if it is in order, of course we have several volumes on the other side that we propose to have published. [Laughter on the Repub- lican side.] The Spbakbr. . : How extensive the extracts which a member prinu shall be is not a matter for the Chair to determine. The House itself has always, as the Chair understands, determined the question whether or no there has been any violation or breach of the privilege grantei^, and therefore the Chair thinks there should Be 1 rinolution or motion on the subject. Mr. Burrows. . . I move to strike out, on page 3;s6 of the Record, from what is printed as the speech of Mr. Stone of Kentucky, all that Henry George says . . ^ Mr. Richardson, i suppose the gentleman will include** also the letter of Mr. Horr, printed on the same page, inserted by the gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Dolllver]. There are about two columns of that matter. I move to amend the motion of the gentleman from Michigan by including the letter of Mr. Horr, and I also move to strike out the poem on page 3368 inserted by the gentle- man from Michigan [Mr. Belknap.] [Laughter.] Mr. Stonb of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, the motion is to strike out matter inserted in the Record by myself. Now, I want to plead guilty to the charge of the gentle- man from Michigan that 1 did insert that matter in the Record, and did so for the reason that I had the right to do so under the leave given by the House. I inserted it for the express purpose of having it go to the voters of this country upon the question of tariff reform. I inserted it for that express purpose and no other. I want to say to the House and to the gentleman from Michigan that there are a number of members upon this floor who, at various times during the discussion of the tariff question, have tried in vain to get an opportunity to address the House in regard to it— really to address the country, be- cause we do not listen to tariff speeches here ; they are made to go to the country. I myself, during the discussion that has gone on up to this time, have been so unfortunate as not to be recog^nued for the purpose of addressing the House, or my constit- uents, through the funnel of this House, but upon the day mentioned I did secure recognition for the purpose of extending in the Record some re marks upon the tariff, and I hiserted the matter in question, and, Mr. Speake» s .■*,**if.vjti I Indorse the article that I have had printed in the Il*eorii. I put it in there, as I have had said, for the purpose of havingr it gp to the country. There is no denial to be made of that, and I do not desire any denial or excuse. Further, upon that point, let me say that this is my fourth term in Congress, and that during my service here I have seen every gentleman that 1 have had any ac- §uaintance with who has been at all prominent in the iscussion of public questions in this House, insert that very class of matter in the Record. I do not mean matter exactly like this, because gentlemen upon the other side do not insert this kind of matter [laughter] : and that is where the thing Is hurting, that this matter is going out to the voters of the country. But I have seen gentlemen insert .almost all sorts of matter in the Rtcord under the leave to print. Why, sir, member.' of the Republican party Inserted the tariff articles of Mr. Blaine contained in his Twenty Years of Congress; Inserted them bodily into the Rtcord during the campaign of 1884. Mr. McMiLLiN. lhat was done by Mr. Brewer, of New Jersey, if the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bur- rows] will recollect, and it was done without any com- plaint on the part of the gentleman from Michigan. Mr. Stonb of Kentucky. There was no complaint about it, and no complaint has been raised about any such matter hitherto. But, Mr. Speaker, the question of the revision of the tariff and of relieving the people from the burdens of taxation that are now resting upon them is before the country and is being made warm for the party that favors protection, and they object that this argument should go to the voters of the country. fdid not submit this matter as my argument ; I do not claim to have made it as a .speech ; but I put it in the Record that it might go through the mails to the people of the country in order th.^i they might have the benefit of the views of one of the strongest writers in the country upon the side of tariff reform. That is exactly why I did it. If the House desires to strike it out, of course I sub- mit ; but I ask that it also strike out all the things that have gone into the Record during this session of Con- Sress that have not been spoken of by members on the oor. And when you have done that you will have rid the Record of a vast amount of misleading stuff that has been put into It, from newspapers and other sources, by mem- bers of the Republican party to t>olster up the cause of protection. And you will leave a good many skeletons in tlie Record \ you will strike out some of the best por- tions of speeches on the other side. The gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Dolliver] has within the last day or two inserced matter of this kind in the Record (I refer to page 3453); that must go out ; and the poems and other things o{ that kind which have been inserted in the Record will have to go out. > Mr. Speaker, so far as I am individually concerned, I am wiUing that the Record shall be held right down to what occurs on the floor — the utterances that are made here. But if this privilege of "leave to print" is to be allowed, It can not be confined to one set of men ; every man on the floor must be recognized as entitled to exer- cise the same privilege. I have no excuse to offer ; I have no denials to make. I did insert this matter in the Record: and I inserted it in order that It might go to the country under the frank of members of the House in order that their constituents might be able to read this argument without having to buy it. I am glad that attention has been called to it, for it will emphasize the fact that this matter is in the Rec- ord, and that the people can have it without paying Ibt it. Mr. Burrows. Mr. Speaker, . . If the House shall determine that this shall remain in the Record, we have untold volumes that we wish to Insert in reply. Mr. Simpson. It would take untold volumes to reply to it. '^ Mr. FiTHiAN . . The gentleman from Iowa had pre- viously to publishing this letter of Mr. R. G. Horr in the RecordsOCQM-pS&A the floor of the House for an hour or more, and had published in the Congressional Record a lengthy speech on the subject of the revision of the tariff. After he had taken up the time of the House, after he had occupied the space in the Record by the publication of his remarks, he now publishes a second speech which is wholly composed of this letter of R. G. Horr on the sub- ject of farm implements in the Record as a contribution upon the subject of tariff, with a heading " Duties upon wool and woolen goods," to which it bears no '■reference. Now, I want to say to the House and to the Speaker that during the discusion of the tariff question I had put my name down early on the list with the Chairman of the Committe of the Whole, and requested that time be allot- ted me, to be occupied on the floor in the discusion of the pending subject. I was denied the right to be heard, because, I suppose, the time allowed for the general debate was not sufficient to accommodate all who wanted to speak upon the subject. I had no opportunity, Mr. Speaker, to make any n>> marks during the discussion of this question upon the floor, and I thought and think still I had the right— I in- sist I had the right— in the absence of any remarks of my own, to submit remarks or writings of other gentlemen, especially the eminent gentleman from whom I copied the extract, for the purpose of expressing clearly the views that I entertain upon the question ; and if it were not for the fact that the argument I inserted in that speech goes to the very vitals of this question, if it were not for the fact that the argument I inserted in the Record was a complete refutation of the position of gentlemen on the other side on the tariff question, the question that was under discussion at that time, no objection whatever . . would have been made to it even if it had occupied fp twenty pages of the Record instead of a few columns. It Mras not because of the space occupied in the Record that these gentlemen complain, but it was because of the facts, tne cold facts, that are laid down for the people to read on this question, an argument which reviews and lays bare the position of gentlemen upon that side, that the complaint against these remarks being inserted in the Record is heard now upon this floor. Mr. Dolliver. Will the gentleman allow me? Mr. Pith IAN. Now, if it is unfair that members on this side who have not been permitted to be heard on the tariff question on the floor of the House shall insert extra -its from books or newspapers as their remarks in the Record, it is certainly very unfair and unjust for gentlemen on the other side, who have had opportunity and have taken advantage of it, to address the House and take up the space In the Congressional Record with their remaria, should Insert a speech on a subject, as the gentleman from Iowa has done, which is nothing but, as I have said, a letter written by a gentleman on a subject that was not under consideration. . . Mr. Dolliver. If I could be sure that the Democratic National Committee would undertake to circulate the works of Henry George as campaign documents, I think there would be no objection on this side, . . but we have no assurance that the Democratic National Commit- tee will touch it. . . Mr. FiTHiAN. The gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Dolli- ver] need not worry himself about what the National Democratic Committee will do. We will attend to the Democratic party, and he will have all he can do If he attends to the affairs of the Republican party. This Congress was elected as a rebuke to the proceedings of the Republican part In the Fifty-first Congress, with a Democratic majority of nearly one hundred and hfty. Mr. Dolliver . . But can this House see no dif- ference between the publication of a brief extract from a public newspaper and the concerted publication of a copyrighted volume in its Record? Mr. FiTHiAN. Who is making objection to the copy- ri;;ht being infringed upon ? Is It the gentleman who had the volume copyrighted, or is it the gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Dolliver] ? Mr. WASHINGTON. It sccms to be the gentleman from Iowa who is struck by the copyright business. Mr. BvNUM. Mr. Speaker . . I do not know that I have any reason to complain, because the gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Dolliver] has inserted something in the Record ^}aA\.)a& did not deliver. During the hour and a half that he occupied the floor in his speech on the tariff question he propounded with a g^eat deal of gusto a question to the other side of the House as to whether any one could name any article upon which the price had been Increased since the McKlnley bill had gone into operation, whereupon I tendered nim, I believe, a list containing one hundred and twenty-four articles, which somehow or other has been lost entirely out of the Record. [Laughter.] Mr. Burrows. . . It appears from an examination of the Record, there seems to have been a concerted action to get thi-^ book into the Record and get it franked, <(^ and into the bands of the public in this manner. I wish to withdraw my motion and offer In lieu thereof the fol- lowing. . . i Resolved, That there be referred to the Committee on Printing pages 3389, 3403, 3053, 3454, 3556 and other pages contiguous, devoted to printing of chapters from Henry George's works, for examination and report whether, in the Insertion of said matter In the Record, the privileges of the House have been violated. . . Mr. Goodnight. It seems t* aie this reselutien cannot be consistently adopted, for the reason that all members have general leave to print. Every gentleman upon this floor, by the special order already made, has the right to print as his speech whatever he pleases; the only limita- tion being that he must respect the personal rights of members, and the courtesies of the House, and unless he vi^tes these therfe Is no offense; kence this resolution odgbt not to be adopted. lake any n- on upon the I right— I in- marks of my r gentlemen, om I copied : clearly the id if it were rted in that >n, if it were in the Rtcord gentlemen on tion that was )n whatever ad occupied columns. It Record that ;ause of the he people to reviews and lat side, that iserted in the me? nbers on this ] on the tariH sert extracts 1 the Rteord, lemen on the have talcen ake up the eir remarlcs, itleman from have said, a hat was not Democratic :irculate the ents, I thtnic . . but we nal CcAnmit- 1 [Mr. DolH- the National ttend to the can do if he party. This oceedings of iresSj with a ind hfty. see no dif- tract from a ication of a to the copy- tleman who tleman from tleman from ). know that I tleman from bing in the ! hour and a on the tariff [ of gusto a whether any le price had 1 gone into ilieve, a list tides, which '■ the Record. examination a concerted !t it franked, ' ler. I wish eof the fol- immittee on other pages from Henry whether, in le privileges iitien cannot all members sn upon this the right to only limita- al rights of id unless he s reaolution Gcntleinen have exercised the right here complained of from time immemorial, and as a precedent, which I think the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Burrows] will hold to be perfectly good, I call attention to the Congressional Record t Porty-tighth Congress, first session, page 3A4 of the Appendix, wnere Mr. Brewer, of New Jersey, printed as his speech upon the tariff a chapter from Mr. Blaine's Twenty Years in Congress, giving ^6 pages of that book, covering over nine solid pages oitbe Record, this quota- tion constituting his entire speech. That book was copy. righted also, and the case is exactly in point. The same objection could have oeen raised to it, but the Record does not show that the gentleman from Michigan or any one else objected. It precedent were needed in aid of the present order of the House this would be justification for my colleague from Kentucky [Mr. Stone] and other memtiers. . . ^ Mr. Washington. ' Mr. Speaker, I want to make a brief statement regarding my connection with printinar the matter under controversy. I was not in the Hall when the gentleman from Michigan raised this little ■quail of wind. I am one of tlu^, however, who did Rublish some of the chapters from the very able woric of Ir. Henry George. By reference to the Record it will be seen that 1 did not publish the matter as emanating from my pen, but I stated that as a contribution, and a very good one, to the debate on the free-wool bill, I would print some observations on the theory of protection from one of the deepest thinkers and ablest writers of the day. I considered the publication entirely germane to the tariff debate then going on in the House, and thought that the ■eed thus sown might enter the .minds of some, who otherwise would never see or read the work of Mr. George, and bring forth good fruit. What has already transpired proves the truth of my surmise. Evidently ' the gentleman from Michigan, and others, have been reading the g^iod doctrine, which is sound Democracy. When I printed the chapters from Mr. George's book I violated no rule of the House: on the contrary I followed a precedent which has prevailed in this House for almost a century. It certainly has been the practice prevailing, during the five years I have been a member of this body. If there has been no specific rule permitting, there has been at least a custom, hoary with age, and therefore amounting to a rule of the House, that a gentleman may publish in this way whatever he sees fit as his contribu- tion to the debate when general leave to print has been allowed. The difference, as some gentleman has asked that ques- tion, between the publication of these chapters from the pen ol an eminent author, and the remarks Injected some days ago into the Record by the gentleman from Massa- chusetts [Mr. Walker] ought to be apparent to everyone upon a moment's reflection. Thfese chapters do not con- tain anything personal to any member of the House, but are devoted entirely to a discussion of economic questions. The remarks to which objections were raised by the gentleman [Mr. Williams] on the occasion just referred to, and which were printed in the Record by the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Walker], were in- tensely and offensively personal. They were not deliv- ered on the floor in the presence of thosa who were criti- cized, and who, therefore, had been afforded no oppor- tunity to reply. There is no parallel, and can be none between the cases whatever— none in the world. The only question, it seems to me, involved in the point at issue is, when general leave to print has been granted, how much or how long a quotation from a t>ook, oamphlet, speech, or poem is a member allowed to insert in the Record as a part of his remarks? If he could get the floor be could consume his whole time in reading from any publication bearing on the subject of debate, and obviously no man could object, for no rule prescribes that the speeches, whether read or spoken by members on this floor, shall be theur own original productions. Were this so, I fear the Record would be much reduced in size. The House lias increased in membership so enormously, owing to the immense growth of the population of the Union, that it would be impossible for all who desired to do so to speak on any subject of general interest to the whole country like the reform of the tariff. Therefore, the House has been compelled to resort to the practice ot allowinff such members as are unable to get time to speak* on the floor, to print their remarks in the oflicial Record •f the House, and thus present them not only to the notice of the House but of the country, and, above all. to tlieir constituents, to whom the Record, or at least that part of it containing the gentleman's remarks, may be ■mt through tlys mails free of postage. " Were it not for this liberty to print many a constituency would have no voice and never be heard on this floor on many important measures. Recognition by the Speaker or bf the Chairman of the Committee of the Whole and 4Maoo ol time allowed t» » committee for debate oa a bill Is neeetnrilir InflnetKed to a mat extent by personal friendship and favoritism. Alican not get time or recognition. It is human and natural that favors should go to friends, and this condition, known by all to exist, does not reflect improperly or injuriously on anybody. The only thin? to be guarded against in printing is to carefully avoid personalities and unparliamentary lan- guage. I am quite sure that these chapters from Henry eorge's book which has been printed are far more read- able and of infinitely greater value to those who will read them than great numbers of reports and books from Departments and from officials which will be printed at the expense of the Government and mailed liree to all parts of the country. The only expense to the people attending the printing of these chapterBwllI be the cost of that much of ttie space of the CoMgrusionai Rtecrd. Should they be all gathered together afterwards and r^ published in pamphlet form, the expense will be born en- tirely by those persons who may wish tcr distribute th« book as a valuable document. Now, Mr. Speaker, I think, as the House is just as competent to judge of this matter and to act on it as any conunlttee of the House, the right and proper thing to do la to lay the motion of the gentleman from Michigan on the table. . . Mr. PiTHiAN. L.eave has been granted to members of the House to print remarks on this subject. Now, Mr. Speaker, under the permission of the House, I printed in the Record this matter from the book of Henry George upon the subject of the tariff. I have no excuses to offer, no apologies to make, and if I have committed any offense I am glad of it. If the floor had t>ceu yielded to me 1 could have read from the book and had inserted what I read beyond question. Not having an opportunity to get the floor, under the general leave to print I had the right to print what I would have had the right to have read if I had been given the floor. ' And it seems to me it should make no difference to the ; gentleman from Michigan whether I printed the remarks or writings of some other gentleman than myself or whether the words printed came from my own month. \ Perhaps the matter published was better— In fact, it was better than anything I could say upon the subjectv and, in my judgment, better than anything the gentleman from Michigan could say upon the subject of the tariff. It at least. suited me better than anything be could aay. . . Mr. Richardson. I yield two minutes to the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Johnson], because if anyone is guilty he is, he being one of the parties who published the extracts from the works of Mr. George. Mr. Johnson of Ohio. Mr. Speaker. I am one of the guilty persons here, and I am proud 01 it. [Laughter.] Through the courtesy of the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Shively] I had half an hour in which to speak on the wool bill' I consumed nearly all of my time. I spoke in defense of the bill putting wool on the free list, and, at tha£ time, made an attack on the protective tariff. I in- tend to send that speech to my constituents, and I want to send them at the same time the best thing I can get in opposition to all protective tariffs; and as I am sure nothing has ever been written more convincing than the five chapters, I introduced them; I knew it was well written, and calculated to make Democratic votes. For that reason I put it in. We see in the Record awry day great tables occupying whole pages of the Record, that cost five times as mucn to set up as the plain printing that was required by these chapters inserted there. These tables contain sutistlcs that are not read, and that nobody believes if they do read them; and I think when I find a book that is the ablest exposition of the fallacies of protection, that I have a right to put it into the Record and send it to my con- stituents; it the Republicans do not like it, it is because .it hurts. . . Mr. CuMMiNGS. Before a vote is taken I want to call the attention of the House to one fact. Debate upon the tariff bill was limited. Members who desired to speak had no opportunity to do so. If they had had the oppor- tunity and had read this printed matter in their remarks no man would have questioned its right to go into the Record. Now, after giving them leave to print, do you mean to rob them of any privilege they would have nad f they had taken the floor ? I think not. To save time in debate the House granted them leave to print, and that leave carried with it all the privileges that they would have had if they had taken the floor. They are entitled to all the rights of those who spoke in the open bouse ; and after the bargain is made, under which they yielded the floor to others without protest, you have no right to curtail their privileges. . . Mr. Stone of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, I only desire to say that it seems to me this matter has raised a little bad feeling in the House. So far as I am concerned, I want tony a motion to «riiw oai, or refer to a oommittMi, wbAtever comoilttM the House niay decide, theee ex- cerpta from a book, aa stated by the ffentleman from Kichigan [Mr. Burrows], has no sort oieilect on me to make me feel 111 towards anybody. I have heard no statement or reason from the gentleman from Michigan, or anybody advocating the reference of this matter to a committee, why It should be done. I have heard no charge that a rule of the House was violated. The gentleman from Michigan made the point of order that a rule of the House had been violated and by bis own con- fession said that no rule had been violated, because be withdrew that point of order. He confesses that be is convinced that the rules have not been violated. I want to say, sir, that I am as much opposed as anjr man can be to making the Rtcord a receptacle for all sorts of publications from books, newspapers and private letters, and all sorts of things; but. as I said awhile ago, if one member of this House is to be granted that privi- lege, I do not see why another should not be. I want to say, Mr. Speaker, that I see no difference be* tween quoting a whole chapter from a book and quoting it in paragraphs. It is said that by quoting paragrapu from the Bible you can prove anything. In this instance other gentlemen -nd myself have been chareed with putting in whole chapters. We did that for the benefit of gentlemen on the other side [laughter], in order that they might get the whole thing, and that they might see there was foundation for the argument, and in order that they might be enlightened. We did not take extracts but whole chapters. We have given them the whole dose, and it seems it has hurt. i i Now, Mr. Speaker, I do not care whether this matter is : I referred to a committee or not. All that I do insist la that if it is to be referred to a committee, and should come back here with a recommendation tiiat a portion of the Record be stricken out, that every member of this House who is disposed to vote for striking them out will l>e willing to strike out every other quotation made from every Dook or paper that has been printed in the Rmord in the present session of Congress. It seems, Mr. Speaker, that the matter Inserted by me has struck home in the vitals of the protective heresy, and that it proves to be more than tne leaders of the other side can stand quietly. It seems they are unwilling to have the truth in clear and forcible form go to the people, hence this effort to suppress it. I only want to be dealt with as other members are. I have no excuse to offer, nobody's pardon to ask, and no apologies to make. \ have not printed these extracts in ue Record as my speech. I tiave a tariff speech already prepared, and I shall endeavor to secure recognition on one of the bills yet to be acted upon, when I will put in some additional remarks, which, I think, will show to the agriculturists of this country that the tariff policy advo- cated by the Republican party is grinding the agricul- turists into th. ground, and building up the protecting interests and classes of the country. That is wliat I pro- pose to show in the remarks which I expect to make oereafter; and /ou need not strike out this article, be- cause I have gca a speech prepared, and I will put that article In that speech, if necessary, to get it in \h't Record. [Laughter.] . . Mr. Bland. Mr. Speaker, . . I undertake to say that there is scarcely a speech made here by a gen- tleman of an hour's duration who does not ask leave to print certain matters connected with the subject; and that leave is never refused him, because in this House we have only one hour to detiate any subject, while in the other end of the Capitol they may take a day or a week if necessary. Members here are confined to one hour, and in one hour it is impossible to get aU matters bearing upon any subject into the RecordvxAta» we have leave to prim. I have icen report* and extractt from newpapers and all sorts of documents bearing upon the subject under debate printed In the RecordyxnAn leave to print, and never before have I heard any objec- tion made to it, whtro the matter printed was pertinent to the debate and not personal to members. If the House desire to stop printing these matters In the Record they must do it by refusing to give leave to print, and not undertake first to give members leave to print because they may be unabTe to obtain a hearing upon the floor, ana afterwards strike out the matter printed under the leave thus given. Such action wouid be a stultification of the House and an injustice to the members concerned, and the only remedy, as I have said is to refuse leave to print. If you adopt that rule then members can take their chance of getting the floor and delivuring their remarks in the House. The motio..of the gentleman from Michigan and all the amendments ought t be tabled, and If there is anything wrong in this matter it ought to be remedied by objecting to leave to print hereafter, . . Mr. Burrows. Mr. Speakor, I demand the previous question on my motion. Mr. FiTHiAN. Mr. Speaker, I move that the motion of the gentleman from Michigan, and all the amendments be laid on the table. The question was taken on the motion of Mr. Fithian, and the Speaker declared that the ayes seemed to have it. The House divided ; and there were — ayes 96, noes 70. Mr. Burrows. We will have the yeas and nays, Mr. Speaker. The yeas and nays were ordered, 45 members voting in favor thereof. The question was taken: and there were— yeas isi, nays 71, not voting 136 ; as follows : Yeas— Abbott, Alexander, Amerman, Andrew, Bailey, Baker, Barwlg, Beeman, Bently, Bland, Bowman, Branch, Brawley, Bretz, Brlckner, Bullock, Bunn, Bunting, Busey, Butler, Byrnes, Cable, Camlnetti, Caruth, Causey,Chip- man, Clarke, Ala.: Clover, Cobb, Mo.; Coburn, Compton, Covert, Cox, N. V.; Cox. Tenn.; Craig, Penn.; Craln, Tex.; Crawford, Crosby, Cummings, Daniell, Davis, De Armond, De Forest, Dickerson, Donovan, Elliott, Ellis, Everett, Fithian, Forman, Forney, Gantz, Geary, Geis- senhainer, Gillespie, Goodnight, Hallowell, Halvorson, Hamilton, Harries, Hatch, Hayes, Iowa; Hemphill, Henderson, N. C; Herbert, Holman, Hooker, Miss.; Houk, Ohio; Johnson, Ohio; Johnstone, S. C; ICilKore, Lanham, Layton, Lester, Ga.; Mallory, Martin, McAleer, McCreary, McGann, McKalg, McKeighan, McKinney, Montgomery, Moore, Gates, O'Nell, Mass.; O'Neill, Mo.; Otis, Tage. K. I.; Parrett, Patterson, Tenn., Paynter, Peel, Pendleton, Richardson, Sayers, Scott, Seerley, Shively, Simpson, Steward, III.; Stewart, Tex.; Stone, Ky.; Stout, Stump, Terry, Tillman, Van Horn, Warner, Wash- ineton. Watson, Weadock, Wheeler, Ala.: White. Whiting, Wike, Willlam8,Mass,; Williams, lU.; Wilson, Mo.; WoU verton, Youmans.— lai. Nays— Atkinson, Bankhead, Belden, Bingham, Blount, Boutelle, Bowers, Broderlck, Buchanan, N. J.; Buchanan, Va. ; Burrows, Bushnell, Caldwell, Castle, Clancy, Cobb, Ala.; Coolidge, Culberson, Dalzell, Dixon, Dockery, Dunphy, Edmunds, Epes, Funston, Greenleaf, Griswold, Grout, Hare, Harmer, Haugen, Henderson, Iowa ; Hitt, Huff, JohiMon, Ind.; Johnson. N. Dak.; JoUey, Ketcham, Kyle, Lewis, Little, Lodgv, Long, Loud, Lynch, Mo- Millin, Meredith. Miller, Milliken, O'Neill, Pa.; Perkins, Pickler, Post, Raines. Reyburn, Rife, Smith, Suckhouse, Stephenson, Stone, C. W. ; Stone, W. A. ; Storer, Tarsney, Taylor, E. B. ; Taylor, V. A. ; Townsend, Tucker, Wada- worth, Walker, Warwick, Wise— 71. . . So the motion to lay it on the table was agreed to. PROTECTION OR FREE TRADE?— By Henry Giorgb. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. Near the window by which I write a great bull is tethered by a ring in his nose. Grazing round and round he has wound his rope about the stake until now he stands a close prisoner, tantalized by rich grass he cannot reach, unable even to toss his head to rid him of the flies that cluster on his shoulders. Now and again he strug- gles vainly, and then, after pitiful bellowings, relapses uito silent misery. •.This bull, a very type of massive strength, who, be- ' cause he has not wit enough to see how ne might be free, suffers want in sight of plenty, and is belples^ preyed upon by weaker creatures, seema to me no unfit Mwlem of tiw working I In all lands, men whose toil creates abounding wealth are pinched with poverty, and, while advancing civiliza- tion opens wider vistas and awakens new desires, are held down to bruish levels by animal needs. Bitterly conscious of injustice, feeling in their inmost souis that ^ey were made for more than so narrow a life, they, too, spasmodically struggle and cry out. But unti' they trace effect to cause, until they see how they are fettered and how they may be freed, their struggles and outcries are as vain as those of the bull. Nay, they are vainer. I shall go out and drive the bull in the way that will un- twist his rope. But who shall drive men in„o freedom h Till they use the reason with which they have been gifttd, nothing can avail. For them there la no qiedal providence. Under all forma of government the ultimate power lies with ttat mniiM. It u not kings nor ariatocradesi nor wages kely id extracts iringupon toraunatt »ny objec- 1 pertinent the Hoiue iecorJ they A, and not Int because n the floor, 1 under the House and d the only ,o print. If heir chance .. larks In the >'. ichlgan and 1 if there Is lie remedied he previous tie motion of amendments Mr. Flthlan, id to have it. I — ayes 9«, nd nays, Mr. ers voting In te— yeas isx, Irew, Ballev, man, Branch, nting, Buaey, Causey.Chip- irn, Coospton, Penn.; Grain, ell, Davis, De Elliott, Ellis, , Geary, Gels- 11, Halvorson, a; HemphlU, looker. Hiss.; .C; KUgore, rtln, McAleer, n, McKinney, •.O'Neill, Mo.; inn., Paynter, cott, Seerley, ix.; Stone, Ky.; Varner, Washr ^hlte. Whiting, ton. Mo.; Wot igham, Blount, .J.; Buchanan, Clancy, Cobb, bcon, Dockery, leaf, Griswold, in, Iowa; Hltt, ,Uey, Ketcham, d. Lynch, Mc- , ta.; Perkins, th, Suckhouse, itorer,Tanmey, Tucker, Wads- agreed to. lunding wejltlt ancing civilisa- ew desires, are needs. Bitterly nost souis that a life, they, too, unti- they trace re fettered and nd outcries are are vainer. I lythat will un- nin..o freedom ft hey have been E. is no special Imate power lies rlstocrades, nor landns to laborers, it is also the most important of questions to society at large. Whatever improves the condition of the lowest ana broadest social stratum must promote the true interests of all. Where the wages of common labor are high and remunerative employment is easy to obtain, prosperity will be general. Where wages are highest, there will be the largest production and the moat equit- able distribution of wealth. There will Invention be most active and the brain best guide the hand. There will be the greatest comfort, the widest diffusion of knowledge, the purest morals and the truest patriot- ism. If we would have a healthy, a happy, an en- lightened and a virtuous people, il we would have a pure government, firmly based on the popular will and quickly responsive to it, we must strive to raise wages and keep them high. I accept as good and praiseworthy the ends avowea by the advocates of protective tariffs. What I propose to inquire is whether protective tariffs are in reality conducive to these ends. To do this thor- oughly I wish to go over all the ground upon which pr«>- tective tariffs are advocated or defended, to consider what effect the opposite policy of free trade would have, and to stop not until conclusions are reached of which we may feel absolutely sure. • To some it may seem too much to think that this can be done. For a century no question of public policy has been so widely and persistently debated as that of Pro- tection vs. Free Trade. Yet it seems to-day as far as ever from settlement— so far, indeed, that many have come to deem it a question as to which no certain con- clusions can be reached, and i.-^any more to regard it as too complex and abstruse to be understood by those who have not equipped themselves by long study. This is, indeed, a hopelesu view. We may safely leave many branches of knowledge to such as can devote them- selves to special pursuits. We may safely accept what chemists tell us of chemistry, or astronomers oi^ astron- omy, or philologists of the development of language, or anatomists of our internal structure, for not only are . there in such investigations no pecuniary temptations to warp the judgment, out the ordinary duties of men and of citizens do not call for such special knowledge, and the great body of a people may entertain the crudest notions as to such things and yet lead happy and useful lives. Far different, however, is it with matters which relate to the production and distribution of wealth, and which thus directly affect the comfort and livelihood of men. The intelligence which can alone safely guide in these matters must be the intelligence of the masses, for as to such thinss it is the common opinion, and not the opinion of the teamed few, that finds expression in legislation. If the knowledge required for the proper ordering of public affairs belike the knowledge required for the pre- diction of an eclipse, the making of a chemical analysis, or the decipherment of a cuneiform inscription, or even like the knowledge required in any branch of art or handicraft, then the shortness of hitman life and the necessities of human existence mu; . >'v'i tver condemn the masses of men to ig^noranyeof m^.i-'i.: which directly affect their means of subsistence. ^ this be so, then popular government is hopeless, and, confronted on one side by the fact, to which all experience testifies, that a people can never safely trust to any portion ot their num- ber the making of regulations which affect their earn, ings, and on the other by the fact that the masses can never see for themselves the effect of such regulations, the only prospect before mankind is that the many must always be ruled and robbed by the few. But this is not so. Political economy is only the economy of human aggregates, and its laws are laws which we may individually recognize. What Is required for their elucida- tion is not long arrays of statistics nor the collocation of laboriously ascertained facts, but that sort of clear think- ing which, keeping in mind the distinction between the part and the wnole, seeks the relations of familiar things, and which is as possible for the unlearned as for ue learned. Whether protection does or does not Increase national wealth, whether it does or does not benefit the laborer, are questions that from their nature must admit of decisive answers. That the controversy between protec- tion and free trade, widely and energetically as it has been carried on, has as yet led to no accepted conclusion cannot therefore be due to difficulties inherent In the subject. It may in part be accounted for by the fact that powerful pecuniary Interests are concerned In the issue, for it is true, as Macaulay said, that If large pecuniary "interests were concerned in denying the attraction of gravitation, that most obvious o( physical facts would have dlsputers. But that so many fair-minded men who have no special interests to serve are stUl at variance on this subject can only, it seems to me, be fully explained ■'^mKi-^-fhf- ■■I m ' m tte UUBpUOB that tlw ditenMloii hM not been carried ter •OMfh to bring oat that full truth which harmonlzei •UHurtUl truths. 'Aa prceent condition of the controrerajr, indeed, ahowa tUa to be the (act. In the literature of the subject I know of no woric in which the inouiry lus yet been carried to ita proper end At to the effect of protection upon the fwoduction of wealth, all haa probably been eald that can M said ; but that part of the question which relates to wagea and which u primarily concerned wirh the distri- bution of wealth has not been adequately ueated. Yet this is the very heart of the controversy, the ground from which, until it is thoroughly explored, faUacies and con- fusions must constantly arise, to envelop in obscurity even that which has of itself been suiHciently explained. The reason of this failure is not far to seek. Political economy is the simplest of the sciences. It Is but the Intellectual recognkion, as related to social life, of laws which in their moral aspect men Instinctively recognize, and which are embodied in the simple teachings of Him whom the common people heard gladly. But, like Christianity, political economy has been warped by in- atitutiona which, denving the equality and brotherhood «[ man^ have enlistea authority, silenced objection, and Ingrained themselves in custom and habit of thought. Its professors and teachers have abaost Invariably belonged to or ikeen dominated by that class which tolerates no qoMloning of social adjustments that give to those who do not Ubor the fruiu of labor's toil. They have been like physicians employed to make a diagnosis on con- dition that they shall discover no unpleasant truth. Given social conditions such as those that throughout the dvUiied world to-day shock the moral sense, and politi- cal economy, fearlessly pursued, must lead to conclusions . that will be as a lion in the way of those who have any tenderness for "vested interests." But in the colleges and universities of our time, as In the Sanhedrim of old, It Is Idle to expect any enunciation of truths unwelcome to the powers that be. Adam Smith demonstrated clearly enough that protect- ive tariffs hamper the production of wealth. But Adam ^mith— the university professor, the tutor and pensioner of the Duke of Buccleuch, the prospective holder of a government place— either did not deem it prudent to go further, or, as is more probable, was prevented from seeing the necessity of domg so by the atmosphere of his time and pUce. He at any rate failed to cairy his great inquiry into the causes which from "that original state of things in which the production of labor constitutes the naturalrecompenseor wages of labor" had developed a state of things in which natural wages seemed to be only such part of the produce of labor as would enable the Uborer to exist. And, following Smith, came Malthus, to formulate a doctrine which throws upon the Creator the responsibility for the want and vice that flow from man's injustice— a doctrine which has barred from the inquiry which Smith did not pursue even such high and generous minds as that of John Stuart Mill. Some ofthe publications of the Anti-Com-Law League contain indications that if the struggle over the English corn laws had been longer continued, the discussion might have been pushed further than the question of revent^ tariff or protective tariff; but, ending as it did, the capiulists of the Manchester school were satisfied, and In such discussion as has since ensued English free traders, with few exceptions, have made no further advance, while American advocates of free trade have merely followed the English free traders. On the other hand, the advocates ofprotection have evinced a like indisposition to venture on burning ground. They extol the virtues of protection as furnishing em- ployment, without asldng how it comes that any one should need to be furnished with employment; they assert that protection maintains the rate of wages, without ex- plaining what determines the rate of wages. The ablest of them, under the lead of Carey, have rejected the Mal- thusian doctrine, but only to set up an equally untenable optimistic theoiy which serves the same purpose of barring inquiry into the wrongs of labor, and which has been borrowed by Continental free traders as a weapon with which to fignt the agitation for social reform. That, so far as it has yet gone, the controversy between protection and free trade has not been carried to its logi- cal conclurions is evident from the positions which both sides occupy. Protectionists and free tr^iders alike seem to lack the courage of their convictions. If protection have the virtues claimed for it, why should it be confined to the restriction of imports from foreign countries ? If it really " provides employment " and raises wages, then a condition of things in which hundreds of thousands vainly seek employment, and. wages touch the point of bare subsistence, demands a far more vigorous appli- cation of this benefldent principle than any (.rotectionist haa yet proposed. On the other hand, if the principle of fjm tram »« tniti the tubatittttion of • revenue tariff for a orotectlva tariff Is a ridlculomly iadBdeiit KpplkatiM oj it. Like the two knights of allegory, who, halting o^e ea each side of the shield, continued to dispute about h whaa the advance of either must have revealed a truth thak would have ended their controversy, protectkMilsts and free traders stand to-day. Let it be ours to carry the In- quiry wherever it may lead. The fact is, that fully to understand the tariff question we must go beyond thr tariff question as ordinarily debated. And here, it nay be, we shall find ground on which honest div^gencies of opinion may be reconciled, and facts which seem conflict ing may fau into harmonious relations. CHAPTER II. CLBARINO CaOfNO. •'/ The protectiye theory has ceruiniy the weight of nuiak general acceptance. Forty years ago all civilised coun- tries based their policy upon it; and though Great Britain has since discarded it, she remains the only considerable nation that has done so, while not only have her own colonies, as soon as they have obtained the power, shown a disposition to revert to it, but such a disposition has of late years been growing in Great Britain herself. It should be remembered, however, that the presump- tion in favor of any belief generally entertained baa ex- isted in favor of many beliefs now known to be entirely erroneous, and is especially weak in the case of a theory which, like that of protection, enlists the support of pow- erful special interests. The history of mankind every- where shows the power that special interests, capable of organization and action, may exert in securing the ac- ceptance of the most monstrous doctrines. We nave, in- dc«d, only to look around us to see how easily a small special interest may exert greater influence in forming opinion and making laws than a large general interest. As what is everybody's business is nobody's business, so what is everybody's interest is nobody's interest. Two or three citizens of a seaside town see that the building of a custom-house or the dredging of a creek will put monqr In their pockets; a few silver miners conclude that it will be a good thing for them to have the government stow away some millions Of silver every month; a navy coiV' tractor wants the profit of repairing useless iron h Great Briuin ly contldermble have her own ! power, shown ipoaition haa of heraelf. t the presuinp< rtained basex- t to be entirely ase of a theory upportof pow- nankind every- ests, capable of ecuring the ac- i. We nave, in- r easily a small nee in forming (cneral interest. ly's business, so interest. Two : the building of will put money lude that it will >venunent stow Lh; a navy con- ess Iron-dads or ind again suCh I larger Intereau arer than that a at least as good Yet special in- and maintain a d reason can b« )rotective urifli feneral benefit, hem active in 1 of large means in whicb large >n occasion, as a ropagating their •n the organs of (ittary, oners no srest, and in the r injuries which » are not f dt so ially. r interests which despread accept- 1 which they are s do constitute a ling opinion and ,ct weakens the wotection might lose who believ4-'^ constantly heardP >r themselves. I an effective ally ivhich are in part I that have made Ished and devaa- lave everywhere ive been induced lavement al existence Am- Dtective tariff of owed; but since on, ito American itional prejudice m American sy^ ition. Just now mm^ 0mm s^^a^.i- Vong nppinrtijni lih Mart, and, in ■ftvaiiiiiat tvtrytblaff Brittah wL.., ana wialu have engendered la the Irtih the words of a recent political platform. Iriah-Americar are called upon " to resist the introduction into America of the English theory of free trade, which has been so Bucceasfully used as a means to destroy the industries and oppress the people of Ireland." Even if free trade had originated in Great Britain we should be as foolish in rejecting it on that account as we should be in refusing to speak our mother tongue because it is of British origin, or in going back to hand and water gtwer because steam engines were first introduced in reat Britain. But, in truth, free trade no more originated In Great Briuin than did the habit of walking on the feet. Free trade is the natural trade— the trade that goes on in the absence of artificial restrictions. It is protection that had to be invented. But instead of being invented in the United Sutes, it was in full force in Great Briuin long before the United Sutes were thought of. It would be nearer the truth to say that protection origina'M in Great Briuin, for, if the system did not originate there, it was fully developed there, and it is from that country that it has been derived by us. Nor yet did the reaction against it originate in Great Briuin, but in France, among a school of eminent men headed by Queanay, who were Adam Smith's predecessors ana in many things his teachers. These French economists were what neither Smith nor any subsequent British economist or sutesman has been— true free traders. They wished to sweep away not merely protective duties, but all taxes, direct and indirect, save a single Ux upon land values. This logical conclusion of free-trade principles the so-called British free traders have shirked, and it meeu to-day as bitter opposition from the Cobden Club as from American pro- tectioniiiU, The only sense in which we can properly speak of " British free trade " is the same sense in which we speak of a ceruin imitation meUl as " German silver." "British free trade" is spurious free trade. Great Briuin doea not really enjoy free trade. To say nothing of internal taxes, inconsistent with true free trade, she still maintains a cordon of custom house officers, coast guards and baggajEe searchet's, and still collects over a hundred million dollars of her revenue from import duties. To be sure, her Uriff is " for revenue ^nly," out a Uriff for revenue only is not free trade. The ruling classes of Great Britain have adopted only so much free trade as suits their class interesu, and the battle for free trade in that country has yet to be fought. On the other hand, it is absurd to Ulk of protection as an American system. It had been fully developed in Europe before the American colonies were planted, and during our colonial period England maintained a more thorough system of protection than now anywhere exists, —a system which aimed at building up English industries not merely by protective duties, but by the repression of like industries In Ireland and the colonies, and wherever else throughout the world English power could be exerted, what we got of protection was the wrong side of it, in regulations intended to prevent American in- dustries from competing with those of the mother coun- try and to give to her a monopoly of the American trade. The irriution produced in the growing colonies by these restrictions was the main cause of Uie revolution which made of them an independent nation. Protection- ist ideas were doubtless at that time latent among our people, for they permeated the menul atmosphere of the civilized world, but so little disposition was there to em- body those ideas in a national policy, that the American represenutives in negotiating the treaty of peace en- deavored to secure complete freedom of trade between the United Sutes and Great Briuin. This was refused by England, then and for a long time afterward com- pletely dominated by protective ideas. But during the period following the revolution in which the American Union existed under tlie Articles of Confederation, no UriS hampered Imporutions into the American Sutes. The adoption of the Constitution made a Federal Uriff possible, and to give the Federal Government an inde- pendent revenue a uriff was soon imposed ; but although Srotection had then begun to find advocates in the United Utes, this first American Uriff was almost nominal as compared with what the British tariff was then or our Urift is now. And in the Federal Constitution sute Uriffs were prohibited— a step which has resulted in giving to the principle of free trade the greatest extension it nas had in modem times. Nothing could more clearly tdbow how far the American people then were from accepting the theories of protection since popularized among Uiem, for the national idea had not then acquired the force it haa since gained, and if protection had then been looked upon as necessary, the different Sutes would not without a struggle have given up the power of imposing Uriffs of '*— •- iwn. ould protectta tmrt reached itt prewot height la tha Unhtd StattabM for the ehrfl wtr. White tion was coacantratad on the ttnMwto I sending their sons to the battlefield, tha Interem that sought protection look advantage of the patrlotlam that was ready for any sacrifice to secure protective taxca such as had never before been dreamed of— taxes which they have ever since managed to keep hi force, and even in many cases to Increase. The truth is that protection is no more American than Is the distinction made in our regular army and navy bo- tween commissioned officers ana enlisted men— a dieting tion not of degree but of kind, so that there Is between the highest non-commissioned officer aad the lowest oon- miiaioned officer a deep gulf fixed, a gulf which can onljr bo likened to that which exisu between white and blacK where the color line Is drawn sharpest. This distinction is historically a aurvival of that made In the armies of aristocratic Europe, when they were officered by noblea and recruited from peasanu, and has been copied by us in the same spirit of imitation that has led us to copy other undemocratic customs and instltutiona. Though we preserve this aristocratic distinction after It haa been abandoned in some European countries, it is in no sense American. It neither originated with ua nor does it con> sort with our distinctive ideaa and institutions. So it la with protection. Whatever be iu economic merlu there can be no doubt that It conflicu with those ideas of natu> ral right and personal freedom which received national expression in the esublishmentof the American Republic, and which we have been accustomed to regard aa dia> tinctively American. What more incongruous than the administering of custom-house oaths and the searching of trunka and hand-bags under th? shadow of "Libntr Enlightening the World " ? Aa for the assertion that " the English theory of fret trade" haa been used "to destroy the industries and oppress the people of Ireland," the truth is that it waa "tne English theory of protection" that was so used. The restrictions which Eiritish protection imposed upon the American colonies were trivial as compared with those imposed upon Ireland. The successful resistance of the colonies roused in Ireland the same spirit, and led to the great movement of " Irish Volunteers," who, with cannon bearing the inscription " Free Trade or 1" forced the repeal of those restrictions and won for a tlm« IrMi legislative independence. Whether Irish industries that were unquestionablf hampered and throttled by British protection could now be benefited by Irish protection, like the question whether grotecUon benefiu the United Sutes, is only to be settled y a determination of the effects of protection upon the country that imposes it. But without going into that, it is evident that the free trade between Great Briuin and Ireland which has existed since the union in iSox, haa tut been the cause of the backwardness of Irish industry. There is one part of Ireland which has enjoyed compara- tive prosperity and in which imporunt Industries have grown up— some of them, such as the building of iron ships, for which natural advanUges cannot be claimed. How can this be explained on the theory that Irish ia- dustries cannot be re-esublished without protection ? If the very men who are now trying to persuade Irisb- American voters that Ireland has been impoverished by " British Free Trade" were privately asked the cause of the greater prosperity of Ulster over other paru of lr» land, they would probably give the answer made familiar by religious bigotry— that Ulster is enterprising and firosperous because it is ProtesUnt, while the rest oi reland is sluggish and poor because it is Catholic. But the true reason is plain. It is, that the land tenure in Ulster haa been such that a larger portion of the wealth produced has been left there than in other parU of Ire- land , and that the mass of the people have not been ao re- morselessly hunted and oppressed. In Presbyterian Skye the same general poverty, the same primitive condittona of industry exist aa in Catholic Connemara, and iu cauae is to be seen in the same rapacious system of landlordiatn "Which has carried off the f ruiu of industry and prevented the accumulation of capiul. To attribute the Backward- ness of industry among a people who are steadily stripped of all they can produce above a bare Uving, to the want of a protective Uriff or to religious opinions Is like attributing the sinking of a scuttled ship to the loss of her figurehead or the color of her paint. What, however, in the United Sutes at least, haa tended more than any appeals to national fediag to di» pose the masses in favor of protection, haa becathe dif- ference of attitude toward the working claaaea assumed by the contending policies. In its beginnlagi In this country protection was stron;qre8t In those sections where labor bad the largest opportunities and was held in the highest esteem, while the strength of free tnule has been the greatest in the section in which up to the civil war ■lavery prevailed. The political paifwhlebauoceMfuUr i t 6 i ^ tiM tMfiMHM of tht llAVt pOWtr tlK d«- ' eland for a protacUT* urUf , whita tha man who triad to rand tha Union in order to aatabllah a nation baaed upon tha right of capiul to own labor, prohibited orotaction In tha Gonatitution they (ormad. TIm aipUnatlon of thaaa facta la, that in one aaction of tha country there were ■any tnduatriea that could ba protected, while In the otlMr iection there were few. while American cotton oihura waa in iu earlier atafee, Southern cotton plantera were willing enough to avail Ihemaelvea of a heavy duty on India oottona, anaLouiaiana sugar jgrowera have alwaya been peralatent sticklers for protection. But when cotton ralaed for export became the great staple of the South, protection, in the absence of manufactures, waa not only clearly op(x>sed to dominant Southern intercata, but a»- aumed tha character of a aectional imposition by which tha South was uxed for the benefit of the North. This sectional division on tha tariff question had no reference whatever to the conditlona of hbor, but in many minds Ita effect haa been to aasoc'ate protection with respect for labor and free Uade with iu enslavement. Irrespective of this there haa been much in the presen- tation of the two theoriea to dispose the working classes toward protection and against free trade. Workingmen Eenerally feel that they do not get a fair reward for their ibor. They luiow that what prevents them from suc- cessfully demanding higher wages Is the competition of others anxious for work, and they are naturally disposed to favor the doctrine or jparty that proposes to shield them from competition. This, its-advocates urge, is the aim of protection. And whatever protection accomplishea, protectionists at least profem regard for the working classee, and proclaim their desire to use the jpowers «» Stvemment to raise and maintain wages. Protection, ay declare, means the protection of labor. So constantly is this reiterated that many suppose that this is the real derivation of the term, and that ^'protection " is short for " protection of labor." On the other hand, he opponenta of protection have, for the most part, not only professed no special interest in the well-being of the working classes, and no desire to raise wages, but have denied the justice of attempting to use the powers of government for this purpose. The doctrines of free trade have l>een intertwined with teachings that throw upon the laws of nature responsi- bility for the poverty of the laboring class, and foster a calloua Indifference to their sufferings. On the same grounds on which they have condemned legislative inter- ference with commerce, free-trade economists have con- demned interference with hours of labor, with the rate of wages, and even with the employment of women and children, and have united protection and tradea unionism In the same denunciation, proclaiming supply and de- mand to be the only true and rightful regulator of the price of labor as of the price of pig iron. While protest- ing against restrictions upon the production of wealth, they nave ignored the monstrous injustice of its distribu- tion, and have treated as fair and normal that competi- tion in which human beings, deprived of their natur J opportunities of employing themselves, are compelled by biting want to bia Mamst one another. AlTthia la true. But it Is also true that the needs of labor reouiie more than kind words, and are not to be satisfied by such soft phrases as we address to a horse when we want to catch him that we may put a bit in his mouth and a saddle on his back. Let me ask those who are disposed to regard protection as favorable to the aspirations of labor, to considsr whether it can be true that what labor needs is to be protected ? To admit tliat labor needs protection is to acknowledge Its Inferiority: it is to acquiesce in an assumption that degrades the workman to the position of a dependant, and leads logically to the claim that the employee is bound to vote In the interest of the employer who /r^vii^f him with work. There is something in the very word "protMtion" that ought to make workingmen cautious ol accepting anything presented to them under it. The protection oi the masses has In all times been the pretense of tyranny— the plea of monarchy, of aristocracy, of special privilege of every Idnd. The slave owners justified slavery aa protecting the slavea. British misrule in Ireland is upheld on the ground that It Is for the protection of the Irish. But, whether under a monarchy or under a republic. Is there an instance In the history of the world In which the " protection " of the laboring masses has not meant their opprendon ? The protection that those who have got the law-making power in their hands have given to labor, haa at belt always been the protection that man gives to cattle— he protects them that he may ua: and eat them. There runs through protectionist professions of concern for labor a tone of condescending patronage more inaulN ing to men who feel the true dignity of labor than frankly cipressed contempt could be— an assumption that pauper- iNiittlwiiatnnl oonditioa of tabor, to wbkb it ffluat everywhere fall ualaia baatrelmUf protactad. h k mrtr Intimated that the land-owner or tfia capnaUal naada pro- tection. They, it ia always asawMd, can uke car* of themselves. It is only the poor worUngman who Buat be protected. What is labor that it should wn aeed protection ^ Is not labor the creator of capiul. the producer of all wealth t la It not the men who labor tnat feed and ckHhe all others } Is it not true, aa haa been said, that the three 8reat orders of society are "worUngmen, beggarmen and lievcc?" How, then, does It come that workingmen alone need protection } When the first man came upon the earth who waa there to protect hia> or to provide nim with employraentr Yet whenever or however he casM he must have managed to get a living and raise a familyl > When we conaider that labor ia the producer of all \ \ wealth. Is it not evident that the impoverishment and dependence of Ubor are abnormal conditions resulting from vestrictiona and usurpations, and that Instead o! accepting protection, what bibor should demand ia frea- dom. That thow who advocate any extenalon of freedom chooee to go no further than suiu their own special pur< ppae ia no reason why freedom Itself should be distrusted. For years it was held that the assertion of our Declaratloo of Independence that all men are created equal and en- dowed by their Creator with unalienable rights, applied only to white men. But this in no wise vitiated the prin- ciple. Nor does It vitiate the principle that it la atUI beM to apply only to political rights. And so, that freedom oi trade has been advocated by thoaewho have no s^~~'"*^ ...... ^ .. judice us dpatlon lo have no sympathy with Ubor should not pre- I against it. Can the road to the industrial emao- of u« maiMS be any other than that of freedom t CHAPTER III. or MBTHOD. On the deck of a ship men are pulling on a rope and on her mast a yard is rising. A man aloft is clinging to the Uckle that raises the yard. Is his weight assisting iu rise or retarding it } That, of course depends on what part of the tackle his weight is thrown upon, and can only be told by noticing whether its tendency is with or against the efforu of those who pull on deck. If in things so simple we may easily err in assuming cause from effect, how much more liable to error are such assumptions in regard to the complicated phenomena of social life. Much that la urged In current discussions of the tariil question is of no validity whatever, and however it may serve the purpose of controversy, cannot aid in the dis- covery of truth. That a thing exisu with or follows another thing is no proof that it is because of that other thing. This assumption is the fallacy >m/ Aoe, trgo i>r«^ Ur hocy which leads, if admitted, to the most preposter- ous conclusions. Wages In the United Sutesaremgher than In England, and we differ from England In having a protective tariff. But the aaaumption that the one fan Is oecause of the other, ia no more valid than would ba the assumption that these higher wages are due to our decimal coinag or to our republican form of govern- ment. That England haa grown In wealth since the abo- lition of protection pr ves no more for free trade than the growth f the United Sutes under a protective urifl does for protection. It does not follow that an Instltutlmi is good because a country haa prospered tinder it, nor bad because a country In which it exisu is not prosper^ ous. It does not even follow that Institutions to b* found In all prosperous countries and not to be .'ound In backward countries are therefore beneficial. For thia, at various times, might have been confidently asserted of slavery, of polygamy, of aristocracy, of esublished churches, and it may still be asserted of public debts, of private property in land, of pauperism, or of the exist- ence of distinctively vicious or criminal classes. Nor •vcn when it can be shown that ceruin changes in tha prosperity of a country, of an Industry or of a cuss, have followed certidn other changes in laws or institutions can it be inferred that the two are related to each other aa effect and cause, unless It can also be shown that tha assigned cause tends to produce the assigned effect, or unless, what ia clearly ImptMwIble in most cases, it can be shown that there Is no other cause to which the effect can be attributed. The almost endless multiplicity of causes consuntly operating In human societies, and the almost endless interference of effect with effect, make that pop- ular mode of reasoning wUcb logicians call the method of simple enumeration worse than uaelesa in aodal investigar tiona. . I Aa 1m criiMMvpoa ■utisUca, that invohts ttead^ . hiii tnwdapfD- kin cut of who km} It not aUwtaldir id clothoaU t tilt thrtt gtrmtn and rorUncmtn carat upon proTidt him tr ht camt IM a fomllyl luctr of all ihmtnt and u rttulUnv t Intttad oi und la f ro^ I of freedom ■ptcialpur^ e diitnuted. Dcclaratloo lual and tn- ;nu, applied ted the prin- tUitUllitld liTocattd bjr luld not pre> atrial enan- of freedom r rope and on iging to tba ■tingitariat I what part can only be I or agalnat in amuming ror are tuch enomena of of the tariff 'ever it may d in the dia- 1 or foUowB i that other t prepoattr- aarenigher td In having the one fact ui would be due to our I of govem- nce ue abo- e trade than tective uriff n institution nder it, nor not protpefw Liona to b« be /ound In For thia, at aaserted of esubliahed lie debta,of if thcexitt- lasses. Nor uigea intiM tciaaB,have itutions can kch other aa ra that the d effect, or es, it can bo le effect can y of causes thealfflott te that pop* e method of ainvtitifft* tional difRenltf of kaowiiiff wiMthar wt hate tht right ■utittict. Though " flguret cannot He," there it in their collection and grouping tuch liability to overtight and ■uch temptation to bias that they are to be distrusted tn matters of controTersy until thcv have been subjected to rigid examination. Tne value of most arguments turning upon sutlstics is well illustrated in the story of the gov- ernment clerk who, beins told to get op the statistics of a certain Question, wished nrst to Itnow which side it was desired that they should support. Under their imposing appearance of exactness may lurk the gravest errors and wildest assumptions, To ascertain the effect of protective tariffs, we must inquire what they are and how they operate. When we. thus discover their nature and tendencies, we shall be Mable to weigh what is said (or or against them, and have a clue oy which we may trace their results amid the complications of social phenomena. For the largest communities are but expansions of the smallest com- munities, and the rules of arithmetic by which we cal- culate gain or loss on transactions of dollars apply as well to transactions of hundreds of millions. Thus the (acts we must use and the principles we must apply are common (acts that are known to all and prin- cfples that are recognized in every-day life. Starting from premises as to which there can be no dispute, we have onlv to be careful as to our steps in order to reach conclusions of which we may (eel sure. We cannot ex- periment with communities as the chemist can with ma- terial substances, or the physiologist can with animals. Nor can we Und nations so alike in all other respects that we can sa(ely attribute any difference in their conditions to the presence or absence o( a single cause without first assuring ourselves o( the tendency o( that cause. But the imagination puts at our command a method of inves- tigating economic problems which is within certain limits hardly less useful tnan actual experiment. We may test the working of known principles by mentally separating, combining or eliminating conditions. Let me explain what I mean by an illustration I have once before used.* When I was a boy I went down to the whar( with an- other boy to see the first iron steamship that had ever crossed the ocean to Philadelphia. Now, hearing o( an iron steamship seemed to us then a good deal like hearing o( a leaden kite or a wooden cooking-stove. But we had not been long aboard of her before my comrade said in a tone of contemptuous disgust: "Pooh! I seehowitis. She's all lined with wood : thafs the reason she floats." I could not controvert him for the moment, but I was not satisfied, and sitting down on the wharf when he left me, I set to , work trying mental experiments. If it was the woodin- side of her that made ner float, then the more wood the higher she would float ; and, mentally, I loaded her up with wood. But, as I was familiar with the process of making boats out of blocks o( wood, I at once saw that, instead of floating higher she would sink deeper. Then, I mentally took all the wood out of her, as we dug out our wooden boats, and saw that thus tightened she would float higher still. Then, in imagination, I jammed a hole in her and saw that the water would run in and she would sink, as did our wooden boats when iMllasted with leaden keels. And thus I saw, as clearly as though I could have actually made these experiments with the steamer, that it was not the wooden lining that made her float, but her hollowness, or, as I would now phrase it, her displacement of water. In such ways as this, with which we are all familiar, we can isolate, analyze or combine economic principles, and, by extending or diminishing the scale of propositions, either subject them to inspection through a mental mag- nifying glass or bring a larger field into view. And this eau one can do for nimself . In the inquiry upon which we are about to enter, all I ask of the reader is that he tball in nothing trust to me. CHAPTER IV. 1^ PROTBCTION AS A UNIVERSAL NEBD, To understand a thing it is often well to begin by look- ing at it, as it were, from the outside and observing its relations, before examining it in detail. Let us do this with the protective theory. ^otectlon, as the term has come to signify a certain! national policy, mears the levying of duties upon im-l ported commodities for the purpose of protecting fromj competition the home producers of such commodities.! Pirotectionlste contend that to secure the highest prosper- 1 Ity of each nation It should produce for itself everything | It is capable of producing, and that to this end its home I *Lecturt before the studenu of the Univarsity of Cali- foniia, on the " S^^ of Political Economy," April, 1877. induatrin itould b« protMtad agalntt the CMBpMitli foreign Industries, They also contend (In tnt Unit States at least) that to enable workmen to obtain at bk wages as possible they should be protected by tarU duties against the competition countries where the corn relations. the correctness he competition of goods produced In wages are lower, without disputing of tnis theory let us consider Its lanrtr The protective theory, it is to be obatrved, amrtt a general law, as true In one country as in anothtr. How- ever protectionists In the United States may talk of "American protection" and "British free trade," pro- tection is, and of necessity must be, advocated as of universal application. American protectionists ust tht arguments of foreign protectionists, and even where they complain that the protective policy of other coun- tries is Injurious to us, commend it as an example which we should follow. They contend that (at least up to a certain point in national development) protection to everywhere beneficial to a nation, and free ;rade every- where injurious; that the prosperous nations have built up their prosperity by protection, and that all nationa that would be prosperous must adopt that policy. And their arguments must be universal to have any :)laual- blilty, for It would be absurd to assert that a theory of national growth and prosperity applies to some countrlat and not to others. Let me ask the reader who has hitherto accepted tht protective theory to consider what Its necessarily uni- versal character Involves. It was the realisation of thto that first led me to question that theory. I was for a number of years after I had come o( age a protectionist, or rather, I supposed I was, (or, without real examination] I had accepteid the belle(, as In the first place we all accept our belie(s, on the authority of others. So far, however, as I thought at all on the subject, I was logical, and I well remember how when the Florida and AMam» were sinking American ships at set, I thought their depredations, after all, a good thing (or il.e state In which I lived— California— since the Increased risk and < ost of ocean carriage In American ships (then the only way of bringing goods (rom the Eastern States to California) would give to her Infant Industries something of that needed protection against the lower wages and better established industries of the Eastern States which tht Federal Constitution prevented her from securing by a state tariff. The (ufl bearing of such notions never occurred to me till I happened to hear the protective theory elaborately expounded by an able man. Ashe urged that American industries must be protected from the competition of foreign countries, that we ought to work up our own raw materials and allow nothing to be imported that we could produce for ourselves, I oegan to realize that these propositions. If true, must be uni- versally true, and that not only should tytry nation shut ItseK out (rom every other nation ; not only should the various sections o( ttvtry large country institute tariffs of their own to shelter their industries (rom the competition of other sections, but that the reason given why no people should obtain (rom abroad anvthing they might malce at home, must apply as well to tlir family. It waa this that led me to weigh arguments I had bclore accepted without real examination. It seems to me impossible to consider the necessarilv universal character of the protective theory without feel- ing it to be repugnant to moral perceptions and Incon- sistent with the simplicity and harmony which we every- where discover in natural law. What should we think of human laws framed (or the government of a country which should compel each family to keep constantly on their guard against every other (amily, to expend a largt part o( their ume and labor in preventing exchanges with their neighbors, and to seek their own prosperity by op- posing the natural efforts o( other families to become prosperous ? Yet the protective theory implies that lawa such as these have been imposed by the Creator upon tht families of men who tenant this earth. It implies that by virtue of social laws, as immutable as the physical laws, each nation must stand jealously on guard against every other nation and erect artificial obstacles to natiomu Intercourse. It Implies that a federation of mankind, such as that which prevents the establishment of tariffi between the states of the American Union, would be a disaster to the race, and that in an ideal world each nation would be protected from every other nation ,by a cordon of tax collectors, with their attendant spies and informers. Such a theory might consort with that form of polythe- ism which assigned to each nation a separate ana hostile God ; but it is hard to reconcile it with the idea of the unity of the Creative Mind and the universality of law. Imagine a Christian missionary expounding to a newly discovered people the sublime truths of the gospel of peace and love— the fatherhood of God ; the brotherhood of nun; the duty of regarding the Imcrettr of our neigb> 10 r/ B til bon Mnnjpjwltli our own, and of doing to othen u we would nave tn«m do to us. Could he, in the aame breath, IP on to declare that, by virtue of the laws of this same ' God, each nation, to prosper, must defend itself against all other nations by a protective tariff. Religion and experience alike teach us that the highest good of each is to be sought in the good of others; that the true interests of men are harmonious, not antagonis- tic; that prosperity is the daughter of good will and peace: and that want and destruction follow enmity and strife. The protective theory, on the other hand, implies the opposition of national interests; that the gain of one people is the loss of others; that each must seelc its own good ky constant efforts to get advantage over others and to prevent others from getting advantage over it. It makes of nations rivals instead of co^perators; it incul- cates a warfare of restrictions and prohibitions and aearchings and seizures, which differs in weapons, but not in spirit, from that warfare which sinks snips and burns cities. Can we imagine the nations beaming their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks and yet maintaining hostile tariffs. No matter whether he call himself Christian or Deist, or Agnostic or Atheist, who can look about him without seeing that want and suffering flow inevitably from selfishne^^, and that in any community the golden rule which '.caches us to regard the interests of others as care- fully as our own would bring not only peace but plenty 7 Can it be that what is true of individuals ceases to be true of nations— that in one sphere the law of prosperity is the law of love: in the other that of strife r On the contrary, universal history testifies that poverty, deg.adation and enslavement are the inevitable results of that spirit which leads nations to regard each other as rivals and enemies. Every political truth must be a moral truth. Yet who cj^n accept the protective theory as a moral truth ? A few months ago I found myself one night, with four other passengers, In the smoking car of a Pennsylvania limited express train traveling west. The conversation, beginning with fast trains, turned to fast steamers, and then to custom-house experiences. One told how, coming from Europe with a trunk filled with presents for bis wife, he had significantly said to the custom-house inspector de- tailed to examine his trunks that he was in a hurry. " How much of a hurry ? " said the officer. " Ten dollars' worth of a hurry," was the reply. The officer took a ' quick look through the trunk and remarked, " That's not much of a hurry for all this." "I gave him ten more," said the story teller, "and he chalked the trunk." Then another told how under simitar circumstances he had. placed a magnificent meerschaum pipe so that it would be the first thing seen on lifting tiie trunk lid, and, when the officer admired it, had repned that it was his. The third said he simply put a greenback conspicuously in the first article of luggage; and the fourth told how his plan was to crumple up a note and put it with his keys in the ofllcer's hands. Here were four reputable business men, as I afterward found them to be— one an iron worker, one a coal pro- ducer, and the other two manufacturers— men of at least average morality and patriotism, who not only thought it no harm to evade the tariff, but who made no scruple of the false oath necessary, and regarded the bribery of . customs officers as a good joke. I had the curiosity to edge the conversation from this to the subiect of tree trade, when I found that all four were staunch protec- tionists, and by edging it a little further I found tnat all four were thorough believers in the right of an employer to discharge any workman who voted for a free trade candidate, nolding, as they put it, that no one ought to eat the bread of an employer whose interests he opposed. I recall this conversation because it is typical. Who- ever has traveled on transatlantic steamers has listened to such conversations, and is aware that the great majority of the American protectionists who visit Europe return with purchases which they smuggle through, even at the expense of a "custom-house oath" and a green- back to the examining officer. Many of our largest under-valuation smugglers have been men of the highest social and religious standing, who gave freely of their spoils to churches and benevolent societies. Not long ago a highly respected b?.nker, an extremely religious man, who had probably neglected the precautions of my smok- ing-car friends, was detected in the endeavor to smuggle through in his luggage (which he had of course taken a "custpm-houseoatlv' dia not contain anything dutiable) a lot of very valuable presents to a churcu I Conscientious men will (until they get used to them) sturink frem fglse oaths, from bribery, or from other means neeuMwy to evade a tariff, but even of believers in protectlbM are there any who really think such evasions wrong in themselves? What theoretical protectionist is • there, who, if no one was watching him, would scrosle to amy a box- of cigan or a dresa patterni or aoytlSnir else that conld be carriedt aeraa a ttminer wharf or acroM Niagara bridge? And why should he scruple to carry such things across a wharf, a river or an imag^narf line, since once inside the custom-house frontier no one would object to his carrying them thousands of miles. That unscrupulous men, for their own private advan- tage, break laws intended for the general good proves nothing ; but that no one really feels smuggling to be wrong proves a good deal. Whether we hold the basis of morarideas to be intuitive or utilitarian, is not the fact that protection thus lacks the support of the moral senti- ment inconsistent with the idea that tariffs are necessary to the well-being and progress of mankind? If, as is held by some, moral perceptions are implanted in our nature as a means whereby our conduct may be Instinct- ively guided in such way as to conduce to the general well-belttr, how is it, if the Creator has ordained that man should prosper by protective tariffs, that the moral sense takes no cognizance of such a law? If, as others hold, what we call moral perceptions he the result of general experience of what conduces to the common good, how Is it that the beneficial effects of protection ave not developed moral recognition ? To make that a crime iiy statute which is no crime in morals, is inevitably to destroy respect for law; to resort to oaths to prevent men from doing what they feel injures no one, is to weaken the sanctity of oaths. Corruption, evasion and false swearing are inseparable from tariffs. Can that be good of which these are the fruits ? A system which requires such spying and searching, such invoking of the Almighty to witness the contents of every box, bundle and package— a system which always has pro- voked, and in the na'ure of man always must provoke, corruption and frauo— can it be necessary to tne pros- perity and progress of mankind ? Consider, moreover, how sharply this theory of pro- tection conflicts with common experience and habits of thought. Who would think of recommending a site for a proposed city or a new colony because it was very difficult to get at ? Yet, if the protective theory be tru& this would really be an advantage. Who would regard piracy as a promotive of civilization ? Yet a discriminat- ing pirate, who would confine his seizures to eoods which might be produced in the country to which they were being carried, would be as beneficial to that country as a tariff. Whether protectionists or free traders, we all hear with interest and pleasure of improvements in transportation by water or land ; we are all disposed to regard the open- ing of canals, the building of railways, the deepening of harbors, the Improvement of steamships, as beneficial? But if such things are beneficial, how can tariffs be bene- ficial ? The effect of such things is to lessen the cost of transporting commodities; the effect of tariffs is to in- crease it. If the protective theory be true, every im- provement that cheapens the carriage of goods between country and country is an injury to mankind unless tariffs be commensurately increased. The directness, the swiftness and the ease with which birds cleave the air, naturally excite man's desire. His fancy has always given angels wings, and he has ever dreamed of a time when the power of traversing those unobstructed fields might also be his. That this triumph is within the power of human ingenuity who in this age of marvels can doubt? And who would not hail with deught the news that invention had at last brought to realization the dream of ages, and made navigation of the atmosphere as practicable as navigation of the ocean ? Yet if the protective theory be true this mastery of another element would be a misfortune to man. For it would make protection impossible. Every inland town and village, every rood of ground on the whole earth's sur- face would at once become a port of an all-embracing ocean, and the only way in which any people could con- tinue to enjoy th*; blessings of protection would be to roof their country in. It is not only improvements in transportation that are antagonistic to protection ; but all labor-saving invention and discovery. The utilization of natural gas bids fair * to lessen the demand for native coal far more than could the free importation of foreign coal. Borings in Central New York nave recently revealed vast beds of pure salt, the working of which will destroy the industry of salt making, to encourage which we impose a duty on foreign salt. Vre maintain a tariff for the avowed purpose of keeping out the products of cheap foreign labor; vet ma- chines are daily invented that produce goods cheaper than the cheapiest foreign labor. Clearly the only con- sistent protectionism is that of China, which would not only prohibit foreign commerce, but forbid the introi duetton of labor-saving machinery. The aim of protection, in short, is to prevent the bring- ing into a country of things in theiaiselves useful and vahiallet to order to compel the mailing of such thinfa. aner whaif or d he scruple to \r an imaginary frontier no one ids of miles, private advan- al good proves nuggling to be lotd the basis of is not the fact the moral senti- Is are necessanr ind? If, as is planted in our lay be instinct- to the general ordained that that the moral f If, as others e the result of i the common I of protection is no crime in law; to resort hey feel injures s. Corruption, le from tariffs, uits? A system , such invoicing of every box, ways has pro- must provoke, ry to tne pros- theory of pro t and habits of iding a site for e it was very heorybe tni& would regard I a discriminat- :o goods which lien they were It country as a e all hear with transportation gard the open- : deepening of as beneficial? ariffs be bene- sen the cost of ariffs is to in- ue, every im- ;oods between d unless tariffs ise with which 's desire. His [d he has ever iversing those U this triumph rho in this age not hail with ast brought to vigation of the of the ocean ? tery of another For it would ind town and le earth's sur- all-embracing pie could con- 1 would be to tation that are iring ihvention I gas bids fair * ore than could igs in Central s of pure salt. dustiV of salt uty on foreign 'ed purpose of labor; yet ma- foods cheaper the only con- ich would not :bid theintro- 'ent the bring- es useful and f such tMaga, "\ But what all manlriiWI, la tho Individual ailain of every- day life, regard at to be desired is not the maldng of things, but the poieeuion of things. CHAPTER V. THB PKOTBCTIVB UNIT< The mora one considers the theory that every nation ought to "protect" itself against every other nation, the more inconsistent does it seem. Is there not, in the first place, an obvious absurdity in taking the nation or country as the protective unit and saying that each should have a protective tariff ? * What is meant by nation or country in the protectionist theory is an independent political division. Thus Great Britain and Ireland are considered one nation, France another, Germany another, Switzerland another, the United States, Canada, Mexico, and each of the Central and South American republics are others. But these divisions are arbitrary. They do not coincide with any differences in soil, climate, race or industry— they have no maximum or minimum of area or population. They are, moreover, continually changing. The maps of Europe and America used by school children toKlay are very different from the maps ttieir fathers used. The difference a hundred years ago was greater yet ; and as we go further back: still greater differences appear. According to this theory, when the three British kingdoms had separate govern- ments it was necessary for the well-being of all that they should be protected from each other, and should Ireland achieve independence that necessity would recur; but while the three countries are united under one government it does not exist. The petty states of which a few years ago Germany and Italy consisted, ought upon this theory to have had, as they once had, tariffs between them. Yet now, upon the same theory, they no longer need these tariffs. Alsace and Lorraine, when provinces of France, needed to be protected against Germany. Now that they are German provinces they need protection against France. Texas, when part of Mexico, required a protective tariff against the United States. Now, being a part of the United States, it requires a protective tariff against Mexico. We of the United States require a protective tariff against Canada, and the Canadians a tariff against us, but if Canada were to come into the Union the necessity for both of these tariffs would disappear. Do not these Incongruities show that the protective theory is destitute of scientific basis; that instead of origi- nating in any deduction from principlesor induction from facts, it has been invented merely to serve the purposes of its inventors ? Political changes in no wise alter soil, climate, or industrial needs. If the three British king- doms do not now need tariffs against one another, they could not have needed them before the union. If it is not injurious to the various states of Italy or Germany to trade freely with each ciher now, it could not have been injurious before they were united. If Alsace and Lor- raine are benefited by free trade with Germany now, they would have been benefited by it when French provinces. If the people of the opposite shores of the great lakes and St. Lawrence River would not be injured By the free exchange of their products should Canada enter the American Union, they could not be injured by freedom to exchange their products now. Consider how inconsistent with the protective theory is the free trade that prevails between the states of the American Union. Our Union includes an area almost as large as Europe, yet the protectionists who hold that each * That protectionist writers are themselves conscious of this absurdity is to be seen in their constant effort to suggest the idea, too preposterous to be broadly stated, that nations instead of being pur^y arbitrary political divisions of mankind, are natural, or divinely appointed, divisions. Thus, not to multiply instances, Prpfessor Robert Ellis Thompson {Political Economy ^ p. 34) defines a nation as "a people speaking one language, living under one government, and occupying a continuous area. This area is a district whose natural boundaries designate it as intended for the site of an independent people." This definition is given in large type, while underneath is appended in small type: "No one point of this defini- tion is essential save the second." Yet in spite of this admission that the " nation " is a purely arbitrary political division. Professor Thompson endeavors throughout his book to suggest a different impression to the mind of the reader, by talking of " the existence of nations as parts of the world's providential order," tiie "irnidtHtiai boundarie9 of nations," etc. European eotmtry ought to orotect Itadf agalnat all tha rest make no objections to the free trade that exiitt be- tween the American Sutes, though some of these states . : . larger than European kingdoms, and the differences between them, as to natural resources and industrial de- velopment, are at least as great. If it is for the benefit of Germany and France that they should be separated by protective tariffs, does not New Jersey need tne protec- tion of a tariff from New York and Pennsylvania? and do not New York and Pennsylvania also need to be pro- tected from New Jersey? And if New England needs Firotection against the Province of Quebec, and Ohio, llinoisand Michigan against the Province of Ontario, is it not clear that these states also need protection from the states which adjoin them on the south ? What difference does it make that one set of states belong to ttie Ameri- can Union and the other to the Canadian Confederation ? Industry and commerce, when left to themselves, pay no more attention to political lines than do birds or fishes. Clearly, if there Is any truth in the protective tiieory it must apply not only to the grand political divisions, but to all their parts. If a country ought not to import from other countries anything which its own people can pro- duce, the same principle must apply to every subdivision; and each state, each county and each townsnip must need its own protective tariff. And further than this, the proper application of the pro tective theory requires the separation of mankind into the smallest possible political divisions, each defended against the rest by its own tariff. For the larger the area of the protective unit, the more difficult does it become to apply the protective theory. With every extension of such countries as the United States, the possibility of pro, tection, if it can be applied only to the major political divisions, becomes less, and were the poet's dream reaU ized, and mankind united in a *' Federation of the World," the possibility of protection would vanish. On the other tiand, the smaller the productive unit the better can the theory of protection be applied. Protectionists do not go so far as to aver that all trade is injurious. They hold that each country may safely import what it cannot pro, duce, but should restrict the importation of wliat it can produce. Thus discrimination is required, which be> comes more possible the smaller the protective unit. Upon protective principles the same tariff will no t>etter suit all tne states ot our Union than the same sized shoes will fit all our sixty million people. Massachusetts, for instance, does not produce coat, iron or sugar. These, then, on protective principles, ought to come into Massa- chusetts tree, while Pennsylvania enjoyed protection on iron and coal, and Louisiana on sugar. Oranges may be grown in Florida, but not in Minnesota ; therefore, while Florida needs a protective duty on oranges, Minne- sota does not. And so on through the whole list of states. To "protect" them all with the same tariff is to ignore as to each that part of the protective theory which lifmits the free importation of commodities that cannot le produced at home ; and, by compelling them to pay higher prices for what they cannot produce, to neutralize the benefits arising from the protection of such com- modities as they do produce. Furthermore, while Massachusetts, on the protective theory, does not need protection on coal, iron and sugar, which she cannot .'produce, she does need protection againfit the beef, hogs and breadstuffs with which she is " deluged " from the west to the injury of her agricul- tural industries, and of which protection would enable her to raise enough for her home consumption. On the other hand, the west needs protection agafnst the boots and shoes and woolens of Massachusetts, so that western leather and wool could be worked up at home, instead of being carried long distances in raw form, to be brought back in finished form. In the same way the iron workers of Ohio need protection against Pennsylvania more than they do against England, while it is only mockery to pro- tect Rocky Mountain coal miners against the coal of Nova Scotia^ British Columbia and Australia, which cannot come into competition with them, while not protecting them against the coal of Iowa; or to protect the infant cotton mills of the south against Old England while giv- ing them no protection against New England. Upon the protective theory protection is most needed against like industries. All protectionists agree that the United States has greater need of protection against Great Britain than against Brazil— and Canada against the United Sutes than against India: all agree that if we must have free trade It should be with the countries most widely differing as to their productions from our own. Now there is far less difference between the productions and productive capacities of New Hampshire and Ver- mont, of Indiana and Illinois, or of Kansas and Nebraska, than there is between the United States as a whole and any foreign country. Therefore, on the protective theory, t«M^iff> between tbcM MMCS are more needed t|iaa bjh I It tween the United Sutes and fordgn countiiee. And ■tnce mdjoininc township* differ less in induttrial capaci- ties tlian adjoining sutes, they require protective Uriffs all the more. The thirteen American colonics came together as thirteen independent sovereignties, each retaining the full power of taxation, induduig that of levying duty on imports, which was not given up by them until 1787, eleven years after the Declaration of Independence, when the Federal Constitution was adopted. If the pro- tective theory, then dominant in Great Britain, had at that time had the hold upon the American people which it afterward obtained, it is certain tliat the power of pro- tecting tliemselves would never have been given up by the states. And had the Union continued as at first form^, or had the framers of the Constitution lacked the foresight to prohibit state tariffs, there is no doubt that when we came to imitate the British system of protection we should have had as strong a demand in the various states for protection aeainst other states as we have had for protection against foreign countries, and the argu- ments now used against free trade with foreign coun- tries would tOHlay oe urged against free trade oetween the states. Nor can there be any doubt that if our political organization made our townships independent of one another, we should have in our townships and vil- lages the same clamor for protection against the Industries of other townships and villages that we have now for the protection of the nation against other nations. , 1 am Mrriting on Long Island, near the town of Jamaica. I think I could make as good an argument to the people of that little town as is made by the protectionists to the people of the United States. I could say to the shop- beepers of Jamaica, " Your townsmen now go to New York when they want to purchase a suit of clothes or a bill of dry goods, leaving to you only the fag end of their custom, wtule the farmers' waggons that pass in a long liiw over the turnpike every night, carrying produce to New York and Brooklyn, bring back supplies the next day. A protective tariff will compel these purchases to be mad«. here. Thus profits that now go to New York and Brooklyn will be retained in Jamaica; you will want larger stores and better houses, can pay your clerks and journeymen higher wages, will need more banking accommodations, will advertise more freely in Jamaican newspapers, and thus will the town grow and pros- per." " Moreover," I might say, " what a useless waste of labor there is in carrying milk and butter, chickens, eggs and vegetables to New York and Brooklyn and bringing back other things. How much better for our farmers if they had a home market. This we can secure for them by a tariff that will protect Jamaican industries against those of New York and Brooklyn. Clothing, c^ars, boots and shoes, agricultural implements and f tur- niture may be manufactured here as well as in those cities. Why should we not ha - a cotton factory, a woolen mill, a foundry, and, in shori, all the establishments necessary to supply the wants of our people ? To get them we need only a protective tariff. Capital, when assured of pro- tection, will be gladly forthcoming for such enterprnes, and we shall soon he exporting what we now import, while our farmers will find a demand at their doors for all their produce. Even if at first they do have to pay some- what higher prices for what they buy they will be much more than compensated by the higher prices they will get for what they sell, and will save an eight or ten-mile haul to Brooklyn or New York. Thus, instead of Jamaica re- maining a little village, the industries which a protective tariff will build up here will make it a large town, while the increased demand for labor will make wages higher and employment steadier. I submit that all this is at least as valid as the protective arguments that are addressed to the people of the whole United States, and no one who has listened to the talk of village shopkeepers or noticed the comments of local newspapers can doubt that were our townships inde- pendent, village protectionists could get as ready a Bearing as natwnal protectionists do now. But to follow the protective theory to Its logical con- clusions we cannot stop with protection between state and state, township and township, village and village. If protection be needful between nations, it must oe needful not only between political subdivisions, but between family and family. If nations should never buy of other nations what they might produce at home, the same principle must forbid each family to buy anything it might produce. Social laws, like physical laws, must apply to the molecule as well as the aggregate. But a social condition in which the principle ol protection was thus fully carried cut would be a condltioB of utter terixkriiuiit CHAPTER VI. TXADI. Protection implies prevention. To protect Is to pre> serve or defend. What is it that protection by uriff prevenu? It Is trade. To speak more exactly, it is that part of trade which consists In bringing in from other countries com- modities that might be produced at home. But trade, from which "protection" essays to preserve and defend us, is not, like flood, earthquake or tornado, something that comes without human agency. Trade implies human action. There can be no need of preserv- ing from or defending against trade, unless there are men who want to trade and try to trade. Who, then, are the men against whose efforts to trade "protection" preserves and defends us ? If I had been asked this question before I had come to think over the matter for myself, I should have said that the men against whom "protection" defends us are foreign prmlucers who wish to sell their goods in our home markets' This is the assumption that runs through all protectionist arguments— the assumption tliat foreign- ers are constantly trying to force their products upon us, and that a protective tariff is a means for defending our- selves against what iMey want to do. Yet a moment's thought will show that no effort of foreigners to sell us their products could of itself make a tariii necessary. For the desire of one party, however strong it may be, cannot of itself bring about trade. To every trade there must be two parties who mutually de- sire to trade, and whose actions are reciprocal. No one can buy unless he can find some one willing to sell; and no one can sell unless there is some other one willing to buy. If Americans did not want to buy foreign goods, foreign goods could not be sold here even if there were no tariffT The efficient cause of the trade which our tariff aims to prevent is the desire of Americans to buy foreign foods, not the desire of foreig^n producers to sell them, 'hus protection really prevents what the "protected" themselves want to do. It is not from foreigners that protection preserves and defends us; it is from ourselves. Trade is not invasion. It does not involve aggression on one side and resistance on the other, but mutual con- sent and gratification. There cannot be a trade unless the parties to it agree, any more than there can be a ?|uarrel unless the parties to it differ. England, we say, orced trade with the outside world upon China, and the United States upon Japan. But, in both cases, what was done was not to force the people to trade, but to force their governments to let them. If the people had not wantM to trade, the opening of Ihe ports would have been useless. Civilized nations, however, do not use their armies and fleets to open one another's ports to trade. What they use their armies and fleets for, is, when they quarrel, to close one another's ports. And their effort then is to grevent the carrying in of things even more than the ringing out of things— importing rather than exporting. For a people can be more quickly injured by preventing them from getting things than by preventing them from sending things away. Trade does not require force. Free trade consists simply in letting people buy and sell as they want to buy and sell. It is protection that requires force, for it consists in preventing people from doing what they want to do. Protective tariffs are as much applications of force as are blockading squadrons, and their object Is the same— to prevent tradie. The dif- ference between the two is that blockading squadrons are a means whereby nations seek to prevent their enemies from trading; protective tariffs are a means whereby nations attempt to prevent their own people from trading. What protection teaches us, is to do ourselves in time of peace what enemies seek to do to us in time of war. Can there be any greater misuse of language than to apply to commerce terms suggesting strife, andto talk of one nation invading, deluging, overwhelming or inunda- ting another with goods? Good I what are they but good things— things we are all glad to get } Is it not pre- posterous to talk of one nation forcing its good things upon another nation? Who individually would wish to be preserved from such invasion? Who wou'd object to being inundated with all the dress goods hU .. ife and daughters could want ; deluged with a Morse and buggy : overwhelmed with clothing, with groceries, with good cigars, fine pictures, or anything else that has v«uue? And who would take it kindly ifany oife should assume to protect him by driving off those whoi wanted to bring him such things? In point of fact, however, not only is it impoeslble for OIK nation to sell to another unless that other titanta te ••■)/ \'l ■P*iii events? It is part of trade :ountries com- m to preserve Ice or tornado, :ency. Trade ed of preserv- less there are . Who, then, ! "protection" I had come to have said that ifends us are goods in our runs through > that f oreign- lucu upon us, iefending our- it no effort of itself make a irty, however ut trade. To mutually de- ical. No one : to sell; and le willing to ireign goods, f there were bich our tariff 9 buy foreign to sell them. t "protected" ireigners that om ourselves. e aggression mutual con- trade unless can be a and, we say, lina, and the es, what was but to force >ple had not would have armies and What they quarrel, to then is to ore than the exporting. preventing them from quire force. buy and sell hat requires from doing ire as much adrons, and The dif- iiadrons are ir enemies whereby m trading. in time of war. ige than to dto ulk of or inunda- they but it not pre- x>d things lid wish to d object to lie and nd buggy: with good as value? Id assume to briny >«slble for ' MtautMU la tiuy, but intemationAl trade doe« not consist in sending out goods to be sold. The great mass of tlie imporu n every civilized country connsts oi goods ttwt have been ordered by thepeople of that country and are imported at their risk. This is true even In our own case, although one of the effects of our tariff is that many goods that otherwise would l>e imported by Americans are sent here by European manufacturers, because undervaluation is thus made easier. But it is not the importer who is the cause of import- ation. Whether goods are brought here bv American importers or sent here by foreign exporters, the cause of thdr coming here is that they are asked for by the American people. It is the demand of purchasers at retail that causes goods to be imported. Thus a pro- . tective tariff is a prevention by a people not of what \ )/ il' others want to do to them, but of what they themselves want to do. When in the common use of the word we apeak of individuals or communities protecting themselves, there is always implied the existence of sonle external enemy or danger, such as cold, heat or accident, savage beasts or noxious vermin, fire or disease, robbers or invaders; something dispowd to wtiat the protected object to. The only cases in which the common meaning of the word does not imply some external enemy or danger are those in which it implies some protector of superior intelligence, as when we apeak of imbeciles, lunatics, drunkards or youn^ children being protected against their own irrational acts. But the systems of restriction which their advocates have named "protective" lack both the one and the other of these essential qualities of real protection. What they defend a people against is not external enemies or dangers, but what that people themselves want to do. Yet this " protection " is not the protection of a superior intelligence, for human wit has not yet been able to de- vise a:iy scheme by which any intelligence can be secured in a parliament or congress superior to that of the people it represents. That where protective tariffs are imposed it is in ac- cordance with the national will I do not deny. What I wbh to point out is tliat even the people who thus im- pose protective tariffs upon themselves still want to do what by protective tariffs they strive to prevent them- selves from doing. This is seen in the tendency of im- portation to conUnue in spite of tariffs, in the disposition of citizens to evade their tariff whenever they can, and in the fact that the very same individuals who demand the imposition of tariffs to prevent the importation of foreign commodities are among the individuals whose demand for those commodities is the cause of their importation. Given a people of which every man, woman and child is a protectiom^ and a tariff unanimously agreed upon, and still tliat tariff will be a restriction upon what these people want to do and will still try to do. Protectionists are only protectionists in theory and in politics. When it comes to buying what they want all protectionists are free traders. I say this to point out not the inconsistency of protectionists, but something more significant. "I ¥rrite." "I breathe." Both propositions assert action on the part of the same indivldmil, but action of different kinds. I write by conscious volition ; I breathe instinctively. I am conscious that I breathe only when I think of it. Yet my breathing goes on whether I think of it or not — when my consciousness is absorbed in thought, or is dormant in sleep. Though with all my will I try to stop breathing, I yet, in spite of myself, try to breathe, ana will continue that endeavor while life lasts. Other vital functions are even further beyond consciousness and will. We live by the continuous carrying on of multifarious and delicate processes apparent only in their results and utterly irresponsive to mental direction. Between the man and the community there is in these respects an analogy which becomes closer as civilization progresses and social relations grow more complex. That power of the whole which is lodged in governments is I' umited in its field of consciousness and action much as the conscious will of the individual is limited, and even that consensus of personal beliefs and wishes termed pub- lic opinion is but httle wider in its range. There is, be- yona national direction and below national conscious- ness, a life and relation of parts and a performance of functions which are to the social body what the vital pro- cesses are to the physical body. What would happen to the individual if all the functions of the body were placed under the control of the con- sciousness, and a man could forget to breathe, or miscal- culate the amount of gastric juice needed by his stomach, or blunder as to what his kidneys should take from the blood, is what would happen to a nation in which ail in- dividuai activities were directed by government. \ And though a people collectively may institute a tariff to prevent trade, their individual wants and desires win itiU force them to try to trade, just aa when a man tiea a ligature round his arm, his bk>od will still try to circu- late. For the effort of mch to satisfy liis desires with the least exertion, which is the motive of trade, is as instinc- tive and persistent as the instigations which the vital organs of the body obey. It is not the importer and ex- pcffter who are the cause of trade, but the daily and hourly demands of those who never think of importing or ex- porting, and to whom trade carries that which they de- mand, just as the blood carries to each fibre of the body that for which it calls. It is na natural for men to trade as it is for blood to cir- culate. Man is by nature a trading animal, impelled to trade by persistent desires, placetT in a world where everything shows that he was intended to trade, and finding in trade the possibility of social advance. With- out trade man would be a savage. Where each family raises its own food, builds its own house, makes its own clothes and manufactures its own tools, no one can have more than the barest necessaries of life, and every local failure of crops must bring famine. A people living in this way will be independent, but their independence will resemble that of the beasts. They will be poor, ignorant, and all but powerless against the forces of nature and the vicissitudes of the seasons. This social condition, to which the protective theory would logically lead, is the lowest in which man is ever found— the condition from which he has toiled upward. He has progressed only as he has learned to satisfy his wants by exchanging with his fellows and has freed and extended trade. The difference between naked savages possessed only of the rudiments of the arts, cowering in ignorance and weakness before the forces of nature, and the wealth, the knowledge and the power of our highest civilization, is due to the exchange of the independence which is the aim of the protective system, for that inter- dependence which comes with trade. Men cannot apply themselves to the production of but one of the many things human wants demand unless they can exchange their products for the products of others. And thus it la only as the growth of trar^e permits the division of labor that, beyond the merest rudimenu, skill can be developed, knowledge acquired and invention made ; and that productive power can so gain upon the requirements for maintaining life that leisure becomes possible and capital can be accumulated. If to prevent trade were to stimulate industry and pro- mote prosperity, then the localities where he was most isolated would show the first advances of man. The natural protection to home industry afforded by rugged mountain chains, by burning deserts, or by seas too wide and tempestuous for the frail bark of the early mariner, would have given us the first glimmerings of civilization and shown Its most rapid growth. But, in fact, it is where trade could best be carried on that we find wealth first accumulating and civilization beginning. It is on accessible harbors, by navigable rivers and much traveled highways that we find cities arising and the arts and sciences developing. And as trade becomes free and ex- tensive—as roads are made and navigation improved; as pirates and robbers are extirpated and treaties of peace put an end to chronic warfare — so does wealth augment and civilization grow. All our great labor-saving inven- tions^rom that of money to that of the steam engine, spring from trade and promote its extension. Trade has ever Deen the extinguisher of war, the eradicator of prejudice, the diffuser of knowledge. It is by trade that useful seeds and animals, useful arts and inventions, have been carried over the world, and that men in one plact have been enabled not only to obtain the products, but to profit by the observations, discoveries and inventions of men in other places. In a world created on protective principles, all habit- able parts would have the same soil and climate, and be fitted for the same productions, so that the inhabitants of each locality would be able to produce at home all they required. Its seas and rivers would not lend themselves to navigation, and every little section intended for the habitat^n of a separate community would be guarded by a protective mountain chain. If we found ourselves in such a world, we might infer it to be the intent of nature that each people should develop its own industries inde- gendently of all others. But the work! in which we do nd ourselves is not merely adapted to inter-communica- tion, but what it yields to man is so distributed as to compel the people of different localities to trade with each other to fully satisfy their desires. The diversities of soil and climate, the distribution of water, wood and mineral deposits, the currents of sea and air, produce infinite differences in the adaptation of different parts to different productions. It is not merely that one zone yields sugar and coffee, the banana and the pineapple, and another wheat and barley, the apple Mid the potatoi 14 b 't I U^>i l*s-'" li 4 i that one wppUet fun and another cotton: that nere are hillsidea adapted to pasture and there vaueys fitted for the plow; here granite and there clay; in one place iron and coal and in another copper and lead: but that there are differences so delicate that, though ex- perience tells us they exist, we cannet say to whtft there they are due. Wine of a certain ■ quality is produced in one place which cuttings from the same vines will not yield in another place, though soil and climate seem alike. Some localities, without assign- able reasons, become renowned for productions of one kind and some for productions of another kind ; and ex- perience often shows that plants thrive differently in dif- ferent parts of the same field. These endless diversities, in the adaptation of different parts of the earth's surface to the production of the different things required bvman, show that nature has not intended man to depend for the supply of his wants upon his own production, but to ex- change with his fellows, just as the placing of the meat before one guest at table, the vegetables before another, and the bread before another, shows the intent of the host that they should help one another. Other natiiral facts have similar bearing. It has long been known that to obtain the best crops the farmer should not sow with seed grown in his own fields, but with seed brought from afar. The strain of domestic animals seems aways improved by imported stocic, even poultry breeders finding it best to sell the male birds they raise and supply their places with cocks brought from a distance, whether or not the same law holds true with regard to the physical part of man, it is certain that the admixture of peoples produces stimulating men- tal effects. Prejudices are worn down, wits are sharp- ened, language enriched, habits and customs brought to the test of comparison and new ideas enldndled. The most progressive peoples, if not always of mixed blood, have always been the peoples who came most in contact with and learned most from others. " Home keeping youths have ever homely wits" is true of nations. And, further than this, it is characteristic of all the inventions and discoveries that are so rapidly increasing our power over nature that they require the greater division of labor, and extend trade. Thus every step in advance destroys the independence and increases the in- terdependence of men. The appointed condition of human progress is evidently that men shall come into closer relations and become more and more dependent upon each other. Thus the restrictions which protection urges us to im- pose upon ourselves are about as well calculated to pro- mote national prosperity as ligatures, that would impede the circulation of the blood, would be to promote bodily health and comfort. Protection calls upon us to pay officials, to encourage spies and informers, and to pro- voke fraud and perjury for what ? Why, to preserve our- selves from and protect ourselyes ajgainst something which offends no moral law; something to which we are instinctively impelled ; something without which we could never have emerged from barbarism, and some- thing which physical nature and social Ikws alike prove to be in conformity with the creative intent. It is true that protectionists do not condemn all trade, and though some of them have wished for an ocean oi fire to bar out foreign products others, more reasonable if less logical, would permit a country to import tilings it cannot produce. The international trade which they con- cede to be harmless amounts not te a tenth and perhaps not to a twentieth of the international trade of the world, and, so far as our own country is concerned, the things we could not obtain at home amount to a little more than a few productions of the torrid zone, and even these, if properly protected, might be grown at home by artificial heat, to the incidental encouragement of the glaw and coal industries. But, so far as the correctness of the theory goes, it does not matter whether the trade which "protection" would permit, as compared with that it would prevent, be more or less. What "protection" calls on us to preserve ourselves from, and guard our- selves against, is trade. And wheUier trade bie between citisens of the same nation or citizens of different nations, and whether we get by it things that we couid produce for ouselves or things that we could not produce for our- selves, the object oArade is always the same. If I trade with a Canadian, a Mexican, or an Enelishman it is for the same reason that I trade with an American— that I would rather have the thing he gives me than the thing I give him. Why should I refuse to trade with a foreigner any mose than with a fellow-citizen when my object in tmding ia my advanUge, not his ? And>is it not in the one case, quite as mudi as in the other, an injury to me that my trade should be prevented ) What difference doea It make whether it would be possible or impoaible for me to make for myself the thing for irtiidi l trade? If I did not UMit the Vaiag I aa to get more than the thing I am to give* I would not wish to makt the tnd*. Here is a farmer who proposes to exchange with hit neighbor a horse he does not want for a couple of cow* he does want. Would it benefit these farmers to prevent this trade on the ground that one might breed nis owt horses and the other raise his own cows? Yet if one farmer lived on the American and the other lived on the Canadian side of the line this is just what both the American and Canadian governments would do. And this is called "protection."^ It is only one of the many benefits of trade that it enables people to obtain what the natural conditions of their own Ic alitles would not enable them to produce. This is, however, so obvious a benefit that protectionist, cannot altogether Ignore it, and a favorite doctrine with American protectionists, is that trade ought to follow meridians of longitude instead of parallels of latitude, because the great differences of climate and consequently, of natural productions are between north and south.* The most desirable reconstruction of the world on this theory would be its division into "countries" consisting of narrow strigi running from the equator to the poles, with high tariffs on either side and at the equatorial end, for the polar ice would serve the purpose at the other. But in the meantime despite this notion that trade ought to be between the north and south rather than between east and west, the fact is that the great commerce of the world is and always has been between east and west. And the reason is clear. It is that peoples most alike in habits and needs will call most largely for each other's productions, and that the course of migration and of assimilating influences has been rather between east and west than between north and south. Difference in latitude is but one element of difference in climate, and difference in climate is but one element of the endless diversity in natural productions and capacities. In no one place will nature yield to labor all that man finds useful. Adaptation to one class of products involves non-adaptation to others. Trade, by permitting us to obtain each of the things we need from the locahty bat fitted for its production, enables us to utilize the htehust powers of nature in the production of them all, and thus to increase enormously the sum of vart^us things which a given quantity of labor expended in any locality crn secure. But, what is even more important, trade also enables us to utilize the highest powers of the human factor in production. All men cannot do all things equally well. There are differences in physical and mental powera which give different degrees of aptitude for different parts of the work of supplying human needs. And far more import- -t still are the differences that arise from the development of special skill. By devoting himself to one branch of production a man can acquire dcill which enables him, with the same labor, to produce enormously more than one who has not made that oranch his specialty. Twenty boys may have eoual aptitude for any one of twenty trades, but if every boy tries to learn the twenty trades, none of them can hecome good workmen in any ; whereas, if each devotes himself to one trade, all may become good workmen. There will not only be a saving of the tunc and effort required for learning, but each, moreover, can in a single vocation work to much better advantage, and may acquire and use tools which it would be impo^ble to obtain and employ did each attempt the whole twenty. And as there are differences between, individuals which fit them for different branches of production, so, but to a much greater d^ee, are there such differences between communities. I^t to speak again of the differences due to situation and natural faciuties, some things can be produced with greater relative advantage where popula- tion is sparse, othera where it is dense, and differences in industrial development, in habits, customs and related occupations, produce differences in relative adaptation. Such gains, moreover, as attend the division of labor be- tween individuals, attend also the division of lobor be- tween communities, and lead to that localizatio;> of in- dustry which causes different places to become noted for different industries. Wherever the production of some special thing becomes the leading industry, skill Is more easily acquired, and is carried to a higher pitch, supplies are most readily acquired, auxiliary and correlative oc- cupations grow up and a larger scale of production leads *"This, then, is our position respecting commerce * * * that it should interchange the productions of diverse zones and climates, following its traiUK>ceanic voyages line^of longitude oftener than lines of Utitude." — HOKACB Grbblby, PcMteat £e0n«m3>^ p. 39. "Learltlmate and natural commerce moves rather along the meridians than along the parallels of Utitude." — Paor. RoBSKr Bitus Thompsom, FtlUiemt Mcttumy, p. S17. ii t! u s< ij tc 01 w w nt P< h< lij Pi CI fr w hi bi 811 to St at It tc ol tc oi ti( tb m bi vi hj oc 6i IS 01 -X^t ii liiiniliwuilli ak* the trad*, inge with hit ouple of cowt era to prevent sreed fiii owk i Yet if one ither lived on what both the luld do. And trade that it conditions of n to produce. protectionist, doctrine with ght to follow Is of latitude, consequently, 1 and south.* world on this »" consisting r to the poles, iquatorial end, I at the other. It trade ought than between nmerce of the ast and west. I most alilce in r each other's ration and of ween east and I of difference jne element of and capacities, rail that man iducts involves rmitting us to le locaUty best ize the high(.-8t n all, andthus 3 things which ly locality c-n le also enables [man factor in equally well. lental powera for different eds. And far lat arise from Ing himself to re slcill which enormously his specialty. any one of the twenty kmen in any ; ade, all may / be a saving ig, but each, much better hich it would attempt the iduals which , so, but to a ices between Serences due ings can be here popula- lifferences in and related adaptation, of labor be- of bborbe- tion of in- le noted for ion of some stclU Is more ,chj supplies rrieiative oc- liction leads commerce Auctions of lana-oceanic Vutitude." rather If UUtude." fepMfmy, p. >r ^^V 1» to the cmplojrment of more efficient methods. Thus hi the natural developme t of society trade brings about differentiations of Industry between communities as be- tween individuals, and with similar benefits. Men of different nations trade with each other for the same reason that men of the same nation do— because they find it profitable : because they thus obtain what they want with less labor than they otherwise could. Goods will not be Imported into any country unless they can be obtained more easily by producing something else and exchanging it for them than by producing them directly. And hence, to restrict importations must be to lessen productive power and reduce the fund from which all revenues are drawn. Any one can see what would be the result of forbidding each Individual to»btain from another any commodity or service which he himself was naturally fitted to produce or perform. Such a regulation, were any government mad enough to adopt it and powerful enough to maintain it, would paralyze the forces that malce civuization possi- ble and soon convert the most populous and wealthy country into a howling wilderness. The restrictions which protection would Impose upon foreign trade differ only in degree, not in kind, from such restrictions as these. They would not reduce a nation to barbarism, because they do not affect all trade, and rather hamper than prohibit the trade they do affect; but they must pre- vent the people that adopt them from obtaining the abundance they might otherwise enjoy. If the end of labor be, not the expenditure of effort, but the securing of results, then whether any particular thing ought to be obtained in a country by home production, or by Importa- tion, depends solely upon which mode of obtaining it will give the largest result to the least labor. This is a ques- tion involving such complex considerations that what any country ought to obtain in this way or in that cannot l>e settled by any Congress or Parliament. It can safely i>e left only to those sure instincts which are to society what the vital instincts are to the body, and which always im- pel men to take the easiest way open to them to reach their ends. When not caused by artificial obstacles, any tendency in trade to take a certain course is proof that it ought to take that course, and restrictions are harmful because they restrict, and in proportion as they restrict. To as- sert tliat the way for men to become healthy and strong is for them to force into their stomachs what nature tries to reject, to regulate the play of their lungs by bandages, or to control the circulation of their bloml by ligatures, would not be a whit more absurd than to assert uat the way for nations to become rich is for them to restrict the natural tendency to trade. CHAPTER VII. PRODUCTION AND PRODUCBR5. Remote from neighbors, in a part of the country where population is only beginning to come, stands the rude house of a new settler. As the stars come out, a ruddy light gleams from the little window. The housewife is preparing a meal. The wood that bums so cheerily was cut by the settler, the flour now turning into bread is from the wheat of his raising ; the fish hissing in the pan were caught by one of the boys, and the water bubbling in the kettle, in readiness to be poured on the tea was brought from the spring by the eldest girl before the sun had set. The settler cut the wood. But it took more tlian that to produce the wood. Had it been merely cut, it would still be lying where it fell. The labor of hauling it was as much a part of its production as the labor of cutting it. So the journey to and from the mill was as necessary to the production of the flour as the planting and reaping of the wheat. To produce the fish the boy had to walk to the lake and trudge back again. And the production of the water in the kettle required not merely the exer- tion of the girl who brought ft from the spring, bui. also the sinking of the barrel in which it collected, and the making of the bucket in which it was carried. As for the tea, it was grown in China, was carried on a bamboo pole upon the shouldere of a man to some river village, and sold to a Chinese merchant, who shipped it by boat to a treaty port. There, having been packed for ocean transporutlen, it was sold to the agency of some American bouse, and sent by steamer to San Francisco. Ibeacc it passed by railroad, with another transfer of o«niership, into the hands of the Chicago jobber. The jobber, in turn, in pursuance of another sale. shippedHt lo the vfflage storekeeper wh* held it so that the settler ■ight get it when and in sueb quantities as he pleased. just aa the water from the ipring Is held In the nuken barrel so that It may be had when needed. « The native dealer who first purchased this tea of the grower, the merchant who shipped it across the Pacific, le Chicago jobber who held it as in a reservoir, until the store-keeper ordered it. the store-keeper who, Imnging it from Chicago to the vilUge, hekl it as in a smalla — xr- voir until the settler came for it, aa well as those con- cerned in !•« transportation, from the coolie who carried it to the b)tnk of the Chinese river to the brakemen of the train that brought It from Chicago— were they not all parties to the production of that tea to this family as truly as were the peaaanU who cultivated the plant and gath- ered its leaves ? The settler got the tea by exchanging for it money ob- tained in exchange for things produced from nature by the labor of himself and his ooys. Has not this tea, then, been produced to this family by their labor as truly as the wood: the flour or the water t Is it not true that the labor of this family devoted to producing things which were exchanged for tea has really produced tea, even in the sense of causing it to be grown, cured and trans- ported ?~ It is not the growing of the tea in China that causes it to be brought to the United Sutes. It is the demand for tea in the United States— that ia'to say, the readiness to give other products of labor for it— that causes tea to be grown in China for shipment to the United Sutes. To produce is to bring forth, or to bring to. There is no other word in our language which Includes at once all the operations, such as catching, gathering, extracting, growing, breeding or making, by which numan labor rings forth from nature, or brings to conditions adapted to human uses, the material things desired by men and which constitute wealth. When, therefore, we wish to speak collectively of the operations by which things are secured or fitted for human use, as distinguished from operations which consist in moving them uom place to place or passing them from hand to hand after they have been so secured or fitted, we are obliged to use the word groduction in distinction to transportation or exchange. ;ut we should always remember that this is but a narrow and special use of the word. - While in conformity with the usages of our language we may properly speak of production as distinguished from transportation and exchange, just as we may prop- erly speak of men as distinguished from women and children, yet in its full meaning, production includes transportation and exchange, just as men includea women and children. In the narrow meaning of the word we speak of coal as having been produced when it has been moved from its place in the vein to the surface of the ground; but evidently the moving of the coal from the mouth of the mine to those who are to use it is as necessary a part of coal production, in the full sense, as is the bringing of it to the surface. And while we may produce coal in the United States by digging it out of the ground, we may also just as truly produce it by exchang. ing other products of labor for it. Whether we r*et coal by digging it or by bringing it from Nova ScotisTor Aus- tralia or England in exchange for other products of our labor, it is, in the one case as truly as in the other, pro- duced here by our labor. Through all protectionist arguments runs the notion that transporters and traders are non-producera, whose suppon lessens the amount of wealth which other classes can enjoy.* This is a short-sighted view. In the full sense of the term transporters and traders are as truly producers as are miners, farmers or manufacturers, since the transporting of things and the exchanging ot things are as necessary to the enjoyment of things as la extracting, growing or making. There are some opera- tions conducted under the i^rms of trade that are in reality gambling or blackmailing, but this does not alter the fact that real trade, which consists in exchanging and transporting commodities, is a part of production— a part so necessary and so important that without it the other operations of production could only be carried on in the most primitive manner and with the most niggard results. And not least important of the functions of the trader Is that of holding things in stock, so that those who vrlsh *"In my conception, the diief end of true political economy is the conversion of idiera and useless ex- changers and traffickera into habitual, effective iH«>ducera of weaIth."->-HoitACB Gxbblxy, Polititml St0nciiif, p. 39. The trador " adds nothing to. the real wealth oi-eociety. He neither directs and manages a vital change In the form of 'muter as does the farmer, nor a chemical and mechanical change In form as does the manufaeturer. He merely transf en things from the olace of thehr^o- duetlon to the place of demand."— PaoF. R. £. Thohimis P»lUicmr£e»nomyt p. 198. !• to uw them may be Me to iret them at such times and nacct, and in such quantities, as are most convenient. This is a service analogous to that performed by the sunken barrel which holds the water of a spring so that it can be luid by the bucketful when needed, or by the reservoirs and pipes which enable the inhabitant of a dty to obtain water by the turning of a faucet. The profits of traders and " middlemen " may sometimes be excessive (and anything which hampers trade and in- creases the capital necessary to carry ft on tends to make them excessive) but they are in reality based upon the performance of services in holding and aistributing things as well as In transporting things. " When Charles Fourier was young " says Professor Thompson {Political Economy, p. igg), " he was on a visit to Paris, and priced at a street stall some apples of a sort tliat grow abundantly in his native province. He was amazed to find that they sold for many times the lum they would bring at home, having passed through the lianas of a host of middlemen on their way from the owner of the orchard to the eater of the fruit. The im- Session received at that instant never left him; it gave e first impulse to his thinking out his socialistic scheme for the reconstruction of society, in which, among other sweeping changes, the whole class of traders and their profits are to be abolished." This story, quoted approvingly to convey an idea that the trader is a mere toll gatherer, simply shows what a superficial thinker Fourier was. If he had undertaken to bring with him to Paris a supply of apples and to carry them around with him so that he could have one when he felt like it, he would have formed a much truer idea of what he was really paying for in the increased price. That price included not merely the cost of the apple at its place of growth, plus the cost of transporting it to Paris, the octroi at the Paris gates,* the loss of damaged apples, and remuneration for the service and capitsu of the wholesaler, who held the apples in stock untii the vender chose to take them, but also payment to the vender, for standing all day in the streets of Paris in or- der to supply a few apples to those who wanted an apple then and there. So when I go to a druggist's and buy a small quantity of medicine or chemicals, I pay many times the origrinal cost of those articles, but what I thus pay is in much larger degree wages than profit. Out of such small sales the druggist must get not only the cost of what he sells me, with other costs incidental to the business, but aiso pay- ment for his services. These services consist not only in the actual exertion of giving me what I want, but in wait- ing there in readiness to serve me when I choose to come. In the price of what he sells me he makes a charge for what printers call " waiting time." And he must mani- festly not merely charge " waiting time" for himself, but aiso for the stock nf many different things only occasion- ally called for, which he must keep on hand. He has been waiting there, with his stock, in anticipation of the fact that such persons as myself^ in sudden need of some small quantities of drugs or chemicals, would find it cheaper to pay him many times their wholesale cost ttian to go fur- tlier and buy larger quantities. What I pay him, even when it is not payment for the skilled lat>or of compound- ing, is largely a payment of the saftee nature as, were be not there, 1 might have had to make to a messenger. If each consumer had to go to the producer for the small ouantities individually demanded, the producer would nave to charge a higher price on account of the greater labor and expense of attending to such small transactions. A hundred cases of shoes may be sold at wholesale in less time than would be consumed in suiting a customer with a single pair. On the other hand, the going to the producer direct would involve an enormous increase of cost and trouble to the consumer, even when such a method of obtaining things would not be utterly impossible. What "middlemen" do is to save to both parties this trouble and expense, and the profits which competition permits them to charge in return are infinitesimal as compared with the enormous savings effected— are like the charge made to each customer for the cost of the aqueducts, mains and pumping engine of a great system of water supply as compared with the cost of providing a separate system for each house. And further than this, these middlemen between pro- • The octroi, or municipal tariff on produce brought Into a town is still levied in France, though abolished for a time by the Revolution. It is a survival of the local tariffs once common in Europe, which separated province from province and town from country. Colbert, the first Napoleon, and the German Zollverein did much in reduc- ing and abolishing these restrictions to trade, producing in this way good results which are sometimes attributed by pratecuonlsts to external tariffs. ducer and ooiuumer effect an enormoiis economf in tlw amount of commodities that it is necessary to Keep in stock to provide for a given consumption, and conse- quently vastly lessen the loss from deterioration and decay. Let any one consider what amount of stores would be needed to keep in their accustomed supply, even for a month, a family used to easy access to those handy maga- zines of commodities which retail dealers maintain. He will see at once that there are a number of things such as fresh meat, fish, fruits, etc., which it is impossible to keep on hand, so as to t>e sure of having them when needea. And of the things that would keep longer, such as flour, sugar, oil, etc., he will see that but for the retail dealer it would be necessary that much greater quantities should tie kept in each house, with a much greater liability to loss from decay or accident. But it is wnea he comes to things not constantly needed, but which, when needed, though it may not be once a year or once a lifetime, may be needed very badly— that he will reaUze ful!v how the much abused "middleman" economizes the 'capital of society and increases the opportunities of its members, A retail dealer is called by the English a "shop-keeper" and by the Americans a "store-keeper." The American usage best expresses his real function. He is in reality a keeper of stores which otherwise his customers would have to keep in hand for themselves, or go without The English speak of the shops of coKiperative supply associa- tions as "stores," since it is in them that the various things required from time to time by the members of those associations are stored until called for. But this is precisely what, without any formal association, the retail dealer does for those who ouy of him. And though co- operative purchasing associations have to a certain ex- tent succeeded in England (they have generally failed in the United States) there can be no question that the functions of keeping things in store and distributing them to consumers as needed are on the whole performed more satisfactorily and more economically by self-ap- pointed store or stock-keepers than they could be as yet By formal associations of consumers. And the tenden- cies of the time to economies in the distribution as well as in the production of commodities, are bringing about through the play of competition, just such a saving of expense to the consumer as is aimed at by coK>perative supply associations. That in civilized society to-day th,are seem to be too many store-keepers and other distributors Is quite true. But so there seem to be too many professional men, too many mechanics, too many f armers,and too many laborers. What may be the cause of this most curious state of things It may hereafter lie in our way to inquire, but at present I am only concerned In pointing out that the trader Is not a mere " useless exchanger " who " adds nothing to the ,real wealth of society," out that the transporting, stor- ing and exchanging of things are as necessary a part of the work of supplying human needs as Is growing, ex- tracting or making. Nor should it hi forgotten that the investigator, the philosopher, the teacher, the artist, the poet, the priest, though not engaged In the production of wealth, are not only engaged in the production of utilities and satisfac- tions to which the production of wealth Is only a means, but by acquiring and diffusing knowledge, stimulating mental powers and elevating the moral sense, may greatly increase the ability to produce wealth. For man does not live t>y bread alone. He is not an engine, in which so much fuel {^ves so much power. On a capstan bar or a topsail halyard a good song tells Uke muscle, and a "Marseillaise" or a "Battle Hymn of the Republic counts for bayonets. A hearty laugh, a noble thought, a perception of harmony, may add to Uie power of deal- ing even with material things. He who by any exertion of mind or body adds to the aggregate of enjoyable wealth, increases th- sum of human knowledge or gives to human life higher eleva- tion or greater fullness— he is in the targe meaning of the words, a "producer," a "working man," a "laborer," and is honestly earning honest wages. But he who with- out doing aught to make mankind richer, wiser, better, happier, lives on the toil of others— he, no matter by what name of honor he may be called, or how lustily the priests of Mammon may svring their censers before him, IS in the last analysis but a beggarman or a thief. CHAPTER VIII. TARIFFS FOR RBVBNinS. Tariffs may embrace duties on exports as well as on Imports ; but duties on exports are prohibited by the Constitution of the United States and are now levied only by a few countries, such as Brazil, and by them only on a few articles. The tariff, as we have to consider it, is a schedule of taxes upon Imports. \ IS eeonoBV in tlM eflsary to Keep in ition, and conae- aration and decay. r stores would be upply, eyen for a hose handy maga- era maintain. He r of things such aa ImpoasitMe to Iceep em when needea. Sit, such as flour, e reuil dealer it quantities should ter liability to loss he comes to things n needed, though lifetime, may be ize fut!y how the ces the 'capital of of its members. Ii a "shop-keeper" " The American He is in reality a customers would go without llie ive supply associa- that tJie various ' the members of 1 for. But this is jciation, the retail And though co- : to a certain ex- renerally failed in question that the and distributing ! whole performed ically by self-ap- ey coulcf be as yet And the tenden- itribution as well e bringing about such a saving of .t by co-operative i seem to be too tors is quite true, lessional men, too :oo many laborers, lus state of things e,but at present I Lhe trader is not a s nothing to the ansporting, stor- :cessary a part of s is growing, ex« investigator, the poet, the priest, wealth, are not ties and satisfao- is only a means, dge, stimulating nse. may greatly , For man does engine, in which a capstan bar or : muscle, and a the Republic I noble thought, i power of deal- idyadds to the I th- sum of higher eleva" meaningofthe ,,' a "laborer," juthewhowitb- ; wiser, Iwtter, no matter by how lustily the n before him, a thief. as well as oa iblted by the |re now levied and by them Lve to consider IT 1 The mrd *'ttrlfl" Is latd to be derived from the SpaniA town of Tarifa, near Gibraltar, where the Moors \ in tlie days of their power collected duties, probably much after the manner of those Chinese local custom houses called " squeeze sutions." But the thing is older than the name. Augustus Cesar levied duties on im- ports into Italy, and there were tariffs long before the Ciesars. The purpose in which tariffs originate is that of raising revenue. The Idea of using them for protection is an afterthought. And' before considering the protective function of urifFsMt will be well to consider them as a means for collecting revenue. It is usually assumed, even by the opponents of protec- tion, that tarilTs should l>e maintained for revenue. Most of those who are commonly called free traders might more property be called revenue tariff men. They obiect, not to the tariff, but only to its protective features, and propose, not to atxtlish it, but only to restrict it to re- venue purposes. Nearly all the opftosition to the pro- tective system in the United States is of ihis kind, and In current discussion a tariff for revenue only is usually assumed to be the sole alternative to a tariff for protec- tion. But since there arc other ways of raising revenue than bv tariffs this manifestly is not so. And if not useful for protection, the only justification for any tariff is that it is a good means of raising revenue. Let us inquire as to this. Duties on imports are indirect taxes. Therefore the question. whether a tariff is a good means of raising revenue involves the question whether indirect taxation is a good means of raising revenue. As to ease and cheapness of collection indirect taxation is certainly not a good means of raising revenue. While there are direct taxes, such as taxes on real estate and taxes on legacies and successions, from which great revenues can easily and cheaply be collected, the only in- direct taxes from which any considerable revenue can be obtained require large and ex pensive staffs of officials and the enforcement of vexatious and injurious regulations. To collect the indirect tax on tobacco and cigars, France and some other countries make the trade and manufacture a strict government monopoly, while Great Britain pro- hibits the culture of tobacco under penalty of fine and imprisonment— a prohibition particularly injurious to Ireland, where the soil and climate are in some parts admiralily adapted to the growth of certain kinds of totncco. In the United States we maintain a costly In- quisdtorial system which assumes to trace every pound of tobacco raised or imported, through all its stages of man- ufacture, and requires the most elaborate returns of pri- vate buaness to be made to government officials. To more easily collect an indirect tax upon salt the govern- ment of British India cruelly prevents the making of salt in many places where the natives suffer from the want of It. VTbile indirect taxes upon spirituous liquors, wherever reported to, require the most elaborate system of prohibi- tion, inspection and espionage. So with the collection of indirect taxes upon Imports. Land frontiers must be guarded and sea-coasts watched; imports must l>e forbidden except at certain places and under regulations which are always vexatious and fre- quently entail wasteful delays and expenses; consuls must be maintained all over the world, and no end of oaths required; vessels must be watched from the time they enter harbor until the time they leave, and every- thing landed from them examined, down to the trunks and satchels and sometimes the persons of passengers, while spies, informers and "bloodhounds" must be encouraged. > But in spite of prohibitions, restrictions, searchings, watchingrs, and swearings, indirect taxes on commodi- ties are largely evaded,' sometimes by the bribery of officials and sometimes by the adoption of methods for eluding their vigilance, which though costly in them- selves, cost less than the taxes. All these costs, however, whether borne by the government or by the first payers, (or evaders) of the taxes, together with the increased ctiarges due to increased.prices, finally fall on consumers, and thus this method of Uxatlon is extremely wasteful, taking from the people much more than the government obtains. A still more important objection to indirect Uxatlon is that when imposed on articles of general use (and it is only from such articles that large revenues can be had) it bears with far greater weight on the poor than on the rich. Since such taxation falls on people not according to wBat they have, bjit according to what they consume, it is the heaviest on those whose consumption is largest in proportion to their means. As much sugar is needed to sweeten a cup of tea for a working-girl as for the richest lady in the land, but the proportion of their means which a tax on sugar compels eacn to contribute to the g dv e r n menl is in the cue of the one much greater than in theeaieoftheflthcr. So It ti whh all taxes that incretse the cost of articles of general consumption. They Ixar far more heavily on married men than on bachelors ; on those who have children than on those who have none ; on those barely able to support their families than on those whose incomes leave them a large surplus. If the millionaire chooses to live closely he need pay no more of these indirect taxes than the mechanic. I nave known at least two millionaires— possessed not of one, but of from six to ten millions each— who paid little more of such taxes than ordinary day laborers. Even if cheaper articles were taxed at no higher rates than the more costly, such taxation would be grossly un- just ; but in indirect taxation there is always a tendency to impose heavier taxes on the cheaper articles used by ail ^han on the more costly articles usied only by the rich. This arises from the necessities of the case. Not only do the larger amounts of articles of common consumption afford a wider basis for large revenues than the smaller amounts of more costly articles, but taxes imposed on them cannot be so easily evaded. For instance, while articles in use by the poor as well as the rich are, under our tariff, taxed fifty and a hundred, and even a hundred and fifty per cent., the tax on diamonds is only ten per cent., and this comparative light tax is most difficult to enforce, owing to the high value of diamonds as com- pared with their bulk. Even where discrimination of this kind is not made in the imposition of indirect taxa- tion, it arises in its collection. Specific taxes fall more heavily upon the cheaper than the costlier grades of goods, while even in the case of ad valorem taxes, under- valuation and evasion are easier in regard to the more valuable grades. That indirect :&'xes thus bear far more heavily on the poor than on the rich is undoubtedly one of the reasons why they have po readily been adopted. The rich are ever the powerful, and under all forms of government have most influence in forming public opinion and fram- ing laws, while the poor are ever the voiceless. And while indirect taxation causes no loss to those who first pay it, it is collected in such insidious ways from those who finally pay it that they do not realize it. It thuii affords the best means of getting the largest revenues from the body of the people with the lea&t remonstrance against the amount collected or the uses to whidi It Is put. This is the main reason that has Inductd govern- ments to resort so largely to indirect taxation. A direct tax, where its justice and necessity are not clear, pro- vokes outcry and opposition which may at times rise to successful resistance; but not only do those indirectly taxed seldom realize it, but it is extremely difficult for • them to refuse payment. They are not called on at set times to pay definite sums to government agents, but the tax becomes indistinguishabty blended with the cost of the goods they buy. When it reaches those who must finally pay it, together with all costs and profits of collec- tion. It is not a tax yet to be paid, but a tax which has already been paid some time ago, and many removes back, and which cannot be separated from other ele- ments which go to make up the cost of goods. There is no choice save to pay the tax or go without the goods. If a tax-gatherer stood at the door of every store, and levied a tax of twenty-five per cent, on every article bought, there would quickly be an outcry; but the very people who would fight rather than pay a tax like this, will uncomplainingly pay higher taxes when they are col- lected by store-keepers indncreased prices. And even if an indirect tax is consciously realized, it cannot easily tie opposed. At the beg[inhing of our Revolution the indirect tax levied by the British government without the consent of the American colonies, was successfully resisted by preventing the landing of the tea; but if the tea had once got into the hands of the dealers, with the taxes on it paid, the English government could have laughed at the opposition of the patriots. When in Ireland, during the height of the Land League agitation, I was much struck with the ease and certainty with which an unpopular government can collect indirect taxes. At the beginning of the century the Irish people, without any assistance from America, proved in the famous Tithe war that the whole power of the English government could not collect direct taxes they tiad resolved not to pay: and the strite against rent, which so long as persisted injproved so effective, could readily have been made a strike against direct taxation. Had the government which was enforc- ing the claim of the landlords depended on direct taxa- tion, its resources could thus have been seriously dimin- ished by the same blow which crippled the landlord* but during all the time of this strike the force used to put down the popular movement was being supported by indirect Uxatlon on the people who were tn passive rebellion. The people who struck against rent could not strilw against taxes paid in buying the commodities they used. Even had rebelUoa been activ* and geaenl, Ow It Brittob govtrnoient couM liaye collected the hulk of Its ravenuM from indirect taxation, «o long as it retained oomiiiAnd of the principal towns. It it no wonder that princes and ministers anxious to make their revenues as large as possible should prefer a method that enables them to "pluck theffoose without making it cry," nor is it wonderful that this preference ■houlcTbe shared by those who get control of popular governments; but the reason which renders indirect taxes io agreeable to those who levy taxes is a sufficient reason why a people Jealous of their liberties should insist that taxes levied tor revenue only should be direct, not Indirect. It is not merely the ease with which indirect taxes can be collected that urges to their adoption. Indirect taxes always enlist active private interests in their favor. The first rude device for making the collection of taxes easier to the governing power is to let them out to farm. Under this system, which existed in France up to the Revolution, and still exists in such countries as Turkey, persons called farmers of the revenue buy the privilege of collecting certain taxes, and make their profits, frequently very large, out of the greater amount which their vigilance and extortion enable them to collect. The system of indi- rect taxation ia essentially of the s.-ime nature. The tendency of the restrictions .-ind regulations neces- sary for the collection of indirect taxes is to concentrate business and give large capital and advantage. For instance, with a board, a knife, a kettle of paste and a few dollars' worth of tobacco, a competent cigar maker could set up in business for himself were it not for the revenue regulations. As it is, in the United States, the ttoclc of tobacco which he must procure is not only increased in value some two or three times by a tax upon it, but before the cigar maker can go to work nc must buy a manufacturer's license and find bonds in the sum of five hundred dollars. Before be can sell the cigars he has made he must furthermore pay a tax on them, and even thenif he would sell cigars in less quantities than by the box he must buy a second license. The effect of all this is to give capital a great advantage, and to concentrate in the hands of large manufacturers a business in which, if free, workmen could easily set up for themselves. But even in the absence of such regulations indirect tax- ation tends toconcentration. Indirect taxes add to the price of goods not only the tax itself, but also the profit upon the tax. If on goods costing a dollar a manufacturer or merchant has paid fifty cents in taxation, he will now ex- pect profit on a dollar and fifty cents instead of upon a dollar. As, in the course of trade, these taxed goods pass from hand to hand, the amount which each successive purchaser pays on account of the tax is constantly aug- menting. It is not merely inevitable that consumers have to pay considerably more than a dollar for every dollar the government receives, but larger capital is re- quired by dealers. The need of larger capital for dealing in goods that have been enhanced in cost by taxation, the restrictions imposed on trade to secure the collection of the tax and theoettcr opportunities which those who do business on a large scale have of managing the pay- ment or evading the tax, tend to concentrate business, and, by. checking competition, to permit large profits, which must ultimately oe paid by consumers. Thus the first payers of indirect taxes are generally not merely in- different to the tax, but regard it with favor. , That indirect taxation is of the nature of farming the revenue to private parties is shown by the fact that those who pay such taxes to the government seldom or never ask for their reduction or repeal, but on the contrary gen- erally oppose such propositions. The manufacturers and dealers in tobacco and cigars have never striven to secure any reduction in the heavy taxes on those articles, and the importers who pay directly the immense sums col- lected by our custom houses have never grumbled at the duties, however they may grumble at the manner of their collection. When, at the time of the war, the national taxation was enormously increased, there was no opposition to the imposition of^indirect taxation from those who would tlius be called upon to pay large sums to the government. On the contrary, the imposition of these taxe^ by enhancing the value of stock in liand, made many fortunes. And since the war the main diffi- culty in reducing taxation has been the opposition of the very men who pay these taxes to the government. The reduction of the war tax on whisky was strongly opposed by the whisky ring, composed of great distillers. The match manufacturers fought bitterly the abolition of the tax or matches. Whenever it has been proposed to re- duce or reoeal any indirect tax Congress has been beset by a persistent lobby urging that, whatever other taxes ought be dispensed with, that particular tax might be left in lull force. In order ta provide an excuse for keeping iip.uidiiect taxes all sorts of extravagant expenditures of wrauSi^ money .bave been made, and hundreds el millions have been voted away to get them out of the Treasury. Despite all this extravagance we have a sur- plus ; yet we go on collecting taxes we do not need be- cause of the opposition of interested partie* to their reduction. This opposition is of the same kind and springs from the same motive as that which the farmera of tlie revenue under the old French system would hare made to the abolition of a tax which enabled them to ex- tort two millions of francs from the French people for one million wiiich they paid to the government. Now, over and above the great loss to the people which indirect taxation thus imposes, the manner in which it- gives individuals and corporations a direct and selflrii interest in public affairs tends powerfully to the corrup- tion of government. These moneyed interests enter into our politics as a potent demoralizing force. Whato'.i to the ordinary citizen is a question of public policy, affecting him only as one of some sixty milliona of peo- ple, is to them a question of special pecuniary interest. To this is largely Uue the state of things in which politics has become the trade of professional politicians; in which it is seldom that one who has not money to spend can, with any prospect of success, present himself for the suffrages of his fellow-citizens; in which Congress is suf» rounded by lobbyists clamorous for special interests, and questions of the utmost general importance are lost sight of in the struggle which goes on for the spoils of taxation. That under such a syttem of taxation our government is not far moi e corrupt than It is, is the strongest proof of the eisential f^ood ess of republican institutions. That indirect taxes may sometimes serve purposes other than the raising of revenue ? do not deny. The license taxes exacted from the sellers of liquor may be defended on the ground that they diminish the number of saloons and lessen the traffic injurious to public morals. And so taxes on tobacco and spirits may be de- fended on the ground tnat the smoking of tobacco and the drinking of spirits are injurious vices, which may be lessened by making tobacco and spirits more expensive, so that (except the rich) those who smoke may be com- pelled to smoke poorer tobacco, and those who drink to drink viler liquor. But merely as a means of raising revenue, it is clear that indirect taxes are to be con- demned, since they cost far more than they yield, bear with the greatest weight upon those least able to pay, add to corruptive influences and lessen the control of the people over their government. All the objections which apply to indirect taxes in general apply to import duties. Those protectionists are right who declare that protection is the only justification for a tariff,* and tlie advocates of "a tarilt for revenue only " have no case. If we do not need a tariff for protec- tion we need no tariff at all, and for the purpose of raising revenue should resort to some system which will not tax the mechanic as heavily as the millionaire, and will not call on the man who rears a family to pay on that account more than the man who shirks his natural obligation, and leaves some woman whom in the scheme of nature it was intended that he should support, to talte care of herself as best she can. CHAPTER IX. TARIFFS FOR FROTBCTION. Protective tariffs differ from revenue tariffs in their object, which is not so much that of obtaining revenue as that of protecting home producers from the competition of imported commodities. , The two objects, revenue and protection, are not merely distinct, but antagonistic. The same duty may raise some revenue and give some protection, but, past a certain point at least, in proportion as one object is secured the other is sacrificed, since revenue depends on the bring- ing in of commodities ; protection on keeping them out^v . So the same tariff may embrace both protective and revl^- enue duties, but while the protective duties lesser, its ♦ '* Tariffs for revenue should have no existence. Inter- ferences with trade are to be tolerated only as measures of sel€-protection."— H. C. Carbv, Past, Prtstnt and Futurty-p. 472. "Taxes for the sake of revenue should be imposed directly, because such is the only mode in which the con- tribution of each individual can be adjusted in proporticn to his means."— Prof. E. P. Smith, Polilical Economy, pp. 265-8. " Duties for revenue ♦ * ♦ are highly unjust. They inflict all the hardship of indirect and unequal taxa* tion without even the purpose of benefitting the co» sumer."— Paor. R. B. THOMfsoN, Political £c9H9mcf^ p. sa>< fjama^uamvum^ them out of th* ;e we have a sur- do not need be< partiet to their ■ame kind and rhich ihe farmera •tem would have kbied them to ex- reach people for 'nment. the people which iner in which it Jirectand aelfiih 11^ to the corrup* interests enter., inff force. What »; of public policy, r milliontof peo- cunlary interest, in which politics .1 politicians; in t money to spend nt himself for the Congress is sup :ial interests, and ice are lost sight ipoils of taxation, ur government is rongest proof of ItutTo'ns. serve purposes not deny. The of liquor may be linish the number urious to public ipirits may be de- gof tobacco and es, which may be more expensive, lolce may be com- ose who drink to means of raising IS are to becon- they yield, bear least able to pay, the control oi the ndirect taxes in ;>rotectionists are only justification arifi for revenue 1 tariff for protec- urpose of raising rhich will not tax jre. and will not y on that account itural obligation, scheme of nature to take care of tariffs In their ining revenue as the competition n, are not merely duty may raise on. but, past a object is secured ndson thebring- ieping themoutA.. >tective and rev**'- duties lesser, its sxistence. Inter- >nly as measures It, PrtitfU and >uld be imposed 1 which the con- ed in proportion Hiical Economjtt B unjust. They unequal taxa> efitting the co» itieai £coiuiit^ pemtt of collecting revenue, the revenuedutles by adding to the cost of bom' riroductlon lessen Its power of en- couraging home pre L'Ts. The duties of a purely rev- enue tariR shoulo fiiii c-.iy on commodities not produced In the country ; or, if levied on commodities partly pro- duced at home should be balanced by equivalent internal taxes to prevent incidental protection. In a purely pro- tective tariff, on the otlier hand, commodities not produced In the country should be free and duties should be levied on commodities that are or may be produced in the country. And, Just in proportion as it accomplishes Its object, the less revenue wUl It yield. The Uriff of Great Briuin is an example of a purely revenue tarifl. Incidental protection being prevented by excise duties. There is no example of a purely protective tariff, the purpose of obtaining revenue seeming always to be the original stock upon wmcK protective features are grafted. The tariff Of the United States, liktf all actual protective tariffs, is partly revenue and partly protective, its original purpose of yielding revenue having been subordinated to that of giving protection, until it may now be best described as a protective tariff yielding Incidental revenue. As we have already considered the revenue functions of tariffs, let us now consider their protective functions. Protection, as the word has come to be used to denote a scheme of national policy, signities the levying of duties on the importation of commodities (as a means) in order (as an end) to encourage domestic industry. Now, when the means proposed in any such scheme is the only means by which the proposed end can be reached, it Is only needful to inquire as to the desirability of the end; but when the proposed means is only one of various means, we must satisfy ourselves that It is the best. If it is not, the scheme is condemned irrespective , of the goodness of its end. Thus the advisability of protection does not, as is generally assumed, follow the admission of the advisability of encouraging domestic industry. That granted, the advisability of protectton is still an open question, since It Is clear that there are other ways of encouraging home industry than by import duties. Instead of levying import duties, we might, tot instance, destroy a certain proportion of imported commodities, or require the ships bringing them to sail so many times around the world before landing at our ports. In either of these ways precisely the same protective effect could be secured as by import duties, and In cases where duties secure full protection by preventing importation, such methods would involve no more waste. Or, Instead o( indirectly encouraging domestic producers by levying duties on foreign goods, we might directly encourage them by paying them bounties. As a means of encouraging domestic industry the bounty has over the protective system all the advantages that the system of paying public officers fixed salaries has over the system prevaulng In some countries, and In some Insunces In our own, of letting them make what they can. As by paying fixed salaries we can get officials at such places and to perform such functions as we wish, while under the make-what-you-can system thevcan only be got at places and Incapacities that will enable them to pay themselves, so do bounties permit the encouragement of any industry, while protection permits only the en- couragement of the comparatively few industries with which Imported commodities compete. As salaries enable us to know what we are paying, to proportion the rewards of different offices to their re- spective dignity, responsibility and arduousness, while make-what-you-can may give to one official much more thiti is necessary, and to others not enough, so do boun- ties enable us to see and to fix the encouragement to each industry, while the i protective system leaves the public in the dark and malces the encouragement to each in- dustry almost a matter of chance. And as salaries im- pose on the people much lighter and more fairly-appor- tioned burdens than does the make-what-you-can system, so is the difference between bounties and protection. To illustrate the working of the two systems, let It be assumed desirable to encourage aerial navigation at pub- lic expense. Under the bounty system we should offer premiums for the building and successful operation of air ships. Under the protective system we should impose deterrent taxes on all existing methods of transportation. In the ane case we should have nothing to pay till we got what we wanted, and would then pay a definite sum which would fall on individuals and localities in general taxes. But in the other case we should have to suffer all the iric6nveniences of obstructed transportation before we got air ships, and whether we got them or not ; and while these obstructions would,, in some cases, more seriously affect Individuals, busiaesses and localities than In ethers, we should never be able to tell how much they _ distorted industry and cost the people, or how much they's' •timulaited the invention and building of air snips. In' the one case, moreover, after aerial navlnratlon had proved successful and the stipulated bounties had been paid, the air-ship men would hardly have the audacity to ask for more bounties, and would not be llkelv' to get them If they did. In the other case, the public would have grown accustomed to the taxes on surface irans> portatTon. while the air .>hip proprietors, if they had not convinced themselves that these taxes were necessary to the continued prosperity of aerial navigation, could readily pretend so, and would have, in opposing their repeal, the advantage of that inertia which tends to the continuance of anything that is. The superiority of the bounty system over the protect- ive system for the encouragement of any single industry is very great ; tut it becomes greater as the number of Industr^sto be encouraged Is increased. When we en- courage an industry by a bounty we do not discouran any other industry, except as the necessary Increase in general taxation may have a discouraging effect. But when to encourage one industry we ra»e tne price of its Sroducts by a protective duty, we at the same time pro- uce a directly injurious effect upon other Industries that use those products. So complicated has production be- . come, so Intimate are the relations between industries, and In so man / forms do the products of one Industry enter Into the materials and processes of others, that what will be the effect of a single protective duty It Is hard for an expert to say. But when It comes to encour- aging not one nor a dozen, but a thousand different In- dustries, It Is Impossible for human intelligence to trace the multifarious effects of raising the prices of so many products. 'The people cannot tell what such a system costs them, nor in most cases can even those who are supposed to be Its beneficiaries really tell how their gains under It compare with their losses from it. The "drawback" system Is an attempt to prevent, so far as exports are concerned, the discouragement to which the protection of one Industry subjects others. Drawbacks are bounties paid on exports of domestic goods to an amount which it is calculated will com- pensate for the addition a duty on material has made to their cost. But drawbacks not only leave home prices undiminished, but while fruitful of fraud, can only In small part prevent the discouragement of exports, since It Is only on goods Into which dutiable commodities have entered in Targe proportion and obvious ways that drawbacks are allowed, or that it is worth the while of the exporter to atempt to collect them. In 1884, for Instance, the United States paid out a larger sum In drawbacks on copper than was received in duties on cop- per, yet It Is certain that very many exports into which copper entered, and which were therefore enhanced In cost by the duty, got no drawback whatever. And so of drawbacks on refined sugar, for which we are paying a sum greatly in excess of the duties collected on the raw sugar, though many of our exports, such as those of condensed milk, syrups and preserved fruits, are much curtailed by these duties. The substitution of bounties for protection in encourag- ing industry would do away with the necessity for such inefficient^ fraud-provoking and . back-action devices. Under th^munty system prices would not be raised, ex- cept as affected by general taxation. Each encouraged producer would know in dollars and cents how much en- couragement he got, and the people at large would know how much they paid. In short, all and even more than protection can do to encourage home industries can be done more cheaply and more certainly by bounties. It is sometimes asserted, as one of the advantages of tariff duties, that they fall on the producers of imported goods, and are thus paid by foreigners. This assertion contains a scintilla 01 truth. An import duty on a com- modity of which the production Is a closely controlled foreign monopoly may in some cases fall in part or in whole upon the toreign producer. For instance, let us say that a foreign house or combination has a monopoly in the production of a certain, article. Within the limits of cost on the one hand and the highest rate at which any can be sold on the other, the price of such article can he fixed by the producers, who will naturally fix it at the point they conclude will give the largest aggregate profits. If we impose an import duty on such an article they may prefer to reduce their profit on what they sell to this country rather than have the sale diminished by the addition of the duty to the price. In such case the duty will fall upon them. (Dr, again, let us suppose a Canadian farmer so situated that the only market in which he can conveniently sell his wheat is on the American side. Wheat being a com- modity of which our home production not merely supplies home demands, buf leaves a surplus for export, the duty on wheat does not add to price, and the Canadian farmer so exceptionally situated that he must send wheat to this side although there is no general demand for Canadian 51S8B»;.-. I'. r -I I- BO 'H : wbcftt, cannot (at back in enhanced price Uie duty lie muit pay. The two claiwes repretented by these Instances suggest all the cases in which import duties fall on foreign pro> ducers.* Such cases, too unimportant to be considered in any estimates of national revenue, are only the rare exceptions to the general rule that the ability to tax ends with the terrltorailimits of the taxing power. And it is well for mankind that this is so. If it were possible for the government of one country, by any system of taxa- tion, to compel the people of other countries to pay its expenses, the world would soon be taxed into barbarism. But the poMibility of exceptional cases in which im- port duties may in part or in whole fall on foreign pro- ducers, insteacf of domestic consumers, has in it, even for 'those who would gladly tax " foreigners," no shadow of a recommendation for protection. For it will be noticed that the cases in which an import duty falls on foreign producers, are cases in which it can afford no encourage- ment to home producers. An import duty can only fall on foreign producers when its payment does not add to Srice ; while the only possible way in which an import uty can encourage home producers Is by adding to price. It is sometimes said that protection does not Increase pricin. It is sufHcient answer to asic, how then can it encourage? To say that a protective duty encourages the home producer without raising prices, is to say that it encourages him without doing anything for him. Wherever beneath this assertion, as regardless of fact as it is of theory, there is any glimmering of reason, it is either in the notion that protective duties do not permanently add to prices, because they bring about such a competi- tion between home producers as finally carries prices down to the previous level; or else in a confused idea that it would be an advantage to home producers to be secured the whole home market, even if at no higher prices. But as to the first, the only way in which a protective duty can increase home competition in the production of any commodity is by so increasing prices as to attract producers to tne industry by the superior profits to be ohtained. This competition, when free to operate, ulti- mately reduces profits to the general level. But this is not to say that It reduces prices to what they would be without the duty. The profits of Louisiana sugar grow- ing are now, doubtless, no larger than in other occupa- tions involving equal risks, but the duty on sugar does make the price of sugar very much higher in the United , States than it is England, where there is no duty upon it. And even where there is no reason in natural or social conditions why a commodity should not be produced as cheaply as in any foreign country, the effect of the net- work of duties, ot which the particular duty is but a part, is to increase the cost of production, and thus, though profits may fall, to keep prices above the point of free importation. Did the price of a protected article fall to the point at which the foreign product could not be im- * In certain cases where an import duty, levied in one country on the produce of another, has the effect of re- ducing price in the exporting country at the expense of rent, it may. In some part, fall upon foreign land-owners. John Stuart Mill (Chap. III., Book V., Political Economy) jfurther maintains that taxes on imports fall in part, not on the foreign producer of whom we buy, but on the foreign consumer to whom we sell— since they Increase the cost of products we export. But this is only to say that the injury which we do ourselves by protection must in some part fall upon those with whom we trade. And even if import dutiesdo, in such ways, somewhat increase the cost to foreigners of what they get from us, and thus, in some degree, compel them to share our loss, yet they also handicap us when we come into competition with them. Thus, assuming that our tariff upon imports may at times, to some slight extent, have increased the price which English consumers have had to pay for our cotton, wheat or oil, the increased cost of production in the United States has certainly operated far more strongly to g^ve English producers an advantage over American prmlucers in markets in which they compete, and to en- able England to take the lion's share of the ocean-borne commerce of the world. The minute tracing of the action and reactions of taxa- tion upon international trade is, however, more a matter of theoretical nicety than of practical interest, since the general conclusion will be that stated in the text, that while we cannot injure ourselves without injuring others, the taxing power of a government is substanually re- stricted to its territorial flmit. The clearest exception to this is in the case of export duties on articles ol which tlie country levying the export duty has a monopoly, as Brazil has of Incua>-rubber and Cuba of the Havana tobacco. I ported were then no duty, the datr would eeiu to pro- tect, since the foreign product would not bt imported if it were abolished, and the producers for whose protection it was imposed would cease to care for its retention. In what Instance has this been the case ? Are any of our protected Industrie* less cUmorous for protection now than they were forty years ago ? As to the second notion, it Is to be observed that the only way in which a protective duty can give the home market to home producers is by increasing the price at which foreign products can be sold in It. Not merely does thia increase In the price of foreign products eoropel an increase in the price of domestic products into which they enter, but the shutting out of foreign products mutt increase the price of similar domestic products. For it Is only where prices are fixed by the will of the producer -^ . of the that increase or decrease in supply does not result In lU^ after increase or decrease of price* Thus, while the newspaper — businesa is not a monopoly, the j>ublication of each individual paper is, and its price is fixed by the publisher. A publisher may, and In most cases will, prefer increased circulation to increased prices. And if competition were to be lessened, or even cut off, as, for instance, by impos- ing a sump duty on, or prohibiting the publication of all the newspapers of New York save one, it would not necessarily follow that the price of that paper would be Increased. But the prices of the great mass of commodi- ties, and especially the great mass of commodities which are exported and imported, are regulated by competition. They are not fixed by the will of producers, but by the relative intensity of supply and demand, which are brought to an equation in price by what Adam Smith called "the higgling of the market," and hence any lessening of supply caused by the shutting out of importa- tions win at once increase prices. In short, the protective system is simply a system of en- couraging certain industries by enabling those carrying them on to obtain higher prices for the goods they pro- duce. It is a clumsy and. extravagant mode of giving en- couragement that could be given much better and at much less cost by bounties or subsidies. If it be wise to "encourage" American industries, and this we have yet to examine, the best way of doing so would be to abolish our tariff entirely and pay bounties from funds obtained by direct taxation. In this way the cost would be dis- tributed with some approach to fairness, and a citizen who is worth a million times more than another could have the satisfaction of contributing a million times as much to the encouragement of American industry. I do not forget that, from the bounties given in the colonial days for the killing of noxious animals to the sub- sidies granted to the Pacific railroads, experience has shown that the bounty system inevitably leads to fraud and begets corruption, while but poorly accomplishing the ends sought by it. But these evils are inseparable from any method of " encouragement," and attach to the protective more than to the bounty system, because its operations are not so clear. If protection has been pre- ferred to bounties it is not that it is a better means of encouragement, but for the same reason that indirect has been preferred to direct taxation— because the people do not so readily realize what is lieing done. Where a grant of a hundred thousand dollars directly from the treasury would raise an outcry, the imposition of a duty which will enable the appropriation of millions in higher prices ex- cites ao comment. Where trauntles have oeen given by our States for the establishment of new industries they have been comparatively small sums, given in a single payment or in a subsidy for a definite term of years. Although the people have in some cases been willing thus to pay bounties to a small extent and for a short time, in no case have they consented to regard -them as a settled thing, and to keep on paying them year after year. But Erotective duties once imposed, the protected industry as alwa]rs been as clamorous for the continuance of protection as it was in the beginning for the grant of it. And the people not being so conscious of the payment have permitted it to go on. |^ It is often said by protectionists that free trade is right in theory but wrong in practice. Whatever may be meant by such phrases they involve a contradiction in terms, since a theory that will not agree with facts must be false. But without inquiring into the validity of the protective theory it is clear that no such tariff as it pro- poses ever has been or ever can be made. The theory of free trade may be carried into practice to the point of Ideal perfection. For to secure free trade we have only to abolish restrictions. But to carry the theory of protection into practice some articles must be taxed and others left untaxed, and, as to the articles taxed, different rates of duty must be imposed. .And as the protection elven to any industry may be neutralized by protection that enhances the price of its materials, careful diacriaination ia required, for there are very few wmild etut to pf»> d not bt importad if for wboM protection or its retention. In e t Are anv of our (or protection now e observed that the can give the home 'easing the price at I in it. Not merely Ign products eompel products into which reign products mtut products. For It is •1 artlelM Uut can be deemed ilnlshed prodoeu In relation to all their usee. The finished products of some industries are the materials or tools of other industries. Thus, while the protection of any industry is useless unless sufficient to produce the desired effect, too much protec- tion is nicely ieven from a protective sundpoint, to do barm. It ia not merely that the Ideal perfection with which the free-trade theory may be reduced to practice is impossible in the case of protection, but that even a *>ugh approximation to the protective theory is impossible. There never has been a protective tarift that satisfied protectionists, and there never can be. Our present Uriff , for Instance, is admitted by protectionists to be full vlll of the producer -^ ^ of the grossest blunders. It was only adopted because, f does not result In IH^ after a long wrangle, it was found impossible to agree while the newspaper >ublication of each ced by the publisher, vlll, prefer increased if competition were ' instance, by impos- he publication of all s one, it would not hat paper would be It mass of commodl- commodities which ated by competition, oducers, but by the lemand, which are ' what Adam Smith !t," and hence any itting out of importar Imply a system of en- bling those carrying the goods they pro- it mode of giving en- much better and at lies. If it be wise to ind this we have yet > would be to abolish from funds obtained ! cost would bedis- mess, and a citizen than another could BT a million times as Fican Industry, punties given in the IS animals to the sub- ads, experience has tably leads to fraud oorly accomplishing ;vils are inseparable . and attach to the system, because its ection has been pre- is a lietter means of son that indirect has scause the people do one. Where a grant ly from the treasury of a duty which will in higher prices ex- have oeen given by new industries they , given in a single nite term of years. «s been willing thus for a short time, in d Ihem as a settled ar after year. But protected industry tne continuance of for the grant of it. bus of the paymeni t free trade is right Whatever may be * a contradiction in ee with facts must the validity of the ich tarifE as it pro- ide. ried into practice to secure free trade But to carry the e articles must be as to the articles imposed. .And as lay be neutralized oe of its materials, there are very few upon a better one, and It ia only maintained and defended because any attempt to amend it would begin a scramble out of which no one can tell what sort of a tariff would come. This has been the case with every former tariff, and must Iw the case with every future uriff. To make a protective tariff that would even roughly accord with the protective theory would require in the first place a minute knowledge of all trade and industry, and of the manner in which an effect produced on one industry would act and react on others. This no king, congress, or parliament ever can have. But, further than this, absolute disinterestedness is required, for the fixing of protective duties is simply the distribution of pecuniary favors among a crowd of^ greedy applicants. And even were it possible to obtain tor the making of a protective tariff a body of men themselves disinterested and in- capable of yielding to bribery, to threats, to friendship or to flattery, they would have to be more than human not to be dazed by the clamor and misled by the represen- utions of selfish interests. The making of a tariff, instead of being, as the pro- tective theory requires, a careful consideration of the cir- cumstances and needs of each industry, is in practice a great "grab" In which the retained advocates of selfish interests bully and beg, bribe and log-roll, in the endeavor to get the largest possible protection for themselves without regard for other interests or for the general good. The result is, and always must be, the enactment of a tariff which resembles the theoretical protectionist's idea of wliat a protective tariff sl.ould t>e about as closely as a bucketful of paint thrown against a wall resembles the fresco of a Raphael. But this is not all. After a tariff has been enacted, come the interpretations and decisions of treasury officials and courts to unmake and re-make it, and duties are raised or lowered by a printer's placing of a comma or by arbitrary constructions, frequently open to grave suspicion, and which no one can foresee, so that, as Horace Greeley naively says (Political Economy^ p. r.80' "The longer a tariff continues the more weak spots are found, the more holes are picked in it, until at last, through the infiuence of successive evasions, construc- tions, decisions, its very father could not discern its original features in the transformed bantling that has quietly taken its place." Under the bounty system, bad as it is, we can come much nearer to doing what we want to, and to knowing what we have done. * CHAPTER X. THE ENCOUKACBMBNT OP INDUSTRY. Without questioning the end sought by them we have seen that protective tariffs are to be condemned as a means. Let us now consider their end— the encourage- ment of home industry. > H , There can be no difference of opinion as to what en- % Inouragement means. To encourage an industry in the protective sense is to secure to those carrying it on larger profits than they could of themselves obtain. Only so far and so long as it does this can any protection encourage an industry. But when we ask what the industries are that proteo> tion proposes to encourage we find a wide difference. Those whom American protectionists have regarded as their ablest advocates have asked protection tor the en- couragement of " infant industries"— describing the pro- tective system as a means for establishing new industries in countries to which they are adapted.* They have ♦ " Whoever will consult Alexander Hamilton's Report oil Manut'actures, the writings of Matthew Carey. Heze- k.ah Ntteti oiiU tiicir uompeerii, with the speecbesot Henry scouttd Um IdM o< attonptinff to MCOuraM all iiflliMtnr, and daclarad the encouragement of Industries not adapted to a country, nr already established, or (or a time longer than necessary for their esubltohmtnt to bo waste and robbery. As ft Is now popularly advocated and practically applied In the United Sutes the aim o( protection, however. Is not the cncourafement of " ln(aat Industries" but the encouragement of ^' home Industry' —that is to say, o( all home IndiMtrtes. And what naa proved true in our case Is generally trtie. Wherever pro- tection is once begun, the imposition o( duties never stopsuntil every home industry o( any political strength that can be protected by tariff gets some encouragement. It is only in new countries and in the beginnings of th« system that the encouragement o( In(ant industries can be presented as the sole end o( protection. Kuropean firotectlonlsts can hardly ask protection, on the ground of heir in(ancy, (or industries that have been carried on since the time o( the Romans. And in the United States to ask now the encouragement o( such giants as our iron, ■teel and textile industries as a means for their establiaii- ment would, after all these years of high tariffs, be mani- festly absurd. We have thus two distinct propositions to examine— the proposition that new and desirable industries should be encouraged, which still figures in the apolqgetics of protection, and the proposition, popuhirly urged and which our protectionist legislation attempts to carry iqto effect— thai home industry should be encouraged. As an abatract proposition it is not, I think, to be de- nied that there may be indastries to which temporary encouragement might profitably be extended. Indua- tries caiMbie, in their development, of much public bene- fit have oftan to struggle under great disadvantages in their beginnings, and their development might some- times be Deneficially hastened by judicial encouragement. But there are insuperable difficulties in the way of dis- covering what industries would repay encouragement. There are, doubtless, in every considerable community some men of exceptional powers who, if provided at Jiublic expense with an assured living and left free to nvestigate, to invent, or to think, would make to the public most valuable returns. But it is certain that, under any system yet devised, such livings, if instituted, would not be filled by men of this kind; but by the push- ing and influential, by flatterers and dependants of those in power or by respectable nonentities. The very men who would give a good return in such places would, by virtue of their qualities, be the last to get them. So it is with the encouragement of struggling industries. All experience shows that the policy oiencouragement, once begun, leads to a scramble in which it is the strong, not the weak i the unscrupulous, not the deserving, that succeed. What are really infant industries have no more chance in the struggle for governmental encouragement than infant pigs have with full grown swine about a meal tub Not merely is the encouragement likely to go to industries that do not need it, but it is likely to go to industries that can only be maintained in this way, and thus to cause absolute loss to the community by diverting labor and capital from remunerative industries. On the whole, the ability of any industry to establish and sustain itself in a free field is the measure of its public utility, and that "struggle for existence " which drives out unprofitable industries is the best means of deter- mining what industries are needed under existing con- ditions and what are not. Even promising industries are more apt to be demoralized and stunted than to be aided in healthy growth by encouragement that gives them what they do not earn, just as a young man is more likely to be injured than benefited by being left a fortune. "The very difficulties with which new industries must contend not merely serve to determine which are really needed, but also serve to adapt them to surrounding conditions and to develop improvements and inventions that tuider more prosperous circumstances would never be sought for. Thus, while it may be abstractly true that there are industries that it would be wise to encourage, the only safe course is to give to all "a fair field and no favor." Where there is a conscious need for the making of some invention or for the establishment of some industry which, though of public utility, would not be commercially profitable, the best way to encourage it is to offer a bounty conditional upon success. Nothing could better show the futility of attemptbig to Clay, Thomas Newton, James Tod, Walter Forward, Rollin C. Mallacy, and other forensic champions of pro- tection, with the messages of our earlier Presidents, of Governors Simon Snyder, George Clinton, Daniel D. Tomkins, De Witt Clinton, etc., cannot fail to note that they champion not the maintenance, but the. creation of ,home manufactures."— HoRAca Grulbv, Political Efoth «V. p. 34. '■,t\ •■ li.. •Akt Indttitric* iielf<4upportlnir tiy tRrilT than th« con- fcMcd Inability of the Indimrten that we have no lonf en- couraged to stand alone. In tliu ctirly daya of the Ameri- can Republic, when the friend* of protection were tryinc to initraft it upon the Federal revenue live In commensurate style. We will enlarge our houses and Improve our grounds, set up carriages, hire servants, [Ive parties and buy much more freely at the stores. Improve our grounds, set up carriages, hire servants, five parties and buy much more freely at the stores, his will make trade brisk aiftl cause a greater demand for labor. This, In turn, will create a greater demand for agHcultural productions, which will enable the neighboring farmers to make a greater demand for store goods and the labor of mechanics. Thus shall we all become prosperous." There IS in no country under the sun a Tlllaffe In which the people would listen to such a propualtlon. Yet It Is every wnlt as plausible as the doctrine that encouraging some Industries encourages all industries. The only way In which we could even attempt to rn- courage all industry would be by the bounty < r subsidy system. Were we to substitute bounties for duties as .1 means of encouraging industry It would not < nly t)ecome possible for us to encourage other Industries than those now encouraged by tariff, out we sh uld be forced to do ■o, for it is not in human nature that the farmers, the stock raisers, the builders, the newspaper publishers and io on, would consent to the payment < f bounties to other industries without demanding them for their own. Nor could we consistently stop until every species of Industry, to that of the bootblack or rag-picker, wasisubsldlxed. Yet evidently the result of such encouragement of each would be the discouragement of all. For as there could only be distributed what was raised by taxation, less the cost of collection, no one could get back In subsidies, were there any fairness In their distribution, as much as he would be called upon to pay in taxes. This practical reduction to absurdity is not possible* under the protective system, because only a small part of the industries of a country can thus be "encouraged," while the cost of encouragement Is concealed in prices and is not realized by the masses. The tax gatherer does not demand from each citizen a contribution to the en- couragement of the favored few. He sits down in a custom house and by taxing imports enables the favored producer to collect "encouragement" from his fellow- citUens in higher prices. Yet It is as true of encourage- ment by tarlR as of encouragement by bounties that the gain to some Involves loss to others, and since encourage- ment by tariff Involves far more cost and waste than en- couragement by bounty, the proportion which the loss bears to the gain must be greater. However protection may affect special forms of industry it must necessarily diminish the total return to industry— first, by the waste inseparable from encouragement by tariff, and, second, by the loss due to the transfer of capital and labor from occupations which they would choose for themselves to less profitable occupations which they must be bribed to engage in. If we do not see this without reflection, It is because our attention is engaged with but a part ol the effects of protection. We see the large smelting works and the massive mill without realizing that the same taxes which we are told have built them up have made more costly every nail driven and every needleful of thread used throughout the whole country. Our imaginations are affected as were those of the first Europeans who visited India, and who, impressed by the profusion and the magnificence of the Rajahs, Mit not noticing the -ob- ject poverty of the masses, mistook for the richest country In the world what Is really the poorest. But reflection will show that the claim popularly made for protection, that it encourages home industry (i. e. all home industry), can be true only in one sense— the sense in which Pharaoh encouraged tfebrew industry when he compelled the making of bricks without straw. Protec- tive tariffs make more work, in the sense in which the spilling of grease over her kitchen floor makes more work for the housewife, or as a rain that wets his hay makes more work for the farmer. CHAPTER XI. THE HOME MARKET AND HOME TRADE. Wt fhould kttp our own markets /or our own producers, seems by many to be regarded as the same kind of a proposition as, U^e should kttp our own pasture for our own cows, whereas, in truth, it is such a proposition as, U^t should keep our own apptti*:s /or our own cooktry, or, W> should keep our own transportation /or our own legs. What is this home market from which protectionists tell us we should so carefully exclude foreign produce ? Is it not the home demand— the demand for the satisfac- tion of our own wants } Hence the proposition that we should keep ottr home market for home producer* it ffii'j p jy " tmtmmmmJtmm ,-K-'"'j*^,4-v'rU' P5lffl(9Pn&~- Haphr tb« propMkion that wt ihould keep our own wanu for our own powers of utiifyin( them. In •hort, to reduce it to the Indlvidunl, It k tn«t we ought not to Mt a meal cooked by another, tince that would deprive us of the pleaiure of cooklnB a meal for ouriclvet, or outke uae of any horaen or railwayt becauM that would deprive our legs of employment. A ihort time ago Kntfllsh protectionlatt (for protection li far from dead in England) were cennurlng the govern- lAent for having given large orderi for powder to (ier- man Instead of to Kngliih producers. It turned out that the Germans were making a new powder called "cocoa," which In heavy guns gives great velocity with low press- ure, and with which all the conlinental powers had at once provided themselves. Had the English government frefused to buy from foreign producers, English ships, in the event of war, which then seemed imminent, would have been placed at a serious disadvantage. Now, Just as the policy of reserving home markets for home producers would in war put a country which should adhere to it at a great disadvantage— even to the extent, if fully carried out, of restricting the country that does not produce coal to the use of sailuig ships, and compelling the country that yields no iron to fight with bows and arrows— eo in all the vocations of peace does this policy involve like disadvantages. To strictly reserve our home, market for home producers would be to exclude ourselves from participation in the advantages which natural con- ditions or the peculiar skill of their people give to other countries. If bananas will not grow at home we must not eat bananas. If India rubber is not a home produc- tion we must not avail ourselves of its thousand uses. If salt can only be obtained in our country by evaporating sea water we must continue so to obtain our salt,althougn in other countries nature has performed this work and provided already-crystallized suit in quantities sufficient not only for their people, but for us too. Because we cannot grow the cinchona tree we must shake with ague and die from malarial diseases, or must writhe in agony under the oculist's knife because the beneliccnt drug that gives local insensibility is not a home production. And so with all those products In which the peculiar develop- ment of industry nas enabled the people of various coun- tries to excel. To reserve our home markets to home production is to limit the world from which our wants may be supplied to the bounds of our own country, how little soever that may be. And to place any restrictions upon importations is, in so far as they operate, to deprive ourselves of opportunities to satisfy our wants. It may be to ttie interest of a shopkeeper that the people of his neighborhood should be prohibited from buying from anyone but him, so that they must take such goods as he chooses to keep, at such prices as he chooses to charge, but who would contend tnat this was to the gen- eral advantage? It might be to the interest of gas com- panies to restrict the number and size of windows, but nardly to the interest of a community. Broken limbs bring fees to surgeons, but would it profit a municipality to prohibit the removal of ice from sidewalks in order to encourage surgery? Yet it is in such ways that protec- tive tarms act. Economically, what difference is there between restricting the importation of iron to benefit iron producers and restricting sanitary improvements to bene- fit undertakers? To attempt to make a nation prosperous by preventing it from biiying from other nations is as absurd as it would be to attempt to make a man prosperous by preventing him from buying from other men. How this operates in the case of the individual we can see from that practice which, since its application in the Irish land agitation, has come to be called '^ boycotting." Captain Boycott, upon whom has been thrust the unenviable fame of having his name turned into a verb, was in fact " protected." He bad a protective tariff of the most efficient kind built around him by a neighborhood decree more effective than act of Parliament. No one would sell him labor, no one itould sell him milk or bread or meat or any service or commodity whatever. But instead of growing prosperous, this much-protected man had to fly from a place where his own market was thus reserved for his own produc- tions. What protectionists ask us to do to ourselves in re- serving our home markets for home producers, is in kind what the Land Leaguers did to Captain Boycott. They ask us to boycott ourselves. In order to convince us that this would be for our benefit, no little ingenuity has been expended. It is asserted (i) that restrictions on foreign trade are bene- ficial because home trade is more profitable than foreign trade; (2) that even if these restrictions do compel people to pay higher prices for the same commodities, the real cost is no greater, and (3) that even if the cost is greater they get it twck again. Straagely enough, the mvt of these propodttons is for- tified by the autnority of Ad»m Sndth, In Book U., Chapter V., of Tkt Wt»Hh 0/ Nmlltm, occurs tUt passage I " The capital which Is employed In purchasing in on* part of the country In order to sell In another the produce of the industry of that ccuntry, generally replaces by w«ry such operation two distinct capitals that hbd both !.<;L-n employed in the agriculture or manufacture of that iuuntry, and thereby enahlcs tlicm to continue tliat em- ploymetif * • * The cu|iltal which sends Scotch manu- factures 1(1 F."iHl(iri, and brings back English corn and miiniifacturcs t<> Kil<"'biiruh,nccesiarllyre|)iaces by every sucti ijieration two lirllii^ capitals wnlch had both been employed in the agriculture or manufacture of Great Britain. " The capital employed in purchasing foreign goods lur home consumption vvlipn tills purchase is made with the produce of domestic industry, replaces, too, by every such operation, two diMtinct capitals , but one of them only is employed in subporiing domestic industry. The capital which sends Dritish Koelled him to pay for iron represented a loss to him which was not a gain to any one eise. For on Mr. Greeley's supposition that the tariff was neces- sary to give American iron makers the same remuneration such labor could have obtained in other pursuits, its effect was simply to compel the expenditure of $70 worth of ; "labor to obtain what otherwise could have been obtained by Iso worth of labor. To do this was necessary to lessen the wealth of the covntry as a whole, and to reduce the fund available for the purchase of newspapers and other articles. This loss is as certain and is of the same Idnd as if Mr. Greeley had been compelled to employ portrait painters to do whitewashing. _ The more popular form' of this argument that protec- tion costs nothing, hardly needs analysis. If, as is asserted, consumers lose nothing in the higher prices the tariff compels them to pay, because these prices are paid to our own people, then producers would lose nothing if compelled t- sell to their fellow-citizens below cost. If workmon are necessarily compensated for high-priced goods -y the increased demand for their labor, then manufacturers would be compensated for high-priced labor by the increased demand for their goods. In short, on this reasoning, it makes no difference to anybody whether the price of anything is high or low. When farmers complain of the high charges of railroads, they are making much ado about nothing; and workmen are taking needless trouble when they demand an increase of wages, while employers are quite as foolish when they try to cut wages down. CHAPTER XII. EXPORTS AND IMPORTS. The aim of protection is to diminish imports, never to Aiminish exports. On the contrary, the protectionist IftUt ii to regard exports with favor, and to cooiidcr the country which exports most and ifliports least as dotag the most profiuble trade, when exports exceed imports there is said to be a favorable balance of trade. When imports exceed exports there Is said to be an unfavorable bamnce of trade. In accordance with his idea all protec- tionist countries afford every facility for sending thi^g* away and fine men for bringing things in. If the things which we thus try to send away and prevent coming in were pests and vermin— things of which all men want as little as possible— this policy would conform to reason. But the things of whicn exports and imports consist are not things that nature forces on us against our will, and that we have to struggle to rid ourselves of; but things that nature gives only in return for labor, things for which men make exertions and undergo pri" vations. Him who has or can command much 01 these things we call rich ; him who has little we call poor ; and when we say that a country increases in wealth we mean that the amount of these things which it contains in- creases faster than its population. What, then, is more repugnant to reason than the notion that the way to in- crease the wealth of a country is to promote the sending of such things away and to prevent the bringing of them in? Could there be a queerer inversion of ideas? Should we not think even a dog had lost his senses that snapped and snarled when given a bone, and wagged his tail when a bone was taken from him ? Lawyers may profit by quarrels, doctors by diseases^ rat-catchers by the prevalence of vermin, and so it may be to the interest of some of the individuals of a nation to have as much as possible of the good things which we call ''goods" sent away, and as little as possible brought in. But protectionists claim that it is for the benefit of a community, as a whole, of a nation considered as one man, to make it easy to send goods away and difficult to bring them in. Let us take a community which we must perforce con- sider as a whole— that country, with a population of one, which the genius of Devoe has made familiar not only to English readers, but to the people of all European tongues. Robinson Crusoe, we will suppose, is still living alone on his island. Let us suppose an American protectionist is the first to break his solitude with the long yearned-for music of human speech. Crusoe's delight we can well imagine. But now that he has been there so long he does not care to leave, th^ less since his visitor tells him that the island, having now been' discovered, will often be visited by passing ships. Let us suppose that after having heard Crusoes story, seen his island, en- joyed such hospitality as he could offer, told him in return of the wonderful changes in the great world, and left him books and papers, our protectionist prepares to depart, but before going seeks to offer some kindly warning of the danger Crusoe will be exposed to from the " deluge of cheap goods " that passing ships will seek to exchange for fruit and goats. Imagine him to tell Crusoe just what protectionists tell larger communities, and to warn him that, unless he takes measures to make it difficult to bring these goods ashore, his industry will be entirely ruined. " In »ct," we may imagine the pro- tectionist to say, " so cheaply can all the things you re- ' quire be produced abroad that unless you make it hard to land them I do not see how you will be able to employ your own industry at all." "Will they give me all these things?" Robinson Crusoe would naturally exclaim. "Do you mean that I shall get all thes^ things for nothing, and have no work at ail to do ? That will suit me completely. I shall rest and read and go fishing for the fun of it. I am not anxious to work if without work I can get the things I want." " No, I don't quite mean that," the protectionist would be forced to explain. "They will not give you such things for nothing. They will, of course, want some- thing in return. But they will bring you so much and will take away so little that your imports will vastly ex- ceed your exports, and it will soon be difficult for you to \ find employment for your labor. " But I don't want to find employment for my labor," Crusoe would naturally reply. ^' I did not spend months in digging out my canoe and weeks in tanning and sewing these goat-skins because I wanted employment for my labor, but because I wanted the things. If I can get what I want with less labor, so much the better, and the more I get and the less I give in the trade you tell me I am to carry on — or, as you phrase it, the more my imports ex- ceed my exports— the easier 1 can live and the richer I shall be. I am not afraid of being overwhelmed with goods. The more they bring the better it will suit me." And so the two might part, for It is certain that no matter how long our protectionist talked the notion that his industry would be ruined by getting things witll less labor tlian before would never irigbten Zvmm, "IW iMtudoiag »ert importt ade. wben unfavorable A all protec- iding thing* and prevent rhichall men 1 conform to uid imp9ru nus against id ourselves rn for labor, indergo pri" uch of these U poor ; and ,1th we mean contains in- len, is more e way to in- the sending B^ng of them 1 of ideas? s senses that and wagged by diseases, nd so it may )f a nation to Fs which we ible brought : benefit of a lered as one d difficult to terforce con- ation of one, r not only to U European 1 living alone protectionist : yearned-for we can well e so long he i visitor tells covered, will suppose that s island, en- told him in Lt world, and prepares to some kindly )sed to from lips will seek : him to tell x>mmunitle8, ures to make ndustry will fine the pro- mgs you re-" lake It bard le to employ " Robinson 1 mean that ave no work I shall rest I am not the things I lionist would re you such want some- K> much and ill vastly ex- ilt for you to • my labor," >ena months ; and sewing lent for my :an get what nd the more 1 me I am to imports ex- 1 the richer I lelmed with rUl suit me." ain that no : notion that ga withlcH Vet. are thoe ftrgumenu for pioteetloii a whit more absurd wben addressed to one man living on an island tlian when addressed to sixty millions living on a con- tinent? What would be true in the case of Robinson Crusoe is true in the case of Brother Jonathan. If foreign- ers will bring us goods cheaper than we can make them ourselves, we shall be the gainers. The more we get in imports as compared with what we have to give In ex- ports, the better the trade for us. And since foreigners are not liberal enough to giv^ us their productions, but will only let us have them In return for our own produc- tions, bow can they ruin our industry ? The only way they could ruin our industry would be by bringing us for nothing all we want, so as to save us the necessity for work. If this were possible, ought it seem very dreadful. Consider this matter in another way: To impose taxes on exports in order that home consumers might get the advantage of lower prices would l>e quite as just as to impose taxes on imports in order that home producers may get the advantage of higher prices, and it would be far more conformable to the principle of " the greatest good of the greatest number," since all of us are consumers, while only a few of us are producers of the things that can be raised in price by taxes on imports. And since the wealthy country is the country that in proportion to its population contains the largest quantities of the things of which exports and imports consist, it would be a far more plausible method of national enrichment to keep such things from going out than to keep them from commg in. NoWf supposing it were seriously proposed, as a means for enriching the United States, to put restrictive duties on the carrying out of wealth ivstead of the bringing in of wealth. It is certain that th'S would be oppMea by protectionists. But what objection could they make ? The objection they would make would be in substance tliis : " The sending away of things in trade from one country to another does not involve a loss to the country ' from which they are sent, but a gain, since other things of more value are brought back in return for them. Therefore, to place any restriction upon the sending away of things would be to lessen instead of to increase the wealth of a country." This is true. But to say this, is to say that to restrict exports would be injurious be- cause it would diminish imports. Yet, to diminish im- ports is the direct aim and effect of protective tariffs. Exports and imports, so far as they are induced by trade, are correlative. Each is the cause and com- plement of the other, and to impose any restrictions on the one is necessarily to lessen the other. And so far from its being the mark of a profitable commerce that the value of a nation's exports exceeds her imports, the reverse of this is true. In a profitable international trade the value of imports will always exceed the value of the exports that pay for them, just as in a profitable trading voyage the return cargo must exceed in value the cargo carried out. This is possible to all the nations that are parties to commerce, for in a normal trade commodities are carried from places where they are relatively cheap to places where they are relatively dear, and their value is thus increased by the transportation, so that a cargo arrived at its destination has a Ugher value than on leaving the port of its exporta- tion. Kit on the theory that a trade is profitable only when exports exceed imports, the only way for all coun- tries to trade profitably with one another would be to carry commodities from places where they are relatively dear to places where they are relatively cheap. An international trade made up of such transactions as the exportation of manufactured ice from the West In- dies to New England, and the exportation of hot-house fruits from New England to the West Indies, would en- able all countries to export much larger values than they imported. On the same theory the more ships sunk at sea the better for the commercial world. To have all the ships that left each country sunk before they could reach any other country would, upon protectionist principles, be the quickest means of enriching the whole world, since all countries could then enjoy the maximum of ex- ports with the minimum of imports. It must, however, be bomcfin mind that all exporting and importing are not the exchanging of products. This, however, is a fact which puts in sUU stronger light, if that be possible, the absurdity of the notion that an excess of exports over imports shows increasing wealth. When Rome was mistress of the world, Sicily, Spain, Africa, Egypt, and Briuin exported to luly far more than they imparted from Italy. But so far from this excess of their expans over their imports indicating their enrichmenr, it indicated their impoverishment. It meant that the wealth produced in the provinces was being drained to Rome in taxes and tribute and rent, for which no return was made. The tribute exacted by Germany from France in 1871 caused a large excess of French exports over imports. So in India the '^bome charges" «l an alien government and the remittances of ahen officials secure a permanent excess of exports over impdrts. So the foreign debt which has been fastened upon Egypt requires large amounts of the produce of that countiy to be sent away for which there is no return in imports. And so for many years the exports from Ireland have largely exceeded the imports into Ireland, owins to the rent drain 01 absentee landlords. The Iri^ landlords who live abroad do not directly draw produce for their rent, nor yet do they draw money. Irish cattle, hogs, sheep, butter, linen and other productions are exportra as if in the regular course of trade, but their proceeds instead of coming back to Ireland as imports, are through the medium of bank and mercantile exchanges, placed to the credit of the absent landlords, and used up by them. This drain of com- modities in return for which no commodities are im- ported, would be greater yet were it not for the fact that thousands of Irishmen cross the channel every sum- mer to help get in the English harvests, and then return home, and that from those who have permanently emi- grated to other countries there is a constant, stream of remittances to relatives left behind. The last (ime I crossed to England I sat at the steamer table by two young Englishmen, who drank much cham- pagne and in other ways showed they tiad plenty of money. As we became acquainted I learived that they were younger sons of English *' country families," graa- uates of a sort of school which has been established in Iowa for wealthy young Englishmen who wish to become "gentlemen farmers" or " estate owners" in the United States. Each had got him a considerable tract of new land, had cut it up into farms, erected on each farm a board house and bam, and then rented these farms to tenants for half the crops. They liked America, they said ; it was a good country to have an estate in.. The land laws were very good, and if a tenant did not pay 6tt>mptly you could get rid of him without long formality, lut they preferred to live in England, and were gpinjg back to enjoy their incomes there, having put thdr Mfairs in the hands of an agent, to whom the tenants were re- quired to give notice when they wished to reap their crops, and who saw that the landlord's half was properly rendered. Thus in this case half the crop (less commis- sion) of certain Iowa farmers mwt annually be exported without any returns in imports. And this tide of ex- ports for which no imports come back is only commencing to flow, Many Englishmen already own American land by the hundred thousand, and even by the million acre^ and are only beginning to draw rent and royalties. Puneh recently had a ponderous joke, the point of which was that the British House of Lords had much greater landed interests in the United Sutes than in Great Briuin. If not true already, it will not under present conditions be many years before the English aristocracy will draw far larger incomes from their American estates than from their home estates— incomes to supply which we must ex- port without any return in imports.* In the commerce which goes on between the United States and Europe there are thus other elements than the exchange of productions. The sums borrowed of Europe by the sale ot railway and other bonds, the sums paid by Europ«ins for land in the United States or invested in industrial enterprises here, capital brought by emigrants, what is spent by Europeans traveling here, and some small amounts of the nature of gifts, legacies, and suc- cessions tend to swell our Imports or reduce our exports. On the other band, not only do we pay in exports to Europe for our imports from Brazil, India, and such * The Chicago Tribune ot January 35, 1886, contains a long account of the American estates of an Irish landlord, Wiuiam Scully. This Scully, who was one of the most notorious of the rack-renting and evicting Irish land- lords, owns from 75,000 to 90,000 acres of the richest land in Illinois, besides large tracts in other States. His estates are cut up into farms and rented to tenants who are obliged to pay all taxes and make all improvements, and who are not permitted to sell their crops until the rent is paid. A " spy system " is maintained, and tenants are required to doit their hats when they enter the " estate office." The Tribune describes them as reduced to a condition of absolute serfdom. The houses in which they live are the poorest shanties, consisting generally of a room and a half, and the whole district is described as bligfhted. Scully got most of his land at nominal prices, ranging as low as s«;venty-five cents per acre. He Hves in London, and is said to draw from his American estates a net income of $400,000 a year, which means, of course, that American produce to that value is exported every year without any imports coming back. The Tribune, closes its long account by saying: "Not content with acquiring land himself, Scully has induced a number of Ills relatives to become American landlords, and thetf system is patterned on his owa" M countnes, but Intirat on bonds and et&er oolifatioiu. profiu on capital Invested here, rent for Amaican land owned abroad, remittances from Immigrants to relatives at home, property passing by will or Inheritance to peo- ple abroad, payments for ocean transportation formerly carried on by our own vessels but now carried on by foreign vessels, the sums spent by American tourists who every year visit Europe, and by the increasing number of rich Americans who live in Europe, all contribute to swell our exports and reduce our imports. The annual balance against us on these accounts is , already very large and is steadily growing larger. Were we to prevent importations absolutely we should still have to export largely in order to pay our rents, to meet interests, and to provide for the increasing number of rich Americans who travel or reside abroad. But the fact that our exports must now thus exceed our imports in- stead of being what protectionists take it for, an evidence of increasing prosperity, is simply the evidence of a drain upon national wealth like that which has so Impoverished Ireland. But this drain is not to be stopped by tariffs. It pro- ceeds from a deeper cause than any tariff can touch, and is but a part of a general drift. Our internal commerce also involves the flow from country to city, and from West to East, of commodities for which there is no return. Our large mlae owners, ranch owners, land speculators, and many of our large farmers, live in the great cities. Our small farmers have nad in lar^e part to buy their farms on mortgage of men who nve in cities to tlie east of them ; the bonds of the national, state, county, and munic- ipal governments are largely so held, as are the stocks and lK>nds of railway and other companies— the result being that the country has to send to the cities, the West to the East, more than is returned. This flow is increas- ing, and, no matter what be cur tariff legislation, must continue steadily to increase, for it springs from the most fundamental of our social adjustments, that which makes land private property. As the land in Illinois or Iowa, or Oregon, or New Mexico, owned by a resident of New York or Boston increases in value, people who live in those states must send more and more of their produce to the New Yorker or Bbstonian. They may work hard» but grow relatively poorer ; he may not work at all but grow relatively richer, so that when they need, capital for building railroads or any other purpose, they must borrow and pay interest, while he can lend and get in- terest. The tendency or the time is thus to the owner- ship of the whole country by residents of the cities, and it makes no difference to tne people of the country dis- tricts whether those cities are in America or Burope. CHAPTER XIII. CONFUSIONS ARISING FKOM THB USB OF MONBY. There is no one who in exchanging his owa productions for the productions of another would think that the more he gave and the less he got the better off he would be. Yet to many men nothing seems clearer than that the more of its own productions a nation sends away, and the less of the productions of other nations it receives in re- turn, the more profitable its trade. So widespread is thiS' belief that to-day nearly all civilized nations endeavor to discourage the bringing in of the productions of other nations while regarding with satisfaction the sending away of their own. What is the reason of this ? Men are not apt to apply to the transactions of nations principles opposite to those they apply to individual transactions. On the contrary, . the natural tendency is to personify nations, and to think, and speak of them as actuated by the same motives and governed by the same laws as the human beings of whom^ ley are made up. Nor have we to look far to see that., the preposterous notion that a natioa gains by exporting' and loses by importing actually arises from tne applica- tion to the commerce between nations of ideas to which individual transactions accustom civilized men. What men dispose of to others we term their sales ; what they obtain from others we terra their purchases. Hence we become accustotned to think of exports as sales, and of imports as purchases. And as in daily life we habitually think that the greater the value of a man's sales and the less the value of his purchases the better his business ; so, if we do not stop to fix the meaning of the words we use, it seems a matter of course that the more a nation exports . and the less it imports the richer it will become. It is significant of its origin that such a notion fs un- known among savages. Nor could it have arisen among civilized men if they were accustomed to trade as sav- ages do. Not long ago a class of traders called " soap-fat men " used to go from bouse to house exchanging soap ' for the refuM fat accumulated by housewives. In this petty commerce, carried on in this primitive man- ner, the habit of thinking that in a profitable trade the value of sales must exceed the valut of purchases could neVer have arisen, it being clearly to the interest of each party that, the value of what he sold (or exported) should be as little as possible, and the value of what he bought (or imported) as great as possible. But in civilized society this is only the ex* ceptional form of trade. Buying and selling, as owt dally life familiarizes us with them, are not tlie exchange of commodities for commodities, but the exchange of moniey for commodities, or of commodities for money. It is to confusions of thought growing out of this use of money that we may trace the belief that a nation profits by exporting and loses by importing— a belief to which ' countless lives and incalculable wealth have been sacri- ficed in bloody wars, and which to-day moulds the policy ■ of nearly all civilised nations and interposes artificial bar* riers to the commerce of the world. The primary form of trade is barter— the exchange of •commodities for commodities. But just as when we begin to think and speak of length, weight or bulk, it is neces- sary to adopt measures or standards by which these -qualities can be expressed, so when trade begins there arises a need for some common standard by which the value of different articles can be apprehended. The dif- ficulties attending barter soon lead, also, to the adoption by common consent of some commodity as a medium of exchange, by means of which he who wishes to exchange a. thing for one or more other things is no longer obliged to find some one with exactly reciprocal desires, bul is enabled to divide the complete exchange into stages or steps, which can be made with different persons, to the •enormous saving of time and trouble. In primitive society, cattle, skins, shells, and many •other things have in a rude Way fulfilled these functions. But the precious metals are so peculiarly adapted to this iise that wherever they have become known mankind has 'been led to adopt them as money. They are at first used by weight, but a great step in advance is taken when they are coined into pieces of definite weight and purity, 'SO that no one who receives them needs to take the trouble of weighing and testing them. As civilization advances, as society becomes more settled and orderly, -and exchanges more numerous and regrular, gold atid silver are gradually superseded as mediums of exchange by credit in various forms. By means of accounts current, -one purchase is made to balance another purchase and one debt to cancel another debt. Individuals or associa- tions of recognized solvency issue bills of exchange, let- ters of credit, notes and drafts, which largely tsike the place of coin; banks transfer credits between individuals, and clearing-houses transfer credits between banks, so that immense transactions are carried on with a very : small actual use of money; and finally, credits of con- venient denominations, printed upon paper, and adapted to transference from hand to hand without indorsement or formality, being cheaper and more convenient, take in -part or in whole the place of gold or silver in the country where they are issued. This is, in brief, the history of that labor-saving in- .'Strument which ranges in its forms from the cowries of the African or the wampum of the red Indian to the bank- -note or greenback, and which does so much to facilitate trade that without it civilization would be impossible. The part which it plays in social life and intercourse is so necessary, its use is so common in thought and speech and ■ actual transaction, that certain confusions with regard to it are apt to grow up. It is not needful to speak of the delusion that interest grows out of the use of money, or that increase of money is increase of wealth, or that paper money cannot properly fulfill its functions unless an ' equivalent of coin is buried somewhere, t .t only of such confusions of thought as have a relation to international trade. I was present yesterday when one farmer gave another farmer a horse and four pigs for a mare. Both seemed pleased with the transaction, but neither said, "Thank you." Yet when money is given for anything else it is usual for the person who receives the nioney to say, "Thank you," or in some other way to indicate that he is more obliged in receiving the money than the other party is in receiving the thing the money is given for. This custom is one of the indications of a habit of thought which (although it is clear that a dollar cannot be more valuable than a dollar's worth) attaches the idea of bene- fit more to the giving of money for commodities than to the giving of commodities for money. The main reason of this I take to be that difficulties of, exchange are most felt on the side of reduction to the medium of exchange. To exchange anything for money it is necessary to find some one who wants that particular thing, but, this exchange effected, the excnange of n f)' n I'' Itiea of. to the money ticular nge of money for other thlnff» 'a generally easier, since all wlio have anything to exciianee are willing to talce money for it. This, ana the fact that the value of money is more certain and definite than the value of things measured by it, and the further fact that the sale or co:e bulk of our exports consists of those crude productions in which wages are not so important an element of cost, since they do not embody so much labor as the more elaborate productions called manu- factures. But the first part of this answer is an admission that the rate of wages is not the determining element in the cost of production, and that the country of low wages does not necessarily produce more cheaply than the country of high wages ; while, as for the distmction drawn between the cruder and the more elaborate productions, it is evident that this is founded on the comparison ot such things by bulk or weight, whereas the only measure of embodied labor is value. A pound of cloth embodies more labor than a pound of cotton, but this is not true of a dollar's worth. That a small weight of cloth will ex- change for a large weight of cotton, or a small bulk of watches for a large bulk of wheat, means simply that equal amounts of labor will produce larger weights or bulks of the one thing than of the other; and in the same way the exportation of a certain value of grain, ore, stone or timber means the exportation of exactly as much of the produce of labor as would the exportation of the same value of lace or fancy goods. Looking further, we see in every direction that it is not the fact that low priced labor gives advantage in produc- tion. If this is the fact, how was it that the development of industry in the slave States of the American Union was not more rapid than in the free States? How is It that Mexico, where peon labor can be had for from four to six dollars a month, does not undersell the products of our more highly paid labor ? How is it that China and India and Japan are not "flooding the world" with the products of their cheap labor ? How is it that England, where labor Is better paid than on the Continent, leads the whole of Europe in commerce and manufactures? The truth is, that a low rate of wages does not mean a low cost of production, but the reverse. The universal and obvious truth is, that the country where the wages are highest can produce with the greatest economy, because workmen have there the most intelligence, the most spirit and the most ability ; because invention and discovery are there most quickly made and most readily utilized. The great inventions and discoveries which so enormously increase the poWer of human labor to produce wealth have all been made in countries where wages are comparatively high. That lo^r wages mean inefficient labor may be aeco kt » tf -A) an 'beseco whereTer we took. Hilf a doien Bengaleie carpenters are needed to do a job that one American carpenter can do in less time. American residents in China get ser- vants for almost nothing, but find that so many are required that servants cost more than in the United States; yet the Chinese, who are largely employed in domestic service in California, and get wages that they would not have dreamed of in China, are efficient workers. Go to High Bridge, and you will see a great engine attendM by a few men, everting the power of thousands ot horses in pumping up a small river for the supply of New Yoric city, while on the Nile you may see the Egyptian fellans raising water by buckets and tread wheels. In Mexico, with labor at four or five dollars a month, silver ore has for centuries been carried to the surface on the backs of men who climbed rude ladders, but when silver mining began in Nevada, where labor could not be had for less than five or six dollars a day, steam power was employed. In Russia, where wages are very low, srain is still reaped by the sickle and threshed with the flau or by the hoofs of horses, while in our Western States, where labor is very high as compared with the Russian standard, grain » reaped, threshed, and sacked by machinery. It it were true that equal amounts of labor always pro- duced equal results, then cheap labor might mean cheap Eroduction. But this is obviously untrue. The power of uman muscle is, indeed, much the same everywhere, and if his wages be sufficient to keep him in good bodily health the poorly paid laborer can, perhaps, exert as much physical force as the highly paid laborer. But the power of human muscles, though necessary to all pro- duction, is not the primary and efficient force in produc- tion. That force is human intelligence, and human muscles are merely the agency by which that intelli- gence makes connection with and takes hold of ex- ternal things so as to utilize natural forces and mould matter to conformity with its desires. A race of intelligent pygmies with muscles no stronger than those of the grasshopper could produce far more wealth than a raceof stupid giants with muscles as strong as those of the elephant. Now, intelligence varies with the standard of comfort, and the standard of comfort varies with wages. Wherever men are condemned to a poor, hard ana precarious living their mental qualities unk towArtt the level of the brute. Wherever easier con- ditions prevail the qualities that raise man above the brute and give him power to master and compel external nature develop and expand. And so it is that the effi- . ciency of labor is greatest where laborers get the best living and have the most leisure— that is to say, where wages are highest. How, then, in the face of these obvious facts, can we account for the prevalence of the belief that the low wage country has an advantage in production over the high wage country. It cannot be charged to the teaching of protection. This is one of the fallacies which protection- ism avails itself of, rather than one for which it is respon- sible. Men do not hold it because they are protectionists, but become protectionists because they hold it. And it seems to be as firmly held, and on occasion as energetic- ally preached by soeir incomes so reduced that they would have to go to m t'k and thus increase production, while as soon asanincrea^ie in wages began to tell on the habits of the people and on industrial methods productive power would increase. CHAPTER XV. « OF ADVANTAGES AMD DISADVANTAGE AS REASONS FOR PROTECTION. We have seen that low wages do not mean low cost of production, and that a high standard of wages, instead of putting a country at a disadvantage in production, is really an advantage. This disposes of the claim that protection is rendered necessary by high wages, by show- ing the invalidity of the first assumption upon which it is based. But it is worth while to examine the second as- sumption in this claim— that production is determined by cost, so that a country of less advantages cannot produce if the free competition of a country of greater advantages be permitted. 'For while we are sometimes told that a country needs protection because of great natural ad- vantages that ought to be developed, we are at other times told that pi'otection is needed because of the sparse- ness of population, the want of capital or machinery or skill, or because of high taxes or a high rate of interest,* * The higher rate of interest in the United States than in Great Britain has until recently been one of the stock reasons of American protectionists for demanding a Itigh -.' I i or other cenditloni which, it may be, involve real dis- advantage. But without reference to the reality of the alleged advantage or disadvanta^re, all these special pleas for protection are met when it is shown, as it can be shown, that whatever be its advantages or disadvantages for production a country can always increase its wealth by loreign trade. If we suppose two countries, each of which is, for any reason, at a decided disadvantage in some branch of production in which the other has a decided advantage, it IS evident that the free exchange of commodities between them will be mutually beneficial, by enabling each to make up for its own disadvantage by availing itself of the advantage of the other, just as the blind man and the lame man did in the familiar story. Trade between them win give to each country a greater amount of all things tlian It could otherwise obtain with the same quantity of labor. Such a case resembles that of two workmen, each having as to som" things skill superior to the other, and who, by working together, each devoting himself to that part for which he is the better fitted, can accomplish more than twice as much as if each worked separately. But let us suppose two countries, one of which lias ad- vantages superior to the other for all the productions of which both are capable. Trade between them being free, would one country do all the exporting and the other all the importing? That, of course, would be pre- posterous. Would trade, then, be impossible? Certainly not. Unless the people of the country of less advantages transferred themselves bodily to the country of greater advantages, trade would go on with mutual benefit. The people of the country of greater advantages would im- port from the country of less advantages those products as to which the difference of advantage between the two countries was least, and would export in return those products as to which the difference was ereatest. By this exchange both peoples would gain. The people of the country of poorest advantages would gain oy it some part of the advantages of the other country, and the people of the country of greatest advantages would also gain, since, by being saved the necessity of producing the things as to which their advantage was least, they could concentrate their energies upon the production of things in which their advantage was greatest. This case would resemble that of two workmen of different degrees of skill in all parts of their trade or that of a skilled workman and an unskilled helper. Though the workman might be able to perform all parts of the work in less time than the helper, vet there would be some parts in which the advantage of nis superior skill would be less than in others; and as by leaving these to the helper he could devote more time to those parts in which superior skill would be most effective, there would be, as in the former case, a mutual gain in their working together. ' Thus it is that neither advantages or disadvantages afford any reason for restraining trade.* Trade is always to the benefit of both parties. If it were not there tvould be no disposition to carry it on. And thus v.'e see again the fallacy of the protectionist tariff. We do not hear so much of this now that the rate in New York is as low as in London, if not lower, but we hear no less of the need for protection. It is hardly necessary in this discussion to treat of the nature and law of interest, a subject which I have gone over in Progress and Poverty. It may, however, be worth while to say that a high rate of interest where it does not proceed from insecurity, is not to be regarded as a disadvantage, but rather as evidence of the large returns to the active factors of production, labor and capital— returns which diminish as rent rises and the land owner gets a larger share of their produce for permitting labor and capital to work. * In point of fact there is no country which as to all branches of production can be said to have superior advantages. The conditions which make one part of the habitable globe better fitted for some production, unfit it '.~ix others, and what is disadvantage for some kinds of production, is generallv advantage for other kinds. Even the lack or rain which makes some parts of the globe useless to man, may, if invention ever succeeds in directly utilizing the power of the sun's rays, be found to be especially advantageous for certain parts of produc- tbn. The advantages and disadvantages that come from the varying density of population, the' special development of certain forms of industry, etc., are also largely relative. The most positive of all advantages in prdHuction— that which most certainly gives supcHority la all branches, is that which arises from that general intelligence which increases with the increase of the comfort and leisure of the masses of the people, that is to ny, w^ith the increase of wages. ^ contention. that If it taltcs no more labor to produce* tbing in our country than elsewhere, we shall lose nothing by shutting out the foreign product, even though we have to pay a higher price for the home prod.ict. The Inter- change of tne products of labor doe^ not depend upon differences of absolute cost, but of comparative cost. Goods may profitably be sent from places where they cost more labor to places where they cost less labor, provided (and this Is the only case in which they ever will be so sent) th%t a still greater difference in labor-cost exists as to other things which the first country desires to obtain. Thus tea, which Horace Greeley was lond of referring to as a production that might advantageously be naturalized in the United States by a heavy duty, could undoubtedly be produced in the United States at less cost of labor i:\\ ^ than in China, for in transportation to the seaboard, ^' ^ packing, etc., we could save upon Chinese methods. But there are other things, such as the mining of silver, the refining of oil, the weaving of doth, the making of clocks and watches, as to which our advantage over the Chinese is enormously greater than in the growing of tea. Hence, by producing these things and exchanging them directly or Indirectly for Chinese tea, we obtain; ui spite of the long carriage, more tea for the same labor than we could g'.i. Dy growing our own tea. ^ Consider how this principle, that the interchange of commodities is governed by the comparative, not the absolute, cost of production, applies to the plea that pro- tective duties are required on account of home taxation. It is of course true that a special tax placed upon any branch of production puts it at a disadvantage unless a like tax is placed upon the importation of similar produc- tions. But this is not true of such general taxation as falls on all branches of industry alike. As such taxation does not alter the comparative profitableness of industries it does not diminish the relative inducement to carry any of them on, and to protect any particular industry from foreign competition on account of such general taxation is simply to enable those engaged in it to throw off their share of a general burden. A favorite assumption of American protectionists is, or rather has been (for we once heard much more of it than now), that free trade is a good thing for rich countries but a bad thing for poor countries—that it enables a country of better developed industry to prevent the de- velopment of industry in other countries, and to make such countries tributary to itself. But it follows from the principle which, as we have seen, causes and governs international exchanges, that for any country to impose restrictions on its foreign commerce on account of itsown disadvantages in production is to prevent such ameliora- tion of those disadvantages as foreign trade would bring. Free trade is voluntary trade. It cannot go on unless to the advantage of both parties, and, as between the two, free trade is relatively more advantageous to the poor and undeveloped country than to the rich and prosperous country. The opening up of trade between a Robinson Crusoe and the rest of the world would be to the advant- age of both parties. But relatively the advantage would be far greater to Robinson Crusoe than to the rest of the world. There is a certain class of American protectionists who concede that free trade is good in itself, but who say that we cannot safely adopt it until all other nations have adopted it, or until all other nations have come up to our standard of civilization; or, as it is sometimes phrased, until the millennium has^come and men have ceased to struggle for their own interests as opposed to the interests of others. And so British protectionists have now assumed the name of " Fair Traders." They have ceased to deny the essential goodness of free trade, but contend that so long as other countries maintain protec- tive tariffs <^reat Britain, in self-defense, should main- ain a protective tariff too, at least against countries that refuse to admit British productions free. The fallacy underlying most of these American excuses ^V for protection is that considered in the previous chapter —the fallacy that the country of low wages can undersell the country of high wages; but there is also mixed with this the notion to which the British fair traders appeal— the notion that the abolition of duties by any country is to the advantage, not of the people of that country, but of the people of the other countries that are thus given free access to its markets. " Is not the fact that British manufacturers desire the abolition of our protective tariff a proof that we ought to continue it?" ask American protectionists. '' .s it not a suicidal policy to give for- ctigners free access to our markets while they refuse us access to theirs ? " cry British fair traders. All these notions are forms of the delusion that to ex- port is more profitable than to import, but so widespread and inflential are they that it may be well to Uevste a f^w words to them. The direct effect of a tariff is to restrain the people of the country ttiat imposes it. It curtails the V ■Mm tl to produce* I lose nothing ugh we have ;. The inter- lepend upon arative cost, lere they cost >oi', provided rcr wilt he so cost exists as res to obtaini f referring to e naturalized undoubtedly cost of labor he seaboard, lethods. But of silver, the Ana of clocks r the Chinese tea. Hence, them directly spite of the lian we could terchange of live, not the }lea that pro- >me taxation, ed upon any taee unless a nilar produc- 1 taxation as such taxation > of industries to carry any ndustry from leral taxation irow oft their :tionists is, or jre of it than rich countries it enables a event the de- and to malce ows from the and governs :ry to impose intof itsown ich ameliora- would bring. on unless to een the two, to the poor ■ prosperous a Robinson the advant- ntage would rest of the tionists who vho say that lations itave ne up to our les phrased, ceased to the interests have now They have trade, but tain protec- lould main- untries that can rxcuses ous cnapter n undersell mixed with rs appeal— f country is ountry, but thus given that British :ctive tariff American ,o give for- y refuse us that to ex. widespread !v«te a f(!w to restrain ;urtailB tho ^ ^ *■ freedom of foreignen to trade only through its operation in curtailing the freedom of citizens to trade. So far as foreigners are concerned it only indirectly affects their freedom to trade with that particular country, while to citizens of thiit country it is a direct curtailment of the freedom to trade with all the world. Since-trade involves mutual Ibenefit, it is true that any restriction that pre- vents one party from trading must operate in some degree to the injury of another party. But the indirect injury which a protective tariff mflicts upon other countries is diffused and slight as compared with the injury it inflicts directly upon the nation that imposes it. To illustrate: The tariff which we have so long main- tained upon iron to prevent our people from exchanging their products for British iron has unquestionably lessened our trade with Great Britain. But the effect upon the United States has been very much more injurious than the effect upon Great Britain. While it has lessened our trade absolutely, it has lessened the trade of Great Britain only with us. What Great Britain has lost in this curtail- ment of her trade with us she has largely made up in the consequent extension of her trade elsewhere. For the effeet of duties on iron and iron ore, and of the system of which they are part, lias been so to increase the cost of American productions as to give to Great Britain the greater part of the carrying trade of the world, for which we were her principal competitor, and to liand over to her the trade of South America and of other countries, of which, but for this, we should have had the largest share. And in the same way, for any nation to restrict the freedom of its own citizens to trade, because other nations BO restrict the freedom of their citizens, is a policy of the "biting off one's nose to spite one's face" order. Other nations may injure us by the imposition of taxes which tend to impoverish their own citizens, for as denizens of the world it is to our real interest that all other denizens of the world should be prosperous. But no other nation can thus injure us so much as we shall injure ourselves if we impose similar taxes upon our own citizens by way of retaliation. Suppose that a farmer who has an improved variety of potatoes learns that a neighbor has wheat of such superior Idnd that it will yield many more bushels to the acre than that he has been sowing. He might naturally go to his neighbor and offer to exchange seed potatoes for seed wheat. But if the neighbor while willing to sell the wheat should refuse to buy the potatoes, would not our farmer be a fool to declare, " Since you will not buy my superior potatoes I will not buy your superior wheat 1 " Would it not be very stupid retaliation for him to go on planting poorer seed and getting poorer crops ? • Or, suppose, isolated from tho rest of mankind, half a dozen men so situated and so engaged that mutual con- venience constantly prompts them to exchange produc- tions with one another. Suppose five of these six to be under the dominion of some curious superstition which leads them when they receive anything in exchange to bum one-half of it up before carrying home the other lialf. This would indirectly be to the injury of the sixth man, because by thus lessening their own wealth his five neigh- bors would lessen their ability to exchange with bun. But, would he better himself if he were to say : " Since these fools will insist upon burning half of all they get in exchange I must, in self-defense, follow their example and burn half of all I get " ? The constitution and scheme of things in this world in which we find ourselves for a few years is such that no one can do either good or evil for himself alone. No one can release himself from the influence of his surroundings and say, " What others do is nothing to me ; " nor yet can anyone say, " What I do is nothing to others." Never- theless it is in the tendency of things that he who does good most profits by it, and he who does evil injures, most of all, himself. And those who say that a nation should adopt a policy essentially bad because other nations have embraced it are as uuwise as those who say. Lie because others are false ; Be idle, because others are lazy ; Refuse knowledge, because others arc ignorant. CHAPTER XVI. THE DEVELOPMENT OF MANUFACTURES, • English protectionists, during the present century at least, struggled for the protection of agriculture, and the repeal of the corn laws in 1846 was their Waterloo. On the continent, also, it is largely agriculture that is held to need protection, and special efforts have been made to protect the German hog, even to the ^extent of shutting out its American competitor. But in the United States the favorite plea for protection has been that it is neces- nary to the estdblisbtnent of loanufactures; and the prev* alent Ameriean idea of protection is that it Is a scheme for fostering manufactures. As a matter of fact, American protection has not been confined to manufacturers, nor has there been any hesita- ' tion in Imposing duties which, by raising the cost of materials, are the very reverse of encouraging to manu- factures. In the scramble which the protective system has induced, every interest capable of being protected and powerful enough to compel consideration in con- gressional logrolling has secured a greater or less share of protection— a share not based upon any standard of needs or merits, but upon the number of votes it could command. Thus wool, the production of which is one of the most primitive of industries, preceding even the till- ing of the soil, has been protected by high duties, although certain grades of foreign wool are necessary to American woolen manufacturers, who have by these duties been put at a disadvantage in competing with foreign manufacturers. Thus iron ore has been pro- tected despite the fact that American steel «nakers need foreign ore to mix with American ore, and are obliged to import it even under the high duty. Thus copper ore has been protected, to the disadvantage of American smelters, as well as of all the many branches of manu- facture into which copper enters. Thus salt has been protected, though it is an article of prime necessity, used in large quantuies in such important industries as the curing of meats and fish, and entering into many branches of manufacture. Thus lumber has been protected in ' spite of its importance in manufacturing, as well as of the protests 01 all who have inquired into the conse- quences of the rapid clearing of our natural woodlands, "Thus coal has been protected, though to many branches of manufacturing cheap fuel is of first importance. And so on, through the list. Protection of this kind is direct discouragement of manufactures. Nor yet is it encouragement of any in- dustry, since its effect is, not to make production of any- kind more profitable, but to raise the price of lands or mines from which these crude products are obtained. Yet in spite of all this discouragement of manufactures, of which the instances I have given are but samples, pro- tection is still advocated as necessary to manufactures, and the growth of American manufactures is claimed as its result. So long and so loudly has this claim been made that to- day many of our people believe, what protectionist writers and speakers constantly assume, that but for protection there would not now be a manufacture of any importance carried on in the United Sutes, and that were protection abolished the sole industry that this great country could carry on would be the raising of agricultural products for exportation to Europe. That so many believe this is a striking instance of our readiness to accept anything that is persistently dinned into our ears. For that manufactures grow up without protection, and that the effect of our protective tariff is to stunt and injure them, can be conclusively shown from general principles and from coinmon facts. But first, let me call attention to a confusion of thought which gives plauMbility to the notion that manufactures should be "encouraged." Manufactures grow up as poptilation increases and capital accumulates, and, in the natural order of industry, are best developed in countries of dense population and accumulated wealth. Seeing this connection, it is easy to mistake for cause what is really effect, and to imagine that manufacturing brings population and wealth. Here, in substance, is the argu- ment which has been addressed to the people of the United States from the time when we became a nation to tho present day. Manufacturing countries are always rich countrin. Countries thai produce only raw materials are alwayt poor. Therefore, if lue would be rich we must have manufactures, and in order .to get manufactures w» must encourage them. To many this argument seems plausible, especially as the taxes for the "encouragement" of the protected in- dustries are levied in such a way that their, payment is not realized. But I could make as good an argument to the people of the 'ittle town of Jamaica, near which I am now living, in support of a subsidy to a theatre ; I could say to them: "All large cities have theatres, and the more theatres it has the larger the city. Look at New York I New York has more theatres than any other city in America, and is consequently the greatest city in America. Phila- delphia ranlcs next to New York in the number and size of Its theatres, and therefore comes next to New York in population and wealth. So, throughout the" country, wherever you find large, well-appointed theatres you will find large and prosjierous towns, while where there are no theatres the towns are small. Is it any wonder that Jamaica is so small and grows so slowly when it has ■! ':S ti BO theatres M all ? Ptople do not Uke to Mttle in a place where they cannot occasionally go to the theatre. If you want Jamaica to thrive you must take step* to build a fine theatre, which will attract a large population. Look at Brooklyn ? Brooklyn was only a small riverside Tillage before its people had the enterprise to start a theatre, and see now, since they began to build theatres, bow targe a city Brooklyn has become." Modeling my argument on that addressed to American voters by the Presidential candidate of the Republican party of 1884,1 might then drop into "statistics" and point to the fact that when theatrical representations tirst braan in this country its population did not amount to a million : that it was totally destitute of railroads and without a single mile of telegraph wire. Such has been our progress since theatres were introduced that the census of 1880 showed that we had 50.155,783 people, 97,907 miles of railroad and agi.aia 9-10 miles of telegraph wires. Or I might go into greater detail, as some pro- tectionist " statisticians " are accustomed to do. I might talce the 'date of the building of each of the New York theatres, give the population and wealth of the city at that time, and then, by presenting the statistics of popu- lation and wealth a few years later, show that the build- ing of each theatre had been followed by a marked in- crease in population and wealth. I might point out that San Francisco had not a theatre until the Americans came there, and was consequently but a straggling yillage ; that the new comers immediately set up theatres and maintained them more generously than any other similar population in the world, and that the consequence was the marvelous growth of San Francisco. I might show that Chicago and Denver and Kansas City, all re- markably good tneatre towns, have also been remarkable for their rapid growth, and. as in the case of New York, prove statistically that the building of each theatre these cities contain has been followed by an increase of popu- lation and wealth. Then, stretching out after protectionist fashion into the historical argument, I might refer to the fact that Nineveh and Babylon had no theatres that we know of; and so went to utter ruin; dilate upon the fondness of the ancient Greeks for theatrical entertainments conducted at public expense, and their consequent greatness in arts and arms; point out how the Romans went even farther than the Greeks in their encouragement of the theatre, and built at public cost the largest theatre in the world, and how Rome became the mistress of the nations. And, to embellish and give point to the argument, I might perhaps drop into poetry, recalling Byroirs lines : "When faJIs the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; And when Rome falls— the world! " Recovering from this, I might cite the fact that in every province they conquered the Romans established thea- tres, as explaining the remarlcable facility with which they extended their civilization and made ttie conquered provinces integrral parts of their great empire ; point out that the decline of these theatres and the decay of Roman power and civilization went on together ; and that the extinction of the theatre brought on the night of the Dark Ages. Dwelling, then, a moment upon the rude- ness and ignorance cf that time when there were no theatres, I might triumphantly point to the beginning of modern civilization as contemporaneous with the revival of theatrical entertainments in miracle plays and court masques, and showing how these plays and masques were always supportea by monasteries, municipalties or princes, and how places where they began became sites of great cities, I could laud the wisdom of " encouraging infant theatricals." Then, in the fact that English actors, until recently, styled themselves her Majesty's ser- vants, and that the Lord Chamberlain still has authority over the English boards and must license plays before they can be acted, I could trace to a national system of subsidizing infant theatricals the foundation of England's greatness. Coming back to our own times, I could call attention to the fact that Paris, where theatres are still subsidized and actors still draw their salaries from the public treasury, is the world's metropolis of fashion and art, steadily growing in population and wealth, though other parts of the same country which do not enjoy sub- sidized theatres are either at a standstill or declining'. And finally I could point to the astuteness of the Mor- mon leaders, who early in the settlement of Salt Lake built a spacious theatre, and whose little village in the sage brush, then hardly as large as Jamaica, has since the building of this theatre grown to be a populous and beau- tiful) cUy, and indignantly ask whether the virtuous people of Jamaica should allow themselves to be outdone by wicked polygamists. If such an argument would not induce the Jamaicans to tax themselves to "encourage" a theatre, would it not at least be as logical as argiuaents that have induced the American people to tax themselves to encourag* manufactures ? The truth is, that manufactures, like theatres, are the ' result, not the cause, of the growth of population and wealth. If we take a watch, a book, a steam engine, a piece of dry goods, or the product of any of the industries which we class as manufactures, and trace the steps by which the material of which it is composed has been brought from the condition in which it is afforded by nature Into finished form, we will see that to the carrying on of any manufacturing industry many other industries are neces- sary. That an industry of this kind shall be able to avail itself freely of the products of other industries is a prime condition of its' successful prosecution. Hardly less im- portant is the existence of related industries, which aid , .,) In economizing material and utilizing waste, or make ' easier the procurement of supplies or services, or the sale and distribution of products. This is the reason why* the more elaborate industries tend within certain limits to localization, so that we find a particular district, with- out any assignable reason of soil, climate, material pro- ductions, or character of the people, become noted for a particular manufacture, while aWerent places within that district become noted for different branches. Thus, in those parts of Massachusetts where the manufacture of boots and shoes is largely carried on, distinctions such as those between pegged and sewed goods, men's and women's wear, coarse and fine, will be lound to duurao- terize the Industry of different towns. And In any oon- sidcrable city we may see the disposition of various in^ dustries, with their related industries, to cluster togetlier. But with this .tendency to localization there isviso a ten. dency Which Causes industries to arise in their order wherever population increases. This tendency is due not only to the difficulty and cost of transportation, but to differences in taste and to the individuality of demands. For instance, it will be much more convenient and satis- factory to me, if I wish to have a boat built, to have it built where I can talk with the builder and watch its con- struction; or to have a coat made where I can try it on; or to have a book printed where I can readily read the proofs and consult with the printer. Further than Uiis that relation of industries which makes the existence of certain industries conduce to the economy with which others can be carried on, not merely causes the growth of one industry to prepare the way for others, but to pro- mote their establishment. Thus the development of fhdustry is of the nature of an evolution, which goes on with the increase ot popu- lation and the progress of society, the simpler industries coming first and forming a basis for the more elaborate ones. The reason that newly settled countries do not manu- facture is that they can get manufactured goods cheaper— that is to say, with less expenditure of labor than by manufacturing them. Just as the farmer, though he may have ash and hickory growing on his place, finds it cheaper to buy a wagon than to make one, or to take his wagon to the wheelwright's when it wants repairing, rauier than attempt the job himself, so in a new ana sparsely settled country it may take less labor to obtain goods from long distances than to manufacture them, even when every natural condition for their manufacture exists. The conditions for profitably carrying on any manufac- turing industry are not merely natural conditions. Even more important than climate, soil, and mineral deposits are the existence of subsidiary industries and of a large demand. Manufacturing involves the production of large quantities of the same thing. The development of skill, the use of machinery and of improved processes, only become possible as large quantities of the same product are required. If the small quantities of all the various things needed must be produced for itself by each small community, they can only be produced by rude and wasteful methods. But if trade permits these things to be produced in large quantities the same labor becomes (f I much more effective, and all the various wants can be ^ much better supplied. The rude methods of savages are due less to ignorance than to isolation. A gun and ammunition will enable a man to kill more game than a bow and arrows^but a man who had to make his own weapons from the materiais furnished by nature could hardly make himself a gun in a lifetime, even if he understood gun making. Unless there is a large number of men to bt supplied with guns and ammunition, and the materials of which these are made can be produced with the economy that comes with the production of large quantities, the most effective weapons, taking into account the labor of producing them, are bows and arro .vs not fire-arms. With a steel axe a tree may be felled with much less labor than with a stone axe. But a man who must make his own axe would be able to fell mnny trees with a sf-ne axelntbe i;> M dm* ht.woald ipmd trybiff r.o aakt a MMl an from tlM ore. w« MDlU at the Mrafct who for a tbtath knlfa or eoppar kattla cladly fiva many rich fura. Such artldaa ara with ua ofiittle yaluc, bccauM baling mada in iwae qnantitiea the expenditure of labor required for each la very uaall, but If made in small quantitica, u the ear- age would have to make them, the expenditure of labor would far exceed that needed to obtain the fura. Even if thev had the fullest knowledge of the tools and meth- ods of eiyllised industtr, men Isolated as savages are iso- lated would be forcea to resort to the rude tools and methods of savages. The great advantage which clvtl- ixed men have over savages in settling among them is in the possession of tools and weapons made in that state of society in which alone It Is possible to manufacture them, and that by keeping up communication with the denser populations they have left behind them, the settlera are able by meana of trade to avail themselves of the manu- focturlng advanUges of a more fully developed society. R the first American colonists had been unable to Import from Europe the goods they required, and thus to avail themselves of the fuller development of European Indus- try, they must soon have been reduced to savage tools and weapons. And this would have happened to all new settlements In the westward march of our people had they been cut off from trade with larger populations. In new countries the Industries that yield the largest comparative returns are the primary or extractive indus- tries which obuin food and the raw materials of manu- facture from nature. The reason of this is that In these primary industries there are not required such costly tools and appliances, nor the co-operation of so many other industries, nor yet Is production In large quantities so important. The people of new countries can there- fore get the largest return for their labor by applying it to the primary or extractive industries, and exchanging their products for those of the more elaborate indua- tries that can l>est be carried on where population is denser. As population Increases, the conditions under which the secondary or any more elaborate Industries can be carried on gradually arise, and such industries will be established— those tor which natural conditions are peculiarly favorable, and those whose products are in most general demand and will least bear transportation, , comiiw firat. Thus in a country having fine forests, manufactures of wood will arise before manufactures for which there is no special advsntage. The making of bricks will precede the making of china, the manufacture of plowshares that of cutlery, window glass will be made before telescope lenses, and the coarser grades of cloth before the finer. But while we may describe in a general way the con- ditions which determine the natural order of industry, ''et so many are these conditions and so oomplex are their ictionaand reactions upon one another that no one can predict with any exactness what in any given community this natural order of development will oe, or say when it becomea more profitable to manufacture a thing than to import it. Legislative Interference, therefore. Is sure to prove hurtful, and such questions should be left to the unfettered play of individual enterprise, which is to the community wlut the unconscious vital activities are to the man. If the time has come for the establishment of an industry for which proper natural conditions exist, restrictions upon importation In order to promote its establishment are needless. If the time has not come, such restrictions can only divert labor and capital from industries in which the return is greater, to others in which it must be less, and thus rrauce the aggregate production of wealth. Just as It is evident that to pre- vent U'e people of a new colony from importing from coun* A of fuller industrial devdopment would deprive the' A many things they could not possibly make for tb .selves, so it is evident tliat to •restrict importations «' ^retard the symmetrical development of domestic ydustries. It may be that protection applied to one or enefit the system of pro- tection is most advocated, by making more costly the proddteta which they must use and repressing the correlar tlve industries with which they interlace. To assume, aa protectionistt do, that economy must necaMarily result from bringing producer and consumer together in point of space,* u tOHUsume that things can * * Pntactlonlst argua^ents frequently Involve the addi- tional aMuaptioa that the " home producer " and " home bapndoMd MWiDlnoiMplMtuIniiiothar, and tlttt diflcultlaa la axchaaga ara \o Ita maasurad solaly by dis- tance. The truth is, that commoditiea can often ba pro- duced In one place with so much greater fadlitj than in another that it involves a less expenditure of labor to bring them long distances than to produce them on tha spot, while two points a hundred miles apart mayba commercially nearer each other than two points ten milea apart. To bring the producer o the con> - r In point of distance. Is, If It Increases the cost of pk ition, not economy but waste. But tnis is not to deny that trade as it is carried on Uv day doea involve much unnecessary transportation, and that producer and consumer are In many cases need- lessly separated. Protectionists are right when they point to the wholesale exportation of the elements of fertility of our soil, in the great stream of breadstufls and meats which poun across the Atlantic, as reon industry generally, but it is a dead weight upon the very industries it is intended to stimti- II there are producers Tflfo permanently profit by pro wauak tective dutlcd, it i* only because they are In tome other way protected from domestic competition, and hence the profit which comes to them by reason of the duties does not come to them as producers but as monopolists. That Is to say, tki only catet in which proUction can m&rt than itm^orariiy btntfit any clat$ of proHucir* an casts tn which it cannot stimulat* industry. For that neither duties nor subsidies can sive any permanent advantage in any business open to home competition results from the tendency of profits to a common level. The risk to which protected industries are exposed from changes in the tariff may at times keep profits in them somewtiat above the ordinary rate ; but this represents not advant- age, but the necessity for increased insurance, and and though It may constitute a tax upon consumers e produced, are land and labor. To these essential factors is added, when productioR passes beyond primitive forms, a third factor, capital-^ which coniists of tbe product 01 laud and latMr (wcaUl) ■M m iZl at •f ■re In tome other tlon, and hence the nf the duties doct monopolists. That titctien can mtyr* troduttri mrt catit . For that neither nancnt advantage titlon rcRulta from level. The risk to 1 from changes in n them somewhat eaents not advant- !d insurance, and on cortsumers (?.oev. This clement oiH ted industries can icted industries by I them from home reign competition, to increase profits ) that industry be lux of competitors ittract, this influx general level. A which may thus or themselves the feet of a proteaive isessionof advant- I the possession of For instance, the the United Sutes, family have been es which the pro em to charge home e discovery ef ne v and Montana, f he mines were eiia- he protective duty mpetition was im- t that could reduce three or four cenu old in the United d to Europe, ned by the po«8a»> rthe patent laws, n patents for mak- >n with them was '.noirmous duty on 1! )y to their divl- r-i process used in lilariy encouraged be secured by the large capital and tlon of producers home production ace, the protective 79, resulted to the . combination of > Company— have ompetltion in the abled to retain to e proteaive duty to iar«;ely concen- ts of working iip id in no way en- ies. O'n the con- itlons natural or ' these industries, ipital engaged in of aatuial oppor- ition orcombina- rnerdiip in these :ombinations, ni^M luction. Though les who are pro- oducers ; though who are capital- heir employment ership of. special benefit of profits the most import- mership of land, wise benefits the I, without which land and labor, hen productioa factor, capital-<- d labor (weabV •J#> med for the purpeu of faciliuting the production of more wealth. Thus to production as it goes on in clvil- ixed societies the three factors are land, labor, and capital, and since land is in modern civilization made a subject of private ownerxhip, the proceeds of production are divided between the land-owner, the labor-owner, and the capital-owner. But netween these factors of production there exists an essential diflference. Land is tne purely passive factor; labor and capital are the active factors— the factors by whose application and according to whose application wealth Is brought forth. Therelore, it is only that part of the produce which goes to labor and capital that con- stitutes the reward of producers and stimulates produc- tion. The land-owner is In no sense a producer— ne adds nothing whatever to the sum of productive forces, and that portion of the proceeds of production which he receives for the use of natural opportunities no more rewards and stimulates production than does that portion of their crops which superstitious savages might burn up before an idol in thanlc-oiTering for the sunlight that had ripened them. There can be no labor until there is a man; there can be no capital until man has worked and saved; but land was here before man came. To the pro- duction of commodities the laborer furnishes human ex- ertion; the capitalist furnishes the results of human exer- tion embodied informs that may be used to aid further exertion; but the land-owner turnishes— what ? The superlicies of the earth ? the latent powers of the soil i the ores beneath it ? the rain ? the sunshine ? gravitation ? the chemical affinities? l^Aat does the land-owner furnish that involves any contribution /rom Aim to the exertion required in production ? The answer must be, nothing I And lience it is that what goes to the land-owner out of the results of production is not the reward of producers and does not stimulate production, but is merely a toll which producers are compelled to pay to one whom our laws permit to treat as his own what Nature furnishes. Now, keeping these i rinclples in mind, let us turn to the effects of protection. Let us suppose that England were to do as the English agriculturist landlords are very anxious to have her do — go back to the protective policy and impose a high duty on (rrain. This woiiid much in- crease the price of grain in England, and its first eftect would be, while seriously injuring other industries, to give much larger profits tc English farmers. This in- crease of profits would cause a rush into the business of farming, and the increased competition for the use of agricultural land would raise agricultural rents, so that the result would be. When industry had readjusted itself, that though the people of England would have to pay more for grain, the profits of grain producing would not be larger than profits in any other occupation. The only class that would derive any benefits from the Increased price that the people of England would have to pay for their food would be the agricultural land-owners, wh? are not producers at all. Protection cannot add to the value of the land of a country as a whole, any more than it can stimulate in- dustry as a whole \ on the contrary, its tendency is to check the general increase of land values by checking the production of wealth ; but by stimulating a particu- lar form of industry it may increase the value of a par- ticular kind of land. And it is instructive to observe this, for it largely explains the motive in urging protec- tion, and where its benefits go. For instance, the duty on lumber has not been asked for and lobbied for by the producers of lumber— that is to say, the men engaged in cutting down and sawing up trees, and who derive their profits solely from that source — nor has it added to their profits. The parties who have really lobbied and log-rolled for the imposition and maintenance of the lumber duty are the owners of timber lands, and its effect has been to increase the price of "stumpage," the royalty which the producer of lum- ber must pay to the owner of timber land for the privi- lege of cutting down trees. A certain class of forestall- ers have made a business of getting possession of timber lands by all the various "land-grabbing" devices as soon as the progress of population promised to make them available. Constituting a compact and therefore powerful interest, they have been able to secure a daty on lumber, which, nominally imposed for the encourage- ment of the lumber producer, has really encouraged only the timber land forestaller, who^ instead of being a pro- ducer ^t all, is merely a blackmailer of production.* So It is with many other duties. The eifect of the * When, after the great fire in Chicago a bill was intro- duced in Congress |iermitting the importation free of duty of materials intended for use in the rebuilding of that city, the Michigan Jimber land barons went to W<^h- ington in a special par and induced the committee to omit lumber from the bill. sugar duty, for inttanu, li to Increase « valtM of ttu lands in Louisiana, ana our treaty / the Hawah Islands, by which Hawaiian sugar is at i 'i«d free of t. duty, being equivalent (since the prodviciiuii of Hawaiiau sugar Is not sutticient to supply the United States) to the payment of a heavy bounty to Hawaiian sugar growers, nas enormously increased the value of sugar lands in the Hawaiian Islands. So with the duty on copper and copper ore, which for a long time enabled American copper com* pahics to keep up the price of copper in the United States while they were shipping copper to Europe and selling it there at a considerably lower price.* The benefits at these duties went to companies engaged in producing copper, but it went to them not as producers of copper but as owners of copper mines. If, as is Urgely the case in coal and iron mining, the Work had been carried on by operators, who paid a royalty to the mine owners, tM enormous dividends wdfilu h " "' and not to the operators. enormous dividends wdfilu have gone to the mine ownen Horace Greeley used to think that he conclusively disproved the assertion that the duties on iron were en- riching a few at the expense of the many, when he de* dared that our laws gave to no one any special privilege of'making iron, and asked why, if the tariff gave such enormous profits to the iron proiduceis as the free traders said it did, these free traders did not go to work and make iron. So far as concerned those producers who derived no special advantage from patent rights or com* binations, Mr. Greeley was right enough— the fact that there was no ipccial rush to get into the business prov- ing that iron producers as producers were making on the average no more than ordinary profits. And could iron be made from air, this fact would have shown what Mr. Greeley seems to have imagined it did, though it would not have shown that the nation was not losing greatly by the duty. But iron cannot be made from air; it can only be made from iron ore. And though Nature, especially in the United States, has provided abundant supplies of iron ore, she has not distributed them equally, but haa stored tnem in large deposits in particular places. If in- clined to take Horace Greeley's advice to go and make iron, should I think its price too high, I must obtain ao- cess to one of these deposits, and that a deposit suffi- ciently near to other materials and to centres of popular tion. I may find plenty of such deposits which nn one is using, but where can I find such a deposit that is free to be used by me? ' The taws of my country do not forbid me from making iron, but they do allow Individuals to forbid me from making use of the natural material from which alone iron can be made— they do allow individuals to take po^ session of these deposits of ore which Nature has pro- vided for the making of iron, and to treat and hold tnem as though they were their own private property, placed there by themselves and not by God. Consequently these deposits of iron ore are appropriated as soon as there is any prospect that any one will want to use them, and when I find one that will suit my purpose I find that it is in the piossession of some owner who will not let me use it until I pay him down in a purchase price, or agree to pay him in a royalty of so much per ton, nearly, ifnot quite, all I can make above the ordinary return to capital in producing iron. Thus, while the duty which raises the price of iron may not benefit producers, it doesben»' (it the dogs-in-the-manger whom our laws permit to claim as their own the stores which eeons before man appeared were accumulated by Nature for the use of the millions who would one day be called into being- enabling the monopolists of our iron land to levy heavy taxes on their fellow-citizens long before they could otherwise have done so.t So with the duty on coal. It adds nothing to * A striking illustration of the way American industry has been encouraged by a duty which enabled the stock- holders in a couple of copper mines to pay dividends of over a hundred per cent, is afforded by the following case : Some years ago a Butch ship arrived at Boston having in her hold a quantity of copper with which her master proposed to have her resheathed in Boston. But learning that in this "land of liberty" be would not b^ permitted to take the copper from the inside of the ship and employ American mechanics to nail it on the outside, without paying a duty of forty-five per cent, on the new copper put on, as well as a duty of tour cents per pomid on the old conper taken off, he found it cheaper to sail in ballast to Halifax, get his ship recoppered by Canadian workmen, and then come back to Boston for his return cargo. tThe royalty paid by iron miners fer the privilege of taking the are eut ef the earth in many cases eouals and in seme eases exeeeds the cost of mining it. Tae royal- ties af the Pratt Iron and Coal Company of Alabama are said to run as high as |io,ooo per acre. In the Cbicage Jntev'Osean, a suuncb protestlonist paper, «f 0«tobtr ii« r^ f-. •• II tbt pfoflta of the esal SMnM who buy tht rifht to take coal out of the Mrtn, bur It doei enable a ring of coaUland and railway owneni to levy In many placet an arldldonal blackmail upon the uie of Nature'* bounty. The motive and effect of many of our duties are well lUuHtrated by the Import duty we levy on borax and horaciu acid. We had no duties on borax and boracic acid iwhich have Important usee in manv branches of manu- facture) until It was discovered that in the State o( Nevada Nature had provided a deposit of nearly pure borax for the use of the people of this continent. This free gift of the Almighty having been reduced to private ownership, in accordance with the laws of the United States for such cases made and provided, the enterprising forentallers at once applied to Congress for (and of course secured) the imposition of a duty which would make borax artificially dear and Increase the profits of this monopoly of a natural advantdfe. * While our manufacturers and other producers have been caught readily enough with the delusive promise that protection would Increase their profits, and have used their influence to institute and maintain protective duties, I am inclined to think that the most efficient interest on the side of protection in the United States has been that of those wno have posssessed themselves of lands or other natural advantages which thev hoped protection would make more valuable. For it has been not merely the owners of coal, Iron, timber, sugar, orange, or wine lands, of salt springs, borax lakes, or copper deposits, who have seen in the shutting out of foreign competition a quicker demand and higher value for their lands, but the same feeling has had Its influence upon the holders of city and village real estate, who, realizing that the establishment of factories or the work- ing of mines in their vicinity would give value to their lots, have been disposed to support a policy which had for its avowed object the transfer of such industries from other countries to our own. To repeat : It is only at first that a protective duty can stimulate an industry. When the forces of production have had time to readjust themselves, profits^^in the pro- tected industry, unless kept up by obstacles 'which pre- vent further extension of the industry, must sink to the ordinary level, and the duty losing its power of further stimulation ceases to yield any advantage to producers unprotected against home competition. This is the situa- tion of the greater part of " protected " American pro- ducers. They feel the general injury of the system with- out really participating in its special benefits. How, then, it may be asked, is it that even these produc- ers who are not sheltered by any home protection are in general so strongly in favor of a protective tariff } The 1885, 1 find a description of the Colby Iron Mine, at Bes- semer, Michigan. This mine, it is said. Is owned by parties who got it for fi.as per acre. They lease the privilege of taking out ore on a royalty of 40 cents per ton to the Colbys, who sub-lease It to Morse & Co. for u^ cents per ton royalty, who have a contract with Captain Sellwoodtoputtheoreonthe cars for 87H cents per ton. Sellwood sub-lets this contract for ta)i cents per ton, and the sub-contractors are said to make a profit of 3^ cents per ton, as the work is done by a steam shovel. Deducting transportation, etc., the ore brings $a.8o per ton, as nuned, of which only 12% cents goes to the firm who do the actual work of production. The output is 1,900 tons per day, which, according to the /nter-Ocean correspondent, gives to the owners a net profit of $480 per day ; to the Colbjrs, $150 per day ; Morse & Co., $1,680; Captain Sellwood, $90 per day, and the sub-contractors who do the work of mining $30 per day, " a total net profit from the mine, over and above what profit there may be In the labor, 01 $3,340 per day." The account concludes by saying : " As the product will be at least doubled during the coming year, you see there will be some fortunes made out of the Colby mine." To these fortunes our protective duty on foreign ore un- doubtedly contributes, l)ut how much does it in this case encourage production ? In Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, Is a HHl of magnetic iron ore nearly pure, which has merely to be quarried dut. It is owned by the Coleman heirs, and has made them so enormously wealthy that these are said by some to be the richest people in the United States. They are producers of iron, smelting their own ore, as well as rail- way owners and farmers, owning and cultivating by superintendents great tracts of valuable land. They, doubtless, have been much encouraged by the duty on iron which we have maintained for " the protection of American labor," but this encouragement comes to them as owners of this rich gift of Natjire to— Mr. Coleman's heirs. The deposit of Iron ore would be worked were there no duty, and was worked, I belicTCt before any duty on iron was imposed. true rtuon it to bt found in tht etuiM I will HarMfMr speak of, which predispoee the common mind to an a» ceptance of protective Ideas. And, while keen enough as to their Individual interests, these producera are as blind to social interests as any other class. They have so long heard and been accustomed to repeat, that free trade would ruin American Industry, that it never occurs to them to doubt It; and the effect of duties upon so many other products being to enhance the cost of their own productions, they see, without apprehending the cause, that were it not for the particular duty that pro- tects them they could be undersold \)y foreign products, and so they cling to the system. Protection it necessary to them in many cases, because of the protection of other industries. But were the whole system abolished, there I.V could be no doubt that American industry would spring forward with new vigor. CHAPTER XVIII. amcrs or pmotbction on ambrican iNOtrsTRV. If there Is one country In the world where the assump- tion that protection is necessary to the development of manufactures and the " diversification of industry " is conclusively disproved by the most obvious facts, that country is the United States. The first settlers in America devoted themselves to trade with the Indians and to those extractive industries which a sparse population always finds most profitable, the produce of the forest, of the soil, and of the fisheries, constituting their staples, while even bricks and tiles were at first imported from the mother country. But without any protection and in spite of British regulations intended to prevent the growth of manufactures in the colonies, one industry after another took root, as population increased, until at the time of the first Tarili Act, in 1789, all the more important manu. lactures, including those of iron and textiles, had become firmly establisheo. As up to this time they had grown without any tariff, so must they have continued to grow with the increase of population, even if we had never had a tariff. But the American who contends that protection is necessary to diversification of industry must not merely ignore the history of his country durihg that long period Mfore the first tariff of any kind was instituted, but be must ignore what has been going on ever since, and ii still going on under his eyes. We need look no further back than the formation ol the Union to see that if it were true that manufacturing could not grow up In new countries without the protec- tion of tariffs the manufacturing industries of the United States would to-day be confined to a narrow belt along the Atlantic seaboard. Philadelphia, New York and Boston were considerable cities, and manufactures had taken a firm root along the Atlantic, when Western New York and Western Pennsylvania were covered with forests, when Indiana and Illinois were buffalo ranges, when Detroit and St. Louis were trading posts, Chicago undreamed of, and the continent beyond the Mississippi as little known as the interior of Africa is now. In the United States, the East has had over the West all the ad- vantages wliich protectionists say make it impossible for a new country to build up its manufacturing industries against the competition of an older country— larger capital, longer experience and cheapef labor. Yet without any protective tariff between the West and the East, manufacturing has steadily moved westward, with the movement of imputation, and is moving westward still. This is a fact that of itself conclusively disproves the protective theory. The protectionist assumption that manufactures have increased in the United States becanst of protective tariffs is even more unfounded than the assumption that ' I! the growth of New York after the building of each new theatre was because of the buildin ? of the theatre. It is as if one should tow a bucket bemnd a boat and insist that it helped the boat along because she still moved for- ward. Manufacturing has increased in the United States because of the growth of population and the de- velopment of the country; not because of tariffs, but- in spite of them. That protective tariffs have injured instead of helped American manufactures is shown by the fact tttat our manufactures are much less than they ought to be, con- sidering our population and development — much leu relatively than they were in the beginning of the cen- tury. Had we continued the policy of free trade our manufactures would have grown up in natural hardihood and rigor, and we should now not only be exporting maniifactured goods to Mexico and the West Indies, South America and Australia, ai Ohio is exporting nanu- •W will harMfttr nind to an a» kMn tnough lucera are «■ I. They have eat, that free 1 never occura utiei upon ID I coat of their ehendlng the uty that pro- sign producti, 1 it ncceaaary iction of other loliihed, there would spring tm)t»TRV. B the auump* velopment of industry" ia M fact!, that '.n in America IS and to those lation always :8t, of the soil, », while even n the mother 1 in spite of le growth of after another t the time of x>rtant manu- >, had become y had grown nued to grow ve had nevet protection is Bt not merely X long period ituted, Dut he since, and ii formation of anufacturing It the protec- >f the United )w belt along V Yorli and fectOres had Vestern New overed with flalo ranges, ssts. Chicago e Mississippi now. In the istall the ad- npossible for ig industries ntry— larger Yet without id the East, rd, with the ;stward still, isproves the ictures have I protective mption that jf each new leatre. It is t and insist moved for- the United and the de- riffs, but in d of helped ct tHat our to t>e, con- -much less of the cen* '■ trade our il hardihood \ exporting est Indies, rtlngnsnu- >:v '>,' focturtd vx)A% to KanMi, Nebratlu, Colorado and Daliota, but we should be exporting manufactured goods to Great Britain, Just as Ohio I* to-day exporting manu- factured gooil* to Pennsylvania and New York, where manufactures began before Ohlii was settled. But so heavily arc our manufactures weighted by a t»i Iff which increases the cost of all their materials and appliances, that, in spite of our natural advantages a.aA the invent- iveness of uur people, our sales are confined to our pro- tected market, and we can nowhere compete with the manufacture* of other countries. In spite of the increase of duties with which we have attempitd ti> l trivial per- centage of our exportH consist of raw mai rials. Bven where we import largely from such count ncn as Brazil, which have almost no manufactures o( their own, we cannot send them In return the manufactured goods they want, but to pay for what we buy of them must send our raw materials to Europe. This Is not a natural condition of trade. The United States have long passed the stage of growth in which raw .naterlals constitute the only natural exports. We have now a population of nearly sixty millions, and con- sume more manufactured goods than any other nation. * We possess unrivalled advantages for manufacturing. In extent and accessibility our coal deposits far surpass those of any other civilized country, wtiile we have reser- voirs of natural gasthatsupply fuel almost without ktbor. Moreover, we are the iirst of civilized nations in the invention and use of machinery, and in the economy of material and labor. But all these advantages are neu- tralized by the wall of protection we have built along our coasts. For as long as I can remember, the protectionist press has been from time to time chronicling the fact that con- siderable orders for this, that or the other American manufacture had been received from abroad, as proving that protection was at last beginning to bring about the results promised for it, and that American manufacturing industry, so safely guarded during its infancy by a pro- tective tariff, was now atx>ut to enter the markets of the world. The statements that have been made the basis of these congratulations have generally been true, but the predictions founded upon them have never been verified, and, while our population has doubled, our exports of manufactured articles have relatively declined. The ex- planation is this: The higher rates of wages that have prevailed in the United States, and the consequent higher standard of general intelligence, have stimulated Ameri- can invention, and we are constantly making improve- ments upon the toots, methods, and patterns elsewhere in use. These improvements are constantly starting a foreign demand for American manufactures which seems to promise large increase. But before this increase takes place the improvements are adopted in countries where manufacturing is not so heavily burdened by taxes on material, and what should have been peculiarly an American manufacture is transferred toa foreign country. Every American who has visited London has doubtless noticed, opposite the Parliament House at Westminster, a shop devoted to the sale of " American notions." There are a number of such shops in London, and they are also to be found in every town of any size in the three king- doms. These shops must sell in the aggregate quite an amount of American tools and contrivances, which in part accounts for the fact that we still export some manufac- tures. But the American will be deluded who from the number of these shops and the interest taken by the people who are constantly looking in the windows or examining the goods, imagines that American manufactures are t>e- ginmng to gain a foothold in the Uld World. Theseshops are in fact curiosity shops, just as arc the Chinese and Japanese shop? that we iind in the larger American cities, ^and people gj to them to seethe ingenious things the 'Americans ars getting up. But no sooner do these shops . so far popularize an '*^American notion " that a consider- able demand for it arises, than some English manufacturer at once begins to make it, or the American inventor, if he liolds an English patent, finds oiore profit in manufactur- ing it abroad. Ndt having the discouragements of Amer- can protectici; to contend with, he can make it in Great Britain cheaper than in the United States, and the conse- quence of the introduction of an American " nation " is tnat. Instead of its importation from America increasing, it comes to an end. # This illustrates the history or American manufactures abroad. One article after another which has been in- vented or improved in the United States has seemed to ?:et a foothold in foreign markets only to loose it when airly introduced. We have sent locomotives to Russia, arms to Turkey and Germany, agricultural implements to Bngland, river steamers to China, sewing machines to all pant of tht world, but have never been able to Im>I4 the trade onr Inventivenaaa should have secured. But it is on the high teas and in an industry in which we once led the world that the effect of our protective policy can be most clearly seen. Thirty years ago ship-bullding had reached such U pitch of excellence In this country that we built not on v for ourselves but for other nations. American ships wcr : the fastest sailers, the largest carriers, and every whc i . got the quickest dispatch and the highest freights. Tic registered tonnage of the United States almost equalrJ that of Great Britain, and a few years promised to give us the unquestionable supremacy of the ocean. The abolition of the more important British protective duties In 1816 was followed in 1854 by the repeal of the navigation la>vs. and from thenceforth not only were British subjects free to buy or build ships wherever they pleased, but the coasting trade of the British Isles was thrown open to foreigners. Dire were the predictions oi British protectionists as to the utter ruin that was thus prepared for British commerce. The Yankees were to sweep the ocean, and "half-starved Swedes and Nor wtglans" were to drive the " ruddy, beef-eating English tar^' from his own seas and channels. While one great commercial nation thus abandoned protection, the other redoubled it. The breaking out of the civil war was the golden opportunity of pmtectiuii, and the unselfish ardor of a people ready to make any sacrifice to prevent the dismemberment of their country was taken advantage of to pile protective taxes upon them. The ravages of Confederate cruisers and the con- HC(|uent high rate of insurance on American ships would under any circumstances have diminished our deep-sea commerce ; yet this effect was only temporary, and but for our protective policy we should at the end of the war have quickly resumed our place in the carrying trade of the world and move forward to the lead with more vigor than ever. But crushed by a policy which prevents Americans from building, and foroids them to buy ships, our com- merce, ever since the war, has steadily shrunk, until American ships which, when we were a nation of twenty- five millions, plowed every sea of the globe, are now, when we number nearly sixty millions, seldom seen on blue water. In Liverpool doclcs, where once it seemed as If every other vessel was American, you must searrli the forests of masts to find one. Fh San Francisco Hay you may count English ship, and English ship, and English ship, before you come to an American, while five^sixths of the foreign commerce of New York is carried on in foreign bottoms. Once no American dreamed of crossing the Atlantic s^^ve on an American ship ; to-day no one thinks of taking one. It is the French and the Germans who compete with the Briti^ in carrying Americans to Europe and bringing them Iwck. Once our ships were the finest on the ocean. To-day there is not a first-class ocean carrier under the American flag, and but for the fact that foreign vessels are absolutely prohibited from carrying between American pons, shipbuilding, in which we once led the world, would now be with us a lost art. As it Is, we have utterly lost our place. When I was a boy we confidently believed that American war ships could outsail, when they could not outfight, anything that floated, and in the event of war with a commercial nation we knew that every sea of the globe would swarm with swift American privateers. To-day Great Britain could take from those greyhounds of the sea which Amer- ican travel and trade support, qpough fleet ships'o snap up any vessel that ventured out of an American port. I do not complain of the inefficiency of our navy. The maintenance of a navy in time of peace is unworthy of the dignity of the G/eat Republic and of the place she should aspire to among the nations, and to my mind the hundreds of millions that during the last twenty years we have spent upon our navy would have been wasted. But I do complain of the decadence in our ability to build ships Our misfortune is that we lack the swift merchant lieet, the great foundries and shipyards, the skilled .-nf^ineers andf seamen and mechanics, in which, and not in navies, true power upon the seas consists. A people in whose veins runs the blood of Vikings, have been driven off the ocean by— themselves, f Of course the selfish interests that profit, or imagine they profit, by the policy which has swept the American flag from the ocean as no foreign enemy could have done, ascribe this effect to every cause but the right one. They say, for instances, that we cannot compete with other nations in ocean commerce because they have an advantage in lower wages and cheaper capital, in will- ful disregard of the fact that when the difference in wages and interest between the two sides of the Atlantic was; far greater than now we not only carried for our- selves but for other nations, and were rapidly rising to the position of the greatest of ocean carriers. The truth 88 if |i 1 b, Uiat if waffM are higher with us this is really to our uvanUffe, while not only can capital now be had as cheaply in New York as in London, out American capital ia actually bein^r used to run vessels under foreign flags, bccaiisc of the taxes whirh malce it unprofitable to build or ran American vessels. De Tocqueville, fifty years ago, was struck with the fact that nine-tenths of the commerce between the United States and Euiope, and three-fourths of the com- merce •£ the New World with Europe was carried in American skips; that these ships tilled the docks of Havre and Liverpool, while but few English and French ves- aete were to be seen at New York. This, he saw, could only be explained by the fact that " vessels of the United States can cross the seas at a cheaper rate than any other Teasels in the world." But, he continues: " It is difficult to say for what reason the American can trade at a lower rate than other nations; and one Is at first sight led to attribute this circumstance to the physical or natural advantages which are within their reach; but this supposition is erroneous. The American vessels cost almost as much as our own ; they are not better built, and they generally last for a shorter time, while the pay of the American sailor is more considerable than the pay on board European ships. I am of opinion that the true cause of their superiority must not be sought for in physical advantages but that it is wholly attnbuuible to their moral and intellectual qualities. » « « « The European sailor navigates with pru- dence: he only sets sail when the weather is favorable; if an unforeseen accident befalls him, he puts into jport; at night he furls a portion of his canvas; and when the -whitening billows intimate the vicinity of land, he checks his way and takes an observation of the sea. But the American neglects these precautions, and braves these dangers. He weighs anchor in the midst of tempestuous gales; by night and by day he spreads his sheets to the wind: he repairs as he goes along such damages as his vessel may have sustained from the storm; and when at last he approaches the term of his voyage he darts on- ward to the shore as if he already descried a port. The Americans are often shipwreckecT, but no trader crosses the sea so rapidly, and, as they perform the same dis- tance In a shorter time, they can perform it at a cheaper rate. " I cannot better explain my meaning than by saying that the American affects a sort of heroism in his manner of trading, in which he follows not only a calculation of histrain, but an impulse of his nature." What the observant Frenchman describes in somewhat extravagant language was a real advantage— an advan- tage that attached not merelv to the sailing of ships, but to dieir designing, their building, and everything con- nected with them. And what gave this advantage wag not anything in American nature that differed from other human nature, but the fact that higher wages and the resulting higher standard of comfort and better oppor- tuhities developed a greater power of adapting means to ends. Irt short, the secret of our success upon the ocean (as of all our other successes) lay in the very things that according to the exponents of protectionism now shut us out from the ocean.* * By way of consolation for the manner in which protec- tionism has driven American ships from the ocean, Pro- fessor Thompson (Political Economy ^ p. 216) says : " If there were no other reason for the policy that seeks to reduc* foreign commerce to a minimum, a sufficient one would be found in its effect upon tlie human material it employs. Bentham thought the worst possible use that could be made uf a man was to hang him; a worse still is to make a common sailor of him. The life and the manly character of the sailor has been so admired in song and prose, and the real excellences of individuals of the profession have been made so prominent that we forget what the mass of tnis class of men are, ana what repre- sentatives of our civilization and Christianity we send out to all lands in the tenants of the forecastle. ' •There is some truth in this, but what there is is -lue to protectionism in its broader sense. There is no reu^on in the nature of his vocation why the sailor should not be as well fed, well paid, and well treated, as intelligent and self-respecting, as any mechanic. That he is not is at bAttom due to the paternal interference of maritime law with the relations of employer and employed. The law docs not specifically enforce contracts for services on shore, and for any breach of contract by an employee the employer has only a civil remedy. He cannot restrain the employed of nis liberty, coerce him by violence or duress, or, should he quit work, call on the law to bring him back, and thus the personal relations of employer and employed are left to the free play of mutual interest. For the services requiring vigilance and sobriety, and where great loss or danger would result trom a sudden refusal Again, it it said that it is the substitution of steam for canvas and iron for wood that has led to the decay of American shipping. This is no more a reason for the decay of American shipping than is the substitution of the double top-sail yard for the single top-sail yard. River steamers were first developed here- it was an American steamship that first crossed from ISfew York to Liverpool, and thirty years ago American steamers were making the " crack " passages. The same skill, the same energy, the same facility of adapting means to ends which enabled our mechanics to bund wooden ships would have enabled them to continue to build ships no matter what the change in material. With free trade we should not merely have kept abreast of the change from wood to iron, we should have led it. This we should have done even though not a pound of iron could have been produced on the whole continent. In the glorious days of American shipbuilding Donald McKay of Boston, and William H. Webb of New York, drew the materials for their white-winged racers from forests that were practically almost as far from those cities as they were frem the Clyde, the Humber, or the Thames. Had our shipbuilders been as free as their English rivals to get their materials wherever they could buy them best and cheapest, they could as easily have built ships with Hon brought from England as they did build them with knees from Florida and planks from Maine and North Carolina, and spars from Oregon. Ireland produces neither iron nor coal, but Belfast has become noted for iron shipbuilding, and iron can be carried across the Atlantic almost as cheaply as across the Irish Sea. But so far from its being necessary to bring iron from Great Britain, our deposits of coal and iron are larger, better and more easily worked than those of Great Britain, and before the Revolution we were actually ex- "■ porting iron to that country. Had we never embraced the poucy of protection we should to-day have been the first of Iron producers. The advantage that Great Britain has over us is simply that she has abandoned the repressive system of protection, while we have increased it. This difference in policy, while it has enabled the British producer to avail himself of the advantages of all the world, has handicapped the American producer and restricted him to the market of his own country. The ores of Spain and Africa, which, for some purposes, it is necessary to mix with our own ores, have been burdened with a heavy duty ; a heavy duty has enabled a great steel combination to keep steel at a monopoly price • a heavy duty on copper has enabled another combination to go on with the work, the employer must look to the char- acter of the men he employs, and must so pay a;id treat them that there will be no danger of their wishing to leave him. But what on shore is thus left to the self- regulative principle of freedom is, as to services to be performed on shipboard, attempted to be regulated on the paternal principle of protectionism. Here the law steps in to compel the specific performance of contracts, and not only gives the employer or his representative the right to restrain the employed of his personal liberty, and by violence or duress to compel his performance of services he has contracted, but if the employed leave the ship the law may be invoked to arrest, imprison, and force him back. The result has been on the one hand largely to destroy the incentive to proper treatment of their crews on the part of owners and masters of ships, and on the other to degrade the character of seamen. Crews have been largely obtained by a system of virtual impressment or kidnapping, called in 'long.shore vernac- ular, " shanghaing," by which men are put on board ship when drunk, or even by force, for the sake of their acl- vaiice wages, or a bonus called " blood-money," which the power of keeping the men on board and compelling them to work, enables the ship-owners safely to pay. The power that must be entrusted to the master of a ship, on whose skill and judgment depends the saletv of all on board, is necessarily despotic, but while the abuse of this >/ power has, under a system which enables a brutal cap- tain to get crews with as touch, or almost as much, facility as a humane one, been little checked by motives of self- interest, it has been stimulated by the degradation which such a system inevitably produces in the character of the crews. Various attempts have been made to remedy this state of thiags; but nothing can avail much that does not go the root of the difficulty and leave the sailor, no matter what contract he may have signed or what ad- vances have been paid to or for him, as free to quit a ves- sel as anv mechanic on shore is free to quit his employ- ment. Theoretically the law may guard the rights of one party to a contract as well as those of the other ; but practically the poor and uninfluential are always at a dis- advantage in appealing to the law. This is a vice which inheres in all forms of protectionism, from that of abso- lute monarchy to that ot protective duties. 89 to ^ a hiffh price for Afflerican copper at home, while exporting it to Great Britain for a low price ; and to en- courage a singie bunting factory the very ensign of an American ship has been subjected to a duty of 150 per centk From keelson to truclt, from the wire in her slays to th* brass in her taffrail log, everything that goes to the building, the fining or the storing of a ship is bur- dened with heavy taxes. Even should she be repaired abroad, she must pay taxes for it on her return home. Thus has protection strangled nn Industry in which with free trade we might still have led 'the world. And the injury we have done ourselves has been, in some degree at least, an injury to mankind. Who can doubt that ocean steamers would to-day have been swifter and bet- ter had American builders been free to compete with M^Er^lish builders > '~ Though our Navigation Laws, which forbid the carry- ing of a pound of freight or a single passenger from Afflerican port to American port on any other than an American-built vessel, obscure the effects of protection in our coasting trade, they are just as truly felt as in our ocean trade. The increased cost of building and running vessels has, especially as to steamers, operated to stunt the growth of our coasting trade, and to check by higher freights the development of other ividustries. And how restriction strengthens monopoly is seen in the manner in which the effect of protection upon our coastwise trade has been to make easier the extortions of railway syn- dicates. For instance, the Pacific Railway pool has for years paid the Pacific Mail Steamship Company $85,000 a month to keep up its rates of fare and freight between New York and San Francisco. It would have been im- possible for the railway ring thus to prevent competition had the trade between the Atlantic and Pacific l>cen open to foreign vessels. CHAPTER XIX. PROTECTION AND WACRS. We have sufficiently seen the effect of protection on the production of wealth. Let us now inquire as to its effect on wages. This is a question of the distribution of wealth. Discussions of the tariff question seldom go further than the point we have now reached, for though much is said, in the United States at least, of the eftect of protec- tion on wages, it is as a dcductioii from what is asserted of its effect on the production of wealth. Its advocates claim that protection raises wages ; but in so far as they attempt to prove this it is only by arguments such as we have examined, that protection increases the prosperity of a country as a whole, from which it is assumed that it must increase wages. Or when the claim that protection raises wages is put in the negative form (a favorite method with American protectionists) and it is asserted that protection prevents wages from falling to the lower level of other countries, this assertion is always based on the assumption that protection is necessary to enable pro- duction to be carried on at the higher level of wages, and that if it were withdrawn production would so decline, by reason of the underselling of home producers by foreign producers, that wages must also decline.* B>t although its whole basis has already been over- thrown, let us (since this is the most important part of the Question) examine directly and' independent!/ the claim that protection raises (or maintains) wages. Though the question of wages is primarily a question of the distribution of wealth, no protectionist writer that I know of ventures to treat it as such, and free traders generally stop where protectionists stop, arguing that protection must diminish the production of wealtn, and ♦Here, for instance, taken from the New York Tribune ,^uring the last Presidential campaign (1884), is a sample Vf the argruments for protection which are manufactured about election times tor the consumption of " the intelli- gent and highly paid American wotkmg-man :" " All workers know that labor in other countries is not paid as well as it is here. But this difference could not exist if the products of 50-cent labor in England or Ger- many or Canada could be sold freely in our market, instead of the production of $1 labor here. Hence, this country compels the eniployers of the so-cent labor abroad to pay a duty for the privilege of selling their goods in thfc market. That duty is called a tariff. If it Is made high enough to tit the difference in rate of wages, so that labor in tins country cannot be degraded toward the level of similar labor in other countries, it is called a protective tariff. Such a tariff is a defense of American industry against direct competition with the underpaid labor at other countries." (so far as they treat the matter of wages) from this in (erring that protection must reduce wages. For pur- poses of controversy this is logically sufficient, since, free trade being natural trade, the onus of proof must lie upon those who would restrict it. But as my purpose is more than that of controversy, I cannot be contented with showing merely the unsoundness of the arguments for protection. A true proposition may be supported by a bad argument, and to satisfy ourselves thoroughly as to the effect of protection we must trace its influence on the distribution, as well as on the production of wealth. Error often arises from the assumption that what bene- fits or injures the whole must in like manner affect all its parts. Causes which increase or decrease aggregate wealth often produce the reverse effect on classes or in- dividuals. The resort to salt instead of kelp for obtain- ing soda increased the production of wealth in Great Britain, but lessened the inco.ne of many Highland land- lords. The introduction of railways, greatly as they have added to aggregate wealth, ruined the business of many small villages. Out of wars, destructive to national wealth though they may be, great fortunes arise. Fires, floods, and famines, while disastrous to the community, may prove profitable to individuals, and he who has a contract to fill, or who has speculated in stocks for a fall, may be enriched bv hard times. As, however, those who live by their labor constitute in all countries the large majority of the people, there is a strong presumption that no matter who else is benefited, anything that reduces the aggregate income of the com- munity must be injurious to workingmen. But that we may leave nothing to presumption, howevA" strong, let us examine directly the effect of protective tariffs on wages. Whatever affects the production of wealth may at the same time affect distribution. It is also possible that in- crease or decrease in the production of wealth may, under certain circumstances, alter the proportions of distribu- tion. But it is only with the first of these questions that ■ we have now to deal, since the second goes beyond the question of tariff, and if it shall become necessary to open it, that will not be until after we have satisfied our- selves as to the tendencies of protection. Trade, as we have seen, is a mode of production, and the^ tendency of tariff restrictions on trade is to lessen the production of wealth. But protective tariffs also operate to alter the distribution of wealth, by imposing higher prices on some citize.:- and giving extra profits to others. This alteration of distribution in their favor is the impelling motive with those most active in procuring the imposition of protective duties and in warning work- men of the dire calamities that will come on them if such duties are repealed. But in what way can protective tariffs affect the distribution of wealth in favor of labor .' The direct object and effect of protective tariffs is to raise the price of commodities. But men who work for wages are not sellers of commodities ; they are sellers of labor. They sell labor in order that they may buy com- modities. How can increase in the price of commodities benefit them ? I speak of price in conformity to the custom of com- paring ether values by that of money. But money is only a medium of exchange and a measure of the comparative vaiues of other things. Money itself rises and falls in value as compared with other things, varying between time and time, and place and place. In reality the only true and final standard of values is labor— the real value of anything being the amount of labor it will command in exchange. To speak exactly, therefore, the effect of a protective tariff is to increase the amount of labor for which certain commodities will exchange. Hence it re- duces the value of tabor just as it increases the value of commodities. Imagine a tariff that prevents the coming in of laborers, but places no restriction on the coming in of commodities. Would those who have commodities to sell deem such a tariff for their benefit ? Yet to say this would be as reasonable as to say that a tariff upon commodities is for the benefit of tliose who have labor to sell. It is not true that the products of lower priced labor will drive the products of higher priced labor out of any market in which they can be freely sold, since, as we have aiready seen, low priced labor does not mean cheap pro- duction, and it is the comparative not the absolute cost of production that det«rmines exchanges. And we have but to look around to see that even in the same occupation, wages paid for labor whose products sell freely together, are generally higher in large cities than in small towns, in .some districts than in others. It is true that there is a constant tendency of all wages to a common level, and that this tendency arises from competition. But this competition is not the competition of the goods marjcet ; it is (he competition of the labor market. The cUfference between wiges paid in thepro- 4uction of goods that sell Uiiiy in tlie-same market caQ* I J 40 / ! tiot arise from checks on the cofflpetition of (oods for sale; but manifestly arises from checlcson the competition of labor for employment. As the competition of lal>or varies between employment an4 employment, or between place and place, so do wajges vary. The cost of living being greater in large cities than in small towns, the higher wages in the one are not more attractive tlian the lower wages in the other, while the differing rates of wages in different districts are manifestly maintained by the inertia and friction which retard the flow of popula- tion, or by causes, physical or social, which produce differ- ences in the intensity of competition in the labor market. The tendency of wages to a common level is quickest In the same occupation, because the transference of labor is easiest. There cannot be, in the same place, such dif- ferences in wages in the same industry as may exist be- tween different industries, s'nce labor in the same industry can transfer itself from employer to employer with far less difficulty than is involved in changing an occupation. There are times when we see one employer reducing wages and others following his example, but this occurs too quickly to be caused by the competition of the goods market. It occurs at times when there is great competl-- tion in the labor market, and the same conditions which enable one employer to reduce wages enable others to do the same. If it were the competition of the goods mar- ket that brought wages to a level, they could not be raised in one establishment or in one locality unless at the same time raised in others that supplied the same market; whereas, at the times when wages go up, we see work- men in one establishment or in one locahty first demand- ing an increase, and then, if they are successful, work- men in other establishments or localities following their . example. ' If we pass now to a comparison of occupation with oc- cupation, we art that although there is a tendency to a common level, which maintains between wages in differ- ent occupations a certain relation, there are, m the same time and place, great differences of wages. These differ- ences are not inconsistent with this tendency, but are due to it, just as the rising of a balloon and the falling of a stone exemplify the same pliysical law. While the com- petition of the labor market tends to bring wages in all occupations to a common level, there are differences be- tween occupations (which may be summed up as differ- ences in attraction and differences in the difficulty of access) that check in various degrees the competition of labor and produce different relative levels of wages. Though these differences exist, wages in different occu- pations are nevertheless held in a certain relation to each other by the tendency to a common level, so that a reduc- tion of wages in one trade tends to bring about a reduc- tion in others, not through the competition of the eoods market, but through tl^t of the labor market. Thus cabinet makers, for instance, could not long get $2 where workmen in other trades as easily learned and practised were only getting |i, since *b<^ superior wages would so attract labor to cabinet making as to increase competition and bring wages down. But if the cabinet makers pos- sessed a union strong enough to strictly limit the number of new workmen entering the trade, is it not clear that they could continue to get $a while in other trades similar labor was only getting $1 ? As a matter of fact, trades-unions, by checking the competition of labor, have considerably raised wages in many occupations, and have even brought about differences between the wages of union and non-union men in the same occupation. And what limits the possibility of thus raising wa«es is clearly not the free sale of commodities, but the difficulty of re- stricting the competition of labor. Do not these facts shew that what American workmen have to fear is not the sale in our goods market of the products of " cheap foreign labor." out the transference to our labor market of that labor itself i Under the con- ditions existing over the greater part of the civilized world, the minimum of wages is fixed by what economists call the " standard of comfort "—that is to say, the poorer the mode of life to which laborers are accustomed the lower are their wages and the greater is their ability to compel a reduction in any labor market they enter. What, then, shall we say ot that sort of " protection of American working-men'*' which, while imposing duties upon goods, under the pretenst. that they are made by " pauper labtpr," freely admits the " pauper laborer " himself. The in-ooming of the products of cheap labor is a very different thing from the inrotect themselves by checking the competition of the abor market. Our protective tariff on commodities raises the price of commodities, but what raising there is of wages has been accomplished by trades-unions and the Knights of Labor. Break up these organizations and what could the tariff do to prevent the forcing down of wages in all the now organized trades? A scheme really intended for the protection of work- ing-men from the competition of cheap labor would not merely prohibit the importation of cheap labor under contract, but would prohibit the landing of any laborer who had not sufficient means to raise him above the necessity of competing for wages, or who did not give bonds to join some trades-union and abide by its rules. And if, under such a scheme, any duties on commodities were imposed, they would be imposed, in preference, on such commodities as could be produced with small capi- tal, not on those which require large capital; that is to say, the effort would be to protect industries in which workmen can readily engage on their own account, rather than those in which the mere workman can never hope to become his own employer. Our tariff, like all protective tariffs, aims at nothing of this kind. It shields the employing producer from com- petition, but in no way attempts to lessen competition among those who must sell him their labor; and the in- dustries it aims to protect are those in which the mere workman, or even the workman with a small capital, is helpless— those which cannot be carried on without large establishments, costly machinery, great amounts of cap- ital, or the ownership of natural opportunities which bear a high price. It is manifest that the aim of protection Is to lessen competition in the selling of commodities, not in the sell- ing of labor. In no case, save in the peculiar and excep- tional cases I shall hereafter speak of, can a tariff on commodities benefit those who have labor, not commod- ities, to sell. Nor is there in our tariff any provision that aims at compelling such employers as it benefits to share their benefits with their workmen. While it gives these employers protection in the goods market it leaves them free trade in the labor market, and for any protec- tion they need workmen have to organize. I am not saying that any tariff could raise wages. I am merely pointing out that in our prot<'':tive tarin there is no attempt, however inei.t in the sell- « r and excep- I a tariff on lot commod- iy provision it benefits to 'hile it gives Icet it leaves any protec- te wages. I ! UriR there lis— that the e protection Je buyers of maintaining r to protect ■items'tm^-^ v'A American labor by raising the price of what they tnem- selves have to sell, notoriously buy labor as cheap as they can and fiercely oppose any combination of work- men to raise wages. The cry of " protection for Ameri- can labor " comes most vociferously fr«m newspapers that lie under the ban of the printers' unions; from coal and iron lords who, importing "pauper labor" by whole- sale, have bitterly fought every eitort of their men to claim anything like decent wages ; and from factory owners who claim the right to dictate the votes of men. The whole spirit of protection is against the rights of labor. This is so obvious as hardly to need illustration, but there is a case in which it is so clearly to be seen as to tempt me to reference. There is one kind of labor in which capital has no advantage, and that a kind which has been held from re- mote antiquity to redound to the true greatness and glory of a countrv— the labor of the author, a species of ubor hard in itself, requiring long preparation, and in the vast majority of cases extremely meagre in its pecuniary re- turns. What protection have the protectionist majorities that have so long held sway in Congress given to this kind of labor? While the American manufacturer of books— the employing capitalist who puts them on the market— has been carefully protected from the competition ' of foreign manufacturers, the American author has not only »0/been protected from the competition of foreign au- thors, but has been exposed to the competition of labor for which nothing whatever is paid. He has never asked for any protection save that of common justice, but this has been steadily refused. Foreign-made books have been saddled with a high protective duty , a force of customs ex- aminers is maintained in the post-oltice, and an American is not even allowed to accept the present of a book from a friend abroad without paying a tax for it.* But this is not to protect the American author, who as an author is a mere laborer, but to protect the American publisher, who is a capitalist. And this capitalist, so carefully pro- tected as to what he has to sell has been permitted to compel the American author to compete with stolen labor. Congrress, which year after year has been maiiitaining a heavy tariff, on the hypocritical plea of protecting Amer- ican labor, has steadily refused the bare justice of acced- ing to an international copyright which would prevent American publishers from stealing the work of foreign authors, and enable American authors nut only to meet foreign authors on fair terms at home, but to get payment for their books when reprinted in foreign countries. An international copyright, demanded as it is by honor, by morals and by every dictate of patriotic policy, has always been opposed by the protective interest. Could anything more clearly show that the real motive of protection is always the profit of the employing capitalist, nevet the benefit of labor ? What would be thought of the Congressman who should propose, as a " workingman's measure," to divide the surplus in the treasury between two or three railway king^j and who should gravely argue that to do this would be to raise wages in all occupations, since ^he rail- way kings, finding themselves so much richer, would at once raise the wages of their employees ; which would lead to the raising of wages on ail railways, and this again to the raising of wages in all occupations. Yet the contention that protect.' ve duties on goods raise wages involves just such assumptions. It IS claimed that protection raises the wages of labor- that is to say, of labor generally. It is not merely con- tended that it raises wages in the special industries pro- tected by the tariff. That would be to confess that the benefits of protection are distributed with partiality, a thing which its advocates are ever anxious to deny. It is always assumed by protectionists that the benefits of pro- tection are felt in all industries, and even the wages of farm laborers (in an industry which in the United States is not and cannot be protected by the tariff) are pointed to as,showing the results of protection. * Although a great sum is raised in the United States every year to send the Bible to the heathen in foreign parts, we impose for the protection of the home " Bible manufacturer " a heavy tax upon the bringing of Bibles into our country. There have recently been complaints of the smuggling of Bibles across our northern frontier, which have doubtless inspired our custom-house officers to renewed vigilance, since, according to an official ad- vertisement, the following property seized for violation of the United States revenue laws, was sold at public auction in front of the Custom House, Detroit, on Satur- day, February 6, i886, at 12 o'clock noon : i set silver jewelry, 3 bottles of brandy, 7 yards astrachan, i silk tidy, 7 books, I shawl, i sealskin cloak, 4 rosaries, i woolen shirt, a pairs ofsiittens, i pair of stockings, x bottle of gin, x "iijf* 5f.-*W< s'^iyi-"- iiBlt;ihT:a«i'f The scheme of pro^eetloA is, by eheckiaff iiaporutloa to increase the price of protected commodities so as to aable the home producers of these commodities to make • rger profits. It is only as it does this, and so long as it does this, that protection can have any encouraging effect at all, and whatever effect it has upon wages must be derived from this. I have already shown that protection cannot, except temporarily, increase the profits of producers as pro- ducers, but without regard to this it is clear that the con- tention that protection raises wages involves two as- sumptions : (1) that increase in the profits of employers means increase in the wages of their workmen ; and (2) that increase of wages in the protected occupations in- volves increase of wages in all occupations. To state these assumptions is to show their absurdity. Is there anyone who rcalljr supposes that because an em- ployer makes larger profits lie therefore pays higher wages ? I rode not long since on the platform of a Brooklyn horse-car and Ulked with the driver. He told me, bitterly and despairingly, of his long hours, hard work and poor pay— how he was chained to that car, a verier slave than the horses he drove; and how by turning himself into this kind of a horse-driving machine he could barely keep wife and children, laying by nothing for a " rainy day." I said to him, " Would it not be a good thing if the Legislature were to pass a law allowing the companies to raise the fare from five to six cents, so as to enable them to raise the wages of their drivers and conductors?' The driver measured me with a quick glance, and then exclaimed: "They give us more because they made more ! You might raise the fare to six cents or to sixty cents, and they would not pay us a penny more;^ No matter how much tiey made, we would get no more, so long as there are hundreds of men waiting and anxious to take our places. The company woula payer higher dividends or water the stock ; not raise our pay." Was not th.T driver right ? Buyers of labor, like buyers of other things, pay, not according to what they can, but according to what they must. There are occasional ex- ceptions, it is true; but these exceptions are referable to motives of benevolence, which the shrewd business man keeps out of his business, no matter how much he may otherwise indulge them. Whether you raise the profits of a horse-car company or of a manufacturer, neither will on that account pay any higher wages. Employers never give the increase of their profits as a reason tor raising the wages of their workmen, though they frequently assign decreased profits as a reason tor reducing wages. But this is an excuse, not a reason. The true reason is that the dull times which diminish their profits increase the competition of workmen for employment. Such ex- cuses are given only when employers feel that if they re- duce wages their employes will be compelled to submit to the reduction, since others will be glad to step into their places. And where trades-unions succeed in check- ing this competition they are enabled to raise wages. Since my talk with the driver, the horse-car employes of ' New York and Brooklyn organized into assemblies of the Knights of Labor, and su-jported by that association have succeeded in somewhat raising their pay and short- ening their hours, thus gaining what no increase in the profits of the companies would have had the slightest tendency to give them. No matter how much a protective duty may increase the profits of employers, it will have no effect in raising wages unless it so acts upon competition as to give work- men power to compel an increase of wages. There are cases in which a protective duty may have this effect, but only to a small extent and for a short time. When a duty, by increasing the demand for a certain domestic production, suddenly increases the demand for a certain kind of skilled labor, the wages of such labor may be temporarily increased, to an extent and for a time determined by the difficulties of obtaining skilled laborers from other countries or of the acquirement by new laborers of the needed skill. But in any industry it is only the few workmen of peculiar skill who can thus be affected, and even when by these few such an advantage is gained, it can only be maintained by trade unions that umit entrance to the craft. The cases are, I think, few indeed in which any increase of wages has thus been gained by even that small class of workmen who in any protected industry require such exceptional skill that their ranks cannot easily be swelled; and the cases are fewer still, if they exist at all, in which the difficulties of bringing workmen from abroad, or of teaching new workmen, have long sufficed to maintain such increase. As for the great mass of those engaged in the protected industries, their labor can hardly be called skilled. Much of it can be performed by ordinary unskilled laborers, and much of It does not even need the physical strength of tS;e adut I, ■ ,)■ -i 4B ttOiti, but consists of the mere tending of machinery, or of manipulations which can be learned by boys and girls in a few weeks, a few days, or even a few hours. As to all this labor, which constitutes by far the greater part of the labor required in the industries we most carefully protect, any temporary effect which a tariff might have to increase wages in the way pointed out would be so quickly lost that it could hardly be r.aid to come into operation. For an increase in the wages of such occupa- tfons would at once be counteracted by the flow of labor from other occupations. And it must be remembered that the effect of "encouraging" any industry by taxa- tion is necessarily to discourage other industries, atnd thus to force labor into the protected industries by driving it out of others. Nor could wages be raised if the txiunty that the tariff I I aims to give employing producers were given directly to I I their workmen. If, instead of laws intended to add to the 1 1 profits of the employing producers in certain industries, { I we were to make laws by which so much should be added to the wages of the workmen, the increased competition which the bounty would cause would soon bring wages plus the bounty to the rate at which wages stood with- out the bounty. The result would be what it was in Bngland when, during the early part of this century, it was attempted to improve the miserable condition of agrriculturai laborers by "grants in aid of wages" from parish rates. Just as these grants were made, so did the wages paid by the farmers sink. The car-driver was right. Nothing could raise his wages that did not lessen the competition of those who stood ready to take his place for the wages he was get- ting. If we were to enact that every car-driver should be paid a dollar a day additional from public funds, the result would simply be that the men who are anxious to get places as car-drivers for the wages now paid would e as anxious to get them at one dollar less. If we were to give every car-driver two dollars a day, the companies would be able to get men without paying them anything, just as where restaurant waiters are customarily leed by the patrons, they get little or no wages, and in some cases even pay a bonus for their places. But if it be preposterous to imagine that any effect a tariff may have to raise protits in the protected industries can raise wages in those industries, what shall we say of the notion that such raising of wage's in the protected industries would raise wages in all industries? This is like saying that to dam the Hudson River would raise the level of New York Harbor, and consequently that of the Atlantic Ocean. Wages, like water, tend to a level, and unless raised in the lowest and widest occupations can be raised in any particular occupation only as it is walled in from competition. The general rate of wages in every country is mani- festly determined by the rate in the occupations which require least special skill, and to which the man who has nothing but his labor can most easily resort. As tuey en- gage the greater body of labor these occupations con- stitute the base of the industrial organization, and are to other occupations what the ocean is to its bays. The rate of fwages in the higher occupations can be raised at>ove the rate prevailing in the lower, only as the higher occupations are shut off from the inflow of labor by their {greater risk or uncertainty, by their requirement of superior skill, education or natural ability, or by restric- tions such as those imposed by trades unions. And to secure anything like a general rise of wages, or even to secure a rise of wages in any occupation upon ingress to which restrictions are not at the same time placed, it is necessary to raise wages in the lower and wider occupa- tions. That is to say, to return to our former illustration, the level of the bays and harbors that open into it cannot t>e raised until the level of the ocean is raised. If it were evident in no other way, t!ie recognition of this general principle would suffice to make it clear that duties on imports can never raise the general rate of wages. For import duties can only "protect" occupa- tions in which there is not sufficient laoor employed to t>roduce the supply we need. The labor thus engaged tcan never be more than a fraction of the labor engaged Jtn producing commodities of which we not only provide '{the home supply, but have a surplus for export, and the {labor engaged in work that must be done on the spot. ■ No matter what the shape or size of an iceberg, the lass above the water must be very much less than the lass bel'jw the water. So no matter what be the condi- ions of a country ur what the peculiarities of its industry, ,bat part of its labor engaged in occupations than can be 'protected ' by import duties must always be small as mpared with that engaged in occupations that cannot protected. In the LHiited States, where protection s Men carried to the utmost, the census returns show at not more than one-twentieth of the labor oif tbe MOtry i> engaged in protected infirc cents a day, and half-clad woaeo are I tene and] oppj couti Til protl Deal hav^ labol fluctl posel theiiT tionj then } iiie.i into I to dl whal tionf the I even! wagC unprr 4» are leeJing furnace fires. " Pluck-rne stores," company tenements and boardins houses, Pinkerton detectives and mercenaries, and all the forms and evidences of the oppression and degradation of labor are, throughout the country, characteristic of the protected industries. The greater degradation and unrest of labor in the protected than in the unprotected industries may in part be accounted for by the fact that the protected employers have been the largest importers of "foreign pauper labor." But, in some part, at least, it is due to the greater fluctuations to which the protected industries are ex- posed. Being shut of^ from foreign markets, scarcity of their productions cannot be so quickly met by importa- tion, nor surplus relieved by exportation, and so with them for much of the time it is either " a feast or a fam- ine." These violent fluctuations tend to bring workmen into a stafte of dependence, if not of actual peonage, and to depress wages below the general standard. But whatever be the reason, the fact is that so far is protec- tion from raising wages in the protected industries that the capitalists who carry them on would soon " enjoy " even lower priced labor than now, were it not that wages in them are kept up by the rate of wages in the unprotected industries. CHAPTER XX. THE ABOLITION OP PROTHCTIOM. Our inquiry has sufficiently shown the futility and absurdity of protection. It only remains to consider tfte plea that is always set up for protection when other ex- cuses fail— the plea that since capital has been invested and industry organized upon the basis of protection it would be unjust and injurious to abolish protective duties at once, and tliat their reduction must be gradual and slow. This plea for delay, ttiough accepted and even urged by many of those who up to this time have l>een the most conspicuous opponents of protection will not bear examination. If protection be unjust, if it be an in- fringement of equal rights that gives certain citizens ^he power to tax other citizens, then anything short of its complete and immediate abolition involves a continuance of injustice. No one can acquire a vested right in a wrong; m one can claim property in a privilege. To admit that privileges which have no other basis than a legislative Act cannot at any time be taken away by legislative Act, is to commit ourselves to the absurd doctrine that has been carried to such a length in Great Britain, where it is held that a sinecure cannot be abolished without buying out the incumbent, and that because a man's ancestors have enjoyed the privilege of living on other people, he and his descendants to the remotest time have acquired a sacred right to live upon other people. The true doctrine— of which we ought never, on any pretense, to yield one iota— is that enun- ciated in our Declaration of Independence, the self- evident doctrine that men are endowed by their Creator with equal and inalienable rights, and that any law or institution that denies or impairs this natural equality may at any time be altered or abolished. And no more salutarr lesson could to-day be taught to capitalists throughout the world than that justice is an element in the safety of investments, and that the man who trades upon the ignorance or the enslavement of a people does so at his own risk. A few such lessons, and every throne in Europe would topple, and every great standing army melt away. Moreover, abolition at once is the only way in which the industries now protected could be treated with any fair- ness. The gradual abolition of protection would give rise to the same scrambling and pipe-laying and log- rolling which every tariff change brings about, and the stronger would save themselves at the expense of the weaker. But further than ^his, the gradual abolition of protec- tion would not only continue for a long time, though in a diminishing degree, the waste, loss and injustice in- separable from the system, but during all this period the anticipation of coming changes and the uncertainty in regard to them would continue to inspire insecurity and depress business ; whereas, were protection abolished at once, the shock, whatever it might be, would soon be over, and exchange and industry could at once reorgan- ize ujjon a sure basis. Even on the theory that the aboli- tion of protectic^ involves temporary disaster, immediate abolition is as preferable to gradual abolition as amputa- tion at one operation is to amputation by inches, - And to the working classes— the classes for whom those who deplore sudden change profess to have most con- cern—the difference would be greater still. It is always to the relative advantage of the poorer classes that anv change Involving disaster should be as sudden as possible, since the effect of delay is simply to give the richer classes opportunity to avoid it at tbe expense of the poorer. If there is to be a certain loss to any community, whether by flood, by fire, by invasion, by pestilence, or by commercial convulsion, that los% will fall more lightly on the poor and more heavily on the rich the shorter the time in which it is concentrated. If the currency of a country slowly depreciates, the depreciating currency will be forced into the hands of those least able to pro- tect themselves, the price of commodities will advance in anticipation of the depreciation, while the price of labor will lag along after it ; capitalists will have opportunity to make secure their loans and to speculate in advancing prices, and the loss will thus fall with far greater relative severity upon the poor than upon the rich. In the same way if a depreciated currency be slowly restored to par, the price ot labor falls more quickly than the price oi commodities •. debtors struggle along in the endeavor to Say their obligations i'.i an appreciating currency, and lose who have the most means are best able to avoid the disadvantages and avail themselves of the speculative opportunities brought about by the change. But the more suddenly any given change in the value of currency takes place the more equal will be its effects. So it is with the imposition of public burdens. It is manifestly o the advantage of the poorer class that any great public expens. be met at once rather thaft spread over years by means of public debts. Thus, if the ex- penses of our Civil War had been met by taxation levied at the time, such taxation must have fallen heavily upon the rich. But by the device of a public debt— a twin in- vention to that of indirect taxation— the cost of the war was not, as was pretended, shifted from present time to future time (for that would only have been possible had the means to carry on the war been borrowed from abr3ad. which was not the case), but taxation, which otherwise might have fallen upon individuals in propor- tion to their wealth, was changed into taxation spread over a long series of years, and falling upon individuals in proportion, no( to their means, but to their consump- tion, thus imposing upon the Dcor far greater relative burdens than upon the rich. Whether the rich would have had the patriotism to support a war which thus called upon them for sacrifices more commensurate with those of the poor, who in all wars furnish the far greater portion of "the food for powder," is another matter ; but it is certain that the spreading of the war taxation overyears has not only made the cost of the war many times greater, but has been to the advantage of the rich and to the disadvantage of the working classes. If the abolition of protection is, as protectionists pre- dict, certain to disorganize trade and industry, then it is better for all, and especially is it better for the workine classes, that tbe change should be sharp and short. If the return to a natural condition of trade and produc- tion must temporarily throw men out of employment, then it is better that they should be thrown out at once and have done with it, than that the same loss of em- ployment should be spread over a series of years with a constant depressing effect upon the labor market. In a sharp but snort period of depression the public purse could, without serious consequences, be drawn upon to relieve distress, but any attempt to relieve in that way the less general but more protracted distress incident to a long period of depression, would tend to create an army of habitual paupers. But, in truth, the talk about the commercial convulsions and industrial distress that would follow the abolition of protection is as baseless as the story with which Southern slave holders during the war attempted to keep their chattels from running away— that the Northern armies would sell them to Cuba; as baseless as the predictions of Republican politicians that the election of a Demo- cratic President would mean the assumption of the Con- federate debt, if not the revival of the "Lost Cause." The real fear that underlies all this talk of the disas- trous effects of the sudden abolition of protection was welt exemplified in a conversation a friend of mine had awhile ago with a large manufacturer, who belongs to a com- bination which prevents competition at home while the tariff prevents competition from abroad The manufac- turer was inveighing against any meddling with the tariff, and dilating upon tKe ruin that would be brought upon.the country by free trade. " Yes," said my friend, who had been listening with an air of sympathetic attention, " I suppose, if the tariff were abolished you wculd have to shut up your works." "Well, no; not quite that," said the manufacturer, " We could go ahead, even with free trade ; but then— we couldn't get the same profit." The notion that our manufactures would be suspended and our iron works doted and our coal mines shut dowa li :'^'« !i 111 N if the abolition of protection it a notion akin to that of "theuUwaffging the dog." Where are the eoods to come from which are thus to deluge our markets, and howarethey tobe paid for? There is not productive power enough in Europe to supply them, nor are there ■hips to transport them, to say nothing of the effect upon European prices of the Remands o7 sixty millions of people, who, head for head, consume more than any other people in the world. And since other countries are not going to deluge us with the products of their labor without demanding the products of our own labor in payment, any increase in our imports from the abolition of protection would involve a corresponding increase in exports. The truth is, that the change would not only be benefi- cial to our industries at large— four-fifths of which, at least, are not brought into competition with imported commodities— but it would be beneficial even to the "pro- tected " industries. In those that are sheltered by home monopolies profits would be reduced ; in those in which the tariff permits the use of infrrior machinery and slov- enly methods better machinery would have to be pro- vided and better methods introduced ; but in the great bulk of our manufacturing industries the effect would only be beneficial, the reduction in t le cost of material far more than compensating for the reduction in prices. And with a lower cost of proauction foreign markets from which our manufacturers are now shut out would be opened. If any industry would be "crushed," it coulaonlybe some industry now carried on at national^ loss. The increased power which the removal of restrictions upon trade would give in the production of wealth would be felt in all directions. Instead of a collapse there would be a revivication of industry. Rings would be broken up, and where profits are now excessive they would come down; but production would go on under healthier conditions and with greater energy. American manufacturers would begin to find markets the whole world over. American snips would again sail the high seas. The Delaware would ring like the Clyde with the clash of riveting hammers, and the United States would rapidly take that first place in the industrial and com> mercial world to which her population and her natural re- sources entitle her, but which is now occupied by England, while legislation and administration would be relieved of a great cause of corruption, and all governmental reforms would be made easier. CHAPTER XXI. INADBQUACV OP THE FREB TRADE ARGUMENT. The point we have now reached is that at which dis- cussions of the tariff question usually end— the extreme limit to which the avowed champions of the opposing policies carry their controversy. We have, in fact, reached the legitimate end of our in- quhy so far as it relates to the respective merits of pro- tection and free trade. The stream, whose course our examination has been following, here blends with other streams, and though it still flows on, it is as part of a wider and deeper river. As he who would trace the waters of the Ohio to their final union with the ocean cannot stop when the Ohio ends, but must still follow on that mighty Mississippi which unites streams from far different sources, so, as I said in the beginning, to really understand the tariff question we must go Eeyond the tariff question. This we may now see. ^ So far as relates to questions usually debated between protectionists and free traders our inquiry is now com- plete and conclusive. We have seen the absurdity of protection as a general principle and the fallacy of the special pleas that are made for it. We have seen that protective duties cannot increase the aggregate wealth of the country that enforces them, and have no tendency to give a greater proportion of that wealth to the working class. We have seen that their tendencies, on the con- trary, are to lessen aggregate wealth, and to foster monop- olies at ttie expense of the masses of the people. But although we have directly or inferentially dis- proved every argument that is made for protection, although we nave seen conclusively that protection is in its nature inimical to general interests, and that free trade is in its nature promotive of general interests, yet if our inquiry were to stop here we should not have accom- plished the purpose with which we set out. For my part, did it end here, I would deem the labor I have so far spent in writing this book little better than wasted. For all that we have seen has, with more or less coherence and clearness, been shown again and again. Yet protection ■till retains its hold upon the popular mind. And untii loiaething mora is shown, protection will retain tiua hold. In exposing the fallacies of protection I have en< deavored in each case to show wliat has made the fallacy plausible, but it still remains to explain why such ex- posures produce so little effect. The very conclusiveness with which our examination has disproved the claims of protection will suggest tliat there must be something more to be said, and may well prompt the question, " n the protective theory Is really so incongruous with the nature of things and so inconsistent with itself, how is it that after so many years of discussion it still obtains such wide and strong support ? " Free traders usually attribute the persistence of the belief in protection to popular ignorance, played upon by special interests. But this explanation will tiardly satisfy an unbiased mind. Vitality inheres in truth, not in error. Though accepted error has always the strength of habit and authority, and the battle against it must always be hard at first, yet the tendency o7 discussion in which error is confronted with truth is to make the truth steadily clearer. That a theory which seems wholly false holds its ground in popular belief de.pite wide and long discussion, should prompt its opponents to inquire whether their arguments have really gone to the roots of popular belief, and whether this beaef does not derive support from truths they have not considered, or from errors not yet exposed, which still pass for truths— rather than to attribute its vitality to popular incapacity to recognize truth. I shall hereafter shovHr that the protective idea does indeed der*,ve support from doctrines that have been activAy taught and zealously defended by 'he very economists who have assailed it (who, so to speak, have been vigorously defending protection with the riglit hand while raining blows upon if with the left), &nd from habits of thought which the opponents no less than the advocates of protection have failed to call in ques- tion. But what I now wish to point out is the inade- quacy of the arguments which free traders usually rely on to convince working-men that the abolition of pro- tection is for their interest. In our examination we have gone as far, and in certain respects somewhat farther than free traders usually go. But what have we proved as to the main issue ? Merelj that it is the tendency of free trade to increase the pro ductionof wealth, and \.\ais to fier7nii ol the increase ol wages, and that it is the tendency of protection to do crease the production of wealth and foster certain monop dies. But from this it does not follow that the aboUtioa of protection would be of any benefit to the working class. The tendency of a brick pushed off a chimney top is to fall to the surface of the ground. But it will not fall to the surface of the ground it its fall be intercepted by the roof of a house. The tendency of anything that in- creases the productive power of labor is to augment wages. But it will not augment wages under conditions in which laborers are forced by competition to offer their services for a mere living. In the United States, as in all Countries where political power is in the hands of the masses, the vital point in the tariff controversy is as to its effect upon the earnings of " the poor people who have to work."^* But this point lies beyond the limit to which free traders are accustomed to confine their reasoning. They provt that the tendency of protection is to reduce the produc- tion of wealth and to increase the price of commodities, and from this they assume that the effect of the abolition of protection would be to increase the earnings of labor. But not merely is such an assumption logically in- valid until it is shown that there is nothing in existing conditions to prevent the working classes from getting the benefit of this tendency , but, although in itself a na- tural assumption, it is in the minds of " the poor people who have to work" contradicted by obvious facts. In this is the invalidity of the free trade argument, and here, and not in the ignorance of the masses, is the reason why all attempts to convert working-men to the free tradeism which would substitute a revenue tariff for a protective tariff must, save under suoh conditions as existed in England forty years ago, utterly fail. While both sides have shown the same indi"position to go to the heart of the controversy, there can be no ques- tion that so far as issue is joined between protectionists and free traders, in current discussion, the free traders liave the best of the argument. But that the belief in protection has survived long and wide discus^on, that it seems to spring up again when beaten down and to arise with apparent spontaneity in communities such as the United States, Canada and Australia, that have grown up without tariffsfand where the system lacks the advantage of inertia and of en- * I find this suggestive phrase in a protectionist newa- paper. But it well expresses the attitude toward labor 'of many of the free trade writers also. 45 Ion I have en. lade the fallacy n why such ex- ■ conclusiveness :d the claims of be something le question, " If sngruous with ?t with Itself, iscussion it still sistence of the e, played upon on will hardly s in truth, not ys the strength gainst it^must If discussion in nake the truth ns wliolly false ivide and long iqulre whether ots of popular lerive support ■om errors not -rather than i to recognize ive idea does It have been by he very > speak, have th the right he left), and > no less than call in ques- is the inade- usually rely ition of pro- nd in certain s usually go. ue? Merely »se the pn> : increase oi action to da ■tain monop he abolition he working -himney top will not fan :rcepted by ing that in- o augment • conditions > offer their re political >oint in the arnings of ree traders hey provt ^e produc- nmodities, ^ abolition of labor, ically in- " existing getting 'If a na- or people ts. nent, and tie reason the- free riff for a itions as sition to no qucs- ctionists traders >ng and n when neity in ]a and where of en- . newt- labor ;seli lifited intereats, proves that beyond the discussion there must be something which strongly commends protection to the popular mind. This may also be inferred from what protectionists themselves say. Beaten in argument, the protectionist usually falls back upon some declaration which Implies that the real grounds of his belief have been untouched, and which generally takes the form of an assertion that though free trade may be true in theory it fails in prac- tice. In such form the assertion is untenable. A theory is but an explanation of the relation of facts, and nothing can be true in theory that is not true in practice. But free traders really beg the question when they answer by merely pointing this out. The real question is, whether the reaEoning on which free traders rely takes into ac- count all existing conditions? What the protectionist means, or at least the perception that he appeals to, when he talu in this way of the difference between theory and fact, is, that the free trade theory docs not take into ac- count all existing facts. And this is true. As the tariff question is presented, there a- indeed, un- der existing social conditions, two sides to tbe shield, so that men vvho only look at one side, closing their eyes to the other, may continue, with equal confidence to hold opposite opinions. And that the distinction between them may, with not entire inaptness, be described as that of exclusively regarding theory and that of exclusively re- garding facts, we shall see when we have developed a theory which will embrace all the facts, and which will explain not only why it is that honest men have so diamet- rically differed upon the question of protection vt. free trade, but why the advocates of neither policy have been inclined to press on to that point where honest differences may be reconciled. For we have reached the place where the Ohio of the tariff question flows into the Mississippi of the great social question. It need not surprise us that both parties to the controversy, as it has hitherto been conducted, should stop here, for it would be as rational to expect any thorough treatment of the social question from the well-to-do class represented in the English Cobden Club or the American Iron and Steel Association, or from their apologists in professional chairs, as it would be to look for any thorough treatment of the subject of personal liberty In the controversies of the slave-holding Whigs and slave-holding Democrats of forty years ago, or in the sermons of the preachers whose salaries were paid by them. , CHAPTER XXII, ^ . THB REAL. WEAKNESS OF FREE TRADE. How the abolition of protection would stimulate pro- duction, weaken monopolies and relieve government of a great cause of corruption, we have seen. " But what," it will be asked, "would be the gain to workingmen ? Will wages increase ? " For some time, and to some extent, yes. For the spring of industrial energy consequent upon the removal of the dead weight of the tariff would for a time make the demand for labor brisker and employment steadier, and in occupations where they can comt>ine, working-men would have better opportunity to reduce their hours and increase their wages, as, since the abolition of the pro- tective tariff in England, many trades there have done. But even from the total abolition of protection, it is im- possible to predict any general and permanent increase of wages or any general and permanent improvement in the conditions of the working classes. The effect of the abolition of protection, great and beneficial though it must be, would in nature be similar- to that of the inven- tions and discoveries which in our time have so greatly increased the production of wealth, yet have nowhere really raised wages or of themselves improved tlie con- dition of the working classes. Here is the weakness of free trade as it is generally ad- Tocated and understood. The working-man asks the free trader : " How will the change you propose benefit me ? " The free trader can only answer: "It will increase wealth and reduce the cost of commodities." But in our own time the working-man has seen wealth enormously increased without feeling himself a sharer in the gain. He has seen the cost of commodities greatly reduced without finding it any easier to live. He l . nds waa such that no could be kept down. 5t so much a national ting state of Society, i more Into regular illel between Amerl- imes closer, and tlie : societies arc begin- Compctiiion in our ind more the fie.d of :er so easy for those iventions fetter men irrowcr bounds, jeath at Dayton the fate. He was down iprivedof hlsoldre- \ ». His large family ' lot compete success- ped contemporaries, done In the great i^ery few, It is to be mmunity. Yet this of population and :r all the time ; and ve and hamper the fertility of resource theaverage skill of lion of mechanical :ial requirements of d among us a class al struggle and as live comfortably if :annot do It, and so demoralize them- healtby American I this way, and we >f feeble folks who ch hewers-of wood d city masses have medy and regener- forous and better to come from the •y life, when every proportion of our ind when country id with tramps. 1 [of the recognition [art of those who lat it is becoming IS nothing but his a living in the assumption that ;ains wages, but It the abolition of tendency which, '- for existence itself through- , the more un- iccompanies the }lition of protec- this respect, be •hat accelerates promised for the mewhat restrain as continued to Jtection, despite ES for the relief II at work. « In- n of education, provements, the irnmental regu- during all these jndition of the r are as dark as d wealth nr ire aught to nirtke ,-> ^wshavelon^ ' resin the mor- vith wealth. > to show to .azarus is be- clergymen of t cities declare :hes and solac- ming that the been growing ; the immoral idening which iiity froui our 'and civihza- trhich seem to at does it all 4T ;ie bVS )m amount to ? We are timply Itvtnir In a fool's paradise if we Imagine that all these agencies combined are doing a thousandth part of what needs to be done. We must face the facts, and these compel the conclusion that thin terrible flood of sin and misery is gaining on us. It is rising every day." This is everywhere the testimony of disinterested and sympathetic observers. Those who are raised above the (terce struggle may not realize what Is going on beneath them. But whoever chooses to look may see. And when we take into account longer periods of time than are usually considered In discussions as to whether the condition of the working-man has or has not improved with improvement in productive agencies and increase in wealth, nere Is a great broad fact : Five centuries ago the wealth-producing power of England, man for man, was small Indeed compared with what it Is now. Not merely were all the great Inven- tions and discoveries which since the Introduction of steam have revolutionized mechanical industry then un- dreamed of, but even agriculture was far ruder and less productive. Artificial grasses had not been discovered. The potato, the carrot,' the turnip, the beet, the many other plants and vegetables which the farmer now finds most prolific, had not been introduced. The advantages which ensue from rotation of crops were unknown. Agricultural implements consisted of the spade, the sickle, the flail, the rude plow and the harrow. Cattle had not been bred to more than one-half the size they average now, and sheep did not yield 'half the fleece. Roads, where there were roads, were extremely t>ad, wheeled vehicles scarce and rude, and places a hundred miles from each other were, in difficulties of transporta- tlon, practically as far apart as London and Hong Kong, or San Francisco and New York, are now. Yet patient students of those times— such men as Pro- fessor Thorold Rogers, who has devoted himself to tlie history of prices, and has deciphered the records of colleges, manors and public oifices— tell us that the condi- tion of the English laborer was not only relatively, but absolutely better In those rude times than it is in England to-day ^tter five centuries of advance in the productive arts. They tell us that the working-man did not work so liard as he does now, and lived better; that he was exempt from the harassing dread of being forced by loss of employment to want and beggary, or of leaving a family that must apply to charity to avoid starvation. Pauperism as it prevails in the rich England of the nine- teenth century was in the far poorer England of the fourteenth century, absolutely unknown. Medicine was empirical and superstitious, sanitary regulations and pre- cautions were all but unknown. There was frequently plague and occasionally famine, for, owing to the diffi- culties of transportation, the scarcity of one district could not be relieved by the plenty of another. But men did not, OS they do now, starve m the midst of abundance ; and what is perhaps the most significant fact of all is that not only were women and children not worked as they are to-day, but the eight-hour system, which even the working classes of the United States,, with all the pro- fusion of labor-saving ■ machinery and appliances, have notyet attained, was then the common system. U this be the result of five centuries of such increase in productive power as has never before been known in the world, what ground is there for hoping that the mere abolition of protective tariffs would permanently benefit working-men f And not merely do facts of this kind prevent us from assuming that the abolition of protection could more than temporarily benefit working-men, but they suggest the question, whether it could more than temporarily in- crease the production of wealth. Inequality in the distribution of wealth tends to lessen tke production of wealth— on the one side, by lessening intelligence and incentive among workers; and on the other side, by augmenting the number of idlers and those who minister to them, and by increasing vice, crime and waste. Now, if increase in theTproduction of wealth tends to increase inequality in distribution, net only shall we be mistaken in expecting its full effect from any- thing which tends to increase production, but there may be a point at which increased inequality of distribution will neutralize increase^ power of production, just as the carrying of too much sail may deaden a ship's way. Trade is a labor-saving method of production, and the effect of tariff restrictions upon trade is unquestionably to diminish productive power. Yet, importanttas may be the effects of protection in diminishing the production of wealth, they are far less important than ,the waste of productive forces which Is commonly attributed to the very excess of productive power. The existence of pro- tective tariffs will not suffice to explain that paralysis of Industrial forces which in all departments of industry teems tr arise from an excess of productive power, over the demand for consumption, and which Is everywhere leading to combinations to restrain production. And considering this, can we feel ouitc sure that the effect of abolishing protection would be more than temporarily to increase the production of wealth } CHAPTER XXIII. THE REAL STRENGTH OF rROTECTION. The pleas for protection are contradictory and ab- surd ; the books in which it is attempted to give it the semblance of a coherent systeiy are confused and illog- ical. But we all know that the reasons men give for their conduct or opinions are not always the true reasons, and that beneath the reasons we advance to others or set forth to ourselves there often lurks a feeling or percep- tion which we may but vaguely apprehend or may even be unconscious of, but which is in reality the determin- ing factor. I have been at pains to examine the arguments by which protection is advocated or defended, and this has been necessary to our in(iuiry, just as it is necessary that an advancing array should first take the outworks before it can move on the citadel. Yet though these arguments are not merely used controversially, but iustify their faith in protection to protectionists themselves, the real strength of protection must be sought elsewhere. One needs but to talk with the rank and file of the supporters of protection in such a way as to discover their thoughts rather than their arguments, to see that beneath all the reasons assigned for protection there is something which gives it vitality, no matter how clearly those reasons may be disproved. The truth is that the fallacies of protection draw their real strength from a great fact, which is to them as the earth was to the fabled Antseus, so that they are beaten down only to spring up again. This fact is one which neither side in the controversy endeavors to explain — which free traders quietly ignore and protectionists quietly utilize; but which is of all social facts most obvious and important to the working classes— the fact that as soon, at least, as a certain stage of social develop- ment is reached, there are more laborers seeking employ- ment than can find it— a surplus which at recurring periods of industrial depression becomes very large. Thus the opportunity of work comes to be re^^arded asa privilege, and work itself to be deemed in common thought a good. Here, and not in the labored arguments which its ad- vocates make, or in the power of the special interests which it enhsts, lies the real strength of protection. Beneath all the mental habits I have spoken oi as dispos- ing men to accept the fallacies of protection lies one still more important— the habit ingrained in thought and speech ot looking upon work as a boon. Protection, as we have seen, operates to reduce the power of a community to obtain wealth — to lessen the result which a given amount of exertion can secure. It " makes more work," in the sense in which Pharaoh made more work for the Hebrew brick-makers when he refused them straw ; In the sense In which the spilling of grease over her floor makes more work for the housewife, or the rain that wets his hay makes more work for the farmer. Yet, when we prove this, what have we proved to men whose greatest anxiety is to get work ; whose idea of good times is that of times when work is plentiful? A rain that wets his hay is to the fariaer clearly an Injury; but is it an in^u^-y to the laborer who gets by reason of it a day's work and a day's pay that otherwise he would not liave got ? The spilling of grease upon her kitchen floor may be a bad thing for the housewife; but to the scrubbing woman who is thereby enabled to earn a needed haif^ollar it may be a godsend. Or if the laborers on Pharaoh's public works had been like the laborers on modern public works, anxious only that the job might last, and if outside of them had been a mass of less fortunate laborers, pressing, struggling, beg- sing for employment in the brickyards — wouJd the edict that, by reducing the productiveness of labor, made more work have really been unpopular? Let us go back to Robinson Crusoe. In speaking of him I purposely left out Friday. Our protectionist might have talked until he was tired without convincing Crusoe that the more he got and the less he gave in his exchange with passing ships the worse off he would be. But if he hud taken Friday aside, recalled to his mind how Crusoe had sold Xury into slavery as soon as he liad no further use for him, even though the poor boy h t .1 43 :eiii:.-i-i-'v?i- •• w;^f riifis'saB^ • 4t f'H had helped him Mcape from the Moor* and had saved hit life, and then had whiapered into Friday's ear that the less work there wan to do the less need would Crusoe have of him and the greater the daneer that he might give him back to the cannibals, now that he was certain to have more congenial companions— would the idea that there might be danger in a deluge of cheap goods have seemed so ridiculous to Friday as it did to Crusoe ? Those who imagine that they can overcome the popu- lar leaning to protection by pointing out that protective tariffs make necessary more work to obtain the same result, ignore the fact that in all civilized countries that have reached a certain stage of development the malorlty of the people are unable to employ themselves, ancl, un- less they find some one to give them work, are helpless and, hence, are accustomed to regard work as a thing to be desired in itself, and anything which makes more work as a beneiit, not an injury. Here is the rock against which " free traders," whose Ideas of reform go no further than " a tariff for revenue only" waste their 8treng;th when they demonstrate that the effect of protection is to Increase work without in- creasing wealth. And here is the reason why. as we have seen in the United States, in Canada and in Aus- tralia, the disposition to resort to protective tariffs increases as that early stage in which there is no difficulty of finding employment is passed, and the social phe- nomena of older countries begin to appear.* There never yet lived a man who wanted work for its own sake. Even the employments, constructive or de- structive, as may be, in which we engage to exercise our faculties or to dissipate ennui, must to please us show result. It is not the mere work of felling trees that tempts Mr. Gladstone to *ake up his axe as a relief from the cares of state and the strain of politics. He could get as much work— in the sense of exertion— from pounding a sand-bagr with a wooden mallet. But he could no more derive pleasure from this than the man who enjoys a brisk walk could find like enjoyment in tramping a tread- mill. The pleasure is in the sense of accomplishment that accompanies the work— in seeing the chips fly and the great tree bend and fall. The natural Inducement to the work by which human wants are supplied is the produce of that work. But our industrial organization Is such that what laree numbers of men expect to get by work is not the produce or any proportional share of the produce of their work, but a fixed sum which is paid to them by those who take for their own uses the produce of their work. This sum takes to them the place of the natural inducement to work, and to obtain it becomes the object of their work. Now the very fact that, without compulsion, no one will work unless he can get something tor it, causes. In common thought, the idea of wages to become involved in the idea of work, and leads men to think and speak of wanting work when what they really want are the wages that are to be got by work. But the tact that these wages are based upon the doing[ of work, not upon its produc- tiveness, dissociates the idea of return to the laborer from the idea of the actual productiveness of his labor, throwing this latter idea into the background or eliminate ine it altogether. In our modem civilization the masses of men possess only the power to labor. It is true that labor is tne pro- ducer of all wealth, in the sense of being the active factor of production; but it Is useless without the no less necessary passive factor. With nothing to exert Itself upon, labor can produce nothing, and is absolutely help- less. And so, the men who have nothing but the power to labor must, to make that power of any use to them, either hire tho material necessary to the exertion of labor, or, as Is thf* i,.'eva.or and who are thus exposed to privation and anxiety, if not to physical suffering. Hence arises the feeling that the man who employs an- other to work is a benefactor to him— a feeling which even the economists who have made war upon some of the popu- lar delusions growing out of it have done their best to foster, by teaching that capital employs and maintains labor. This feeling runs through all classes, and colors all our thought ana speech. One cannot read our news- papers without seeing that the notice of a new building or projected enterprise of any kind usually concludes by stating that it will give .mployment to so many men, as though the giving of employment, the providing of woric, were the measur' oi its public advantage, and something for which all should be grateful. This feeling, strong among the employed, is stronger still among employers. The nch manufacturer, or iron-worker, or shipbuilder, talks and thinks of the men to whom he has "given em- ployment " as though he had actually given something which entitled him to their gratitude, and he is Inclined to think, and in most cases does think, that in combining to demand higher wages or less hours, or in any way endeavoring to put themselves In the position of freely contracting parties, they are snapping at the hand that has fed them, although the obvious tact Is that such an employer's men have given him a g:reater value than he has given them, else ne could not have grown rich by employing them. This habit of looking on the giving of employment as a benefaction and on the work as a boon, lends easy cur- rency to teachings which assume that work is desirable in itself— something which each nation ought to try to get the most of— and makes a system which professes to prevent other countries from doing for us work we might do for ourselves seem like a system for the enrichment of our own country and the benefit of Its working-classes. It not only indisposes men to grasp the truth that pro- tection can only operate to reduce the productiveness of labor ; but it indisposes them to care anything about that It is the need for labor, not the productiveness of labor, that they are accustomed to look upon as the thin^ to be desired. *: : confirmed is this habit, that nothing is more common than to hear it said of a useless construction or expendi- ture that " it has done no good, except to provide em- ployment," while the most popular argument for the eight-hour system is that machinery has so reduced the amount of work to be done that there is not now enough to go around unless divided into smaller " takes." When men are thus accustomed to think and speak of work as desirable in itself, is it any wonder that a system which proposes to "make work^' should easily obtain popularity? Protectionism viewed in itself is absurd. But it is no more absurd than many other popular beliefs. Professor W. G. Sumner of Yale College, a fair representative of the so,» wmm Untlon upon tht lying and Mllinff rcater force than I. There are Mv- keep. The man layscll itto-mor- nodity. But the ky because no one ■ow. The oppor- If, and the labor nd a buyer for It, othlngr out their he clau who live tble to bear lou. are numerous as li have the power I prevail in mod- V have the means ays, even in the cult to sell their tion and anxiety, who employs an> ellng which even lome of the popu- >ne their best to s and mainulns sses, and colors ^read our news- f a new building illy concludes by many men, as ovidingof work, I, and something 1 feeling, strong ong employers, or shipbuilder, las " given em- iven something id he is Inclined at in combining I, or in any way sition of freely t the hand that Is that such an ' value than he grown rich by aployment as a ends easy cur- irk is desirable JUght to try to |ch professes to rork we might enrichment of prldng-classes. ruth that pro- puctlveness of |ng about that :ne8S of labor, le thin^ to be lore common ^n or expend!- provide em- nent for the reduced the now enough kes." I and speak of It a system sily obtain But it is no Professor entative of aly trying to Tilted States \ the United Irotectionism hat the pro- Is as these: wages by Ibor market; lisons ought 1 labor: that aple should ' at trades- ning the |he destruc- ng for the |ne. of men farfroa 40 tucii notions lecminir abnird to the enmmon mind, they arc accustomed ideas. Is it not true that the "good limes during the war" are widely attributed to the "em- liloyment furnished by the Kovernment" in calling so many men Into the army, and to the brisk demand for commodities caused by their unproductive consumption and by actual destruction ? Is it not true that all over the United States the working classes are protesting against the employment of convicts in this, that, or the other way, and would much rather have them kept in idleness than have them " take work from honest men } " Is It not true that the rich man who "gives employment" to others by his lavish waste Is universally regarded as a better friend to the workers than the rich man who "takes work from those who need it" by doing It himself? W In themselves these notions may be what the Professor declares them, "miserable fallacies which sin against common sense/' but they arise from the rccogiiltlon of actual facts. Take the most preposterous of ihem. The burning down of a city Is indeed a lessening of the aggregate wealth. But Is the waste involved in the burning down of a city any more real than '.he waste Involved in the standing idle of men who would gladly be at work in building up a city? Where every one who needed to work could find opportunity, there it would indeed be clear that the maintenance in Idleness of convicts, paupers or rich men must lessen the rewards of workers; but where hundreds of thousands must endure privation because of their inability to find work, the doing of work by those who can support them- selves, or wilt be supported without it, seems like taking the opportunity to work from those who most need or most deserve it. Such "miserable fallacies" must con- tinue to sway men's minds until some satisfactory ex- planation is ulorded of the facts that make the " leave to toil " a boon. To attempt, as do " free traders " of Pro- fessor Sumner's class, to eradicate protectionist ideas while ignoring these (acts is utterly hopeless. What they take for a seedling that maybe pulled up with a vigorous effort, is in reality the shoot of a tree whose spreading roots reach to the bedrock of society. A political economy that will recognize no deeper social wrong than the framing of tarufs on a protective instead of on a revenue basis, and that, with such trivial exct , tions, is but a justi- fication of "things as they are," is . «pellent to the in- stincts of the uiasses. To tell working-men, as Professor Sumner does, that " trades-unionism and protectionism are falsehoods," is simply to dispose them to protection- ism, for whatever may be said of protection they well know that trades-unions have raised wages in many vocations, and that they are the only things that have yet given the working-classes any power of resisting a strain of competition that, unchecked, must force them to the maximum of toil for the minimum of pay. Such free- tradeism as Professor Sumner represents— and it is this that is taught In England, and that In the United States has essayed to do battle with protectionism— must, wherever the working-classes have political power, give to protection positive strength. But it is not merely by indirection that what is known as the "orthodox political economy" strengthens pro- tection. While condemning protective tariffs it has justi- fied revenue tariffs, and its most important teachings iiave not merely barred the way to such an explanation of social phenomena as would cut the ground from under protectionism, but have been directly calculated to strengthen the beliefs which render protection plausible. The teaching that labor depends for employment upon capital, and that wages are drawn from capital and are determined by the ratio between the number of laborers and the amount of capital devoted to their employment- all the teachings, in short, which have degraded labor to the position of a secondary and dependent factor in pro- duction, have tended to sanction that view of things which disposes the laboring-class to look with favor upon ^ anything which by preventing the coming into a country IP of the produce of other countries, seems, at least, to in- crease the requirement for work at home. CHAPTER XXIV. THB PARADOX. If our investigation has as yet led to no satisfactory conclusion it has at least explained why the controversy so long carried on between protectionists and free traders has been so indeterminate. The paradox we have reached is one toward which all the social problems of our day converge, and had our examination been of any similar question it must have ccme to just such a point. Take, for insUnce, the question of the effects of machinery. The opinion that finds most influential ex- pretrion is that labor-saving invention, although it may sometimes cause temporary inconvenience or even hard- ship to a few, is ultimately beneficial to all. On the othei hand, there is among working-men a widespread belM that labor-saving machinery is injurious to them although, since the belief does not enlist those powerful specialinterests that are concerned In the advocacy of protection, it has not been wrought Into an elaborate system and docs not get anything like the same rep- resentation In the organs of public opinion. Now, should we subject tnis question to such an ex- amination as we have given to the tariff question we should reach similar results. We should find the notion that Invention ought to be restrained as Incongruous as the notion that trade ought to be restrained— as incapable of being carried to its logical conclusions without result- ing in absurdity. And while the use of machinery enor- mously increases the production of wealth, examination would show in it nothing to cause inequality in distribu- tion. On the contrary, we should see that the increased power given by invention Inures primarily to labor, and that this gain Is so diffused by exchange that the effect of an improvement which Increases the power of labor in one branch of Industry must be shared by labor in all other branches. Thus the direct tendency of labor-saving improvement is to augment the earnings of labor. Nor Is this tendency neutralized by the fact that labor-saving inventions generally require the use of capital, since com- petition when free to act, must at length bring the profits of capital used in this way to the common level. Even the monopoly of a labor-saving Invention, while it can seldom be maintained for any length of time, cannot prevent a large (and generally much the largest) part of the benelts from being diffused.* From this we might conclude with certainty, that ti.,i tendency of labor-saving improvements Is to benefit all, and especially to benefit the working-class, and hence might naturally attribute any distrust of their t>eneficial effects partly to the temporary displacements wtiich, in ai highly-organized society, any change in the forms of in- dustry must cause, and partly to the increased wants called forth by the increased ability to satisfy want. Yet, while as a matter of theory it Is clear that laboi^ saving inventions ought to improve the condition of all, as a matter of fact it is equally clear that they do not. In countries like Great Britain there is still a large class living on the verge of starvation, and constantly slipping over It— a class vvho have not derived the slightest bienent from the immense Increase of productive power, since their condition never could have been any worse than it is— a class whose habitual condition in times of peace and plenty is lower, harder, more precarious and more de- graded than that of any savages. In countries like the united States, where such a clasa did not previously exist, its development has been con- temporaneous with wondrous advances of labor-saving invention. The laws against tramps which have been placed upon the statute books of our States, the restric- tions upon child labor which have been found necessary, thr walking :idvertisements of our cities, thejgrowli^ bi'.ierness of the strife which working-men are forced to wage, indicate unmistakably that while discovery and invention have been steadily increasing the productive power of labor In every department of industry, the condition of the mere laborer nas been growing worse. It can be proved that labor-saving invention tends to benefit labor, but that this tendency is in some way aborted is even more clearly evident in the facts of to- day than it was when John Stuart Mill questioned if me- chanical invention had lightened the day s toil of any hu- man being. That in some places and in some occupations there has been improvement In the condition of labor is true. But not only is such improvement nowhere com- mensurate with the increase of productive power ; it ia clearly not due to it. It exists only where it has bee 4 won by combinations of workmen or by legal interference. It is trade unions, not the increased power given 1^ machinery, that have in many occupations Hi Great Britain reduced hours and increased pay; it is legislation, not any improvement in the general condition of labor, that has stopped the harnessing of women in mines and the working of little children in mills and brick-yards. Where such influences have not been felt, it is not only certain that labor-saving inventions have not improved the condition of labor, but it seems as if tbey had exerted a depressing effect— operating to make labor a drug instead of to make It more valuable. Thus, in relation to the effecu of machinery, as in re- lation to the effects of Uriffs, there are two sides to the shield. Conclusions to which we are led by a considera- tion of principles are contradicted by conclusions we are compelled to draw from existing facts. But, while dis- * For a fuller examinatioo of the effects of machinwy see my Sfct'al Problinu, i\ \* "'t«p,'!''3Kasa6 privilege of Uving on bis island, and could in no wise < increase what those who had nothing but their labor could demand. If Heaven itself rained down wealth upon the island, that wealth would be his. And so, loo, any economy that might enable these mere laborers to live more cheaply would simply increase the tribute that they could pay and that he could exact. Of course, no man could utilize a power like this to its full extent or for himself alone. A sinjgie landlord in the midst of ten thousand poor tenants, Uke a single master amid ten thousand slaves, would be as lonely a» was Robinson Crusoe before Friday came. , Xhe human being is by nature a social animal, and no matter how selhsb such a man might be, he would desire companions nearer his own condition. Natural impulse would prompt him to reward those who pleased him, prudence would urge him to interest the more influential among his ten thousand Fridays in the maintenance of hisownersbim HMM tquatity tiM joint I of the tMve might onditton lower aiut ve cruelty nr wan- lew order of (hingi lieir unimal wants eat M Friday had, n better houiei, be I in llln«H have the I keeing this, iNland r devlM diagram! rawer* than their ina cave and lived the conclutiona of 4) II the island newa- ' figures that can- lured, how Indus, thealavcl" 1 takes no account . Compelled to a irietyr, undignified eeing results and ared with thai of ind more that of be the same upon it is to say, to use ! to that which is of setting Crusoe's ras thenceforward 'usoe's ownership le difference ? As perty on Crusoe's amounted to the ( in the sea, or to en enjoying only dom to starve or f\ some one else's led by improve- vealth. For they of it than has the : must give them he wants him to ength ; but when o work they must Crusoe ownership an, would be as ive; as incapable production of nor from what ne man would be land Fridays, aU ves, and but one So long as his -J be enforced ten thousand as }f their flesh and ind without bis labor, or even •, "Leave my This owner of ind " free men " god, of whom lany deity that ove. For as a Almighty may if you don't do "free"labor- - opening up of ving machines, introduction of would simply charge for the^> uld in no wise * 9ut their labor m wealth upon nd so, too, any aborers to live ibute that they like this to iu landlord in the sinsle master lonely a<> was human being r how selHsb companions would prompt 'udence would among his ten lis ownersbi(\ fl while eiperiencc would show hire If calcttlAtlon did not, that a larger Income couU! he obtained by leaving tn superior energy, skill and thrill vuine part of wtmt their efforts secured. Uut while the linulc owner ol nuch an island would thus be induced to Niiare his privllegcx by means of grants, leases, exemptions or stipends, with a class more or less numerous, who would thus partake with him in the advantages of any imuruvcment that in- creased the power of producing wealtli, there would yet remain a class, the mere laliorers of only ordinary ttbillty, to whom such improvement could bring no beneht. And it would only be necessary to be a little chary in granting permission to work upon the island, sn as to keep a small percentage of the population congtaiiily on the verge of % starvation and begging to be permitted to use their power to labor, to create a competition in which, bidding against each other, men would of themselves offer all that their labor could procure save a bare living, for the privilege of getting that. We can sometimes see principles all the clearer if we imagine theqi brought out under circumstances to which we are not habituated ; but, as a matter of fact, the social adjustment which in modern civilization creates a clasa who can neither labor nor live save by permission of others, never could have arisen in this way. The reader of Tkt Furthtr Advintum 0/ RoUnton Crutt*. as related by De Foe, will remember that during Crusoe s long absence, the three English rogues, ted by Will Atkins, set up a claim to the ownership of the island, declaring that it bad been given tu them bv Rob- inson Crusoe, and demanding that the rest of the Inhabi- tants should work for them by way of rent. Though used in their own countries to the acknowledgment of just such claims, set up in the name of men gone, not to other lands, but to another world, the Spaniards as well as the peaceable Englishmen, laughed at this demand, and, wnen it was insisted on, hiid Will Atkins and his companions by the heels until they had got over the notion that otherjpeople should do tneir work for them. But if the three English rogues had gut possession of all the fire-arms before asserting their claim to own tlie Island. the rest of its population might have been compeilea to acknowledge it. Thus a class of land-owners and a class of non-land-owners would have been established, to which arrangement the whole population might in a few generations nave become so habituated as to think it the natural order, and when they had begun, in course of time, to colonize other islanos, they would have estab- lished the same institution there. Now, what might thus have happened on Crusoe's island, had the three English regues got possession of all the fire-arms, is precisely what on a larger scale did happen in the development of Euro- pean civilization, and what is happening in its extension to other parts 01 the world. Thus it is that we find in civilized countries a large class who, while they have power to labor, are denied any right to the use of the elements necessary to make that power available, and who, to obtain the use of those elements, must either give up in rent a part of the produce of their labor, or take in wages less than their labor yields. A class thus helpless can gain nothing from advance in productive power. Where such a class exists, increase in the general wealth can only mean increased inequality in distribution. And though this tendency may be a little checked as to some of them by trades-unions or similar combinations which artificially lessen competition, it will operate to the full upon those outside of such combinations. And, let me repeat it, this increased inequality in distribution does not mean merely that the mass of those who have nothing but the power to labor do not propor- tionately share in the increase of wealth. It means that their condition must become absolutely, as well as rela- tively, worse. It is in the nature of industrial advance —it Is of the very essence of those prodigious forces ^ which modern invention and discovery are unloosing, iW that they must injure where they do not benefit. These forces are not in themselves either good or evil. They bring good or evil according to the conditions un^er wbicD they are exerted. In a sute of society in which ail men stood upon an equality with relation to the use of the material universe their effects could be only benefi- cent. But in a state of society in which some men are held to be the absolute owners of the material universe, while other men cannot use it without paying tribut^ the blessing these forces might bring is changed into a curse— their tendency is to destroy independ- ence, to dispense with skill and convert the artisan into a "hand," to concentrate all business and make it harder for an employee to become his own employer, and to compel women and children to injurious and stunt- ing toll. The change industrial progress is now working in the conditions of the mere laborer, and which is only somewhat held in check by the operations of trades- tintdns, is that change which would coavcrt a slave who shared the varied occupatlnns and rud* eemfortt of his goatskin-clothed manter into a slave held as a mere in- strument u( factory production. Compare the skilled craftsman of the old order with the operative of the new order, the mere feeder of a machine. Compare the American farm "help" of an earlier state, tne social eijual of his employer, with the cowboy, whose dreary life is enlivened onfy by a "round-up" or "drunk," or with the harvest hand ui the " wheat factory," who sleeps in barracks or barns, and after a few montns of employ- ment goes on a tramp. Or compare the poverty of Con> nemara or Skye with the infinitely more degraded pov^ erty of Belfast or Glasgow. Do this, and then say if tft those who can only hope to sell their labor for subsistence, our very Industrial progress has not a dark side. And that this muU be the tendency of labor-saving ifw vention or reform in a society where the planet Is held to be private property, and the children that come into life upon it are denied all right to its use except as they buy or inherit the title of some dead man, we may see plainly. If we imagine labor-saving invention carried to its farthest imaginable extent. When we consider that the object of work is to satisfy want, the idea that labor-saving inven- tion can ever cause want by making work more product- ive seems preposterous. Yet, could invention go so far as to make It possible to produce wealth without labor, what would be the effect upon a class who can call nothing their own save the power to labor, and who, let wealth be never so abundant, can get no share of it except by selling this power ? Would it not be to reduce to naught the value of what this class have to sell; (• make them paupers in the midst of all possible wealth— to deprive them of the means of earning even a poor livelihood, and to compel them to beg or starve, if they could not steal ? Such a point it may be impossible for invention ever to reach, but it Is a point toward which modern invention drives. And is there not in this some explanation of the vast army of tramps and paupers, and of deaths by want and starvation in the very midst of plenty. The abolition of protection would tend to increase the production of wealth, that is sure. Hut under conditions that exist, increase in the production of wealth may itself become a curse— first to the Uboring-class, and ultimately to society at large. Is it not true, then, it may be asked, that protection, for the reason at least that it does check that freedom and extension of trade which are essential to the full play of modern industrial tendencies, is favorable to the worls. ing-classes ? Much of the strength of protection among working-men comes, I think, from vague feelings of thS kind. My reply would be negative. Not only has protectlea —which is merely the protection of procfucing capitalists against foreign competition in the home market— tenden- c^s in Itself toward monopoly and inequality, but it is im- potent to check the concentrating tendencies of modem inventions and processes. To do this by " protection "we must not only forbid foreign commerce, but restrain in- ternal commerce. We must not only prohibit any new applications of labor-saving invention,but must prevent the use of the most important of those already adopted. We must tear up the railway and go back to the canal boat and freight wagon ; cut down the telegraph wire and rely upon the post horse ; substitute the scythe for the reaper, the needle for the sewing-machine, the hand loom for the factory ; In short, discard all that a century of in- vention has given us, and return to the industrial proo esses of a hundred years ago. This is as imposible as for the chicken to go back to the egg. A man maybe- come decrepit and childish, but once manhood is reached he cannot again become a child. No ■ it is not in going backward, it Is in going forward, that tne hope of social improvement lies. CHAPTER XXV. . THE KOBBKR THAT TAKES ALL THAT IS LEFT. In itself the abolition of protection is like the driving off of a robber. But it will not help a man to drive off one robber, if another, still stronger and more rapacious, be left te plunder him. Labor may be likened to a man who as he carries home his earnings is waylaid by a series of robbers. One demands this much, and another that much, but last of all stands one who deitaands all that is left, save just enough to enable the victim to maintain life and ceme forth next day to work. So long as this last robber remains, what will it benefit such a man to drive off any or aH of the other robbers) 4 - -^*H; jwiwiaaa-' ft Snch It the dtuation of labor tOi^lay ttaroughout the dvUized world. And the robber that takes all that is left b private property in land. Improvement, no matter h >w great, ana reform, no matter how beneficial in itself, cannot help that class who, deprived of all right to the use of the material elements, have only the power to labor— a power as useless in itself as a sail without wind, a pump without water, or a saddle without a horse. I have likened labor to a man beset by a series of rob- bers, because there are in every country other things than private property in land which tend to diminish na- tional prosperity and divert the wealth earned by labor into the hands of non-producers. This is the tendency of monopoly of the processes and machinery of production . and exchange, the tendency of protective tariffs, of bad systems of currency and finance, of corrupt government. of public debts, of standing armies, and of wars and preparations for war. But these things, some of which are conspicuous in one country and some in another, can- not account for that impoverishment of labor which is to be seen everywhere. They are the lesser robbers, and to drive them off is only to leave more for the great rob- ber to take. If the all-sufficient cause of the impoverishment of labor were abolished, then reform in any of these direc- tions would improve the condition of laE>or ; but so long as that cause exists, no reform can effect any permanent improvement. Public debts might be abolished, standing armies disbanded, war and thelhought of war forgotten, protective tariffs everywhere discarded, government administered with the greatest purity and economy, and all monopolies, save the monopoly of land, destroyed, without any permanent improvement in the condition ot the laboring-class. For the economic effect of all these reforms would simply be to diminish the waste or increase the production of wealth, and so long as competition for employment on the part of men who are powerless to employ themselves tends steadily to force wages to the minimum that gives the laborer but a bare living, this is all the ordinary laborer can get. So long as this tendency exists— and it must continue to exist so long as private property in land exists— improvement (even itpossible) in the personal qualities of the laboring masses, such as im- provement in skill, in intelligence, in temperance or in thrift, cannot improve their material condition. Im- provement of this kind can only benefit the individual while it is confined to the individual, and thus gives him an advantage over the body of ordinary laborers whose wages form the regulative basis of all other wages. If such personal improvements become general the effect can only be to enable competition to force wages to a lower level. Where few can read and write^ the ability to do so confers a special advantage and raises the in- dividual who possesses it above the level of ordinary labor, enabling him to command the wages oi special skill. But where all can read and write, the mere pos- session of this ability cannot save ordinary laborers from being forced to as low a position as though they could not read and write. And so, where thriftlessness or intemperance prevails, the thrifty or temperate have a special advantage which may raise them above the conditions of ordinary labor ; but should these virtues become general that advant- age would cease. Let the great body of working-men so reform or so degrade their habits that it would become possible to live on one-half of the lowest wages now paid, and that competition for employment which drives men to work for a bare living must proportionately reduce the level of wages. I do not say that reforms that increase the intelligence or Improve the habits of the masses are even in this view . useless. The diffusion of intelligence tends to make men discontented with a life of poverty in the midst of wealth, and the diminution of intemperance better fits them to revolt against such a lot. Public schools and temperance societies are thus pre-revolutionary agencies. But t hey can never abolish poverty so long as land continues ti. be treated as private property. The worthy people who imagine that compulsory education or the prohibition of the drink traffic can abolish poverty are making the same mistake that the Anti-Corn Law reformers made when they imagined that the abolition of protection would make hunger impossible. Such reforms are in their own nature good and beneficial, but in a world like this, tenanted by eings like ourselves, and treated by them as the ex- clusive property of a part of their number, there must, under any conceivable conditions, be a class on the verge of starvation. This necessity inheres In the nature of things ; it arises ' from the relation between man and the external universe. Land is the superficies of the globe— that bottom of the ocean of air to which our physical structure confines us. It is our only possible standing place, our only possible wwkshop, the only reservoir from which we can draw material for the supply of our needs. Conttderioff land in its narrow aenie, as distinguished from water and air, it is still the element necessary to our use of the other ele> ments. Without land man could not even a^l himself of the light and heat of the sun or utilize the forces that pulse through matter. And whatever be his essence, man, in his physical constitution, is but a changing form of matter, a passing mode of motion, constantly drawn from nature's reservoirs and as constantly returning to thema^ain. In physical structure and powers he is re' lated to land as the fountain jet is related to the stream, or the flame of a gas burner to the gas that feeds it. Hence, let other conditions be what they may, the man who, if he lives and works at all, must live and work on land belonging to another, is necessarily a slave or a pauper. There are two forms of slavery— that which Friday ac- cepted when he placed Crusoe's foot upon his head, and that which Will Atkins and his comrades attempted to establish when they set up a claim to the ownerdiip of the island and called on its other inhabitants to do all the work. The one, which consists in making property oi man, is only resorted to when population S too sparse to make practicable the other, which consists in making property of land. For while population is sparse and unoccupied land is plenty, laborers are able to escape the necessity of buy- ing the use of land, or can obtain it on nominal terms. Hence to obtain slaves— people who will work for you without you working for them in return— it is necessary to make property of their bodies or to resort to predial slavery or serfdom, which is an artificial anticipation of the power that comes to the land-owner with denser population, and which consists in confining laborers to land on which it is desired to utilize their labor. But as population becomes denser and land more fully occupied, the competition of non-land-owners for the use of land obviates the necessity of making property of their bodies or of confining them to an estate in order to obtain thdr labor without return. They themselves will beg the privilege of giving their labor in return for being per> mitted what must be yielded to the slave— a spot to live on and enough of the produce of their own labor to main- tain life. This, for the owner,. is much the more convenient form of slavery. He does not have to worry about his slaves — is not at the trouble of whipping them to make them work, or chaining them to prevent their escape, or chas- ing them with blood-hounds when they run away. He is not concerned with seeing that they are properly fed in infancy, cared for in sickness or supported in old age. He can let them live in hovels, let them work harder and fare worse, than could any half-humane owner of the bodies of men, and this without a qualm of conscience or any reprobation from public opinion. In short, when society reaches the point of development where a brisk com- J>etition for the use of land springs up, the ownership of and gives more profit with less risk and trouble than does the ownership of men. If the two young Engli^ men I have spoken of had come over here and iwught so many American citizens, they could not have sfot from them so much of the produce of labor as they now get by having bought land which American citizens are glad to be allowed to till for half the crop. And so, even if our laws permitted, it would be foolish for an English duke or marquis to come over here and con- tract for ten thousand American babies, born or to be bom, in the expectation that when able to work he could get out of them a large return. For by purchasing or fencing in a million acres of land that cannot run away and do not need to be fed, clothed or educated, he can, in twenty or thirty years, have ten thousand full grown Americans, ready to give him half of all that their labor can produce on his land for the privilege of supporting themselves a ni their families out of the other halt. Thu gives him mure of the produce of labor than be could exact from so many chattel slaves. And as time goes on and American citizens become more plentiful, the owner- ship of this land will enable him to get more of them to work for him, and on lower terms. His speculation in land is as much a speculation in the growth of men as though he had bought children and contracted for infants yet to be born. For if infants ceased to be bom and men to grow up in America, his land would be valueless. The profits on such investment do not arise from the growth of land or increase of its capabilities, but from growth of population. Land in itself has no value. Value arises only from human labor. It is not until the ownership of land be- comes equivalent to the ownership of laborers that any value attaches to It. And where land has a speculative value it is because of the expectation that thfe growth of society will in the future make its ownership equivalent to the ownership of laborers. i) i\^ i ii i i i ii | i i »i inddering land water and air, i the other ele- n avail himidf the forces that be his essence, chaneingr form lutantly drawn ly returning to x>wers he is re* to the stream, t feeds it. f may, the man re and worli on f a slave or a bkb Friday ac> '$.> 1 bis head, and I attempted to e ownership of Its to do all the IE property ol IS too sparse to Ists in maldng ccupied land is icessityof buy> nominal terms. 1 work for you -it is necessary »ort to prediu al anticipation ler with denser ling laborers to labor. But as fully occupied, the use of land of their bodies to obtain their 1 will beg the t for being per> —a spot to live I labor to main- onvenient form ibout his slaves t to make them ape, or chas- n away. He is iroperly fed in n Old age. He larder and fare X of the bodies ience or any , when society a brisk com- |e ownership of trouble than oung English- and Doughtso ' lave f ot from ley now get by :izens are glad And so, even lish for an here and con- l>orn or to be to work he ly purchasing not run away ated.he can, d full grown t their labor f supporting ler hair ThS lan he could time goes on ;. 1, the owner- -fV ire of them to ipeculation in 'th of men as led for infants im and men lueless. The the growth ' im growth of I only from > of land be- lers that any la speculative M growth of Ip equivalent ft Itlttme that all valuable things have the quality of enabling their owner to obtain labor or the produce of labor In return for them or for their use. But with things that are themselves the produce of labor such transactions involve an exchange— the giving of an equivalent of labor-produce in return for labor or its produce. Land, however, b not the produce of labor, it existed before man was, and, therefore, when the ownership of land can command labor or the products of labor the trans- action, though in form it may be an exchange, is in reality an appiopriation. The power which the owner- ship of valuable land gives, is that of getting human ser- vice without giving human service, a power essentially the same as that power of appropriation which resides A in^e ownership of slaves. It is not a power of exchwige, 'but a power of blackmail, such as would be asserted were some men compelled to pay other men for the use of the ocean, the air or the sunlignt. The value of such things as grain, cattle, ships, houses, goods or metals is a value of exchange, based upon the cost of production, and therefore tends to diminish as the progress of society lessens the amount of labor necessary to produce such things. But the value of land is the value of appropriatiota, based upon the amount that can be appropriated, and therefore tends to increase as the progress of society increases production. Thus it is, as we see, that while all sorts of products steadily fall in value, the value of land steadily rises. Inventions and discoveries that increase the productive power of labor lessen the value of the things that require labor for their production, but increase the value of land, since they in- crease the amount that labor can be compelled to give for its use. And so, where land is fully appropriated as pri- vate property, no increase in the production of wealth, no economy in its use, can give the mere laborer more than the wages of the uave. If wealth rained down from heaven or welled up from the depths of the earth it could not enrich the laborer. It could merely increase the value of land. Nor do we have to appeal to the imagination to see this. In Western Pennsylvania it has recently been discovered that if borings are made into the earth combustible gas will force itself up— a sheer donation, as it were, by Nature, of a thing that heretofore could only be pro- duced by labor. The direct and natural tendency of this new power of obtaining by boring and piping what has heretofore required the mining and retortine of coal is to inake labor more valuable and to increase the earnings of the laborer. But land in Pennsylvania being treated as private property, it can have no such effect. Its effect, in the first place, u to enrich the owners of the land through whic^ the borings must be male, who, as legal owners of the whole material universe above and below their land , can levy a toll on the use of Nature's gift. In the next place, tne capitalists who have gone into the business of bringing the gas in pipes to Pittsburgh and other cities have formed a combination similar to that of the Stand- ard Oil Company, by which they control the sale of the natural gas, and thus over and above the usual returns of capital make a large profit. Still, however, a residue of advantage Is left, for the new fuel is so much more easily handled, and produces so much more uniform a heat, that the glass and iron workers of Pittsburgh find it more economical than the old fuel, even at the same cost. But they cannot long retain this advantage. If it prove per- manent, other glass and iron workers will soon be crowd- ing to Pittsburgh to share in it, and the result will be that the value of cuy lots in Pittsburgh will so increase as finally to transfer this residual advantage to the owners of Pittsburgh land.* And if the monopoly of the piping company is abolished, or If by legislative regulation its 8 routs are reduced to the ordinary earnings of capital, le ultimate result will, in the same way, be not an ad- vantage to workers, but an advantage to land-owners. Thus it is that railways cheapen transportation only to , Acrease the value of land, not the value of labor, and that when their rates are reduced it is land-owners not labor- era who get the benefit. So it is with all improvements of whatever nature. The Federal government has acted the part of a munificent patron to Washinf;ton City. The consequence is that the value of l9ts has advanced. If the Federal government were to supply every Wash- ington householder with free light, free fuel and free food, the value of lots would still further increase, and the owners of Washington " real esUte " would ultimately pocket the donation. The primary factors of production are land and labor. Capital is their product, and the capitalist is but an inter- *The largest owners of Pittsburgh land are an Eng- lish family named Schenley, who draw in ground rents a great revenue, thus (to the gratification ot Pennsylvania protectionliMs) increasing our exports over our importSi jiut as though they owned so many Pduurlvaiilaai. mediary between the landlord and the laborer. fleoM working-men who imagine that capital is the oppressor of labor are " barking up the wrong tree." In the fint place, much that seems on the surface like oppreasiQO br capital is in reality the result of the helplessness to wbicta labor is reduced by being denied all right to the use of land. " The destruaion of the poor is their poverty." It is not in the power of capital to compel men who can obtain free access to nature to seU their labor for starvation wages. In the second place, whatever of the earnings of labor capitalistic monopolies may succeed in appropnathig, they are merely lesser robbers, who take what, if they were abolished, land ownership would take. No matter whether the social organization be simple or complex, no matter whether the uitermediaries between the owners of land and the owners of the mere power to labor be few or many, wherever the available land has been fully appropriated as the property of some of the people, there must exist a class, the laborera of ordinary abihtv and skill, who can never hope to get more than a bare fiving for the hardest toil, and who are conitanlly in danger of failure to get even that. We see that class existing in the simple industrial organization of Western Ireland or the Scottish High- lands, and we see it, still lower and more degraded, in the complex industrial organization of the great British cities. In spite of the enormous increase of productive power, we have seen it developing in the United States, lust as the appropriation of our land has gone on. This IS as it must be, tor the most fundamentalof all human relations is that between man and the planet he inhabits. How the recognition of the consequences involved in the division of men into a class of world-ownera and a class who have no legal right to the use of Uie world ex- plains many things otherwise inexplicable I cannot here point out, since I am dealing only with the tariff question. We have seen why what is miscalled " free trade "—the mere abolition of protection— can only temporarily bene- fit the working-classes, and we have now reached a position which will enable us to proceed with our inquiry and ascertain what the effects oftrue free trade would be. CHAPTER XXVI. TRUB FRBB TRADB. "Come with me," said Richard Cobden, as John Bright turned heart-stricken from a new-made grave. " There are in England women and children dying with hunger— with hunger made by the laws. Come with me, and we will not rest until we repeal those laws." In this spirit the free trade movement waxed and grew, arousing an enthusiasm that no mere fiscal reform could have aroused. And intrenched though it was by re- stricted suffrage and rotten boroughs and aristocratic privilege, protection was overthrown in Great Britain. And there is hunger in Great Britain still, and women and children yet die of it. But this is not the failure of free trade. When protec- tion had been abolished and a revenue tariff substituted for a protective tariff, free trade had only won an out- post. That women and children still die of hunger in Great Britain arises from the failure of the reformers to go on. Free trade has not yet been tried in Great Britain. Free trade in its fullness and entirety would indeed abolish hunger. This we may now see. Our inquiry has shown that the reason why the aboli- tion of protection, greatly as it would increase the pro- duction of wealth, can accomplish no permanent benefit for the laboring class is, that so long as the land on which all must live is made the property of some, increase of productive power can only increase the tribute which those who own the land can demand for its use. So long as land is held to be the individual property of but a por- tion of its inhabitants, no possible increase of productive power, even if it went to the length of abolishing the necessity of labor, and no hnaginable increase of wealth, even though it poured down from heaven or gushed up from the bowels of the earth, could Improve the condi- tion of those who possess only the power to labor. The greatest imaginable increase of wealth could omy intensify in the greatest imaginable degree the phenooh' eoa which we are familiar with as " overproduction "-~ '. ui 14 only rednce the Uboring clan to unlvenal pauper- Thus it is, that to make either the abolition of pro- tection or any other reform beneficial to the worldng-class we nrast abolish the inequality of legal rights to land, and restore to all their natural and equal rights in the com- mon heritage. How can this be done ? Consider for a moment precisely what it is that needs to be done, for it is here that confusion sometimes arises. To secure to each of the people of a country bis equal right to the land of that country does not mean to secure to each an equal piece of land. Save in an extremely primitive society, where population was sparse, the di- vision of lal>or bad made little progress, and family groups Uved and worlced in common, a division of land into any- thing lilut equal pieces would indeed be impracticable. In a state of society such as exists in civilized countries tolic ly than tliat of nd proceeding no shocic, that *f instead of re- aachinery, will irnmental ma- irge sums are ns thus needed n amount, but ads steadily to inctionS which iriduals. Now, government, sent. Some of movable prop- 1 or persons (as eality taxes on I the transport :h last category ;, in the Umted y, on the value taken together. . I is assessed on sments is, in its }r the common »me that prop- I of the equal e for the use of from land, just armally appro- ily necessary to es now levied, II it reaches, as le land. :tion is reached, ippear, and the ommunity for M:ome in form oint is reached, icrease of a tax [as direct taxes le of land irre- can be ascer- than any other 3 change In the aust refer the ted this branch here possible. upon the exer- abolished. No or improving a hings in from ray to the stock ind constitute « to make and ge, without let :tion the use of All those taxes hand to hand, lid disappeai^V lid be as secure low, subject to Dunity for the id the ground 1 the land they now. But the Id be less than gs or improve- mmunities) on get the benefit Ent the tenant has to pay in liat he paid on ise the wealth ich the tenant ttly increaiinf 5« innd mttU be provided for common OMSvWltbout any tax on the earnings of labor or on the returns of capiul— a fund which in well settled countries would not only suffice for all of what are ^now considered necessary ex- penses of government, but would leave a large surplus to be devoted to purposes of general benefit. In the third place, and^ most important of all, the monopoly of land would be abolished, and land would be thrown open and kept open to the use of labor, since it would be unprofitable for any one to hold land without putting it to its full use, and both the temptation and the power to speculate in natural opportunities would be gone. The speculative value of land would be destroyed as soon as it was known that, no matter whether land was used or not, the tax would increase as fast as the value increased; and no one would want to hold land that he did not use. With the disappearance of the capi- talized or selling value of land, the premium which must now be paid as purchase money by those who wish to use land would disappear, differences in the value of land being measured by what would have to be paid for it to the community, nominally in taxes but really in rent. So long as any unused land remained, those who wished to use It could obtain it, not only without the payment of any purchase price, but without the payment of any tax or rent. Nothing would be required for the us« of land till less advantageous land came into use, and possession thus gave an advantage over and above the return to the labor and capital expended upon it, and no matter how much the growth of population and the progress of society increased the value of land, this increase would go to the whole community, swelling that general fund in which the poorest would be an equal uiarer with the richest. Thus the great cause of the present unequal distribu- tion of wealth would be destroyed, and that one-sided competition would cease which now deprives men who possess nothing but power to labor of the benefits of ad- vancing civilization, and forces wages to a minimum, no matter what the increase of wealth. Labor, free to the natural elements of prod k.' ;, wculd no longer be in- capable of employing if: 'f, ' '1 mpetition, acting as fully and freely between ei." ■ V h - between employed, would carry wages up to wi n / their natural rate —the full value of the produ o* ^ >r— and keep them there. Let -us turn again to the tariff question. The mere abolition of protection— the mere substitu- tion of a revenue tariff for a protective tariff— is such a lame and timorous application of the free-trade principle that it is a misnomer to speak of it as free trade. A revenue tariff is only a somewhat milder restriction on trade than a protective tariff. Free trade, in its true meaning, requires not merely the abolition of protection, but the sweeping away of all tariffs— the abolition of all restrictions (save those im- posed in the interests of public health or morals) on the bringing of things into a country or the carrying of things out of a country. But free trade cannot logically stop with the abolition of custom-houses. It applies as well to domestic as to foreign trade, and in its true sense requires the abolition of all internal taxes that fall on buying, selling, trans- porting or exchanging, on the making of any transaction or the carrying on of any business, save of course where the motive of the tax is public safety, health or morals. Thus the adoption of true free trade involves the aboli- tion of all indirect taxation of whatever kind, and the resort to direct taxation for all public revenues. But this is not all. Trade, as we have seen, is a mode of production, and the freeing^ of trade is beneficial be- cause it is a freeing of production. For the same reason, therefore, that we ought not to tax any one for adding to the wealth of a country by bringing valuable things into it. we ought not to tax any one for adding to the wealth of a country by producing within that country valuable things. Thus the principle of free trade requires that we should not merely abolish all indirect taxes, but that we should abolish as well all direct taxes on things that are the produce of labor ; that we should, in short, give full play to the natural stimulus to production— the posses- sion and enjoyment of the things produced— by imp<^sing n« tax whatever upon the production, accumulation or possessien of wealth (i. *., things produced by labor), leaving every one free to make, exchange, give, spend or bequeath. There are thus left, as the only taxes by which, in ad^ cordance with the free-trade principle, revenue can be raised, these two classes : I. Taxes on ostentation. Since the motive of ostentation in the use of wealth is timplj to show the ability to expend wealth, and since this can be shown as wen in the abtllty to pay a tax, uam on ottenutlon pars and timplei wbfle not checking the prodttctkm of weahh« do not evtn rettnin the en* joyment of wealth. But such t^otes, while they have a place in the theory of uxation, areof no practical im- portance. Some trivial amount is raised in England from taxes on footmen wearing powdered wigs, taxes on armerial bearings, etc., but such taxes are not resorted to in this country, and are incapable anywhere of yielding any considerable revenue. «. Taxes on the value of laAd. Taxes on the value of land must not be confounded with taxes on land, from which they differ essentially. Taxes on land— that is to say, taxes levied on land by quantity or area— apply equally to all land,.and hence fall ultimately on production, since they constitute a check to the use of land, a tax that must be paid as the condition of engaging in production. Taxes on land values, however, do not fall upon all land, but only upon valuable land, and on that in proportion to its value. Hence they do not in any degree check the ability of labor to avail itself of land, and are merely an appropriation, by the taxing power, of a portion of the premium which the owner of valuable land can charge labor for its use. In other words, a tax on land, according to quantity, could ultimately be transferred by owners of land to users of land and become a tax upon production. But a tax on land values must, as is recognized by all economists, fall on the owner of land, and