The Sun.
London, England, 1870-03-29 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, MARCH 29, 1870.

PROTECTION VERSUS FREE TRADE.

(From the Anglo- American Times.)
The Free-traders are working with energy in the
United States. Even the New York Tribune, which
the Nation says is now the principal, owing to a
variety of circumstances, indeed age might say the
sole remaining champion of distinction which tie
old Protectionist cause has in the press, admits that
the issue of Protection against Free Trade must soon
become what for years it was, the most, prominent
and absorling among those which divide the Ateeri-
cin people and array them in contending parties.
Tin re is now regularly published a monthly perioll- •
cal in New York, called the Free-Trader, which, rt,
its names indica' es, is the special organ of the Free
trade League. We have the last number of that
raper before us as we write, and from its pages we
gather intelligence of the progress of the movement.
That the great issue between parties will soon be
Free Trade versus Protection has beer long foreseen
by us, the indications being, in truth, unmistakeable.
The solution of the great moral questions of the day,
and their replacement by material issues ; the aboli-
tion of slavery; the equality of all men before the
law; the equal rights accorded by the Constitution to
every citizen ; these, and other fundamental ques-
tions arising from them, received their settlement
in the late amendments to the Constitution, and a
new political era dawns on the United States.
First, in importance, is Protection versus Free
Trade, and on that must broadly be based the par-
ties now gradually forming. There are other sub-
jects of almost cilia' weight, such as the reform of
the Public Service, and matters relating to the
National Debt, also the Revenue and its collection.
Those who watch the tone of the American
press as well as of Congress, where, however,
it is less observable, can see clearly enough the
truth of our assertion that parties are gradually
but unmistakeably changing. What marstrive
to know who desire to be in advance of public
opinion is the drift of that opinion, which is much
more difficult than many suppose. Take, for in-
stance, the question of the greenback redemption of
the Five-Twenty Bonds, raised on the eve of the
Presidential election. The !louse of Representa-
tives appeared on the whole rather to favour that
mode of payment ; that is, the members did net
rightly forecast the honesty of their constituencies.
The bill was quickly discussed and decided on by the
nation, for a rapid decision was necessary, and in
a few months many of these very men went back
to the new Congress to reverse the votes they had
given in the old. '1 hu s those best acquainted with the
feeling of the country were in error in predicting
when away from their ccnstituencies what it would
be on that issue. The .Ration says, the average
Congressman is naturally timid, and of new ideas
or movements arising after his election, he is exceed-
ingly shy. _ Changes in public opinion rarely affect.
Congressmen, unless they have been revealed by
actual contests at the polls. " Ilis letters from
home are not reliable indicators of the way the
stream is flowing ; and he reads the newspapers
with a distrust which we are sure will be forgiven
him when he comes up for final judgment." But.
though Congress and the Press may blunder, they
are not permitted long to remain in error ; for both
are soon made to feel the effects of running coun-
' ter to the general sentiment, if they persist in con-
tinuing their course, or. on the other hand, the effect
of their want of susceptibility in getting into the
popular drift. We do not pretend that a rapid
Aria of tail to catch the earliest winds of the na-
tional breath is either a high course of statesman-
ship or or principle, but it is what the majority of
Americans who hope to succeed as Congressmen or
" newspaper men" reust do, and what, as a general
rule, they all strive to do. We can then readily
comprehend that both are, in some degree, " in a
fix" at the pre sent juncture, for soundness on the
main question will no longer avail the blundering
and backsliding politician who has now no main
question on which to be soand. Presently the main
question will be Protection or Free Trade, and the
aspiring politician will soon have to decide on which
he intends to be sound. For Protection there is at
present a majority in Congress. The Protectionist
fraternity have rulei since the secession of the
South ; ruled, so as some think, seriously to injure
their own c :use; for the withdrawal of the South-
ern members left them in possession of the field to
do as they liked, and they did a great deal more
than was wise. Their chief strength, hoverer,
lies, as it lay in England, in the material interests
guarded by the Tariff. One man fighting ;or his
property is worth a dozen fighting !-n- a mere
theory. There are, of course, exceptions, for the
theorist, without any pecr eiary interest involved,
may rise into an enthusiast, and become quite as
formidable an enemy as the man -fighting for
his money. Still the grand difference is, that the
nucleus of Protection is a sfeong, even if a small,
force of men who believe 'their means of living
to be involved, while their opponents, with the few
who want no other incitement than principle, arc
mere upholders of a doctrine they believe would in
practice be beneficial to the nation. The one force
is like a highly-disciplined army, aided by their
velunteer backers, in possession of forts, citadels,
and arsenals ; the other like an opposing gathering
of insurgents, backed, it may be, by a good cause.
That the disc'plined army is dangerous, is very
powerful, and will die hard is certain ; but it is
uncertain what the latent strength of the insur-
rection is, and this cannot be ascertained till nume-
rous battles have been fought, and numbers have
committed themselves to the issue. It is asserted
that the depression of most industries in the Re-
public is due to the contributions levied by way
of PrOtection acting and re-acting till they sap the
foundations. of the very wructures they were de-
signed to support, and that the people are becom-
ing alive to this.. The West is throwing itself by
degrees into the Free-Trade ranks, and, with the
rise of the South, will rise a power hostile to Pro-
tection. Thus the belief is growing that Free
Trade, notwithstanding the acknowledged strength
. of . Protection, will conquer in the strife. But we
are satisfied that victory or defeat will depend on
the intrinsic strength of the arguments which each
will 'array in defence of its cause. An English
Free-trader is inclined sneeringly to remark that
if that be the case, Protection will have no chance ;
but there he drops into the old British error of
concluding, that what is good for his island must
be good for all other countries. There are special
and very strong reasons why America's policy
should be protection to native industry. These
reasons we have before given, and there is no need
to reproduce them here ; but an European who over-
looks them and the powerful hold they have on the
national heart will omit from his calculation a main
element. In discussing the Tariff controversy, the
Nation says of the Tribune, the leading Protec-
tionist champion, that it has two styles of treat-
ment for the subject—the humorous and the vitu-
peraCve, and both are inapplicable, as a Protec-
tive tariff does not admit of being defended hutno-
rouly, for the defender must be as solemn- as
a judge, and look as wise as an owl. Neither does
Protection admit of a vituperative defence, "r s the
public has grown old, and grave, and sedate to a
degree of which Mr. Gunn: and some of his
brother agitators seem to have no idea." The
grand charge which used formerly to damage op-
ponents has wholly lost its power, the charge of
being bribed with British gold ; yet neverthe-
less, is freely used. The Free-Trader says it is still
the fashion in New England to kill a man, or asso-
ciation, or an organisation, by asserting that he or
it, is in the pay of the Free-Trade League; but
although the Free-Trade League is itself said to
be subsidised by Great Britain, and to bribe per-