All trade barriers rest upon the moral premise that it is fairer for the U.S. government to effectively force an American citizen to buy from an American company than to allow him to voluntarily make a purchase from a foreign company. U.S. trade policy assumes that the moral difference between an American company and a foreign company is greater than the difference between coercion and voluntary agreement. Every trade restraint is a moral issue, forcibly sacrificing some Americans for the benefit of other Americans. If a businessman pulls a gun on a customer and demands 20 percent more for a product, that is robbery. If a politician intervenes to the same effect, it is fair trade.
Protectionism rests upon a moral glorification of an economy's least competitive producers.
The Government must take care of producers. No government was ever organized to get everybody something for a cheap price. The market does that. Protectionists murder the market and then scorn consumers for being orphans. Fair trade is based on the doctrine that producers have rights and consumers have duties.