The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1874-09-24
FREE TRADE IN PRACTIcE

NaOnANAAlAnk AlAllt AllNll Ollt
years ago, Peter Leopold the First of Aus
tria, Grand Duke of Tuscany, IIapsburg
sitting in and adorning the throne
which the last of the Medicis had not
been able to fill, seeing the distress Of the
people, determined to relieve them by
giving them free trade. The condition
of Tuscany at that time was deplorable in
the extreme. The poverty of the land
almost amounted to nakedness; the peo-
pie were "prejudiced, ignorant, and Ian
guild from decay" commerce, fettered by
million exactiOns and restrictions, had
well nigh disappeared; manufacture,
drowned in the stagnsnt pool Of mOnop-
oily, was not only dead but rotten; while
agriculture, the mainstay Of people,
crushed by the hand Of government at
once ignorant and relentless, maintained
feeble and sickly existence, with bligh-
ted crops, perishing harvosts,, exhausted
fields, and famine ever at its heels to
drive and press. The corn crop was
hedged about by every conceivable meas
uTe Of protection" that five hundred
years of bigoted and greedy govern
ment could devise. II was regulated"
and tolled, subject to perquisition and
seizure, taxed in the blade and in the
Loaf, in the contadini's field and in the
peasants mouth. Stagnation was the
condition Of the central provinces, while
smuggling and disorder, riots and resist
ance to the law were the only sorts of nc.
tivity that prevailed ut the borders.
While things were in this wretched
state, the failure of two successive har-
vests, combined with the necessity ofpay-
ing large tribute money to Vienna,
plunged the people into such a crisis of
famine, misery, and despair that Leopold,
clear-headed, original prince, who had
good counsellors about him who thought
for himself, and who had--so historians
tell us--"a well-foundcd conviction that
the subjects pocket was ever the most
profitable treasury" determined to give
his people relief by Immediately taking
the first step in his profoundly devised
system of reforming state fallen into
decrepitude through long series of evil
days. With a single bold stroke hc set
the corn trade almost entirely free took
off all the restrictions upon grain, native
and foreign, in all its notifications, and
removed every impcdment to the free
circulation Of food.
The Outcry against this proclamation of
universal liberty waS immense, of course.
In the words Of the graphic and acute
Napier, the innovation "was assailed by
the yells Of all that were fattening upon
public misery; by monopOlists, and many
others that through fear and ignor-
ance were welded 10 the ancient sys-
tenn; and although merely reducing Il
branch Of trade to its simple commercial
principles, it was almost universally Will
tied-the timid, the ignorant, tho preiu-
diced, the rapacious all joined in one bar
barous cry against it; depreciation, scorn,
misconceptiOn, ,ridicule, and open hostility
assailed it, and the fears and agitation of
a blind mass of ignorant and credulous
people gave heart and vigor to the COM
bat"
Some OF the arguments urged against
this wise and necessary measure were ri
diculously like those Of modern American
protectionists; but, as Napier reminds us,
they were likewise intrinsically no more
than rehashes of the eXclamations made
against new doctrine by the "God-smiths
Of Ephesus" and the hemiscellaneous huck-
sters who thrived by trading in the por-
tico of Diana's temple. II would re-
suit in certain ruin, they urged, to fly
thus in the face Of experience, and open
markets so long shut to the greedy COM
merce of covetous world. Free Trade
was we'll enough in theory, but it should
follow, not precede the restora ion Of in
dustry. Agriculture must first be estab-
lished on firm basis "beiorC We make
laws that presuppose it in hourishing
state" The balance of trade must set in
our favor before We can open our ports
and to have free trade in corn, an over
plus in our own crops is Il preliminary
necessity; in brief, We must know all
about swimming before we 60 into the
water!
Leopold, however, was not to be moved
by this sort of talk, and no sooner was
his policy adopted than its results COM
pletely vindicated the wisdom oft. 1.-THE
marketsinsensibly began to overflow, the
shops and stores to fill bread and flour,
and the whole country to change its as
pect like the transition of q dissolying
view, from famine to abundance" Nor
were the effects less lasting than imme-
diately benefcent, Years after Leopold
wrote himselfto DIR. Recmanis, the Ham
burg historian CT the corn trade, and said
Before we emancipated the corn trade,
if we happened to have two bad harvests
Government was obliged to expend more
than hundred thousand crowns in grain
among the neighboring nations, yet the
people suffered from hunger and were
turbulent. After the trade became free,
we had three successive failures in crops,
but Government provided no grain, no
public debt was incurred, the people were
quiet, and no one suffered from hunger
1 beliere that to make free trade beneficial, ii
should be ,pithOM limits; The liberty Of com
merce has greatly augmented the industry Of
cUltipdtOrs and manufacturers, the farmers
are enriched, and The LabOrers Lipe e0mfortd-
bly."
These are the words in which Haps-
burg despOt, who gave his people Free
Trade in 1866 and municipal reform and
a liberal constitution some years later,
recited his experience of the benefits OF
that policy and the advantages to come
from enlargng it. Just hundred years
later, in 1866, in the Congress of the free
and prosperous United States. Senators
and Representatives were imposing
more onerous system Of tariff tax than
Florence ever saw under the worst Medi-
elsa tariff that taxed more than 5000
justifying its iniquities and
absurJities upon the false pretext of af-
tording protection to American indus
tryV-N. Y. World.