Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1886-08-13
THE LATEST TRICK.

The LATEST lRlCk.
Here is one deception going
about daily to defraud the limo
cent and unwary, which may as
we'll be exposed. When any de
fender of a protective tariff makes
a motion IN Congress, the free trade
journals with one consent call him
a "high prOtectiOnist." The object
is to cheat the unwary into the
notion that those who oppose him
are only moderate or ordinary pro-
tectionists, and complain only Of
the height of his protectionism.
The men who never dare to avOw
their real belief or aim, who go
about continually pretending to be
what they are not, and who never
get so furious as when an honest
man calls them by the right name,
have made three or four names so
odious already, by stealing and
wearing them, that it is almost an
insult to apply them to anybody.
Time was when they assembled
with flourish of trumpetS and or
ganIzed "Free Trade clubs or
leagues, and considered themselves
too brave to associate with people
who did not like that name, and
yet, Mr.. George has shown. they
were in fact spurious tree traders
all the time. They never meant
real free trade, but only British free
trade. Presently that name began
to smell bad, and then they called
themselves "revenue tariff mem
just long enough to make that
phrase OdiOus. Next they made
the name "tariff refOTmerS.' Now
they are trying to get themselves
called moderate prOtectiOnists or
ordinary prOtectiOnists, and any
man who opposes their devices
they call a high prOtectionist.
These dodgers are perfectly aware
that they have become so offensive
to the country that their only chance
is to pretend to be somebody else.
A protective duty Is protective,
whether it is high or low. If it
sufiices to build up a home indus
try and to defend it against Grip
ping foreign competition, though
it be only 10per cent, it is as truly
protective and to all genuine pro.
tectiOnists as satisfactory as if il
were ten times as much. But if il
does not suffice to build up a home
industry or to defend it against
gripping foreign competition, il
does not protect, whether high OF
low, and in that case the higher il
is the worse it is. The duty OF
lawmakers is to frame a law which
will honestly do the work for which
it is advocated, and if any duty
called protective is not high
enough to protect, there is not a
genuine protectionist who Will not
say that 1t ought to be either made
high enough or else abandoned. If
a duty does build up home source
of supply, it insures cheapness in
the end. fit is just low enough
not to build up a home source of
supply, it burdens the people as
far as it possibly can, without
doing any good. Whether high
or low, IN that case 1t is a nuisance,
and ought to be raised or abolish
ed.
The word "high,' therefore, in.
wolves a deception. There is no
high protection, and no low pro-
lection a man either believes in
protection or he does not. Just
now the country is cursed with a
set OF men who want British free
trade, or spurious free trade" but
have not pluck enough to say so.
These are the men who are pretend
ing that "they are as much in favor
ofprotectiOn as anybody, but they
are not high prOtectionists." The
plain truth is that is the only diff
culty.-Erchdage.
NHz