The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1888-11-01

merce; it is a good thing when it pays,
Whether it pays or not, is the right test,
which congress ought not to disturb by
the tariff.
The protective tariff has had its poet in
prose in the late Henry c. Carey of Penn
sylvania. Carey was no scientific man:
there are no logical deductions and no
system in his large books. But he wrote
full of life and he has his merits in the
economical science as a defender of liberty
in banking and as an expounder of the
American way of government; he did not
refute the English theory of rent of land,
bur he gave from his American exper-
rience such examples that he could
show the holowneSS of this theory for a
possible development of an universal law,
which the world sufficiently has reorgan-
lied by last years experience. The same
Carey likes home trade. but hates foreign
commerce. He thinks it acts on society
like the magnetic rock in the Arabian
Nights, when it attracts nails and bolts
out of the unfortunate ships that come TO
near it. A commercial country like Eng
land is according to his opinion no better
than robber; he compares it with all
oppressors and Conquerors from the be-
ginning of the world till modern times.
Free trade is the cause of all national
misfortune from hunger epidemics in
Inpia to the chinchbugs in America, while
the alleged excellent state of Russia and
the progress of France above England
should demontrate the benefit of the pro-
tective system in these countries. A
Danish economist has told us how old
Carey once happened to spend a Sunday
afternoon with him in Copenhagen, and
how he then drove him out over the road
where people in their good Sunday clothes
came home from the woods, returning
over another road where they go out to
enjoy themselves in the evenings. 1t is
evidently this impression which lets Carey
range little Denmark amongst the happy
countries where the protective tariff has
made them well off and happy and enabled
it to withstand the whole power of Ger
many-it was before the late war of 1864
all Notwithstanding Denmark. as the
other Scandinavian countries has tariff,
with all its faults, still relatively liberal
and specially immensely liberal compared
with that of the United States. We do
not know whether Carey mainly writes
as man of Irish blood hating all that is
British, or as a Pennsylvania wishing to
continue the system which, supposed or
actually, enables men of Pennsylvania to
live at the cost of other citizens of the
states. AT all events it is difficult to take
Carey's TRADES seriously.
And generally speaking, it is difficult to
take the whole class of arguments in
earnest. 1t is of course well enough to
get all kinds of industries built up and
extended more and more 1t is true that
this gives purchasing power, home market,
etc. But the question is whether it just
pays best to build that special industry
up at that place and to that extent. The
capital and the labor do not fall down
from the sky. 1t is the question whether
we could use them better. 1t sounds
very nice to tell the farmer that he will
be benefited by the gain of the manufac-
turer, that something will fall off from
their riches to him too. But it will not
in the long run be possible to persuade
him that it really should be in his interest,
in hope of future profit, for the moment
to pay this immense tax, not to be allow
ed to purchase what he wants, compelled
to pay the whole mountain of artificial
increase in price, and at the same time to
be hndered in the sale of his products
where he best can sell them, rather than
use his money as he wishes. for the pay
ing of his mortgage, the improving of his
property, or the education of his children.
The farmer has often in the several coun-
tries been regarded as kind of food on
whom all burdens could DE loaded, "der
dunno Hans in Germany, "Jacdue Bon
homme'' in France, poor Hodge in
England. But it is a mistake TO believe
that the American farmer is made of the
same stuff. 1t may take time before he
understands what really is the matter
But let him only realize it. He is not the
poor down-trodden serf of Europe He
is the true descendant of the brave and
strong freeholders who once in olden
times in their ships swarmed out from
the Scandinavian countries, under the
names of Danes conquered England and
and Normans or Warangians organized
more than hall of Europe The Ameri-
can farmer in the same manner, daring
and adventurous. with strong arms and
strong head, set out and subdued the
largest territory occupied by any civilized
nation. He is the master and ruler of
the country He has a will of his own,
and he has the power to carry it through
if he wants to.