Year: 1877

. Absolute protection is absolute
prohibition. Absolute protection is
therefore. the destruction ofrevenue
, a tariff so high as to shut OF all i'm
!: portation is a tariff squarely opposed
: to all revenue. The principal OI
:. protection is at war with revenue
To give revenue, something must
T come in. To give much revenue,


something. or rather good many


things. must come in pretty freely.


To get the largest revenue, we must


abandon the policy of protection en-


tirely. eu. ...g --..-...a - -


1t is beginning to be apprehend-


ed that the petting of our industries,


at this period of our history, is a


luxury, which. as great impover>


ished people, we cannot afford. We


have learned, at least, that protec-


tion cannot keep industries alive


when the market for their products


is insufficient, and that we are pay


ing much more than we ought to pay


for goods. while the man who pro-


duces them is not benefited. Some


of our industries, which have been


utterly overshadowed by protection,


have died out. An illustration Of


the working of protection, in increas-


ing the cost of goods to the people.


can be found in almost everything


we wear. A silk hat, for instance,


which ought to cost, at it's best. ne


more than five dollars, now costs


eight. The duty of sixty per cent.


on the plush and other silk employ


ed makes the silk hat q luxury, and


nobody is benefited. We pay three


dollars more for the hat than we
ought to pay; the halter himself
does not at all increase his profts,
while he finds his business cut down
to its lowest mark compatible with
continued existence, for only rich
people will buy silk hats>at the price.
A low tariff on the matsrials-say q
tariff of twenty per cent.-wOuld in
crease the revenue. and SO cheaper
the hat that everybody could afferd
to buy it, and thus set all the manu-
factures at work. Forty millien of
people, which every man and woman
of the number heavily taxed to keep |
alive our wooden industries, while |
their gates are shut down and their
workmen unemployed, do not form
a very edifying spectacle The peo-
pie have petted the manufacturers a
good many years. They have sub
mitted to a taxation for this purpose /
that none but a prosperous people
could stand. Now it seems to US
that it is time for the people to take
care of themselves,-time for the
fostering mother to push the birds
out Of the nest. f sss


We have built q wall around US
a wall of protection. Our manufac-
tsries are lying still because they
have no market. They can get no
market outside, for, with raw mate
rials taxed, as they are in many in
stances. they cannot compete in the
markets Of the world. Again, they
can get no markets outside, because
weat those markets hBve to give US
in exchange is shut out by ''protec-
tion." Trade is game of give and
take and we cannot shut out the
products of other nations if we hope
to sell them our own. We ask for
no free trade that will be inconsis-
tent with tariff that will give US
the largest revenue but it seems to
Us that the policy of taxing the peo-
pie of the United States for the pro-
lection of industries that have be-
come bankrupt under the policy, or
nave ceased to find sufficient mar I
xet at home, is about played out
Scribner for December.