Laws have familiarized everybody with the plea that we ought to be independent of foreigners for the food of the people; and the Navigation Laws were grounded, in theory and profession, on the necessity of keeping up a "nursery of seamen " for the navy. On this last subject I at once admit that the object is worth the sacrifice; and that a country exposed to invasion by sea, if it can not otherwise have sufficient ships and sailors of its own to secure the means of manning on an emergency an adequate fleet, is quite right in obtaining those means, even at an economical sacrifice in point of cheapness of transport. When the English navigation laws were enacted, the Dutch, from their maritime skill and their low rate of profit at home, were able to carry for other nations, England included, at cheaper rates than those nations could carry for themselves: which placed all other countries at a great comparative disadvantage in obtaining experienced seamen for their ships of war. The navigation laws, by which this deficiency was remedied, and at the same time a blow struck against the maritime power of a nation with which England was then frequently engaged in hostilities, were probably, though economically disadvantageous, politically expedient. But English ships and sailors can now navigate as cheaply as those of any other country, maintaining at least an equal competition with the other maritime nations even in their own trade. The ends which may once have justified. navigation laws require them no longer, and afford no reason for maintaining this invidious exception to the general rule of free trade.

Since the introduction of steamships and the advance of invention in naval contrivances, the plea for navigation laws on the ground that they keep up a "nursery of seamen" for the navy is practically obsolete. The "seaman" employed on the modern naval ships more nearly resembles the artisan in a manufacturing establishment; he need have but comparatively little knowledge of the sea, since the days of sailing-vessels have passed by, so far as naval warfare is concerned. Steam and mechanical appliances now do what was before done by wind and sail.

While Mr. Mill thinks navigation laws were economically

-that is, so far as increase of wealth is concerned-disadvantageous, yet he believes that they may have been "politically expedient." It is possible, for example, that retaliation by the United States and other countries against England early in this century brought about the remission of the English restrictions on foreign shipping. But it is quite another thing to say that such laws produced an ability to sail ships more cheaply. That the English navigation acts of 1651 built up English shipping is not supported by many proofs; whereas it is very distinctly shown that English shipping languished and suffered under them. Moreover, under the régime of steam and iron (which drew out England's peculiar advantages in iron and coal), in all its history English shipping never prospered more than it has since the abolition in 1849 of the navigation lawsevents which have taken place since Mr. Mill wrote.

The United States is still weighed down by navigation laws adapted to medieval conditions, and the relics of a time when retaliation was the cause of their enactment. So long as wooden vessels did the carrying-trade, the natural advantages of the United States gave us a proud position on the ocean. Now, however, when it is a question of cheaper iron, steel, and coal for vessels of iron and steel, we are at a possible disadvantage, and the bulk of navigation laws proposed in these days are intended to draw capital either by raising prices through duties on ships and materials, or by outright bounties and subsidies from industries in which we have advantages, to building ships. And until of late no distinction has been made between shipbuilding and ship-owning (or ship-sailing). Within the last year (1884) many burdens on ship-sailing have been removed; but even when we are permitted to sail ships on equal terms with foreigners, we can not yet build them with as small a cost as England (which is proved by the very demand of the builders of iron vessels for the retention of protective duties), and our laws do not as yet allow us to buy ships abroad and sail them under our own flag.'

With regard to subsistence, the plea of the Protectionists has been so often and so triumphantly met, that it requires little notice here. That country is the most steadily as well as the most abundantly supplied with food which draws its supplies from the largest surface. It is ridiculous to found a general system of policy on so improbable a danger as that of being at war with all the nations of the world at once; or to

1 See "Sketch of the History of Political Economy," supra, p. 6, note 1. For bibliography of the United States shipping question, see Appendix I.

suppose that, even if inferior at sea, a whole country could be blockaded like a town, or that the growers of food in other countries would not be as anxious not to lose an advantageous market as we should be not to be deprived of their

corn.

In countries in which the system of Protection is declining, but not yet wholly given up, such as the United States, a doctrine has come into notice which is a sort of compromise between free trade and restriction, namely, that protection for protection's sake is improper, but that there is nothing objectionable in having as much protection as may incidentally result from a tariff framed solely for revenue. Even in England regret is sometimes expressed that a "moderate fixed duty" was not preserved on corn, on account of the revenue it would yield. Independently, however, of the general impolicy of taxes on the necessaries of life, this doctrine overlooks the fact that revenue is received only on the quantity imported, but that the tax is paid on the entire quantity consumed. To make the public pay much, that the treasury may receive a little, is no eligible mode of obtaining a revenue. In the case of manufactured articles the doctrine involves a palpable inconsistency. The object of the duty as a means of revenue is inconsistent with its affording, even incidentally, any protection. It can only operate as protection in so far as it prevents importation, and to whatever degree it prevents importation it affords no revenue.

§ 4. The only case in which, on mere principles of political economy, protecting duties can be defensible, is when they are imposed temporarily (especially in a young and rising nation) in hopes of naturalizing a foreign industry, in itself perfectly suitable to the circumstances of the country. The superiority of one country over another in a branch of production often arises only from having begun it sooner. There may be no inherent advantage on one part, or disadvantage on the other, but only a present superiority of acquired skill and experience. A country which has this skill and experience yet to acquire may in other respects be better

adapted to the production than those which were earlier in the field; and, besides, it is a just remark of Mr. Rae that nothing has a greater tendency to promote improvements in any branch of production than its trial under a new set of conditions. But it can not be expected that individuals should, at their own risk, or rather to their certain loss, introduce a new manufacture, and bear the burden of carrying. it on, until the producers have been educated up to the level of those with whom the processes are traditional. A protecting duty, continued for a reasonable time, will sometimes be the least inconvenient mode in which the nation can tax itself for the support of such an experiment. But the protection should be confined to cases in which there is good ground of assurance that the industry which it fosters will after a time be able to dispense with it; nor should the domestic producers ever be allowed to expect that it will be continued to them beyond the time necessary for a fair trial of what they are capable of accomplishing.

The great difficulty with this proposal is that it introduces (what is inconsistent with Mr. Mill's general system) the Socialistic basis of state-help, instead of self-help. If industries will never support themselves, then, of course, it is a misappropriation of the property of its citizens whenever a government takes a slice by taxation from productive industries and gives it to a less productive one to make up its deficiencies. The only possible theory of protection to young industries is that, if protected for a season, the industries may soon grow strong and stand alone. Mr. Mill never contemplated anything else. But the difficulty is constantly met with, in putting this theory into practice, that the industry, once that it has learned to depend on the help of the state, never reaches a stage when it is willing to give up the assistance of the duties. Dependence on legislation begets a want of self-reliance, and destroys the stimulus to progress and good management. It is said: "There has never been an instance in the history of the country where the representatives of such industries, who have enjoyed protection for a long series of years, have been willing to submit to a reduction of the tariff, or have proposed it. But, on the contrary, their demands for still higher and higher duties are insatiable, and never intermitted." The question of fact, as

i

1 D. A. Wells, "Cobden Club Essays," second series, p. 533.

to whether or not the United States is indebted for its present manufacturing position to protection when our industries were young, seems to be capable of answer, and an answer which shows that protection was imposed generally after the industries got a foothold, and that very little assistance was derived from the duties on imports.'

The following explanation by Mr. Mill' of the meaning put upon his argument of protection to young industries by those who have applied it to the United States will be of no slight interest:

"The passage has been made use of to show the inapplicability of free trade to the United States, and for similar purpose in the Australian colonies, erroneously in my opinion, but certainly with more plausibility than can be the case in the United States, for Australia really is a new country whose capabilities for carrying on manufactures can not yet be said to have been tested; but the manufacturing parts of the United States-New England and Pennsylvania—are no longer new countries; they have carried on manufactures on a large scale, and with the benefit of high protecting duties, for at least two generations; their operatives have had full time to acquire the manufacturing skill in which those of England had preceded them; there has been ample experience to prove that the alleged inability of their manufactures to compete in the American market with those of Great Britain does not arise merely from the more recent date of their establishment, but from the fact that American labor and capital can, in the present circumstances of America, be employed with greater return, and greater advantage to the national wealth, in the production of other articles. I have never for a moment recommended or countenanced any protecting industry except for the purpose of enabling the protected branch of industry, in a very moderate time, to become independent of protection. That moderate time in the

1 See F. W. Taussig's "Protection to Young Industries as applied in the United States" (1883).

2 In a letter written February 26, 1866, to Mr. Horace White, published in the Chicago "Tribune," and reprinted in the New York "Nation," May 29, 1873.