TARIFF REVISION 445 



on us in the same act, for the commodity we must send abroad to effect 

 the purchase. 



Perhaps the most important condition of prosperity, to manufac- 

 turing and all mercantile business, is " Peace among ourselves and with 

 all nations." There can be no reasonable doubt that continually sha- 

 ping our policy with a view to possible war has a tendency to provoke 

 war, among nations as among individual citizens; while the endeavor 

 to increase the interdependence of nations, as of citizens, is a potent 

 agency for peace. Free trade is thus a long step on the way t6ward 

 universal peace, and as such it accords with the interests of mercantile 

 business, as with the aspirations of all who believe in the Sermon on the 

 Mount. 



The question of the true interest of the manual laborer, too im- 

 portant to pass without a mention, is also too wide for adequate treat- 

 ment within the limits here permissible. All other considerations 

 might be banished from the problem, when once we convince ourselves 

 which way the interests of the toiling millions point. If their interests 

 demand a high protective rate of import duties, we might feel justified 

 in adopting that policy, however objectionable it appeared on other 

 grounds. But there is no real reason for separating the interests of 

 the manufacturing operatives from those of their employers, and every 

 business which would draw larger profits from cheaper raw materials 

 and greater sales of cheaper finished products, would be sure to have 

 more to pay its laboring men. As to the many times larger number of 

 laborers in occupations not protected, because not subject to foreign 

 competition or because able to meet it on its own ground by exjx>rting, 

 it is difficult to see anything but clear gain in the reduction of tariff 

 duties for them. The most important of such occupations is the agri- 

 cultural. Free trade is clearly to the advantage of the farmer, and 

 whatever helps him will help those he employs. Every workman, in 

 whatever calling, must be benefited by increasing the purchasing 

 power of his wages, and the demand for labor in general must be in- 

 creased by opening new markets abroad. 



Some people pretend to believe, and some others may really believe, 

 that free trade between countries having different wage-rates per day 

 will tend to equalize those daily rates ; but that is a fancy that finds no 

 support in the realm of fact. It might be so if a day's work were 

 everywhere under similar conditions and equally effective in produc- 

 tion; but that has never been the rule, and with the increase of ma- 

 chinery it is becoming less and less the rule. The great difference in 

 wage-scales prevailing in different sections of our union have estab- 

 lished themselves and grown wider in the face of complete free trade 

 throughout ; the higher wages paid in Great Britain, with lower average 

 cost of necessaries of life, as compared with all other countries of 

 Europe, accompany a policy of free trade, and have advanced with it; 



