156 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



upon that A may be " protected." Nay, aggressionists would much 

 more truly describe the anti-free-traders than the euphemistic title 

 " protectionists " ; since, that one producer may gain, ten consumers 

 are fleeced. 



Now, just the like confusion of ideas, caused by looking at one face 

 only of the transaction, may be traced throughout all the legislation 

 which forcibly takes the property of this man for the purpose of giving 

 gratis benefits to that man. Habitually when one of the numerous 

 measures thus characterized is discussed, the dominant thought is 

 concerning the pitiable Jones who is to be protected against some evil, 

 while no thought is given to the hard-working Brown who is aggressed 

 upon, often much more to be pitied. Money is exacted (either directly 

 or through raised rent) from the huckster who only by extreme pinch- 

 ing can pay her way, from the mason thrown out of work by a strike, 

 from the mechanic whose savings are melting away during an illness, 

 from the widow who washes or sews from dawn to dark to feed her 

 fatherless little ones ; and all that the dissolute may be saved from 

 hunger, that the children of less impoverished neighbors may be edu- 

 cated, and that various people, mostly better off, may read newspapers 

 and novels for nothing ! The error of nomenclature is, in one respect, 

 more misleading than that which, as we see, allows aggressionists to 

 be called protectionists ; for, as just shown, protection of the vicious 

 poor involves aggression on the virtuous poor. Doubtless it is true 

 that the greater part of the money exacted comes from those who are 

 relatively well-off. But this is no consolation to the ill-off from whom 

 the rest is exacted. Nay, if the comparison be made between the 

 pressures borne by the two classes respectively, it becomes manifest 

 that the case is even worse than at first appears ; for, while to the well- 

 off the exaction means loss of luxuries, to the ill-off it means loss of 

 necessaries. 



And now see the Nemesis which is threatening to follow this 

 chronic sin of legislators. They and their class, in common with all 

 owners of property, are in danger of suffering from a sweeping appli- 

 cation of that general principle practically asserted by each of these 

 confiscating acts of Parliament. For what is the tacit assumption on 

 which such acts proceed ? It is the assumption that no man has any 

 claim to his property, not even to that which he has earned by the 

 sweat of his brow, save by permission of the community ; and that 

 the community may cancel the claim to any extent it thinks fit. No 

 defense can be made for this appropriation of A's possessions for the 

 benefit of B, save one which sets out with the postulate that society as 

 a whole has an absolute right over the possessions of each member. 

 And now this doctrine, which has been tacitly assumed, is being openly 

 proclaimed. Mr. George and his friends, Mr. Hyndman and his sup- 

 porters, are pushing the theory to its logical issue. They have been 

 instructed by examples, yearly increasing in number, that the indi- 



