THE AMERICAN TARIFF. 243 



Great Britain may though even this is unlikely have 

 increased since the tariff was established, in the same 

 degree in which it would have increased had free trade 

 continued. But the value to the Western farmer of the 

 price paid here for his produce has diminished at least 

 one-lxalf, simply because the price of manufactured 

 goods, of labour in short, the cost of living has 

 doubled in America, in consequence of the protective 

 tariff. This increase in the cost of living might be 

 taken as proving of itself the other point I have men- 

 tioned namely, the injury to America as a whole. 

 But there is a proof which may come home more 

 directly to a great commercial nation I mean the 

 diminution of American maritime commerce. Twenty 

 years ago, though Great Britain still stood before all 

 other nations as respected the number and tonnage of 

 vessels engaged in trade that is, though we still 

 possessed the largest share of the commerce of the 

 world the United States were rapidly gaining upon 

 us, and it was clear that before long they would take 

 the first place. Nor was this a matter to be regretted 

 by us, or to cause anxiety or alarm. We should have 

 gained almost as much as America herself by the 

 natural growth of her commercial marine. In a few 

 years, however, all this was altered. American mari- 

 time trade, instead of advancing more rapidly than 

 ours, actually and rapidly retrograded ; and though at 

 the present time she is slowly advancing, we are 

 advancing so much more rapidly that America is falling 

 more and more in the rear, to her loss, and only in a 



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