Land Problems and National Welfare 



power was not foreseen by those who brought 

 in Free Trade in England; and, apart from every 

 other consideration, I believe that a measure 

 of Protection will be forced upon us simply to 

 safeguard the very existence of many of our 

 industries, and that it will be a case of only a 

 few years before this necessity is recognised by 

 Free Traders themselves. How much wiser 

 then to be beforehand in devising a policy to 

 meet the requirements of the times ! 



It is interesting to note that the highly pro- 

 tective tariffs which exist in Canada are 

 maintained by the Liberal and " Free Trade " 

 party, who have been in power for so many 

 years ; they, too, recognised that a protective 

 wall was the only way to safeguard Canadian 

 industries from American competition. 



Free Traders lose few opportunities of point- 

 ing out that whatever else Protection may do it 

 certainly increases the cost of living. 



This is too large a question to go into in detail, 

 but I will begin with the United States, because 

 I am actually in that country at the time that I 

 write these lines. 



The cost of living has gone up enormously, it 

 has increased at a greater rate than the wages of 

 the labouring man. But in this connection it 

 must be remembered that the average wage in 

 America provides and always has provided a 

 much larger margin over and above the living 



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