THE "CHEAP" LOAF CRY 143 



in the process deprived literally inillious of our unfortunate 

 countrymen of useful occupation, without securing to the 

 people even the single advantage of a cheap loaf, and the 

 people have, therefore, every justification and every right in 

 demanding from those who are responsible for this impasse 

 the restoration of the status quo ante. 



Simple Truths appeal to the People 



A demand of this nature, based as it is on the broad 

 principles of common sense, and fortified with irresistible 

 logic, must appeal to the vast masses of our fellow-country- 

 men, and that it does so is proved by the rapid progress of 

 Tariff-reform. 



Having placed our 4-lb. loaf side by side with similar loaves 

 from other countries, we find, in spite of all we have been told 

 to the contrary, by those who raised the clicai-) loaf cry, that it 

 is neither heavier, liggcr, nor cheaper than those made and sold 

 in countries which protect their trade by a multitude of 

 restrictive tariffs, and in which there is not a vestige of 

 what is fatuously called in our country " free-trade." 



Not a man in a hundred thousand was aware that the 

 Protected States of the world produced and sold their bread 

 as cheaply as we do ; not a man in ten thousand ever thought 

 of it at all. The general belief was that our loaf was really 

 cheap, a good deal cheaper than in other countries, and we 

 accepted this as a fact because we were told so by those who 

 professed to know. 



Europe was asked the price of bread on a certain day in 

 eight of her great capitals, and she replies — No Dearer than in 

 YOUR Own. 



The writer, for example, believed in much that Free- 

 traders said, and, among other things, he believed in cheap 

 bread as a result of Free-trade. He never put his beliefs to any 

 tests, nor did he regard unemployment, poverty, and rampant 

 pauperism as aught else than the natural results of human life. 

 He considered the social and economic conditions under which 

 the people lived as perfectly normal, and requiring no great 

 changes in our economic system ; and if a number of his fellow- 

 countrymen suffered from time to time, owing to bad trade or 

 other causes, well — it was regrettable but certainly unavoidable. 



The Danger of Implicit Beliefs 



Hundreds of thousands, nay, millions of our countrymen 

 believe in this, that, or the other, not because tliey have any 

 real, solid foundations for their belief; not because they have 



