200 AMERICAN FARMS. 



through tariff legislation for the protection of the farmer 

 cannot be met by the other classes through the indirect 

 benefits which protection is said to produce, how can the 

 farmer expect benefit through protection to the manufac- 

 turers ? Moreover, if nothing can be done by protecting 

 farm products and other natural products in the way of 

 bringing laborers into the country, or to keep them in 

 the country to raise such natural products, and thereby 

 create a home market for manufacturers, how is the 

 farmer to gain a benefit by protection to the manufac- 

 turers ? Prosperous farmers mean decidedly good home 

 markets for the blacksmith, shoemaker, carriage-builder, 

 the house-builder, brick-maker, the school teacher, the 

 clergyman, and the merchant. 



The protectionists are undoubtedly right in the admis- 

 sion that an extension of free trade in natural products 

 only, means an increase of protection to domestic manu- 

 factures. Free traders who contend to the contrary, are 

 of a very questionable class ; though, to use the words 

 of Bastiat, " there is in political economy no more gen- 

 erally accredited sophism than this." In serving as 

 argument in the hands of the pretended free-trade 

 school, says Bastiat, " its most mischievous tendencies 

 are called into action. For a good cause suffers much 

 less in being attacked than in being badly defended." 

 Yet, not only are the avowed protectionists willing for 

 this one-sided trade, but some of the most prominent 

 figures in the so-called free-trade party in Canada, as 

 well as in the United States, are advocates of such a 

 system. 



It certainly appears obvious enough, that an extension 

 of freedom as to the importation of raw materials and of 

 food necessaries, gives the manufacturer a new advan- 



