THE FARMER AND AN EXTORT COUNTY. 315 



increased prosperity whicli they claim to be given by protec- 

 tion, by the increased home market for general agricultural 

 products, which they may, if they choose, produce. They say 

 that if the farmer deliberately continues to produce commodities 

 which he knows must be sold at competitive prices, instead of 

 other commodities for which protection provides a home 

 market, he must not blame protection for the consequences of 

 his fully, and that as u matter of fact he will not do so, but 

 that gradually, under a permanent system of rational protec- 

 tion, the agricultural industries would be directed to the pro- 

 duction of such commodities, including staples, as the increas- 

 ing manufacturing and trading population would require, and 

 that they would thus come to participate in the benefits of 

 protection as rapidly as other classes. Some of them say that, 

 while the attempt to conquer foreign markets by means of 

 bounties forms no part of the policy of protection, which is 

 confined to the assuring of tlie home market, yet they would 

 not seriously object to engrafting on the bounty system, were 

 there any possibility of accomplishing its object, but as there 

 is not, they decline to support it. 



It is plain that the argument of this class, like that of the 

 free traders, reopens the subject of protection and free trade, 

 already considered. 



The principle of giving aid to an industry by means of 

 a bounty on exports of its products finds no support from 

 any quarter entitled to respect for anything but its honesty. 

 American economists, if they allude to the subject at all, do so 

 only in the most cursory manner, nor has the discussion in 

 this country ever yet assumed proportions sufficient to draw 

 the attention of those most competent to engage in it.* In 

 some countries of Europe it is a question of national and 

 international importance, but the question di.scussed is not 

 that of imposing the bounty but of how to get rid of it. In 



* I should nuike one exception to this remark. Mr. David Lul)in, of Ciili- 

 fornia, the apostle of the export bounty in America, is a man of very keen 

 intellect. There is some internal evidence, however, that he entered upon this 

 propaganda without adequate previous study of the working of the export 

 bounty .system in other countries. 



