TARIFF DUTIES AND CONSUMERS. 



of $34,009,435.78; for, during that period, we imported 401,386 

 tons of steel rails, the whole of which quantity was retained for 

 home consumption, at a total invoice value of $26,199,155.42, 

 equal to an average price of $65.27, gold, per ton, showing a sav- 

 ing in coin expenditure of $84.73 P er ton, or, in the aggregate, of 

 $7,810,280.36 in gold more than the entire foreign cost of all the 

 steel rails imported for our own use during the four years specified. 

 Even admitting, for the sake of argument, that the above estimate 

 involves an error of fifty or even of seventy-five per cent, too much, 

 which can not be the case, still the result establishes, to a remark- 

 able degree, the beneficial influences exerted by tariff legislation, 

 Protective in character, in reducing prices to American consumers. 

 It is evident, therefore, that the proposition of the Post leaves en- 

 tirely out of view some of the essential elements of the effect of 

 tariff taxes. 



We might adduce various other examples of similar force. Why, 

 we ask, are the instances of the cheapening of prices under Pro- 

 tective duties so very numerous, if they are merely exceptions to 

 a general rule? And why is it that instances of commodities 

 made dearer by Protective duties instances which should out- 

 number the others more than a hundred to one are not forth- 

 coming? If they constitute the body of the facts why are they 

 not put upon the witness stand and made to testify? We will 

 answer: because they exist nowhere except upon paper; because 

 they are merely speculative assumptions, not living realities. 

 Were they actual circumstances they would be offered in evidence 

 fast enough. 



When the Post says that ''Trade is always carried on for the 

 sake of the profits of it," and proceeds to reason upon the propo- 

 sition as if it embodied all the factors of the problem, that paper 

 misrepresents the facts and commits a grave error. Let us illus- 

 trate this point. W T hen farmer and miller are within easy reach of 

 each other, they divide between them, on some equitable plan, all 

 the flour made; but when considerable distance is interposed 

 between the two, a third person, the transporter in other words, 

 a middleman must be employed, who takes a share of the grain, 

 or the money price of that share, to compensate him for his ser- 

 vices in conveying the grain to the miller; and, again, a share of 

 the flour, or the equivalent of that share, to pay him for his time 



