 Prefaces of Sophisms of the Protectionists A previous edition of this work has been published under the title of Essays on Political Economy by the late M. Friedrich Bastiat. When it became necessary to issue a second edition, the Free Trade League offered to buy the stereotype plates and the copyright with a view to the publication of the book on a large scale and at a very low price. The primary object of the League is to educate public opinion, to convince the people of the United States of the folly and wrongfulness of the protective system. The methods adopted by the League for this purpose have been the holding of public meetings and the publication of books, pamphlets, and tracks, some of which are for sale at the cost of publication and others given away gratuitously. In publishing this book, the League feels that it is offering the most effective and most popular work on political economy that has as yet been written. Am Bastiat not only enlivens a dull subject with his wit, but also reduces the propositions of the protectionists to absurdities. Free traders can do no better service than the cause of truth, justice, and humanity than by circulating this little book among their friends. It is offered you at what it costs to print it, but not every free trader put a copy of the book into the hands of his protectionist friends. It would not be proper to close this short preface without an expression on the part of the League of its obligation to the April translator of the work from the French, Mr. Horace White of Chicago. Office of the American Free Trade League, 9 Nassau Street, New York, June 1870 Preface to the first edition This compilation from the works of the late Am Bastiat is given to the public in the belief that the time has now come when the people relieved from the absorbing anxieties of the war and the subsequent strife on reconstruction are prepared to give a more earnest and thoughtful attention to economical questions than was possible during the previous ten years. That we have retrograded in economical science during this period while making great strides in moral and political advancement by the abolition of slavery and the enfranchisement of the freedmen seems to me incontestable. Professor Perry has described very concisely the steps taken by the manufacturers in 1861 after the southern members had left their seats in Congress to reverse the policy of the government in reference to foreign trade. He has noticed but has not laid so much stress as he might on the fact that while there was no considerable public opinion to favor them there was none at all to oppose them. Not only was the attention of the people diverted from the tariff by the dangers then impending, but the Republican Party, which then came into power, had in its national convention offered a bribe to the State of Pennsylvania for its vote in the presidential election, which bribe was set forth in the following words. Resolved. That while providing revenue for the support of the general government by duties upon imports, sound policies require such an adjustment of these imposts as to encourage the development of the industrial interests of the whole country. And we commend the policy of national exchanges which secures to the working men liberal wages, to agriculture, remunerative prices, to mechanics and manufacturers an adequate reward for their skill, labor and enterprise, and to the nation commercial prosperity and independence. Chicago Convention Platform 1860. It is true that this resolution did not commit anybody to the doctrine that the industrial interests of the whole country are promoted by taxes upon imported property, however adjusted. But it was understood by the Pennsylvanians at least, to be a promise that if the Republican Party were successful in the coming election, the doctrine of protection, which had been overthrown in 1846 and had been in an extremely languishing state ever since, should be put upon its legs again. I am far from asserting that this overture was needed to secure the vote of Pennsylvania for Mr. Lincoln in 1860, or that this state was governed by less worthy motives in her political action than other states. I only remarked that her delegates in the convention thought such a resolution would be extremely useful, and such was the anxiety to secure her vote in the election that a much stronger resolution might have been conceded if it had been required. I affirm, however, that there was no agitation on the tariff question in any other quarter. New England had united in passing the tariff of 1857, which lowered the duties imposed by the Act of 1846 about fifty percent, i.e. one half of the previously existing scale. The western states had not petitioned Congress or the convention to disturb the tariff, nor had New York done so, although Mr. Greenlee, then as now, was invoking more or less frequently the shade of Henry Clay to help re-establish what is deftly styled the American system. The protective policy was restored after its fifteen years' sleep under the auspices of Mr. Morrill, a representative, now a senator, from Vermont. Laterally I have noticed in the speeches and votes of this gentleman, who is, I think, one of the most conscientious, as he is one of the most amiable men in public life, of reluctance to follow to their logical conclusion the principles embodied in the Morrill tariff of 1861. His remarks upon the copper bill during the recent session of Congress indicate that, in his opinion, those branches of American industry which are engaged in producing articles sent abroad in exchange for the products of foreign nations are entitled to some consideration. This is an important admission, but not so important as another, which he made in his speech on the national finances, January 24, 1867, in which, referring to the banknote circulation existing in the year 1860, he said, and that was a year of as large production and as much general prosperity as any, perhaps, in our history. If the year immediately preceding the enactment of the Morrill tariff was a year of as large production and as much general prosperity as any in our history, of what use has the Morrill tariff been? We have seen that it was not demanded by any public agitation. We now see that it has been of no public utility. In combating by arguments and illustrations, adapted to the comprehension of the mass of mankind, the errors and soffisms with which protectionists deceive themselves and others, Ambastia is the most lucid and pointed of all writers on economical science with whose works I have any acquaintance. It is not necessary to accord to him a place among the architects of the science of political economy, although some of his admirers rank him among the highest. It is enough to count him among the greatest of its expounders and demonstrators. His death, which occurred at Pisa, Italy on the 24th December 1850 at the age of 49, was a serious loss to France and to the world. His works, though for the most part fragmentary, and given to the public from time to time through the columns of the journal d'economiste, the journal de debate, and the Libre Exchange, remain a monument of a noble intellect guided by a noble soul. They have been collected and published, including the Harmonies Economics, which the author left in manuscript, by Guillemin and Co. the proprietors of the journal d'economiste, in two editions of six volumes each, Octavo and Duodessimo. When we reflect that these six volumes were produced between April 1844 and December 1850 by a young man of feeble constitution who commenced life as a clerk in a mercantile establishment and who spent much of his time during these six years in delivering public lectures and laboring in the National Assembly, to which he was chosen in 1848, our admiration for such industry is only modified by the thought that if he had been more saving of his strength, he might have rendered even greater services to his country and to mankind. The Sophism Economic, which filled a large portion of this volume, were not expected by their author to outlast the fallacies which they sought to overthrow. But these fallacies have lived longer and have spread over more of the Earth's surface than any one, a priori, could have believed possible. It is sometimes useful in opposing doctrines which people have been taught to believe are peculiar to their own country and time to show that the same doctrines have been maintained in other countries and times and have been exploded in other languages. By what misuse of words the doctrine of protection came to be denominated the American system, I could never understand. It prevailed in England nearly two hundred years before our separation from the mother country. Adam Smith directed the first formidable attack against it in the very year that our independence was declared. It held its ground in England until it had starved and ruined almost every branch of industry, agriculture, manufacturers, and commerce alike. It was not wholly overthrown until 1846, the same year that witnessed its disconfiture in the United States, as already shown. It still exists in a subdued and declining way in France, despite the powerful and brilliant attacks of, say, Bastille and Chevalier, but its end cannot be far distant in that country. The Compte and Chevalier Treaty with England has been attended by consequences so totally it variants with the theories and prophecies of the protectionists that it must soon succumb. As these pages are going through the press, Antelogram announces that the French government has abolished the discriminating duties levied upon goods imported in foreign bottoms, and has asked our government to abolish the like discrimination which our laws have created. Commercial freedom is making rapid progress in Prussia, Austria, Italy, and even in Spain. The United States alone, among civilized nations, hold to the opposite principle. Our anomalous position in this respect is due, as I think, to our anomalous condition during the past eight or nine years already adverted to a condition in which the protected classes have been restrained by no public opinion, public opinion being too intensely preoccupied with the means of preserving the national existence to notice what was doing with the tariff. But evidences of a reawakening are not wanting. There is scarcely an argument current among the protectionists of the United States that was not current in France at the time Bastiat wrote the Sophism Economic, nor was there one current in his time that is not performing its bad office among us. Hence his demonstrations of their absurdity and falsity are equally applicable to our time and country as to his. They may have even greater force among us if they thoroughly dispel the notion that the protection is an American system. Surely they cannot do less than this. There are one or two arguments current among the protectionists of the United States that were not rife in France when Bastiat wrote his Sophism. It is said, for instance, that protection has failed to achieve all the good results expected from it because the policy of the government has been variable. If we could have a steady course of protection for a sufficient period of time, nobody being bold enough to say what time would be sufficient, and could be assured of having it, we should see wonderful progress. But inasmuch as the policy of the government is uncertain, protection has never yet had a fair trial. This is like saying, if the stone which I threw in the air had stayed there, my head would not have been broken by its fall. It would not stay there. The law of gravitation is committed against it staying there. Its only resting place is on the earth. They begin by violating natural laws and natural rights, the right to exchange services for services, and then complain because these natural laws war against them and finally overcome them. But it is not true that protection has not had a fair trial in the United States. The protection has been greater at some times than at others, that is all. Prior to the late war, all our revenue was raised from customs, and while the tariffs of 1846 and 1857 were designated free trade tariffs to distinguish them from those existing before and since, they were necessarily protective to a certain extent. Again, it is said that there is need of diversifying our industry, as though industry would not diversify itself sufficiently through the diverse tastes and predilections of individuals, as though it were necessary to supplement the work of the creator on this behalf by human enactments founded upon reciprocal repine. The only rational object of diversifying industry is to make people better and happier. Do men and women become better and happier by being huddled together in mills and factories, in a stifling atmosphere, on scanty wages, 10 hours each day, and 313 days each year? And then when cultivating our free infertile lands, do they have equal opportunities for mental and moral improvements? The trade unions tell us no. Whatever may be the experience of other countries where the land is either owned by absentee lords, who take all the product except what is necessary to give the tenant a bare subsistence, or where it is cut up in parcels not larger than an American garden patch, it is an undeniable fact that no other class of American workmen are so independent, so intelligent, so well provided with comforts and leisure, or so rapidly advancing in prosperity, as are agriculturalists. And this notwithstanding they are enormously overtaxed to maintain other branches of industry, which, according to the protective theory, cannot support themselves. The natural tendency of our people to flock to the cities, where their eyes and ears are gratified at the expense of their other senses, physical and moral, is efficiently marked not to need the influence of legislation to stimulate it. It is not the purpose of this preface to anticipate the admirable arguments of ambassadure, but there is another theory in vogue which deserves a moment's consideration. Mr. H. C. Kerry tells us that a country which exports its food in reality exports its soil, the foreign consumer not giving back to the land the fertilizing elements abstracted from it. Mr. Mill has answered this argument upon philosophical principles at some length, showing that whenever it ceases to be advantageous to America to export breadstuffs, she will cease to do so. Also, that when it becomes necessary to manure her lands, she will either import manure or make it at home. A shorter answer is that the lands are no better manure'd by having the bread consumed in Lowell, or Pittsburgh, or even in Chicago, than in Birmingham or Lyons. But it seems to me that Mr. Kerry does not take into account the fact that the total amount of breadstuffs exported from any country must be an exceedingly small fraction of the whole amount taken from the soil, and scarcely appreciable as a source of manure, even if it were practically utilized in that way. Thus our expectation of flour and meal, wheat and Indian corn, for the year 1860, as compared to the total crop produced, was as follows. Total crop, flour and meal, barrels. 55,217,800. Wheat, bushels. 173,104,924. Corn, bushels. 838,792,740. Exportation. Flour and meal, barrels. 2,845,305. Wheat, bushels. 4,155,153. Corn, bushels. 314,155. Percentage of exportation to total crop. 5,152,409. And this was the result for the year preceding the enactment of the Morale Tariff. It is true that our exports of wheat and Indian corn rose in the three years following the enactment of the Morale Tariff, from an average of 8 million bushels to an average of 46 million bushels. But this is contrary to the theory that high tariffs tend to keep breadstuffs at home and low ones to send them abroad. There is need of great caution in making generalizations as to the influence of tariffs on the movement of breadstuffs. For bad harvests in various countries, exercise an uncontrollable influence upon their movement, far beyond the reach of any legislation short of prohibition. The market for breadstuffs in the world is as the number of consumers, that is, of population. It is sometimes said in the way of reproach, and it is a curious travesty of Mr. Carey's manure argument, that foreign nations will not take our breadstuffs. It is not true, but if it were, that would not be a good reason for our passing laws to prevent them from doing so. That is, to deprive them of the means to pay for them. Every country must pay for its imports with its exports. It must pay for the services which it receives with the services which it renders. If foreign nations are not allowed to render services to us, how shall we render them the service of bread? The first series of Bastia's Sophisms were published in 1845, and the second series in 1848. The first series were translated in 1848 by Mrs. DJ McCord, and published the same year by GP Putnam, New York. Mrs. McCord's excellent translation has been followed by permission of her publisher who holds the copyright in this volume, having been first compared with the original in the Paris edition of 1863. A very few verbal alterations have been made, which however have no bearing on the accuracy and faithfulness of her work. The translation of the essay on Capital and Interest is from a duodesimal volume published in London a year or two ago, the name of the translator being unknown to me. The second series of the Sophisms, and the essay entitled, Spoilation and Law, are I believe presented in English for the first time in these pages. HW, Chicago, August 1st, 1869. End of Previces, recording by Katie Riley, March 2010. Section 1 of Sophisms of the Protectionists. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Sophisms of the Protectionists by Frederique Bastia, translated by Horace White. Section 1. Part 1. Sophisms of Protection. First Series. Introduction. My object in this little volume has been to refute some of the arguments usually advanced against free trade. I am not seeking a combat with the Protectionists. I merely advance a principle which I am anxious to present clearly to the minds of sincere men who hesitate because they doubt. I am not of the number of those who maintain that protection is supported by interests. I believe that it is founded upon errors, or if you will, upon incomplete truths. Too many fear-free trade for this apprehension to be other than sincere. My aspirations are perhaps high, but I confess that it would give me pleasure to hope that this little work might become, as it were, a manual for such men as may be called upon to decide between the two principles. When one has not made oneself perfectly familiar with the doctrines of free trade, the Sophisms of Protection perpetually return to the mind under one form or another, and on each occasion, in order to counteract their effect, it is necessary to enter into a long and laborious analysis. Few, at least of all legislators, have leisure for this labor, which I would, on this account, wish to present clearly drawn up to their hand. But it may be said, are the benefits of free trade so hidden as to be perceptible only to economists by profession? Yes, we confess it. Our adversaries in the discussion have a signal advantage over us. They can, in a few words, present an incomplete truth, which, for us to show that it is incomplete, renders necessary long and uninteresting dissertations. This results from the fact that protection accumulates upon a single point, the good which it affects, while the evil inflicted is infused throughout the mass. The one strikes the eye at a first glance, while the other becomes perceptible only to close investigation. With regard to free trade, precisely the reverse is the case. It is thus with almost all questions of political economy. If you say, for instance, there is a machine which has turned out of employment thirty workmen, or again, there is a spendthrift who encourages every kind of industry, or the conquest of Algiers has doubled the commerce of Marseille, or, once more, the public taxes support one hundred thousand families. You are understood at once. Your propositions are clear, simple and true in themselves. If you deduce from them the principle that machines are evil, that sumptuous extravagance, conquest and heavy imposts are blessings, your theory will have the more success, because you will be able to base it upon indisputable facts. But we, for our part, cannot stop at a cause and its immediate effect, for we know that this effect may in turn become itself a cause. To judge of a measure, it is necessary that we should follow it from step to step, from result to result, until through the successive links of the chain of events we arrive at the final effect. We must, in short, reason. But here we are assailed by clamorous exclamations. You are theorists, metaphysicians, ideologists, utopians, men of maxims, and immediately all the prejudices of the public are against us. What then shall we do? We must invoke the patience and candor of the reader, giving to our deductions, if we are capable of it, sufficient clearness to throw forward at once, without disguise or paliation, the true and the false, in order, once for all, to determine whether the victory should be for restriction or free trade. I wish here to make a remark of some importance. Some extracts from this volume have appeared in the journal The Economists. In an article otherwise quite complimentary, published by the Viscount d'Romene, c. Monetier industrial of the 15th and 18th of May 1845, he intimates that I ask for the suppression of custom houses. Mr. de Romene is mistaken. I ask for the suppression of the protective policy. We do not dispute the right of government to impose taxes, but would, if possible, dissuade producers from taxing one another. It was said by Napoleon that duties should never be a fiscal instrument, but a means of protecting industry. We plead the contrary, and say that duties should never be made an instrument of reciprocal repine, but that they may be employed as a useful fiscal machine. I am so far from asking for the suppression of duties that I look upon them as the anchor on which the future salvation of our finances will depend. I believe that they may bring immense receipts into the Treasury, and to give my entire and undisguised opinion, I am inclined, from the slow progress of healthy economical doctrines, and from the magnitude of our budget, to hope more for the cause of commercial reform from the necessities of the Treasury than from the force of an enlightened public opinion. 1. Abundance, Scarcity Which is the best for man or for society, abundance or scarcity? How, it may be exclaimed, can such a question be asked? Has it ever been pretended, is it possible to maintain, that scarcity can be the basis of a man's happiness? Yes, this has been maintained, this is daily maintained, and I do not hesitate to say that the scarcity theory is by far the most popular of the day. It furnishes the subject of discussions, in conversations, journals, books, courts of justice, and extraordinary as it may appear, it is certain that political economy will have fulfilled its task and its practical mission, when it shall have rendered common and irrefutable the simple proposition that, in abundance, consist man's riches. Do we not hear it said every day, foreign nations are inundating us with their productions? Then we fear abundance. Has not Mr. DeSaint Crick said, production is super abundant? Then he fears abundance. Do we not see workmen destroying and breaking machinery? They are frightened by the excess of production. In other words, they fear abundance. Has not Mr. Bugad said, let bread be dear and the agriculturalist will be rich? Now, bread can only be dear because it is scarce. Then Mr. Bugad lauded scarcity. Has not Mr. DeArgault produced the fruitfulness of the sugar culture as an argument against it? Has he not said, the beet cannot have a permanent and extended cultivation because a few acres given up to it in each department would furnish sufficient for the consumption of all France? Then, in his opinion, good consists in sterility and scarcity, evil in fertility and abundance. La Presse, lay commerce, and the majority of our journals are every day publishing articles whose aim is to prove to the chambers and to governments what a wise policy should seek to raise prices by tariffs. And do we not daily see these powers obeying these injunctions of the press? Now, tariffs can only raise prices by diminishing the quantity of goods offered for sale. Then, here we see newspapers, the legislature, the ministry, all guided by the scarcity theory, and I was correct in my statement that this theory is by far the most popular. How then has it happened that in the eyes at once of laborers, editors, and statesmen, abundance should appear alarming and scarcity advantageous? It is my intention to endeavor to show the origin of this delusion. A man becomes rich in proportion to the profitableness of his labor, that is to say, in proportion as he sells his productions at a high price. The price of his productions is high in proportion to their scarcity. It is plain then that, as far as regards him at least, scarcity enriches him. Applying successively this mode of reasoning to each class of laborers individually, the scarcity theory is deduced from it. To put this theory into practice, and in order to favor each class of labor, an artificial scarcity is forced in every kind of production, by prohibition, restriction, suppression of machinery, and other analogous measures. In the same manner it is observed that when an article is abundant, it brings a small price. The gains of the producer are, of course, less. If this is the case with all produce, all producers are then poor. Abundance then ruins society. And as any strong conviction will always seek to force itself into practice, we see, in many countries, the laws aiming to prevent abundance. This softism, stated in a general form, would produce but a slight impression. But when applied to any particular order of facts, to any particular article of industry, to any one class of labor, it is extremely specious, because it is a syllogism, which is not false, but incomplete. And what is true in a syllogism always necessarily presents itself to the mind, while the incomplete, which is a negative quality and unknown value, is easily forgotten in the calculation. Man produces in order to consume. He is at once producer and consumer. The argument given above considers him only under the first point of view. Let us look at him in the second character and the conclusion will be different. We may say, the consumer is rich in proportion as he buys at a low price. He buys at a low price in proportion to the abundance of the article in demand. Abundance then enriches him. This reasoning extended to all consumers must lead to the theory of abundance. It is the imperfectly understood notion of exchange of produce, which leads to these fallacies. If we consult our individual interest, we perceive immediately that it is double. As sellers, we are interested in high prices, consequently in scarcity. As buyers, our advantage is in cheapness, or what is the same thing, abundance. It is impossible then to found a proper system of reasoning upon either the one or the other of these separate interests before determining which of the two coincides and identifies itself with the general and permanent interests of mankind. If man were a solitary animal, working exclusively for himself, consuming the fruit of his own personal labor, if in a word he did not exchange his produce, the theory of scarcity could never have introduced itself into the world. It would be too strikingly evident that abundance, when so ever derived, is advantageous to him, whether this abundance might be the result of his own labor of ingenious tools or of powerful machinery, whether due to the fertility of the soil, to the liberality of nature, or to an inundation of foreign goods, such as the sea, bringing from distant regions, might cast upon his shores. Never would the solitary man have dreamed, in order to encourage his own labor, of destroying his instruments for facilitating his work, of neutralizing the fertility of the soil, or of casting back into the sea the produce of its bounty. He would understand that his labor was a means, not an end, and that it would be absurd to reject the object in order to encourage the means. He would understand that if he has required two hours per day to supply his necessities, anything which spares him an hour of this labor, leaving the result the same, gives him this hour to dispose of as he pleases in adding to his comforts. In a word he would understand that every step in the saving of labor is a step in the improvement of his condition. But traffic clouds our vision in the contemplation of this simple truth. In a state of society with the division of labor to which it leads, the production and consumption of an article no longer belong to the same individual. Each now looks upon his labor, not as a means, but as an end. The exchange of produce creates with regard to each object two separate interests, that of the producer and that of the consumer, and these two interests are always directly opposed to each other. It is essential to analyze and study the nature of each. Let us then suppose a producer of whatever kinds. What is his immediate interest? It consists in two things. First, that the smallest possible number of individuals should devote themselves to the business which he follows. And secondly, that the greatest possible number should seek the articles of his produce. In the more succinct terms of political economy, the supply should be small, the demand large, or yet in other words, limited competition, unlimited consumption. What on the other side is the immediate interest of the consumer? That the supply should be large, the demand small. As these two interests are immediately opposed to each other, it follows that if one coincides with the general interest of society, the other must be adverse to it. Which then, if either, should legislation favor as contributing most to the good of the community? To determine this question, it suffices to inquire in which the secret desires of the majority of men would be accomplished. In as much as we are producers, it must be confessed that we have each of us anti-social desires. Are we vine growers? It would not distress us or the frost to nip all the vines in the world except our own. This is the scarcity theory. Are we iron workers? We would desire, whatever might be the public need, that the market should offer no iron but our own. And precisely for the same reason that this need, painfully felt and imperfectly supplied, causes us to receive a high price for our iron. Again, here is the theory of scarcity. Are we agriculturalists? We say with Mr. Bugatt, let bread be dear, that is to say scarce, and our business goes well. Again, the theory of scarcity. Are we physicians? We cannot but see that certain physical ameliorations, such as the improved climate of the country, the development of certain moral virtues, the progress of knowledge pushed to the extent of enabling each individual to take care of his own health, the discovery of certain simple remedies, easily applied, would be so many fatal blows to our profession. As physicians, then, our secret desires are antisocial. I must not be understood to imply that physicians allow themselves to form such desires. I am happy to believe that they would hail with joy a universal panacea. But in such a sentiment, it is the man, the Christian, who manifests himself, and who, by a praiseworthy abnegation of self, takes that point of view of the question which belongs to the consumer. As a physician exercising his profession, and gaining from this profession his standing in society, his comforts, even the means of existence of his family, it is impossible but that his desires, or if you please so to word it, his interests, should be antisocial. Are we manufacturers of cotton goods? We desire to sell them at the price, most advantageous to ourselves. We would willingly consent to the suppression of all rival manufacturers. And if we dare not publicly express this desire, or pursue the complete realization of it with some success, we do so, at least to a certain extent, by indirect means, as, for example, the exclusion of foreign goods in order to diminish the quantity offered, and to produce, thus, by forcible means, and for our own profits, a scarcity of clothing. We might thus pass in review every business and every profession, and should always find that the producers, in their character of producers, have invariably antisocial interests. The shopkeeper, says Montang, succeeds in his business through the extravagance of youth, the laborer by the high price of grain, the architect by the decay of houses, officers of justice by lawsuits and quarrels, the standing in occupation, even of ministers of religion, are drawn from our death and our vices. No physician takes pleasure in the health even of his friends, no soldier in the peace of his country, and so on with all. If then the secret desires of each producer were realized, the world would rapidly retrograde towards barbarism. The sale would prescribe steam, the ore would prescribe the sale, only in its turn to give way to wagons, the wagon to the mule, and the mule to the foot-peddler. Wool would exclude cotton, cotton would exclude wool, and thus on, until the scarcity and want of everything would cause man himself to disappear from the face of the globe. If we now go on to consider the immediate interest of the consumer, we shall find it in perfect harmony with the public interest, and with the well-being of humanity. When the buyer presents himself in the market, he desires to find it abundantly furnished. He sees with pleasure, propitious seasons for harvesting, wonderful inventions putting within his reach the largest possible quantity of produce, time and labor saved, distances of faced, the spirit of peace and justice diminishing the weight of taxes, every barrier to improvement cast down, and in all this his interest runs parallel with an enlightened public interest. He may push his secret desires to an absurd and chimerical height, but never can they cease to be humanizing in their tendency. He may desire that food and clothing, house and hearth, instruction and morality, security and peace, strength and health, should come to us without limit and without labor or effort on our part, as the water of the stream, the air which we breathe, and the sunbeams in which we bask. But never could the realization of his most extravagant wishes run counter to the good of society. It may be said, perhaps, that, were these desires granted, the labor of the producer, constantly checked, would end by being entirely arrested for want of support. But why? Because in this extreme supposition, every imaginable need and desire would be completely satisfied. Man, like the all-powerful, would create by the single act of his will. How, in such a hypothesis, could laborious production be regretted? Imagine a legislative assembly composed of producers, of whom each member should cause to pass into a law, his secret desire as a producer. The code which would emanate from such an assembly could be nothing but systematized monopoly, the scarcity theory put into practice. In the same manner, an assembly in which each member should consult only his immediate interest of consumer, would aim at the systematizing of free trade, the suppression of every restrictive measure, the destruction of artificial barriers, in a word would realize the theory of abundance. It follows, then, that to consult exclusively the immediate interest of the producer is to consult an antisocial interest. To take exclusively for basis the interest of the consumer is to take for basis the general interest. Let me be permitted to insist once more upon this point of view, though at the risk of repetition. A radical antagonism exists between the seller and the buyer. The former wishes the article offered to be scarce, supply small, and data high price. The latter wishes it abundant, supply large, and data low price. The laws, which should at least remain neutral, take part for the seller against the buyer, for the producer against the consumer, for high against low prices, for scarcity against abundance. They act, if not intentionally, at least logically, upon the principle that a nation is rich in proportion as it is in want of everything. For, say they, it is necessary to favor the producer by securing him a profitable disposal of his goods. To effect this, their price must be raised. To raise the price the supply must be diminished, and to diminish the supply is to create scarcity. Let us suppose that at this moment, with these laws in full action, a complete inventory should be made, not by value, but by weight, measure, and quantity. Of all articles, now in France, calculated to supply the necessities and pleasures of its inhabitants, as grain, meat, woolen and cotton goods, fuel, etc. Let us suppose again that tomorrow, every barrier to the introduction of foreign goods, should be removed. Then, to judge of the effect of such a reform, let a new inventory be made three months hence. Is it not certain that at the time of the second inventory, the quantity of grain, cattle, goods, iron, coal, sugar, etc., will be greater than at the first? So true is this, that the sole object of our protective tariffs is to prevent such articles from reaching us, to diminish the supply, to prevent low prices, or which is the same thing, the abundance of goods. Now I ask, are the people under the action of these laws better fed, because there is less bread, less meat, and less sugar in the country? Are they better dressed, because there are fewer goods? Better warmed, because there is less coal? Or do they prosper better in their labor, because iron, copper, tools and machinery are scarce? But, it is answered, if we are inundated with foreign goods and produce, our coin will leave the country. Well, and what matters that? Man is not fed with coin, he does not dress in gold, nor warm himself with silver. What difference does it make, whether there be more or less coin in the country, provided there be more bread in the cupboard, more meat in the larger, more clothing in the press, and more wood in the cellar? Two restrictive laws, I offer this dilemma. Either you allow that you produce scarcity, or you do not allow it. If you allow it, you confess at once, that your end is to injure the people as much as possible. If you do not allow it, then you deny your power to diminish the supply, to raise the price, and consequently, you deny having favored the producer. You are either injurious or inefficient. You can never be useful. End of Section 1, Recording by Katie Riley, March 2010 Section 2 of Sophisms of the Protectionists This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Sophisms of the Protectionists by Frédéric Bastia, translated by Horace White. Section 2 2. Obstacle Cause The obstacle mistaken for the cause. Scarcity mistaken for abundance. The Sophism is the same. It is well to study it under every aspect. Man naturally is in a state of entire destitution. Between the states and the satisfying of his wants, there exists a multitude of obstacles, which it is the object of labor to surmount. It is interesting to seek how and why he could have been led to look even upon these obstacles to his happiness as the cause of it. I wish to take a journey of some hundred miles, but between the point of my departure and my destination, there are interposed mountains, rivers, swamps, forests, robbers, in a word, obstacles. And to conquer these obstacles, it is necessary that I should be so much labor and great efforts in opposing them, or, what is the same thing, if others do it for me, I must pay them the value of their exertions. It is evident that I should have been better off had these obstacles never existed. Through the journey of life in the long series of days from the cradle to the tomb, man has many difficulties to oppose him in his progress. Hunger, thirst, sickness, heat, cold, are so many obstacles scattered along his road. In a state of isolation he would be obliged to combat them all by hunting, fishing, agriculture, spinning, weaving, architecture, etc. And it is very evident that it would be better for him that these difficulties should exist to a less degree, or even not at all. In a state of society he is not obliged, personally, to struggle with each of these obstacles, but others do it for him, and he, in return, must remove some one of them for the benefit of his fellow men. Again it is evident that, considering mankind as a whole, it would be better for society that these obstacles should be as weak and as few as possible. But if we examine closely and in detail the phenomena of society and the private interests of men as modified by exchange of produce, we perceive, without difficulty, how it has happened that once have been confounded with riches and the obstacle with the cause. The separation of occupations, which results from the habits of exchange, causes each man, instead of struggling against all surrounding obstacles, to combat only one, the effort being made not for himself alone, but for the benefits of his fellows, who, in their turn, render a similar service to him. Now it hence results that this man looks upon the obstacle which he has made it his profession to combat for the benefit of others as the immediate cause of his riches. The greater, the more serious, the more stringent may be this obstacle, the more he is remunerated for the conquering of it by those who are relieved by his labors. A physician, for instance, does not busy himself in baking his bread or in manufacturing his clothing and his instruments. Others do it for him, and he, in return, combats the maladies with which his patients are afflicted. The more dangerous and frequent these maladies are, the more others are willing, the more, even, are they forced, to work in his service. Disease, then, which is an obstacle to the happiness of mankind, becomes to him the source of his comforts. The reasoning of all producers is, in what concerns themselves, the same. As the doctor draws his profits from disease, so does the shipowner from the obstacle called distance, the agriculturalist from that named hunger, the cloth manufacturer from cold, the schoolmaster lives upon ignorance, the jeweler upon vanity, the lawyer upon quarrels, the notary upon breach of faith. Each profession has, then, an immediate interest in the continuation, even the extension, of the particular obstacle to which its attention has been directed. Theorists, hence, go on to found a system upon these individual interests, and say, Once are riches. Labour is riches. The obstacle to well-being is well-being. To multiply obstacles is to give food to industry. Then comes the statesmen, and as the developing and propagating of obstacles is the developing and propagating of riches, what more natural than that, he should bend his efforts to that point. He says, for instance, if we prevent a large importation of iron, we create a difficulty in procuring it. This obstacle, severely felt, obliges individuals to pay in order to relieve themselves from it. A certain number of our citizens, giving themselves up to the combating of this obstacle, will thereby make their fortunes. In proportion to, as the obstacle is great, and the mineral scarce, inaccessible, and of difficult and distant transportation, in the same proportion will be the number of labourers maintained by the various branches of this industry. The same reasoning will lead to the suppression of machinery. Here are men who are at a loss how to dispose of their wine harvest. This is an obstacle which other men set about removing for them by the manufacture of casks. It is fortunate, say our statesmen, that this obstacle exists, since it occupies a portion of the labour of the nation and enriches a certain number of our citizens. But here is presented to us an ingenious machine, which cuts down the oak, squares it, makes it into staves, and, gathering these together, forms them into casks. The obstacle is thus diminished, and with it the profits of the coopers. We must prevent this. Let us prescribe the machine. To sift thoroughly this softism, it is sufficient to remember that human labour is not an end, but a means. It is never without employment. If one obstacle is removed, it seizes another, and mankind is delivered from two obstacles by the same effort which was at first necessary for one. If the labour of coopers becomes useless, it must take another direction. But, with what, it may be asked, will they be remunerated? Precisely with what they are at present remunerated. For if a certain quantity of labour becomes free from its original occupation, to be otherwise disposed of, a corresponding quantity of wages must thus also become free. To maintain that human labour can end by wanting employment, it would be necessary to prove that mankind will cease to encounter obstacles. In such a case, labour would not only be impossible, it would be superfluous. We should have nothing to do, because we should be all-powerful, and our fiat, alone, would satisfy at once, our wants and our desires. We have seen that between our wants and their gratification, many obstacles are interposed. We conquer or weaken these by the employment of our faculties. It may be said, in general terms, that industry is an effort followed by a result. But by what do we measure our well-being? By the result of our effort, or by the effort itself. There exists always a proportion between the effort employed and the result obtained. Does progress consist in the relative increase of the second, or of the first, term of this proportion? Both proportions have been sustained, and in political economy, opinions are divided between them. According to the first system, riches are the result of labour. They increase in the same ratio as the result does to the effort. Absolute perfection, of which God is the type, consists in the infinite distance between these two terms in this relation, vis, effort, none, result, infinite. The second system maintains that it is the effort itself which forms the measure of, and constitutes, our riches. Progression is the increase of the proportion of the effort to the result. Its ideal extreme may be represented by the eternal and fruitless efforts of societies. The first system tends naturally to the encouragement of everything which diminishes difficulties and arguments production, as powerful machinery which adds to the strength of man, the exchange of produce which allows us to profit by the various natural agents distributed in different degrees over the service of our globe, the intellect which discovers, experience which proves, and emulation which excites. The second test logically inclines to everything which can augment the difficulty and diminish the product, as privileges, monopolies, restrictions, prohibitions, suppression of machinery, sterility, etc. It is well to remark here that the universal practice of man is always guided by the principle of the first system. Every workman, whether agriculturalist, manufacturer, merchant, soldier, writer, or philosopher, devotes the strength of his intellect to do better, to do more quickly, more economically, in a word, to do more with less. The opposite doctrine is in use with legislators, editors, statesmen, men whose business is to make experiments upon society, and even of these we may observe that in what personally concerns themselves, they act like everybody else upon the principle of obtaining from their labor the greatest possible quantity of useful results. It may be supposed that I exaggerate, and that there are no true, societalists. I grant that in practice the principle is not pushed to its extremist consequences, and this must always be the case when one starts upon a wrong principle, because the absurd and injurious results to which it leads cannot but check it in its progress. For this reason practical industry can never admit of societalism. The error is too quickly followed by its punishment to remain concealed. But in the speculative industry of theorists and statesmen, a false principle may be for a long time followed up. Before the complication of its consequences only half understood can prove its falsity, and even when all is revealed the opposite principle is acted upon, self is contradicted, and justification sought in the incomparably absurd modern axiom that in political economy there is no principle universally true. Let us see then if the two opposite principles I have laid down do not predominate each in its turn, the one in practical industry, the other in industrial legislation. I have already quoted some words of Mr. Bugard, but we must look on Mr. Bugard in two separate characters, the agriculturalist and the legislator. As agriculturalist Mr. Bugard makes every effort to attain the double object of sparing labor and obtaining bread cheap. When he prefers a good plow to a bad one, when he improves the quality of his manure, when to loosen his soil he substitutes as much as possible the action of the atmosphere for that of the hoe or the hero, when he calls to his aid every improvement that science and experience have revealed, he has and can have but one object, vis to diminish the proportion of the effort to the result. We have intended no other means of judging of the success of an agriculturalist or of the merits of his system, but by observing how far he has succeeded in lessening the one while he increases the other. And as all the farmers in the world act upon this principle, we may say that all mankind are seeking, no doubt for their own advantage, to obtain at the lowest price, bread, or whatever other article of produce they may need, always diminishing the effort necessary for obtaining any given quantity thereof. This incontestable tendency of human nature, once proved, would, one might suppose, be sufficient to point out the true principle to the legislator and to show him how he ought to assist industry, if indeed it is any part of his business to assist it at all, for it would be absurd to say that the laws of man should operate in an inverse ratio from those of Providence. Yet we have heard Mr. Bugatt in his character of legislator exclaim, I do not understand this theory of cheapness, I would rather see bread dear and work more abundant. And consequently, the deputy from Dordon votes in favour of legislative measures whose effect is to shackle and impede commerce. Precisely because by so doing, we are prevented from procuring by exchange and at low price, what direct production can only furnish more expensively. Now it is very evident that the system of Mr. Bugatt, the deputy, is directly opposed to that of Mr. Bugatt the agriculturalist. Were he consistent with himself, he would as legislator vote against all restriction, or else as farmer, he would practice in his fields the same principle which he proclaimed in the public councils. We should then see him sowing his grain in his most sterile fields, because he would thus succeed in laboring much to obtain little. We should see him forbidding the use of the plow, because he could, by scratching up the soil with his nails, fully gratify his double wish of dear bread and abundant labour. Restriction has for its avowed object and acknowledged effect the augmentation of labour. And again, equally avowed and acknowledged, its object and effect are the increase of prices, a synonymous term for scarcity of produce. Pushed then to its greatest extreme, it is pure socyfism as we have defined it. Labour-infinite result nothing. Baron Charles Dupin, who was looked upon as the oracle of the peerage in the science of political economy, accuses railroads of injuring shipping. And it is certainly true that the most perfect means of attaining an object must always limit the use of a less perfect means. But railways can only injure shipping by drawing from it articles of transportation. This they can only do by transporting more cheaply, and they can only transport more cheaply by diminishing the proportion of the effort employed to the result obtained. For it is in this that cheapness consists. When, therefore, Baron Dupin laments the suppression of labour in attaining a given result, he maintains the doctrine of socyfism. Logically, if he prefers the vessel to the railway, he should also prefer the wagon to the vessel, the pack saddle to the wagon, and the wallet to the pack saddle. For this is, of all known means of transportation, the one which requires the greatest amount of labour in proportion to the result obtained. Labour constitutes the riches of the people, said Mr. DeSaint Crick, a minister who has laid not a few shackles upon our commerce. This was no elliptical expression, meaning that the results of labour constitute the riches of the people. No, this statesman intended to say that it is the intensity of labour, which measures riches. And the proof of this is, that from step to step, from restriction to restriction, he forced on France, and in so doing believed that he was doing well, to give to the procuring of, for instance, a certain quantity of iron, double the necessary labour. In England's iron was then at eight francs. In France it cost sixteen. Supposing the day's work to be worth one franc, it is evident that France could, by barter, procure a quintal of iron, by eight days labour, taken from the labour of the nation. Thanks to the restrictive measures of Mr. DeSaint Crick, sixteen days' work were necessary to procure it, by direct production. Here then we have, double labour for an identical result, therefore double riches. And riches, measured not by the result, but by the intensity of labour, is not this pure and unadulterated societalism. That there may be nothing equivocal, the minister carries his idea still farther, and on the same principle that we have heard him call the intensity of labour, riches, we will find him calling the abundant result of labour, and the plenty of everything proper to the satisfying of our wants, poverty. Everywhere, he remarks, machinery has pushed aside manual labour. Everywhere production is super abundant. Everywhere the equilibrium is destroyed between the power of production and that of consumption. Here then we see that, according to Mr. DeSaint Crick, if France was in a critical situation, it was because her productions were too abundant. There was too much intelligence, too much efficiency international labour. We were too well fed, too well clothed, too well supplied with everything. The rapid production was more than sufficient for our wants. It was necessary to put an end to this calamity, and therefore it became needful to force us, by restrictions, to work more in order to produce less. I also touched upon an opinion expressed by another minister of commerce, Mr. Diargo, who is worthy of being a little more closely looked into. Wishing to give a death blow to the beat, he said, the culture of the beat is undoubtedly useful, but this usefulness is limited. It is not capable of the prodigious developments which have been predicted of it. To be convinced of this, it is enough to remark that the cultivation of it must necessarily be confined within the limits of consumption. Double, triple if you will, the present consumption of France, and you will still find that a very small portion of her soil will suffice for this consumption. Truly a most singular cause of complaint. Do you wish the proof of this? How many hecticers were planted in beats in the year 1828? 3,130, which is one 10,540th of our cultivable soil. How many are there at this time when our domestic sugar supplies one third of the consumption of the country? 16,700 hecticers, or one 1,978th of the cultivable soil or 45 centiers for each commune. Suppose that our domestic sugar should monopolize the supply of the whole consumption. We still would have but 48,000 hecticers or one 689th of our cultivable soil in beats. There are two things to consider in this quotation. The facts and the doctrine. The facts go to prove that very little soil, capital and labor would be necessary for the production of a large quantity of sugar and each commune of France would be abundantly provided with it by giving up one hecticer to its cultivation. The peculiarity of the doctrine consists in the looking upon this facility of production as an unfortunate circumstance and the regarding the very fruitfulness of this new branch of industry as a limitation to its usefulness. It is not my purpose here to constitute myself the defender of the beat or the judge of the singular facts stated by Mr. Diarcho but it is worth the trouble of examining into the doctrines of a statesman to whose judgment France for a long time confided the fate of her agriculture and her commerce. I began by saying that a variable proportion exists in all industrial pursuits between the effort and the result. Absolute imperfection consists in an infinite effort absolute perfection in an unlimited result without any effort and perfectibility in the progressive diminution of the effort compared with the result. But Mr. Diarcho tells us that where we looked for life we shall find only death the importance of any object of industry is according to him in direct proportion to its feebleness what for instance do you expect from the beat do you not see that 48,000 hecticers of land with capital and labour in proportion will suffice to furnish sugar to all France it is then an object of limited usefulness limited be it understood in the work which it calls for and this is the sole measure according to our minister of the usefulness of any pursuit this usefulness would be if thanks to the fertility of the soil or the richness of the beat 24,000 hecticers would serve instead of 48,000 if there were only needed 20 times 100 times more soil more capital more labour to attain the same result oh then some hopes might be founded upon this article of industry it would be worthy of the protection of the state of international labour but to produce much with little is a bad example and the laws ought to set things to rights what is true with regard to sugar cannot be false with regard to bread if therefore the usefulness of an object of industry is to be calculated not only by the comforts which it can furnish with a certain quantum of labour but on the contrary in order to furnish a certain quantity of comforts it is evident that we ought to desire that every acre of land should produce little corn that each grain of corn should furnish little nutriments in other words that our territory should be sterile enough to require a considerably larger proportion of soil capital and labour to nourish its population the demand for human labour could not fail to be then truly with the wishes of Messers Bugaud, St. Crick, Dupin and Diargo be satisfied bread would be dear work abundant and France would be rich rich according to the understanding of these gentlemen all that we could have further to hope for would be that human intellect might sink and become extinct for while intellect exists it can but see continually of the end to the means of the product to the labour indeed it is this continuous effort and in this alone that intellect consists Cicyphism has then been the doctrine of all those who have been entrusted with a regulation of the industry of our country it would not be just to reproach them with this for this principle becomes that of our ministry only because it prevails in the chambers only because it is sent there by the electoral body and the electoral body is imbued with it only because public opinion is filled with it to repletion let me repeat here that I do not accuse such men as Messers Dugaud, Dupin, St. Crick and Diargo of being absolutely and always Cicyphists very certainly they are very certainly each one of them will procure for himself by barter what by direct production would be attainable only at a higher price but I maintain that they are Cicyphists when they prevent the country from acting upon the same principle end of section 2 recording by Katie Riley April 2010 section 3 of Sophism's of the protectionists this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Sophism's of the protectionists by Frédéric Bastia translated by Horace White section 3 4 equalizing of the facilities of production it is said but for fear of being accused of manufacturing Sophism's for the mouths of the protectionists I will allow one of their most able reasoners to speak for himself it is our belief that protection should correspond to should be the representation of the difference which exists between the price of an article of home production and a similar article of foreign production a protecting duty calculated upon such a basis does nothing more than secure free competition free competition can only exist where there is an equality in the facilities of production in a horse race the load which each horse carries is weighed and all advantages equalized otherwise there could be no competition in commerce if one producer can undersell all others he ceases to be a competitor and becomes a monopolist suppress the protection which represents the difference of price according to each and foreign productions must immediately inundate and obtain the monopoly of our market every one ought to wish for his own sake and for that of the community that the productions of the country should be protected against foreign competition whenever the latter may be able to undersell the former this argument is constantly recurring in all writings of the protectionist school it is my intention to make a careful investigation of its merits and I must begin by soliciting the attention and the patience of the reader I will first examine into the inequalities which depend upon natural causes and afterwards into theirs which are caused by diversity of taxes here as elsewhere we find the theorists of protection taking part with the producer let us consider the case of the unfortunate consumer who seems to have entirely escaped their attention they compare the field of production to the turf but on the turf the race is at once a means and an end the public has no interest in the struggle independent of the struggle itself when your horses are started as a runner nothing is more natural than that their burdens should be equalized but if your object were to send an important and critical piece of intelligence could you without incongruity place obstacles to the speed of that one whose fleetness would secure the best means of attaining your end and yet this is your course in relation to industry you forget the end aimed at of the community but we cannot lead our opponents to look at things from our point of view let us now take theirs let us examine the question as producers I will seek to prove one that equalizing the facilities of production is to attack the foundations of all trade two that it is not true that the labor of one country is the competition of more favored climates three that even were this the case protective duties cannot equalize the facilities of production four that freedom of trade equalizes these conditions as much as possible and five that the countries which are the least favored by nature are those which profit most by freedom of trade equalizing of the facilities of production is not only the shackling of certain articles of commerce but it is the attacking of the system of mutual exchange in its very foundation principle for this system is based precisely upon the very diversities or if the expression be preferred upon the inequalities of fertility climate temperature capabilities which the protectionists seek to render null if Gen sends its wines to Brittany and Brittany sends corn to Guy it is because these two provinces are from different circumstances induced to turn their attention to the production of different articles is there any other rule for international exchanges again to bring against such exchanges the very inequalities of condition which excite and explain them is to attack them in their very cause of being the protective system closely followed up would bring men to live like snails in a state of complete isolation in short there is not one of its softisms which if carried through by vigorous deductions would not end in destruction and annihilation two it is not true that the unequal facility of production in two similar branches of industry should necessarily cause the destruction of the one which is the least fortunate on the turf if one horse gains the prize the other loses it but when two horses work to produce any useful article each produces in proportion to his strength and because the stronger is the more useful it does not follow that the weaker is good for nothing wheat is cultivated in every department of France although there are great differences of fertility existing among them if it happens that there be one which does not cultivate it it is because even to itself such cultivation is not useful analogy will show us that under the influence of an unchackled trade notwithstanding similar differences wheat would be produced in every kingdom of Europe and if any one were induced to abandon entirely the cultivation of it this would only be because it would be her interest to employ otherwise her lands her capital and her labor and why does not the fertility of one department paralyze the agriculture of a neighboring and less favored one because the phenomena of political economy have a suppleness and elasticity and so to speak a self leveling power which seems to escape the attention and use us of being theorists but it is themselves who are theorists to a supreme degree if being theoretic consists in building up systems upon the experience of a single fact instead of profiting by the experience of a series of facts in the above example it is the difference in the value of lands which compensates for the difference in their fertility your field produces three times as much as mine and therefore I can still compete with you this is the soul mystery and observe how the advantage on one point leads to disadvantage on the other precisely because your soil is more fruitful it is more dear it is not accidentally but necessarily that the equilibrium is established or at least inclines to establish itself and can it be denied that perfect freedom in exchange is of all the systems the one which favors this tendency I have cited an agricultural example I might as easily have taken one from any trade there are tailors at Quimper but that does not prevent tailors from being in Paris also although the latter may have to pay a much higher rent as well as higher price for furniture, workmen and food but their customers are sufficiently numerous not only to reestablish the balance but also to make it lean on their side when therefore the question is about equalizing the advantages of labor it would be well to consider whether the natural freedom of exchange is not the best umpire this self-leveling faculty of political phenomena is so important and at the same time so well calculated to cause us to admire the providential wisdom which presides over the equalizing government of society that I must ask permission a little longer to turn to it the attention of the reader the protectionists say such a nation has the advantage over us in being able to produce cheaply coal, iron, machinery, capital it is impossible for us to compete with it we must examine the proposition under other aspects for the presence I stop at the question whether when an advantage and a disadvantage are placed in juxtaposition they do not bear in themselves the former a descending the latter an ascending power which must end by placing them in a just equilibrium let us suppose the countries A and B A has every advantage over B you then conclude that labor will be concentrated upon A while B must be abandoned A you say sells much more than it buys B buys more than it sells I might dispute this but I will meet you upon your end ground in the hypothesis labor being in great demand in A soon rises in value while labor iron, coal, lands, food, capital all being little sold after in B soon fall in price again A being always selling and B always buying cash passes from B to A it is abundant in A very scarce in B but where there is abundance of cash it follows that in all purchases a large proportion of it will be needed then in A real dearness which proceeds from a very active demand is added to nominal dearness the consequence of a super abundance of the precious metals scarcity of money implies that little is necessary for each purchase then in B A nominal cheapness is combined with real cheapness under these circumstances industry will have the strongest possible motives for deserting A to establish itself in B now to return to what would be the true course of things as the progress of such events is always gradual industry from its nature being opposed to certain transits let us suppose that without waiting the extreme point it will have gradually divided itself between A and B according to the laws of supply and demand that is to say according to the laws of justice and usefulness we do not advance an empty hypothesis when I say that were it possible that industry should concentrate itself upon a single point their must from its nature arise spontaneously and in its midst an irresistible power of decentralization we will quote the words of a manufacturer to the chamber of commerce at Manchester the figures brought into his demonstration are suppressed formerly we exported goods this exportation gave way to that of thread for the manufacture of goods later instead of thread we exported machinery for the making of thread then capital for the construction of machinery and lastly workmen and talons which are the source of capital all these elements of labor have one after the other transferred themselves to other points where their profits were increased and where the means of subsistence being less difficult to obtain life is maintained at a less cost there are present to be seen in pressure Austria Saxony Switzerland and Italy immense manufacturing establishments founded entirely by English capital worked by English labor and directed by English talent we may perceive here that nature or rather providence with more wisdom and foresight than the narrow rigid system of the protectionist can suppose does not permit the concentration of labor the monopoly of advantages from which they draw their arguments as from an absolute and irremediable fact it has by means as simple as they are infallible provided for dispersion diffusion mutual dependence and simultaneous progress all of which your restrictive laws as much as in their power by their tendency towards the isolation of nations by this means they render much more decided the differences existing in the conditions of production they check the self-leveling power of industry prevent fusion of interests and fence in each nation within its own peculiar advantages and disadvantages three to say that by a protective law the conditions of production are equalized is to disguise an ever under false terms it is not true that an import duty equalizes the conditions of production these remain after the imposition of the duty just as they were before the most that the law can do is to equalize the conditions of sale if it should be said that I am playing upon words I retort the accusation upon my adversaries it is for them to prove that production and sale are synonymous terms which if they cannot do I have a right to accuse them if not of playing upon words at least of confounding them let me be permitted to exemplify my idea suppose that several privacy and speculators should determine to devote themselves to the production of oranges they know that the oranges of Portugal can be sold in Paris at ten centimes whilst on account of the boxes hot houses etc which are necessary to ward against the severity of our climate it is impossible to raise them at less than a franc apiece they accordingly demand a duty of ninety centimes upon Portugal oranges with the help of this duty say they the conditions of production are equalized the legislative body yielding as usual to this argument imposes a duty of ninety centimes on each foreign orange now I say that the relative conditions of production are in no wise changed the law can take nothing from the heat of the sun in Lisbon nor from the severity of the frosts in Paris oranges continuing to mature themselves naturally and artificially upon those of the sign must continue to require for their production much more labor on the latter than the former the law can only equalize the conditions of sale it is evident that while the Portuguese sell their oranges at a franc apiece the ninety centimes which go to pay the tax are taken from the French consumer now look at the whimsicality of the result upon each Portuguese orange the country loses nothing for the ninety centimes which the consumer pays to satisfy the tax enter into the treasury there is improper distribution but no loss upon each French orange consumed there will be about ninety centimes lost for while the buyer very certainly loses them the seller just as certainly does not gain them for even according to the hypothesis he will receive only the price of production I will leave it to the protectionist to draw their conclusion four I have laid some stress upon this distinction between the conditions of production and those of sale which perhaps the prohibitionist may consider as paradoxical because it leads me on to what they will consider as a still stranger paradox this is if you really wish to equalize production leave trade free this may surprise the protectionist but let me entreat them to listen if it be only through curiosity to the end of my argument it shall not be long I will now take it up where we left off if we suppose for the moment that the common and daily profits of each Frenchman amount to one franc it will indisputably follow that to produce an orange one day's work or its equivalent will be requisite whilst to produce the cost of a Portuguese orange only one tenth of this day's labor is required which simply means this that the sun does at Lisbon what labor does at Paris now is it not evident that if I can produce an orange or what is the same thing the means of buying it with one tenth of a day's labor is required to produce a Portuguese producer himself accepting the expense of transportation it is then certain that freedom of commerce equalizes the conditions of production direct or indirect as much as it is possible to equalize them for it leaves but the one inevitable difference that of transportation I will add that free trade equalizes also the facilities for attaining efforts and general consumption the last an object which is it would seem quite forgotten and which is nevertheless all important since consumption is the main object of all our industrial efforts thanks to freedom of trade we would enjoy here the results of the Portuguese sun as well as Portugal itself and the inhabitants of Haver would have in their reach as well as those of London the advantages which nature has in a mineralogical point of view conferred upon Newcastle the protectionists may suppose me in a paradoxical humor for I go farther still I say and I sincerely believe that if any two countries are placed in unequal circumstances as to advantages of production that one of the two which is the least favored by nature will gain most by freedom of commerce to prove this I shall be obliged to turn somewhat aside from the form of reasoning which belongs to this work I will do so however first because the question in discussion turns upon this point and again because it will give me the opportunity of exhibiting a law of political economy of the highest importance and which well understood seems to me to be destined for all the nations although sex which in our days are seeking in the land of chimeras that social harmony which they have been unable to discover in nature I speak of the law of consumption which the majority of political economists may well be reproached with having too much neglected consumption is the end the final cause of all the phenomena of political economy no effect whether favorable or unfavorable can be arrested permanently upon the producer the advantages and the disadvantages which from his relations to nature and to society are his both equally passed gradually from him with an almost insensible tendency to be absorbed and fused into the community at large the community considered as consumers this is an admirable law alike in its cause and its effects and he who shall succeed in making it well understood will have a right to say I have not in my passage through the world forgotten to pay my tribute to society every circumstance which favors the work of production is of course hailed with joy by the producer for its immediate effect is to enable him to render greater services to the community and implement a greater remuneration every circumstance which injures production must equally be the source of uneasiness to him for its immediate effect is to diminish his services and consequently his remuneration this is a fortunate and necessary law of nature the immediate good or evil of favorable or unfavorable circumstances must fall upon the producer in order to influence him further again when a workman succeeds in his labor the immediate benefit of the success is received by him this again is necessary to determine him to devote his attention to it it is also just because it is just that an effort crowned with success should bring its own reward but these effects good and bad although permanent in themselves if they had been so a principle of progressive and consequently infinite inequality would have been introduced among men this good and this evil both therefore pass on to become absorbed in the general destinies of humanity how does this come about I will try to make it understood by some examples let us go back to the 13th century when men who gave themselves up to the business of copying received for this surface a remuneration regulated by the general rate of profits among them is found one who seeks and finds the means of multiplying rapidly copies of the same work he invents printing the first effect of this is that the individual is enriched while many more are impoverished at the first view wonderful as the discovery is one hesitates in deciding whether it is not more injurious than useful it seems to have introduced into the world as I said above an elements of infinite inequality Gutenberg makes large profits by this invention and perfects the invention by profits until all other copies are ruined for Gutenberg takes care to lower the price of books only just so much as is necessary to undersell all rivals but the great mind which put harmony into the movements of celestial bodies could also give it to the internal mechanism of society we will see the advantages of this invention escaping from the individual to become forever the common patrimony of mankind the process finally becomes known Gutenberg is no longer alone in his art others imitate him their profits are at first considerable they are recompensed for being the first who make the effort to imitate the process of the newly invented art this again was necessary in order that they might be induced to the effort and thus forward the great and final result to which we approach they gain much but they gain less than the inventor has commenced its work the price of books now continually decreases the gains of the imitators diminish in proportion as the invention becomes older and in the same proportion imitation becomes less meritorious soon the new object of industry attains its normal condition in other words the remuneration of printers is no longer an exception to the general rules of remuneration and like that of copious formerly regulated by the general rate of profits here then the producer as such holds only the old position the discovery however has been made the saving of time labor effort for a fixed result for a certain number of volumes is realized but in what is this manifested in the cheap price of books for the good of whom the good of the consumer of society of humanity printers having no longer any particular merit receive no longer a peculiar remuneration as men as consumers they no doubt participate in the advantages which the invention confers upon the community but that is all as printers as producers they are placed upon the ordinary footing of all other producers and not for the usefulness of the invention that has become a gratuitous benefit a common heritage to mankind what has been said of printing can be extended to every agent for the advancement of labor from the nail and the mallet up to the locomotive and the electric telegraph society enjoys all by the abundance of its use its consumption and it enjoys all gratuitously the fact is to diminish prices it is evident that just so much of the price as is taken off by their intervention renders the production in so far gratuitous there only remains the actual labor of man to be paid for and the remainder which is the result of the invention is subtracted at least after the invention has run through the cycle which I have just described I send for a workman he brings a saw with him I pay him two francs for his day's labor and he saws me twenty-five boards if the saw had not been invented he would perhaps not have been able to make one board and I would have paid him the same for his day's labor the usefulness then of the saw is for me a gratuitous gift of nature or rather it is a portion of the inheritance and with my brother men I have received from the genius of my ancestors I have two workmen in my field the one directs the handle of a plow the other that of a spade the result of their day's labor is very different but the price is the same because the remuneration is proportioned not to the usefulness of the result but to the effort the labor given to attain it I invoke the patience of the reader and beg him to believe that I have not lost sight of free trade I entreat him only to remember the conclusion at which I have arrived remuneration is not proportioned to the usefulness of the articles brought by the producer into the market but to the labor I have so far taken my examples from human inventions but will now go on to speak of natural advantages in every article of production nature and man must concur but the portion of nature is always gratuitous only so much of the usefulness of an article as is the result of human labor becomes the object of mutual exchange and consequently of remuneration the remuneration varies much no doubt in proportion to the intensity of the labor of the skill which it requires of its being a promise to the demand of the day of the need which exists for it of the momentary absence of competition etc but it is not the less true in principle that the assistance received from natural laws which belongs to all counts for nothing in the price we do not pay for the air we breathe although so useful to us that we could not live two minutes without it we do not pay for it because nature furnishes it without the intervention of man's labor but if we wish to separate one of the gases which compose it for instance to fill a balloon we must take some trouble in labor or if another takes it for us we must give him an equivalent in something which will have caused us the trouble of production from which we see troubles efforts labor it is certainly not for hydrogen gas that I pay for this is everywhere at my disposal but for the work that it has been necessary to accomplish in order to disengage it work which I have been spared and which I must refund if I am told that there are other things to pay for as expense, materials, apparatus I answer the price of the coal employed is only the representation of the labor necessary to dig and transport it we do not pay for the light of the sun because nature alone gives it to us but we pay for the light of gas tallow, oil, wax because here is labor to be remunerated and remark that it is so entirely labor and not utility to which remuneration is proportioned that one of these means of lighting while it may be much more effective than another may still cost less to cause this it is only necessary that less human labor should be required to furnish it when the water carrier comes to supply my house where I to pay him in proportion to the absolute utility of the water my whole fortune would not be sufficient but I pay him only for the trouble he has taken if he requires more I can get others to furnish it or finally go and get it myself the water itself is not the subject of our bargain but the labor taken to get the water this point of view is so important and the consequences that I am going to draw from it so clear as regards the freedom of international exchanges that I will still elucidate that the water that is contained in potatoes does not cost us very dear because a great deal of it is attainable with little work we pay more for wheat because to produce it nature requires more labor from man it is evident that if nature did for the latter what she does for the former their prices would tend to the same level it is impossible that the producer of wheat should permanently gain more than the producer of potatoes the law of competition cannot allow it if by a happy miracle the fertility of all arable lands were to be increased it would not be the agriculturalist but the consumer who would profit by this phenomenon for the result of it would be abundance and cheapness there would be less labor incorporated into an acre of grain and the agriculturalist would be therefore obliged to exchange it for a less labor incorporated into some other article if on the contrary the fertility of the soil were suddenly to deteriorate the share of nature in production would be less that of labor greater and the result would be higher prices I am right then in saying that it is in consumption in mankind that at length all political phenomena find their solution they fail to follow their effects to this point and look only at immediate effects which act but upon individual men or classes of men as producers we know nothing more of political economy than the quack does of medicine when instead of following the effects of a prescription in its action upon the whole system he satisfies himself with knowing how it affects the pallet and the throat to the production of sugar and coffee that is to say nature does most of the business and leaves but little for labor to accomplish but who reaps the advantage of this liberality of nature not these regions for they are forced by competition to receive simply remuneration for their labor it is mankind who is the gainer for the result of this liberality is cheapness and cheapness belongs to the world here in the temperate zone we find coal and iron ore on the surface of the soil we have but to stoop and take them at first I grant the immediate inhabitants profit by this fortunate circumstance but soon comes competition and the price of coal and iron falls until this gift of nature becomes gratuitous to all and human labor is only paid according to the general rate of profits thus natural advantages like improvements in the process of production or have a constant tendency to become under the law of competition the common and gratuitous patrimony of consumers of society of mankind countries therefore which do not enjoy these advantages must gain by commerce with those which do because the exchanges of commerce and labor subtraction being made of all the natural advantages which are combined with these labor and it is evidently the most favored countries which can incorporate into a given labor the largest profit of these natural advantages their produce representing less labor receiving less recompense in other words is cheaper if then all the liberality is evidently not the producing but the consuming country which profits by her benefits hence we may see the enormous absurdity of the consuming country which rejects produce precisely because it is cheap it is as though we should say we will have nothing of that which nature gives you you ask of us an effort equal to two in order to furnish ourselves with articles only attainable at home by an effort equal to four because with you nature does half the work but we will have nothing to do with it we will wait till your climate becomes more inclement forces you to ask of us a labor equal to four and then we can trade with you upon an equal footing A is a favored country B is maltreated by nature mutual traffic then is advantageous to both but principally to B not between utility and utility but between value and value now A furnishes a greater utility in a similar value because the utility of any article includes at once what nature and what labor have done whereas the value of it only corresponds to the portion accomplished by labor B then makes an entirely advantageous bargain for by simply paying the producer money for his labor it receives in return not only the results of that labor but in addition there is thrown in whatever may have accrued from the superior bounty of nature we will lay down the general rule traffic is an exchange of values and as value is reduced by competition to the simple representation of labor traffic is the exchange of equal labor whatever nature has done towards the production of the articles exchanged is given on both sides gratuitously for once it necessarily follows that the most advantageous commerce is transacted with those countries which are the most favored by nature the theory of which I have attempted in this chapter to trace the outlines would require great developments but perhaps the attentive reader will have perceived in it the fruitful seed which is destined in its future growth to smother protection at once with foreurism saint simonism commonism and the various other schools whose object is to exclude the law of competition from the government of the world competition no doubt considering man as producer must often interfere with his individual and immediate interests but if we consider the great object of all labor the universal good in a word consumption we cannot fail to find that competition is to the moral world what the law of equilibrium is to the material one it is the foundation of true communism of true socialism of the equality of comforts and condition so much sought after in our day and if so many sincere reformers so many earnest friends to the public rights seek to reach their end by commercial legislation it is only because they do not yet understand commercial freedom end of section 3 recording by Katie Riley April 2010