Sophisms of the Protectionists — 13 - Second Series Part 4
VII. A CHINESE STORY.
They exclaim against the greed and the selfishness of the age!
Open the thousand books, the thousand papers, the thousand pamphlets, which the Parisian presses throw out every day on the country; is not all this the work of little saints?
What spirit in the painting of the vices of the time!
What touching tenderness for the masses!
With what liberality they invite the rich to divide with the poor, or the poor to divide with the rich!
How many plans of social reform, social improvement, and social organization!
Does not even the weakest writer devote himself to the well-being of the laboring classes?
All that is required is to advance them a little money to give them time to attend to their humanitarian pursuits.
There is nothing which does not assume to aid in the well-being and moral advancement of the people--nothing, not even the Custom House.
You believe that it is a tax machine, like a duty or a toll at the end of a bridge?
Not at all.
It is an essentially civilizing, fraternizing and equalizing institution.
What would you have?
It is the fashion.
It is necessary to put or affect to put feeling or sentimentality everywhere, even in the cure of all troubles.
But it must be admitted that the Custom House organization has a singular way of going to work to realize these philanthropic aspirations.
It puts on foot an army of collectors, assistant collectors, inspectors, assistant inspectors, cashiers, accountants, receivers, clerks, supernumeraries, tide-waiters, and all this in order to exercise on the industry of the people that negative action which is summed up in the word _to prevent_.
Observe that I do not say _to tax_, but really _to prevent_.
And _to prevent_, not acts reproved by morality, or opposed to public order, but transactions which are innocent, and which they have even admitted are favorable to the peace and harmony of nations.
However, humanity is so flexible and supple that, in one way or another, it always overcomes these attempts at prevention.
It is for the purpose of increasing labor.
If people are kept from getting their food from abroad they produce it at home.
It is more laborious, but they must live.
If they are kept from passing along the valley, they must climb the mountains.
It is longer, but the point of destination must be reached.
This is sad, but amusing.
When the law has thus created a certain amount of obstacles, and when, to overcome them, humanity has diverted a corresponding amount of labor, you are no longer allowed to call for the reform of the law; for, if you point out the _obstacle_, they show you the labor which it brings into play; and if you say this is not labor created but _diverted_, they answer you as does the _Esprit Public_--"The impoverishing only is certain and immediate; as for the enriching, it is more than problematical."
This recalls to me a Chinese story, which I will tell you.
There were in China two great cities, Tchin and Tchan.
A magnificent canal connected them.
The Emperor thought fit to have immense masses of rock thrown into it, to make it useless.
Seeing this, Kouang, his first Mandarin, said to him: "Son of Heaven, you make a mistake."
To which the Emperor replied: "Kouang, you are foolish."
You understand, of course, that I give but the substance of the dialogue.
At the end of three moons the Celestial Emperor had the Mandarin brought, and said to him: "Kouang, look."
And Kouang, opening his eyes, looked.
He saw at a certain distance from the canal a multitude of men _laboring_.
Some excavated, some filled up, some leveled, and some laid pavement, and the Mandarin, who was very learned, thought to himself: They are making a road.
At the end of three more moons, the Emperor, having called Kouang, said to him: "Look."
And Kouang looked.
And he saw that the road was made; and he noticed that at various points, inns were building.
A medley of foot passengers, carriages and palanquins went and came, and innumerable Chinese, oppressed by fatigue, carried back and forth heavy burdens from Tchin to Tchan, and from Tchan to Tchin, and Kouang said: It is the destruction of the canal which has given labor to these poor people.
But it did not occur to him that this labor was _diverted_ from other employments.
Then more moons passed, and the Emperor said to Kouang: "Look."
And Kouang looked.
He saw that the inns were always full of travelers, and that they being hungry, there had sprung up, near by, the shops of butchers, bakers, charcoal dealers, and bird's nest sellers.
Since these worthy men could not go naked, tailors, shoemakers and umbrella and fan dealers had settled there, and as they do not sleep in the open air, even in the Celestial Empire, carpenters, masons and thatchers congregated there.
Then came police officers, judges and fakirs; in a word, around each stopping place there grew up a city with its suburbs.
Said the Emperor to Kouang: "What do you think of this?"
And Kouang replied: "I could never have believed that the destruction of a canal could create so much labor for the people."
For he did not think that it was not labor created, but _diverted_; that travelers ate when they went by the canal just as much as they did when they were forced to go by the road.
However, to the great astonishment of the Chinese, the Emperor died, and this Son of Heaven was committed to earth.
His successor sent for Kouang, and said to him: "Clean out the canal."
And Kouang said to the new Emperor: "Son of Heaven, you are doing wrong."
And the Emperor replied: "Kouang, you are foolish."
But Kouang persisted and said: "My Lord, what is your object?"
"My object," said the Emperor, "is to facilitate the movement of men and things between Tchin and Tchan; to make transportation less expensive, so that the people may have tea and clothes more cheaply."
But Kouang was in readiness.
He had received, the evening before, some numbers of the _Moniteur Industriel_, a Chinese paper.
Knowing his lesson by heart, he asked permission to answer, and, having obtained it, after striking his forehead nine times against the floor, he said: "My Lord, you try, by facilitating transportation, to reduce the price of articles of consumption, in order to bring them within the reach of the people; and to do this you begin by making them lose all the labor which was created by the destruction of the canal.
Sire, in political economy, absolute cheapness"-- The Emperor.
"I believe that you are reciting something."
Kouang.
"That is true, and it would be more convenient for me to read."
Having unfolded the _Esprit Public_, he read: "In political economy the absolute cheapness of articles of consumption is but a secondary question.
The problem lies in the equilibrium of the price of labor and that of the articles necessary to existence.
The abundance of labor is the wealth of nations, and the best economic system is that which furnishes them the greatest possible amount of labor.
Do not ask whether it is better to pay four or eight cents cash for a cup of tea, or five or ten shillings for a shirt.
These are puerilities unworthy of a serious mind.
No one denies your proposition.
The question is, whether it is better to pay more for an article, and to have, through the abundance and price of labor, more means of acquiring it, or whether it is better to impoverish the sources of labor, to diminish the mass of national production, and to transport articles of consumption by canals, more cheaply it is true, but, at the same time, to deprive a portion of our laborers of the power to buy them, even at these reduced prices."
The Emperor not being altogether convinced, Kouang said to him: "My Lord, be pleased to wait.
I have the _Moniteur Industriel_ to quote from."
But the Emperor said: "I do not need your Chinese newspapers to tell me that to create _obstacles_ is to turn labor in that direction.
Yet that is not my mission.
Come, let us clear out the canal, and then we will reform the tariff."
Kouang went away plucking out his beard, and crying: Oh, Fo!
Oh, Pe!
Oh, Le!
and all the monosyllabic and circumflex gods of Cathay, take pity on your people; for, there has come to us an Emperor of the _English school_, and I see very plainly that, in a little while, we shall be in want of everything, since it will not be necessary for us to do anything!
VIII. POST HOC, ERGO PROPTER HOC.
"After this, therefore on account of this."
The most common and the most false of arguments.
Real suffering exists in England.
This occurrence follows two others: First.
The reduction of the tariff.
Second.
The loss of two consecutive harvests.
To which of these last two circumstances is the first to be attributed?
The protectionists do not fail to exclaim: "It is this cursed freedom which does all the mischief.
It promised us wonders and marvels; we welcomed it, and now the manufactories stop and the people suffer."
Commercial freedom distributes, in the most uniform and equitable manner, the fruits which Providence grants to the labor of man.
If these fruits are partially destroyed by any misfortune, it none the less looks after the fair distribution of what remains.
Men are not as well provided for, of course, but shall we blame freedom or the bad harvest?
Freedom rests on the same principle as insurance.
When a loss happens, it divides, among a great many people, and a great number of years, evils which without it would accumulate on one nation and one season.
But have they ever thought of saying that fire was no longer a scourge, since there were insurance companies?
In 1842, '43 and '44, the reduction of taxes began in England.
At the same time the harvests were very abundant, and we can justly believe that these two circumstances had much to do with the wonderful prosperity shown by that country during that period.
In 1845 the harvest was bad, and in 1846 it was still worse.
Breadstuffs grew dear, the people spent their money for food, and used less of other articles.
There was a diminished demand for clothing; the manufactories were not so busy, and wages showed a declining tendency.
Happily, in the same year, the restrictive barriers were again lowered, and an enormous quantity of food was enabled to reach the English market.
If it had not been for this, it is almost certain that a terrible revolution would now fill Great Britain with blood.
Yet they make freedom chargeable with disasters, which it prevents and remedies, at least in part.
A poor leper lived in solitude.
No one would touch what he had contaminated.
Compelled to do everything for himself, he dragged out a miserable existence.
A great physician cured him.
Here was our hermit in full possession of the _freedom of exchange_.
What a beautiful prospect opened before him!
He took pleasure in calculating the advantages, which, thanks to his connection with other men, he could draw from his vigorous arms.
Unluckily, he broke both of them.
Alas!
his fate was most miserable.
The journalists of that country, witnessing his misfortune, said: "See to what misery this ability to exchange has reduced him!
Really, he was less to be pitied when he lived alone."
"What!"
said the physician; "do not you consider his two broken arms?
Do not they form a part of his sad destiny?
His misfortune is to have lost his arms, and not to have been cured of leprosy.
He would be much more to be pitied if he was both maimed and a leper."
_Post hoc, ergo propter hoc_; do not trust this sophism.
IX. ROBBERY BY BOUNTIES.
They find my little book of _Sophisms_ too theoretical, scientific, and metaphysical.
Very well.
Let us try a trivial, commonplace, and, if necessary, coarse style.
Convinced that the public is _duped_ in the matter of protection, I have desired to prove it.
But the public wishes to be shouted at.
Then let us cry out: "Midas, King Midas, has asses' ears!"
An outburst of frankness often accomplishes more than the politest circumlocution.
To tell the truth, my good people, _they are robbing you_.
It is harsh, but it is true.
The words _robbery_, _to rob_, _robber_, will seem in very bad taste to many people.
I say to them as Harpagon did to Elise, Is it the _word_ or the _thing_ that alarms you?
Whoever has fraudulently taken that which does not belong to him, is guilty of robbery.
(_Penal Code, Art.
379. _) _To rob_: To take furtively, or by force.
(_Dictionary of the Academy.
_) _Robber_: He who takes more than his due.
(_The same.
_) Now, does not the monopolist, who, by a law of his own making, obliges me to pay him twenty francs for an article which I can get elsewhere for fifteen, take from me fraudulently five francs, which belong to me?
Does he not take it furtively, or by force?
Does he not require of me more than his due?
He carries off, he takes, he demands, they will say, but not _furtively_ or _by force_, which are the characteristics of robbery.
When our tax levy is burdened with five francs for the bounty which this monopolist carries off, takes, or demands, what can be more _furtive_, since so few of us suspect it?
And for those who are not deceived, what can be more _forced_, since, at the first refusal to pay, the officer is at our doors?
Still, let the monopolists reassure themselves.
These robberies, by means of bounties or tariffs, even if they do violate equity as much as robbery, do not break the law; on the contrary, they are perpetrated through the law.
They are all the worse for this, but they have nothing to do with _criminal justice_.
Besides, willy-nilly, we are all _robbers_ and _robbed_ in the business.
Though the author of this book cries _stop thief_, when he buys, others can cry the same after him, when he sells.
If he differs from many of his countrymen, it is only in this: he knows that he loses by this game more than he gains, and they do not; if they did know it, the game would soon cease.
Nor do I boast of having first given this thing its true name.
More than sixty years ago, Adam Smith said: "When manufacturers meet it may be expected that a conspiracy will be planned against the pockets of the public."
Can we be astonished at this when the public pay no attention to it?
An assembly of manufacturers deliberate officially under the name of _Industrial League_.
What goes on there, and what is decided upon?
I give a very brief summary of the proceedings of one meeting: "A Ship-builder.
Our mercantile marine is at the last gasp (warlike digression).
It is not surprising.
I cannot build without iron.
I can get it at ten francs _in the world's market_; but, through the law, the managers of the French forges compel me to pay them fifteen francs.
Thus they take five francs from me.
I ask freedom to buy where I please.
"An Iron Manufacturer.
_In the world's market_ I can obtain transportation for twenty francs.
The ship-builder, through the law, requires thirty.
Thus he _takes_ ten francs from me.
He plunders me; I plunder him.
It is all for the best.
"A Public Official.
The conclusion of the ship-builder's argument is highly imprudent.
Oh, let us cultivate the touching union which makes our strength; if we relax an iota from the theory of protection, good-bye to the whole of it.
"The Ship-builder.
But, for us, protection is a failure.
I repeat that the shipping is nearly gone.
"A Sailor.
Very well, let us raise the discriminating duties against goods imported in foreign bottoms, and let the ship-builder, who now takes thirty francs from the public, hereafter take forty.
"A Minister.
The government will push to its extreme limits the admirable mechanism of these discriminating duties, but I fear that it will not answer the purpose.
"A Government Employe.
You seem to be bothered about a very little matter.
Is there any safety but in the bounty?
If the consumer is willing, the tax-payer is no less so.
Let us pile on the taxes, and let the ship-builder be satisfied.
I propose a bounty of five francs, to be taken from the public revenues, to be paid to the ship-builder for each quintal of iron that he uses.
"Several Voices.
Seconded, seconded.
"A Farmer.
I want a bounty of three francs for each bushel of wheat.
"A Weaver.
And I two francs for each yard of cloth.
"The Presiding Officer.
That is understood.
Our meeting will have originated the system of _drawbacks_, and it will be its eternal glory.
What branch of manufacturing can lose hereafter, when we have two so simple means of turning losses into gains--the _tariff_ and _drawbacks_.
The meeting is adjourned."
Some supernatural vision must have shown me in a dream the coming appearance of the _bounty_ (who knows if I did not suggest the thought to M. Dupin?
), when some months ago I wrote the following words: "It seems evident to me that protection, without changing its nature or effects, might take the form of a direct tax levied by the State, and distributed in indemnifying bounties to privileged manufacturers."
And after having compared protective duties with the bounty: "I frankly avow my preference for the latter system; it seems to me more just, more economical, and more truthful.
More just, because if society wishes to give gratuities to some of its members, all should contribute;
more economical, because it would save much of the expense of collection, and do away with many obstacles; and, finally, more truthful, because the public could see the operation plainly, and would know what was done."
Since the opportunity is so kindly offered us, let us study this _robbery by bounties_.
What is said of it will also apply to _robbery by tariff_, and as it is a little better disguised, the direct will enable us to understand the indirect, cheating.
Thus the mind proceeds from the simple to the complex.
But is there no simpler variety of robbery?
Certainly, there is _highway robbery_, and all it needs is to be legalized, or, as they say now-a-days, _organized_.
I once read the following in somebody's travels: "When we reached the Kingdom of A---- we found all industrial pursuits suffering.
Agriculture groaned, manufactures complained, commerce murmured, the navy growled, and the government did not know whom to listen to.
At first it thought of taxing all the discontented, and of dividing among them the proceeds of these taxes after having taken its share; which would have been like the method of managing lotteries in our dear Spain.
There are a thousand of you; the State takes a dollar from each one, cunningly steals two hundred and fifty, and then divides up seven hundred and fifty, in greater or smaller sums, among the players.
The worthy Hidalgo, who has received three-quarters of a dollar, forgetting that he has spent a whole one, is wild with joy, and runs to spend his shillings at the tavern.
Something like this once happened in France.
Barbarous as the country of A---- was, however, the government did not trust the stupidity of the inhabitants enough to make them accept such singular protection, and hence this was what it devised: "The country was intersected with roads.
The government had them measured, exactly, and then said to the farmers, 'All that you can steal from travelers between these boundaries is yours; let it serve you as a _bounty_, a protection, and an encouragement.'
It afterwards assigned to each manufacturer and each ship-builder, a bit of road to work up, according to this formula: Dono tibi et concedo, Virtutem et puissantiam, Robbandi, Pillageandi, Stealandi, Cheatandi, Et Swindlandi, Impune per totam istam, Viam.
"Now it has come to pass that the natives of the Kingdom of A---- are so familiarized with this regime, and so accustomed to think only of what they steal, and not of what is stolen from them, so habituated to look at pillage but from the pillager's point of view, that they consider the sum of all these private robberies as _national profit_, and refuse to give up a system of protection without which, they say, no branch of industry can live."
Do you say, it is not possible that an entire nation could see an _increase of riches_ where the inhabitants plundered one another?
Why not?
We have this belief in France, and every day we organize and practice _reciprocal robbery_ under the name of bounties and protective tariffs.
Let us exaggerate nothing, however; let us concede that as far as the _mode of collection_, and the collateral circumstances, are concerned, the system in the Kingdom of A---- may be worse than ours; but let us say, also, that as far as principles and necessary results are concerned, there is not an atom of difference between these two kinds of robbery legally organized to eke out the profits of industry.
Observe, that if _highway robbery_ presents some difficulties of execution, it has also certain advantages which are not found in the _tariff robbery_.
For instance: An equitable division can be made between all the plunderers.
It is not thus with tariffs.
They are by nature impotent to protect certain classes of society, such as artizans, merchants, literary men, lawyers, soldiers, etc. , etc. It is true that _bounty robbery_ allows of infinite subdivisions, and in this respect does not yield in perfection to _highway robbery_, but on the other hand it often leads to results which are so odd and foolish, that the natives of the Kingdom of A---- may laugh at it with great reason.
That which the plundered party loses in highway robbery is gained by the robber.
The article stolen remains, at least, in the country.
But under the dominion of _bounty robbery_, that which the duty takes from the French is often given to the Chinese, the Hottentots, Caffirs, and Algonquins, as follows: A piece of cloth is worth a _hundred francs_ at Bordeaux.
It is impossible to sell it below that without loss.
It is impossible to sell it for more than that, for the _competition_ between merchants forbids.
Under these circumstances, if a Frenchman desires to buy the cloth, he must pay a _hundred francs_, or do without it.
But if an Englishman comes, the government interferes, and says to the merchant: "Sell your cloth, and I will make the tax-payers give you _twenty francs_ (through the operation of the _drawback_)."
The merchant, who wants, and can get, but one hundred francs for his cloth, delivers it to the Englishman for eighty francs.
This sum added to the twenty francs, the product of the _bounty robbery_, makes up his price.
It is then precisely as if the tax-payers had given twenty francs to the Englishman, on condition that he would buy French cloth at twenty francs below the cost of manufacture,--at twenty francs below what it costs us.
Then bounty robbery has this peculiarity, that the _robbed_ are inhabitants of the country which allows it, and the _robbers_ are spread over the face of the globe.
It is truly wonderful that they should persist in holding this proposition to have been demonstrated: _All that the individual robs from the mass is a general gain.
_ Perpetual motion, the philosopher's stone, and the squaring of the circle, are sunk in oblivion; but the theory of _progress by robbery_ is still held in honor.
_A priori_, however, one might have supposed that it would be the shortest lived of all these follies.
Some say to us: You are, then, partisans of the _let alone_ policy?
economists of the superannuated school of the Smiths and the Says?
You do not desire the _organization of labor_?
Why, gentlemen, organize labor as much as you please, but we will watch to see that you do not organize _robbery_.
Others say, _bounties_, _tariffs_, all these things may have been overdone.
We must use, without abusing them.
A wise liberty, combined with moderate protection, is what _serious_ and practical men claim.
Let us beware of _absolute principles_.
This is exactly what they said in the Kingdom of A----, according to the Spanish traveler.
"Highway robbery," said the wise men, "is neither good nor bad in itself; it depends on circumstances.
Perhaps too much freedom of pillage has been given; perhaps not enough.
Let us see; let us examine; let us balance the accounts of each robber.
To those who do not make enough, we will give a little more road to work up.
As for those who make too much, we will reduce their share."
Those who spoke thus acquired great fame for moderation, prudence, and wisdom.
They never failed to attain the highest offices of the State.
As for those who said, "Let us repress injustice altogether; let us allow neither _robbery_, nor _half robbery_, nor _quarter robbery_," they passed for theorists, dreamers, bores--always parroting the same thing.
The people also found their reasoning too easy to understand.
How can that be true which is so very simple?
X. THE TAX COLLECTOR.
JACQUES BONHOMME, Vine-grower.
M.
LASOUCHE, Tax Collector.
L.
You have secured twenty hogsheads of wine?
J.
Yes, with much care and sweat.
