Sophisms of the Protectionists — 08 - First Series Part 8

HUMAN LABOR--NATIONAL LABOR.

Destruction of machinery--prohibition of foreign goods.

These are two acts proceeding from the same doctrine.

We do meet with men who, while they rejoice over the revelation of any great invention, favor nevertheless the protective policy; but such men are very inconsistent.

What is the objection they adduce against free trade?

That it causes us to seek from foreign and more easy production, what would otherwise be the result of home production.

In a word, that it injures domestic industry.

On the same principle, can it not be objected to machinery, that it accomplishes through natural agents what would otherwise be the result of manual labor, and that it is thus injurious to human labor?

The foreign laborer, enjoying greater facilities of production than the French laborer, is, with regard to the latter, a veritable _economical machine_, which crushes him by competition.

Thus, a piece of machinery capable of executing any work at a less price than could be done by any given number of hands, is, as regards these hands, in the position of a _foreign competitor_, who paralyzes them by his rivalry.

If then it be judicious to protect _home labor_ against the competition of _foreign labor_, it cannot be less so to protect _human labor_ against _mechanical labor_.

Whoever adheres to the protective system, ought not, if his brain be possessed of any logical powers, to stop at the prohibition of foreign produce, but should extend this prohibition to the produce of the loom and of the plough.

I approve therefore of the logic of those who, whilst they cry out against the _inundation_ of foreign merchandise, have the courage to declaim equally against the _excessive production_ resulting from the inventive power of mind.

Of this number is Mr. de Saint Chamans.

"One of the strongest arguments, (says he) which can be adduced against free trade, and the too extensive employment of machines, is, that many workmen are deprived of work, either by foreign competition, which depresses manufactures, or by machinery, which takes the place of men in workshops."

Mr. de St. Chamans saw clearly the analogy, or rather the identity which exists between _importation_ and _machinery_, and was, therefore, in favor of proscribing both.

There is some pleasure in having to do with intrepid arguers, who, even in error, thus carry through a chain of reasoning.

But let us look at the difficulty into which they are here led.

If it be true, _à priori_, that the domain of _invention_, and that of _labor_, can be extended only to the injury of one another, it would follow that the fewest _workmen_ would be employed in countries (Lancashire, for instance) where there is the most _machinery_.

And if it be, on the contrary, proved, that machinery and manual labor coexist to a greater extent among rich nations than among savages, it must necessarily follow, that these two powers do not interfere with one another.

I cannot understand how a thinking being can rest satisfied with the following dilemma: Either the inventions of man do not injure labor; and this, from general facts, would appear to be the case, for there exists more of both among the English and the French, than among the Sioux and the Cherokees.

If such be the fact, I have gone upon a wrong track, although unconscious at what point.

I have wandered from my road, and I would commit high treason against humanity, were I to introduce such an error into the legislation of my country.

Or else the results of the inventions of mind limit manual labor, as would appear to be proved from limited facts; for every day we see some machine rendering unnecessary the labor of twenty, or perhaps a hundred workmen.

If this be the case, I am forced to acknowledge, as a fact, the existence of a flagrant, eternal, and incurable antagonism between the intellectual and the physical power of man; between his improvement and his welfare.

I cannot avoid feeling that the Creator should have bestowed upon man either reason or bodily strength; moral force, or brutal force; and that it has been a bitter mockery to confer upon him faculties which must inevitably counteract and destroy one another.

This is an important difficulty, and how is it put aside?

By this singular apothegm: "_In political economy there are no absolute principles.

_" There are no principles!

Why, what does this mean, but that there are no facts?

Principles are only formulas, which recapitulate a whole class of well-proved facts.

Machinery and Importation must certainly have effects.

These effects must be either good or bad.

Here there may be a difference of opinion as to which is the correct conclusion, but whichever is adopted, it must be capable of being submitted to the formula of one or other of these principles, viz.

: Machinery is a good, or, Machinery is an evil.

Importations are beneficial, or, Importations are injurious.

Bat to say _there are no principles_, is certainly the last degree of debasement to which the human mind can lower itself, and I confess that I blush for my country, when I hear so monstrous an absurdity uttered before, and approved by, the French Chambers, the _élite_ of the nation, who thus justify themselves for imposing upon the country laws, of the merits or demerits of which they are perfectly ignorant.

But, it may be said to me, finish, then, by destroying the _Sophism_.

Prove to us that machines are not injurious to _human labor_, nor importations to _national labor_.

In a work of this nature, such demonstrations cannot be very complete.

My aim is rather to point out than to explain difficulties, and to excite reflection rather than to satisfy it.

The mind never attains to a firm conviction which is not wrought out by its own labor.

I will, however, make an effort to put it upon the right track.

The adversaries of importations and of machinery are misled by allowing themselves to form too hasty a judgment from immediate and transitory effects, instead of following these up to their general and final consequences.

The immediate effect of an ingenious piece of machinery, is, that it renders superfluous, in the production of any given result, a certain quantity of manual labor.

But its action does not stop here.

This result being obtained at less labor, is given to the public at a less price.

The amount thus saved to the buyers, enables them to procure other comforts, and thus to encourage general labor, precisely in proportion to the saving they have made upon the one article which the machine has given to them at an easier price.

Thus the standard of labor is not lowered, though that of comfort is raised.

Let me endeavor to render this double fact more striking by an example.

I suppose that ten million of hats, at fifteen francs each, are yearly consumed in France.

This would give to those employed in this manufacture one hundred and fifty millions.

A machine is invented which enables the manufacturer to furnish hats at ten francs.

The sum given to the maintenance of this branch of industry, is thus reduced (if we suppose the consumption not to be increased) to one hundred millions.

But the other fifty millions are not, therefore, withdrawn from the maintenance of _human labor_.

The buyers of hats are, from the surplus saved upon the price of that article, enabled to satisfy other wants, and thus, in the same proportion, to encourage general industry.

John buys a pair of shoes; James, a book; Jerome, an article of furniture, etc. Human labor, as a whole, still receives the encouragement of the whole one hundred and fifty millions, while the consumers, with the same supply of hats as before, receive also the increased number of comforts accruing from the fifty millions, which the use of the machine has been the means of saving to them.

These comforts are the net gain which France has received from the invention.

It is a gratuitous gift; a tribute exacted from nature by the genius of man.

We grant that, during this process, a certain sum of labor will have been _displaced_, forced to change its direction; but we cannot allow that it has been destroyed or even diminished.

The case is the same with regard to importations.

I will resume my hypothesis.

France, according to our supposition, manufactured ten millions of hats at fifteen francs each.

Let us now suppose that a foreign producer brings them into our market at ten francs.

I maintain that _national labor_ is thus in no wise diminished.

It will be obliged to produce the equivalent of the hundred millions which go to pay for the ten millions of hats at ten francs, and then there remains to each buyer five francs, saved on the purchase of his hat, or, in total, fifty millions, which serve for the acquisition of other comforts, and the encouragement of other labor.

The mass of labor remains, then, what it was, and the additional comforts accruing from the fifty millions saved in the purchase of hats, are the net profit of importation or free trade.

It is no argument to try and alarm us by a picture of the sufferings which, in this hypothesis, would result from the displacement or change of labor.

For, if prohibition had never existed, labor would have classed itself in accordance with the laws of trade, and no displacement would have taken place.

If prohibition has led to an artificial and unproductive classification of labor, then it is prohibition, and not free trade, which is responsible for the inevitable displacement which must result in the transition from evil to good.

It is a rather singular argument to maintain that, because an abuse which has been permitted a temporary existence, cannot be corrected without wounding the interests of those who have profited by it, it ought, therefore, to claim perpetual duration.

XXI. RAW MATERIAL.

It is said that no commerce is so advantageous as that in which manufactured articles are exchanged for raw material; because the latter furnishes aliment for _national labor_.

And it is hence concluded: That the best regulation of duties, would be to give the greatest possible facilities to the importation of raw material, and at the same time to check that of the finished article.

There is, in political economy, no more generally accredited Sophism than this.

It serves for argument not only to the protectionists, but also to the pretended free trade school; and it is in the latter capacity that its most mischievous tendencies are called into action.

For a good cause suffers much less in being attacked, than in being badly defended.

Commercial liberty must probably pass through the same ordeal as liberty in every other form.

It can only dictate laws, after having first taken thorough possession of men's minds.

If, then, it be true that a reform, to be firmly established, must be generally understood, it follows that nothing can so much retard it, as the misleading of public opinion.

And what more calculated to mislead opinion than writings, which, while they proclaim free trade, support the doctrines of monopoly?

It is some years since three great cities of France, viz.

, Lyons, Bordeaux, and Havre, combined in opposition to the restrictive system.

France, all Europe, looked anxiously and suspiciously at this apparent declaration in favor of free trade.

Alas!

it was still the banner of monopoly which they followed!

a monopoly, only a little more sordid, a little more absurd than that of which they seemed to desire the destruction!

Thanks to the Sophism which I would now endeavor to deprive of its disguise, the petitioners only reproduced, with an additional incongruity, the old doctrine of _protection to national labor_.

What is, in fact, the prohibitive system?

We will let Mr. de Saint Cricq answer for us.

"Labor constitutes the riches of a nation, because it creates supplies for the gratification of our necessities; and universal comfort consists in the abundance of these supplies."

Here we have the principle.

"But this abundance ought to be the result of _national labor_.

If it were the result of foreign labor, national labor must receive an inevitable check."

Here lies the error.

(See the preceding Sophism).

"What, then, ought to be the course of an agricultural and manufacturing country?

It ought to reserve its market for the produce of its own soil and its own industry."

Here is the object.

"In order to effect this, it ought, by restrictive, and, if necessary, by prohibitive duties, to prevent the influx of produce from foreign soils and foreign industry."

Here is the means.

Let us now compare this system with that of the petition from Bordeaux.

This divided articles of merchandise into three classes.

"The first class includes articles of food and _raw material untouched by human labor_.

_A judicious system of political economy would require that this class should be exempt from taxation.

_" Here we have the principle of no labor, no protection.

"The second class is composed of articles which have received _some preparation_ for manufacture.

This preparation would render reasonable the imposition of _some duties_."

Here we find the commencement of protection, because, at the same time, likewise commences the demand for _national labor_.

"The third class comprehends finished articles, which can, under no circumstances, furnish material for national labor.

We consider this as the most fit for taxation."

Here we have at once the maximum of labor, and, consequently, of production.

The petitioners then, as we here see, proclaimed foreign labor as injurious to national labor.

This is the _error_ of the prohibitive system.

They desired the French market to be reserved for _French labor_.

This is the _object_ of the prohibitive system.

They demanded that foreign labor should be subjected to restrictions and taxes.

These are the _means_ of the prohibitive system.

What difference, then, can we possibly discover to exist between the Bordalese petitioners and the Corypheus of restriction?

One, alone; and that is simply the greater or less extension which is given to the signification of the word _labor_.

Mr. de Saint Cricq, taking it in its widest sense, is, therefore, in favor of _protecting_ every thing.

"Labor," he says, "constitutes _the whole_ wealth of a nation.

Protection should be for the agricultural interest, and _the whole_ agricultural interest; for the manufacturing interest, and _the whole_ manufacturing interest; and this principle I will continually endeavor to impress upon this Chamber."

The petitioners consider no labor but that of the manufacturers, and accordingly, it is that, and that alone, which they would wish to admit to the favors of protection.

"Raw material being entirely _untouched by human labor_, our system should exempt it from taxes.

Manufactured articles furnishing no material for national labor, we consider as the most fit for taxation."

There is no question here as to the propriety of protecting national labor.

Mr. de Saint Cricq and the Bordalese agree entirely upon this point.

We have, in our preceding chapters, already shown how entirely we differ from both of them.

The question to be determined, is, whether it is Mr. de Saint Cricq, or the Bordalese, who give to the word _labor_ its proper acceptation.

And we must confess that Mr. de Saint Cricq is here decidedly in the right.

The following dialogue might be supposed between them: _Mr.

de Saint Cricq.

_--You agree that national labor ought to be protected.

You agree that no foreign labor can be introduced into our market, without destroying an equal quantity of our national labor.

But you contend that there are numerous articles of merchandise possessing _value_, for they are sold, and which are nevertheless _untouched by human labor_.

Among these you name corn, flour, meat, cattle, bacon, salt, iron, copper, lead, coal, wool, skins, seeds, etc. If you can prove to me, that the _value_ of these things is not dependent upon labor, I will agree that it is useless to protect them.

But if I can prove to you that there is as much labor put upon a hundred francs worth of wool, as upon a hundred francs worth of cloth, you ought to acknowledge that protection is the right as much of the one, as of the other.

I ask you then why this bag of wool is worth a hundred francs?

Is it not because this is its price of production?

And what is the price of production, but the sum which has been distributed in wages for labor, payment of skill, and interest on money, among the various laborers and capitalists, who have assisted in the production of the article?

_The Petitioners.

_--It is true that with regard to wool you may be right; but a bag of corn, a bar of iron, a hundred weight of coal, are these the produce of labor?

Is it not nature which _creates_ them?

_Mr.

de St. Cricq.

_--Without doubt, nature _creates_ these substances, but it is labor which gives them their _value_.

I have myself, in saying that labor _creates_ material objects, used a false expression, which has led me into many farther errors.

No man can _create_.

No man can bring any thing from nothing; and if _production_ is used as a synonym for _creation_, then indeed our labor must all be useless.

The agriculturist does not pretend that he has _created_ the corn; but he has given it its _value_.

He has by his own labor, and by that of his servants, his laborers, and his reapers, transformed into corn substances which were entirely dissimilar from it.

What more is effected by the miller who converts it into flour, or by the baker who makes it into bread?

In order that a man may be dressed in cloth, numerous operations are first necessary.

Before the intervention of any human labor, the real _primary materials_ of this article are air, water, heat, gas, light, and the various salts which enter into its composition.

These are indeed _untouched by human labor_, for they have no _value_, and I have never dreamed of their needing protection.

But a first _labor_ converts these substances into forage; a second into wool; a third into thread; a fourth into cloth; and a fifth into garments.

Who can pretend to say, that all these contributions to the work, from the first furrow of the plough, to the last stitch of the needle, are not _labor_?

And because, for the sake of speed and greater perfection in the accomplishment of the final object, these various branches of labor are divided among as many classes of workmen, you, by an arbitrary distinction, determine that the order in which the various branches of labor follow each other shall regulate their importance, so that while the first is not allowed to merit the name of labor, the last shall receive all the favors of protection.

_The Petitioners.

_--Yes, we begin to understand that neither wool nor corn are entirely _independent of human labor_; but certainly the agriculturist has not, like the manufacturer, had every thing to do by his own labor, and that of his workmen; nature has assisted him; and if there is some labor, at least all is not labor, in the production of corn.

_Mr.

de St. Cricq.

_--But it is the labor alone which gives it _value_.

I

grant that nature has assisted in the production of grain.

I will even grant that it is exclusively her work; but I must confess at least that I have constrained her to it by my labor.

And remark, moreover, that when I sell my corn, it is not the _work of nature_ which I make you pay for, but _my own_.

You will perceive, also, by following up your manner of arguing, that neither will manufactured articles be the production of labor.

Does not the manufacturer also call upon nature to assist him?

Does he not by the assistance of steam-machinery force into his service the weight of the atmosphere, as I, by the use of the plough, take advantage of its humidity?

Is it the cloth-manufacturer who has created the laws of gravitation, transmission of forces and of affinities?

_The Petitioners.

_--Well, well, we will give up wool, but assuredly coal is the work, the exclusive work, of nature.

This, at least, is _independent of all human labor_.

_Mr.

de St. Cricq.

_--Yes, nature certainly has made coal; but _labor has made its value_.

Where was the _value_ of coal during the millions of years when it lay unknown and buried a hundred feet below the surface of the earth?

It was necessary to seek it.

Here was labor.

It was necessary to transport it to a market.

Again this was labor.

The price which you pay for coal in the market is the remuneration given to these labors of digging and transportation.

[13] [Footnote 13: I do not, for many reasons, make explicit mention of such portion of the remuneration as belongs to the contractor, capitalist, etc. Firstly: because, if the subject be closely looked into, it will be seen that it is always either the reimbursing in advance, or the payment of anterior _labor_.

Secondly: because, under the general labor, I include not only the salary of the workmen, but the legitimate payment of all co-operation in the work of production.

Thirdly: finally, and above all, because the production of the manufactured articles is, like that of the raw material, burdened with interests and remunerations, entirely independent of _manual labor_; and that the objection, in itself, might be equally applied to the finest manufacture and to the roughest agricultural process.

] We see that, so far, all the advantage is on the side of Mr. de St. Cricq, and that the _value_ of unmanufactured as of manufactured articles, represents always the expense, or what is the same thing, the _labor_ of production; that it is impossible to conceive of an article bearing a _value, independent of human labor_; that the distinction made by the petitioners is futile in theory, and, as the basis of an unequal division of favors, would be iniquitous in practice; for it would thence result that the one-third of the French occupied in manufactures, would receive all the benefits of monopoly, because they produce _by labor_; while the two other thirds, formed by the agricultural population, would be left to struggle against competition, under pretense that they produce _without labor_.

It will, I know, be insisted that it is advantageous to a nation to import the raw material, whether or not it be the result of labor; and to export manufactured articles.

This is a very generally received opinion.

"In proportion," says the petition of Bordeaux, "as raw material is abundant, manufactures will increase and flourish."

"The abundance of raw material," it elsewhere says, "gives an unlimited scope to labor in those countries where it prevails."

"Raw material," says the petition from Havre, "being the element of labor, should be _regulated on a different system_, and ought to be admitted _immediately_ and at the _lowest rate_."

The same petition asks, that the protection of manufactured articles should be reduced, not _immediately_, but at some indeterminate time, not to the _lowest rate_ of entrance, but to twenty per cent.

"Among other articles," says the petition of Lyons, "of which the low price and the abundance are necessary, the manufacturers name all _raw material_."

All this is based upon error.

All _value_ is, we have seen, the representative of labor.

Now it is undoubtedly true that manufacturing labor increases ten-fold, a hundred-fold, the value of raw material, thus dispensing ten, a hundred-fold increased profits throughout the nation; and from this fact is deduced the following argument: The production of a hundred weight of iron, is the gain of only fifteen francs to the various workers therein engaged.

This hundred weight of iron, converted into watch-springs, is increased in value by this process, ten thousand francs.

Who can pretend that the nation is not more interested in securing the ten thousand francs, than the fifteen francs worth of labor?

In this reasoning it is forgotten, that international exchanges are, no more than individual exchanges, effected through weight and measure.

The exchange is not between a hundred weight of unmanufactured iron, and a hundred weight of watch-springs, nor between a pound of wool just shorn, and a pound of wool just manufactured into cashmere, but between a fixed value in one of these articles, and a fixed equal value in another.

To exchange equal value with equal value, is to exchange equal labor with equal labor, and it is therefore not true that the nation which sells its hundred francs worth of cloth or of watch-springs, gains more than the one which furnishes its hundred francs worth of wool or of iron.

In a country where no law can be passed, no contribution imposed without the consent of the governed, the public can be robbed, only after it has first been cheated.

Our own ignorance is the primary, the _raw material_ of every act of extortion to which we are subjected, and it may safely be predicted of every _Sophism_, that it is the forerunner of an act of Spoliation.

Good Public, whenever therefore you detect a Sophism in a petition, let me advise you, put your hand upon your pocket, for be assured, it is that which is particularly the point of attack.

Let us then examine what is the secret design which the ship-owners of Bordeaux and Havre, and the manufacturers of Lyons, would smuggle in upon us by this distinction between agricultural produce and manufactured produce.

"It is," say the petitioners of Bordeaux, "principally in this first class (that which comprehends raw material, _untouched by human labor_) that we find _the principal encouragement of our merchant vessels_....

A

wise system of political economy would require that this class should not be taxed....

The second class (articles which have received some preparation) may be considered as taxable.

The third (articles which have received from labor all the finish of which they are capable) we regard as _most proper for taxation_."

"Considering," say the petitioners of Havre, "that it is indispensable to reduce _immediately_ and to the _lowest rate_, the raw material, in order that manufacturing industry may give employment to our merchant vessels, which furnish its first and indispensable means of labor."

The manufacturers could not allow themselves to be behindhand in civilities towards the ship-owners, and accordingly the petition of Lyons demands the free introduction of raw material, "in order to prove," it remarks, "that the interests of manufacturing towns are not opposed to those of maritime cities."

This may be true enough; but it must be confessed that both, taken in the sense of the petitioners, are terribly adverse to the interest of agriculture and of consumers.

This, then, gentlemen, is the aim of all your subtle distinctions!

You wish the law to oppose the maritime transportation of _manufactured_ articles, in order that the much more expensive transportation of the raw material should, by its larger bulk, in its rough, dirty and unimproved condition, furnish a more extensive business to your _merchant vessels_.

And this is what you call a _wise system of political economy_!

Why not also petition for a law requiring that fir-trees, imported from Russia, should not be admitted without their branches, bark, and roots;

that Mexican gold should be imported in the state of ore, and Buenos Ayres leathers only allowed an entrance into our ports, while still hanging to the dead bones and putrefying bodies to which they belong?

The stockholders of railroads, if they can obtain a majority in the Chambers, will no doubt soon favor us with a law forbidding the manufacture, at Cognac, of the brandy used in Paris.

For, surely, they would consider it a wise law, which would, by forcing the transportation of ten casks of wine instead of one of brandy, thus furnish to Parisian industry an _indispensable encouragement to its labor_, and, at the same time, give employment to railroad locomotives!

Until when will we persist in shutting our eyes upon the following simple truth?

Labor and industry, in their general object, have but one legitimate aim, and this is the public good.

To create useless industrial pursuits, to favor superfluous transportation, to maintain a superfluous labor, not for the good of the public, but at the expense of the public, is to act upon a _petitio principii_.

For it is the result of labor, and not labor itself, which is a desirable object.

All labor, without a result, is clear loss.

To pay sailors for transporting rough dirt and filthy refuse across the ocean, is about as reasonable as it would be to engage their services, and pay them for pelting the water with pebbles.

Thus we arrive at the conclusion that _political Sophisms_, notwithstanding their infinite variety, have one point in common, which is the constant confounding of the _means_ with the _end_, and the development of the former at the expense of the latter.