القرن التاسع عشر ، رقم ١٨٢، أبريل ١٨٩٢ [ظ‎‎٣‎٦] (٢٤٤/٧٧)

562
THE NINETEENTH
April
It appears to me that if the American people have come to the
conclusion that the best way to develop their own industries is to
put a high protective duty on the products of others, they are
perfectly justified in imposing such a duty. They are merely acting
according to their own best lights. It is our business to show them,
if we can, that they are wrong, that they are encouraging the manu
facture of inferior goods and increasing their price,; that they are
not keeping out our wares, but only making the American consumer
pay more for them. To grumble at and abuse the Americans is
mere foolishness. To refuse to take every chance of improving our
trade is to perform the childish operation of cutting off our nose to
spite our face.
And it is by no means certain that the new tariff will have the
effect expected of it. As was pointed out by Mr. Carnegie in a
previous number of this Review, 4 it remains to be seen whether it
will have very much effect on British trade with the United States.
Large classes of our goods are not touched by it; the duties on
some others are reduced. Very many can stand the increased rate,
which is paid by the American consumer in higher prices, while for
others, again, no duty is protective, since they cannot be made in
America at all. It is said that the chief result of the very heavy
duties on tin-plate has been to lower the profit of American fruit
growers. A can of preserved fruit has to be sold for a certain price.
The can costs more, so its contents must cost less.
There has, of course, been a falling off in British export trade
during the past twelve or eighteen months. Careful examination of
the figures, however, shows that the falling off in the trade with the
United States is only a little greater in proportion than the diminution
in other quarters. Nor would it be fair to put even all of this down to
the account of the tariff. Some of it is certainly to be attributed to
other causes than increased customs dues. The mere overstocking
of the market from heavy purchases under the old rates would alone
have caused a diminished export if the tariff had been suddenly
abolished the day after it came into force.
Changes of fashion also will account for at all events some of the
diminution. The Bradford manufacturers are very sore about the
tariff, and probably they have suffered from it as much as anybody.
But they are certainly also suffering from one of those capricious
changes of fashion to which their trade is so specially liable. To
take one example: it is stated on good authority that one principal
article of export to the United States was the sort of plush known as
imitation sealskin. This has gone out of fashion, and the manu
facturers of this material, both here and in America, will be out of
work till they find some other class of goods for which there is a
rapid and extensive demand. That the existing depression in their
4 Nineteenth Centur June 1891.