MR. BADEN-PO WELLON PROTECTION AND BAD TIMES.*
Ii is discouraging to think that political economists should still, in these days, have to write refutations of the old, old fal- lacies of Protection. It is humiliating to be forced to admit that for multitudes of Englishmen, as well as their kinsmen in our Colonies, the apostles of Free-trade have taught in vain ; and that if the question were put to the vote in some constituencies, the result would be, to say the least, uncertain. This admission, however, must be made. Mr. Wheelhouse and Mr. Eaton can get half-a-dozen votes in the House of Commons in favour of an inquiry as to whether Free-trade may not be, after all, a mistake, or whether a country may not have too much of it. In that Assembly a knowledge of political economy seems rarer than it was. Fallacies which were unheard of a few years ago now come out into the light. Some Members are not ashamed to show their ignorance of the first principles of economical science by deploring the growth of imports, or by declaring that "the consumers are probably not more than one-tenth of the human race." Almost every Chamber of Commerce has its little clique of Reciprocity-mongers; and at a farmers' ordinary, if the market has been bad and if the reporters are gone, some landowner will be found to tell the gloomy agriculturists that plenty, and especially American corn, is our curse. Bad times have brought into the light of day the unregenerate. We are finding out that the prosperity which came in the wake of Free-trade silenced, but did not convince, its opponents. Mr. Baden-Powell talks a little wildly—he more than once does so—about political economy not having "advanced far since the days of Aristotle." This is, of course, exaggeration. But it is only too true that the principles of political economy have penetrated but skin-deep ; and that the world still requires books such as those of Mr. Fawcett and Mr. Baden-Powell, which restate and elucidate forgotten principles, and which scotch fallacies torpid no longer, but roused into mischievous activity. The barbarians who hover on the Trontiers of economical science, and threaten to make raids across them, are in strong force ; they grow a little insolent, and they must from time to time be chastised and driven back. Whether Mr. Baden-Powell's mode of war- fare is in all respects the most effective may be doubted. He overlays his subject with matter which, though denoting wide reading, and interesting in itself, has but the re- motest relations to his argument. His line of reason- ing is often far from straight, and deviates in its course like an American snake-fence. His style, too, has a certain woolliness of texture, and a loosely abstract character ; it is affected by a kind of drawl ; and the reader, who is pulled up to listen to what he does not wish to hear, is often tempted to say, "Why will not this excellent, sensible author wake up, and move faster P" Let one or two sentences serve as illustrations of many others. He proposes to prove that "structural develop- ments are very similar when they occur, whether in old or young societies." Having stated this Spencerean-looking proposition, be proceeds to say, "A sincere desire to adjust theory to practice makes it, above all, desirable to thoroughly explore the nature of the material that affords the matter-of- fact evidence on which we build our explanation of the actual. And most theories of Protection draw a line of demarcation, more or less hard and fast, between young and old com- munities ;" and so on for pages in this sleepy, loitering manner.
Mr. Baden-Powell writes as much for the edification of our colonists as for that of Englishmen. He does not dwell long on the crude fallacies which seduce Mr. Wheelhouse and Lord Bateman. He states the true doctrines with tolerable clearness, though he occasionally mixes them up with a good deal of foggy philosophy and gossiping matter, which does not advance the argument, and is open to doubt. It serves no good pur- pose to bar the reader's way to the consideration of the pro- blem really dealt with in the book, to be compelled to stop to study a paragraph headed, "Political Economy must be Pro- visional," and intended to show that all human science is vanity ; or one headed, "Political Economy must be Comprehensive," and amounting to the excellent principle that things which should be borne in mind by the economist should not be for- gotten. After all, common-places turned upside down or ex- pressed crookedly are not social philosophy. Our author
• Protection and Bad Times : with Special Reference to the Political Economy of English Colonisation. By George Baden-Powell, M.A. London : Triibner and Co.
has a way of talking, almost purposelessly, about " develop- ment " and "social phases," as other men have of whistling, to pass the time, rather than advance his argument. He will not boldly meet his opponents ; he always protects himself by a big barricade of soft truisms, as besiegers shield themselves behind earthworks or sandbags. But his passion for preliminary truisms, and occasional little philosophical flourishes, do not interfere with his unwavering adhesion to the true faith ; his analysis of the causes of depression in trade and the natural effects of reciprocity is satisfactory ; and an impartial reader who studies the book can scarcely fail to conclude with him that the latter "is the outcome of a species of a spite, which comes of the baffled desire of men for the unlimited benefit of universal Free-trade." The chapter entitled "Is Protection Profitable?" leaves little to be desired. The author's remarks on the depres- sion of trade, the fallacious arguments of Protectionists with respect to the English sugar trade, the marvellous growth of the colonial trade of the country, are excellent. It is difficult to show originality in the discussion of a well-worn theme.
But his arguments derived from commerce in favour of keeping firmly knitted together the relations between England and her colonies are too rarely adduced. We have room only for this short extract :—
" Manufacturers and merchants, and indeed all, for all are con- cerned, might with profit study the recorded growth of the trade of this English Empire ; there will they find unimpeachable evidence of the fact that while foreign trade has suffered a steady decline in value, colonial trade has made a comparatively equivalent steady rise. Foreign trade reached, in 1873, a culminating total of £530,000,000. It has since declined to 2480,000,000 in 1877; a decline of 10 per cent. Trade with the colonies rising in 1873 to 2150,000,000, has since continued to rise, till in 1877 it had reached a total of £165,000,000; a rise of 12 per cent. At the present, her outlying provinces absorb about one-fourth of England's trade ; and these provinces are destined to a rapid proximate growth, whereas foreign countries' have no immediate prospect of rapid growth, while any increase in trade with them is entirely problematical. It seems, then, certain that this trade within the empire is a most important feature in the prosperity of England; and this trade is entirely in the hands of Englishmen; can they not insure its freedom for thomselves ?"
Had the book been considerably shorter than it is--had it been confined to demonstrating the mischievousness of Protec- tion in all forms, and whether in young or old countries—it would have been admirable and opportune. But, a little un- fortunately, we think, the author desires to be comprehensive ; he will needlessly start alien topics ; and he chooses to embrace remote questions, and to cumber with dubious matter his clear argument for Free-trade.
Mr. Baden-Powell tells, in his chapter on "Protection with Regard to Natural Agencies," the history of the land system in Prince Edward's Island, where the whole soil was given away in one day to sixty owners; and describes the promiscuous free grants in Lower and Upper Canada, and the efforts made in some of our Australian Colonies to establish perfect peasant-proprie- tors, in the persons of the "free selectors," or " cockatooers." He criticises the Wakefield system of colonisation, and several other modes of interference with the disposal of the land in young communities. We do not think that he does quite justice to the merits of the Wakefield system, either as first excogitated, or as "spoiled by Grey ;" but what is to be complained of is, that a confusion of ideas runs through this portion of the book. Mr. Baden-Powell here mixes things which are dissimilar, and describes and criticises, under the general name of Protection, systems which have almost nothing in common. Protection, as every one understands it, has a distinct meaning ; it supposes some fiscal system which pre- vents people selling freely what they have got, or buying what is offered them. Mr. Baden-Powell, in speaking of the policy of our Colonies with regard to unoccupied land, applies the term to systems which do not inter-
fere with the sale of what people have got, but which deter- mine the manner in which grants of land belonging to the State shall be made. High taxes on the transfer of land owned by private persons are protective in their operation. But is it not an abuse of language to say that Colonial Govern- ments which did not bring all their surplus land into the market at once, or which attached terms to the sale of it, were pursuing a Protective policy ? We cannot quite make out what Mr. Baden-Powell means by free-trade in land. It may be surmised that he thinks that it is almost equi- valent to the divine right of the squatter, and that a colony which gives its land for nominal prices, and with-
out regard to the consequences, is carrying out the principles of Free-trade. Indeed, it is not easy to ascertain what view definitely recommends itself to him. Apparently, at one point of his argument, he is inclined to conclude that it is better to "allow things to take a free course ; " and yet he also appears. to think that "the true land policy of a young community" is to "seek to retain in the hands of the State the actual pro- prietary right in the soil, till such time as those industries which involve ownership are in need of such soil,"—which, whether right or wrong, is not exactly allowing things to "take their free course."
An excellent chapter is devoted to the consideration of the. devices favoured by young communities for keeping up wages by excluding or discouraging the entrance of cheap labour. The remarks, though too timid, and needlessly weakened by "may," "it may be advanced with some show of reason," &c.,. are full of instruction, and throw light on measures of colonial policy of which most Englishmen know nothing. This part of Mr. Baden-Powell's book is particularly valuable, because, among other reasons, the subject is dismissed by Professor Fawcett in almost a single paragraph, in his very successful work on "Free-trade and Protection."
We wish that Mr. Baden-Powell had examined critically,. quoting figures as he went along, the assertion, so frequently made, but never proved, that abroad there is no tendency to- wards Free-trade. What truth is there in this boast of Pro- tectionists? It is not enough to say that scarcely a Continental country has a tariff imposed merely for revenue purposes. The fair test would be to go back twenty or thirty years, dis- cover the duties then levied in the various Continental States,. compare them with the taxes now in force, and note the changes which had taken place in the interval. That survey would disclose some backslidings. It would indicate no steady advance. But our impression is that it would reveal an approximation to- wards Free-trade which, considering the obstacles to what the Germans term Manchesterthum in human nature and vested interests, is considerable. The subject of Commercial Treaties is dismissed in a manner scarcely adequate to the importance of the theme ; and almost nothing is said as to the obstacles which increase every day, and which make the transition from Protection to Free-trade a matter of growing difficulty. Mr. Fawcett has truly said that the arguments of Free-traders have- been less convincing than they might have been, because few attempts have been made to understand the position of Protec- tionists in the United States and our Colonies. The key to comprehending their situation, is a perception of the fact that a community which has once adopted Protection cannot aban- don it without a violent wrench. This, which is the chief excuse of Protectionists, is the condemnation of their system.
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