RECIPROCITY.
We have just seen that all which renders
transportation difficult, acts in the same manner
as protection; or, if the expression be preferred,
that protection tends towards the same result as obstacles
to transportation.
A tariff may then be truly spoken
of, as a swamp, a rut, a steep hill; in a word, an
obstacle, whose effect is to augment the difference
between the price of consumption and that of production.
It is equally incontestable that a swamp, a bog, etc.,
are veritable protective tariffs.
There are people (few in number, it
is true, but such there are) who begin to understand
that obstacles are not the less obstacles, because
they are artificially created, and that our well-being
is more advanced by freedom of trade than by protection;
precisely as a canal is more desirable than a sandy,
hilly, and difficult road.
But they still say, this liberty ought
to be reciprocal. If we take off our taxes in
favor of Spain, while Spain does not do the same towards
us, it is evident that we are duped. Let us then
make treaties of commerce upon the basis of
a just reciprocity; let us yield where we are yielded
to; let us make the sacrifice of buying that
we may obtain the advantage of selling.
Persons who reason thus, are (I am
sorry to say), whether they know it or not, governed
by the protectionist principle. They are only
a little more inconsistent than the pure protectionists,
as these are more inconsistent than the absolute prohibitionists.
I will illustrate this by a fable.
STULTA AND PUERA (FOOL-TOWN AND BOY-TOWN).
There were, it matters not where,
two towns, Stulta and Puera, which at
great expense had a road built which connected them
with each other. Some time after this was done,
the inhabitants of Stulta became uneasy, and
said: Puera is overwhelming us with its
productions; this must be attended to. They established
therefore a corps of Obstructors, so called
because their business was to place obstacles in the
way of the wagon trains which arrived from Puera.
Soon after, Puera also established a corps
of Obstructors.
After some centuries, people having
become more enlightened, the inhabitants of Puera
began to discover that these reciprocal obstacles
might possibly be reciprocal injuries. They sent
therefore an ambassador to Stulta, who (passing
over the official phraseology) spoke much to this
effect: “We have built a road, and now we
put obstacles in the way of this road. This is
absurd. It would have been far better to have
left things in their original position, for then we
would not have been put to the expense of building
our road, and afterwards of creating difficulties.
In the name of Puera, I come to propose to you,
not to renounce at once our system of mutual obstacles,
for this would be acting according to a theory, and
we despise theories as much as you do; but to lighten
somewhat these obstacles, weighing at the same time
carefully our respective sacrifices.”
The ambassador having thus spoken, the town of Stulta
asked time to reflect; manufacturers, agriculturists
were consulted; and at last, after some years’
deliberation, it was declared that the negotiations
were broken off.
At this news, the inhabitants of Puera
held a council. An old man (who it has always
been supposed had been secretly bribed by Stulta)
rose and said: “The obstacles raised by
Stulta are injurious to our sales; this is
a misfortune. Those which we ourselves create,
injure our purchases; this is a second misfortune.
We have no power over the first, but the second is
entirely dependent upon ourselves. Let us then
at least get rid of one, since we cannot be delivered
from both. Let us suppress our corps of Obstructors,
without waiting for Stulta to do the same.
Some day or other she will learn to understand better
her own interests.”
A second counselor, a man of practice
and of facts, uncontrolled by theories and wise in
ancestral experience, replied: “We must
not listen to this dreamer, this theorist, this innovator,
this utopian, this political economist, this friend
to Stulta. We would be entirely ruined
if the embarrassments of the road were not carefully
weighed and exactly equalized, between Stulta
and Peura. There would be more difficulty
in going than in coming; in exportation than in importation.
We would be, with regard to Stulta, in the inferior
condition in which Havre, Nantes, Bordeaux, Lisbon,
London, Hamburg, and New Orleans, are, in relation
to cities placed higher up the rivers Seine, Loire,
Garonne, Tagus, Thames, the Elbe, and the Mississippi;
for the difficulties of ascending must always be greater
than those of descending rivers. (A voice exclaims:
’But the cities near the mouths of rivers have
always prospered more than those higher up the stream.’)
This is not possible. (The same voice: ‘But
it is a fact.’) Well, they have then prospered
contrary to rule.” Such conclusive
reasoning staggered the assembly. The orator
went on to convince them thoroughly and conclusively
by speaking of national independence, national honor,
national dignity, national labor, overwhelming importation,
tributes, ruinous competition. In short, he succeeded
in determining the assembly to continue their system
of obstacles, and I can now point out a certain country
where you may see road-builders and Obstructors
working with the best possible understanding, by the
decree of the same legislative assembly, paid by the
same citizens; the first to improve the road, the last
to embarrass it.