PROTECTION v. FREE TRADE. TO THE EDITOR OF THE EVENING POST.

Evening Post, Volume XXII, Issue 74, 26 September 1881, Page 2

PROTECTION v. FREE TRADE. TO THE EDITOR OF THE EVENING POST.

Sir— To fully answer "J.G.'s" letter would require more space than pan well be afforded in a newspaper, but having had more experience than many of tho working of the laws concerning Proteotion and Froe Trade, 1 will give tho result of that oxperience for the benefit of younger men in view of the coming elections. Before tho year 1825 there were in England duties upon overy article that can bo imagined. As' examples of those in most general use, I will mention glass, leather, salt, soap, and candles, on each of which tho duty was 3d per lb. To begin with glass, t.hero were no largo shop windows in those days, only small panes as? . in dwellings, and in going to Franoe in 1822 I Was much struok with tho large windows and superabundance of glass in houses and shops. It was generally thought that if the duty were repealed we should be inundated with foreign glass to the destruction of onr home manufacturers, whereas what waa the result when, under Mr. Huskisaon'a inauguration of Free Trade ia 1829, tho duty - was repealed? Competition exoited the , aotivity and enterprise of our manufacturers who Boon proved that they oould beat all other nations, and glass was used for numerous purposes never dreamt of previously, and a person has only to walk not only through streets in England, but in any. town in the colonies, to imagine the quantity of glass used and tho number of persons omploved in its manufacture. Tho leather trade was precisely similar. We wore going to be inundated with imports from Franoe and Germany. After 1828 tho imports slightly increased, but the exports have inoroasod in a most extraordinary ratio to the present time, as may be seen by the Custom-house returns of the millions of hides and skins from all parts of the world to be manufactured either for home consumption or exportation, affording employment to thousands of tanners, curriers, bootmakers, Saddlers, and others at higher wages, whilst the cost of living haa been so much reduoed by the free importation of food. In tho days of proteotion the price of the quartern or 4}lb loaf was generally from Is to Is 4d ; soap and oom- , mon tallow candles, Is 2d per lb ; best white sugar, Is 2d. Tea paid an ad valorem duty of cent, per cent, upon the price at which it was sold by auotion by the East India Company, and was retailed at from 7s to 255. How would it suit our protectionists and working men to go back to those times P I should like to say a little respecting protection in America, but it would be making this letter too long. lam, &<j., B.C. 23rd September, 1881.