Page:The Economist 1843-08- Vol 1 Preliminary Number (IA sim economist 1843-08 1 preliminary-number).pdf/5

 sened; and at last, though not with less certainty, the agricultural interest, that interest which is most strongly protected by law, but far more strongly by the stern necessity which exists for their produce in priority to all other articles, was involved in the common lot of increased charges, diminished demand, and lower prices: and thus the narrow policy of restriction and protection worked mischief to all, benefit to none; for where is the interest which does not at this moment confess itself in a state of depression without parallel?—It is no longer complaints of a class, or of classes, it is a universal national embarrassment;—an embarrassment which has disturbed and complicated our commercial relations over the whole world.

?—who is the man that would remain as he is?—who is the man that would go back into greater restrictions, into a narrower field; into less demand? All now begin to feel and acknowledge that want of consumption is the true cause of depression and low prices,—that the real cause of all our evils is found in the want of employment for the labour, energy, and capital of the country as it now is: but how is that to be remedied? Only by extending our markets abroad, by increasing our exports: but we can only increase our exports by being willing to, and this can only be done from those large productive countries, the produce of which, at this time, is practically prohibited. No revision of the tariff will be of our factories of any practical benefit which will not admit in the greatest abundance all the first necessaries of life, and which does not open the markets of those great countries which produce them. It is of no avail to open freely our ports for articles of small and trifling consumption, to open our trade to small and comparatively unimportant specks on the ocean;-if we will really extend our trade, we must be willing to take freely and regularly articles of extensive consumption from countries of wide and rich territory, having great wants. We must be willing to take the corn of Prussia, Poland, and America; the sugar and coffee of Brazil, Cuba, and Java; and by the acts indicated in these two lines give to our great population, round whose well-being we have discovered all other interests revolve, the two-fold blessings of and.

We must retrace the whole of that narrow and ignorant legislation which seeks falsely and in vain to prop up and protect individual interests—which has only deceived and misled; we must rely alone on the great principles of public good for public prosperity. We must relieve industry and capital from all restrictions; we must know that there is no safety for our great active population but in the freest intercourse with the producers and consumers of all the world; in short, as the only true guarantee for prosperity and peace, we must honestly and fearlessly carry into practice those principles which all parties are ready to advocate in theory involved in

To no country in the world that ever did or does exist are these principles of the same first importance that they are to us, for in no country does so large a portion of the population and property depend on commerce and industry alone, in order that they shall have any value. We believe that this important and critical fact has been entirely overlooked, or has never been considered in one tithe of its importance. Let us consider what a huge portion of our property and reliance for employment consists of, and depends upon, the vast variety of factories, mills, and other manufacturing establishments, and their numberless aiders, assistants, contributors, and ministers, found in every variety in manufacturing districts; our extensive and rich kingdom of minerals; our canals, railroads, and various facilities of internal transport; our endless variety of public companies; our huge and splendid commercial marine; our docks, basins, and public warehouses; and our great cities attached to and dependent on the same interests.

Now the important fact to which we wish to draw attention is, that the labour and property thus involved, not only depend on trade, but on a, to retain any value whatever. As long as they are profitably employed they represent their full amount of cost in the sum of national wealth; and are of their full amount of utility in affording employment to the population: but with an increasing population and ingenuity always at work, supply must have a constant tendency to increase. If the demand for the produce be not correspondingly increased, but on the contrary, diminished, competition must become greater and greater, until all profit ceases; the capital is sunk, and until there is a loss competitors will persevere. When that period arrives, when the price of the goods will not repay the labour and cost of the raw material, then the whole of this property vanishes, and its means of giving employment to labour, and its various contributors, ceases: for of what value or utility is a factory, and all its magnificent and complicated machinery and arrangement, with its steam-engine still and motionless? As long as our mines of iron and of coal yield a profit, they represent at least the whole value of the labour employed in exploring them, and generally much more in the form of rent or royalty; but increase the quantity of iron or coal without an increase of demand, and competition will lower the prices, so that first all rent will vanish, and as soon as the price does not pay the expense and labour of raising the mineral, we are no richer with coal or iron fields than if they were beds of quicksand: their power of employing labour is at an end, and all the money invested ceases to be national wealth. As long as railways and canals are profitable, they truly represent in real wealth the capital invested: but diminish the amount of traffic only so much as pays the profit—until the receipts do not cover the necessary wear and tear and expenses—and they are no longer wealth. Increase our number of ships, without proportionably increasing the consumption of articles of foreign growth—first the competition will destroy the merchant's profit and yield only freight, but next competition will reduce freight, until the wages and expenses are not covered, and then all wealth in ships