11. Protection renders a country independent of foreigners.

This is only another form of that principle of isolation which, if fully carried out, would convert the various nations of the world into so many hostile tribes. In what possible way could mankind be benefited if each country were really to be commercially independent of every other? The evils and privations which all would suffer from such mutual estrangement are too obvious to require pointing out, but what would be the counterbalancing advantages? We can see but this solitary one—that, in case of war, the country that had no commercial intercourse with other countries would be free from any inconvenience that might be caused by hostile interference with such intercourse. This might, perhaps, hold good if every nation were perpetually at war with every other nation. But such a state of things never did and never could exist. Even under the present very imperfect system of international relations, wars are only occasional, and are never universal. Where, then, is the wisdom of a nation voluntarily inflicting on itself for all time the evils and inconveniences of isolation merely to avoid their possible temporary infliction by an enemy in case of war at some future uncertain period? It is thus that the coward commits suicide from fear of death. Is a man to deny himself all present enjoyments because he may some day or page 35 other be deprived of them by illness or misfortune? Are you never to carry about you in the streets a watch, or a purse, or a handkerchief, because it is possible that, sooner or later, they may be purloined by a pickpocket? If the mere fear of some future war is to divest us for ever of the benefits of commercial intercourse with other nations, it is one more to be added to the long train of evils which the war system inflicts on mankind.

Moreover, it is to be noted that full and free commercial intercourse does not imply the dependence of one country on the rest—it implies the mutual and equal interdependence upon each other of all countries. Interchanges presuppose benefit to both parties, or they would not be entered into. In the same way, the interruption which war would cause to such interchanges would prove equally injurious to both parties—to one just as much as to the other. The stronger the ties of mutual interest and the more numerous the points of pleasant and profitable contact, the greater will be the interdependence of nations upon each other. But that mutual interdependence does not place anyone of them at special disadvantage as compared with the rest. If there be any disadvantage when war supervenes, it will be common to all. They will occupy in this respect the same relative positions which they would have occupied if they had, during all the time that they were at peace, deprived themselves of the advantages of foreign trade. It is true that the more nations are knit together by the ties of mutual interest, the greater will be the reluctance to break through them, and the more they will all lose by substituting hostile collision for peaceful commerce. But the reluctance will be felt, and the loss will be shared alike by all of them. If there be a shade of difference between them, it may perhaps consist in this. The more largely and closely a nation is in connection with the rest of the world, the more independent will that nation be, supposing that its foreign commerce were partially disturbed by war with one or more other countries. That commerce would still continue, and would be carried on partly through its old and partly through fresh channels. What articles it might no longer procure from its enemies would, through its organised intercourse with neutrals, be page 36 abundantly poured in by the latter. Either from them or through them its wants would be supplied; and either by them or through them its productions would be taken in exchange.

In reference to this subject, we may quote a speech delivered by Macaulay in 1842. In answer to the argument that England ought only casually to be dependent on other countries, for food supply, he said that he "preferred constant to casual dependence, for constant dependence became mutual dependence . . . . As to war interrupting our supplies, a striking instance of the fallacy of that assumption was furnished in 1810, during the height of the continental system, when all Europe was against us, directed by a chief who sought to destroy us through our trade and commerce. In that year (1810) there were 1,600,000 quarters of corn imported, one-half of which came from France itself." Napoleon's Berlin decrees were far more oppressive and intolerable to the continental nations from which they nominally emanated than they were to England, against whom they were directed.

Thus that "independence of foreigners," on which Protectionists lay such stress, is a privilege acquired at an immense sacrifice of annual wealth, and which, when war supervenes to test its value, is found to be worthless. To secure it we are, according to this doctrine, to do without foreign trade during peace in order to teach us to do without it during war. We are to forego it when we can reap its benefits in order to inure us to the privation when we cannot. To sum up, the truth is that Independence of Foreigners Really means Commercial Isolation, which Nullifies International Division of Labour, Discourages Production, and Foments a Hostile Spirit Among Nations.