advantage and needed markets abroad rather than monopoly of the home market. Hence the emphasis in tariff policy was upon protection to the farmer and upon foreign tariff favors to the manufacturer. Measured by American protectionist standards, the general level of duties was low; but those on agricultural products were nearly twice as high as those on manufactures. The former were urged in the interest of selfsufficiency, while the latter were regarded more often as "educational duties" in behalf of infant industries or as weapons with which to induce reasonable treatment from foreign countries. German economists have been sharply divided both as to the principle of protectionism and as to the importance of safeguarding the nation against overweening industrialization and dependence upon abroad for indispensable foodstuffs and materials.

Other Continental European Countries. The general trend in Italy has not been unlike that in France. From the unification of the kingdom in 1870 the tendency was toward greater freedom of trade. Increased public expenditures led to a general tariff revision in 1877 whereby higher duties were placed on all kinds of manufactures, while a few years later the agricultural depression was largely responsible for the Tariff Act of 1887 in which agrarian protection was the distinctive feature. After that date there seems to have been no abatement in the general protectionist tendency excepting a slight reaction shown in some of her commercial treaties.

The trend of Austrian policy was similar to that of Germany. Higher protection was inaugurated in 1878 and was the continuous policy down to the World War, although some modifications were made by commercial treaties with Germany and other powers. There was this distinctive difference between German and Austrian policies the former favored more essentially agrarian protection while the latter emphasized manufacturing protection.

Of the remaining countries of Continental Europe, Holland and Belgium might have been characterized at the outbreak of the World War as essentially free-trade countries; Greece, Switzerland, and the Scandinavian nations as countries of moderate protection with moderate protection tendencies; and Russia, Spain, and Portugal, as countries in which high protection tended to become more excessive. It should be noted, however, that in most protectionist countries of Europe the average duty was much lower than we are accustomed to consider characteristic of a protective tariff in the United States.

During the war there "The belligerents con

Post-war Tendencies in Europe. was little change in protective tariffs. trolled trade by prohibitions, embargoes, licensing and rationing systems, requisitions, and government monopolies . the neutrals had difficulty rather in obtaining supplies than in protecting their markets against competition. Even after the armistice, abnormal conditions continued for a time to afford complete protection without recourse to tariffs." 1 But with the progress of readjustment, tariff rates have been raised in almost all countries in Europe and elsewhere. In most cases, these increases have been ostensibly to meet revenue needs or to maintain the preëxisting measure of protection despite increased prices, dislocated exchanges, and the disturbed industrial balance among nations. Nations newly formed - Czecho-Slovakia, Jugo-Slavia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland — have also been experimenting with customs policies. It is too early to gauge accurately the significance of this post-war legislation in countries old or new. It has its cross currents; it is subject to frequent revision; some of it is plainly labeled "temporary" or "emergency emergency "; so-called permanent measures are only gradually taking shape. But undoubtedly much of it marks a decided advance over pre-war

1 Annals, 94: 180.

standards of protection. Heightened national feeling; hatred, fear, and suspicion; concern for "key" industries and increased self-sufficiency as elements of preparedness; pressure of war-fostered industries, and alarm at the prospect of dumping" - all have come to reënforce the customary demands of special interests. Apparently war has ushered in an era of general protectionist advance; but Great Britain is the only important country in which it seems to have brought a sharp reaction in tariff policy.

The Protectionist Reaction in Great Britain. - For thirty years after the repeal of the Corn Laws, the free-trade régime went practically unchallenged in England. Agriculture prospered and manufacturers and traders still had no fear of foreign competition. Before 1880, however, came signs of a revival of protectionist sentiment which has animated a "tariff reform movement in that country ever since. It was precipitated and stimulated by industrial and agricultural depressions which focused attention upon (1) the increasing severity of the competition of overseas foodstuffs in the home market; (2) the growing effectiveness of commercial and industrial rivals in European markets; and (3) the disadvantageous position of England as a tariff bargainer with continental powers, since under free trade she had no concessions to grant in return for those of other nations. During the last two decades of the century, protectionist policies were developing in the British Dominions, the mother country was not maintaining her old position in the trade of her colonies, and her exports in general were not keeping pace with the growth either of her population or of the exports of other countries.

The movement for a change of British commercial policy has run through several phases. At first the emphasis was on reciprocity as a means of strengthening England's position in tariff bargaining with other nations; free admission of for

eign products was to be conditioned upon reciprocal concessions. Soon imperial preference pushed to the fore, with a view to freer and closer commercial relations with the colonies and to the greater self-sufficiency of the empire. Under the leadership of Joseph Chamberlain after 1903 the movement for protection to British industries was skillfully combined with that for preference to the colonies. His program won a notable following; but not until 1906 did the Unionist party become definitely committed to it, and thereafter, until the World War, Government was in the hands of free-trade Liberals.

The war aided the tariff reform movement. In the Dominions, it strengthened adherence to protectionism. In Britain, it "stimulated the national sentiment of the people and their interest in and appreciation of the people of the Dominions and colonies. It brought to power as members of the coalition cabinets the leaders of the movement for 'tariff reform.' And it led to the imposition of duties and of import restrictions which, though they were introduced for military reasons, were in effect protective measures and which, though avowedly temporary, presented free traders with faits accomplis, putting them at the disadvantage of opposing vested interests." 99 1

The outstanding features of recent protectionist and preferential legislation may be summarized as follows: (a) In 1915 heavy import duties were laid on clocks and watches, automobiles and motorcycles, musical instruments, and cinematograph films. These duties, at first sumptuary in purpose but now clearly protective in effect, have been retained since the war; and since 1919 colonial products have enjoyed a preferential reduction from these rates as well as from the regular revenue rates on imported tea, coffee, cocoa, sugar, dried fruits, tobacco, and alcoholic beverages. (b) An act of 1920

1 Tariff Commission, Report on Colonial Tariff Policies, 831.

prohibits the importation (except as licensed) of a large class of dyestuffs, unless they have been produced within the British Empire. (c) The Safeguarding of Industries Act of 1921 authorizes a surtax of thirty-three and one third per cent ad valorem on foreign goods other than food and drink, when deemed necessary to protect British manufacturers against dumping. (See Ch. VII.) To safeguard certain "key" industries regarded as essential to national safety, the same law stipulates that for five years a duty of thirty-three and one third per cent ad valorem shall be paid on designated classes of commodities, e.g. optical glass and optical instruments, scientific glassware, laboratory porcelain, hosiery needles, scientific instruments, magnetos, tungsten, compounds of rare earth metals, and certain chemicals; but from these five-year duties, all products of the British Empire are declared exempt. The doors of protection and preference are ajar. How wide they will swing is of course problematical. But “dumping and "key industries" are elastic terms, and the Board of Trade is given considerable discretion.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

A. Consult bibliographies of chapters III and VII.

B. Library of Congress: Lists of References on Foreign Tariffs (1906) and the British Tariff Movement (1904); U. S. Tariff Acts, 1789-1909 (House Doc. 671, 61st Cong., 3d Sess.); Department of Commerce: Tariff Series, Foreign Tariff Notes, and Commerce Reports; Tariff Commission Reports; Tariff Hearings before Ways and Means Committees; Congressional Record; Messages of the Presidents;

U. S. Tariff Board Reports, 1909-1912.

D. ASHLEY, P., Modern Tariff History; DAY, History of Commerce; DAWSON, Protection in Germany; MEREDITH, Protection in France; CHOMLEY, Protection in Canada and Australia; RUTTER, Tariff Systems of South America; DRACHMANN, Industrial Development and Commercial Policies of Scandinavian Countries; CLAPHAM, Economic Development of France and Germany; PORRIT, Sixty Years of Protection; Tariff Commission Report on Colonial Tariff Policies, 810-833 and passim;