ges many specious reasons for his system, to a few of which
only do I intend to call attention to-day.

In the first place, it is urged that protection will develop the
resources of a country, which without it would remain undeveloped.
Of course this, to be of advantage to a country, must be a general
aggregate increase of development, for if it be an increase of some
resources as a result of diminution in others, the people as a whole can
be no better off after protection than before. But the general resources
cannot be increased by a tariff. There can only be such an increase by
an addition to the disposable capital of the country to be applied to
the development of resources. But legislation cannot make this. If it
could it would only be necessary to enact laws indefinitely to increase
capital indefinitely. But, if any legislation could accomplish this,
it would not be protective legislation. As already shown, the theory
of protection is to make prices higher, in order to make business
profitable. This necessarily increases the expense of production, which
keeps foreign capital away, because it can be employed in the protected
industries more profit-ably elsewhere. The domestic capital, therefore,
must be relied upon for the proposed development. As legislation cannot
increase that capital, if it be tempted by the higher prices to the
business protected, it must be taken from some other business or
investment. If there are more workers in factories there will be
fewer artisans. If there are more workers in shops there will be fewer
farmers. If there are more in the towns there will be fewer in the
country. The only effect of protection, therefore, in this point
of view, can be to take capital from some employment to put it into
another, that the aggregate disposable capital cannot be increased, nor
the aggregate development of the resources of a country be greater with
a tariff than without.

But, secondly, it is said that protection increases the number of
industries, thereby diversifying labor and making a variety in the
occupations of a people who otherwise might be confined to a single
branch of employment. This argument proceeds upon the assumption that
there would be no diversification of labor without protection. In other
words, it is assumed that but for protection our people would devote
themselves to agriculture. This, however, is not true. Even if a
community were purely agricultural, the necessities of t