Tariff for revenue only sapped Norway's strength and ruined her industries. The heavy burden of taxation fell upon her common people and crushed them. Tariff for revenue only will bring the same calamity upon the American people. This is proved in this article.

The last session of the Norwegian parliament recently held, witnessed a new departure in fiscal legislation, which briefly may be characterized as a determined effort to relieve the common people and the industries of the country of some of the burdens imposed by a ruinous tariff policy. Although Norway is a country with limited resources, her experience in tariff legislation is instructive and valuable. It illustrates with unmistakable plainness 2that the inevitable effects of a tariff for revenue are impoverishment for the common people.

Norway was one of the first countries in Europe to embrace the economic gospel of Richard Cobden. Towards the close of the corn-law campaign in England, a young man of eminent ability was appointed to teach political economy in the University of Christiania, and with him, free trade made its entrance into Norway. His work soon bore fruit. The university began to grind out free traders at a rapid rate, and gradually the press drifted into the hand of these young and aggressive followers of the great prophet of England. The Norwegian people, generally so slow and deliberate in their movements, were converted to the new gospel in an incredibly short time. Opposition was silenced, and the doctrine of protection was commonly regarded as economic lunacy. Cobden had no sooner scored his triumph on foreign soil by the conclusion of the commercial treaty between England and the empire of Napoleon III, than Norway followed in the footsteps of France, adjusted her import duties on a tariff for revenue basis only and concluded a series of commercial treaties by which she bound herself to 3adhere to the new policy for a number of years. Thus free trade was firmly established in Norway.

Various reasons of a fiscal and industrial nature account for Norway's easy conversion to the new policy. In the first place, the expenses of the government made it necessary to levy duties on all or nearly all articles of import as well as a few articles of export. The raising of revenue consequently must be one of the main objects of any tariff which might have been adopted. Moreover, from a fiscal point of view, the lowering lumber and fish products. In exchange for these concessions, Norway exposed her tiny industrial plants to practically unrestricted foreign competition, and placed the main burden of taxation upon the shoulders of the common people by raising about two-thirds of her total revenue from heavy import duties on a few articles of common consumption, especially coffee, sugar, tea, illuminating oils and tobacco. In other words, she adopted the very policy which the Democratic party endeavors to establish in this country.

The new policy was inaugurated under favorable auspices, and for a time 4all went well. There was a steady and increasing foreign demand for lumber and fish products; imports increased enormously, and business flourished. The source of all this apparent prosperity was the phenomenal growth of Norwegian shipping. With a population of less than 2,000,000 people, Norway in a few years attained the rank of the third maritime power in the world. Her flag floated over all the seas, and the net income of her ocean trade, some $25,000,000 annually, was sufficient to cover the large difference of value between imports and exports and thus keep the balance of trade even. Free trade was worshiped as the mother of the new activity and what appeared to be the rapid accumulation of wealth.

This spell of an illusory prosperity did not last long, only some fifteen years. By that time iron and steam had largely displaced the old wooden vessels, and in consequence the value of Norway's magnificent fleet of clippers was almost destroyed. They could not be employed profitably. A large and steadily increasing adverse balance of trade stared the nation in the face. The conclusion was inevitable. Gold flowed out of the country to pay for imports; business was at a standstill, employment was scarce, 5wages fell, and the country sank gradually deeper into the quagmire of a financial and industrial crisis. As if carried by contagion, a general bankruptcy swept the whole line of coastal cities, so prosperous and flourishing during the first years of free trade. In some of them nearly every business house was wrecked.

Nor was this all, nor perhaps the worst effects of the free trade policy. The most deplorable feature of the situation was that the people found themselves practically helpless. They had learned to consume more liberally, depending upon foreign countries for manufactured articles. These they were no longer able to buy in sufficient quantities while they were as unable to manufacture them for themselves. Now it became evident how completely free trade had sapped the strength of the country. Its manufacturing industries, never of great importance, had scarcely made any progress whatever. Many industries had been wiped out of existence by foreign competition. The once prosperous tradesmen in the cities were ruined, as was also the very creditable domestic industry of the rural districts. The country was 6flooded with foreign goods and overrun by foreign traveling men, mainly Germans, who in many instances penetrated into the valleys to compete with the country merchants. Their goods were cheap, of course, because Norway was made a dumping ground for part of the surplus German goods. The country was no longer able to sustain its growing population, and the emigration to this country reached enormous figures. The heavy flow of people to America, especially to Chicago and the middle west, dates back to the first years of the depression produced by the free trade policy. A majority of the Norwegian born citizens of the Northwest have come to this country since then. To them the picture outlined above will be very familiar. They left Norway as free traders and many of them have probably remained free traders ever since. Some possibly never dreamed that free trade had anything whatever to do with their coming to America. But if they look back upon conditions in their old homes in the light of their wider experience, they cannot fail to perceive [the fact]that Norway's tariff for revenue only was one of the main sources of the evils from which they fled.

The severe lesson was not taught entirely in vain. The period of pinching 7was a good time for reflection. Some began to question the infallibility of the Cobden gospel. As usual in the politics of Norway, the farmers took the lead. They had suffered severely from American competition and were rapidly going to the wall. They wanted protection and had the power to enforce their demand. The writer happened to be on a visit to Norway some five years ago, when the protection sentiment began to make itself felt. The discussion and reasoning of the people were curious. Nearly everybody was firmly convinced that free trade was all right and protection all wrong. Still the conclusion was that there was nothing to do but to apply the remedy of protection. The hands of the country were tied, however, by commercial treaties. For the time being, little could have been done in the way of increasing the duties on manufactured articles, even if the country had been ready for the change. A cautious beginning was made by raising duties on agricultural products. The experiment was satisfactory, and gradually further steps were taken in the same direction. Meanwhile the protection sentiment attained greater strength and consistency. A demand arose for protection of manufacturers, and it is plainly only a question of time until the tariff laws of Norway will be revised with a 8view to protecting home industries. The last Storthing [Parliament] made a beginning. But public opinion is clearly in advance of legislation. Norway has very promising possibilities in the line of woolen manufactures, and the people demand ample protection for this industry. They do not regard an advalorem duty of 50 per cent on woolens as too high a price for the boon of wearing homemade clothes.

Skandinaven (Daily Edition), Sept. 19, 1892.

However, it is the heavy burden a tariff revenue throws upon the common people which mainly, thus far, has attracted the attention of Norwegian statesmen. This burden had at last become unbearable, and the last Storthing found itself compelled to do something to relieve it. It reduced the duties on sugar and illuminating oils, although it could not do so except by resorting to the extremely unpopular measure of imposing a direct tax on property and incomes. As is well known, this form of taxation is preferred to any other by a small number of theorists; but the great majority of both parties in Norway were opposed to it at heart. Its adoption was the work of necessity.

How to provide sufficient revenue will always be one of the main objects of tariff legislation in Norway. In other words, she is compelled to keep more or less close to the path of a tariff revenue. Even if the majority desired it, she could not at this time adopt a tariff for protection pure and simple, because such a tariff would not produce sufficient revenue. The Norwegian people know this perfectly well. Their change of heart on the tariff issue is therefore all the more remarkable. The country is still hampered and its hands tied by bungling commercial treaties. They all contain the favored nation clause, and unscientific, unbusinesslike arrangement which generally impairs the usefulness of such treaties and often destroys their value. What will best serve Norway's interests are of course reciprocity arrangements with the various nations with which she has intercourse. This would enable her to revise her tariff duties with greater freedom and with a view to giving greater and more effective protection to her home industries.

Norway's painful experience and her efforts to get away from a disastrous policy adds a fresh chapter to the history of destruction and ruin wrought 10by free trade. This lesson may be studied to great advantage by our own people. It illustrates plainly and forcefully how thoroughly free trade saps and drains the strength of a nation, only to leave it a helpless wreck on the rocks of general impoverishment and bankruptcy, unable to supply its wants because [it is]incapacitated for production either for home consumption or [foreign]exchange. Nearly every newspaper in the Northwest has many readers whose experiences in their old homes form a part of this very lesson. The change in the public sentiment in Norway as evidenced by her recent tariff and fiscal legislation must needs appeal to them with particular force. But here we are met by the curious coincidence, that while the Norwegians in Norway have been endeavoring to get away from the free trade, a considerable number of the Norwegians in America have kept on worshiping the old idol and voting for the very policy which drove them out of their native country. Generally speaking, the Norwegians in America are ahead of their kinsmen across the sea; but in this particular instance they seem to lag far behind.