PAYMENT OF THE DEBTS
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sut,—Mr. H. B. Tune's method of making the foreigner pay was exploded twenty-five years ago when the late Mr. Joseph Chamberlain started the theory. Whatever duty is put on American goods has to be paid by the consumers in this country or the business is not transacted. Does the
foreigner pay the existing 10 per cent. duty If so, I should like to get back £200 I have just paid on imported raw materials.
Every duty that is put on raw materials lessens our export trade of manufactured goods, which is the only trade bringing wealth into the country. The home trade is only shuffling money from one pocket to another. So to talk about paying our debts by imposing duties on foreign imports is only loading the country with additional taxation, and at the same time, seeing that 75 per cent, of our imports consists of essentially raw and semi-raw materials, which is the very lifeblood of our manufacturing trade, tariffs, checking the inflow of such materials, kill our export trade of manu- factured goods and minimize our debt-paying capacity.—
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