rospective
advantage, and if a majority decides whether or not a political and
economic doctrine is sound, it has a powerful backing, for every large
country in the civilized world, I think, except England, adheres to
protection; and some of them have returned to it after trying a measure
of commercial freedom. McKinley and the majority of Congress were in
full sympathy, and the Dingley act had the approval of the
administration. But the change in business conditions which, though long
in operation, became signally apparent after 1893, wrought in McKinley,
during his four and a half years of office, a change of opinion. Under
improved processes and economies in all branches of manufactures the
United States began to make many articles cheaper than any other
country, and sought foreign markets for its surplus, disputing
successfully certain open marts with England and Germany. In McKinley's
earlier utterances the home market is the dominating feature; in his
later ones, trade with foreign countries. In his last speech at Buffalo
he gave mature expression to his views, which for one who had been a
leader of protectionists showed him to have taken advanced ground. "We
find our long-time principles echoed," declared the _Nation_. McKinley's
manner of developing foreign trade was not that of the tariff reformers,
for he proposed to bring this about by a variety of reciprocity
treaties; but it was important that he recognized the sound economic
principle that if we are to sell to foreign countries we must buy from
them also. That McKinley had a strong hold on the country is
indisputable from the unanimous renomination by his party and his
triumphant reelection, and it was a step toward commercial freedom that
he who more than all other men had the ear of the country and who had
been an arch-protectionist should advocate the exchange of commodities
with foreign lands. Economists do not educate the mass of voters, but
men like McKinley do, and these sentences of his were read and pondered
by millions: "A system which provides a mutual exchange of commodities
is manifestly essential to the continued and healthful growth of our
export trade. We must not repose in fancied security that we can forever
sell everything and buy little or nothing. If such a thing were possible
it would not be best for us or for those with whom we deal." It is
useless to speculate on what would have been the result had McKinley
lived. Those who considere