orward, _under the special allegation that it
would not exist but for a protective tax_, as a proof that protective
taxes are wise. But if it be true that the thread-mill would not exist
but for the tax, or that the operatives would not get such good wages
but for the tax, then how can we form a judgment as to whether the
protective system is wise or not unless we call to mind all the
seamstresses, washer-women, servants, factory-hands, saleswomen,
teachers, and laborers' wives and daughters, scattered in the garrets
and tenements of great cities and in cottages all over the country, who
are paying the tax which keeps the mill going and pays the extra wages?
If the sewing-women, teachers, servants, and washer-women could once be
collected over against the thread-mill, then some inferences could be
drawn which would be worth something. Then some light might be thrown
upon the obstinate fallacy of "creating an industry," and we might
begin to understand the difference between wanting thread and wanting a
thread-mill. Some nations spend capital on great palaces, others on
standing armies, others on iron-clad ships of war. Those things are all
glorious, and strike the imagination with great force when they are
seen; but no one doubts that they make life harder for the scattered
insignificant peasants and laborers who have to pay for them all. They
"support a great many people," they "make work," they "give employment
to other industries." We Americans have no palaces, armies, or
iron-clads, but we spend our earnings on protected industries. A big
protected factory, if it really needs the protection for its support,
is a heavier load for the Forgotten Men and Women than an iron-clad
ship of war in time of peace.

It is plain that the Forgotten Man and the Forgotten Woman are the
real productive strength of the country. The Forgotten Man works and
votes--generally he prays--but his chief business in life is to pay.
His name never gets into the newspapers except when he marries or dies.
He is an obscure man. He may grumble sometimes to his wife, but he does
not frequent the grocery, and he does not talk politics at the tavern.
So he is forgotten. Yet who is there whom the statesman, economist, and
social philosopher ought to think of before this man? If any student of
social science comes to appreciate the case of the Forgotten Man, he
will become an unflinching advocate of strict scientific thinking in
sociology, and a hard-h