Much ado about Tariffs

 A cartoon about tariffs from Puck magazine in 1908. History doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme sometimes. I remember learning about Tariff reforms in History class. In the 1900s, the British Empire was concerned over increased competition from other industrialised rivals and cheaper imports within the Imperial and domestic markets. One solution favoured by the Conservative party and some Liberal Imperialists* favoured a regime of tariffs on foreign goods.

Anonymous pro-Tariff Reform League image produced around 1911

 

The issue? Well aside from aiming at preserving national dominance and a literal Empire running there were very real dangers of mass starvation. 

Anti Tariff reform poster produced by the Liberal Party in 1905

 

Malnutrition was a major blight of the British population, with unimaginable levels of poverty. And this was with the cheap imported foods the poor could obtain. A price increase on these food stuffs would turn malnutrition into fatal starvation. I remember one statistic relating to the Second Boer War, malnutrition was so severe that in Manchester during one call up for volunteers the majority of men who answered had to be turned away on medical grounds, and three quarters of the men they did take were too weak to pass the bare minimum of official physical standards. The Liberals and the Labour Party eventually won the struggle over tariff reforms, a dispute that lead to a constitutional crisis and pushed the Liberals into an alliance with Labour and to shift away from laissez-faire economics to accept limited welfare provisions including the introduction of the first state pensions.

I like this pro-Tariff poster by the Tariff Reform League, published in 1909. It makes free trade sound great.

 

 

*This was how the split defined themselves, the rest of the Liberal Party and the young Labour Party were equally in favour of preserving the British Empire along with the Conservatives.