Protection or Free Trade
Henry George's 1886 case for free trade — arguing protection cannot help labour because its gains are absorbed by land rent. The first book read in full into the US Congressional Record.
Summary
Protection or Free Trade (1886) is Henry George's contribution to the great 19th-century tariff debate. It is notable both as economics and as rhetoric — in 1892 it became the first book read in its entirety into the Congressional Record (by several congressmen in relay), and Milton Friedman later praised it as among the most rhetorically brilliant works on trade.
Argument
George makes the free-trade case but with a Georgist twist: protectionism cannot durably raise wages, because any gains to labour are ultimately absorbed into land rent (the logic later called ATCOR). Tariffs merely tax consumers to enrich protected interests. True "free trade," George argues, requires not just abolishing tariffs but freeing land — removing the private monopoly that lets landowners capture the gains from any economic improvement. Free trade without land reform is incomplete.
Significance
The book connected George's land thesis to the central political-economy debate of his era and won him admirers across the free-trade movement, including those who never embraced the full single tax.
See Also
Sources
- Henry George (1886), Protection or Free Trade. Full text via the Henry George Institute. henrygeorge.org