Page:The New Protectionism.djvu/109

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HOW TO MEET TRADE AGGRESSION
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the industries in which Germans are pre-eminent are those in which science, education, and business organization, count heavily. In order to defend ourselves, the obvious method is to cultivate these factors of success. Will a tariff help us here ? The general and natural tendency of Protection is to discourage energy, experiment, and progress, in technical and business methods. To decline competition and to shirk behind a tariff wall is not only a cowardly, but a singularly foolish, way of meeting the superiority of our trade rivals in certain industries. If this superiority is built on brains, science, and organization, we had better build our "defence" upon the same basis. Only thus can be got a really reliable defence. For the most striking fact in this type of scientific industry is that it is continually growing and changing. The so-called "key-industry" of to-day will not be the "key-industry" of to-morrow. War is an eye-opener in this matter. Sir Hugh Bell, in writing on the subject, makes a criticism which I commend

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