For if prohibition had never existed, labor would have classed itself
in accordance with the law of exchange, and no displacement would have
taken place. If, on the contrary, prohibition has brought in an
artificial and unproductive kind of work, it is prohibition, and not
free trade, which is responsible for the inevitable displacement, in
the transition from wrong to right.
Unless, indeed, it should be contended that, because an abuse cannot
be destroyed without hurting those who profit by it, its existence for
a single moment is reason enough why it should endure forever.
CHAPTER XXI.
RAW MATERIAL.
It is said that the most advantageous commerce consists in the
exchange of manufactured goods for raw material, because this raw
material is a spur to _national labor_.
And then the conclusion is drawn, that the best custom-house
regulation would be that which should give the utmost possible
facility to the entry of _raw material_, and oppose the greatest
obstacles to articles which have received their first manipulation by
labor.
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