“An unlikely insult has emerged on the 2024 presidential campaign trail: ‘Herbert Hoover,’ wrote Catherine Lucy and Ken Thomas for The Wall Street Journal.[1] Both former President Donald J. Trump and President Joe Biden have both talked about Hoover in a negative manner.[2] President Biden has even gone as far to label the former President “Donald ‘Herbert Hoover’ Trump.”[3] Interestingly, even while using Hoover as a verbal insult both President Biden and former President Trump are advocating policies similar to Hoover, especially trade protectionism. Attacking Hoover is something that receives bipartisan support across political parties and the political divided. George H. Nash, a historian and Hoover biographer, argues that Hoover is a leading economic indicator, that is, his name always comes up during poor economic times.[4] Nash argues that Hoover continues to remain “a historical punching bag, a symbol of hard times, ineptitude, and indifference.”[5]
The reason for this is Hoover is remembered and blamed for the Great Depression. Specifically, the policies that Hoover supported during his time in office cause the most vitriol, especially the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. The Smoot-Hawley Tariff is the most controversial of all economic policies of the twentieth century. It is universally blamed for not only deepening the Great Depression and the destruction of international trade, but even creating the seeds for the second World War.[6] Nevertheless, the policy of trade protectionism was a pillar of Republican economic orthodoxy and Herbert Hoover was a strong defender of tariffs.
President Hoover’s support of Smoot-Hawley was consistent with his political philosophy, and he supported the Republican preference that a protective tariff not only benefited the economy but served to protect the wages of labor. Both conservative and progressive Republicans believed that a higher tariff was needed to protect not only wages, but American agriculture and industry from cheaper foreign goods. Hoover’s support of protective tariffs resulted from a long-standing tradition within the Republican Party that opposed both free trade and a lower tariff for just revenue.
In addition, Hoover’s support for a new tariff to combat the Depression showed that he believed in the philosophy that protectionism was a proper economic tool to help revive and strengthen the economy. President Hoover’s support of the protectionist policy and his support of Smoot-Hawley was based on orthodox Republican economic philosophy, and it will be demonstrated that the infamous tariff law was not the monstrosity that it has become known as today.
The tariff has always been an issue of controversy. Alexander Hamilton, who served as Secretary of the Treasury under President George Washington, recommended in his Report on Manufactures that Congress establish protective tariffs to protect both manufacturing and wages.[7] Hamilton was the architect of Federalist economic policy, which became known as the American System.[8] This was later supported by National Republicans and later Whigs led by Henry Clay and Daniel Webster.[9] The issue of protective tariffs also resulted in sharp criticism from Democratic-Republicans and later the Democrat Party. Critics of the tariff policy argued that it benefited only a select group of manufactures at the expense of agriculture and consumers, who would be forced to pay a higher price. Even with all the controversy the tariff itself would have broad support, but it came down to whether the policy would consist of a low tariff for raising revenue or a high tariff in order to protect manufacturing. The tariff served as the prime source of revenue for the federal government, which is one reason it received broad support, but it still generated tremendous debate over trade policy.
The Republican Party would embrace the Hamiltonian view of protectionism and support a high tariff to protect manufacturing and labor against foreign competition. This policy remained strong in the Republican presidential administrations from Abraham Lincoln through Herbert Hoover.[10] “Republican presidents—from Abraham Lincoln to Theodore Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover—proudly declared themselves ‘protectionists’ and dismissed Democratic opponents as ‘English free traders,’” wrote Alfred E. Eckes.[11] Republicans agreed with the philosophical view of Hamilton and Clay’s American System that the tariff benefited the entire nation and that free trade would lead to “low wages and ruin.”[12]
The policy of protectionism was not just an economic or political issue. It was also based on a philosophical and intellectual tradition. As an example, Henry C. Carey became the leading economic theorist of protectionism, and his ideas influenced many Republican policymakers including President Abraham Lincoln.[13] In the aftermath of the American Civil War the protective tariff was an important part of the rise of industrial America, and it received support from leading industrialists.[14] For many Republicans during this era the tariff, the gold standard, and limiting immigration became important economic policy pillars.[15]
The Republican Party from its founding up until 1952 held the principle of protectionism in high regard in party platforms. This did not mean that the tariff did not cause internal debate within the Republican Party. Progressive Republicans, especially from agricultural and Western states, tended to support a lower tariff. This was the opposite of conservative Republicans, especially from Eastern states, which supported the policy of protection. Republicans who strongly believed in the policy of protectionism believed that it represented “a true American policy that embodied national values.”[16] This was especially true of Republican leaders such as James G. Blaine, President Benjamin Harrison, and President William McKinley.
Progressive Republicans such as President Theodore Roosevelt even embraced the tariff. Nevertheless, many Republican progressives in the early years of the twentieth century started to “regard the tariff as a relic of an older political system.”[17] The debate over the tariff was just one issue that led progressive Republicans to turn on President William Howard Taft, which led to the 1912 civil war within the party. Even with the controversy over the tariff between progressive and conservative Republicans, the Grand Old Party, or “Grand Old Protectionists,” still made the policy of protectionism front and center within their platforms and campaigns. During the 1916 presidential campaign, Charles Evans Hughes, who was the Republican nominee, made the policy of protectionism the center of his campaign against President Woodrow Wilson.[18]
Progressives in both political parties started to challenge the policy of protectionism. This was certainly true of the Democrat progressive populist William Jennings Bryan and Southern Democrats continued their apprehension of the tariff. Progressive intellectuals such as President Woodrow Wilson started to not only challenge the very foundations of constitutionalism, but also advocate complete free trade. “The old political formulas do not fit the present problems; they read now like documents taken out of a forgotten age,” wrote Wilson.[19] Wilson was not just critical of the Constitution and the principles of the American Founding, which he considered to be obsolete and flawed, but he also argued that the tariff was no longer necessary. Wilson was an advocate for abandoning the protective tariff and embracing free trade, a position that would later be fully embraced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.[20]
In the aftermath of the Great War and the defeat of the Democrat Party in the 1920 election not only represented a rejection of Wilson’s progressive liberal internationalism, but the landslide victory of the Republicans met a return of protectionism. Senator Warren G. Harding won the presidential election of 1920 in a landslide and his victory meant not only the return of conservatism, but also protectionism. Harding was a strong defender of the protective tariff. The Republican Party platform of 1920 reaffirmed its belief in protectionism and called for a new tariff for the “preservation of the home-market, for American labor, agriculture, and industry.”[21] The Democrat Party platform called for a revenue tariff, which meant a low tariff.[22] “I believe in the protective tariff policy and know we will be calling for its saving Americanism again,” stated Harding in his address accepting the Republican nomination.[23]
Harding’s administration was confronted with a severe economic crisis in the aftermath of the Great War, the depression of 1920-1921, and the tariff would be one part of the policy response. Harding not only called for an emergency tariff, but the United States must “readjust our tariff, and this time with special regard for the new economic menace to our American agriculture as well as manufacturing.”[24] By readjustment Harding meant a higher tariff which would help in the “preservation of the home market for American labor, American agriculture, and American industry.”[25] A higher tariff would protect the American market from foreign competition and it would also help the suffering agricultural sector of the economy.[26] The benefits of the tariff, Harding argued, included protection of both labor and agriculture from being “exploited” by “unfair competition” from foreign nations.[27] As Harding told Congress, “I believe in the protection of American industry, and it is our purpose to prosper America first.”[28]
Harding shared Hamilton’s view of American economic independence. “I believe in the self-sustaining, independent, self-reliant nation, agriculturally, industrially, and politically. We are then the guarantors of our own security and are equal to the task.”[29] Further, Harding’s support for a higher tariff was shared by key members of his administration including Vice President Calvin Coolidge, Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon, and Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover. As will be seen, while Hoover supported and defended the policy of protection, he did not support the policy as strongly as Harding, Coolidge, and Mellon. As an example, Christian A. Herter, who served as an assistant to Hoover, wrote to the editor of Riverside Press correcting their editorial which stated that Hoover had opposed the emergency tariff.[30] “Mr. Hoover not only did not oppose the Emergency Tariff Act, but urged it very strongly,” wrote Herter.[31]
For Harding the tariff was a crucial ingredient for economic recovery and “one who values American prosperity and maintained American standards of wage and living can have no sympathy with the proposal that easy entry and the flood of imports will cheapen our costs of living…”[32] “It is more likely to destroy our capacity to buy,” stated Harding.[33]
Congress would pass Harding’s emergency tariff, but the major tariff policy would come with passage of the Fordney-McCumber Tariff in 1922.[34] Leading up to the passage of Fordney-McCumber, Harding argued that trade was important, but it should not come at the expense of American industry, agriculture, and labor.[35] Harding wanted economic independence. “I want the self-reliant America, self-reliant agriculturally, self-reliant politically, a nation free and independent to maintain its own great place in the world,” stated Harding.[36] Representative Joseph Fordney, chair of the Ways and Means Committee and architect of the tariff bill argued that “American prosperity in the past has been founded on protection to American products from ruinous foreign competition.”[37]
Fordney made a similar argument that Republicans had used in the past that a protective tariff “would protect farmers from imports, create more jobs for workers, and safeguard industry against the revival of European competitors.”[38] This also included safeguarding American wages from the “low-paid labor of foreign countries.”[39] In describing his tariff bill Fordney stated that “this act is salvation.”[40] William E. Brigham, writing on behalf of the Home Market Club, which published the journal The Protectionist, argued that Fordney-McCumber was necessary because “if American industry halts and falls, through foreign competition, the American farmer goes down with it,” referring to the argument that the tariff linked all sectors of the economy.[41]
The passage of Fordney-McCumber “represented a return to pre-World War I protection, for Congress feared European producers could undersell U.S. manufacturers.”[42] It also established some of the highest tariff rates in American history.[43] Representative Fordney and Senator Porter McCumber, who were the chief authors, were both representatives “of the economic nationalists of this period.”[44] The Fordney-McCumber Act also demonstrated the divisive nature of the tariff between progressives, conservatives, agriculture, industry, and labor interests.[45] This was one criticism of those who opposed the policy of protectionism is that it not only was a feeding ground for special interests, but it created favoritism or what is referred to today as the government picking winners and losers.
Nevertheless, the tariff received support from conservative Republicans such as Secretary of the Treasury Mellon.[46] In an attempt to reform tariff policy and reduce the “politics” of the tariff, Fordney-McCumber created a flexible tariff provision, which allowed the President to raise or lower rates by 50 percent.[47] This followed up on a previous reform which created the Tariff Commission, which was designed to further remove the politics of setting tariff rates.
Representative Edward Nelson Dingley, who had authored the Dingley Tariff, argued that Fordney-McCumber would not hurt consumers and it “embodies the idea of American protection, which wrought such splendid results between 1898 and 1912.”[48] “The purpose of the measure is to reestablish the old truth that America is for Americans,” stated Dingley.[49] As Secretary of Commerce, Hoover lent his support to both the emergency tariff and Fordney-McCumber. Prior to joining the Harding administration Hoover had been viewed with suspicion by conservative Republicans for his service in President Wilson’s administration and his close association with progressives. Kendrick Clements wrote that Hoover’s Commerce Department “constantly warned American manufacturers about the dangers of foreign competition…”[50]
Hoover’s philosophy toward tariffs was complicated and he landed somewhere in between the view that tariffs should be low and only for revenue and the belief that tariffs had to be high to protect American economic interests. Hoover, in private believed that Fordney-McCumber had set tariff rates too high, but he believed that a tariff was necessary for both agriculture and industry.[51] Even with those private concerns about the high tariff rates, Hoover argued that Fordney-McCumber did lead to “rising American living standards,” which were “attributable in part to protectionism.”[52] In addition, he argued that this led to a greater demand for imported products and it increased American exports, and overall he argued that Fordney-McCumber had “little effect on trade.”[53]
In the aftermath of the passage of the Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act, Hoover argued that the “primary concern of government must be to see that people are employed and fed,” which was in response to the depression of 1920-1921 that had just ended.[54] Hoover also argued that the flexible tariff provision was the “most important provision that we have seen in many years.”[55] As President, Hoover would fight for further reform in both the flexible tariff and creating a “scientific tariff,” which would eliminate the politics and special interest fighting over tariff rates. A “scientific tariff” referred to rates being established by fact and need versus pressure from various special interests who were arguing for higher, lower, or even being exempt. Finally, Hoover agreed with the defenders of Fordney-McCumber that the “increase in duties under this tariff are not going to bring about the destruction of our export trade which some persons so gloomily announce.”[56]
With the unexpected death of President Harding, Coolidge assumed the presidency and he continued the administration’s economic agenda, including the preference for protective tariffs. “My observation of protectionism is that it has been successful in practice, however unsound it may appear to be in theory. That must mean the theories have not taken account of all the facts,” stated Coolidge in 1920.[57] President Coolidge did not initiate any effort to reform Fordney-McCumber.[58]Under the flexible provision, Coolidge could had adjusted rates, but he did not believe it was necessary.[59]
Robert H. Ferrell notes that under Fordney-McCumber rates averaged “38.5 percent on dutiable imports, compared with 27 percent for the Underwood-Simmons Act and 40.8 percent under the Payne-Aldrich Tariff of 1909.”[60] Ferrell argued that the “opportunity for more liberal trade was present, but the president and probably most of his countrymen believed that it was more advisable to ‘buy American.’”[61] President Coolidge also appointed protectionist members to the Tariff Commission, which was chaired by Thomas O. Marvin, who was a member of the Home Market Club of Boston.[62]
Coolidge shared the economic nationalism of Harding. “We do not need to import any foreign economic ideas or any foreign government. We had better stick to the American brand of government, the American brand of equality, and the American brand of wages. America had better stay American,” stated Coolidge.[63] Coolidge even credited two policies that led to the economic growth of his era, and these included “restrictive immigration” and “a tariff for protection.”[64] Coolidge, echoing both Presidents William McKinley and Harding, argued that free trade is a devils bargain for “cheap goods,” which would only lead to lower wages and a lower standard of living.[65] “By restrictive immigration, by adequate protection, I want to prevent America from producing cheap men,” stated Coolidge.[66]
Hoover, who was continuing to serve as Secretary of Commerce under Coolidge, agreed with the President’s view of the tariff. On the campaign trail during the presidential campaign of 1924, Hoover argued in Colorado that the “Fordney Tariff” provided greatly for the economy, especially agriculture.[67] Hoover dismissed arguments that the tariff only benefited eastern manufacturing and he stated that Fordney-McCumber was a protection that benefited both labor and agriculture.[68] “If there is a ‘citadel of privilege’ gaining vast benefits out of the tariff, the Colorado farmer sits in this citadel,” stated Hoover.[69] Hoover echoed Coolidge when he argued that “without the protective tariff it means a loss of agriculture. It means a degradation of homes; it means a loss of jobs to those who work for wages in industry.”[70]
The Republican platform of 1924 reaffirmed the party’s commitment to protectionism. The platform described the tariff as “the American policy,” and it credited “America’s industrial development” as a result of the policy of protection.[71] The Fordney-McCumber Tariff was defended as being a policy that benefited manufacturing, agriculture, and protected wage earners.[72] Fordney-McCumber not only protected the American economy, but Republicans argued that it was the “greatest revenue-producing tariff ever enacted,” which helped both in the reduction of income tax rates and the national debt.[73]
The Democrat Party after a divided convention nominated John W. Davis, a Southern Democrat from West Virginia, who opposed protectionism.[74] Davis was “bitterly opposed to the Fordney-McCumber Tariff,” and he argued that tariffs only protected special interests, mainly manufacturing, and he advocated that the tariff should be repealed, and the nation should embrace more free trade.[75] Democrats argued that Fordney-McCumber “levies the highest tax upon the people and gives the highest protection to favored special interests of any high tariff law ever enacted by a Republican Congress.”[76]
Coolidge won the 1924 presidential election in a landslide and in his Inaugural Address he credited the tariff with the economic prosperity of the period. “Under the helpful influences of restrictive immigration and a protective tariff, employment is plentiful, the rate of pay is high, and wage earners are in a state of contentment seldom before seen,” stated Coolidge.[77] Overall the economic evidence of the 1920s seemed to support Coolidge’s argument even if agriculture was still struggling. “By 1926, the United States produced 42.2 percent of the world’s manufactured goods—as much as the next eight industrialized countries put together—and its foreign investments would grow from $7 billion to $17 billion over the course of the 1920s,” wrote Clements.[78] Hoover reinforced this in a 1926 speech he gave in Duluth, Minnesota and credited the tariff for helping increase economic growth.[79] “I will recollect that at the time the tariff law [Fordney-McCumber] was passed, it was predicted it would destroy our foreign trade, yet under our foreign commerce—both imports and exports—have steadily increased until they have reached the highest volume known in all the peacetime history of our country,” stated Hoover.[80] In Topeka, Kansas, Hoover defended the tariff as helping agriculture and warned that Democrat efforts to lower the tariff would undermine prosperity.[81]
Hoover warned that further protection may be warranted. “If foreign governments want to go into business, it is none of our concern. But the moment they force or allow unreasonable prices or engage in discrimination or put pressure on our citizens for any purpose, then promptly do our businessmen and consumers demand protection from our government,” stated Hoover in reinforcing his commitment to the policy of protection.[82] In addition, Hoover argued, just as with Coolidge, that the “Republican principle of protective tariff and controlled immigration has contributed to our higher standard of living, to our full employment, higher prices for our farmers than would otherwise have been the case.”[83] “It was predicted that this tariff law [Fordney-McCumber] would make the rich richer and the poor poorer, but there was never in the whole history of the country so little poverty and so wide diffusion of comfort as there is today,” argued Hoover.[84]
President Coolidge announced that he would not seek reelection in 1928 and the “Coolidge Prosperity” reaffirmed the arguments by both Coolidge and Hoover that the tariff and associated economic policies were creating prosperity. “From 1920 to 1929, total manufacturing output rose a bit over 50 percent, an aggregate figure that masked even more rapid rates of growth in major sectors of the economy,” wrote Michael A. Bernstein.[85] Bernstein notes that “by 1929, the economy of the United States produced four-tenths of the world’s coal, seven-tenths of the world’s petroleum, a third of the world’s hydroelectric power, half of the world’s steel, and virtually all of the world’s natural gas.”[86] Further, a consumer culture developed as demonstrated by the increase in both automobiles and radios. Bernstein notes that in 1919 6.6 million cars were registered and this increased to 23 million by the end of the decade, and “radio sales increased on the order of 1400 percent.”[87]
Labor productivity increased “close to 63 percent during the 1920s,” and the “national index of gross output of livestock and food crops rose almost 20 percent from 1921 to 19129.”[88] “The American economy showed great health and maturity” during the 1920s, argued Bernstein.[89] Gene Smiley wrote that “from the cyclical peak of 1923 to the cyclical peak in 1929, real per capita incomes rose by 2.13 percent per year.”[90] “After the recovery from the 1920-21 depression, the rate of unemployment averaged 3.3 percent per year, and the highest rate was in 1924 at 5 percent,” wrote Smiley.[91]
With Coolidge not running in 1928, Hoover was the frontrunner and eventual nominee of the Republican Party. During the campaign, Hoover ran on the Republican economic record, which included the protective tariff.[92] Although Hoover supported the policy of protection, he believed that the rates established under Fordney-McCumber were high enough for manufacturing, but further protection was needed for agriculture.[93] During the campaign, Hoover not only reinforced his support of protectionism, but credited it as essential to continuing economic growth.[94] “The first of our policies which have given security and expansion of employment has been the enactment of the protective tariff,” stated Hoover.[95]
Hoover emphasized during the campaign that the tariff was essential for helping agriculture. This was a prime focus of his campaign. “An adequate tariff is the foundation of farm relief…The domestic market must be protected,” stated Hoover.[96] In addition, Hoover stated that “the first and most complete necessity is that the American farmer have the American market. That can be assured to him solely through the protective tariff.”[97] It was not just agriculture, but Hoover went further in when he argued that tariff was necessary to protect “the wage level of the American worker” and manufacturing needed to be protected from foreign competition.[98] He also defended the Fordney-McCumber tariff on the campaign trail arguing that it “has been accompanied by employment and prosperity.”[99] It was the “enactment of adequate protective tariff and immigration laws which have safeguarded our workers and farmers from floods of goods and labor from foreign countries…,” argued Hoover in defending the Harding-Coolidge policies.[100]
Leslie M. Shaw, who was the former Governor of Iowa and Secretary of the Treasury under President Theodore Roosevelt, dismissed the arguments from Democrats that the tariff only benefited special interests and served as a tax on consumers.[101] “If insuring the American farmer the right to feed the American laborer be ‘special privilege’ then the Republican Party alone is guilty. It has never had an accomplice,” stated Shaw.[102] Shaw argued the longstanding argument that the entire nation benefited from the tariff because it protected the home market. “We transport from Minnesota alone, to the one state in Ohio, more iron ore than any other country mines, and simply because the industries of that great state, fostered by protection demand more,” argued Shaw.[103] The economic success was the result of the vast internal free trade network of the United States that was protected by the tariff. “We manufacture more than the people of England, and France, and Germany and Japan, added together…” stated Shaw.[104]
The Republican Party platform of 1928 once again reinforced the party’s commitment to the policy of protection, and it argued that “America’s supremacy was due to the protective tariff.”[105] Specifically the platform stated:
The great expansion in the wealth of our nation during the past fifty years, and particularly in the past decade, could not have been accomplished without a protective tariff system designed to promote the vital interests of all classes. Nor have these manifest benefits been restricted to any particular section of the country. They are enjoyed throughout the land either directly or indirectly. Their stimulus has been felt in industries, farming sections, trade circles, and communities in every quarter. However, we realize that there are certain industries which cannot now successfully compete with foreign producers because of lower foreign wages and a lower cost of living abroad, and we pledge the next Republican Congress to an examination and where necessary a revision of these schedules to the end that American labor in these industries may again command the home market, may maintain its standard of living, and may count upon steady employment in its accustomed field. Adherence to that policy is essential for the continued prosperity of the country. Under it the standard of living of the American people has been raised to the highest levels ever known. Its example has been eagerly followed by the rest of the world whose experts have repeatedly reported with approval the relationship of this policy to our prosperity, with the resultant emulation of that example by other nations. A protective tariff is as vital to American agriculture as it is to American manufacturing. The Republican Party believes that the home market, built up under the protective policy, belongs to the American farmer…[106]
Further, the platform defended the Fordney-McCumber Tariff and argued that the law benefited the economy:
The Tariff Act of 1922 has justified itself in the expansion of our foreign trade during the past five years. Our domestic exports have increased from 3.8 billion dollars in 1922 to 4.8 billion in 1927. During the same period imports have increased from 3.1 billion to 4.4 billion. Contrary to the prophesies of its critics, the present tariff law has not hampered the natural growth in the exportation of the products of American agriculture, industry, and mining, nor has it restricted the importation of foreign commodities which this country can utilize without jeopardizing its economic structure.[107]
If nothing else the Republican platform, and Hoover’s defense of the tariff during the campaign, demonstrated consistency. The American people agreed and elected Hoover in a landslide once again affirming the policies of the Republican Party.
The tariff became a central issue of the Hoover administration. Prior to the collapse of the economy as a result of the Great Depression, Hoover advocated tariff reform, especially in helping agriculture. By revision Hoover meant adjusting some of the rates on “industrial schedules” and raising rates on “farm products.”[108] In the spring of 1929, Hoover called a special session of Congress to address tariff reform with the goal of raising rates for agriculture.[109] Hoover argued that while tariff rates needed to be increased to help agriculture only minor adjustments were needed to rates that impacted manufacturing.[110] Further, Hoover acknowledged that “seven years of experience under the tariff bill enacted in1922 [Fordney-McCumber] have demonstrated the wisdom of Congress in the enactment of that measure.”[111] “On the whole it has worked well,” noted Hoover and he argued that it protected and maintained high wages, increased both exports and imports, and “new industries have come into being” which warranted the possibility of new tariffs.[112] What Hoover was arguing was the traditional Republican view to ensure that a new tariff would remedy “whatever substantial loss of employment may have resulted from shifts since that time [the enactment of Fordney-McCumber].”[113]
Hoover had supported both the “scientific tariff” and the flexible tariff provision. Some Republicans were “suspicious of the flexible tariff provision because it posed a threat to Congress’s authority.”[114] The tariff was also creating divisions within the Republican Party with conservatives that were not only suspicious of the flexible tariff provisions, but also fearful that the agricultural wing of the GOP would prevail in lowering rates on manufacturing.[115] Senator Joseph Grundy, who had recently been appointed to the Senate by the Governor of Pennsylvania, was one of the conservatives who lobbied for a stronger tariff. Prior to his appointment to the Senate, Grundy served as president of the Pennsylvania Manufacturers Association, and he was considered the leading voice and most powerful lobbyist on behalf of the policy of protection.[116] At the time Grundy was so controversial that the term “Grundyism” was used to describe extreme tariff policy—a term used by progressive Republicans and Democrats.[117]
Politically, Grundy had the support of his fellow Pennsylvanian, Andrew Mellon, who was still serving as Secretary of the Treasury, and he supported President Coolidge. Hoover disliked Grundy and described him as a member of the conservative “old guard” and stated that he [Grundy] was “universally known as an extreme protectionist.”[118] Specifically, Hoover and Grundy clashed on the flexible tariff provision and reforms.[119]
The attempt to reform tariff policy was soon overshadowed by the economic downturn, which would become the Great Depression. Attention cannot be given here on President Hoover’s complete response to the Depression, but the tariff became a central issue, which he believed was not only necessary, but needed to help bring stability and recovery. As Congress began debate over the Tariff Act of 1930 or the Smoot-Hawley Tariff (or Hawley-Smoot Tariff, which is the proper name of the House sponsor) the economy had not started to fall. Alfred Eckes notes that “for nearly 18 months from January 1929 to June 1930 the United States Congress deliberated a general tariff revision…”[120] Even before Hoover assumed office, Republican Representative Willis Hawley, chair of the Ways and Means Committee, initiated hearings over a 43-day period, which resulted in a tariff bill being passed on May 28, 1929.[121]
The House voted 264-147 with twelve Republicans in opposition, while 20 Democrats joined with other Republicans in supporting the new tariff measure.[122] Eckes notes that the new tariff bill “increased 916 of 2,683 individual tariff rates and some of the largest included lumber and agricultural products.[123] The average rate was 43.2 percent, which was an increase from the 33.2 percent average of the Fordney-McCumber Tariff.[124] The reaction, especially from markets, to the House passage of another tariff was almost nonexistent as it was expected that rates would increase.[125] The situation started to change when the Senate began to deliberate over the tariff. A coalition of progressive Republicans and Democrats formed to raise tariffs on agriculture products, lower manufacturing tariffs, and defeating President Hoover’s flexible tariff provision.[126] The growing divide in the Senate over the tariff even resulted in some to believe that any tariff bill would eventually die, which was the belief of some Senators such as Senator David Reed of Pennsylvania.[127]
The fight in the Senate lasted nearly a year since the House had passed their tariff bill.[128] The Senate tariff bill was vastly different than the House version and it left 620 tariff rates higher and 202 lower.[129] The final vote in the Senate had 46 Republicans and 7 Democrats voting in favor, while 5 Republicans and 26 Democrats voted against the measure.[130] In April 1930 a conference committee started work to find a compromise between both bills, and the compromise included the higher rates of the House version and it took President Hoover threatening to veto the final bill if the flexible tariff provision was not included.[131]Later, Hoover stated that “progressive Senators made a mass attack on the flexible tariff.”[132] Hoover’s threat resulted in the restoration of the flexible tariff provision and the Senate approved the Smoot-Hawley Tariff with 39 Republicans and 5 Democrats voting in favor, while 11 Republicans joined with 30 Democrats to vote against the measure.[133] The House approved Smoot-Hawley “with few defections from either party.”[134]
The most famous aspect of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff was the pressure that Hoover received to veto the bill. It should be noted that all sides of the tariff debate were not enthusiastic about the Smoot-Hawley Tariff. As an example, Senator Grundy voted reluctantly for Smoot-Hawley.[135] Grundy, the “high priest of protection” believed that Smoot-Hawley was “unfair to the East because almost 94 percent of the increased rates were on agricultural products and were directed toward the interest of western farmers.”[136] Interesting, the Smoot-Hawley Tariff became known as the “Grundy Tariff” as a result of Democrats such as New York Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt connecting the measure to the unpopularity of the “high priest of protection.”[137]
Hoover wrote that he was “deluged with a mass of recommendations” to either approve or veto the Smoot-Hawley Tariff.[138] Hoover noted that most of the opposition came from large corporations, corporate financiers, and academic economists.[139] Specifically, Hoover noted that that the chairmen of Chase National Bank, Guaranty Trust Company, National City Bank, J.P. Morgan Company all urged him to veto the measure.[140] Thomas Lamont of J. P. Morgan, who also served as an adviser to Hoover, described the measure as “asinine” and that it would intensify “nationalism all over the world.”[141] Whereas, Hoover stated that the American farm Bureau Federation, the National Grange, the Farmer’s Union, and the American Federation of Labor all urged him to sign Smoot-Hawley.[142] Douglas Irwin notes that “a survey of editorial opinion revealed that 238 out of 324 newspapers did not believe that Smoot-Hawley tariff was in the nation’s best interest.”[143] Secretary of State Henry Stimson, a Republican internationalist, urged Hoover to veto the measure.[144]
The most famous opposition of all to Smoot-Hawley was the notorious statement that was published by “1,028 economists and businessmen from 46 states and 179 colleges and universities” that urged Hoover to veto Smoot-Hawley.[145] C. Donald Johnson wrote that the “signers, who included nearly every reputable economist in the United States at the time, argued that the bill would raise the cost of living, increase unemployment, hurt rather than help the vast majority of farmers, inject bitterness into international relations, and harm American export trade.”[146]
President Hoover may not have been as militant a protectionist as other conservative Republicans such as Senator Grundy, but he believed in the policy of protection, and he stated that it was his responsibility to uphold the policies of the platform.[147] “Platform promises must not be empty gestures,” stated Hoover.[148] In addition, the measure did fulfill his recommendation of greater “agricultural protection” and the protection of new industries and their workers that needed the tariff.[149] Most important of all, Hoover signed Smoot-Hawley because it contained the flexible tariff provision, which he believed could be used later to readjust tariff rates.[150] This provision would allow the president and the Tariff Commission to adjust rates without the approval of Congress, and Hoover believed this would eliminate the messy “politics” of tariff policy.[151] Hoover, just as other policymakers, was not enthusiastic about Smoot-Hawley, but he believed it was in the national interest and it would provide stability.[152]
Secretary of the Treasury Mellon was “generally content with the outcome” of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff.[153] Mellon also argued that the new tariff would not harm business interests or delay the economic recovery.[154] “I do not believe that it will. It seems to me that fears and criticisms have been greatly exaggerated. Whenever a new protective tariff law has been enacted gloomy prophecies have been made,” stated Mellon.[155] Mellon argued that Smoot-Hawley would not interfere with American trade and the passage helped eliminate uncertainty for business.[156] Mellon shared Hoover’s view that the passage of the tariff provided certainty for business and many business leaders agreed.[157] As an example, Fred I. Kent, a Vice President of Bankers Trust Company, argued that “industry cannot proceed, employ men, buy and process raw materials unless it can feel confident of markets. Every consideration of the tariff develops uneasiness on the part of industry.”[158] Kent was concerned that the coalition in the Senate of progressive Republicans and Democrats were not only creating uncertainty by obstructing the tariff, but it could also lead to lower rates for industry.[159]
The Smoot-Hawley Tariff represented the high watermark in American trade protectionism. The question that must be asked was whether or not Hoover was correct in signing the legislation or should he have heeded the recommendation of those who urged him to use the veto. Finally, does the reputation of Smoot-Hawley of worsening or even causing the Depression and causing the collapse of international trade hold water? Hoover argued that the those who claim that “the passage of the Smoot-Hawley bill was the cause of the Depression is somewhat overdrawn, as it was not passed until nine months after the [stock market] crash.”[160] Hoover rejected the notion that it was “the beginning of a world movement to increase tariffs,” and he noted that the “American increase took place only after nearly thirty other countries had imposed higher tariffs.”[161]
Hoover argued that the cause of the Great Depression was centered in the collapse of international finance as a result of the Great War and the “world-wide tariff movement was largely an outcome” of the war.[162] From a political standpoint, Hoover argued that “raising the tariff from its sleep was a political liability despite the virtues of its reform.”[163] This refers to the forgotten reality that regardless of what side a policymaker was on regarding the Smoot-Hawley Tariff it became a policy disappointment as a result of the political infighting in crafting the legislation. Alfred Eckes agrees with Hoover and wrote that “if incipient protectionism was such a great concern to stock investors, it is striking that the Dow Jones industrial average did not decline when the tariff issue was before the House of Representatives in the winter and spring of 1929.”[164] Eckes offers a reminder that the House version raised rates “on both agricultural and industrial average” and the stock market “rose to its yearly high on September 3 [1929] the day the Finance Committee completed its version of the legislation.”[165]
In addition, Eckes argues that “if protectionism caused the October collapse, it is intriguing that the stock market break came only after Hoover’s protectionist allies lost control of the bill, and the press speculated that either no tariff bill or lower tariffs might result.”[166] Both Hoover and Mellon made this argument that Smoot-Hawley provided certainty and business was expecting another tariff bill, which was not unusual, especially under a Republican administration. The truth, Eckes argues, was the “enactment of the Tariff Act of 1930 [Smoot-Hawley] may have ended business uncertainty about tariff rates, but by the spring of 1930 the economy was sliding rapidly into the Great Depression.”[167] “In 1929-1930, archival evidence suggests that American business was more concerned about uncertainty than protectionism,” wrote Eckes.[168] It was only “when an agricultural coalition of insurgent Republicans and Democrats attempted to control the tariff writing process and lower industrial tariffs in October 1929, the resulting uncertainty became one of the shocks to depress the New York stock market and disrupt business investment.”[169]
Another claim against the Smoot-Hawley Tariff is that is established the highest tariff rates in American history. This is where the issue gets complicated because it centers on how one interprets tariff rates. Alfred Eckes argues that Smoot-Hawley did not enact the highest tariff rates in American history, and he notes that after the passage of the measure “duties on all imports (free and dutiable) averaged 13.7 percent.[170] This is the “ad valorem” rate and “from 1821 to 1914 the average tariff on all imports exceeded that 13.7 percent level in 94 consecutive years.”[171] Eckes notes that a “century before Smoot-Hawley, in 1830, the average duty on all imports peaked at 57.32 percent.”[172]
Eckes argues that scholars who argue that Smoot-Hawley established the highest tariff rates in American history focus “on a single number—the average ad valorem equivalent rate on dutiable imports in 1932.”[173] Under this consideration the average rate was 59.1 percent, which “was one of the higher dutiable imports in 1932.”[174] Eckes acknowledges that this rate was high, but it was not the highest, which actually occurred with the 1830 “Tariff of Abominations” which averaged 61.69 percent.[175] Further, Eckes argues that it was actually price declines “during the Depression,” which resulted in the 59.1 percent rate.[176] Rates under Smoot-Hawley were mostly fixed, that is, “nearly half of dutiable imports carried specific rate—meaning a fixed amount per quantity…”[177] “When prices plunged during the Great Depression, the percentage equivalent of such specific duties soared,” wrote Eckes.[178] As an example, “a 20 cent duty on an item valued at $1.00 effectively became a 40 percent duty if the good’s price fell to 50 cents per unit.”[179]
Douglas Irwin is more critical of Smoot-Hawley than Eckes. Irwin argues that Smoot-Hawley was not only “an ill-timed piece of legislation,” but it also “reflected special interest logrolling run amok.”[180] In addition, Irwin argues that even though Smoot-Hawley was not out of the ordinary because Republicans tended to support higher tariffs, the legislation was different because it was the most complex tariff and the bill itself was nearly 200 pages in length.[181] The complexity of Smoot-Hawley made it especially confusing and added to its failure.[182] Irwin does find agreement with Eckes that Smoot-Hawley did not establish the highest tariff rates in American history. “The legislation did not increase duties by an unusually large amount,” wrote Irwin.[183] As Irwin explains:
Using 1928 imports as a base, the Tariff Commission calculated that the average tariff on dutiable imports was 41.14 percent, using 1930 rates, up from 35.65 percent, using the 1922 rates. Thus, the legislation raised the average tariff on dutiable imports by about six percentage points, about a 15 percent increase in rates. Of course, this is an average; because most of the duties were left unchanged and only a few reduced, those that increased did so much more than this figure suggests.[184]
“In historical context, however, the Hawley-Smoot increase was not necessarily extreme. The McKinley Tariff of 1890 increased tariffs on dutiable imports by about 4 percentage points, a 10 percent increase,” noted Irwin.[185] In addition, “it was significantly less than the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922.”[186] Nevertheless, as Irwin argues Fordney-McCumber had already elevated tariff rates and Smoot-Hawley “marked a further addition.”[187] Irwin also finds agreement with Eckes that the price collapse during the Great Depression had a greater impact than the actual tariff rates of Smoot-Hawley.[188]
Another consequence of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff was the disturbance to trade and retaliation by foreign countries, which resulted in economic harm to the American economy. C. Donald Johnson argues that the high tariff rates of Smoot-Hawley in “a time of world economic crisis brought an immediate international reaction.”[189] The result was many European nations and Canada, which reacted against American imports by utilizing “boycotts, quota systems, and retaliatory tariffs.”[190] Johnson argues that Britain and Canada, which were both important export markets for American goods, retaliated and this impacted both manufacturing and agricultural goods.[191] This included automobiles, which car manufacturers had opposed Smoot-Hawley for this very reason, and food exports, which made the existing agricultural crisis worse.[192] Johnson even argues that the collapse of American trade contributed to “bank failures across the country.”[193]
“Between 1929 and 1933, US foreign trade fell through the floor, with exports plunging from $5.16 billion to $1.65 billion in 1933 and imports dropping from $4.4 billion to $1.45 billion,” wrote Johnson.[194] However, Johnson does acknowledge that “most of this decline resulted from the deflating prices and falling demand spurred by the world depression…”[195] Ian Flecther counters this argument when he wrote that Smoot-Hawley did “not affect enough trade, or raise the tariff by enough to have plausibly so large an effect.”[196] As Flecther further explains:
For start, it only applied to about one-third of America’s trade: about 1.3 percent of our GDP. Our average duty on dutiable goods went from 44.6 to 53.2 percent—hardly a radical change. Tariffs as a percentage of total imports were higher in almost every year from 1821 to 1914. America’s tariffs went up in 1861, 1864, 1890, and 1922 without producing global depressions, and the recessions of 1873 and 1893 managed to spread worldwide without tariff increases.[197]
Flecther also argues that the foreign retaliation is overexaggerated. The “myth of a death spiral of retaliation by foreign nations” does not hold water, argued Flecther.[198] “World trade declined, but almost entirely due to the Depression itself, not tariffs,” wrote Flecther.[199]
Eckes argued that “Smoot-Hawley actually expanded the share of U.S. imports on the free list slightly.”[200] In addition, “two-thirds entered with not import duties whatsoever,” which meant that “69.5 percent of imports entered the country duty-free in the last half of 1930.”[201] Eckes makes the argument that “if one takes the percentage of duty-free imports as the standard for comparing tariffs, then Chairmen Reed Smoot and Willis Hawley, self-styled protectionists, emerge as closet free traders,” because they “wrote a tariff schedule that effectively expanded the share of freely traded goods…”
Marc D. Hayford and Carl A. Pasurka, Jr. in comparing the Fordney-McCumber Tariff and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, argue that the tariff measures implemented under President Harding resulted in greater levels of protection.[202] “The results indicate that the Emergency (1921) and Fordney-McCumber (1922) tariff acts resulted in a much larger increase in the level of protection given to American industry than the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act (1930),” wrote Hayford and Pasurka.[203] If the critics of Smoot-Hawley argue that it created such vast economic turmoil and made the Depression worse then why did Fordney-McCumber not create a similar result? “How did higher Fordney-McCumber duties affect trade? Did Sharply higher tariffs depress imports and economic growth? They did not,” wrote Eckes.[204]
Whereas Eckes and Fletcher are less critical of Smoot-Hawley and the policy of protectionism in general in comparison to Irwin and Johnson, other scholars, especially more ideologically libertarian, scholars tend to be more biased. Both Irwin and Johnson, even though they argue that Smoot-Hawley was bad policy, do concede that other factors had greater influence in deepening the Depression. The late Austrian economist Murray Rothbard was one example of an ideological interpretation of Smoot-Hawley. Rothbard was critical of not just Hoover’s protectionism, but the protectionism of Harding and Coolidge and he argues that tariffs led to the “inflationist policy of the 1920s.”[205] The protectionist policies of the 1920s, Rothbard argued, not only hurt consumers with higher prices, but also impacted imports and trade.[206] In regard to Smoot-Hawley, Rothbard placed considerable blame on Hoover, whom he considered to be the father of the New Deal, and argued that the Smoot-Hawley Tariff not only hurt consumers, but also agriculture and industry.[207] When Hoover signed Smoot-Hawley, Rothbard wrote that the “stock market broke sharply” and “this bill gave the signal for protectionism to proliferate all over the world.”[208] “Markets, and the international division of labor, were hampered and American consumers were further burdened, and farm as well as other export industries were hindered by the decline of international trade,” wrote Rothbard.[209]
More recently, Amity Shlaes, a former editorial writer for The Wall Street Journal and an economic historian who has written on the Great Depression and a biography of Calvin Coolidge, is also extremely critical of Smoot-Hawley. Shlaes wrote that Smoot-Hawley “made sense on an emotional level: America was in trouble, so America’s domestic producers must be protected with fresh advantage.”[210] The result, Shlaes wrote, was some of “the highest tariffs in U.S. History,” and she agrees with Rothbard, Johnson, and Irwin that it had a substantial impact on trade.[211] “It [Smoot-Hawley] would deprive foreign governments of trade. It would drive the prices of imports up for consumers at home. It would hurt other nations, nations that the United States hoped would become its markets,” argues Shales.[212] For Shales, the hero of this story was the economists, business leaders, and others that urged Hoover to veto Smoot-Hawley.[213] “For the economists proved right: Smoot-Hawley provoked retaliatory protectionist actions by nations all over the globe, depriving the United States of markets and sending the country into a deeper slump,” argues Shlaes.[214]
When considering the impact of Smoot-Hawley and the Depression most scholars tend to find agreement with Irwin and Johnson. However, other scholars tend to discredit the ideological arguments of Rothbard and Shlaes. “Both Fordney-McCumber and Hawley-Smoot tariffs are better regarded as symptoms, not causes of the economic distress in 1921 and 1929,” argues David M. Kennedy.[215] Glen Jeansonne, a biographer of Herbert Hoover, finds agreement in Hoover’s arguments that the tariff did not deepen the Depression.[216] Jeansonne also is in agreement with Eckes and Fletcher that “retaliatory tariffs would have made only a marginal difference in America’s economy, which did not operate in the international context…”[217]
In addition, Jeansonne brings up an important point that during this time even Democrats “were protectionists and opposed free-trade agreements,” even though they may not have supported the high tariffs of the Republican Party.[218] Finally, Jeansonne argues that even before Smoot-Hawley had been passed “nearly 30 nations had already raised their tariffs by the time the American tariff was enacted.”[219]
The Smoot-Hawley Tariff would become a campaign issue during the 1932 presidential election. New York Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt, who won the Democrat nomination, blasted Hoover for the protectionist “Grundy Tariff.”[220] During the campaign Hoover defended the tariff. Just as during the 1928 campaign, Hoover addressed the tariff mostly on the grounds of aiding agriculture. “The very basis of safety to American agriculture is the protective tariff on farm products. The Republican Party originated and proposed to maintain the protective tariff on agricultural products,” stated Hoover.[221] The Republican Party defended both its commitment to protectionism and the Hoover tariff policy:
The tariff has long since ceased to be regarded by the country as primarily a source of revenue but rather as the bulwark of the American standard of living, through protection of American industries against competition of industries developed abroad under lower wages and consequently lower standards of living.[222]
The Republican Party argued that “since the last revision of the tariff some American industries had come to need further tariff protection, and the agricultural interests especially required such protection…”[223]
Republicans also argued that “this depression has served to emphasize two points in the tariff controversy, which has furnished one of the most fundamental differences between the Republican and Democratic parties:”
John J. Leary Jr., who was the former Labor editor of the New York World, defended Hoover’s record in keeping wages high and the tariff policy.[225] Hoover’s “recognition of the working man’s interest in the application of tariff laws calculated to protect him from unfair competition of under-paid foreign labor,” was one attribute that Leary credited to Hoover for defending labor during the Depression.[226]
Former President Coolidge defended Hoover and the protective tariff on the campaign trail. In a speech at Madison Square Garden in New York, Coolidge argued that “one of the subjects which is being discussed in this campaign which it is very easy to misrepresent and misunderstand is the tariff.”[227] Coolidge criticized the Democratic Party for wanting to replace the protective tariff with a “competitive tariff, which would only result in foreign nations obtaining an advantage over American industry, agriculture, and workers.[228] “It is proposed to put our wage earners in competition with those of India, China, and Japan,” stated Coolidge in foreshadowing what is even an issue today as a result of free trade agreements.[229]
As Coolidge argued:
But we are told again that by reducing our tariffs we can increase our own foreign commerce. Every foreign nation wants our tariff reduced. No foreign nation wants to increase our commerce. I know that foreign nations do not buy in our markets unless they are compelled to do so even when price and quality are advantageous. I know that our tariffs and trade regulations in general are much more favorable to the rest of the world than their tariffs and regulations are to us. About two-thirds of our enormous imports and all our exports are free of duty.[230]
Further, Coolidge argued that “an independent nation ought to keep within its own control the authority to determine its own revenues and regulate its own commerce.”[231] “Reciprocal trade agreements on any extended scale would involve our surrender of our independence on these two vital points,” stated Coolidge.[232] Interestingly, Coolidge seemed more eager than Hoover to defend the tariff policy.
President Hoover and the Republican Party would be defeated in a landslide in the presidential election of 1932. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, along with his Secretary of State Cordell Hull, would resurrect President Woodrow Wilson’s preference for international free trade. Hull had been a disciple of the British free trade advocate Richard Cobden. The Smoot-Hawley Tariff did represent the highwater mark of American protectionism. Historians and economists will continue to debate the impact of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, but it is clear that the ideological bias in favor of free trade has clouded the historical record.
“That the legend of Smoot-Hawley endures and continues to influence trade policy debate is a tribute to the public relations skills of partisans and ideologues with agendas. They have successfully transformed a molehill into a mountain,” argues Eckes.[233] Agreeing with Eckes does not affirm that Smoot-Hawley was good policy, but it does demonstrate that the issue is much more complicated than the general rhetoric that is used by critics that the law had devastating economic and international consequences. Patrick J. Buchanan, who campaigned for the Republican presidential nomination in 1992, 1996, and who ran as a Reform Party candidate in 2000, refers to the “Great Smoot-Hawley Myth.”[234]
Buchanan, a conservative who made protectionism a pillar of his presidential campaigns, argues that “no one at the time, however, made the claim that Smoot-Hawley had caused a market crash that occurred eight months before it was passed or that Smoot-Hawley triggered a depression that was already underway before Hoover signed the bill.”[235] Buchanan’s arguments echo those of Eckes and Fletcher that Smoot-Hawley has been greatly distorted by advocates for free trade. The late economist Milton Friedman, who argued that the Great Depression was a result of monetary policy, was hardly a defender of protectionism.[236] Friedman, while not defending Smoot-Hawley, argued that the tariff “played no significant role in either causing the depression or prolonging it.”[237] In addition, Friedman regarded the tariff as “bad law,” and he thought “it did great harm, but the Smoot-Hawley Tariff by itself would not have made one-quarter of the labor force unemployed.”[238]
Herbert Hoover was at the center of Republican protectionist trade policy and although he was considered a “centrist” when it came to the policy of tariffs, he still defended and agreed with the policy of protectionism. “In essence, from 1860 to 1932 Republicans preached and practiced a nationalistic trade policy that was intended to develop the American market and advance the commercial interests of domestic producers and workers,” wrote Eckes.[239] This reflected the economic nationalism of the Republican Party and the preference to place “America first” in trade policy. Hoover’s support for both the Fordney-McCumber and Smoot-Hawley Tariff acts demonstrates not only his belief in the policy of protectionism, but also that he considered the tariff to be a crucial element for a successful economic policy.
The debate over Hoover and the policy of protectionism is not just an academic debate. As a nation we are still debating trade policy and whether or not tariffs are an effective policy tool. A majority of Republicans from President Dwight D. Eisenhower through President George W. Bush were critical of not just Hoover and Smoot-Hawley, but the protectionism of Harding and Coolidge. Former President Trump’s embrace of protectionism during the 2016 campaign and as actual policy when he was in office shocked many Republicans who had forgotten their party’s history. Many of President Trump’s policies are actually rooted within the conservatism of the 1920s and reflect the philosophy of Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover.
Robert Lighthizer, who served as President Trump’s United States Trade Representative, has even published a book, No Trade Is Free: Changing Course, Taking on China, and Helping America’s Workers, is a defense of the policy of protectionism. Further, the rise of national conservatism by Republicans such as Senators Josh Hawley and J.D. Vance reflect the economic nationalism of the 1920s. Senator Hawley, who often introduces legislation attempting to implement tariffs, especially on China, was recently referred to as the new “Smoot-Hawley.” Trump, Lighthizer, Hawley, Vance, and other national conservatives are responding to the result of the loss of manufacturing, middle class jobs, and sovereignty as a result of free trade agreements, which have also left the United States dependent upon foreign nations, even hostile nations, for necessities. It is symbolic that the protectionists of the early twentieth century predicted that all of this would occur if the nation embraced free trade. National conservatives are actually resurrecting an older conservative tradition that used to be the foundation of the Republican Party. Today’s policy debate over tariffs demonstrates that the arguments used for and against both the Fordney-McCumber and Smoot-Hawley Tariff acts are alive and well. It is time, especially for conservatives, to stop attacking Hoover and take him and his ideas more seriously.
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[1]Catherine Lucy and Ken Thomas, “The President at the Center of an Odd Biden-Trump Debate: Herbert Hoover,” The Wall Street Journal, February 19, 2024, < https://www.wsj.com/politics/elections/the-president-at-the-center-of-an-odd-biden-trump-debate-herbert-hoover-e25344a4> (accessed on April 29, 2024).
[2]Ibid.
[3]Ibid.
[4]George H. Nash, “Herbert Hoover’s Bad Press,” Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, Grand Valley State University, August 25, 2004,
< https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1102&context=features> (accessed on April 29, 2024).
[5]Ibid.
[6]Douglas A. Irwin, Peddling Protectionism: Smoot-Hawley and the Great Depression, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2011, 1-9.
[7]Alexander Hamilton, “Report on the Subject of Manufactures, December 5, 1791,” in Hamilton: Writings, New York: The Library of America, 2001.
[8]Alfred E. Eckes, “A Republican Trade Policy: Reviving the Grand Old Paradigm,” in America Asleep: The Free Trade Syndrome and the Global Economic Challenge, edited by John P. Cregan, Washington, D.C.: United States Industrial Council, 1991, 74-75.
[9]Ibid., 77-78.
[10]Alfred E. Eckes, Opening America’s Market: U.S. Foreign Trade Policy Since 1776, Chapel Hill, North Carolina: The University of North Carolina Press, 1995, 29.
[11]Ibid.
[12]Ibid.
[13]Eric Helleiner, The Neomercantilists: A Global Intellectual History, Ithica, New York: Cornell University Press, 2021, 139.
[14]Richard Franklin Bensel, The Political Economy of American Industrialization, 1877-1900, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000, 10-11.
[15]Ibid.
[16]Lewis L. Gould, The First Modern Clash Over Federal Power: Wilson Versus Hughes in the Presidential Election of 1916, Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 2016, 102.
[17]Ibid.
[18]Ibid., 102.
[19]Woodrow Wilson, The New Freedom: A Call for the Emancipation of the Generous Energies of a People, New York: Doubleday, Page, and Company, 1918, 3-4.
[20]Eckes, Opening America’s Markets, 43.
[21]Republican National Committee, Republican Campaign Text-Book, 1920, Washington, D.C: Republican National Committee, 1920, 92.
[22]Ibid., 91.
[23]Ibid., 49.
[24]Warren G. Harding, Our Common Country: Mutual Good Will in America, Indianapolis, Indiana, Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1921, 23.
[25]Ibid., 101.
[26]Ibid.
[27]Ibid.
[28]Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 43.
[29]Our Common Country, 87.
[30]Christian A. Herter letter to the Editor of the Riverside Press, June 7, 1921, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library, Commerce Papers, Tariff 1921, West Branch Iowa.
[31]Ibid.
[32]Eugene P. Trani and David L. Wilson, The Presidency of Warren G. Harding, Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1977, 56.
[33]Ibid.
[34]Ibid., 74.
[35]Warren G. Harding, “Our Trade Relations With the World,” The Protectionist, vol. xxxiv, June 1922, Home Market Club, 50-51.
[36]Warren G. Harding, “Constitutional Government,” The Protectionist, vol. xxxii, November 1920, Home Market Club, 308.
[37]Joseph W. Fordney, “Need Immediate Tariff Revision,” The Protectionist, vol. xxxii, March 1921, Home Market Club, 507.
[38]Douglas A. Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce: A History of US Trade Policy, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017, 353.
[39]Ibid.
[40]Ibid.
[41]William B. Brigham, “Will the New Tariff Measure Protect Our Industries?” The Protectionist, vol. xxxiii, July 1921, Home Market Club, 103.
[42] Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 88.
[43]Trani and Wilson, 74.
[44]Edward S. Kaplan and Thomas W. Ryley, Prelude to Trade Wars: American Tariff Policy, 1890-1922, Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1994, 129.
[45]Robert K. Murray, The Politics of Normalcy: Governmental Theory and Practice in the Harding-Coolidge Era, New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1973, 66-68.
[46]David Cannadine, Mellon: An American Life, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006, 297.
[47]“The Senate Passes the Tariff Bill,” The Protectionist, vol. xxxiv, September 1922, Home Market Club, 186.
[48]Edward Nelson Dingley, “The Battle for Protection,” The Protectionist, vol. xxxiv, September 1922, Home Market Club, 193-195.
[49]Ibid., 195.
[50]Kendrick A. Clements, The Life of Herbert Hoover: Imperfect Visionary, 1918-1928, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010, 309.
[51]Ibid., 310.
[52]Ibid.
[53]Ibid.
[54]Herbert Hoover, “Address at Englewood, New Jersey, Resume of the Achievements of the Republican Administration,” Commerce Papers, Tariff 1921-1922, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum, West Branch, Iowa.
[55]Ibid.
[56]Ibid.
[57]Calvin Coolidge quoted in Silent Cal’s Almanack: The Homespun Wit and Wisdom of Vermont’s Calvin Coolidge, edited by David Pietrusza, Createspace Book, 2008, 95.
[58]Robert H. Ferrell, The Presidency of Calvin Coolidge, Lawrence, Kansas, University Press of Kansas, 1998, 69.
[59]Ibid., 70.
[60]Ibid.
[61]Ibid.
[62]Ibid.
[63]Calvin Coolidge, “The President Speaks to Labor: An Address Delivered by President Coolidge to a Group of Labor Leaders, Who Called on Him, September 1, 1924,” Chicago, Illinois: Republican National Committee, 1924.
[64]Ibid.
[65]Ibid.
[66]Ibid.
[67]Herbert Hoover, “Address delivered by Honorable Herbert Hoover, Denver, Colorado, October 25, 1924, Commerce Papers, Tariff, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum, West Branch, Iowa.
[68]Ibid.
[69]Ibid.
[70]Ibid.
[71]Republican National Committee, Republican Campaign Text-Book, 1924, Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 240.
[72]Ibid., 241.
[73]Ibid.
[74]Garland S. Tucker, 1924: Coolidge, Davis, and the High Tide of American Conservatism, Plymouth Notch, Vermont: Coolidge Press, 2010, 189.
[75]Ibid.
[76]The Democratic National Committee, Democratic Campaign Book, 1924, Washington, D.C: The Democratic National Committee, 1924, 205.
[77]Calvin Coolidge, “Inaugural Address, March 4, 1925,” in Foundations of the Republic by Calvin Coolidge, Honolulu, Hawaii: University Press of the Pacific, 2004, 203.
[78]Clements, 309.
[79]Herbert Hoover, “Secretary Hoover’s Views on the Tariff as Represented in his Speeches and Writings,” Commerce Papers, Tariff, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum, West Branch, Iowa.
[80]Ibid.
[81]Ibid.
[82]Herbert Hoover, “The Future of Our Foreign Trade,” Department of Commerce, Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1926.
[83]Herbert Hoover, “Speech in Louisville, Kentucky at the Brown Theatre, October 20, 1926,” Commerce Papers, Tariff, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum, West Branch, Iowa.
[84]Ibid.
[85]Michael A. Bernstein, “The American Economy of the Interwar Era,” in Calvin Coolidge and the Coolidge Era: Essays on the History of the 1920s, edited by John Earl Haynes, Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1998, 192.
[86]Ibid.
[87]Ibid.
[88]Ibid.
[89]Ibid.
[90]Gene Smiley, “New Estimates of Income Shares During the 1920s,” in Calvin Coolidge and the Coolidge Era: Essays on the History of the 1920s, edited by John Earl Haynes, Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1998, 215.
[91]Ibid.
[92] Collen M. Callahan, Judith A. McDonald, and Anthony Patrick O’Brian, Who Voted for Smoot-Hawley?” The Journal of Economic History 54, no. 3 (1994): 683–90, 683.
[93]Ibid.
[94]Herbert Hoover, “Herbert Hoover Champions Labor: Speech at Newark, September 17, 1928, Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1928.
[95]Ibid.
[96]Herbert Hoover, The New Day: Campaign Speeches of Herbert Hoover, Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1928, 20.
[97]Ibid,, 192.
[98]Ibid., 193.
[99]Ibid., 129.
[100]Ibid., 151.
[101]Leslie M. Shaw, “Your Job Versus the Specter of Idleness and Ruin: A Discussion of the Tariff Issue,” Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1928.
[102]Ibid.
[103]Ibid.
[104]Ibid.
[105]Republican National Committee, Republican Campaign Text-Book, 1928, Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1928, 291.
[106]Republican Party Platforms, Republican Party Platform of 1928 Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project, <https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/273379> (accessed on May 3, 2024).
[107]Ibid.
[108]Herbert Hoover, The Memoirs of Herbert Hoover: The Cabinet and the Presidency, 1920-1933, New York, The MacMillan Company, 1952, 291.
[109]Herbert Hoover, “Message to the First Session of the Seventy-First Congress, April 16, 1929,” in The State Papers and Other Public Writings of Herbert Hoover, Volume 1, March 4, 1929-October 1, 1931, edited by William Starr Myers, Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, and Company, 1934, 31.
[110]Ibid., 35.
[111]Ibid.
[112]Ibid.
[113]Ibid.
[114]Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce, 361.
[115]Ibid., 373.
[116]Martin L. Fausold, The Presidency of Herbert C. Hoover, Lawerance, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1985, 53.
[117]Ann Hawkes Hutton, The Pennsylvanian: Joseph R. Grundy, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Dorrace and Company, 1962, preface.
[118]Hoover, The Cabinet and the Presidency, 295.
[119]Ibid.
[120]Alfred E. Eckes, “Smoot-Hawley and the Stock Market Crash, 1929-1930.” The International Trade Journal 12, no. 1 (1998): 65–82, 66.
[121]Ibid.
[122]Ibid.
[123]Ibid.
[124]Ibid.
[125]Ibid., 68-69.
[126]Ibid., 71-73.
[127]Ibid.
[128]Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce, 382.
[129]Ibid.
[130]Ibid., 383.
[131]Ibid., 384.
[132]Hoover. The Cabinet and the Presidency, 294.
[133]Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce, 384.
[134]Ibid.
[135]Hutton, 197.
[136]Ibid., 193 and 197.
[137]Hoover, The Cabinet and the Presidency, 296.
[138]Ibid.
[139]Ibid.
[140]Ibid.
[141]Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce, 386.
[142]Hoover, The Cabinet and the Presidency, 296.
[143]Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce, 386.
[144]Ibid.
[145]C. Donald Johnson, The Wealth of a Nation: A History of Trade Politics in America, New York: Oxford University Press, 2018, 200.
[146]Ibid.
[147]Herbert Hoover, “Statement on the Tariff Bill, June 16, 1930,” in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Herbert Hoover, Containing the Public Messages, Speeches, and Statements of the President, January 1 to December 31, 1930, Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, 1976, 231.
[148]Ibid.
[149]Ibid.
[150]Ibid.
[151]Kumiko Koyama, “The Passage of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act: Why Did the President Sign the Bill?” Journal of Policy History 21, no. 2 (2009): 163–86, 163.
[152]Eckes, “Smoot-Hawley and the Stock Market Crash,” 75.
[153]Cannadine, 397.
[154]Andrew Mellon, “Secretary Mellon Statement on Smoot-Hawley Tariff Law, June 21, 1930.” Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. < https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/press-releases-united-states-department-treasury-6111/volume-6-586844/secretary-mellon-statement-smoot-hawley-tariff-law-55743> (accessed on May 4, 2024).
[155]Ibid.
[156]Ibid.
[157]Eckes, “Smoot Hawley and the Stock Market Crash,” 77.
[158]Ibid.
[159]Ibid., 77-78.
[160]Hoover, The Cabinet and the Presidency, 291.
[161]Ibid.
[162]Ibid.
[163]Ibid., 299.
[164]Eckes, “Smoot-Hawley and the Stock Market Crash,” 77.
[165]Ibid.
[166]Ibid.
[167]Ibid., 80.
[168]Ibid., 81.
[169]Ibid.
[170]Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 106.
[171]Ibid.
[172]Ibid.
[173]Ibid.
[174]Ibid.
[175]Ibid.
[176]Ibid.
[177]Ibid.
[178]Ibid.
[179]Ibid.
[180]Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce, 388.
[181]Ibid.
[182]Ibid.
[183]Ibid.
[184]Irwin., 300.
[185]Ibid.
[186]Ibid.
[187]Ibid.
[188]Ibid., 393-396.
[189]Johnson, 201.
[190]Ibid., 202.
[191]Ibid.
[192]Ibid.
[193]Ibid.
[194]Ibid.
[195]Ibid.
[196]Ian Flecther, Free Trade Doesn’t Work: What Should Replace it and Why, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Business and Industry Council, 2010, 139.
[197]Ibid.
[198]Ibid., 139-140.
[199]Ibid., 140.
[200]Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 109.
[201]Ibid.
[202]Marc D. Hayford and Carl A. Pasurka, “Effective Rates of Protection and the Fordney–McCumber and Smoot–Hawley Tariff Acts.” Applied Economics 23, no. 8 (1991): 1385–92, 1391.
[203]Ibid.
[204]Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 112.
[205]Murray Rothbard, America’s Great Depression, BNP Publishing, 2008, 128.
[206]Ibid.
[207]Ibid., 214-215.
[208]Ibid., 215.
[209]Ibid.
[210]Amity Shlaes, The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression, New York: Haper Collins, 2007, 95.
[211]Ibid.
[212]Ibid.
[213]Ibid., 96-99.
[214]Ibid., 99.
[215]David M. Kennedy, Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, 45.
[216]Glen Jeansonne, The Life of Herbert Hoover: Fighting Quaker, 1928-1933, New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2012, 132.
[217]Ibid.
[218]Ibid.
[219]Ibid., 133.
[220]Franklin D. Roosevelt, “Campaign Address on Agriculture and Tariffs at Sioux City, Iowa, September 29, 1932,” Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project <https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/289314> (accessed on May 4, 2024).
[221]Herbert Hoover, Campaign Speeches of 1932 by President Hoover and Ex-President Coolidge, Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, and Company, 1933, 50.
[222]Republican National Committee, “The Hoover Administration: Its Policies and its Achievements in the First Sixteen Months,” Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1932, 9.
[223]Ibid.
[224] Republican National Committee, Republican Campaign Text-Book, 1932, Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1932, 172. and Republican National Committee, “The Tariff: Protects America from Inundation during Economic Storm, Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1932.
[225]John J. Leary, Jr., “Hoover’s Fight for Labor,” Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee, 1932, 2.
[226]Ibid., 4.
[227]Calvin Coolidge, “Calvin Coolidge Speaks Out,” October 11, 1932, Washington, D.C.: Republican National Committee.
[228]Ibid.
[229]Ibid.
[230]Calvin Coolidge, “Ex-President Coolidge, New York City, Madison Square Garden, October 11, 1932,” in Campaign Speeches of 1932 by President Hoover and Ex-President Coolidge, Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, and Company, 1933, 68.
[231]Ibid., 69.
[232]Ibid.
[233]Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 139.
[234]Patrick J. Buchanan, The Great Betrayal: How American Sovereignty and Social Justice are Being Sacrificed to the Gods of the Global Economy, New York: Little, Brown, and Company, 1998, 232.
[235]Ibid., 241-242.
[236]Ibid., 252.
[237]Ibid.
[238]Douglas A. Irwin, “Goodbye, Free Trade? High tariffs and currency wars cost us big in the 1930s. We can avoid making the same mistakes again,” The Wall Street Journal, October 9, 2010, <https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704696304575538573595009754> (accessed on May 4, 2024).
[239]Eckes, Opening America’s Market, 31.
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