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Snippets (Tariffs and Other Stuff)

Tariffs were controversial before the Civil War. Their benefits and detriments were not equal throughout the country. Brenda Wineapple reports in The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation (2019) that in 1832 the South Carolina legislature said that, if not repealed, a federal tariff was null and void and a ground for secession.

Tariffs were also controversial after the Civil War. They were the chief source of federal revenues until the early twentieth century. The issue was not whether tariffs should be applied but at what rate. As Troy Senik wrote in A Man of Iron: The Turbulent Life and Improbable Presidency of Grover Cleveland (2023), tariffs had conflicting goals. Should they only be high enough to fund government or go further to protect American industry from ruinous foreign competition? Industry was best protected when tariffs were so high that almost no foreign goods were imported, but then little revenue was collected. On the other hand, tariffs set best for funding the government did not protect industry as much as higher taxes.

Troy Senik also says that Grover Cleveland correctly saw another conflict in tariffs: They helped to raise wages in protected industries, but this gain was offset by higher prices workers had to pay for goods

Friends talk about fleeing to Canada. But what is the point if Canada becomes the 51st state?

No friend talks about fleeing to Greenland. Perhaps that will be different when Trump builds Mar-a-Lago Northeast there.

Deputy Attorney Genereal Todd Blanche said recently that the Justice Department is opening a criminal investigation into a leak of “inaccurate, but nevertheless classified” intelligence about the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. It comes as a shock that anyone in the Trump administration wants to keep false information secret.

Present policies show that the Republican party has abandoned much of what Ronald Reagan stood for. Nicole Hemmer in Partisans: The Conservative Revolutionaries Who Remade American Politics in the 1990s states that Reagan, fueled by anticommunism, had “a preference for more open borders and higher immigration levels, for fewer tariffs[,] a stingier social net, [as well as] a more aggressive posture toward the Soviet Union.”

Under Reagan, the federal workforce grew by 200,000.

Because of tariffs, the United States has intervened militarily and politically in foreign countries. Sean Mirski in We May Dominate the World: Ambition, Anxiety, and Rise of the American Colossus (2023) maintains that our interventions in Latin America at the turn of 20th century and beyond were not primarily to protect American business interests but rather to keep European governments outside the hemisphere. Some Latin American countries borrowed profligately from Europe and often could not pay the money back. Under international law, the lender countries were entitled to use force to service the debts. This was often a simple procedure: Seize the customhouse and collect the tariffs. The United States was concerned about this potential European presence in the Americas and feared further that the Latin American countries would grant the Europeans concessions that would disfavor the United States. Consequently, the United States thought it was better to intervene in the debtor nations and use the customs revenues to pay the Europeans. Frequently, this was good for the invaded country since the Americans did not skim from the tariffs, or at least not as much as before, and the Latin American country often saw its revenues increase. Moreover, Europe learned that interventions in the Western Hemisphere were expensive. The European powers then often blustered about intervening to get America to do the expensive work. America soon recognized that the problems would recur unless the debtor countries became stable and lived within their means. As a result, the United States became more and more involved in the internal affairs of Latin American countries.

Posted on by rjonakait

Snippets

It’s been a long time. In 1841, fifty-two years after the Constitution went into effect, John Tyler became the first vice-president to ascend to a vacant presidency. Only two dozen years later, Andrew Johnson succeeded the assassinated Abraham Lincoln. In 1881, Vice-President Chester A. Arthur became President as the result of the murder of James A. Garfield. Two decades later, Theodore Roosevelt became President because of the assassination of William McKinley. Twenty-two years later, Calvin Coolidge ascended to the presidency after Warren G. Harding’s death. After another twenty-two years, Harry S. Truman became President upon the death of FDR. Eighteen years later, in 1963, Lyndon B. Johnson became President after the assassination of John F. Kennedy. And only eleven years later, after the resignation of Richard Nixon, Vice-President Gerald Ford became President. Since then, however, no Veep has moved up to a vacant presidency, the longest stretch in our history since Tyler took the high office. With the possibility of an aged president who seems to indicate declining cognitive powers and a gun-toting population, are we due again for a vice-present to become president?

The Twenty-fifth Amendment to the Constitution lists procedures for declaring a president unable to carry out the powers and duties of the office. The Vice-President then becomes Acting President. Rumor has it that people around JD Vance, perhaps funded by Peter Thiel, are already studying this provision so if Trump wins, six months later Vance can be president.

A perceptive analyst said: “The people for public trusts are the people who can be trusted in private.”

Some Trump supporters, who, when asked about some of Trump’s problematic, sometimes frightening statements, say that Trump does not really mean it when he says that he will use the army against Americans, get rid of Obamacare, impose 100% or higher tariffs, etc. In other words, these Trumpistas support Trump because theyse don’t believe what he says. Amazing.

“The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.” Bertrand Russell.

I have friends and acquaintances who ask how, at this point, anyone could vote for Trump. Many of these people, however, would find it close to impossible to vote for a Republican even if the Democratic candidate were Bob Menendez or Eric Adams. Of course, there are many people who truly support Trump, but there are many who simply can’t vote for a Democrat. Some are voters who we might call hold-your-nose-and-vote-for-Trump, but since Trump heads the Republican ticket, they will vote for him. The crucial time is not now. It was in 2016 when he became the Republican standard bearer. Trump did get more votes than any other single candidate in the 2016 Republican primaries, but he did not get a majority of the ballots cast. However, under Republican rules, he got the majority of the delegates. Eight years ago, a majority of Republicans did not want Trump, and since then, a majority of Americans overall have not wanted him. But he may be our president again.

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Lew’s Judah (continued)

By the end of the Civil War, Lew Wallace, the author of Ben-Hur, had regained such respect that President Andrew Johnson appointed him to the military tribunal that would try the seven men and one woman accused of plotting to assassinate Abraham Lincoln. All eight were convicted. The tribunal sentenced four of them to prison terms, and the other four, including Mary Surratt, to death by hanging. Five of the nine military commissioners later recommended clemency for Surratt. Wallace, the only lawyer on the commission, was not one of them. The president did not grant the reprieve, and Mary Surratt was hanged. (See the posting on ajsdad.blog of May 6, 2020: “The Hanging in the Museum.”)

Six weeks after the Lincoln assassination trial concluded, Wallace was appointed to preside over another military tribunal, this one to try Confederate Captain Henry Wirz, the commandant of the notorious Andersonville prisoner of war camp in Georgia. Wirz, too, was found guilty and sentenced to death. He was hanged on November 10, 1865.

Digression: In high school, I became aware of the horrors of that Confederate camp when, seven years after it won the Pulitzer Prize, I read MacKinlay Kantor’s Andersonville. After I got used to Kantor’s punctuation—no quotation marks, later adopted by Cormac McCarthy and others—I found it to be a powerful book. Only later did I learn that some thought it age-inappropriate for secondary school readers and tried to have it banned from high schools. (See the posting on ajsdad.blog of June15, 2023, and June 19, 2023: “It Was So Age-Inappropriate What I Read.”) Perhaps the language bothered some; the novel is filled with profanities, which is not surprising because Andersonville portrays the inhumanities of the prisoner of war camp. It is not so much an antiwar book but one detailing human degradation. Henry Wirz, who suffered injuries during the war, is portrayed as a still sick man trying to do his best in controlling the horrors in an impossible situation. The military commission, if it was in the book, was merely a coda to the heart of the lengthy book about the construction and operation of the camp. The book may have introduced me to Lew Wallace, but I don’t remember him from the novel.

Wallace’s life took a strange turn after his service on the military tribunals. Apparently invited by Benito Juárez, he went to Mexico to become a major general in the Mexican Army. Juárez was elected to the Mexican presidency in 1861. Shortly thereafter with Mexico facing a major financial crisis, he repudiated foreign debt prompting French Emperor Napoleon III to seek the overthrow of the Mexican government. France invaded and installed Maximilian as emperor of Mexico. The United States at least nominally supported Juárez but, occupied with the Civil War, gave him little support. Even so, Juárez returned to the Mexican Presidency in 1867, and Wallace was off to support him. It is not clear what happened in Mexico, but Wallace soon returned to the U.S. deeply in debt.

He settled again in Crawfordsville, Indiana, to practice law, which he detested. Wallace published his first book in 1873, a historical novel, The Fair God, about Cortez’s conquest of Mexico. Wallace, however, was not the only author in the family. His wife, Susan Arnold Elston Wallace, published six books, two of which were illustrated by Wallace. Her most notable literary work was an 1858 poem titled, “The Patter of Little Feet,” which gave us the phrase.

It is not surprising that Wallace illustrated his wife’s books. They were a close couple, and he, among his many facets, was a talented artist. During the Lincoln assassination trial, he sketched all the defendants, except for Mary Surratt, whose face was nearly always veiled during the proceedings. Shortly after his failed Mexican excursion, Wallace used the drawings as a basis for a painting, usually called “The Conspirators,” which depicts those convicted except for Surratt. The large canvas, roughly five feet by five feet, now hangs in the General Lew Wallace Study and Museum in Crawfordsville.

Lew Wallace’s first novel sold well and perhaps this success inspired him to begin his work on Ben-Hur. He had not been to the Holy Land but did extensive research at the Library of Congress for the new book. Writing, however, was not then a full-time occupation, so when asked in 1878, he accepted a new appointment as Governor of the New Mexico territory.

Santa Fe may have seemed like the perfect place to finish his manuscript, which he did but with some major distractions. After engaging in Civil War battles, judging those charged in Lincoln’s assassination, dealing with the horrors of Andersonville, and seeking to defend the Mexican republic, the sparsely settled New Mexico could have been a haven made for writing. Instead, Wallace encountered the Lincoln County War and the almost mythical Billy the Kid.

The Lincoln County War started in 1878, the year Wallace came to New Mexico, and ended in the year he left, 1881. This is the only “war” I know of that started with a dispute over dry goods businesses and, of course, since this was the Old West, cattle. When a member of one faction was murdered, retaliatory murders ensued climaxing in a five-day gun battle in 1880. The most famous of the participating gunfighters was Henry McCarty, aka William H. Bonney, aka Billy the Kid, who, legends say, killed twenty-one men before he was killed at the age of twenty-one.

In the midst of the Lincoln County War, Bonney wrote Governor Lew Wallace offering his testimony about one of the murders in exchange for amnesty. Billy and the Governor met a few days later, and Wallace promised the gunslinger clemency for the testimony. To guarantee his safety, Bonney agreed to be arrested and placed in jail. Bonney testified, but the local district attorney refused to free him. Wallace felt double-crossed by the DA, and Billy the Kid by Wallace. Two months later Billy escaped from jail and vowed revenge on Wallace. Bullets were later fired into Wallace’s home, but no one knows whether Bonney was the shooter. Wallace, however, posted a $500 bounty for Bonney’s capture, and Sheriff Pat Garrett captured Billy and three others. Billy the Kid sent Wallace at least four letters seeking release, which the governor ignored. Bonney was convicted of murder and sentenced to hanging, but again he escaped, killing two men in the process. Wallace posted another $500 bounty, and three months later, Pat Garrett shot and killed Billy the Kid.

(concluded July 31)

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Forgive Yourself

          Should Trump be criminally prosecuted after he leaves office? Many assume that a president cannot be prosecuted while in office but can be later. Even so, that an ex-president can be prosecuted does not necessarily mean that he should be, and my feelings about such a prosecution are mixed.

          Deciding not to bring valid criminal charges seems to place the president above the law, and that does not seem right. On the other hand, a prosecution brought by a political rival tends to make the country look like a despotic state in which political rivals get jailed by those in power. In addition, I am concerned that the Trumpistas may become even stronger and more entrenched by a Trump prosecution. My opinion: Trump should be prosecuted only if he committed a crime of such clear venality that it would be apparent to most people that this was not simply a political prosecution.

          However, if Trump pardons himself before leaving office, the next administration will have almost a duty to prosecute him. The self-pardon brings up two issues: 1) Can there be a pardon when a person has not been convicted or even charged with an offense? 2) Can a president pardon himself? There is an accepted answer to the first question, but not the second.

          It seems strange to many that a pardon can be issued for crimes that have not been charged, but we have two famous examples of such clemency in our history: On Christmas Day 1868, President Andrew Johnson pardoned all confederates even though the southerners had not been charged with crimes. And on September 8, 1974, President Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon even though Nixon had not been indicted or charged. Nothing in the Constitution and nothing said by the Founders authorizes such preemptive pardons and nothing forbids them, but the actions of Johnson and Ford have been accepted as legitimate. Thus, pundits proclaim that a president can pardon people for crimes that have not been charged.

          (There is an important difference between those two pardons. Johnson pardoned the confederates “for the offence of treason against the United States, or of adhering to their enemies in the late civil war.” Ford issued a blanket amnesty for any and all crimes, known and unknown, during a specific period. Ford granted Nixon a pardon “for all offenses against the United States which he, Richard Nixon, has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 20, 1969, through August 9, 1974.”)

So, while there is precedent for pardons of unindicted crimes, we have no historical precedent for a president pardoning himself. Arguments have been advanced both in favor and against that power. If Trump does issue an I-forgive-myself decree, I may explore the competing arguments, but suffice it to say now that it is not certain whether presidents are allowed to self-pardon. However, neither the constitutional text, the constitutional debates, nor court decisions made it clear that a president could preemptively pardon, but the actions of Johnson and Ford have served as precedents legitimizing that power. (Jimmy Carter on his first full day in the Presidency in 1977 granted amnesty to all who evaded the draft during the Vietnam War era. While many praised or condemned the wisdom of his action, no one seems to have questioned his authority to grant the preemptive pardons.)

          And that is why if Trump pardons himself, the Justice Department, assuming it has appropriate grounds to do so, should indict the Donald. There are clear dangers in presidents being able to pardon themselves. They can then freely commit crimes knowing that they can escape criminal punishment by being able to pardon themselves. If Trump pardons himself and that action is left unchallenged, it may become assumed that a president has such authority, just as it is now accepted that presidents have a preemptive pardon power. A self-pardon should be challenged so that the courts are forced to rule on its legitimacy. Thus, the scenario goes, Trump is indicted. Trump, presumably through an attorney—please, please, let it be streaky-faced and incoherent Rudy Giuliani—will move to dismiss the charges, citing the pardon. Courts will have to rule on this motion, and that ruling will presumably make its way to the Supreme Court. In the end we would have more than Trump’s opinion that he has the ability to pardon himself.

          Thus, I am hesitant about trying Trump for crimes unless he pardons himself, and then there definitely should be a criminal prosecution. I expect that others share these views, and thus we have a somewhat bizarre situation where if Trump does not pardon himself, he is less likely to be federally indicted than if he does.

          Of course, if Trump wants a pardon, he should work out a deal with his Vice-President and say, “Mike, I will resign if you, when you are President, will pardon me. Pinkie swear?” But since it is not clear that the two are even talking these days, this will be a hard conversation for Trump to initiate.