--- title: Donald Trump Offered a History Lesson on Tariffs description: "Our greatest presidents all understood" the use of tariffs, Donald Trump said in announcing tariffs of his own. There's more to that story. canonical: https://time.com/5192161/trump-tariff-history/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-03-08T22:47:35.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T19:35:14.418Z article:section: History og:title: President Trump Offered a History Lesson on Tariffs. But There's More to the Story og:description: He cited the pro-tariff views of predecessors from Washington to Teddy Roosevelt og:url: https://time.com/5192161/trump-tariff-history/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt273bdec5d8e3d40d/69892a34bc6cfc10973e547a/trump-tariff.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2405 og:image:height: 1353 og:image:alt: Trump Tariffs og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Trump Offered a History Lesson on Tariffs. But There's More to the Story twitter:description: He cited the pro-tariff views of predecessors from Washington to Teddy Roosevelt twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt273bdec5d8e3d40d/69892a34bc6cfc10973e547a/trump-tariff.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Trump Offered a History Lesson on Tariffs. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription.  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Mar 8, 2018 10:47 PM UTC  President Donald Trump speaks before signing Section 232 Proclamations on Steel and Aluminum Imports in the Oval Office of the White House on March 8, 2018, in Washington, D.C. President Donald Trump speaks before signing Section 232 Proclamations on Steel and Aluminum Imports in the Oval Office of the White House on March 8, 2018, in Washington, D.C. Mandel Ngan—AFP/Getty Images  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Mar 8, 2018 10:47 PM UTC On Thursday, in announcing [new tariffs on aluminum and steel](http://fortune.com/2018/03/08/trump-signs-tariffs-steel-aluminum/), President Donald Trump positioned himself in a long line of U.S. presidents who have [embraced the idea](http://time.com/5192318/donald-trump-tariffs-steel-aluminum-republicans/) of using those taxes on imports to shore up the American economy. “Our greatest presidents all understood, from Washington to Lincoln to Jackson to Teddy Roosevelt, that America must have a strong, vibrant and independent manufacturing base. Has to have it,” Trump [said](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-trump-expected-to-sign-tariffs-on-steel-aluminum). “President McKinley, who felt very, very strongly about this — the country was very, very successful; we actually operated out of cash flow, if you can believe it. The protective tariff policy of the Republicans, [he said](https://books.google.com/books?id=Qe5gk4hoJXAC&pg=PA605&lpg=PA605&dq=%22made+the+lives+of+the+masses+of+our+countrymen+sweeter%22&source=bl&ots=a89aPK62L3&sig=eWBV72KcDc2NHf047euXQHXMwQ4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi--fmN0d3ZAhVozFQKHfQeD8MQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=%22made%20the%20lives%20of%20the%20masses%20of%20our%20countrymen%20sweeter%22&f=false), has made the lives of our countrymen sweeter, and brighter and brighter and brighter. It is the best for our citizenship and our civilization, and it opens up a higher and better destiny for our people.” Trump’s list does offer a useful [ history lesson](http://time.com/4747019/donald-trump-history-first-100-days/): A tariff was[ one of the first major laws](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/tariff-act-1789) that Washington ever signed. Jackson, a [favorite](http://time.com/4707867/donald-trump-henry-clay-andrew-jackson/) of Trump’s, stuck up for a tariff in 1832 even though it was so controversial that it led to the [nullification crisis](http://www.ushistory.org/us/24c.asp) in South Carolina. Lincoln, whose government badly needed money due to the Civil War, once [said](http://www.abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/abraham-lincoln-in-depth/abraham-lincoln-and-the-tariff/) that “the tariff is to the government what a meal is to the family”; the[ then-young Republican Party](http://time.com/4403385/first-republican-party-platform/) as it existed at the time [embraced protectionism](http://time.com/4310085/protectionism-history-united-states/) in the years after the Civil War. McKinley was [known](https://books.google.com/books?id=SZXlCQAAQBAJ&pg=PA275&lpg=PA275&dq=mckinley+%22the+Napoleon+of+Protection%22&source=bl&ots=u3BlGfAoS7&sig=lVH7qWUpfgEwSvD6jyUhFpEHh-4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjhzo7Z1N3ZAhXL5p8KHRWbBMYQ6AEISjAE#v=onepage&q=mckinley%20%22the%20Napoleon%20of%20Protection%22&f=false) as the “Napoleon of Protection.” And, though Roosevelt’s [take on tariffs](http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/images/research/treditorials/o162.pdf) was nuanced, he ran against Woodrow Wilson, who made lower tariffs [a major campaign issue](https://millercenter.org/president/roosevelt/campaigns-and-elections). (Whether the various tariffs embraced by these men helped or hurt the nation, which was a matter of debate then — case in point: the nullification crisis — remains a complicated question today.) But, as TIME reported back in 2016, when Trump touted tariffs on the campaign trail, it’s no coincidence that the the presidents whom Trump listed didn’t serve in his position very recently. Roosevelt, the most recent in that list, ended his term in 1909. Here’s [how we explained](http://time.com/4352542/history-donald-trump-tariffs/) why tariffs generally went out of fashion about a century ago: --- > “” --- It was after the economy suffered in the wake of that tariff that, in 1934, in an effort to help President Franklin Roosevelt repair the damage quickly, Congress gave the President a power that it had constitutionally been reserved for the legislature: [the power to set tariffs](http://history.house.gov/HistoricalHighlight/Detail/36918). Though [the laws have evolved](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/may/17/paul-ryan/fast-track-trade-authority-has-every-president-fdr/) in the decades since, it was [a version of that power](https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44707.pdf) that Trump drew on this week, adding himself to the history of presidents and protectionism. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5192161/trump-tariff-history/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5192161/trump-tariff-history/"},"headline":"President Trump Offered a History Lesson on Tariffs. 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