CHOOSING FREE-TRADE WITHOUT AMENDING THE US CONSTITUTION

This paper documents the functioning of the market in trade protection . It uses a narrative approach to demonstrate that politicians respond to the demands of special interests by forcing open foreign markets a nd by closing domestic markets. In the process government officials vi olate property rights, disregard economic logic, damage the world trad ing system, multiply rent-seeking costs, and destroy wealth. Such outc omes imply that there is a constitutional failure, and that the rules and institutions governing international trade need to be reformed. Th is paper discusses several such changes and considers how consumers co uld be mobilized to support them.