The Protection Racket : House and Secretary Brady beat up on the Japanese

Someone has got to protect America from congressional protectionists.

Car shoppers interested in imported minivans, sport utility vehicles and vans will face sticker shock if the Senate goes along with an ill-conceived House bill that would boost prices $3,000 to $4,000.

The House voted Friday to increase tenfold the tariffs on certain categories of foreign vehicles by reclassifying them as trucks. That would make them subject to a 25% truck tariff, rather than their current 2.5% rate. The bill is flagrantly protectionist.

Detroit, which controls 88% of the minivan market, not long ago accused the Japanese of “dumping” minivans at below fair-market prices in a bid to drive Americans away from the domestic product. Then and later it argued that higher tariffs were necessary to address unfair Japanese business practices. But that is counter to the U.S. International Trade Commission’s recent determination that the Big Three auto makers did not suffer significant harm from Japanese minivan imports.

The House tariff hike is bad foreign policy as well as flawed trade policy. The bill excludes European manufacturers, targeting only Japan.

Another blow to U.S.-Japan relations came over the weekend from Treasury Secretary Nicholas F. Brady, who used the disparaging word “Japs” while talking to U.S. business reporters. In apologizing later, a spokeswoman for Brady called it a “slip of the tongue.”

Brady’s insensitive use of language mars an otherwise thoughtful Bush Administration policy on both protectionism and U.S.-Japanese relations. And the proposed tariff, on international and other levels, would indeed be hurtful--with the sharpest pain, perhaps, occurring when American minivan buyers reach for their checkbooks.