Quotation of the Day…

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… is from pages 60-61 of the 2023 CL Press edition of John Rae’s 1895 Life of Adam Smith (footnote excluded):

In his lectures on jurisprudence and politics he [Adam Smith] had taught the doctrine of free trade from the first, and not the least remarkable result of his thirteen years’ work in Glasgow was that before he left he had practically converted that city to his views. Dugald Stewart was explicitly informed by Mr. James Ritchie, one of the most eminent Clyde merchants of that time, that Smith had, during his professorship in Glasgow, made many of the leading men of the place convinced proselytes of free trade principles.

DBx: Pay no attention to the many people today who attempt to conscript Adam Smith into the ranks of protectionists. These people have either not read Smith with any care or completeness, or their reading comprehension is abysmal. (I suspect it’s the former.)

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Adam Smith, at the age of 67, died on this date – July 17th – in 1790.