[1][2] The US Congress displayed a pro-business attitude in passing the tariff and in promoting foreign trade by providing huge loans to Europe.
Farmers borrowed heavily to expand their acreage and had difficulty paying back the loans when prices fell.
Some of the postwar problems for American agriculture come from the great surplus of farm goods, which could not be absorbed in the national market as European countries had recovered sufficiently from the war, with their markets no longer requiring large quantities of American agricultural products.
The 1920 election put the conservative pro-business and pro-farm Republicans in control of both Congress and the White House.
[7] The bill also gave the President the power to raise or lower rates on products if that was recommended by the Tariff Commission.
Democratic Representative Cordell Hull warned, "Our foreign markets depend both on the efficiency of our production and the tariffs of countries in which we would sell.
[4] In 1928, Henry Ford attacked the tariff and argued that the American automobile industry did not need protection since it dominated the domestic market.
The American Farm Bureau Federation claimed that because of the tariff, the raised price of raw wool cost to farmers $27 million.
Democratic Senator David I. Walsh challenged the tariff by arguing that the farmers were net exporters and so did not need protection.