DuganS1

America's Trade Is Based on Protectionism

Smoot-Hawley resulted in retaliatory tariffs, a crash in commodity prices which had very serious ramifications for the agricultural sector (out biggest export sector and a large part of the economy back then), and caused extreme dislocation in the credit markets because the slow down in exports for many European debtor nations made them unable to pay their debts (much of it to the United States). The previous tariffs didn't result in as serious repercussions of the three things listed above and thus aren't good comparisons.