There are a couple problems with trying to use Tariffs to force American Companies to "come back to America"...
1. You will be forcing prices up for the end consumers. If an American Company needs to charge $200 for a VCR, while a Foreign Compay can Charge $100, by putting a 100% tariff in place you've "evened" out the playing field, but only by forcing the citizens in the US to pay $200 for all VCRs. Admittedly, VCRs are a luxury item, but the point is that this would apply equally to all goods.
2. Tariffs invite (and almost always bring) retaliation. While you might prop up the US VCR makers, other US firms that were selling well to the foreign country (say Software or Computer manufacturers) will be hit when the other country inevitably raises their own tariffs in response.
3. By using Tariffs to regulate prices, the US would be effectively propping up US firms, but many of those firms may have fundamental flaws that caused them to need the propping up in the first place. If the US Company "needs" to charge $200 for their VCRs because they haven't invested any of their profits in plant upgrades that could allow them to reduce costs, propping up all VCR prices to $200 via Tariffs only encourages them to continue to not invest. Don't forget, most US firms are far more concerned about the profits they report in the next three months than what they will report next year. As long as the next quarter can somehow be made to look good, many will put off or not put enough effort into long term improvements because the costs will hurt the short term. Wall Street generally values stocks on the current profit numbers, and since many Executives' salaries are (relatively) small compared to the potential value of their stock options, they care more about propping up stock prices than long term profits.
To be honest, I'd rather see the US promoting fair labor laws and practices elsewhere. In the short term, it will push retail prices up a bit as paying a worker in a 3rd world country a relatively decent wage (for their area) will increase the cost of the cheaper foreign goods, but because those workers will have more available money we will likely see a rise in our exports as they look for more goods and services. Unfortunately, this is a long term solution and very few people appear to look at the long term (overall economic improvement for both the US and other countries) vs. what will help them for today (tariffs).