BRITISH OPINIONS
ON THE
PROTECTING SYSTEM,
BEING
A REPLY TO STRICTURES ON THAT SYSTEM,
WHICH HAVE APPEARED IN
RSPRINTBD WITH A FEW ALTERATIONS FROM AN ARTICLE
IN THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW,
FOB.JL^LXrV4J^, 1830.
BOSTON:
BY NATHAN HALE, Nos. 6 &, 8, CONGRESS STREET, AND GRAY & BOWEN, WASHINGTON STREET.
Steam Poioer Press— W. L. Lewis' Print.
1830.
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2007 with funding from
IVIicrosoft Corporation
http://www.archive.org/details/britishopinionsoOOeverrich
BRITISH OPINIONS
ON THE
PROTECTING SYSTEM.
The opinions of British writers on all subjects exer- cise a good deal of influence in this country ; nor is this in general to be wondered at or regretted. Their means of information upon matters of pure science and literature are superior to ours ; and it is consequently very natural that we should look to the results of their inquiries with euriosity and confidence. It is obvious, however, that we ought not to feel the same prejudice in favor of their conclusions on questions in which their own national interest is involved, as is the case with all those which grow out of the commercial and political relations between the two countries. With- out indiscriminately rejecting their suggestions, even on these subjects, because they proceed from a suspi- cious quarter, it is nevertheless our duty to receive them with caution ; and before we acquiesce in them, to endeavor to ascertain whether the judgments of their authors have not been in some degree biassed by the circumstances under which they wrote. The question of the Protecting Policy is one of the most important of this class, and is also one which has called forth a very full expression of opinion in various quarters of high authority, on the other side of the Atlantic. The prin- cipal articles that have been published on the subject
in Great Britain have since been reprinted and exten- sively circulated here. Some notice has already been taken of them in the daily papers, but it is perhaps due to the importance of the question, that they should be submitted to a rather more formal investigation. The following pages will accordingly be devoted to this inquiry. We shall particularly direct our attention to the article on the American Tariff, in the Edinburgh Review, for December, 1828; to the debate on the subject in the House of Commons, on the 18th of July, of the same year, as reported in the newspapers ; and to an article in the Quarterly Review, for January, 1829, on the commerce of the United States and the West Indies. The last mentioned article is princi- pally devoted to the question of the Colonial Trade, but takes up at the close that of the Protecting Policy ; and it is the latter part alone that we shall have occa- sion to examine. The debate in the House of Com- mons was short, and by no means of a nature to exhaust the subject ; but it afforded opportunity for several members of different parties to express in gen- eral terms their respective sentiments. The article in the Edinburgh Review is the one which we shall make the more immediate text of our remarks. It is not, we think, very powerful in substance, or very courteous and candid in manner ; but it appears in a journal, which has long maintained a high reputation throughout the literary world, and if we are not misin- formed was contributed by a writer who is considered by his countrymen as an authority on questions con- nected with political economy. It is for these reasons entitled to rather more attention than its actual merit would otherwise justify.
It is perhaps the most remarkable circumstance in the state of opinion upon this question in i\m mother country, that all persons of all parties, who have said any thing about it, have concurred, we believe, without a single exception, in condemning the American sys- tem. Whigs, tories, and radicals, economists and anti- economists, politicians that differ completely upon almost every other point, seem to agree exactly upon this. Thus in the House of Commons Mr Huskisson, a liberal tory, opens the debate by a decided rjondem- nation of our protecting policy. Mr Hume, a thorough reformer, is equally clear against the system, although he finds some apology for it in the British corn laws. Mr Peel, the minister, and a pure tory, agrees with pleasure to Mr Huskisson's request for a copy of the Tariff, and cordially joins him in denouncing this un- lucky measure. Messrs Trant, Robinson, and Stuart hold the same language ; and finally Mr C. Grant closes the debate by expressing the satisfaction he had experienced on hearing his Right Honorable friend (Mr Huskisson) bring forward the motion, which is then agreed to without opposition. This unanimity among the different parties in the House is, we think, a remarkable thing; and it is also worth attention that most, if not all the persons, who have expressed opin- ions against the Tariff on this and other occasions, are more concerned about the interest of the United States than that of England. They pass over, somewhat lightly, the question, how far this measure may affect their own manufacturers, and are generally inclined to think that it will do them Httle or no harm ; but they are all fully satisfied that it is fraught with the most pernicious consequences to us. Mr Huskisson states
6
' his decided impression, that the interest of the United States would be greatly prejudiced by the course they were about to pursue, and declares that he can prove it to a demonstration ;' but 'does not apprehend that Great Britain will suffer by the duties which the Ame- ricans have imposed for the protection of their indus- try.' Mr Hume pronounces the protecting policy * foolish, narrow, injurious, and mischievous;' and adds, that it was ' manfully opposed by all the intelli- gent men in Congress ;' but, has no hesitation in say- ing, that, * if America should shut out every article of British manufacture, an ample market for them would easily be found in other quarters.' Mr Peel * has no doubt that even should the immediate result be to en- courage our domestic industry, the final effect would be against us ;' and Mr Grant ' rejoices that the sub- ject has been started, because it affords an opportunity for giving us a little ivholesome advice in regard to the mistaken course of policy which we are pursuing, and which must in the end operate to the detriment of the funds of the United States, by lessening the amount of our import duties, and making it necessary for us to increase our direct taxes.'
The same exclusive regard for the interest of the United States is observable in the opinions expressed in other quarters, and some of these well-meaning critics are evidently quite out of humor with us for not being more attentive to our own good. 'If America,' says the Courier newspaper, 'fancies that she will promote her own prosperity by shutting her- self in surly selfishness from the world, she will be grievously disappointed. The system of exclusion laid down in this Tariff will produce her as little
profit in a commercial view, as honor in a national one.' In like manner the burden of the article in the Edinburgh Review now before us is the fatal influence which the Tariff must necessarily exercise, not on Great Britain, but on ourselves. 'What we object to in their conduct,' says the Review, ' is that they mis- take wherein their own interest really lies, and that their restrictions and prohibitions, by narrowing the field of commercial enterprise, are a public and gen- eral nuisance, though it is certain that they are infinitely more injurious to themselves than to any other people.' Again, in a tone of mingled flattery and reproach, like that of a kind parent endeavoring to coax a promising but wayward boy ; * Why should Jonathan, who is so very sharp-sighted on other practical questions, be so very blind on this ? ' and afterwards, in the same style of elegant pleasantry ; ' Who will now presume to say that John Bull is the greatest goose in the world ? Had he been in Jonathan's place, we believe he would have said, that it was clearly for his interest to buy his woollens, cottons, and hardware, wherever he could get them cheapest.' ' In our ignorance we long imagined that John Bull had been the most gull- ible of animals, but if Jonathan can swallow such assertions as these, then John has not a vestige of claim to that distinction.' All this display of argu- ment and humor is completely disinterested, for ' Amer- ica cannot inflict any material injury on us by refusing to buy our products, although at present she might injure us by refusing to selL^ The writer in the Quarterly does not yield in disinterestedness to his brother of Edinburgh, and is, if possible, even more decidedly and exclusively American. 'We shall
8
point out the effects of the -Tariffj not as they regard Great Britain, France, Russia, Germany and the Netherlands, but as they regard the interests of the United States as a whole.' He then proceeds to en- large upon the subject, principally under a political point of view ; enters at some length into the contro- versy that has arisen among us, whether the Tariff law be or be not consistent with the constitution ; and concludes by affirming, that whether we succeed in preventing the importation of foreign manufactures, or whether the people obtain their supplies by the contra- oand trade, the Tariff will in either event infallibly destroy the revenue. Notwithstanding the complete security felt by these writers in regard to the effect of the Tariff on British interests, they sometimes admit, for argument's sake, that it may to a certain extent diminish the imports of manufactured goods ; but the supposition of even this extreme case gives them no alarm. They have a remedy prepared, to the applica- tion of which they evidently look forward with much complacency. There is a grand corrector ready, whose influence upon vicious commercial and financial legislation they consider as hardly less beneficial, than that of the school-master is supposed by Mr Brougham to be upon political institutions in general. ' The smuggler, provided we allow him to bring back equiv- alents, will take care of our interests.' Under such high protection they are of course safe ;
* The Gods take core of Cato,' and the British statesmen and writers are quite at leisure to devise the best means of saving poor Jona- than from the disastrous consequences of his own igno- rance and folly.
Poor Jonathan will doubtless feel himself too highly flattered by these unusual testimonies of interest and friendship on the part of his respectable elder brother to suppose for a moment that any thing more is meant than meets the ear ; nor will he probably resent very highly the reflection implied in them upon his capacity to take care of himself, when he finds it sugared over by so many pretty compliments and fond familiarities. Admitting therefore that the regard for our interest professed by these writers, and by all classes of the British public on this occasion, is entirely sincere and disinterested, and offering with equal sincerity our best acknowledgments in return, we may still perhaps be permitted to inquire, w^hether it be quite certain that this zeal is according to knowledge. Are our trans- atlantic friends so fully acquainted with all the cir- cumstances, geographical, statistical, and political, of our situation, as to be able to judge with unerring cer- tainty, at three thousand miles' distance, what meas- ures will best promote our good ? Supposing their disposition to serve us to be as great as our own to serve ourselves, and their ability as much j>;reater, as they may think proper to imagine it, do they possess the complete magazine of facts which would enable them to exhibit this disposition and exert this ability in such a w^ay as to produce beneficial results ? Is not their inferiority to us in this latter respect necessarily as obvious, as their superiority may be, and in their own judgment probably is, in the other ? Differences among intelligent and candid men turn much less fre- quently upon general principles, than upon the man- ner of applying them. In this particular case there is little or no dispute about principles, and the only 2
10
question is about the form under which acknowl- edged truths are to be reduced to practice in the United States. Now will any British statesman of tolerable candor undertake to affirm, that his advan- tages for coming to a correct opinion upon such a ques- tion are equal to ours ? Would any prudent British physician so far commit himself, as to declare posi- tively upon the strength of a reported case, that a patient who had received the best medical advice that could be had at New York or Boston, had been im- properly treated ? And yet how few and simple are the symptoms of even the most difficult and compli- cated case of illness compared with the vast variety of details that make up the situation, for the time being, of a great community, and which must all be kept in view for the purpose of legislation, especially on mat- ters of an economical kind ? The very maxim upon which the British writers found their reasoning against the protecting system is, that every man understands his own interest best, and will take better care of him- self, than any body else can take of him. But is not this principle, the general correctness of which we readily admit, as true of communities as it is of indi- viduals ? Is it not as completely against these writers on one view of the case, as they suppose it to be against us on another ? It is quite clear that the very argument upon which they rest with so much apparent confidence, may be urged by us as a peremptory and unanswerable plea to the jurisdiction of their tribunal, and ought to prevent any British politician from pre- tending to offer an opinion on the subject in any other way than as a matter of general speculation.
11
There are two inconveniences in reasoning from general principles without a sufficient knowledge of the circumstances under which thej are to be applied. One is, that we are apt to leave out of view facts of importance, that ought to be considered, and the other, that we are apt to keep in view the facts of the case with which we are most familiar, but which may not exist in the one before us. It is easy to see, upon a survey of the British opinions upon our Tariff, that the judgments of our transatlantic friends have been warped by both these causes of error. They take no notice, as we shall have occasion to show, of the vari- ous weighty and urgent considerations deduced from the actual situation of the United States, which in our minds are completely decisive of the whole question ; and they evidently reason on the supposition of a state of things similar to that which now exists in Great Britain. The general introduction, throughout the world, of the system of an unrestrained importation of foreign manufactures would be highly beneficial to Great Britain ; therefore it would be highly beneficial to every other country. Such is the sum and sub- stance of the argument. But mark the difference of the operation of this principle under the different cir- cumstances of Great Britain and the United States. As respects the former country, where capital is abundant and almost every branch of manufactures flourishing to an unprecedented extent, the effect of the general introduction of the principle is to facilitate the entrance of British manufactures into foreign markets. As respects other countries, that are differ- ently circumstanced, and especially the United States, the effect is to facilitate the entrance of foreign man-
12
ufactures into the domestic market. In the former case it encourages domestic manufactures ; in the lat- ter, it destroys them. Can it be maintained with a shadow of plausibility, that a principle which, under different circumstances, produces such directly oppo- site results, is to be applied indiscriminately throughout the world, without consideration of the actual situation of particular countries ? The precise object of the British politicians in desiring the extension of the sys- tem of free importation, is to encourage their own do- mestic manufactures. We find no fault with them for this, but, on the contrary, approve and admire the zeal with which they pursue a really valuable and pa- triotic purpose. But can they in turn complain, if we pursue the very same purpose of encouraging our do- mestic manufactures, though by a different process ? Or if they do, is it not obvious to the slightest obser- vation, that they are viewing our policy through the medium of their own interest? Of this again we make no complaint. It is quite natural, and perhaps commendable, that British statesmen should look at every thing through British spectacles. But are we to be the dupes of such palpable sophistry? If we are, we shall exhibit but little of the sagacity whic h the Edinburgh Reviewer is pleased to consider as a char- acteristic of Jonathan. The grossness of this sophistry was well exposed by Mr de St Cricq, the late intelli- gent French minister of commerce, in conversation with Mr Huskisson, who was exhorting him to con- sent to place the relations of the two countries upon the footing of low duties, and a reciprocally free im- portation of their respective products. The anecdote has found its way into the newspapers, and is worih
13
repeating and keeping in mind. * The system you propose,' said Mr de St Cricq, ' is excellent for you and detestable for us for precisely the same reason ; that is, because we both wish to extend and foster our domestic industry. The operation of it would be to ruin our fabrics, and to build up yours. It is a natural if not a modest request in you to urge us in this way to sacrifice our resources for your benefit ; but if we are not surprised at your making the proposal, you will probably not.-take it ill that we decline it. When our manufactures are so well established and flourish- ing as to defy competition, and command the markets of the world, we will then consent to admit vours on a footing of reciprocity. Till then, permit us to adhere to our present policy.' If Mr Huskisson did not wince a little at this retort courteous, his power of face must be at least on a par with his intellectual talent, which is certainly respectable.
The beautiful consistency of the British mode of reasoning upon this subject is rendered, if possible, still more conspicuous by the suddenness of their conversion to the principle of free and unrestricted trade. For centuries in succession, they kept their ports hermetically sealed against any foreign pro- duct which could possibly be made at home. If every bale and parcel of manufactures from every part of the world had been infected with the plague, the exclusion could not have been enforced with a more strict and relentless jealousy. For the same general purpose the colonies, and those in particular which now form the United States, were prohibited from exer- cising any species of manufacturing industry, and compelled to receive every article of use, comfort, or
14
luxury, from England. The convenience of every other nation, of their own subjects in every other part of the world, was systematically sacrificed to the pro- motion of domestic manufactures in the British islands. By a resolute and persevering adherence to this sys- tem they finally carry their manufactures to such a height of perfection, that they have not only nothing to fear from foreign competition in the home market, but can enter with advantage into competition with foreign nations even in their own nicfrkets. No sooner does this take place, than the statesmen of England perceive at once the error of the exclusive system upon which they have been acting for centuries, and the incontestible truth of the opposite one, as a universal rule of practice. At the same moment they com- mence a series of negotiations with foreign govern- ments, for the benevolent purpose of engaging them to ruin their own manufactures for the sake of promoting those of Great Britain ; and from this time forward, all such foreign governments as do not choose to adopt this patriotic policy, but, on the contrary, continue to act on the principles that have made the prosperity of England, are saluted by the unanimous voice of all the British politicians and writers of all parties and classes with the agreeable charges of gross stupidity, shameful ignorance, and we know^ not what. 'They arc great- er geese than John Bull.' 'They out-Herod George Rose, and would satisfy Lord Malmsbury.' 'Their systems are more iniquitous and absurd than anything in the commercial codes of Austria and Spain.' ' There is no possibility of accounting for the existence of such blockheads .«s the leading American statesmen, unless by supposing, on the old theory of the metempsycho-
15
sis, that the soul of Lord Lauderdale (who by the hy will probably hear with some surprise the news of his own death) has revived, and now animates another body on the w^estern side of the Atlantic' In the mean time we may hope, that, under the full efful- gence of all this new light upon the subject, the liberal system is at least carried into complete execution in Great Britain itself. Quite the contrary. Still, as before, not a pennyworth of any thing foreign is ad- mitted, that can possibly come into competition with any product of domestic industry. Bread itself, the staff of life, must be bought by the people at two or three times its natural price, rather than endanger the interest of the landholders by the admission of foreign grain. In times of scarcity we are invited to relieve their distress, but when plenty returns, the door is again shut in our faces. In short, the commercial liberality of our excellent elder brother stops, as it begins, at the point which appears most suitable for the promotion of his own domestic industry. Against this system we make, as we have said before, no com- plaint. We think it, on the contrary, the true and correct one. But we really do w^onder at the bare- facedness with which the British writers upbraid for- eign nations in the foulest and most unmeasured lan- guage, for no other cause than acting upon British principles, because these principles, when acted upon by others, do not happen to be in exact accordance with British interests.* We hardly know a parallel
* The writer of an article on Russia in the Quarterly Review for January, 1829, takes the British residents at Brussels pretty severely to task for spend- ing th^ir fortunes abroad, although, as he admits, * they are able to live there, with comparative affluence, on an annual income which would not enable
16
for this inconsistency, unless it be in the conduct of the same British government upon the question of the slave trade. After carrying on this traffic for centu- ries to a greater extent than any other nation ; after buying of Spain the monopoly of it between her and her colonies ; after a debate upon the subject of twen- ty years' continuance in both houses of Parliament, Great Britain finally resolves to abolish it. From that moment the propriety of abolishing it is so perfectly clear, that it is a crime for any other nation to hesitate a moment. The aid of the British navy is politely offered to all the friendly and allied powers for the enforcement of their own laws on the subject, and his Catholic Majesty (like a lawyer who takes a fee on both sides of the same case) is now bribed not to car- ry on at all the trade, which he was before bribed to allow Great Britain to carry on for him. Both these examples exhibit the intense nationality of John Bull in a remarkable and somewhat ludicrous point of view*. As respects the slave trade, the really humane, we may almost say, sacred character of the cause throws a veil over all sorts of irregularities, and makes even
them, without the strictest economy, to struggle through life at home.' Id other words, he conceives, that they ought to pay three or four times as much for the necessaries and comforts of life as they cost elsewhere, rather than not have them of English produce. Pursuing his author into Germany, he finds, to his great surprise, that the natives of that country prefer their own hardware, though of inferior quality, to the British. Consistency would seem to require, that their conduct in this respect should be commended as a trait of laudable patriotism ; but, instead of tliis, tliey arc severely reprimanded, and treated with the unceremonious qualification of muzzy-headed smoktrs. ' This,' says he, * is carrying patriotism or piejudice to a great lengtli indeed. We venture to say that a pyir of English scissors may he afibrded at Leipsic for three half pnnce, better than any that can be made in Germany for six pence ; but it would be difficult to persuade the muzzy-headed smokers of this.' The worthy critic appears to us to carry both patriotism and prejudice a little farther than even the Germans.
17
absurdity respectable. In the other case there is no such palliating circumstance ; and we would really counsel our transatlantic brethren to be a little more circumspect in their egotism, unless they wish to make their island the laughing-stock as well as the work- shop of the world.
We conceive, however, that, for the reasons we have stated, the opinions of the British writers on this ques- tion ought not, as such, to be allowed much weight. Independently of the direct interest which they have in opposing our system, and giving them all the credit for honesty, ability, and even disinterested attachment to the United States, to which they are fairly entitled, and as much more as they choose to claim, the essen- tial difficulties which we have indicated still remain, and must for ever incapacitate them from giving us any counsel on the subject of real value. They can- not possibly possess the necessary knowledge of facts, nor can they, even with the best intentions in the world, avoid looking at the question through the me- dium of their own habitual feelings and opinions. Their judgments are therefore necessarily suspicious, and can carry no authority with them, excepting such as they may derive from the intrinsic stren«;th of the reasoning by which they are supported. There is one point of view indeed, and one only, under which the British opinions on this subject are entitled, as such, to some attention ; and that is, when we consider them as indications of the efficiency of the Tariff for the ac^ complishment of its objects. We are far from suppos- ing, that the British writers intend to deceive us when they represent themselves as arguing the question ex- clusively with reference to American interests ; but 3
18
we are not quite sure, that they have not partially de- ceived themselves, and that the singular zeal for our welfare and prosperity, which they unanimously pro- fess on this occasion, is not, in some degree at least, the effect of a secret consciousness, that their own man- ufactures will be injured by the permanent establish- ment of the American system. We are aware, that they pointedly and loudly disclaim any such fears, and profess the most perfect security ; nor are we any more disposed to doubt the sincerity of these protestations than that of the others ; but it is not impossible, or rather it is quite consistent with the ordinary course of human feeling and action in such cases, that these writers should express their hopes under the form of opinions, and should endeavor to persuade others of what they would gladly persuade themselves. With- out intending, in short, to represent the British politi- cians as worse or better than those of any other coun- try, we are strongly inclined to regard their present extraordinary and unprecedented zeal for our good as merely an indirect expression of that which they usually and ordinarily feel for their own ; and must venture to interpret their profuse and repeated profes- sions of perfect security, as unconscious and involun- tary indications of a good deal of real apprehension at bottom. Thus considered, these publications are val- uable to us as proofs of the extent to which the Tariff is likely to operate upon Great Britain. It can never, of course, be the wish or the policy of the United States to adopt any measure for the direct purpose of injuring that or any other country, excepting in time of war ; but it is clear, that in the present case we can only effect ogr object, which is that of protecting and
19
extending our own manufactures, hy diminishiug the importation of British ones. The extent, to which this diminution takes place, is therefore an exact mea- sure of the benefit that will accrue to ourselves; and if we have reason to suppose, from the loudness and unanimity of the expression (in whatever way, direct or indirect,) of British feeling on the occasion, that the diminution is likely to be considerable, we know by the best possible evidence, that we are on the right track ; that the Tariff is what we meant that it should be; and that, by giving it a fair trial, we shall be able to assure ourselves, whether the adoption of a bo7ia fide American policy be or be not as beneficial a thing to us as we have reason to suppose it. When, there- fore, we find the British writers so busily engaged in endeavoring to reason, persuade, advise, coax, flatter, wheedle, and frighten us out of our system, we ought to look upon them as exhorting us all the time, by the strongest arguments they could possibly use, and the only ones to which Ave could safely listen, to persevere in it. Such, in our view, is the only lesson which the British opinions on this subject are fitted, as such, to convey to us, and it is one which, we trust, w^ill not be lost upon the American public.
But although w^e can derive no other instruction than this from the British opinions on the Tariff, con- sidered as such, it is nevertheless natural and proper to give a reasonable degree of attention to the argu- ments by which they are supported. We owe it to ourselves to improve every opportunity for extending our information and correcting our conclusions upon matters of public policy ; and if the British can really give us any valuable hints upon the one now under
20
consideration, we ought to allow them their just weight, however questionable the shape under which they come. Having, therefore, in the preceding pages, cautioned our readers against the error of putting im- plicit faith in such suggestions, and shown, as we trust, satisfactorily, that the authority of the British writers is of a negative, rather than positive kind, we shall now^ proceed to examine, with the brevity that suits the present occasion, their reasoning, and partic- ularly that of the Edinburgh Reviewer. There is lit- tle or no novelty in the statement of the argument given in the article before us, but it may be fairly enough considered as a summary, in a not very pow- erful form, of what can be said upon the subject ; and we shall of course have opportunity in noticing it to take a rapid survey of the leading points of the discus- sion.
We have no disposition, as We have already inti- mated, to contest the correctness of the general princi- | ^ pie of the equilibrium of trade, although we are of opinion, that it can only be received, even as a gene- ral principle, with important qualifications. It is also unnecessary to examine here the nature and extent of these qualifications ; for although the principle is as- sumed by the Reviewer in the article before us, the correctness of his conclusions does not depend at all upon the greater or less degree of extension that may be given to it in the abstract. He very properly ar- gues the question upon considerations deduced from the peculiar circumstances of the United States. He fully admits the great advantages that, in general, ac- crue to a country from the possession of domestic manufactures, and is ready to assent to all that Gene-
21
ral Hamilton has said to this effect and much more* He also admits, with equal frankness, that our manu- factures cannot at present sustain the competition with those of Great Britain, and that a free importation of the latter w^ould ruin them. The natural conclusion from these premises would appear to be entirely in favor of the protecting system. The Reviewer at- tempts, however, to make out, that the case of the United States is a sort of exception from the general rule ; that, under our peculiar circumstances, agricul- ture is obviously and decidedly the most profitable employment of capital ; that all the labor and capital which we may invest in manufactures must be with- drawn or transferred from agriculture ; and that the community sustains a loss by such transfer proportional to the difference in the profitableness of the two sorts of business. The following extract will give the reader a correct idea of the tenor of his reasoning.
' Among the supporters of the restrictive system in America, the first place is due to the late General . Hamilton. His celebrated Report on the subject of \ manufactures was presented to the House of Repre- sentatives towards the close of 1791. It had a very great effect. It is written with considerable talent, and is well calculated to make an impression on those who have not analyzed the real sources of w^ealth. A very slight examination is, however, sufficient to show the fallacy of the principles on which it is founded. General Hamilton dwells at great length on the ad- vantages resulting from the establishment of manufac- tures, on the stimulus which they give to industry and invention, the ample field which they lay open for en- terprise, and the great scope which they furnish for the
22
exercise of the various talents and dispositions with which men are endowed. That all this, and much more, may be truly said in praise of manufactures, no one, with perhaps the exception of the Laureate, will presume to deny. But the point which General Ham- ilton had to consider, was not w hether the prosecution of manufacturing industry was, abstractly considered, advantageous, but whether it was for the advantage of the United States to force the establishment of manu- factures by imposing duties and prohibitions on the importation of manufactured goods from abroad. He has not indeed wholly overlooked this part of the ques- tion ; but, as was to be expected, he has entirely fail- ed to make good his view of the case.
. ' That the great principle of the division of labor ought to be respected by states as well as by individ- uals, is a doctrine too w^ell established to require us to say one w^ord in its defence. The circumstances too, under which America is placed, render it peculiarly in- cumbent on her not to lose sight of this principle. It is not easy to say what species of industry is best for most parts of the old-settled and densely peopled coun- tries of Europe, or which they may prosecute with the greatest advantage. Itidustry is amongst them in a state of perpetual oscillation ; every new discovery in the arts attracting capital to manufactures, and every improvement in agriculture again drawing it back to the land. But this is not the case in America. There neither is, jior can be, any doubt about the species of industry which it is most for her advantage to prose- cute. And it is admitted by^General Hamilton, and has been admitted by all the subsequent advocates of duties and prohibitions, that were government to ab-
23
stain from interfering to protect manufactures, none but the coarser and l)ulkier sorts could maintain them- selves, and that agriculture would draw to itself most of the capital and industry of the nation. Nor is it difficult to perceive why this should be so. The most fertile lands of England, France, and most other Eu- ropean countries, have been long since exhausted ; and we are now compelled to resort to soils of very inferior fertility to obtain a part of our supplies of food. But America is in a totally different situation. She is still possessed of an almost unlimited extent of fertile and unappropriated land ; and it is as obviously her inter- est to apply herself in preference to its cultivation, and to obtain supplies of the finer sorts of manufactured goods from nations less favorably situated for the pro- secution of agricultural industry, as it is the interest of the West Indians to apply themselves to the raising of sugar and coffee. The growth of raw produce must^ for a long series of years, be the most profitable species of employment in which the citizens of America can engage. There can be no doubt indeed, that those branches of manufacture naturally adapted to her pe- culiar situation will gradually grow up and flourish in America, according as her population becomes denser, and as the advantage, which now exists on the side of agriculture, becomes less obvious and decided. But to encourage, by means of duties and prohibitions, tho premature growth of manufactures, is plainly to force a portion of the industry and capital of the nation into channels into which it would not otherwise have flow- ed, because'it would, but for these duties and prohibi- tions, be less productively employed in them, than in those in which it was already invested.
24
* Whatever therefore may be said with respect to the restrictive system in other countries, in America it seems to be destitute even of the shadow of an excuse. The advantages on the side of agricultural industry are there so very signal and obvious, that to attempt forci- bly to draw capital from it to manufactures is really to adopt that precise line of conduct which is best fitted to check the progress of wealth and population. But though the advantages on the side of agriculture were less obvious than they are, the policy of the American legislature would yet be wholly indefensible. Let it be supposed, in illustration of the effect of prohibitions, that America has been accustomed annually to import a million's worth of woollens, or some other manufac- tured product, from Great Britain, France, or any other foreign country ; and let it be further supposed, that, in order to encourage the manufacture of a simi- lar article at home, she prohibits its importation. Now, in this case, — and what is true of this case is true of all restrictions whatever, — it is in the first place plain, that to whatever extent the home demand for the pro- duce of American industry may be increased by the prohibition, the foreign demand for that produce will be equally diminished. Commerce is merely an ex- change of equivalents ; and those who refuse to im- port, really by so doing refuse to export. If America cease to buy a million's worth of produce from foreign- ers, she must at the same time cease selling to them a million's w^orth of some other species of produce ; that is, she must cease sending to the foreigner the articles she had previously been accustomed to export to pay for the articles obtained from him, that are in future, through the agency of the prohibition, to be obtained
25
at home. All, therefore, that she will accomplish by this measure, will be the transference of capital from one branch of industry to another. That equality of protection to w hich all the citizens of the Union are justly entitled, will be encroached upon ; the increase of one employment will be brought about by the de- pression of some other employment which, to say the very least, was equally advantageous. But it is obvi- ously false to affirm, that such a measure can make the smallest addition to the capital and industry of the republic, or to the facilities for employing them with security and advantage.'
The reasoning in the above extract, stated in a more condensed form, seems to be substantially as follows. Although it is generally advantageous to a country to supply its own demand for manufactured articles as well as for agricultural produce, yet as the United States, from the great abundance and cheapness of land, have peculiar facilities for agriculture, and as some other countries, particularly Great Britain, possess, in the abundance of capital and cheapness of labor, peculiar facilities for manufactures, it is more advantageous for the United States, under these circumstances, to devote themselves exclusively to agriculture, and exchange a part of their agricultural produce with Great Britain for manufactures, than to attempt to manufacture for themselves. This, we suppose, will be considered by the Reviewer as a fair statement of the argument ; and we can easily conceive of two communities so situated that an intercourse of the kind here contemplated, would, in fact, be mutually and equally profitable. Such is the nature of the commerce which regularly takes place between all cities and the country around 4
26
them ; and if Great Britain and the United States were neighboring communities, forming constituent parts of one political association, and possessing a complete liberty of mutual intercourse, we should feel no difficulty in assenting to the Reviewer's conclusion. But under the actual circumstances of the case, there are, as we conceive, two or three objections of a very stubborn and peremptory character, not merely to the policy or expediency, but to the practicability of the arrangement suggested by this writer. It can, we think, very easily be shown, that it is wholly impossi- ble for the United States to receive their supplies of manufactured articles in the way above described, and that the absence of domestic manufactures is equiva- lent in practice to the absence of all manufactures.
1 . It is obviously impossible for us to receive our manufactures from Great Britain in exchange for the surplus quantity of agricultural produce which we should obtain by devoting ourselves exclusively to agriculture, unless Great Britain will consent in turn to receive our agricultural produce in exchange for her manufactures. But it is well known that Great Bri- tain, by her interdiction of the importation of foreign grain, refuses to receive the agricultural produce of all that part of our population which is employed in rais- ing grain, and which composes at least two thirds of the whole. The embarrassments which she throws in the way of our intercourse with her West Indian colo- nies, as far as they diminish the value of that branch of trade, are equivalent in practice to a refusal to re- ceive another considerable portion of our agricultural produce. We make no complaint of this policy, either as respects the corn laws or the colonial trade. We
27
willingly leave it to British statesmen to judge what measures are best fitted to promote British interests ; and as these are ostensibly and professedly directed to the promotion of the domestic industry of the kingdom, the end is undoubtedly laudable, whatever may be thought of the prudence of the means. We only say, that while Great Britain refuses to receive the agricul- tural produce of two thirds of the population of the United States, it is impossible for two thirds of the population of the United States to send her their agri- cultural produce in exchange for her manufactures, and that th^ system which the Reviewer proposes as a sub- stitute for that of domestic manufactOres, is of course, as far at least as respects two thirds of our population, out of the question.
It is true, that the Reviewer appears individually to disapprove the policy of the corn laws, and even as- serts explicitly, that he is quite as hostile to them as any foreigner, whether American or Pole, possibly can be. He says, that he looks upon them as decidedly opposed to all the best interests of Great Britain ; as occasioning the misemployment of a large amount of industry and capital ; as multiplying at one and the same time the chances not only of famine but also of glut ; and as tending, by raising the average price of food, and consequently the rate of wages, to an artifi- cial elevation, to depress the rate of profit, and cause the transference of capital to other countries. He is willing to assent to all that can be said, even by the Harrisburgh delegates, in vituperation of the corn laws, and affirms, that it is therefore needless to tell him, that England has acted, and is in this instance still acting, upon that very system of policy which he con-
28
demns. It is not impossible, that, if the occasion had appeared to require it, the Reviewer might have been equally explicit in his disapprobation of the British colonial system, which has not in general been much in favor with the writers of his fraternity. But while we cheerfully admit, that it would be quite superflu- ous to employ much time and labor, in attempting to convince him of the impolicy of the corn laws, of which he seems to be so fully satisfied, it is apparent- ly not wholly unnecessary, — since the consideration seems to have escaped him, — to remind him, that the unfavorable opinion which he entertains of these laws, does not authorise the cultivator of the United States to export his produce to Great Britain. It is abso- lutely necessary for this purpose, that the prohibitory act of Parliament should be repealed. The Reviewer must surely be aware, that the mere signature of Robert Peel, or the person, whoever else he may be, that signs the instructions founded in that act, would have more weight with the custom-house officers, than a whole article in the Edinburgh Review, or even the Quarterly, which, of the two, would probably be view- ed at the custom-house as much the better authority. If a shipmaster from the United States should enter one of the British ports with a cargo of flour, and on being met by the prohibitory act, should allege in re- ply, that this act was in opposition to the theories of Adam Smith, had been formally disapproved in the Edinburgh Review, and was consequently not in force, there cannot be a doubt that the collector would re- fuse to listen to him ; and it is not improbable, that the fact would be commented upon in the next fol- lowing numbers of the leading reviews, and placed on
29
record with the memorable affair of the geocentric lati- tude^ as another example of the characteristic cunning with which Jonathan so often, and in general so un- successfullj, attempts to overreach the straight-forward honesty of his unsuspecting elder brother. It is in short abundantly clear that if the writer before us wish to make his opinion upon the corn laws bear upon the state of the commercial relations between the two countries, he can only succeed, by inducing the British Government to adopt that opinion. It is really not our fault if we do not send to Great Britain, in ex- change for manufactures, the agricultural produce which Great Britain refuses to take ; and it is there- fore to his own ministry, and not to us, that the Re- viewer should address his mingled strain of argument, reproof, and raillery. So able a writer, by giving his labor the proper direction, may doubtless carry his point without much difficulty ; but until he has done this, we may venture to say to him in his own words, and perhaps with more propriety, that it is needless for him to tell us what he thinks of the corn laws, since his opinion of them, whether favorable, or unfavorable, can in no way modify their effect upon our commerce. The Reviewer affirms indeed in the course of the article, that Mr Otis and others are mistaken in sup- posing that Great Britain refuses to take from us any considerable portion of our produce. It is really amus- ing to see the cool and unhesitating confidence with which this transatlantic journalist represents our most enlightened citizens as not knowing what portions of our produce Great Britain will or will not take from us ; nor is it easy to see how he reconciles this asser- tion with his large and frank admissions in regard to
30
the com laws. If he believe himself what he says, he must of course suppose that grain does not form a con- siderable portion of the produce of the United States ; and if such be his opinion, the fact only shows that he is, as we intimated in our preliminary remarks that every foreign writer necessarily must be, destitute of the information respecting the statistical and political situation of the United States which is indispensable to the formation of a correct judgment on the policy of the Tariff. The part of the population employed prin- cipally in raising grain, which we have rated at two thirds, was estimated by Mr Clay in his excellent speech on the Tariff of 1825 at four fifths, and we have no doubt that his computation is the more correct of the two. Mr Addington, an intelligent English gentleman, who resided several years among us as a diplomatic agent of his government, and is now their minister at Madrid, has given a correct view of the sub- ject in his official correspondence with his employers, which has since been published. He there states in substance, that it cannot reasonably be expected of us to take British manufactures in exchange for our pro- duce, while we are prohibited by Great Britain herself from giving our produce in exchange for her manufac- tures ; and he intimates it as his belief, that if the British corn laws had never existed, the protecting policy would not have been thought of among us, be- cause the great grain-growing middle states, which have been, and still are, its principal supporters, would in that case have had no adequate motive for desiring its adoption.
2. We do not however quite agree with Mr Adding- ton in this latter opinion. Although the British corn
31
laws render it physically impossible for the greater part of our population to consume Britisli manufac- tures, and ought therefore to prevent every English- man who has the least sense of shame or consistency from uttering a word against our protecting policy, we are nevertheless far from being certain that a repeal of these laws would materially alter the case ; and the second objection we have to oppose to the policy re- commended by the Reviewer, as a substitute for that of domestic manufactures, is, that it is rendered im- practicable not only by the act of the British govern- ment itself, but by the still more decisive and inexora- ble fiat of nature. The commerce contemplated by the Reviewer between an exclusively agricultural com- munity on the one hand and an exclusively manufac- turing community on the other, might, as we have intimated above, be carried on with profit between neighbwing regions forming parts of the same political association, and is in fact habitually carried on with great mutual advantage between the inhabitants of towns and of the country around them ; but it cannot in the nature of things possibly exist between two great nations politically independent, situated on op- posite sides of a vast intervening ocean, and in differ- ent quarters of the globe. The mere fact of political independence opposes an insuperable obstacle to this arrangement, as we shall presently show ; but waving ?^,^> this consideration, and looking at the subject simply under an economical point of view, we would venture to ask this writer whether it be in his opinion, we will not say expedient or desirable, but physically practica- ble for the different classes of laborers which enter into the composition of all societies, economically consid-
32
ered, to dwell on opposite sides of the globe, and ex- change their several products at the distance of thous- ands of miles. Will the Reviewer himself undertake to affirm that it is possible for the tailors, hatters, shoe- makers, and other manufacturers of England or France to receive their grain, meat, vegetables, and materials from the cultivators on the banks of the Monongahela and the Allegany, and the latter in turn, their hats, coats, shoes, and other manufactured articles from Paris and London ? We know that by improvements in the modes and means of transportation much may be effected in the way of shortening distances and bringing remote places into commimication with each other ; but it is not less obvious that there are certain limits, and those by no means very extensive, beyond ■which it is impossible for communities to depend upon each other for supplies of the necessaries and comforts of life. The interchange of articles of ordinary use supposes in the first place, and absolutely requires, a great deal of personal communication between the par- ties. Clothing for example must be made to suit the person of the wearer. Is the London tailor then to make a voyage across the Atlantic in order to measure his customer on the banks of the Susquehanna and the Wabash, or are the latter to leave their estates and repair to the other side of the world to be measured every time they want a new coat or a new pair of boots? Of agricultural articles again many are perish- able, and will not bear transportation. The fresh meats, vegetables, and fruits, which enter so largely into the ordinary consumption of civilized communities must be consumed in the neighborhood of the spot where they are raised, or not at all. Of agricultural
33
articles that are not perishable, almost all are bulky, and can only be transported to a great distance, even with the advantage of the greatest facilities and the most improved methods, at an expense which vastly augments their original value, and of course diminishes the demand for them to the same extent. It is in short so abundantly clear that a commerce in the necessa- ries and comforts of life, like that which is carried on every where between town and country, cannot possi- bly be carried on between remote communities like Great Britain and the United States, that we really deem it superfluous to waste many words upon the subject. Such is the force of truth, that the Reviewer himself, at the very moment of recommending this impracticable intercourse, draws with sufficient cor- rectness the distinction between the manufactures which we might conveniently receive from abroad, and those with which we should naturally supply our- selves ; and the only wonder is, that he did not per- ceive that his concessions on this head were fatal to his own argument. He admits in the above extract that it would be natural and expedient for us to manu- facture at home the coarser and bulkier articles of or- dinary use, without appearing to recollect that it is precisely upon these coarse and bulky articles, which compose the great mass of our imports from Great Britain, that the present question turns. It is acknow- ledged by all to be a matter of comparatively small importance whether we make at home or receive from abroad our jewelry, laces, wines, and other such pro- ducts of mere luxury, because the consumption of them is necessarily in any case extremely limited. The coarse and bulky articles of ordinary use, whose 5
SA
cheapness renders them accessible to the mass of con- sumers, the cotton and woollen cloths and hardware of middling and inferior qualities, are the great objects of attention. It is precisely these with which Great Bri- tain would willingly supply us, and of which we, on the contrary, are desirous to encourage the domestic manufacture. When therefore the Reviewer grants that it is better for us to manufacture the coarser and bulkier articles at home, he in fact concedes the whole question. But his remark on the subject, though com- pletely sufficient as a refutation of his own reasoning, conveys nevertheless a very inadequate idea of the state of the case. It is not enough to say with him that it would be more for our advantage to manufacture at home the coarser and bulkier articles. The real truth is, as we have shown above, and as must be ob- vious to all on the least reflection, that a trade between remote communities in objects of this description is in its nature impracticable, and that as far as such objects are concerned, the absence of domestic manufactures is equivalent in practice'to the absence of all manufac- turers.
3. Beside these two objections, either of which would perhaps be considered by judicious readers as decisive against the plan of the Reviewer, there is yet a third of a not less peremptory character, which re- sults from the political separation and mutual indepen- dence of Great Britain and the United States. The Reviewer has a paragraph on this subject which we quote entire, as a curious specimen of the way in which the most obvious and weighty considerations lose their character under the contracted observation of a narrow and prejudiced mind.
35
' Some members of the American legislature, who advocate the protecting system, and of the purity of whose motives no doubt can be entertained, seem to lay a great deal of stress on the assumed principle, that no people can truly be said to be independent, if they are indebted to foreigners for supplies of any commo- dity of very great utility. There is some apparent, but no real foundation for this opinion. The fallacy lies in attaching an erroneous meaning to the term inde- pendent. No one would reckon a private gentleman, who had his clothes, hats, shoes, &c. made in his own house, as in any respect more independent than one who had money enough to buy them of the tailors, hatters, shoemakers, and other tradesmen. The same is the case with nations. Each, by applying itself in preference to those pursuits for which it has some pe- culiar aptitude, will be able to obtain a greater com- mand over the necessaries and conveniencies of life through the intervention of an exchange, and will con- sequently be richer, and more truly independent, than if it had directly produced the various articles for which it has a demand. In commerce equivalents are always given for equivalents ; so that there can be no dependence in the vulgar acceptation of the term. The Americans it is true, have on one or two occasions experienced a scarcity of foreign manufactured goods ; but this was a consequence oi their own policy, of their non-impor- tation acts, and not of the prohibitive regulations of any foreign power. They may rest assured that no manufacturing nation tvill ever refuse to sell. No such circumstance has ever yet occurred ; and it may be safely affirmed that it never will. The danger that the American statesmen would provide against, is there-
36
fore altogether imaginary. The independence at which they aspire, is the independence of those w ho swim across the river, that they may owe nothing to the bridge.'
The fallacy of this pretended refutation lies in pro- ceeding upon a complete misconception of the nature of the objection to be refuted. The question is not whether private gentlemen or communities would or would not be rendered more independent by obtaining their supplies of articles of ordinary use within their own territories ; but whether communities which are politically independent be on that account more or less favorably situated for carrying on a trade in such arti- cles. If the residence of a private gentleman were placed in the neighborhood of two villages, with one of which his communications w^ere habitually interrupted by insuperable obstacles for about half the time, and sometimes for months and years in succession, while they were always open with the other, he would be thought excessively imprudent if he did not depend upon the latter, rather than the former, for his daily supply of provisions. The inconvenience of a com- merce in articles of ordinary use between politically independent communities is precisely of the same de- scription. This intercourse is liable to be interrupted at any moment, and, judging from past experience, is in fact, even under the most favorable circumstances, interrupted for about half the time, and sometimes for ten and twenty years in succession by political events. How then is it possible that such communities can carry on with mutual advantage a sort of commerce which indispensably requires a yearly, monthly, week- ly, and even daily interchange of products ? Every
37
judicious reader must perceive at once that the objec- tion is insuperable, and that the wise speculations of the Reviewer upon the nature of true independence, and the ' vulgar acceptation of the term,' are entirely foreign to the question.
He seems indeed in the concluding part of the above observations, to show some indistinct notion of what the difficulty is, and his way of getting over it is not less singular than his preceding misconception of its character. ' The Americans it is true have on one or two occasions experienced a scarcity of foreign manu- factured goods ; but this was a consequence of their own policy^ of their non-importation acts, and not of the prohibitive regulations of any foreign power. They may rest assured that no manufacturing nation will ever refuse to sell. No such circumstance has ever yet occurred, and it may be safely affirmed that it never will. The danger that the American statesmen would provide against, is therefore altogether imagina- ry. The independence at which they aspire is the independence of those who swim across the river, that they may owe nothing to the bridge.' It is difficult to say whether these observations are more remarkable for the flippant impertinence of the language, or the obvious absurdity of the reasoning. Let it be supposed that the United States are forced into war to-morrow, by a clear and undoubted aggression on the part of the British government, and that the communications be- tween the two countries are in consequence interrupt- ed for two, ten, or twenty years, as the case might be. Would this interruption be the effect of our own poli- cy ? Would it not be the manufacturing nation, which, by rendering it impossible for us to buy, would in fact
38
refuse to sell ? Or will it be said that the danger of such an interruption is entirely imaginary ? Has no such case ever occurred, or can it be safely affirmed that it never will ? The language of the Reviewer, when generalized, means, if it mean any thing, that in the political difficulties, that have occurred or may occur between Great Britain and the United States, the for- mer has been and will be always in the right, and the latter in like manner always in the wrong. It amounts in substance to the well known remark ad- dressed by the French lady to her sister, ' II n^y a que moi qui ai toujour s raison.^ This may be very good doctrine on the other side of the water, but is it enti- tled to much weight in a philosophical discussion, or is it likely to produce much effect in conciliating the feel- ings and convincing the judgments of the people of the United States ? As to the . past events to which the critic alludes, it would be easy to show, on authority for which he would probably feel some respect, we mean that of the Edinburgh Review, whether the in- terruption of commerce between the two countries was the result of our own policy, or was forced upon us by the unexampled series of aggressions by which Great Britain, under the pretext of exercising her belligerent rights, harassed for twenty years in succession the per- sons and plundered the property of our citizens. But leaving entirely out of view the merits of the late con- test with England, it certainly cannot have escaped the attention of the Reviewer, that this is not the only war that has occurred even in modern times, and that generally speaking, the occasional occurrence of wars, even between the most civilized nations, must be cal- culated on as inevitable. The most recent experience
39
unfortunately shows, that between such nations, and even at this most enlightened day, it is quite within the compass of possibility, that wars should not only exist, but that they should last with little interruption for five and twenty years in succession. It has in fact been calculated that for the period of nearly two cen- turies which has elapsed since the peace of Westpha- lia, and during which Europe claims to have exhibited a higher degree of civilization than was ever known in any other part of the world, every alternate year has been on an average a year of war. Does the Re- viewer then suppose that Great Britain and the United States are to be for ever exempt from the operation of the evil passions, and conflicting temporary interests, that drive the nations to these terrific extremities? Does theory, or experience, justify any such belief ? Does the tone of the negotiations between the two governments since the last treaty render it probable, that a halcyon age of perpetual peace is to ensue im- mediately upon the close of two centuries of bickering and ill humor, twice interrupted by intervals of open war, but never yet for a moment by one of real and unaffected cordiality ? Is the language of the leading British journals, the torrent of calumny, for example, W'hich is perpetually poured out upon us by the semi- official quarterly organ of the ministry, likely to produce so desirable a result ? Nay, is the very article in the Edinburgh Review now before us, the staple of which only varies from direct attack to contemptuous irony, a production well fitted to conciliate adverse feelings and rival interests, and aid in bringing about the mil- lennium, to which the author appears to look forward ? The necessary answer to these questions is, we fear,
40
far too obviously in the negative, for even the Re- viewer himself to think of giving one of any other kind. Much as we deprecate the occurrence of future wars with England, anxiously as we desire that the good understanding which now so happily exists be- tween the two powers may be perpetual, sincerely as we have rejoiced at some recent demonstrations in quarters of high authority on both sides, which appear to authorise the hope of an improvement in their habit- ual relations, a hope, which, we are happy to say, nothing has yet occurred to diminish materially, we must still consider it as the strict and bounden duty of an American statesman to regard the occurrence of hostilities with Great Britain, or any foreign power with which we have relations, as a thing within the compass of ordinary probability, and to act upon that supposition. It is not our policy, nor yet the policy of the mother country, — for we are not anxious to push any further than it ought to be carried, the conclusion that might be drawn from the circumstances that led to the last war with England, — it is not then our poli- cy, nor that of the British government, but the imper- fection of human nature, — in Shakspeare's phrase, the penalty of Adam^ — which will occasion these hostilities, whenever they may occur, and which renders the sup- position of their probability necessary. Should the international relations of the great powers of the Chris- tian world be on no worse a footing for the next two centuries than they have been for the two last, — and it would surely be rash, whatever we may hope, to rea- son and act on the hypothesis, that the next following age will be better than the best in the history of our race, — we must still calculate, as we have said above,
41
that on an average every other year will be one of war. So far, indeed, are recent and present occurrences from warranting the expectation of any immediate change, in this respect, in the habits of the world, that although the great Christian powers have been at peace, at least among themselves, since the treaties of Paris, there has not been a moment in which the sword has been sheathed in all parts of Christendom ; and for two years past there has been, at times, a strong probabili- ty of the immediate occurrence of another general war, in which Great Britain would of course be involved, and from which it would require the exercise of great moderation and ability m the government of the United States, to keep them clear. But whatever may be the issue of the present crisis, it is at all events the duty of an American statesman to suppose, and to act upon the supposition, that the country is liable at any moment to be drawn into a war with Great Britain, or any other foreign power, — for the argument applies alike to all. The Reviewer will not, we think, dis- pute the correctness of this assumption. If then we look to Great Britain, or any other foreign power for our regular supply of the ordinary comforts of life, what is to become of us during these periods of occa- sional hostilities which may last three years, or thirty, as the quarrel may happen to turn ? By what miracle are we to find, at an hour's warning, resources before unemployed that shall furnish us with substitutes for this supply ? Where are we to look for the bridge, to which the Reviewer so pleasantly alludes, and which is to conduct us safely over this otherwise somewhat awk- ward gulf in our economical arrangements ? Are we to extemporize at the commencement of every war, as we
42
did at that of the last, a set of manufactures sufficient for the consumption of twelve, fifteen, or, looking for- ward only to the end of the next five and twenty years, twenty million persons, only to see them all shaken to their foundations by the return of peace, and sinking in one general ruin, as they did before ? Warped as the judgment of the Reviewer evidently is by habitual prejudices and national feelings, we cannot believe him so totally blind to the most obvious considerations of expediency as to counsel such a policy ; and we would leave it with confidence to himself to decide, whether it would not be the duty of a wise community to pro- vide, by every imaginable means, against the recur- rence of such fatal and widely spreading disasters ; whether, were it even true, as it is not, that domestic manufactures would be, in the long run, dearer than foreign ones, an annual pecuniary sacrifice of consid- erable extent, made in this form, would not be decid- edly preferable, whether on the score of interest or feeling, to supporting the incalculable losses and mise- ries of every kind produced by such convulsions. For ourselves, we have no hesitation in saying, that were there no other argument in favor of a protecting policy except the single consideration to which we have now been adverting, we should still regard it as established beyond the possibility of question. We may add, that the same consideration, duly weighed, would fur- nish the Reviewer with a justification, wiiich does not appear to have occurred to him, of the corn laws of his own country.
Such, however feebly and imperfectly expressed, ap- pears to us to be the substance of the argument upon the merits of this case, as stated by the Reviewer him-
43
self. He fullj admits the great advantages that result in general from the possession of domestic manufac- tures, but contends, that in consequence of the peculiar facilities enjoyed respectively in the United States for agriculture, and in Great Britain for manufactures, it would be more expedient for us, under these particular circumstances, to devote ourselves exclusively to agri- culture, and obtain our supply of manufactures from foreign countries in exchange for our surplus agricul- tural produce, than to attempt to manufacture for our- selves. To this we have replied, first, that Great Britain refuses to receive the agricultural produce of by far the greater part of our population, and thus, by her own act, renders this arrangement impossible ; secondly, that the expense and inconvenience of trans- porting by land and water, over such immense distan- ces, the bulky articles of ordinary use, are so great, as to make a trade of this kind substantially impracticable, were it even allowed by law ; and thirdly, that the intercourse of independent nations is liable to such in- terruptions, that it would be highly impolitic, or rather completely ruinous, for them to depend upon each other for the regular supplies of the usual necessaries and comforts of life. Each of these objections appears to us to be of a decisive and peremptory character, and we cannot but think that taken together they must carry conviction to impartial and unprejudiced minds. If then it be impracticable for us, for these reasons, to receive our supplies of manufactured articles from abroad, it follows, that we must either procure them at home, or not have them at all, and that the absence of domestic manufactures is, as we have intimated above, equivalent in practice to the absence of all manufac-
44
tures. This being the case, were it even true, as the Reviewer supposes, that the capital invested in manu- factures must be withdrawn from agriculture, and that the amount of our exports of agricultural produce would diminish in proportion to the diminution, occasioned by the Tariff, of our imports of British manufactures, it would still be our policy to encounter these results, which are in themselves indifferent, and only tempora- rily inconvenient, when considered as changes in the previous direction of labor, rather than forego the great advantages, which, by the admission of all, and him- self among the foremost, result from the possession of domestic manufactures. We are happy however to be able to add, that the anticipations of the Reviewer in this respect are, in our opinion, no better founded than the rest of his reasoning. We see no ground for sup- posing, that the amount of our exports of agricultural produce will be diminished by the operation of the Tariff, or prevented from increasing as rapidly as it would have done under any other circumstances ; and far from occasioning the withdrawing from agriculture of any part of the capital now invested in it, it is quite certain, that the establishment of domestic manufac- tures is the most effectual, and indeed the only way, by which agriculture can be encouraged or extended in any other form than that of clearing wild land. For the further illustration of the subject, we shall add a few remarks upon both these heads.
1. If our commerce with Great Britain were, as the Reviewer appears to wish that it should be, of the kind which is carried on between a purely agricultural and a purely manufacturing community, or between town and country, by the effect of which the cultivator feeds
45
the manufacturer as well as himself, and the latter in turn manufactures for the u,se of both; if, we say, our commerce with Great Britain were of this description, the establishment of domestic manufactures would un- doubtedly diminish our exports, because the agricultu- ral produce which we before sent abroad to feed the foreign manufacturer, would now be kept at home to feed our own. Such a change in the state of our in- dustry, instead of being injurious, would however be highly advantageous to us. It would prove, that we employed two domestic capitals, when we before em- ployed only one; and as far as it diminished the for- eign trade, it would substitute for it a home trade of equal extent, which all admit to be the more profitable of the two. But this, as we have already shown, is not and never can be the nature of our commerce with Great Britain. Great Britain is a manufacturing na- tion, that chooses, and very properly, to supply herself with the necessaries and comforts of life from her own resources, that depends, in general, for subsistence upon her own agriculture, and that takes nothing from abroad which she can possibly raise at home. Acting on these principles, she prohibits a great part of our agricultural produce, and consents to receive only those articles which she cannot produce at all, or of equal quality, in her own dominions, and which she must of course, for her own interest, purchase wherever she can find them of the kind best suited to her purpose. If she purchases our cotton, in preference to that of any other country, it is not because we take a large amount of her manufactures, but because our cotton suits the purpose for which she wants the article belter than that of any other country. While Uplands and
46
Sea-Island retain their present cheapness and superi- ority over the growth of any foreign region, Great Bri- tain will find precisely the same advantage in buying cotton of us that she does now, however much our im- ports of British manufactures may be diminished by the effect of the Tariff. The loss of our market for her manufactures, from whatever cause and to what- ever extent it may happen, would no doubt be to her a positive evil ; but this evil, instead of being remedied, would only be aggravated by her refusal to take our cotton, supposing it always to be, as it is now, the best that is raised. Without ascribing to our pulchra mater any sentimental fondness for her flourishing family of children on this side of the Alantic, we cannot suppose that she hates us so much as to injure herself merely for the sake of injuring us ; and as it is clearly for her interest, since she cannot raise cotton herself, to pur- chase the best wherever she can find it, it is quite cer- tain that she will continue to take it of us while ours shall be the best, Tariff or no Tariff. If, on the other hand, our planters shall ever, through their own neg- lect, or the greater skill and industry of others, lose their present superiority, it is equally certain that Great Britain will no longer buy of them, although we should take from her twice as great an amount of her manu- factures as we now do.
It may be said, however, and has indeed been said on both sides of the water, and particularly in the arti- cle in the Edinburgh Review now before us, that Great Britain, irritated by our endeavors to exclude her man- ufactures, and desirous to retaliate upon us by ceasing, if possible, to take our cotton, will adopt measures for encouraging the growth of that article in her own pos-
47
sessions in India. But this consideration can have no weight in an argument against the protecting policy ; first, because the superiority of our cotton is so well established, that our planters have no more reason to apprehend the competition of India or Egypt in the raising, than Great Britain has in the manufacturing of it ; and, secondly, because Great Britain, if she can possibly raise within her own dominions cotton of equal quality with ours, will unquestionably cease to buy of us, whether we take her manufactures or not. In this she would only act upon her settled and very judicious system of making herself, as far as possible, independent of foreign nations in regard to her sup- plies of articles of necessary and ordinary use. Our planters must therefore resign themselves to suffer the loss of the British market whenever an article of equal or superior quality shall be raised within the British dominions, whatever may be, in other respects, the state of the trade between the two countries. But until there shall be a well ascertained equality or supe- riority in the British article, a thing of which, as we remarked above, we have no apprehension, we may rest assured that Great Britain, with the immense amount of capital which she now has invested in the cotton manufacture, will try no rash experiments, and run no unnecessary risks, in the way of encouraging her own cotton or discouraging ours. The effect of employing an inferior material would be to destroy the present superiority of her fabrics ; and as the value of the fabric is from ten to twenty times, according to its fineness, greater than that of the material, it is obvi- ous that there is no motive for making any change, however advantageous, in the present method of ob-
48
taining the latter, which would be attended with the slightest danger to the success of the manufacture. The late experiment in the woollen trade would proba- bly be sufficient to cure the British government of any disposition to tempt fortune in this way, w^hich they may have felt before. We have before us, in the same number of the Edinburgh Review which contains the article we are now noticing, another detailing the re- sults of this experiment, from which it appears, that the British government by imposing a duty of sixpence the pound on foreign wool, for the purpose of encour- aging the consumption of their own, injured the quali- ty of their cloths so much as to render them unfit for several markets where they were before in request. It is given as the opinion of the most intelligent woollen manufacturers of the kingdom, that, had the duty been continued a few years longer, it would have complete- ly ruined the branch of industry in question, and that, although the government made great haste to take it off after a short trial, it had already produced such mis- chievous effects, as will probably never be repaired. With such results from this recent experiment before her eyes, w^e may rest assured that Great Britain will not be readily induced, by pique or any other motive, to venture on a similar one in the still more important branch of the cotton manufacture, which furnishes at present nearly two thirds of the whole exports of the kingdom. On this head, therefore, we conceive that our planters may, without reposing any undue confi- dence in the chapter of accidents, set their hearts at rest.
We may remark here, that large as the British ex- ports of manufactured cotton undoubtedly are, they are
49
not quite so large as the Reviewer has thought proper, in the pride of his heart, to represent them, for the pur- pose of making them appear to greater advantage in comparison with ours. Ahhough the error in his state- ment on this subject is immaterial to the course of the argument, we deem it proper to point it out, more espe- cially as we shall have occasion, in so doing, to allude to a point of learning, in regard to the present state of British industry, somewhat curious in itself, and not, we believe, very familiar to the public, at least on this side of the water. After quoting a passage from a re- port made to the meeting of delegates at Harrisburg, in which it is intimated, that our cotton fabrics had been preferred to the British in some of the Spanish American markets (a fact of public notoriety,) the Reviewer proceeds to refute the assertion in the fol- lowing triumphant paragraph.
' In our ignorance, we long imagined, that John Bull had been the most gullible of animals ; but if Jonathan can swallow such assertions as these, John has not the vestige of a claim to that distinction. Smuggle American cottons into Great Britain ! What an opinion must the Hariisburg delegates have formed of their countrymen when they could presume to call such a statement a " sober truth" ! Is there a merchant in the United States so profoundedly ignorant as not to know that American, and all other foreign cottons, may be freely imported into our markets on paying an ad valorem duty of ten per cent. ? Let us now see how they are driving our cottons out of foreign mar- kets. In 1826, the estimated official value of the whole exports from the United States amounted to ;^7 7, 595,322, of which coarse cotton goods of domestic
7
50
manufacture amounted to ^1,138,125; and of these ;^71 1,959 worth were sent to Mexico and South Ame- rica. Now, it appears from the official accounts of our custom-house, that the value of our exports of cot- ton goods only, in 1825, amounted to £30,795,000, or about ^150,000,000; and there are good grounds for thinking, that the value of those exported to Mexico and South America exceeded ^$[25,000,000, so that the American exports to those countries, some of which are their immediate neighbors, amount to about tivo thirds of a per cent, of our own ; a marvellous progress certainly towards " supplanting the British in all for- eign markets^'' ! '
It may perhaps amuse the reader to be informed, that in the midst of this exulting array of capitals, ital- ics, and notes of admiration, which we copy as they stand in the original, the Reviewer has made, appa- rently not without intention, the trifling mistake of about eightytwo millions of dollars, in the statement which he gives of the value of the exports of cottons from his own country. The nature of it lies chiefly in giving the official value of the exports as the real one. The former, as our readers are perhaps aware, is a merely conventional statement, in which the article is valued according to an estimate fixed in the time of King William, and which gives of course about as cor- rect a notion of the actual value of the British exports of cotton cloths, as we should obtain of the amount of capital invested in the bookselling business by estimat- ing every work that is now published at the price at which a manuscript copy of it would have sold before the invention of the art of printing. This official state- ment of the value of the exports sometimes exceeds,
51
and soinetiines falls short of the real value, which is regularly declared on oath bj the owner. In 1814 the real value of the whole exports exceeded the official hy nearly twelve millions of pounds sterling, while in 1828 it fell short of it by nearly sixteen. Now, what- ever advantage there may be for other purposes in em- ploying the official statement (and we confess that we are unable to imagine of what nature they can be,) it is at all events evident, that when the object is, as in the present instance, to compare the British exports with those of another country, in which there is no such double statement, the real value must of course be used.* The Reviewer, however, compares the real
* In the debate on the Budget, of May 8, 1829, Mr Huskisson remarked, in speaking of the amount of exports, that ' he took the official in preterence to the real value, because, having been fixed in tlie time of King William, and having never varied, it expressed the quantity and not the price of commodi- ties.' The official value would perhaps be preferable on this account, for any purpose which required a knowledge of the quantity of the exports, although a simple statement of the number of pieces would apparently be far better than either ; but where the object is, as in the present case, to compare the British exports with those of another country, it is quite evident, as we have remark- ed in the text, that the real value is the one to be used. We subjoin here a table, containing a comparative statement of the official and real value of the British exports from 1814 to 1828 inclusive, which was read to the House of Commons by Mr Waithman in the same debate, and which we deem some- what curious. It exhibits a regular and constantly progressive increase in the official, and decline in the real value during the whole period.
Exports of Manufactures and Produce of the United Kingdom, from 1814 to 1S23, inclusive, with the otficial and declared or real value.
|
Year. |
Official Value. |
Real Value. |
|
1814, |
£3(5,092,167 |
£47,851,153 |
|
1815, |
44,053,455 |
53,217,445 |
|
1816,- |
36,714,555 |
42,942,951 |
|
1817, |
36,697,610 |
42,955,256 |
|
1818, |
41.558,585 |
43,626,253 |
|
1819, |
44,564,044 |
48.903,760 |
|
1820, |
35,6.34.415 |
37,339,5! :6 |
|
1821, |
40,240,277 |
38,619,897 |
|
1822, |
40,831,744 |
36,659,631 |
|
1823, |
44,236,533 |
36,968,954 |
|
1824, |
43,804,372 |
35,453,048 |
|
1825, |
48,735,551 |
38,396.300 |
|
1826, |
40,965,735 |
31,536.723 |
|
1827, |
52,219,280 |
37,182,857 |
|
1828, |
52,797,455 |
36,814,176 |
Difference £11.759,286") 9,163,990 6.228,398 j 6,257,646 V._I_
2.067.668 I 4,139,716 1,7<'5,()91 \ 1,620,380*) 4,172,113 f
7.269.669 I 8,346,324 (
10,339.251 r — 9,429,012 } 15,036,423 15,983,279 J
52
value of our exports for 1826, with the official value of the British for a different year, 1825, that being the one in which the amount of the latter was the largest ever known, having been, as he states, more than thirty millions sterling. In 1826, of course the proper year to compare with ours of the same date, the official value of the exports of cottons was only twenty- six millions sterling. In both these years it exceeded the real by about ten millions sterling, so that there is, on this account only, an error in the Reviewer's state- ment to that extent ; and if we assume as the proper one to compare with ours of the same date the year 1826, in which the official value of the British exports of cottons was, as we have just said, four millions less than the preceding year, the error increases in the same proportion, and rises to about fourteen millions sterl- ing. This sum which, on the Reviewer's calculation of five dollars to the pound, is equivalent to seventy millions of dollars, being deducted from the hundred and fifty millions given in the article, would leave a re- mainder of eighty millions of dollars as the value of the British exports of cotton, correctly stated for the pur- pose of comparison with that of ours for the year 1826. But even this sum requires another correction on ac- count of the inequality in the estimates of the value of the doiliar on the two sides of the account. The Re- viewer takes it, as we have just said, at the rate of five to the pound sterling, probably the market price at London at the time when he wrote, while in our re- ports it expresses a value nine or ten per cent, higher. Assuming as a common standard the ordinary par esti- mate of four dollars and fortyfour cents to the pound, which is that in use with us, the error of the Reviewer
rises to about eightjtwo millions, the amount at* which we have represented it above, and the vahie of the Bri- tish exports finally dwindles from one hundred and fifty millions, at which he reckons it, to about sixty- eight. Even this is doubtless a large amount to be exported in cotton by one country in a single year ; but it must also be allowed, that an error of eightytwo millions of dollars in a single sum is considerable ; and if in the excess of charity, with which we have some- times been reproached, we suppose it to be entirely involuntary, w^e cannot but think it peculiarly unfortu- nate, that the Reviewer should have fallen into it in the course of the very same paragraph in which he dwells with so much apparent satisfaction upon certain supposed inaccuracies of a much less important char- acter, if real, in the Harrisburg Report. By correcting in the same way his statement of the British exports to Spanish America, we shall obtain as the true amount about ten and a half millions of dollars, instead of twentyfive. This correction raises considerably the proportion, which our exports of the same description bear to them, and which the Reviewer sneeringly states at iivo thirds of a per cent., meaning probably two thirds of one per cent. But if from the value of the British exports to Spanish America, thus corrected, we further deduct that of the large portion of them which was shipped on wild speculation, and for which no returns whatever have been or ever will be made, and then transfer, from one side of the account to the other the value of the other portion fraudulently sold as of our manufacture, which is known to be consider- able, and which proves of course, that the demand for our manufactures is in the same proportion greater
54
than i% would appear to be from the actual amount of our exports, we shall find a nearer approach to a bal- ance on the two sides of the account, than we should perhaps think possible upon a first glance at the Re- viewer's estimate. It is no part of our plan, however, to endeavor to represent the value of the British ex- ports as less, or that of ours as greater, than they really are ; and our chief object, in adverting to the subject, has been to point out the excessive inaccuracy of a writer, who yet exhibits so little indulgence for what he deems the inaccuracies of others.
But, to return from this digression to the subject before us ; as all commerce is of necessity an exchange of equivalents, it may be inquired, and the question is in fact asked by the Reviewer, how Great Britain will contrive to pay us for our cotton and tobacco, if we no longer receive from her the manufactures which she now gives in exchange for them? We answer, that she will pay us in money for that portion of the articles she takes from us, for which she does not send us an equivalent in manufactures, just as we now pay her in money for that portion of her manufactures for which we do not send her an equivalent in other products. It is well known, that the proceeds of a considerable part of our exports to other parts of Europe are remit- ted in cash to London, to pay the balance on our trade with Great Britain, which has hitherto been constantly ao:ainst us. Should this same balance happen to be found, at any future period, on the other side of the account, the consequence will be, that the proceeds of a part of the exports from Great Britain to Mexico and South America will be remitted in cash to the United States, and that our merchants will bring home from
55
Europe more silks, claret, and sherry, than they did before. Exchange on the United States will then be at a premium at London, just as exchange on London is now at a premium at New York and Boston. These results need not, we apprehend, be considered by us as of a very disastrous character, nor will they be of any importance to Great Britain any further than as they indicate the loss of a market for a portion of her manu- factures.
We may therefore conclude with confidence, that the amount of our exports will not be diminished in any way by the Tariff, or even prevented from increas- ing as rapidly as it would have done under any other circumstances ; and the correctness of the conclusion appears to be confirmed by the experience we have already had of the effects of the new law. The Re- viewer himself seems to agree with us on this part of the subject ; and if, as we have stated above, he hints that it might be good policy in Great Britain to en- deavor to encourage the growth of cotton in India and Brazil, it is not from a disinclination on his part to buy the article of us, but from a fear that we may, perhaps, hereafter refuse to sell ! ' It is quite clear,' says he, ' that the less dependence we now place on the trade with America so much the better. She cannot indeed inflict any material injury on us by refusing to huy our products, but at present she might injure us by refus- ing to sell ; and after what we have seen of Congress, it would excite no surprise if some such attempt were made. We are not therefore sure, that it might not be good policy to endeavor to encourage the importation of cotton from India, Egypt, South America, &c. by reducing or wholly repealing the existing duty on all
m
cotton not imported from the United States.' We know not whether the critic be in good earnest in this intimation that the United States may, perhaps, here- after refuse to sell cotton to Great Britain, or whether we are to look upon it as a specimen of the pleasantry with which the article is occasionally seasoned. If he really entertain any serious apprehensions on the sub- ject, founded on his view of the policy of our govern- ment, he may perhaps be gratified to learn, that Con- gress is expressly prohibited by the constitution from laying any duty whatever on exports ; and as respects the disposition of the planters themselves, there is, in our opinion, no more probability, that they will ever refuse to sell cotton to the British manufacturers, as long as the latter continue to pay them well for it, than there is, that the British manufacturers will cease to purchase it of them as long as they shall raise it of a quality superior to any that is elsewhere produced.
Having had occasion to make use of the phrase bal- ance of trade,
' a word of fear Unpleasing to a Scottish ear/
we hasten to add, in order to relieve ourselves from any suspicion of heresy, that we are not partisans of the antiquated doctrine on this subject, and that, on the contrary, we fully acquiesce in the modern theory, which is that of Adam Smith, and also, as it seems, of the Reviewer. Our opinions, therefore, on this head, are probably at bottom the same as his ; but if such be the case, we cannot but^remark, that, in what he says upon the subject in the present article, he has not expressed himself with all the accuracy that might have been wished, and has apparently sacrificed, in
57
some degree, his regard for truth to rhetorical eflfect, thinking perhaps with Voltaire, that it is of more import- ance to strike hard than to hit the right spot. Our readers will judge by an inspection of the passage.
' On hearing the terms in which some of the lead- ing American orators talk about the mischiefs arising from the balance of trade being unfavorable to the re- public, and the consequent exportation of specie, one is almost tempted to believe in the doctrine of metemp- sychosis, and to conclude, that the Roses, the Kenyons, and the Lauderdales of a former age, are again revived in the Baldwins, the Lawrences, and the Everetts of the present. It is difficult to argue with those who, f^t this time of day, can talk seriously about the bal- ance of trade. To say that the old doctrine with respect to it has been a thousand times shown to be false, contradictory, and absurd, is not enough. The fact is, that the very reverse of it is true ; and that every nation, carrying on an advantageous foreign commerce, must import more than she exports, and must therefore, according to the transatlantic illuminati, have the balance against her. But in despite of the speeches of honorable gentlemen, and the innumerable essays of Mr Carey, we apprehend that Jonathan is not quite so simple as to export any commodity, except in the view of importing a more valuable one in its stead. It is this greater value which constitutes the profits of the merchants engaged in the foreign trade ; and to affirm that it is large, is to affirm, what is not reckoned a very serious evil on this side of the Atlan- tic, whatever it may be on the other, that the external trade of the country is very lucrative.
' It would, however, be unjust to individual mem- 8
58
bers of the American legislature to represent them as all approving the exploded and absurd notions with re- gard to the balance of trade. Mr Cambreleng, in an able pamphlet, entitled an Examination of the Tariff proposed in 1821, forcibly exposed the fallacy of the opinion of those who believe, or affect to believe, in the pernicious effect of what is called an unfavorable bal- ance. Mr Webster too, in an admirable speech on the Tariff Bill of 1824, set the real nature of commerce, and the true doctrine as to the balance, in the clearest point of view. Mr Webster illustrated his statement by a case which, although it failed to make any impres- sion on the majority of his auditors, is so very conclu- sive, that we believe it will carry conviction to every one who may happen to throw his eye over these pages. " Some time since," said Mr Webster, " a ship left one of the towns of New England, having on board $70,000 in specie. She proceeded to Mocha on the Red Sea, and there laid out these dollars in coffee, drugs, spices, &c. With this new cargo she proceeded to Europe ; two thirds of it were sold in Holland for $130,000, which the ship brought back and placed in the vaults of the same bank, whence she had taken her original outfit ; the other third was sent to the ports of the Mediterranean, and produced a re- turn of $25,000 in specie, and $15,000 in Italian mer- chandise. These sums together make $170,000 im- ported, which is ;^ 100,000 more than were exported, and forms therefore, according to the doctrine of hon- orable gentlemen on the other side, an unfavorable balance to that amount." But honorable gentlemen were proof against this reductio ad absurdum. They continued firm in their belief, that the doctrine of the
59
balance was no chimera, and that the adventure de- scribed by Mr Webster was a losing one ! '
Wliether a belief in the antiquated doctrines of the mercantile system be as general among the politicians of our country as this writer appears to imagine, is, in our opinion very doubtful. We could easily show, if it were necessary, that at least one of the gentlemen, who are mentioned in the above extract among its partisans, has defended in print the modern theory. But, how- ever this may be, we must venture to repeat, that the manner in which the Reviewer expresses himself on this subject, is far from being so precise as could have been wished, and might even lead an uncharitable critic to doubt whether, with all his exultation over the partisans of the * false, contradictory, and absurd ' tenets of the old theory, and all his professed devotion to the new one, he have himself a very exact idea of the real character of either. The assertion made with so much positiveness, that * every nation carrying on an advantageous foreign commerce must import more than she exports,' is not only obviously false, but is plainly contradicted by the principle repeatedly laid down by the Reviewer himself, that all commerce is of necessity an exchange of equivalents.* ^Jonathan,'
* Mr Adams, in his last Message to Congress, affirms it to be ' a general law of prosperous commerce, that the real value of exports should, by a small and only a small balance, exceed that of imports, this balance being a per- manent addition to the wealth of the nation.' The President's remark, which was doubtless founded on some particular view of the subject before his mind at the time of writing, is precisely the reverse of that of the review er ; and as the latter is true only of nations who have more than an equal share of the navigation necessary for conducting their foreign trade, so the former appears to be correct only on the opposite supposition, that a nation has less than an equal share of this navigation. Thus the real value of the exports ofChinais, as we have stated in the text, grciiter than that of her imports, because she must
60
says the Reviewer, * is not quite so simple as to ex- port anj commodity except in the view of importing a more valuable one in its stead.' What then, on this supposition, must be the simplicity of John Bull and other foreigners, who send him the more valuable com- modity in return ? If called on to explain his remark, the Reviewer would perhaps say, that he meant by a nation carrying on an advantageous commerce, one that was largely engaged in navigation ; and in this sense of the phrase the observation would be true, because, in the accounts between a nation so situated, and those with which she deals, the article of mer- chants' profit would probably be greater on her side than on theirs, and the difference must, of course, be balanced by an additional quantity of goods. But this is obviously a particular case, which forms an excep- tion from the general rule ; and the Reviewer, in bringing forward this exception as the general rule, in opposition to his own repeated statements of the latter in the same article, has sacrificed not only accuracy and truth, but common consistency, to his eagerness for a triumph over the * transatlantic illuminati.'
Again ; although the * transatlantic illuminati' would cheerfully admit, that a nation, which is more largely engaged in navigation than those with which she deals,
pay the foreign merchant, not only for the articles he brings, but for his trouble and expense in bringing them. The United States, on the other hand, having more than an equal share of the navigation employed in their trade with for- eign nations, and receiving pay from the latter for this excess as well as for the articles they carry, must of course regularly import more than they export. The President's remark is therefore apparently incorrect in its application to our country, the one which he may be presumed to have had particularly in view. Both principles, considered as general truths, are at variance, in oppo- site ways, with the acknowledged axiom, that commerce is naturally an exchange of equivalents.
Gl
will necessarily import more than she exports, they probably would not affirm, as the Reviewer supposes, that a nation so situated has therefore the balance of trade against her. The Reviewer either does not know, or has inadvertently overlooked in the ardor of controversy, what was meant by the par- tisans of the mercantile system when they spoke of a favorable * and unfavorable balance of trade. A nation was said by them to have the balance of trade in her favor when she exported more of all other articles than she imported, and received the value of the difference in specie. The balance was against her, on the other hand, when she imported more of all other articles than she exported, and paid the value of the difference in specie. Thus China has, in their phraseology, the balance in her favor on her trade with Europe, because on comparing the articles exchanged (the total value of which must of course be equal after making allowance for the excess of naviga- tion on the side of Europe) it appears that the Chinese regularly export more of all other articles than they import, and receive payment for the excess in specie. In the same way, and for the same reason, the balance is said to be in favor of Great Britain on her trade with the United States. In these and all such cases, the article of merchants^ profit, which the Reviewer absurdly represents as constituting, according to the mercantile system, an unfavorable balance of trade, has obviously nothing whatever to do with the matter. It is simply one of the items in the account between the two parties, which usually appears on both sides, and is regularly the same on both, because the car- rying trade of two countries naturally divides itself
62
between them in equal shares. When the shares are unequal, the excess of navigation on one side is com- pensated by an excess of goods on the other ; but this circumstance has, as we have said, no connexion what- ever with the balance of trade, which is calculated on wholly different principles. Thus, in the trade be- tween the United States and Great Britain there is an excess of navigation on our side, which is of course compensated by an excess of goods on the other. We import for this reason more than we export. But if the excess of our imports over our exports only w^ent to this extent, the balance w^ould not be against us. The balance is said to be unfavorable, because, after setting off against each other all the other articles ex- changed, and allowing for the excess of navigation on our side, there still remains a further excess of imports to be settled by a payment in specie, which is in fact annually remitted by us for this purpose, and received by Great Britain. Under such circumstances, the party which receives the specie payment is said, by the adherents of the mercantile theory, to have the bal- ance of trade in its favor, and the reverse ; but the excess of navigation, on which side soever it may hap- pen to fall, has no more to do with the balance than any other item i« the account of either party.
We must therefore venture to suggest, with the def- erence due to so great an authority, that the Reviewer is mistaken when he says, that every nation carrying on a prosperous commerce must import more than she exports ; that he is again mistaken when he says, that a nation so situated would therefore be said, by the partisans of the mercantile system, to have the balance of trade against her ; and that he is consequently mis-
63
taken a third time, when he says that the reverse of the mercantile theory is true. The theory is, that a nation derives great advantages from receiving a specie balance on the settlement of the account of its exchan- ges with foreigners. The reverse of this theory would be, that it is a very advantageous thing to pay out regularly a specie balance of this description. Now, although the advantages of receiving a specie balance are no doubt wholly imaginary and the theory which supposes their reality false, it would show, if possible, a still greater wildness of imagination to think that there is any positive advantage in regularly paying out such a balance. According to the modern and gene- rally received theory, neither one nor the other of these operations is in itself either advantageous or disadvan- tageous. The reverse of the old doctrine is just as * false, contradictory, and absurd,' as the doctrine it- self ; and the Reviewer, by asserting the contrary and by the other mistakes which he has made on the sub- ject, exposes himself somewhat ungracefully, as in the passage before quoted, to a well grounded charge of inaccuracy at the very moment when he is pluming himself with more complacency, than it would perhaps be quite civil to express, w^ere it even better founded, upon his superiority over the leading American states- men.
The remarks contained in the last quoted extract on a case, mentioned by Mr Webster in his speech on the Tariff Law of 1824, confirm what we have just said respecting the indistinctness of the notions of the Re- viewer on this subject. It would be difficult, indeed, to accumulate a greater number of errors within the same space than are to be found in his observations
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upon this transaction. A merchant ships to India the sum of seventy thousand dollars in specie, and after several intermediate voyages and exchanges receives a return of one hundred and fifty five thousand dollars in money and fifteen thousand in goods, making a total of one hundred and seventy thousand dollars, and giv- ing an excess of imports over exports of one hundred thousand dollars. This excess, says the Reviewer, is considered by the advocates of the mercantile system as constituting an unfavorable balance of trade to the same amount ; and as the voyage was a profitable one, the case proves that the theory of the mercantile sys- tem is false, and that the reverse of it is true. He considers the argument so conclusive, that he believes it will carry conviction to every one, who may happen to throw his eyes over the article. But how stands the fact ? All commerce is in its nature an exchange of equivalent values ; and if we suppose this transaction to take place in a regular course of trade (without which it proves nothing any way,) the difference of one hundred thousand dollars between the value of the exports, and that of the imports, is exactly equal to the ordinary returns on the other capital beside specie em- ployed in the voyage. Thus far, therefore, the large- ness of the difference between the value of the import- ed and that of the exported article only proves that the capital has been out upon a long voyage, but has no tendency to show whether the transaction be, on the theory of the mercantile system, a gaining or a losing one. In order to ascertain this, we must look at the nature of the articles exported and imported, and as- certain whether there was a specie balance on either side, and if so, on which. On examining the transac-
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tion for this purpose, it appears that there was a gross return in specie of one hundred and fiftyfive thousand dollars, and setting off the specie exported against an equal amount of that imported, a clear specie balance of eightjfive thousand dollars in favor of the American merchant. And this, says the Reviewer, is considered by the partisans of the mercantile system as a losing concern ! It is really pleasant to find a person who gives himself the airs of a doctor in the science, affirm- ing that a voyage, which brings into the country a large specie balance, is considered in the mercantile theory as a losing concern, when every novice is aware that this precise circumstance is, according to that the- ory, the sure and only criterion of a winning concern. An operation of the kind alluded to vvould undoubtedly be considered, by the adherents of the mercantile sys- tem, as a most advantageous one ; and is in fact ex- pressly described as such by Mun, one of the principal writers in defence of that theory, as quoted by Adam Smith, in his chapter on the subject. ' The exporta- tion of gold and silver,' says Mun, ' in order to pur- chase foreign goods, does not always diminish the quantity of those metals in the kingdom, because those goods might be reexported to foreign countries, and being there sold for a large profit might bring hack much more treasure, than was originally sent out to purchase them.' We cannot but recommend it to the Reviewer before he again assumes a dictatorial tone on the subject of the mercantile system, and the balance of trade, to read over carefully what Adam Smith has written on the subject ; and we venture to assure him that this useful labor, if it do not increase his zeal in favor of the modern doctrine, which appears to be al- 9
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ready sufficient, will enable him to exhibit it in a man- ner more according to knowledge, than he has in the present article. As respects the case alluded to, al- though it illustrates very well what the adherents of the mercantile theory mean by an advantageous voy- age, it has obviously no tendency whatever to show whether the theory be true or false, and has in fact no bearing whatever on the question.
2. Tlie other inconvenience, which in the opinion of the Reviewer is likely to result from the operation of the Tariff, namely, the transfer of capital from agri- culture, seems, as presented by him, to be little else than a statement in a different form, of the one w-e have just been considering, and of course falls with it. The Reviewer evidently reasons on the supposition, that we now have an ample foreign market for, and in fact actually export, all the agricultural produce that we can possibly raise, beyond what we want for our own consumption, in exchange for European manufac- tures ; and that any diminution in the amount of our imports of manufactures would necessarily be attended by a corresponding diminution of our exports of agri- cultural produce, and consequently of our production in this line ; and that the capital thus disengaged would be employed in establishing the manufactures which are to furnish the supplies we before received from abroad. Such appears to be the nature of the transfer of capital from agriculture, which he anticipates as one of the results of the Tariff*. But we have already shown that our trade with Great Britain is not, and never can be, of the kind which the Reviewer wishes and supposes it to be ; that the British demand for our great staple articles of export is wholly independent of
07
the quantity of our imports of her manufactures, and that it would not be in the least diminished, or prevent- ed from increasing as rapidly as it otherwise would, by cUjy diminution in the amount of those imports. This being the case, it is obvious that no part of the capital employed in producing these staples would be disengaged by the effect of such diminution, and that no transfer of capital from agriculture of the kind con- templated by the Reviewer could possil)ly take place by any operation of the Tariff.
On a more general view of the subject, it is quite obvious that the establishment of domestic manufac- tures, instead of withdrawing capital from agriculture, must have a direct and most powerful tendency to en- courage it. The objection of the Reviewer proceeds on suppositions so completely at variance with the re- sults of the most familiar experience, that we really w^onder how it could be urged by a writer of ordinary discretion. Any circumstance that withdraws capital from land depresses its value ; but it is perfectly well known that the establisiiment of manufactures regular- ly raises the value of all the land within the reach of their influence, or, in other words, increases the de- mand for it, and the amount of capital represented by it. The reason why it does so, is not less obvious than the fact is certain. The increase of population by an addition of hands, not employed in agriculture, furnishes to the same extent a new market for agricul- tural produce, and occasions of course a corresponding extension of agricultural labor, and rise in the value of land. These results, as we have shown already, can never be produced in an equal degree by the use of foreign manufactures ; and in the particular case of the
68
United States, we have had occasion to state what has apparently been overlooked, or rather is positively de- nied, by the Reviewer, that we have no foreign mar- ket whatever for the agricultural produce of by far the larger portion of our population, who of course have no means of disposing of any surplus, excepting in the way of exchange for other products of domestic indus- try. It is quite clear that while the extension of do- mestic manufactures has no tendency to diminish the amount of agricultural labor employed in producing the articles which we are able to export, its necessary effect in reference to the much larger portion, employ- ed in producing articles which we are not able to export, instead of discouraging agriculture, as the Re- viewer pretends, occasions an extension of it, of pre- cisely equal importance. Every dollar inv^ested in domestic manufactures leads to the investment of a dollar in agriculture, which could not otherwise have taken that direction, or in other words, adds a dollar to the value of the land. If these principles were not too familiar to require either proof or illustration, it would be easy to place them beyond the reach of doubt by reference to our own short experience, as far as it goes, and to the still more complete and satisfactory results of the longer experience of older countries. We are not informed that land has fallen in value in the neigh- borhood of Waltham, Lowell, Patterson, Pittsburg, or any of our other manufacturing towns ; or that the revenue of the British landholders has declined in consequence of the prodigious extension of domestic manufactures, which has taken place in that kingdom within the last half century. It is indeed surpris- ing that a British writer, with the difference between
69
the rental of England, as it is now and as it was fifty years ago, l)efore his eyes, can seriously affirm that the establishment of domestic manufactures has a tenden- cy to withdraw capital from agriculture, or in other words, to depress the value of land ; and were it not for the just confidence we feel in the good faith and seriousness of the Reviewer, we should be tempted to suspect that in making an objection to our protecting policy, which supposes such a principle, he was insid- iously practising upon what, with his characteristic elegance of style, he would probably call the gullihil' iiy of Jonathan,
However this may be, it is quite certain that the objection is founded on a supposition of principles not only false, but directly the reverse of the truth, and that the extension of domestic manufactures, instead of withdrawing capital from the land, must have a direct tendency to encourage agriculture, and is the most effectual and indeed only way in which it can be encouraged in any other form than that of clearing wild land. The degree to which an extension of do- mestic manufactures of a given amount would operate on agriculture, may be conjectured by reference to the present state of our foreign trade, taken in connexion with some of the most familiar truths in political econ- omy. The great agricultural staples which we export to Europe, are the main produce of the labor of a part of our country containing at present not less than three million inhabitants. Now as all commerce is an ex- change of equivalent values, and as the value of all objects is determined by the quantities of labor respect- ively bestowed upon their production, it is certain, that if we send to Europe in exchange for manufac-
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tures the produce of the labor of three mil lion persons, or whatever other nuiiiher we choose to assume, the manufactures we receive in return must also be the produce of the labor of the same number, and if made at home, would give employment to an equal number of our own citizens, and create a new demand of pro- portional extent for the agricultural produce necessary to their support. In other words, the domestic man- ufactures competent to supply us with the articles we now receive from Euro])e would give us (on the above supposition as to the number of persons employed in producing our exports, which will probably not be thought too high,) a manufacturing population of three millions, and an additional agricultural population of three more, makiug a total addition to the population of six millions, and of the products of the labor of six million persons to the annual revenue of the commu- nity. Such would be the results of the establishment of manufactures, supposing the consumption of domes- tic products to be exactly the same with that of foreign ones before ; but another effect of the same cause w^ould be, as we have already shown, to occasion a greatly increased consumption of manufactures ; and in the same proportion in which this increase should take place, would the addition to the population and wealth of the country be greater than we have stated it above. How far this extension of manufacturing industry might in time be carried, or what maybe con- sidered as the natural and regular proportion between the number of persons belonging to the same commu- nity who are employed respectively in agriculture and all other employments, of those who produce the raw material and of those who fashion it for use, is an
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interesting question, which we need not here under- take to settle. In the United States, it has been cal- culated that there are seventy persons employed in agriculture to one in any other way. In England, on the other hand, the number of persons employed in manufactures and other sorts of work is larger than that of the cultivators in the proportion of three to two. If we suppose one third of the British manufacturers to labor for foreign markets, which is probably a large calculation, the conclusion would be, that in a com- munity as well supplied with the comforts of life as Great Britain, the natural proportion between the ag- ricultural and manufacturing population is that of exact equality, and that the manufactures necessary to sup- ply the present population of the United States in the same way would give employment to an additional population of twelve or thirteen millions, or in other words, would double the present population and reve- nue of the country.
Without however insisting on these remote and partly hypothetical results, it is sufficient for our pres- ent purpose to remark, that the establishment of man- ufactures, instead of withdrawing capital from land, has a direct tendency to extend and encourage agricul- tural industry. In one respect indeed this cause might produce, if not an actual diversion, at least a change in the direction, of a part of the capital and labor employ- ed in agriculture, and that is, by checking in some de- gree the emigration from the settled to the unsettled portions of the country, and concentrating the popula- tion on a smaller extent of surface. In proportion as manufacturing establishments are extended in the older states, which must of course be their seat, and give
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emplojment to a larger number of persons, many of the inhabitants of those states who would otherwise have emigrated to the West will be taken up by them. The native of New Hampshire, Massachusetts or Con- necticut, who finds a profitable market for his labor in a manufactory at his door, will feel but little tempta- tion to seek a better, on the banks of the Wabash or Missouri. In this way the hardy and generous pro- geny of New England, who have been so long in the iiabit of swarming off annually into all parts of the Union, will begin at length to settle round the parent hive, and reserve for the profit and glory of their own rocky region the high talents and manly virtues which have so often shone like rich jewels on the brow of strangers. This increase of manufacturing population in New England and the other Atlantic states, by creating an increased demand for the provisions of the middle and western country, and the raw materials of the southern, will render it in turn more advantageous to the latter to extend their agricultural industry at home than to send off new colonies into the wilder- ness. Thus the tide of emigration, without being wholly dammed up, will be considerably checked throughout all the settled parts of the Union, and the population of them will begin to put on a more con- solidated shape. This result, which does not appear to have attracted the attention of the Reviewer, al- though it amounts in fact, as we have intimated, to a change in the direction of a part of the agricultural labor of the country, and perhaps a transfer of some of it to manufactures, not only furnishes no objection to the encouragement of this branch of industry, but is itself a strong argument in favor of such a policy.
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We say not this because we feel any jealousy of the prosperous condition of the western states. Far from envying, we admire and glory in the rapid progress of their wealth, population, and general prosperity. We consider their progress in all these respects as affording a spectacle unparalleled for moral magnificence by any thing to be met with in the annals of the world. But we are nevertheless satisfied, that the time has now arrived, when a part of that swelling tide of in- crease which has hitherto poured out its exuberance upon the unsettled regions on the outskirts of the Union, might be turned to better account in extending the cultivation of the arts and raising the standard of civilization in the older settlements. The precise dis- tinction between a civilized and a barbarous commu- nity lies in the greater or less extent to which they respectively cultivate the fine and useful arts ; and as we have shown already, that a region situated like the inte- rior of the United States can never be sufficiently suppli- ed with their products from abroad, it follows, that while the population devote themselves exclusively to agricul- ture, and, as fast as they increase, continue to spread themselves more and more widely over the unlimited regions which are accessible to them, they must live in a considerable degree without the knowledge of these products, and will be in continual danger of sinking into a lower state of civilization. This result has hitherto been in a great measure counteracted in the United States by the operation of powerful moral and political causes of an accidental kind. The originally excellent character of the settlers, their industrious habits, and the high tone of patriotic sentiment which has always pervaded the whole western population, 10
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have hitherto iiianitained them at a point of civiliza- tion, which, considering their circumstances, is hardly less wonderful than the rapidity of their progress in wealth and greatness. But the only way in which the advances they have already made can be secured, and a solid foundation laid for the fabric of social improve- ment, is by naturalizing on the spot the cultivation of the useful arts ; and as far as the protecting policy may have the effect of diverting into this channel any portion of the labor and capital of the country from the business of clearing wild land on the borders of the Union, it will work, in our opinion, a material change for the better.
The population, by thus putting on a more condens- ed form, would be at once more comfortably situated, as respects the enjoyments of life, and greatly improv- ed in its intellectual and moral habits. The complaint that manufactures have an injurious effect on the mo- rals of the people, has become, we imagine, nearly obsolete, and was obviously founded on a view of the subject not only false in itself, but directly the reverse of the true one. The objection furnishes indeed a very curious example of the power of names. If those who make it were asked what opinion they entertain of the moral tendency of the cultivation of the fine and use- ful arts (the same thing under another name,) they would probably reply without hesitation, that they deem it exceedingly beneficial. Such at least must be the answer of all who are not prepared to maintain, with the crazy sophist of Geneva, that the savage state is the one in which our nature attains its perfection, and displays itself in all its glory. The truth undoubt- edly is, that labor, under whatever form, is the direct
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source and only real security of good morals ; and it must of course be taken for granted that the principle holds of manufacturing labor, as of every other, at least until the contrary be proved. The sentimental effu- sions of Mr Southey in his ' Espriella's Letters' re- specting the forlorn state of the workmen in some of the British manufactories, which form, we believe, the only argument that has yet been adduced for this pur- pose, are not in our opinion entitled to a serious refu- tation, and are alluded to with contempt by the Re- viewer himself.
It is somewhat curious to remark, while on this sub- ject, the change which seems to have taken place in • the language of our transatlantic critics respecting the present state of civilization in the interior of the United States. Hitherto, reversing the maxim of the Latin poet which forbids us to notice a few chance spots in a generally brilliant picture, they have habitually over- looked the grand and striking features in the situation of the country, and fastened their whole attention upon some petty blemishes which may be detected by a scrutinizing eye in particular parts. From quarter to quarter we have been entertained by the London Re- viewers with the continual repetition of a few isolated anecdotes which were supposed to prove beyond dis- pute the ignorance, grossness, and ferocity of the population of the West. The Edinburgh censors, in a style somewhat less coarse than that of their courtly brethren of the south, have been equally ready to indulge, in their own way, in a gentle sneer at the manner in which the decencies of life are observed in the back settlements. Now admitting that this per- petual strain of calumny, instead of being, as it is in
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the main, completely gratuitous, had a reasonable foun- dation in fact, what would it prove ? Why, that the interior of the United States is at present deficient in the cultivation of the fine and useful arts. But this deficiency is felt, though not under the form indicated by these foreign calumniators, by the population of that region, and they are making great efforts to sup- ply it, and to obtain for this purpose the assistance of government. Such efforts we should naturally sup- pose would have been looked upon with an eye of favor by our critics, and it might perhaps have been expected that they would have triumphed a little in what they might have regarded as a partial confirma- tion of the truth of their strictures. Instead of this, the very same writers who have been heaping upon us every term of obloquy which the language would af- ford, for our supposed neglect of the arts, now assail us with fresh volleys of abuse and sarcasm for endea- voring to introduce and encourage them. It is quite amusing to find how they have become suddenly en- lightened in regard to the present situation of the inte- rior of the country by the attempts that are making to improve it. It is no longer, as before, the haunt of gangers, regulators, and other such
* Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimeras dire,'
from whose clutches a quiet English traveller could hardly expect to escape with his eyes safe in their sockets, but the abode of ' an industrious population employed in clearing the land and extending the em- pire of civilization.' The danger now is, that these laudable pursuits will be exchanged for predatory and ferocious habits, in consequence of — what, gentle rea-
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der ? the cultivation of the arts ! Lest the reader siiould be tempted to question tlie testimony of our eyes, which we have found some difficulty in believing our- selves, we quote the passage as it stands in the article before us. ' The Americans, instead of having the population on their frontier engaged in the clearing of land and extending the empire of civilization, will im- bue them with predatory and ferocious habits, and teach them to defy the laws, and place their hopes of rising in the world not in the laborious occupations of agri- culture, but in schemes to defraud the public revenue.' The Latin poet tells us that it is the cultivation of the arts that prevents men from being ferocious ;
* Ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes, Emollit mores, nee sinit esse feros.'
Our critic, on the contrary, has discovered that it makes them so, and that the interior of the Republic, which has now, it seems, become all at once a Paradise of innocence and refinement, is to be demoralized by the invasion of the demon of domestic industry ! All this is pleasant enough ; but without dwelling any longer on the various shapes under which the Proteus self- interest successively exhibits himself in the mother country, we may safely rest in the general conclusion, that although the state of civilization in the interior is not, and never has been, what the British critics have hitherto constantly represented it, it is nevertheless susceptible of improvement, and that the only possible means, by which this improvement can be effected, is the more extended cultivation of the fine and useful arts, which it is the object of the protecting policy to encourage.
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It results from the liasty suggestions we have here offered, if they be well founded, that there is no reason to suppose with the Reviewer, that the Tariff will either diminish our exports or withdraw capital from land, and that its regular operation will be, on the con- trary, to produce an extension of industry in all its great branches, and a corresponding increase in the wealth, population, and general prosperity of the coun- try. The inconveniences, which in his opinion were likely to result from the growth of domestic manufac- tures, are therefore entirely illusory, and the commu- nity will enjoy, without the alloy of any attendant dis- advantages, the great benefits which by his own admission regularly flow from that cause. If this be true, and if it be also true, as we are ready to admit, that industry naturally takes of itself the direction most conducive to the general good, excepting so far as it is checked or diverted from its course by accidental causes, it might be pertinently enough inquired, what are the accidental or artificial causes which have so long prevented, in the case of the United States, that developement of manufacturing industry, which would have been so highly advantageous, and which might therefore have been looked for as a natural result of the circumstances in which they were placed. It is of course impossible for us, in an article of this kind, to enlarge on every part of so vast a subject, and we must confine ourselves on this head to a few very brief sug- gestions.
1. The condition of new colonies naturally leads them to confine themselves, during the earliest period of their existence, to agricultural pursuits, and to re- ceive their manufactures from the mother country.
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This circumstance accounts for the absence of manu- factures for the first half century after the date of the settlements.
2. At about the same time when these became so extensive as to afford a suitable field for domestic man- ufactures, the mother country imposed a rigorous pro- hibition upon the exercise of this branch of industry, which remained in full force until the declaration of independence.
3. When the country had obtained its indepen- dence, and began to recover from the exhaustion of the revolutionary war, the circumstances of the world were such as to hold out great inducements for the in- vestment of capital in commerce and agriculture. This state of things continued until the commence- ment of the series of political embarrassments which preceded the war with England.
It appears therefore that from the date of the first settlements up to the very recent period just alluded to, there has always been some powerful cause of an ac- cidental or artificial character in operation, tending to prevent the growth of manufactures. Before the last of these causes had ceased to produce its effects, the wealth and population of the country had risen to such a height, that the absence of domestic manufactures had come to be a sort of practical solecism in our economical condition ; and no sooner was the obstacle removed, than they in fact started into being with a kind of violent impulse, which, though compressed for the moment by the inundation of British goods, that overwhelmed our markets at the renewal of peace, and more recently again by other accidental causes, is yet far from being lost. No circumstance within
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the reach of present foresight, supposing our internal union and tranquillity to be preserved, can prevent or materially delay the growth of manufactures. Wheth- er protected by government or not, they must and will thrive, and at no distant period, reach a point of per- fection, which will secure them from foreign competi- tion, far more effectually than the highest duties or the most rigorous prohibitions. This is thought by some to be a reason why legislative encouragement is un- necessary and inexpedient ; but we confess that we cannot agree in this view of the subject. We deem it, on the contrary, the precise character of all wise and useful legislation to follow and aid the operation of natural causes. If the country were not ripe for the establishment of manufactures, the attempt to force them by law could not possibly succeed, and would produce nothing but positive mischief. But however favorable may be the circumstances under which they are established, and however certain their ultimate success with or without protection, it by no means follows that protection is superfluous. Infant in- stitutions of every description, however judiciously planned, are liable to be injured by accidents which would not affect them in a mature state. In the present case, by permitting foreign fabrics to enter freely into competition with our own, we bring our- selves within the reach of those tremendous fluctua- tions in the course of trade, which in the present dis- eased state of society in England are almost perpetual, and which plunge every thing that has not the iron stamp of maturity on it, into remediless ruin. Although nothing can prevent our manufactures from ultimately thriving, a single revulsion of this description may
81
consign a generation of manufacturers to bankruptcy. To secure our rising industry from such disasters is in our opinion the policy and duty of a wise and patriotic government. To say with the Reviewer that the legis- lation, which is intended to effect this purpose, is an at- tempt to force manufactures, is about as reasonable as it would be to say, that the planters of Louisiana and Georgia force their sugar and cotton, because they em- ploy the most approved methods for raising them in perfection. To force a product is to obtain it with extraordinary labor and expense, from a soil and under circumstances not naturally adapted to it. To employ the means necessary for obtaining it from a congenial soil and under favorable circumstances is not to force but to cultivate it ; and we know that without judicious cultivation the most precious shoots run to waste, and the richest ground produces nothing but brambles. If we doubted the capacity of the United States to sup- ply their own wants in the way of manufactured arti- cles, we should then doubt the expediency of a protec- ting policy ; but on this head we cannot allow our- selves for a moment to entertain the slightest scruple. When we reflect upon the variety and excellence of the natural products, animal, vegetable and mineral, that enrich the different parts of our magnificent and almost boundless territory ; the cotton, the sugar, the rice, the tobacco, the corn, the hemp, the flax, that cover our plains ; the flocks and herds that feed upon our pastures ; the groves and forests of oak, live-oak, cedar, pine, maple, and every other useful and orna- mental tree, that overshadow the tops of our moun- tains ; the wealth of really precious metals and other fossils, the iron, the lead, the coal, the salt, the gran- 11
82
ite, the marble, that fill with inexhaustible and incal- culable treasures their hitherto almost unexplored re- cesses ; — when we reflect on this unexampled abund- ance of materials, and consider at the same time the great natural advantages we possess for turning them to account, in the number and opportunity of our riv- ers and water-courses, which furnish at once the cheapest power for moving machinery and the hap- piest facilities for communication between the differ- ent sections of the country ; in the intelligence, enter- prise, and industry, and we may venture to add, tem- perance, patience, perseverance, and generally high moral character of our citizens ; above all, in that sin- gular blessing of Providence, by the eflect of which it has happened, in recompense perhaps for the rare vir- tues which distinguished our fathers, that in this fa- vored region, and this alone upon the wide face of the earth, the individual is permitted to enjoy the fruits of his labor undiminished either by the arbitrary violence or exorbitant legal exactions of government ; — w^hen we reflect on this extraordinary combination of favora- ble circumstances, we cannot hesitate to aflirm that our situation is eminently auspicious for the establish- ment of almost every branch of industry. We should deem it a libel on our countrymen to suppose that they must painfully carry their rich natural products to other countries, four or five thousand miles distant, in order to have them fashioned for use ; and we are well satisfied, as we remarked before, that no accidental causes or want of legislative protection can much longer prevent us from supplying ourselves with most of the articles which we now receive from Europe. With these convictions, and believing also at the same
83
time that, although the ultimate success of our manu- facturing establishments cannot be questioned, they are liable while yet in an infant state to suffer by the effect of foreign competition occasional blights, which, if comparatively unimportant to the community, are yet fraught with ruin to individuals, to families, and even to whole classes of citizens, we regard the situa- tion of the country as that in which a judicious pro- tecting legislation may be applied with the best results to its appropriate purpose of aiding the healthy opera- tion of natural causes, and averting accidental and tem- porary evils. We therefore cannot hesitate in giving it the support, however feeble, of our concurrence and express approbation.
It is time, however, to draw this essay, already of a length which could only be justified by the import- ance of the subject, to a close. We cannot conclude without expressing a hope that the policy of the gov- ernment, on this subject, will never be affected by the progress or results of any of the ephemeral struggles for place and power, that have divided and may here- after divide the citizens. The duty of encouraging and protecting our own industry should, and will, we trust, be regarded by all the parties that may succes- sively predominate as too high, too vitally important, — too sacred, we might almost say, — to be overlooked in deference to any suggestions of immediate interest ; and, what is perhaps a still better security for its future observance, its very importance and the consequent general popularity of all measures taken in fulfilment of it, will always render it the immediate interest of our statemen, however divided on minor points, to unite in pursuing such a course. The protecting sys-
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tern has in fact become already the settled policy of the country. It was recommended and sanctioned at the outset of the government by the powerful mind of Hamilton, a name which stands higher, both abroad and at home, for skill in practical legislation, than al- most any other that adorns our political history, and is nearly sufficient of itself to give authority to any opin- ion. It survived and flourished through all the various turns of the long contest for power, in which that states- man and his contemporaries were afterwards engaged. At the close of the war with Great Britain, which final- ly terminated these ancient feuds, the protecting policy was resumed with renovated interest and vigor by the united community, and has ever since been constantly gaining upon the general favor. During the late strug- gle for the Presidency it was professed with equal zeal, and probably with equal conviction, by a decided majority of the friends of all the candidates ; and the great states, whose powerful influence contributed mainly to the elevation of the successful one, Pennsyl- vania, New York, and Ohio, have always been its warmest adherents and principal supporters. The President himself has given in print, both before and since his election, satisfactory indications of the con- currence of his sentiments on this subject with those of the people. We have a right to suppose therefore, that the influence of the administration will be exerted in future, as it has hitherto been ever since the foundation of the government, in favor of this policy. A strong disapprobation of it has no doubt been manifested by a considerable, and every way respectable portion of the planters of the Southern, and the navigators of the Northern stales ; but longer experience will convince
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even them, that it is not less beneficial to their interests than to those of the rest of the community ; and we con- fidently trust, that Congress, unmoved by any temporary burst of opposition, and especially unmoved by the de- clamations, the sophistry, or the sneers of interested foreigners, will exhibit, in their future proceedings on this subject, the uniformity, steadiness, and wisdom, which have characterized those of all their predeces- sors. We mean not to intimate an opinion, that they should make no alteration whatever in the details of the existing Tariff, which may be, and probably is, in some parts, susceptible of improvement. We only mean, that all ihe legislation on economical matters, however modified in particular points, should display throughout the grand and leading features of a real American System,
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