SPEECH 
 
 r\ = 
 
 
 
 
 lR. SLADE. OF VERMONT, 
 
 A PROTECTING TARIFF, 
 
 Delivered in the House of Representatives, December 20, 1841. 
 
 The question being upon the proposition of Mr. ATHEHTON, of New Hampshire, to amend the 
 resolution for referring so much of the President's megeage ns related to the tariff to the Com- 
 mittee on Manufacture?, l>y referring the same to the Commiltee of Ways and Means 
 
 Mr. SLADE rose and said, that he felt urged by peculiar considerations to address the House 
 upon the question raised by the motion of the gentleman from New Hampshire. It was proposed 
 !o take away from the Committee on Manufactures the consideration of a subject which had long 
 been regarded as appropriately belonging to it, and to transfer it to another committee. Placed as he 
 had been, by the Speaker, on the Committee on Manufactures, he felt it ID he somewhat incumbent 
 on him to vindicate the claim of that committee, in behalf of the maHufacturing interest?, to the 
 consideration of lhat part of the President's message referred to in the resolution. Besides this, 
 Mr. S. said he represented a constituency having a deep interest in the question which had been 
 drawn into discussion, and who, of course, looked to him to defend that interest, whenever it 
 should be brought under consideration. He felt, also, under high obligations, from the fact that 
 the Legislature of the State which he in part represented had, at their late session, passed reso- 
 lutions strongly approving of the protective system, and instructing the Senators and requesting 
 the Representatives of that State, in the Congress of the United States, to use all honorable means 
 to sustain it. These resolutions, Mr. S. said, he held in his hand ; and, as they furnished an ex- 
 cellent summary of the arguments in favor of the protective policy, he desired to make them a part 
 of his speech, and would therefore send them to the Clerk, that they might be read. 
 
 The resolutions were here read by the Clerk, as follows : 
 
 " Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the Stale of Vermont, as follows, to wit : 
 
 "1. Resolved, That labor, bth menial and corporeal, is not only the most honorable means, but the only true 
 source of wealth. 
 
 " 2. Resolved, - That it is the duty of our Government, at all times, to protect and encourage the industry of our citi- 
 zens, by making and enforcing such a tariff of protective duties as will secure our home markets from the desperate 
 and disastrous floodings of foreign competition. 
 
 "3. Resolved, That we reeard the riclit lo enjoy the products of our soil and labor as sacred and valuable as the 
 right to the soil itself; and thai it is equally ihe duty of our Government to repel invasions and encroachments upon 
 the one as the other. 
 
 "4 Resolved, Thai the farmer and manufacturer are alike vitally interested in such protection, and that the 
 proeperity of all classes and occupations is mainly dependent on the success of our agricultural and manufacturing 
 interests. 
 
 " 5. Resolved, That the tariff Iowa now existing are highly defective and insufficient, and, by that part of the com- 
 promise act which is to take effect in July next, will be rendered still more defective, inefficient, and unjust. 
 
 "6. Resolved, That our Senators in Congress be instructed, and our Representatives requested, to use all honor- 
 able means in their power to procure the passage of laws, which, while they shall guard against the numerous fraud* 
 and evasions now practised upon us by foreigners and foreign agents, and while they shall raise a revenue sufficient 
 only fur the necessary expenses of Government, and shall have a due regard to the particular interests of every sec- 
 tion of our country, may give, by prjlective duties, such a preference to domestic over foreign products in our own 
 markets, antl may so discriminate belween those articles which we can and those which we cannot produce at home, 
 as to eive a just, sure, and salutary encouragement to ihe industry of every American citizen. 
 
 "7. Resolved, That his excellency the Governor be requested lo forward a copy of tlirse resolutions to each of our 
 Senators and Representatives in Congress." 
 
 If, said Mr. S., I needed any thing besides the convictions of my own judgment to induce me to 
 sustain the protecting policy, I should find it in a request emanating from such a source as this. 
 I jield to it with a hearty good will ; and, on this and all proper occasions, shall, in the best way 
 I am able, give my reasons for so doing.
 
 Tho debate has taken a very wide range. This h^s naturally, and 1 may say almost necessa 
 rily, resulted from the peculiar character of the motion submitted by the gentleman from New 
 Hampshire. Upon a proposition to commit that part of the President's message which relates to 
 the tariff to the Committee on Manufactures a direction which that subject has taken for more 
 than twenty years it is proposed to change its accustomed direction, and send it to the Committee 
 of Ways arid Means. Why thi.s proposed change 1 is a question which every body at once asks, 
 and which nobody can answer without admitting that the tendency and design of the movement 
 nre adverse to the protecting policy. This is apparent from a consideration of the range of duties 
 appropriated by the rules of the House to the two committees that to which it is proposed to com- 
 mit this subject, and that from which it is proposed to take it. 
 
 The 73d rule provides that " it shall be the duty of the Committee of Ways and Means to take 
 into consideration all such reports of the Treasury Department, and all such propositions relative 
 to the revenue, as may be referred to them by the House; to inquire into the state of the public 
 debt or the revenue, and of the expenditure ; and to report, from time to time, their opinion 
 thereon." 
 
 Here are two fields of inquiry marked out for the committee the public debt and expenditure 
 on one hand, and the ways and means of raising the revenue necessary to meet these liabilities on 
 the other. Now, what have these inquiries to do with the question of protection ? The great 
 quistion for the consideration of the Committee of Ways and Means is a mere question of revenue. 
 It is true this admits of discrimination between the different articles of importation ; but it is a dis- 
 crimination which has respect to the question what articles of importation will best bear taxation, 
 and what rates of duties will raise the needed amount 1 It is merely the discrimination contem- 
 plated by the President in that part of his message in which be says: 
 
 41 In imposing duties for the purposes of revenue, a right to discriminate as to the articlrs on which the duty shall he 
 laid, as well as the amount, necessarily and most properly exists. Otherwise, the Government would be placed In 
 the condition of having to levy the same duties upon all articles, the productive as well as the unproductive. The 
 slightest duty upon some, miaht have the effect oi causing their importation to cease ; whereas others, entering ex- 
 tensively into the consumption of the country, might bear the heaviest, without any sensible- diminution in the amount 
 imported." 
 
 I need not say that there must be a discrimination widely different from this, to give protection 
 to American industry. And yet it is to a committee, whose appropriate range of inquiry is thus 
 limited; which is constituted for purposes having no necessary connexion whatever with protec- 
 tion, that it is proposed to commit the great interests referred to in that part of the President's 
 message whose commitment is now the subject of discussion. And with this is to be connected 
 the #ct of taking away this subject from the Committee on Manufactures a committee instituted 
 for the very purpose of considering it. 
 
 Hostility to the protective policy, and a determination to suppress all inquiry into the claims for 
 its continuance, are too apparent on the face ol this movement to require comment. If the gen- 
 tleman from New Hampshire would avoid this conclusion, let him move an instruction to thr 
 Committee of Ways and Means to consider and report upon the subject of a protective tariff. But, 
 will he do this ? No, sir. He wants no examination with a view to protection. If he did, he 
 would leave this subject to go to its appropriate committee. 
 
 There i another view of this matter. Whatever may be the appropriatf- range of the duties of 
 the Committee of Ways and Means; though it should fairly extend to this subject, yet that com- 
 mittee has been formed with no view to it. There may be a bare majority of the committee favor 
 able to a protective tariff, though I am not sure of that. There should be a decided majority of 
 the committee which is to consider and report on this subject, favorable to the object sought by the 
 numerous petitions for protection. The great interest of domestic industry should have a favora- 
 ble hearing. It should have the benefit of a committee disposed to present its claims fully and 
 fairly to this House. This is the spirit of the Parliamentary law, which requires, in the language 
 of commentators on the Lex 1'urliamcniuria, that the child shall not be put into the hands of a 
 nurse that will strangle it. I do not say that the Committee of Ways and Means would thus dis- 
 pose of the great manufacturing and dependent inturusts; but I do say that, if it had been mn!< s - 
 stood at the commencement of the session that th ; s subject would have been referred to that com- 
 mittee, ii would have been differently constituted. And I will now say that, if this subject is to be 
 committed to it, it ought, forthwith, to be reorganized. 
 
 The Committee on Manufactures has, very properly, been formed with a view to this particular 
 subject. It is understood to be composed of six members in favor of the, grotecting system, and 
 three against it. This is as it should be ; and this is the reason why the gentleman from New 
 Hampshire wishes to take this child from the arms of its natural guardian*, who will nurse and 
 take care of.it, and put it into the hands of a committee, constituted, to say the least, with no ref- 
 erence to iis claims to~guardianship and protection. 
 
 Under existing circumstances, I consider the amendment of the gentleman from New Hamp- 
 shire, if it prevails, as tantamount to a declaration on the part of this House that it will institute 
 no inquiry into thi> subject of protection tantamount, in fact, to abolishing the Committee on 
 Manufactures. For, sir, what has that committee to do to carry out the purpose indicated by its 
 name, unless it acts with a reference to the tariff of duties on imports? This has, hitherto, been
 
 UCSB LIBRARY y 
 
 Hie moile, and the only mode, by which protection to American industry has been effected. The 
 Committee on Manufactures, then, is to be, iti effect, abolished, and all examination, with a dis- 
 tinct reference to the subject of protection, is to be dispensed with. And now let me appeal to 
 gentlemen on all. sides, and of all parties East, West, North, and South to say whether they 
 are prepared to come to a vote which shall speak such a language as this. The gentleman from 
 New Hampshire may be prepared for it. He may be prepared to abolish the committee, and shut 
 the door aguinst all examination into the great interests which so deeply concern the prosperity of 
 his own, as they do that of the "Green Mountain State." As this is evidently his object, why 
 docs he not come out boldly and avow it ! Why did he not second the motion of the gentleman 
 from Virginia [Mr. SMITH] to lay the resolution of reference on the table, with a view to adopting 
 a resolution at once to abolish the Committee 0:1 Manufactures] l3ut, no; he neither makes nor 
 seconds any such motion. He chooses to get at the result by indirection. If I recollect right, 
 sir, that gentleman once offered a series of resolutions here, (the famous " Atherton resolutions,") 
 one of which declared "that Congress has no right to do that indirectly which it cannot do di- 
 rectly." And now here is the gentleman violating his own rule seeking to do indirectly what he 
 dare not attempt directly, but which the gentleman from Virginia is willing to do openly and with- 
 out disguise. 
 
 As it is thus rendered apparent thai the success of the gentleman's motion will, in effect, abol- 
 ish the Committee on Manufactures, and indicate <i disposition on the part of this House to aban- 
 don the protecting policy, [ propose to examine the origin and the history of that policy, to urge 
 the duty of its continuance, and to call the attention of the House to the crisis which is impending 
 in reference to the interests which it was established to protect. 
 
 The nature and necessity of the policy in question are indicated by its name. It is the protecting 
 policy. It supposes the existence of a policy which is to be counteracted of attacks which are to 
 be repelled. It acts on the defensive, and ceases to act only when foreign legislation ceases to render 
 its action necessary. That necessity has existed from the very commencement of this Government. 
 The achievement of our independence did riot change the policy of the mother country. That policy 
 had been to prohibit the manufactures, to discourage the navigation, and to restrain the commerce 
 of the colortie^ ; to g ive a single direction to their industry, and to make it tributary to British wealth 
 and power. The triumphs of the Revolution relieved us from the power of British arms, but- it did 
 not emancipate us from the power of British legislation. That legislation, it is true, had ceased 
 to act on us directlv, but it-still reached us. It prohibited our trade with British colonies; it dis- 
 couraged our navigation, by imposing discriminating duties on our tonnage; and it prohibited or 
 burdened with excessive duties the importation of every production of our industry which could 
 come in competition with British industry. It was then, as it is now, the policy of Great Britain 
 to supply herself and the world with the creations of her own industry to buy nothing which she 
 roukl produce, and to sell every thing which she could induce others to purchase. \ 
 
 Such, too, was substantially the policy towards us of all Europe. It is needless to say that, 
 under its operation, our manufactures languished, and our commerce and navigation were crip- 
 pled and prostrated. There was but one remedy for all this. It was protective legislation. To 
 this the Government of the Confederation was incompetent. It had no such power to regulate 
 commerce as to reach the evil. It could lay no imposts to check the flood of foreign manufactures, 
 which were exhausting the country to foster the industry and augment the wealth of others. The 
 iStatc Governments could not act in concert, and were therefore powerless. Their disconnected 
 'flints were unavailing. 
 
 A s-ense of this great defect pervaded the country, and aided in impressing upon it a conviction 
 of the necessity of a new Government. Said Mr. AMES, in the debate, in the first Congress, on 
 the revenue bill, to which I shall hereafter refer 
 
 " T conceive, sir, that the present Constitution was dictated by commercial necessity, more than any other cause. 
 Tilt want of an ejficicnt (jovem/nenl to secure t/t,c manufacturing interests, audio advance our commerce, was 
 lung ssou by infill of judgment, and pointed out by patriots s.iluutous to promote our general welfare." 
 
 It was in this state of things that the Constitution was formed, and this very state of things con- 
 stituted one of the chief reasons for forming it. In this respect, above all others, there was need of 
 " a more perfect union;" for, in nothing was the old one more imperfect than in this. 
 
 I lie new Government was hailed as the instrument of deliverance from commercial thraldom. 
 The people recognised in its power " to regulate commerce with foreign nations," and to "lay 
 and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common de- 
 fence and general welfare," the power to perform the indispensable duty of protecting their indus- 
 try in the great departments of agriculture, commerce, and manufactures. 
 
 To enable us to enter more fully into the views in which the protecting policy originated, as 
 well as to show how the question of constitutional power was regarded by the people, at the mo- 
 ment the new Government went into operation, it may be useful to recur to some of their petitions, 
 presented to Congress at its first session under the Constitution. 
 
 I have before ins "the petition of the tradesmen, mechanics, and others, of the town of Balti- 
 more," to which I find appended the names of seven hundred and thirty-two citizens of that 
 town, and which "humbly showeth :"
 
 " Th it since the close of the late war, and the completion of the Revolution, your petitioners have observed, will; 
 serious reeret, the manufacturing and trailing interests of thf country rapidly declining, while the wealth of the peo- 
 ple h;Uh been pnxKsally expended in the purchase of those articles from foreigners, which our citizens, if properly 
 encouraged, were fully competent to furnish. 
 
 " To check this srowing evil, applications were made by petitions to some of the State LegislaUirPs. These puar 
 dians of the people, in several of the Slates, interposed their authority. Laws were by them enacted, with the view 
 of JHiUIuine, or at least diminishing, the rage fur foreign, and of encouraging domestic, manufactures. But the event 
 hath clearly demonstrated to all ranks of men that no effectual provision could reasonably be expert 'erf, until one 
 uniform, efficient donernment should pervade this tcide extended country. 
 
 "The happy period havins now arrivrd when the United States are placed in a new situation ; when the adoption 
 of the General Government gives one sovereign Legislature the sole and exclusive power of laying duties upon 
 imports, your petitioners rejoice at the prospect this aflords them, that America, freed from the commercial shackles 
 which have so long bound her, will see and pursue her true interest, becoming independent in fact, (is tc II as in 
 name; and they confidently hope that the encouragement and protection of American manufactures will claim 
 the earliest attention of the supreme Legislature of the nation ; as it is an universally ar.knowludged truth, that the 
 United States contain within their limits resources amply sufficient to enable them to become a great manufacturing 
 country, and only want the patronage and support of a w ise, energetic Government." 
 
 The petitioners then draw a picture of the condition of the country, " the number of her poor in 
 creasing for want of imployment. foreign debts accumulating, houses and lands depreciating in 
 value, trade and manufactures l.mguishins and expiring;" and conclude by prnying " the supreme 
 Legislature of the United States, as the guardians of the whole empire," to "impose on all foreign 
 articles which can be made in America such duties as will give a just and decided preference to 
 their labors, and thereby discountenance the trade which lends so materially to injure them and 
 impoverish their country." 
 
 This petition was presented to tho House of Representatives on the llth of April, 1789. On 
 the 18ih of the same month another of a similar nature was presented from " the mechanics and 
 manufacturers of the city of New York." It is so much to my purpose that I cannot forlear read- 
 ing a portion of it. 
 
 Having referred to the independence which had been acquired, and the fears they had be: n led 
 to entertain " that the country, having gained the form of liberty, had left in the hands of their 
 enemies the instruments of oppression, and the spirit to exercise it," they say : 
 
 "Your petitioners soon perceived, with the deepest regret, that their prospects of improving wealth were blasted by 
 a system of commercial usurpation. They saw the trade of these States laboring under foreign impositions, and loaded 
 with fellers forged in every quarter, to discourage enterprise and def-at industry. In this situation, they have, been 
 prevented from applying to those abundant resources with which nature has blessed this country. Agriculture has 
 lost its capital stimulus, and manufacture, the sister of commerce, has participated in all its distresses. 
 
 "Your petitioners conceive that their countrymen, have been deluded by an appearance of plenty; by the profu- 
 sion of foreign articles which has deluged the country ; and thus have mistaken excessive tmportationfor ajlourith- 
 ing trade. 
 
 " Wearied by their fruitless exertions, your petitioners have long looked forward with anxiety for the establishment 
 of a Government which would have power to check the growing evil, and extend a protcctine hand to the interest? 
 of commerce and the arts. Such a Government is note established. On the promulgation of the Constitution just 
 now commencing its operations, your petitioners discovered in its principles the remedy which they had so long 
 and so earnestly' desir ed. To your honorable body the mechanics and manufacturers of New York look up with 
 confidence, convinced that, as the united voice of America has furnished you with the means, so your knowledse of 
 our common wants has "riven you the spirit, to unbind nur fetters, and rescue our country from disgrace and ruin." 
 
 I have before me. another petition from "the tradesmen and manufacturers of the town of Bos- 
 ton," presented on the 5th of June, of the same year, in which the petitioners, having refetred to 
 " the great decrease of American manufactures and almost total stagnation of American ship build- 
 ing," proceed, among other things, to say : 
 
 "Your petitioners need not inform Congress that, on the revival of our mechanical arts and manufactures depend 
 the wealth and prosperity of the Northern States ; nor can we forbear mentioning to your honors that the citizens of 
 these States conccive'the object of their independence but half obtained till ttv-se national purposes are established 
 on a purmanent and extensive basis, by the legislative acts of the Federal Government." 
 
 These pet'tionn were referred to the Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union, in 
 which the subject underwent a long and able discussion. The result was the passage of the first 
 revenue bill, signed by General Washington on the 4th of July, 1789, [appropriate day!] the 
 preamble of which, as has been stated, expressly declared that it was passed for the purpose, among 
 others, of the "encouragement and protection of manufactures." 
 
 I hardly need call the attention of the House to the facts and reasonings of these petitioners. The 
 national industry had become paralyzed. The State Governments had interposed without effect. 
 The necessity of " one uniform efficient Government" of " one Sovereign Legislature," possess- 
 ing "the sole and exclusive power of laying duties upon imports," had been thus demonstrated. 
 Such a Government the Constitution had provided. " Lv ITS pnixcirLF.s" the petitioners " dis- 
 covered the remedy so lortg desired," and without which "the object of their independence" 
 would, in their opinion, have been "but half obtained." 
 
 Such was the reasoning of the petitioners; and such was the reasoning of the whole country. 
 Tt had just been shaken with discussions of the Constitution ; and here was the common sense con- 
 struction of it by the people. I commend it to those who now deny that any power exists under 
 the Constitution to protect the industry of the country. Then, nobody so much as expressed a 
 doubt of the existence of the power. In all the discussions in the Committee of the Whole to 
 whom these petitions were referred and I have looked through that debate the constitutional 
 power was not, that I can find, once called in question, though differences of opinion existed as to 
 the expediency of exercising it. This is the more remarkable, because of the decided grouad 
 taken on tha subject in these petitions, as well as from the fact that " the encouragement and
 
 protection of manufactures" was made, in the preamble to the revenue law whose pas -age followed 
 these discussions, one of the express grounds of its passage. The strong vote of forty-one to eight 
 in favor of that bill, Mr. MADISOX, "the father of the Constitution," in the affirmative, shows 
 that the leading minds of that day entertained no doubt whatever on the question of constitutional 
 power. 
 
 There is an argument in favor of the constitutional power of Congress over this subject, involved 
 in the reasoning of these petitioners, which seems to me unanswerable. It may be thus stated : 
 The power to regulate commerce and lay duties on imports, existed in the States. , That power 
 had been transferred to Congress wholly transferred. None of it remained. With the transfer 
 of the whole power of the States to regulate commerce and lay duties on imports, there was, 
 therefore, transferred the power to regulate commerce and lay duties/or all the purposes for 
 which these acts might have been performed by the State Governments, one of which, undeniably, 
 was the protection of manufactures. This conclusion results not only from the fact that the power 
 was granted without any restriction as to he purposes for which it might be exercised, but still 
 more undeniably from the consideration that, if the great essential power of protection through 
 these indispensable means was not thus transferred from the States to the General Government, 
 it was annihilated. 
 
 In looking over the debates to which I have referred, I find this argument urged in substance by 
 Mr. MADISON, in one of his speeches in favor of protection : 
 
 " There is (said Mr. M.) another consideration. The Stales that are most advanced in population and ripe for man- 
 ufacture! ousiit to have their particular interests attended to in some degree. While these States retained the power 
 of making regulations of trade, they had the power (o protect and cherish such institutions. By adopting the present 
 Constitution, 'they have thrown the exercise of this power into other hands. They must have done this with an ex- 
 pectation that those interests would not be neglected here." 
 
 It was upon the basis of this argument (hat Gen. JACKSON urged the constitutionality of a pro- 
 tective tariff in his annual message of 1831, to which, in tracing the history of the protective poli- 
 cy, I shall. hereafter more particularly refer. The argument has never been answered, and never 
 can be. The people by whom, anil for whom, this Government was instituted, will never be sat- 
 isfied with a construction of the Constitution which annihilates the great and indispensable power 
 of protecting their industry against the crushing influence of foreign legislation, and lays the coun- 
 try helpless at the feet of foreign Power*. 
 
 The policy of protection extended not only to manufactures, but to our navigation and fish- 
 eries, us I might show if I had time having been, as we have thus seen, established in the earliest 
 legulation of this Government, I propose to show how steadily and uniformly it has continued to 
 he the policy of the country. This I shall do principally by a reference to the messages of the 
 successive Presidents, as furnishing, from time to time, a summary exposition not only of their 
 own, but of the sentiment of the country on this subject. 
 
 After having seen that the act of the 4th of July, 1789, was approved by PRESIDENT 
 WASHINGTON, it will not surprise us to find him recognising the protecting policy in his first 
 annual address to Congress, of the 8th of January, 1790. 
 
 " The safety and interest of the people," said ho, in that address, " require that they should promote such manufac- 
 tures as tend to render them independent of others for essential, particularly for military supplies." 
 
 Washington's practical mind looked to the policy of advancing agriculture, commerce, and man- 
 ufactures, as essential to the maintenance of our independence. Congress expressed its concur- 
 rence with this sentiment by ordering, on the 15th of January, 1790, 
 
 " Thai it \>c referred t;/ the Secretary of the Treasury, to propose and report to this House a proper plan or plans, con- 
 formably to the recommendation of the President in his speech to both Houses of Congress, for the encouragement and 
 promotion of such manufactories as will tend to render the United States independent of other nations for essential, 
 particularly for military supplies." 
 
 This reference drew from the Secretary of the Treasuiy the able and unanswerable vindication 
 of the protectina policy imbodied in his celebrated report, communicated to Congress en the 5th 
 of December, 1791. The following, from its introductory paragraph, presents a summary of the 
 grounds on which he rested that vindication : 
 
 " The embarrassments which have obstructed the progress of our external trade have led to serious reflections on 
 the necessity of enlarging the sphere of our domestic commerce. The restrictive regulations which, in foreign mar- 
 kets, abridge the vent for the increasing surplus of our agricultural produce, serve to beget an earnest desire that a 
 more extensive demand for that surplus maybe created at home ; and the complete success which has rewarded 
 manufacturing enterprise iu some valuable branches, conspiring with the promising symptons which attend some less 
 mature essays in otlvrs, justify a hope that the obstacles to the growth of this species of industry are less formidable 
 than they were apprehended to be, and that it may not be difficult to find, in its further extension, a full indemnifica- 
 tion for any external disadvantges which are or may be experienced, as well as an accession of resources favorable to 
 national independence and safety." 
 
 The policy of protecting manufactures having been thus established, the House of Representa- 
 tives, in the year 1795, instituted the Committee of Commerce and Manufactures, which was con- 
 tinued as a standing committee of the House until the year 1819, when the duties connected with 
 the subject of manufactures, having, in the progress of the protecting policy, become greatly en- 
 larged, were severed from those appertaining to commerce, and committed to a Committee of Man- 
 ufactures, which has ever since continued to be one of the standing committees of the House. 
 
 But to proceed with the Executive addresses. Passing over the incidental recognition of the 
 protecting policy in the intermediate addresses qf President WASHINGTON, we come to the decided
 
 and earnest recommendation of a continuance of the policy in his last address of the 7ih of Decem- 
 ber, 1796, in which he says: 
 
 " Congress havs repeatedly, and not without sue cess, directed their attention to th p encouragement of manufacturts- 
 The object is of too much consequence not to ensure a continuance of their efforts in every way which shall appear 
 eligible." 
 
 Thus did this great man, in his last communication to Congress, refer with evident gratification 
 to the encouragement which Congress had repeatedly and successfully given to manufactures, and 
 urge its continued patronage and support 
 
 We all revere the name of WASHINGTON, not merely for his greatness in the field, but for hi 
 profound, practical wisdom as a statesman. His opinions need no commendation of mine. It 
 should be enough to announce them, to ensure for them the most respectful consideration. I may 
 well ask Virginians, who are so justly proud of his great same, to review their opinions upon the 
 constitutionality and expediency of a tariff for protection, when they find them conflicting with the 
 deliberately formed and repeatedly expressed opinions of their beloved WASHINGTON. 
 
 My next reference is to PRESIDENT JEFFERSON. Being still in the region of Virginia 
 authority, I hope to receive the attention of gentlemen from that State. If I may not venture to 
 urge them to listen to any thing / can say on this subject, I may, I trust, without presumption, 
 crave their attention when JEFFF.BSOX speaks. In his second annual message, of the 15th of De- 
 cember, 1802, he says: 
 
 " To cultivate peace and maintain commerce and navigation in all their lawful enterprises ; to foster our fisheries 
 as nurseries of navigation, and for the nurture of man, and protect the manufactures adapted to our circumstances, 
 to preserve the faith nf the nation by an exact discharge of its debts and contracts, expend the public money with 
 the same care and economy we would practice with our own, and impose on our citizens no unnecessary burdens : to 
 keep in all things within the pal? of our constitutional powers, and cherish the federal Union as the only rock of 
 safety : these, fellow-citizens, are the landmarks by which we are to guide ourselves in all our proceedings. By 
 contmuine to make these the rule of our action, we shall endear to our countrymen the true principles of their 
 Constitution, and promote an union of sentiment and of action equally auspicuous to their happiness and s;i 
 
 Let me ask the attention of the House a moment to this important passage. Here are certain 
 great leading objects to which the President calls the attention of Congress, as to "landmarks'* 
 which were to guide them and the Executive in the discharge of their duties. And what weie 
 these landmarks'? To cultivate peace; to maintain commerce and navigation ; to foster the fish- 
 eries; to protect manufactures , to preserve the national faith ; to practise economy ; to rrspect 
 the Constitution ; to cherish the federal Union. 
 
 Thus, to "protect manufactures" was deemed by Mr. JEFFERSON worthy to be embraced in the 
 comprehensive summary of the "rules of action," in observing which they were to endear to their 
 countrymen "the true principles of the Constitution." And yet, now we have men, who make 
 loud professions of Jeffersonian democracy, as loudly asserting that it is a gross and dangerous 
 constitutional heresy to maintain the right of Congress to strengthen the independence of the 
 country by fostering its manufactures ! 
 
 But I proceed wilh JEFFKKSON'S authority; the next promulgation of which I find in his annual 
 message of the 2d of December, 1806. 
 
 The revenue arising from imposts had, it seems, enabled the Government so far to extinguish 
 the public debt as to lead the President to anticipate taut there would "ere long be an accumula- 
 tion of moneys in the Treasury beyond the instalments of the public debt which the Government 
 would be permitted by contract to pay." In discussing the question of the disposition of the anti- 
 cipated surplus, the President says: 
 
 " To what other objects shall these gurplusaes be appropriated, and the whole surplus of impost after the entire dis- 
 charge of the public debt ? Shall we suppress the impost, and give that advantage to foreign over domestic man- 
 ufactures ?" 
 
 He proceeds to say that on a few articles he thinks the impost may be suppressed, but that, 
 with regard to the great mass of them, the "patriotism'' of the people would "prefer its continu- 
 ance and application to the great purposes of public education, roads, rivers, canals, and such 
 other objects of public improvement as it may be thought proper to add to the constitutional enu- 
 meration of federal powers." 
 
 Thus it will be seen that, rather than suppress the impost, and give that advantage to foreign 
 over domestic manufactures, Mr. JF.FFEHSON would, with a few exceptions, maintain the impost, 
 and ask the States to authorize, by an amendment of the Constitution, the appropriation of the 
 surpluses thus obtained to purposes of education and internal improvement. 
 
 I have not done with Mr. JEFFERSON'S authority in favor of the protecting policy. In his last 
 annual message sent to Congress, on the 8th of November, 1808, he says: 
 
 "The suspension of foreign commerce produced by the injustice of the belligerent Powers, and the consequent 
 losses and sacrifices of our titizens, are subjects of just concern. The situation into which we have thus been forced 
 has impelled us to apply a portion of our industry and capital to internal manufactures and improvements. The ex- 
 tent of this conversion is daily increasing, and little doubt remains that the establishments formed and firming will, 
 under the auspices of cheaper materials and subsistence, the freedom of labor from taxation with us, and of protecting 
 duties and prohibitions, become permanent." 
 
 Mr. JEFFERSON, it thus seems, looked tw the permanency of the manufacturing establishments 
 of the country ; and to this result he was willing to contribute, not only by protecting duties, hut, 
 if necessary, even by prohibitions. 
 
 This pert of the meuag* was referred to .the Committee of Commerce and Manufactures Mr.
 
 NEWTON, of VIRGINIA, chairman from whom I rind a report, made on the 21st of June, 1809, 
 fully sustaining the principle of protection laid down by the President, and containing, among 
 other things, the following just and comprehensive view of the ground of the protective policy. 
 It ought to be placed in letters of ma-sive gold over every entrance to the halls of our national 
 legislation, and daily pondered over by those who enter them : 
 
 " A NATION ERECTS A SOLID BASIS FOR THK SUPPORT AND MAINTENANCE OP ITS INDEPENDENCE AND PROSPERITY 
 WHOSE POLICY IS TO DRAW FROM ITS NATIVE SOURCES ALL ARTICLES OF THE FIRST NECESSITY.'' 
 
 Let, me now turn for a moment from Southern Presidential authority to Southern authority in 
 another branch of this Government. I find it in the action of the House of Representatives on 
 the 7th of June, 1809. On that day it adopted the following resolution : 
 
 " Resolved, That the Secretary of the Treasury be directed to prepare and report to this House, at their next sea 
 sion, a plan for the application of such means as are within the power of Congress, for the purposes of protecting and 
 fostering the manufactures of the United States, together with a statement of the several manufacturing establish- 
 ments which have been commenced, the progress which has been made in them, and the success with which they 
 have been attended ; ami such other information as, in the opinion of the Secretary, may be material in exhibiting a 
 general view of the manufactures of the United States." 
 
 Here, sir, was contemplated the preparation of "apian'' for the application of the means 
 within the power of Congress to protect and foster the manufactures of the United States. And 
 
 how do you think stood the Southern votes upon thia resolution 1 In the four Southern Atlantic 
 States the votes were as follows : 
 
 Virginia - Yeas 12 Nay a 9 
 
 North Carolina 8 3 
 
 SOUTH CAHOLIXA 6 1 
 
 Georgia 1 , 3 
 
 Total 27 1 
 
 Such was the vote of the South, from whence, we now have the most furious denunciation* of 
 the protecting policy, as unconstitutional and oppressive. Lei South Carolina look at her vote 
 on that occasion, and compare it with her subsequent nullification to put down a protective tariff 
 as a flagrant violation of the Constitution. But I must not detain the House by comments. 
 
 In compliance with the resolution referred to, the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. GALLATIN, 
 transmitted to Congress, on the 17th of April, 1810, a report, in which he enumerated the various 
 manufactures of the United States, gave an account, of their progress, as far as he had been able 
 to ascertain it, and recommended protection by "increased duties on importation." He estimated 
 the annual product of American manufactories to exceed $120,000,000, and that the raw mate- 
 rials used, and the provisions and other articles, the produce of the United States, consumed by 
 the manufacturers, created a market at home for our agricultural productions not much inferior to 
 that which arose from the whole foreign demand. Even then, it seems, in the infancy of our 
 manufactures, the agricultural interests of the country, which gentlemen here are in the habit of 
 representing as injuriously affected by the protecting policy, in which they can see nothing but 
 the building up of "monopolies," and the oppressive taxation of the people for their benefit 
 even then agriculture found in the consumption of the manufacturers a market for her productions 
 equal to the whole foreign demand for them. 
 
 Alluding to the defectiveness, from want of lime, of the information he had obtained, Mr. 
 GALLATIJT recommended that more full information be sought through the agents then about to be 
 employed in taking the census: and accordingly, on the 1st of May, 1810, Congress passed a 
 law, directing the marshals and their assistants " to take an account of the several manufacturing 
 establishments and manufactures'.' within the United States thus aiding, l>y direct legislation, 
 in maturing the "plan" for the "protection and fostering" of manufactures, contemplated in 
 the resolution to which I have referred. 
 
 In carrying out my purpose of sustaining the constitutionality and expediency of the protective 
 policy by a reference to the Executive messages to Congress, I come now to PRESIDENT 
 MADISON, the "father of the Constitution." Following the report of Mr. GALLATIX, and 
 the enactment of the law providing for the taking an account of the manufactures, we have Mr. 
 MADISON'S message of the 5th of December, 1810, in which he says: 
 
 " I feel particular satisfaction in rsmarkina that an interior view of our country presents us wi h grateful proofs of 
 Its substantial and increasing prosperity. To a thriving agriculture, and the improvements relating to it, is added a 
 highly interesting extension of useful manufactures, the combined product of professional occupations and of 
 household industry. Such, indeed, is the experience of economy, as well as of policy, in these substitutes for sup- 
 plies heretofore obtained by foreign commerce, that, in a national view, the change is justly regarded as, of itself, 
 more than a recompense for those privations and losses, resulting from foreign injustice, which furnished the general 
 impulse required for ill accomplishment. How far it may be expedient to guard the infancy of this improvement 
 in the distribution of labor, by regulations of the co i mercial tariff, is a subject which cannot fail to suggest itself to 
 your patriotic reflections." 
 
 How striking the contrast between the enlarged view which Mr. MADISON took of this subject, 
 and that in which modern wisdom can alone see it! He regarded the encouragement of manu- 
 factures as a "national" object. In a " national view," the change was, in his opinion, more 
 than a recompense for the privations and losses connected with the injustice which had forced
 
 8 
 
 manufactures into existence. He paw with the eye of a practised statesman the necessary con- 
 nexion between the interest of manufactures and every other interest justly reasoning that a 
 branch of industry which consumed the products of agriculture on one hand, and employed the 
 agencies of commerce en the other, possessed a diffusive energy which would make its influence 
 to be felt for good throughout the entire country. Well might he commend to the "patriotic" 
 reflections of the Congress of the United States an interest thus national, and worth such sacri- 
 fices. But modern patriotism, contracting the scope of its vision, sees nothing but hateful mo- 
 nopolies, and sectional interests, where MADISON", in the soundness of his wisdom and the fulness 
 of his patriotism, saw the wealth, tho strength, the independence, and the glory of the whole 
 country. 
 
 The subject was followed up by Mr. MADISOJT in his next message, sentto Congress on the 5th 
 of November, 1811, in which he said : 
 
 " Although other subjects will press more immediately on your dr-liberations, a portion of them cannot but be well 
 bestowed on the just and sound policy of securing 10 our manufactures the success they have attained, and are 
 still attain! us, under the impulse of causes not permanent, and to our navigation, the fair extent of which it is, at 
 present, abridged by the unequal regulations of foreign Governments. Besides the reasonableness of saving our 
 manufactures from sacrifices which a change of circumstances might bring upon them, the national interest re- 
 quires that, with respect to such articles at least as belong to our defence and primary wants, we should not be left 
 in a stats of unnecessary dependence on external supplies." 
 
 Here was no abatement of Mr. MATIISOX'S zeal in favor of the protecting policy. It was, in 
 his opinion, a "just and sound policy." He would take care to secure the success already at- 
 tained by manufactures, and save them from the sacrifices to which a change of circumstances 
 might exposo them. 
 
 The next expression of Mr. MADISON'S opinions on this subject I find in his special message 
 to Congress of the 20th of February, 1815, accompanying the treaty of peace concluded at 
 Ghent on the 24th of December preceding. Having congratulated Congress and the country on 
 the auspicious event, and recommended the adoption of various measures called for by the change 
 in the condition of the country, he closed by again urging upon the attention of Congress the 
 great interest which seems to have been ever present to his mind. 
 
 "But (said ho) there is no subject that can enter with greater force and merit into the deliberations of Con- 
 gress than a consideration of the means to preserve and promote the manufactures which have sprung into exist- 
 ence, and attained an unparalleled maturity throughout, the United States during the period of the European wars 
 This source of national independence and wealth I anxiously recommend, therefore, to the prompt aha constant 
 guardianship of Congress." 
 
 Here again is exhibited Mr. MADISON'S zeal in behalf of this great interest. No subject could, 
 in his opinion, enter with greater force and merit into the deliberations of Congress. The wealth 
 and the independence, not merely of the manufacturers and the capitalists, but of the nation, were 
 involved in it. It was, therefore, in his opinion, worthy of more than a passing suggestion. He 
 anxiously recommended it to the prompt and constant UUARDIASSHIP of Congress. 
 
 Guardianship ! That was the relation which, during the first forty-four years of this Govern- 
 ment, existed between it and the manufacturing interests of the country. Mr. MADISON well 
 knew, and every statesman ought to know, that without such guardian care the manufacture* 
 of no country can succeed against the capital and skill, the bounties, premiums, and prohibitions, 
 of old and well-established manufacturing communities to say nothing of the pauper labor with 
 which the manufacturer! of this country have to come in competition. If the strong-minded 
 practical men who framed our Constitution, and who long gave direction to our public affairs, 
 had exhausted their energies upon hair-splitting constructions of the Constitution, instead of seizing 
 and carrying out its great principles, we should still have been hewers of wood and drawers of 
 water to the manufacturing capital and skill of foreign countries. 
 
 But I must cease comment, and let Mr. MADISOV again speak. He thus continues to press 
 the subject in his next annual message, of the 5th of December, 1815: 
 
 "In adjusting the duties on imports to the object of revenue, the influence of the tariff on manufactures will ne- 
 cessarily present itself for consideration. However wise the theory may be which leaves to the sagacity and interest 
 of individuals the application of their industry and resources, there are in this, as in all other cases, exceptions to 
 the gsneral rule Besides the condition which the theory itself implies, of a reciprocal adoption by other nations, 
 experience teaches that so many circurnsta ices must concur in introducing and maturing manufacturing establish- 
 ments, especially of the -mure complicaied kinds, that a country may remain long without them, although suffi- 
 ciently advanced, and in snine respects evori peculiarly fitted for carrying them on with success. * * * 
 In selecting the branches more especially entitled to the public patronage, a preference is obviously claimed by such 
 as will relieve the United Slates from a dependence on foreign supplies, ever subject to casual failures, fi>r articles 
 necessary for the public defence, or connected with the primary wants of individuals. It will be an additional 
 recommendation of particular manufactures when the materials for them are extensively drawn from our agricul- 
 ture, and consequently impart and ensure to that great fund of national prosperity and independence an encourage- 
 ment which cannot fail to lie rewarded." 
 
 Here, again, is exhibited the practical good sense of Mr. MADISO.V. He discards the theory 
 which so leaves to sagacity and interest the application of industry as to disregard the considera- 
 tion that it must be adopted by other nations to render its observance consistent with our inde- 
 pendence; while he -sees what I would that some modern wise men could see the direct 
 connexion of manufactures with agriculture, in all its departments using its raw materials, and 
 consuming its other productions, and thus, throughout the entire country, giving "encourage- 
 ment to that great fund of national prosperity and independence." 
 
 Having now arrived at a"n important period in the history of the protective policy, we will pause
 
 9 
 
 a little, and turn from the Executive messages to other evidences of the state of public sentiment 
 on the subject of protection. 
 
 The 'House of Representatives having, in February, 1815, passed a resolution requiring the 
 Secretary of the Treasury to report to Congress a general tariff of duties, the Secretary, (Mr. 
 DALLAS,) on the 13th of February, 1816, transmitted to the House a lengthy and able report, in 
 which he very fully maintained the policy of protection to domestic industry, and recommended, 
 with that view, an increase of the duties on certain articles, particularly on cottons nnd woollens. 
 The following is a specimen of the reasoning of that report reasoning, the correctness of which 
 has been fully te-ted in the practical results of protecting legislation : 
 
 "Althoush (said Blr. DALLAS) some indulgence will always be required for any attempt to realize the national 
 independence in the department of manufactures, the sacrifice cannot be either great or lasting. The inconven- 
 iences of the day will be amply compensated by future advantages. The agriculturist, whose produce and whose 
 flocks depend f-r their value upon the fluctuations of a foreign market, will have no occasion eventually to rreret 
 the opportunity of a ready sale for his wool or his cotton in his own neighborhood ; and it will soon be understood that 
 the success of the American manufacture, which tends to diminish the profit (often the excessive profit) of the im- 
 porter, does not necessarily add to the price of the article in the hands of the coiummer." 
 
 I regret that my limits do not permit me to quote more hugely from this able report. But I must 
 pass on. 
 
 On the same day on which this report was sent to the House of Representatives, the Committee 
 of Commerce and Manufactures of that body, by their chairman, (Mr. NEWTON*, of Virginia,) 
 made an able report upon the reference to that committee of memorials of manufacturers of cotton 
 wool, in which they recommended a large increase of duty on manufactures of cotton, for the pro- 
 tection of the domestic manufacture, and sustained, by an elaborate and able argument, the gen- 
 eral policy of protection. Time will scarcely permit me to read from this report; as it comes 
 from Virginia, however, I cannot refrain from calling the attention of the South to one or two 
 paragraphs : 
 
 " The Slates that are most disposed to manufactures as regular occupations, (say the committee,) will draw from tho 
 airicultural States nil thr- raw materials which they want, and not an inconsiderable portion, also, of the necessaries 
 of life: while the Utter will, in add i( ion to the benefits which they at present enjoy, always command, in peace or in 
 war, at moderate prices, every species of manufacture that their wants may require. Should they be inclined to man- 
 ufacture for themselves, they can do so with success, because they have all the means in their power to erect and to 
 extend, at pleasure, manufacturing establishments, Our wants being supplied by our own ingenuity and industry, 
 exportation of specie to pay for foreign manufacture* will cease." 
 
 Referring to the genera! advantages of the protecting system in developing the resources of the 
 whole country, the committee say: 
 
 "Every Stale will participate in those advantages ; the resources of each will be explored, opened, and enlarged. 
 Different sections of the. Union will, according to their position, the climate, the population, the habits of the people, 
 and the nature of the soil, strike into that line "of industry which is best adapted to their interest and the goo i of the 
 whole; an active and free intercourse, promoted and facilitated by roads and canals, will ensue; prejudices which 
 are generated by distance, and the want of inducements to approach each other and reciprocate benefits, will be 
 removed; information will be extended; the Union will acquire "trenglh and solidity; and the Constitution of the 
 United States, and that of each State, will be regarded as fountains from which flow numerous streams of public and 
 private prosperity." 
 
 Here is an enlarged arid u noble view of the su'.iject, worthy of the best days of Virginia. Would 
 that the present race of her statesmen could expand their minds to a comprehension of its deep 
 philosophy and its wide bearings upon the solid prosperity of the country. 
 
 Following these repoits was the enactment of the tariff law of 1816. Among numerous other 
 protecting duties, it imposed a duty of twenty-five per cent, on woollen cloths, and the same per 
 cent, on cottons, with a proviso that cottons costing les* than twenty-five cents the square yard 
 should be taken to have cost that sum, and be charged with duty accordingly. The effect of this 
 proviso was the exclu-ion from our market of coarse cottons, from which has resulted the present 
 prosperous state of that manufacture, and the low prices of its productions a result which will al- 
 ways follow such protection as shall establish the home manufacture upon a solid basis. 
 
 On looking into tin: Journal of the House, \ find that, on a motion to strike out the "mini- 
 mum" proviso to which I have just referred, six out of the eight members from South Carolina 
 voted in the negative, among whom was Mr. LOWXDKS, chairman of the Committee of Ways and 
 Means, who reported the bill, and Mr. CALHOUN ; the latter of whom, I believe, upon every mo- 
 tion that wa* made to reduce the duties on the protected articles, voted for the highest dutv. 
 
 On the occasion of the motion just referred to, Mr. Calhoun made a speech, from which I ask 
 permission to rend a few passages, exhibiting his thorough attachment to the principle of protec- 
 tion, and contrasting strangely with his present hostility to the whole protecting policy, and espe- 
 cially with his and South Carolina's nullification to put it down. 
 
 " Neither agriculture, manufactures, nor commerce, (said Mr. CALHOUN,) taken separately, are the cause of wealth : 
 it flows from them combined, and cannot exist without each. The wealth of any single nation or individual, it is 
 tnie, may not irmnediay ly be derived from the three, but it always presupposes the existence of the three sources, 
 though derived immediately from one or two of them only. Taken in its most enlarged sense, without commerce, 
 industry would have no stimulus ; without manufactures, it would be without the means of production ; and without 
 agriculture neither of the others could exist ; when separated entirely, and permanently, they must perish. War, in 
 this country, produces, to a great extent, that separation ; and hence the great embarrassment that follows in its train. 
 The failure of the wealth and resources of the nation necessarily involves the ruin of its finances and its currency. 
 It is admitted, by the most strenuous advocates on the other side, that no country ought to be dependent on another tor 
 its means of defence ; that, at least, our musket and bayonet, our cannon and ball, ought to be domestic manufacture. 
 But what is more necessary to the defence of a country than its currency and finance 7 Circumscribed as our coun- 
 try is, can these stand the shock of war ? Behold the effect of the late war on them ! When our manufactures are
 
 10 
 
 ernvn to a certain perfection, as they soon will, under the fo*tt 'ing care of Government, V.-P will n longer experi- 
 ence ihosn evils. The farmer will 'find a ready market for his surplus profiuce, and. what is of almost pquul conse- 
 ([uenw, a certain and cheap supply of nil his wa .is. His prosperity will difl ' r-vety class nf the commu- 
 
 nity." 
 
 Having descril>ed the effect of war upon our industry and currency, its obstruction to the ex- 
 portation of our bulky articles, while a demand would continue for foreign articles, to be supplied 
 through the policy of the enemy or unlawful traffic resulting in a drain of our specie fo pay the 
 balance perpetually accumulating against us, [this process is now going on in a time of peace!] 
 he proceeded !o say : 
 
 " To this distressing state of things there are two remedies, anil only two: one in our powpr immediately, the other 
 requiring much lime and exertion ; but both constituting, in his opinion, the essential policy ol" this <:<uriuy. He 
 meant tfie navy and dom stic majinfaclures. By the former we could open the way to our markets ; l>y the latter 
 we bring themfiom beyond lite ocean, und naturalize them in our oirn soil." 
 
 Having spoken of the effect of the war in giving existence to manufactures, and in bringing 
 them to some degree of maturity, he said : 
 
 " But it will no doubt bo said, if they are s-i far established, and if the situation of the country is favoriHe to their 
 growth, where is .the necessity of aff>rding them protection ? // i to put them beyond the reach of contingency." 
 
 Mr. Calhoun gave the following conclusive reply to an objection against manufacture* which 
 has been urged in this debate : , 
 
 It has been further asserted (said he) that manufactures are the fruitful rav.se of pauperism ; an.! England has 
 been referred to as furnishing conclusive evidence of the 'act. For his part, he could contrive no such tendency in 
 them, but the exact contrary, as they furnish new stimuli to industry and means of subsistence tn the laboring 
 classes of the community' We ought not (said Mr. C.) to look to the cotton and woollen establishments of Great 
 Britain lor the prodigious number of "poor with whi 'h her population is disgraced. Causes much nn re efficient exist 
 Her poor laws and statutes regulating the price of labor, with her heavy taxe., are tht real cai. - 
 
 Alluding to the objection, that the relation between capital and manufacturing labor produced a 
 state of dependence on the part of tke employed, he replied, that 
 
 "He did not think it a decisive objection to the system, especially when it had incidental political advantages 
 which, in his opinion, were more than a counterpoise to it. It produced an. interest strictly American, as much so as 
 agriculture. In this il had the decided advantage of commerce or navigation. Again, (said Mr. C.,) it is calculated 
 to bind together more closely our widely spread republic. It will greatly increase our mutual dependence and inter- 
 course, anil will, as a necessary consequence, excite an increased attention to internal improvement a subject every 
 way intimately connected with the ultimate attainment of national strength and the perfection of our political insti- 
 tutions. He regarded the fact that it would make the parts adhere more closely, that it would form a new and most 
 powerful cement, as far outweighing any political objections that might be urged against the system. 1 ' 
 
 Here we have the "American System," in its full height, and depth, and length, and breadth, 
 maintained by JOHN C. CAI-HOCX, of South Carolina. The inquiry, wky Mr. Calhoun and 
 South Carolina now desire to abandon, ulterly, a system of protection which they once labored to 
 establish, and at a sacrifice of interests justly claiming at their hands parental care and protection, 
 is worthy of grave consideration. 
 
 I turn from this digression, and proceed to Mr. MADISON'S last official expression of his appro- 
 bation of the protecting policy. I find it in his message of the 3d of Dei-ember, ISlfi ; in which 
 he says : 
 
 "Amidst the advantases which have succeeded the peace of Europe and lhat of the United Stales wish Grea 
 Britain, in a general invlgnralion of industry among us, and in the extension of our commerce, the value of which i 
 more and more disclosing itself to commercial nations, it is to be. regretted that a depression is experienced by par- 
 ticular branches of our manufactures and by a portion of our navigation. As the first proceeds, in an essential de- 
 gree, fr.'in an excess of imported merchandise, which carms a check in its own tendency, the cause, at its present 
 extent, cannot be of very long duration. The evil will not, however, be viewed by Congress without a recollection 
 that manufacturing establishments, if suffered to sink loo low, or languish too long, may not rent' after the causes 
 shall have ceased, and lhat, in the vicissiludes of human affairs, situations may recur in which a dependence on for- 
 eign sources for indispensable supplies may be among the most serious embarrassments." 
 
 A suggestion is here made by Mr. MADISON, of great practical importance at the present mo- 
 ment. It is, that " manufacturing establishments, if suffered to sink too low, or languish too 
 long, may not revive after the causes shall have ceased." He deemed the manufacturing and de- 
 pendent interests, of an importance too vital to the country to be lightly subjected to such a hazard. 
 Let the present Congress, then, inquire whether the last and great reduction of duties under the 
 " compromise law," on the 1st of July next, will not place some, at least, of the branches of our 
 manufactures in the predicament described by Mr. MADISON. Being dead, he yet speaks.; and it 
 may be hoped that he will not speak to us in vain. 
 
 Mr. MADISON'S allusion to the effect of the excessive importation of merchandise upon the 
 termination of the war, brings to mind an important fact in connexion with that importation. 
 
 The imports of 1815 amounted to 113,000,000.* The exports were but 52,000,000. The 
 disastrous effects of this excessive importation and great balance against us are matter of history 
 familiar to all. There was one cause connected with these results which has an important bearing 
 on the great question. I find it disclosed in a speech of Lord BUOUOHAU in the British Parlia- 
 ment. Having described the effect of the peace of 1814, which opened continental Europe to 
 British manufactures, and produced excessive exportations in that direction, he said : 
 
 * The returns from which this is taken were for ihe focal year ending September 30th, 1815. As there was but a 
 small amount of importations during the first quarter 01 that year, that is, during the months of October. November, 
 and December, 1614 the war having not then closed the great mass of the 113,000,000 is. of course, thrown upon 
 the three first quarters of the year 1315, inakinr the .vh At importation ol that year ab.'Ut 150,000.000.
 
 11 
 
 " The prace of Ann-rica has produced s mewhal of a similar effect, thought I am very far from pUdng the vast ex- 
 ports whic.h it occasioned upon the same livling with those- ID the European market the year before, both because ul- 
 timately the Americans will pay, which th-> exhausted state, of the continent r* riders very unlikely, and because it 
 teas well worth tthile to incur a loss upon tht first exporlations, in order, by the glut, TO STIFLE IN THE CRADLK 
 T08E RISING MANUFACTURES IN THE UNITED STATES which the war hail forcf-d into existence contrary to the natural 
 course of things. 1 ' 
 
 Here is disclosed (he policy of the British manufacturer?, and of the British Government. The 
 " natural course, nf things" had been disturbed by the war, insomuch that, to a great and unusual 
 extent, American wants had come to be supplied by American skill anj industry ! This state of 
 things must not be suffered to continue; and therefore it was deemed " well worth while to incur 
 a loss upon the first exportation?, in order, by the glut, to stifle in the cradle the rising manufac- 
 tures of the United States" that is, to "restore things to (heir natural state," l>y bringing back 
 the United States to their dependence upon a foreign Power! 
 
 The policy of 1815 is the policy now ; and what has been, may again be, its result. It is a 
 policy against which it is madness in the Congress of the United States not to guard with unceas- 
 ing vigilance. Well may British capitalists ati'ord at any tiire to sacrifice a few millions to crush 
 our manufactures, that they mny have a monopoly of our market. Gladly would British capitalists 
 and British statesmen bring us back to the condition of dependence described in the early petitions 
 of our manufacturers, to which I have referred ; and if mistaken cotton-growing counsels are to 
 prevail, and guide the legislation of this nation, we s.ha!l be thus brought back and held in perpet- 
 ual and ruinous dependence. 
 
 But I must proceed with my authorities in favor. of the protecting policy. PRESIDENT MON- 
 ROE is next in order. There may be impatience at, these full references, but I have set out with 
 a determination that the enemies of protection shall have the whole, and I must proceed at the 
 hazard of wearying the patience of the House. 
 
 [Cries of " go on," "go on" "give us the whole."'] 
 
 The first expression of President MONROE'S opinions cm this subject come to us in a form unu- 
 sually imposing. They are found in his inaugural address of the 5th of March, 1817, the sen- 
 timents of which may well be supposed to have been the result of no ordinary deliberation. Hav- 
 ing referred to various national interests which demanded the attention of the Government, he said : 
 
 " Our manufactures will likewise require the si/slf;iiafic anA fostering care of the Government. Possessing as we 
 do all the raw materials, the fruit nf our own soil and industry, we ought not to depend, in the degree we'have done, 
 on supplies from other countries. While we are thus dependent, the sudden event of war, unsought and unexpect- 
 ed, cannot fail to plunge us into the most serious difficulties. It is important, too, that the capital which nourishes 
 our manufactures should tie domestic, afl its influence in that case, instead of exhausting, as it may do, in foreign 
 hands, would be felt advantageously on agriculture and every other branch of industry. Kqually important is it t.i 
 provide at home a market for our raw materials, as, tiy extending the competition, it will enhance the price and pro- 
 tect the cultivator against the casualties incident to foreign markets.' 1 
 
 Let me be indulged in a few words of comment on this remarkable passage. It is, perhaps, the 
 best summary ot the arguments in favor of the protecting policy which is any where to be found 
 within the same compass. 
 
 The mind of President Monroe was not limited to the narrow circle of the direct and immediate 
 benefits of protection to the manufacturer. It took a wider range, and comprehended within its 
 vision the broad horizon which encircled the whole country with its varied and complicated and 
 mutually dependent interests, in peace and in war. He saw the effect of the protecting policy in 
 providing a home marktt, not only for the raw materials employed in our manufactures such, for 
 example, as those of cottons, woollens, iron, glass, leather, paper, &c. but for the numerous ar- 
 ticles of subsistence, the produce of our agriculture, consumed by those engaged directly or indi- 
 rectly iu manufactures ; thus developing the resources of our soil and industry, increasing the 
 competition for their productions, enhancing; their value, and protecting the cultivators of our soil 
 "against the casualties incident to foreign markets." His wise forecast contemplated especially 
 the "serious difficulties" resulting from a dependence in these respects upon other countries in 
 " the sudden event of a war." 
 
 Entertaining no sickly jealousy of American capitalists, he was wise enough to see how import- 
 ant it was that the capital which nourished the manufactures consumed by us should be American 
 rathe* than foreign that it should be employed in giving existence to manufactures here, where 
 " its influence would be felt advantageously on agriculture and every other branch of industry," 
 instead of producing them ifl foreign countries, and thus becoming tiie instrument of exhausting 
 our resources and paralyzing our industry. 
 
 The care which President MOX'HOK would extend to the manufactures of the country was of a 
 nature which views, so enlarged and just, of the protecting policy might be expected to produce. 
 It was not an irregular and transient, but a " systematic and fostering care" a care which the 
 magnitude and diversity and enduring importance of the manufacturing and dependent interests 
 might well claim, and may still cliim, nt the hands of a wise and a just Government. 
 
 The policy thus indicated in the inaugural address of President MONHOK was carried out during 
 his whole administration. Six of his eight annual messages contained explicit recommendations 
 of the protecting policy to the favorable consideration pf Congress. I will now proceed to bring 
 them, in their order, to the notice of the House. In his first annual message, of the 3d of Decem- 
 ber, 1817, he says:
 
 12 
 
 " Our manufactures will require the continued attention of Congress. The capital employed in them is consider- 
 able, and the kn wlcdge required in the machinery and fabric of all the most useful manufactures is of great value. 
 Their preservation, which depends on due encouragement, is connected witli the high interests of the nation. 
 
 A word, sir, upon this paragraph. Here is a new element of national wealth, or, rather, one 
 which seems never to enter the minds of the opposers of protection. " The knowledge, required in 
 the machinery and fabric of manufactures is (said the President) of great value." If " knowledge 
 is power," it miiy be truly said to be wealth also. Who ca'nco'i.pute the aggregate value to this na- 
 tion of the skill, the "knowledge," which has been brought into existence by the " systematic and 
 fostering care" extended to our manufjcturers? To say nothing of the machinery moved by water 
 and steam, look at the machinery of mind in perpetual motion, as a producing power, in thu great 
 department of manufacturing industry. What a mine of wealth to this nation ! 
 
 But I proceed to the second annual message, of the 17th of November, 1818: 
 
 " The strk t execution of the revenue laws, resulting principally from the salutary provisions of the act of the 20th 
 of April last, amending the several collection laws, has, it is presumed, secured to domestic manufactures all the 
 relief that can be derived from the duties which have benn imposed upon foreign merchandise for their protection. 
 Under the influence of this relief, several branches of this important national interest have assumed greater activity ; 
 and although it is hoped that others will gradually revive, and ultimately triumph over every obstacle, yet the expe- 
 diency of granting further protection is submitted to your consideration." 
 
 I pass to the third annual message, of the 7th December, 1819. Having adverted to the de- 
 pressed state of the manufacturing establishments, resulting from the pecuniary embarrassments of 
 the country, the President proceeds to state : 
 
 " An additional cause of the depression of these establishments may probably be found in the pecuniary embarrass- 
 ments which h.tve ivcemly affected those countries with which our commerce has been principally prosecuted. 
 Their manufactures, lor want of a ready and profitable market at home, have been shipped by the manufacturers to 
 the United Stairs, and, in many instances, sold at a price below tlieir current value at ihe place of manufacture. Al- 
 though this practice may. from its nature, be considered temporary or contingent, it is not on that account less inju- 
 rious~in its elT'-cts. Uniformity in the demand and price of an article is highly desirable to the domestic manufac- 
 turer. It is deemed of great importance to give encouragement to our domestic manufactures. In what manner the 
 evils adverted to may bo remedied, and how far it may lie practicable in other respects to afford to them further en- 
 courageuient, paying due regard to all the other great interests of the nation, is submitted to the wisdom of Congress." 
 
 Here is an illustration of the "stifling" effect, upon " the rising manufactures of the United 
 States," of a glut of our market, described by Lord BrtouGHAitf as resulting from the excessive 
 importations of 1815 subjecting our manufactures to the danger of prostration, not only upon the 
 voluntary determination ot British capitalists to make occasional sacrifices for that purpose, but 
 upon the forced sacrifices produced by derangements in the monetary affairs of that country. 
 
 We have now arrived at the period when the Committee on Manufactures was instituted. It 
 was done on the 8th of December, 1819 the day following the transmission of the message last 
 referred to on the motion of Mr. LITTLE, of Maryland. The interest of manufactures had come 
 to be regarded, by nil branches of the Government, as one of the cardinal interests of the nation. 
 The policy of protection had become fully settled ; and the Committee on Manufactures was its 
 natural and legitimate offspring. To that committee has ever since been confided the subject of 
 manufactures, with a view to their protection; and that, with no more question of the propriety 
 and necessity of such commitment, than there has been of the propriety and necessity of confiding 
 to the Committee on Commerce the commercial interests of the country both, until then, 
 confided to one committee both the handmaids of agriculture and all blended in one harmonious 
 system of dependent ami mutually sustaining interests. 
 
 Mr MONROE'S fourth annual message is silent on the subject. The fifth, of the 3d of Decem- 
 ber, 1821, is full and explicit: 
 
 " It may fairly be presumed (said the President) that, under the protection given to domestic manufactures hy the 
 existing laws, we shall become, at no distant period, a manufacturing country, on an extensive scale. Possessine, as 
 we d , the raw materials in such vast amount, with a capacity to augment them loan indefinite extent ; raising within 
 the country aliment of every kind, to an amount far exceeding the demand for home consumption, even in the most 
 unfavorable yeans, and to be obtained always at a very moderate price ; skilled, also, us our people are, in the me- 
 chanic arts, and in every improvement calculated to lessen the demand for and the price of labor, it is manifest that 
 their success, in every branch of domestic industry, may and will be carried, under the encouragement given by the 
 present duties, to an extent to meet any demand which, unc'.er a (air competition, may be made upon It. 
 
 " It cannot be doubted, that the more complete our internal resources, and the less dependent we are on foreign 
 Powers, for every national as well as domestic purpose, the greater and more stable will be tho public felicity. By 
 the increase of domestic manufactures will the demand for the rude materials at home be increased ; and thus will 
 the dependence of the several parts of the Union on each other, and the strength of the Union itself, be proportion- 
 ably augmented." 
 
 Here, again, are exhibited the broad and statesmanlike views of President Monroe, comprehend- 
 ing the vast capacities of our country, iu varied productions, its diversified soil and climate, arid 
 the mutual dependence of the North and South, the East and West all inviting to the establish- 
 ment of the " American system," and forming the basis, rightfully improved, of an enduring and 
 prosperous Union. 
 
 Mr. MOVROK'S sixth annual message, of the 3d of December, 1822, thus refers to this subject : 
 
 " Satisfied I am, whatever may be the abstract doctrine in favor of unrestricted commerce, (provided all nations 
 would concur in it, and it was not likely to be interrupted by war, which has never occurred, and cannot be expected,) 
 that there are other strong reasons, applicable to our situation and relations with other countries, which impose on us 
 the obligation to cherish our manufactures." 
 
 Here was exhibited the common sense of Mr. MOXHOE. He dealt with realities. The 
 theory of free trade which England forever preaches, but never practices he treated as a mere 
 abstraction. The want of general concurrence in the free-trade theory, and the liability to war,
 
 13 
 
 were with him sober matters of fact, to be taken into account in forming a judgment on this great 
 question. 
 
 In his seventh annual message, of the 2d of December, 1823, President MONROE adverted to the 
 subject, for the seventh and last time, as follows; 
 
 " Having communicated my views to Congress, at the commpncemenfof the last session, respecting the encourage 
 mem which ought to be given to our manufactures, and the principles on which it should be founded, I have only to 
 add, that these views remain unchanged, and that the present state of the countries with which we have the most im- 
 mediate political relations and greatest commercial intercourse tends to confirm them. Under this impression, I 
 recommend a review of the tariff, for the purpose of affording such additional protection to those articles which we 
 are prepared to manufacture, ur which are more immediately connected with the defence and independence of the 
 country." 
 
 This message was followed by the tariff of 1824, which can ied out the views so repeatedly urged 
 upon the attention of Congress by President MONROE, during his administration. 
 
 It is a common remark, that the protective policy has been sustained by WASHINGTON, JEFFER- 
 SON, MADISON, and MONROE. I have deemed it proper, at the hazard of wearying the patience 
 of the House, to depart from the beaten track of general reference to their authority, and s6 to intro- 
 duce them into this debate as that they may speak for themselves. You have the positions taken 
 by these great men, and their reasons for them, expressed under all the varied lights of their own 
 diversified observation and reflection, during the first thirty-five years of the administration of this 
 Government. They were all men of the Revolution two of them the most distinguished mem- 
 bers of the Convention which formed the Constitution, and all familiar with the discussions which 
 preceded its adoption by the people. You have not only the authority of their names, but the 
 power of their arguments, in favor of the protecting policy. Though dead, they yet speak ; and 
 admonish their countrymen, as they value their Independence and their Union, to cherish this 
 policy. 
 
 And shall not their voice be heard ? Will Virginia disregard ill Has she any veneration for 
 the names and the principles of her WASHINGTON, her JEFFERSON, her MADISON, and her MON- 
 ROE '! And shall their recorded opinions on this great question, given under the high sanction of 
 their Executive responsibility, pass unheeded 1 I do not a?k Virginia to hear me ; but I may and 
 do ask her to listen to her own honored and vener.ited sons the depth of whose wisdom, and the 
 fervor of whose patriotism, she surely may not question. 
 
 In concluding my reference to Virginia authority, I need not fay that the Executive messages 
 to which I have referred were just exponents of the policy carried out in the legislation of Con- 
 gress during the first thirty-five years of this Government. During the whole of this period, we 
 have a succession of Executive messages, Treasury reports, reports of committees, resolutions of 
 the House of Representatives, and acts of Congress all fully sustaining the protecting policy, nnd 
 clearly indicating a conviction that it ought to be, and an expectation that it would be, the aetthd 
 policy of the country. 
 
 I now turn from Southern authority to the North. The venerable gentleman from Massachu- 
 setts, [Mr. ADAMb,] now at the post assigned him by the people on this floor, next occupied 
 the chair of state. His sentiments on the subject of the protecting policy during his Presidency 
 are well known. I pass over occasional references to it in his messages, and come to the last, 
 transmitted to Congress on the 2d of December, 1828, which contains an argument in favor of 
 protection, worthy of that policy, and of the great man who vindicated it. 
 
 " The great interests (said Mr. ADAMS) of our agricultural, commercial, and manufacturing nation are s.> linked in 
 union together that no permanent cause of prosperity to any one of them can operate without extending its influence 
 to the others. All these interests are alike under the protecting power of the legislative authority, and the duties cf 
 the representative bodies are to conciliate them in harmony tiigether. So far as the object of taxation is to raise a 
 revenue for discharging the debts and defraying the expenses of the community, it should, as much as possible, suit 
 the burden, with equal hand, upon all, in proportion with their ability of bearing it without oppression. But the le- 
 gislation of one nation is sometimes intentionally made to boar heavily upon the interests of another. That le^islo- 
 lion, adapted, as it is meant to be, to the special interests of its own people, will often press most unequally "upon 
 the several component interests of its neighbors. 
 
 " Thus the legislation of Great Britain, \yhen, as has recently been avowed, adapted to the depression of a rival 
 nation, will naturally abound with regulations of interdict upon the productions of the soil or industry of the other 
 which come in competition with its own, and xvill present encouragement, perhaps eveu bounty, lo the raw material 
 of the other Slate which it cannot produce itself, and which is essential to the use of its manufactures, competitor in 
 the markets of the world with those of its commercial rival. 
 
 " Such is the stale of the commercial legislation of Great Britain, as it bears upon our interests. It excludes with 
 interdicting duties all importations (except in time of approaching famine) of the great staple productions of our Mi-I 
 die and Western States. It proscribes, with equal riser, bulkier lumber and live stock of the same portion, and also 
 of the Northern and Eastern parts of our Union. It refuses even the rice of th<> South, unless asgravated with a charge 
 of duty upon the Northern carrier who brings it to them. But the cotton, indispensable for their looms, they will re- 
 ceive almost duty free, to weave it into a fabric for our own wear, to the destruction of our own manufactures which 
 they are enabled thus to undersell. 
 
 " Is the self-protecting energy of this nation so helpless, that there exists in the political institutions of our country 
 no power to counteract the bias of this foreign legislation; lhat the growers of grain must submit to this exclusion 
 from the foreign markets of their produce ; that the shippers must dismantle Iheir ships, ihe trade of the North slau- 
 nate at the wharves, and the manufacturers starve at their looms, while the whole people shall pay tribute lo foreign 
 industry, to be clad in a foreign garb ; that the Congress of the Union are impotent to restore the balance in favori>f 
 native industry, destroyed by the statutes of another nation t More just and more generous sentiments will, I trust, 
 prevail. 
 
 "If the tariff adopted at the last session of Congress shall be found by experience to bear oppressively upon the in- 
 terests of any one section of the Union, it oueht to be, and I cannot doubt will be, so modified as to alleviate its bur- 
 dens. To the voice of just complaint, from any portion of their constituent, the representatives of the States and the 
 people will never turn away their ears. But so long as the duty of the foreign shall operate only as a bounty upon 
 the domestic article while the planter, and the merchant, and the shepherd, and the hmbandman, shall be found
 
 u 
 
 thriving in their occupations, under the duties imposed lor tlir protection of domestic manufactures they will not 
 rppiii"? at the prosperity shared with themselves by their fellow-citizens of other professions, nor denounce as viola- 
 tions of the Constitution llic deliberate acts of Congress to shield from the wrongs of foreign laws the native industry 
 of the Union." 
 
 If I might allow myself to interrupt the reflections suggested !>y this eloquent a: d unanswerable 
 vindication of the protective policy, .it would be to dwell, for a moment, upon the sentiment with 
 which it commences the indissoluble union of the interests of agriculture, commerce, and man- 
 facturex, so that the permanent prosperity of one necessarily becomes the prosperity of all. All the 
 reasonings [ have heard on this floor, in opposition to the protective policy, have overlooked this 
 threat truth ; insomuch that that whole policy has been repeatedly asserted to be for the exclusive 
 benefit of those engaged in manufactures. We have been referred to the 791,000, returned by 
 the marshals-, as manufacturers and artisans, and tauntiui'ly told that these alone, out of the 17,- 
 000,000 of our population, were to be benefited by the i n-fecting system, at tlic expense of all the 
 rest. I have been amazed at the pertinacity with which ,thio position has been maintained, in the 
 face of the most obvious and overwhelming proofs to the contrary. Why, sir, the sympathy is 
 not more strong between the different members of the human body than it is between these inte- 
 rests. With great propriety may the beautiful language of inspiration be applied to them "If 
 one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; and if one member be honored, all rejoice." 
 
 Look at the producers, in one form or another, of the raw material's employed in the various 
 manufactures in the United States such, for example, as the manufactures of woollens, cottons, 
 iron, glass, ptper, hats, boots, shoes, &c. I have no means of computing either the value of 
 these raw materials, or the number of persons employed in their production. When the statistics 
 obtained by the marshals, in connexion with the late census, shall be published, we shall have in- 
 formation of great value bearing on this subject, to which I may take occasion hereafter to refer. 
 A moaieat's reflection, however, will enable any one to see that the persona employed in the pro- 
 duction, in various ways, of the raw materials that enter into the manufactures of the United 
 States far outnumber those employed in the production of the manufactures themselves to say 
 nothing, now, of the vast amount of capital invesled in the production of those raw materials, and 
 the immense c/eatiori.1 of value in many kinds of them; which valu , but for our manufactures, 
 would have had no existence. Strike a fatal blow at the manufactures, and see how soon it would 
 be felt among tho producers of their raw materials. Its effect upon the wool-growing interest would 
 be especially disastrous. I shall refer to this interest more particularly hereafter. 
 
 But, then, there is the still greater interest involved in the production of the means of subsist- 
 ence of the 791,000 " manufacturers and artisans*," who, we are told, are alone benefited by a pro- 
 tecting tariif. Whence come the wheat, rye, corn potatoe's, peas, beans, pork, beef, poultry, {butter, 
 cheese, &c., consumed by them arid by the families dependent on a large portion of them for sup- 
 port? Are they not the fruit of the labor of hundreds of thousands of agriculturists, all of whom 
 must, of necessity, feel tho benefit of a policy that thus furnishes a market for these means of humnn 
 subsistence ! Try the experiment of leaving our manufacturing interests without protection ex- 
 pose them to the prostration which must follow the withdrawal of the fostering care which the policy 
 of foreign Governments h;is hitherto made it the wisdom and the justice of our Government to ex 
 tend to them, and what become.* of these dependent agricultural interests? Change the 791,000 
 manufacturers and artisans with their dependents, from consumers, to producers, of the means of 
 subsistence, and who can compute the reduction in the value of agricultural products,and of the 
 lands which produce them ? 
 
 And then, too, there are the vast number of persons engaged, in various ways, in the ex- 
 changes that are perpetually going on between the manufacturers on the one hand, and the pro- 
 ducers of the raw materials and the means of subsistence on the other. These, too, should be 
 added to the 791,000 who, we are told, are alone benefited by protection, at the cxpensu of the rest 
 of the community. 
 
 It is thus th it, in the language of President ADAMS, " the planter, and the merchant, and tho 
 shepherd, and the husbandman, are found thriving iti their occupations, under the duties imposed 
 for the protection of domestic manufactures." 
 
 But I must forbear comment, and hasten on ; thougli I can hardly do it without invoking your 
 attention, as I pas-*, to tho argument which Mr. Au.ors draws from the " helplessness of the self- 
 protecting energy of this Government,'' involved in the denial of iu right to "counteract that 
 bias of foreign legislation" which lays our people under " tribute to foreign industry." This 
 great arid strong point he presents with a clearness and force which it seems to me must put to 
 flight all doubts as to the constitutional power of Congress over this subject. But I shall soon 
 present the same argument in another form, by PKESIEENT JACKSON, and therefore pass on 
 to a consideration of hU messages, as they bear on this question. In his lirst annual message, of 
 the 8th of. December, 1629, he thus discourses on the subject : 
 
 'To regulate its conduct, so as to protaote, equally, the prosperity of these three cardinal interests, [agriculture, com" 
 merce, and manufactures,] is one of the most difficult tasks of Government; and it may be regretted that the compli- 
 cated restrictions which now embarrass the- intercourse of nations could not, by common consent, be abolished, and 
 commerce allowed to flow in those channels to which individual enterprise, always its surest guide, might direct it. 
 But we must ever expect selfish legislation in other nations, and are therefore compelled to adapt our own to their 
 regulations, iu the manner best calculated to avoid serious injury, and to harmonize the conflicting interests of pur 
 agriculture, our commerce, and our manufactures. Under these impressions I invite your attention to the existing 
 tariff, believing that some of iu provisions require modification. The general rule to be applied in graduating the
 
 15 
 
 duties upon the articles of foreign growth or manufacture, is that which willJ lace our own in fair competition with 
 those of other countries ; and the inducements to advance even a step beyond this point are controlling in regard to 
 those articles which are of primary necessity in time of war." 
 
 I pass without comment from this to the annual message of President JACKSON, of the 7th of 
 December, 1830, to which I have already alluded, as containing a statement of the argument in 
 support of a protective tariff, drawn from the transfer, by the States, of their whole power over im- 
 posts to the General Government. And here is the argument, in the language of the President : 
 
 " The power la imposo duties on imports originally belonged to the several States. The risrht to adjust these du- 
 ties, with a view to the encouragement of domestic branches of industry, is so completely incidental to that power ( 
 thai il is difficult to suppose the existence of the one without the other. The States have delegated their whole an 
 thority over imports to the Genera] Government, wiUumt limitation or restriction, saving the very inconsiderable re- 
 servation relatini; to their inspection laws. This authority having thus entirely passed" from the Stales, the right to 
 exercise it for tiie purposo of protection does not exist in them ; and, consequently, if it bu not possessed by the 
 General Government; it must be extinct. Our political system would thus present the anomaly of a people stripped 
 of the right to foster ttieirown industry, and to counteract the most selfish and destructive policy which might bo 
 adopted by foreign nations. This, surely, cannot be the case. This indispensable power, thns surrendered by the 
 ISuites, must be within the scope of the authority on the subject expressly delegated to Congress. In this conclusion 
 i am confirmed as well by the opinions of Presidents Washington, Jefferson, IViadison, and'.Monroe, who have, each, 
 tepeatedly recommended the exercise of this right, under the Constitution, as by the uniform practice of Concre??, 
 lie continued acquiescence of the States, and the general understanding of the people." 
 
 We come now to an eventful period in the history of the protecting policy. Though it had, as 
 we have seen, become the settled policy of the country ; though its constitutionality had been 
 confirmed by an unvarying current of executive authority, " by the uniform practice of Congress, 
 by the continued acquiescence of the States, and the general understanding of the people," yet it 
 was now to be met by a determined spirit of resistance. NULLIFICATION reared its brazen front, 
 and bid defiance lo the power of the Government, thus constitutionally exercised. 
 
 A Stale convention assembled at Columbia, in South Carolina, in November, 1832, and passed 
 an ordinance declaring the tariff laws to be null and void within the limits of that Stale, nnd mak- 
 ing it the duty of the Legislature to pass such Inws as should he necessary to carry the ordinance 
 into effect. How promptly the Legislature obeyed this mandate, I need not say. 
 
 The convention, having thus " nullified'' the revenue laws, put forth an address to the people of 
 the United States, in which they said : 
 
 "It remains for us t > submit a plan of taxation in which we would bo willing to acquiesce, in a liberal spirit, of con- 
 cession, provided we are met. in due time, and in a becoming spirit, (!) by the States interested in manufactures." In 
 the opinion of the convent! in, an equitable plan would be, that " the whole list of protected articles should be im- 
 ported free <>f all duty, and thai the revenue derived from import duties should be raised exclusively from the unpro 
 teeted articles ; or that, whenever a duty is inijio.seil upon protected articles imported, an excise duty ol the same rate 
 hall be imposed upon all similar articles manufactured in the United States." 
 
 Such was the plan, submitted in a liberal spirit of concession ! The -convention proceeded to say . 
 
 " They are will in; io make a large offering to preserve the Union; ami, with a distinct declaration that it is aeon- 
 r.rssion o'n their pun. ili'--y will consent that the game rate of duties may be imposed upon the protected articles that 
 ^liail be imposed upon the unprotected, provided that no more revenue be raised than is necessary to meet the de- 
 mands of the Government liir constitutional purp >ses ; and provided, also, that a duty, substantially uniform, be im- 
 j.'Obi.'d upon all foreign imports." , 
 
 Thus, as a matter of " cuitcesxioii" as a "large offering to preserve the Union"- a principle 
 of revenue was proposed which utterly abolished all discrimination for purposes of protection, and 
 pie^criiied as the only alternative to civil war, what, has, in this debate, been denominated a 'hor- 
 izontal tariri";" that is, a tariff of duties "substantially uniform upon all foreign imports." 
 
 And here is the origin of the "compromise lav?' of the 2d of March, 1833. That law was 
 fco far a compliance with the demand of South Carolina as to fix a "horizontal tariff" of twenty 
 per cent,, to take effect on the 1st day of July, 1842. 
 
 And now, Mr. Speaker, upon the near approach of that period, we are called on to consider 
 whether we shall leave the compromise law to its " horizontal" operation, or whether we shall 
 hlill maintain the policy which has, for more than fifty years, protected, by discriminating duties, 
 our domestic industry. 
 
 In this state of things, I am happy to find, in the message of the- President at the opening of 
 the present session, a continuance of Executive authority in favor of the great principle of protec- 
 tion for which we contend. I allude to that part of the message whose proposed reference is now 
 the subject of consideration. 
 
 I am as little disposed as any can he to hold on to the skirts of Executive authority ; and I have 
 referred to the messages of preceding Presidents, a.s expressing not merely their own, but the sen- 
 timent* of the country, during their administration*. But, as President TILER has spoken on 
 the subject, and it is pioposed to refer that part of hi.s message to a committee, I may be excused 
 for considering what some have affected to regard the doubtful question as to what he has said. 
 
 " In imposing duties, (says the President,) fur the purpose of revenue, a right to discriminate as to the articles on 
 which the duty shall be laid, as well as the amount, necessarily and properly exists. Otherwise, the Government 
 would be placed in the condition of having to levy the same duties upon all articles the productive as well as the 
 unproductive. The slightest duty upon some might have the effect of causing their importation lo cease; whereas 
 others, entering extensively into the consumption of the country, might bear the heaviest, without any sensible dimi- 
 a it ion in the amount imported. 
 
 ' So, also, the Government may be justified in so discriminating, by reference to other considerations of domestic 
 policy connected with our manufactures. So long as the duties shall be laid wilh distinct reference to the wants of 
 ihe. Treasury, no well founded objection can be raised against them." 
 
 Here is discrimination for two purposes. First, for revenue. For that purpose, it may be deemed
 
 16 
 
 expedient to impose on some arUilr.. liigb, on others moderate, duties, and on others, none at all. 
 But (says the President) there are "other considerations'" besides the mere purpose of revenue, 
 which may rightfully control discrimination, and constitute a rule for its application. And what 
 are they 1 " Considerations of domestic policy,' connected with our manufactures." Mark! The 
 President speaks of our manufactures ; not the manufactures of New England, or New York, or 
 Pennsylvania, but our manufactures: thus nationalizing this great interest. 
 
 So, then, the policy which protects "our manufactures" may form the ground of discrimina- 
 tion, and, of course, may justify the imposition of high duties on some articles, moderate duties on 
 others, and on others, not needing protection, no duties at all. 
 
 But, asks some opponent of protection, Does riot the President say that the duties must be laid 
 " with a distinct reference to the wants of the Treasury 1" and yet you make him Fay that they 
 may be laid with a distinct reference to the protection of manufactures--. Do you not make him. 
 inconsistent with himself? By no means. The duties may be laid with a distinct reference to 
 both these objects. A reference to the mere wants of the Treasury will involve considerations 
 only as to the aggregate amount of duties to be levied, and such discrimination as shall have re- 
 spect to the best means of raising that aruoimt. The Government may not, for example, levy 
 forty millions, when the wants of the Treasury require but twenty. Bnt, in levying these twenty 
 millions, it may look distinctly at the other object, and so apportion the amount among the various 
 articles of importation as to discourage the importation of some which come in competition with our 
 own manufactures, while the importation of others is left comparatively free. 
 
 Thus the leading purpose may be revenue a purpose which exclusively controls as to the 
 tlmount to be raised ; while there may be another purpose that of discriminating for protection 
 which controls as to Imo that amount shall be apportioned among the several art ides of importa- 
 tion. Thu is plainly the sentiment of the message; and this is discrimination fur protection, in- 
 volving the great principle for which the friends of the protecting policy have ever contended. 
 
 We have, Mr. Speaker, arrived at a momentous crisis in reference to the protecting policy. 
 The great interests which that policy has lon^ cherished have not, as yet, felt the heaviest blows 
 aimed at them by the compromise act of the V5d. of March, 1833. Under that act, four-tenths only 
 of the excess of duties over 20 per cent, have hitherto been abated, and that by the gradual pro- 
 cess of biennial reductions of one-tenth, running through a period of eight years. One-half of the 
 remaining six-tenths is to be taken off on the 1st day of January, 1842, and I hi 1 , remaining three 
 tenths on the 1st of July next. Thus, within a little more than six months from this time, a re- 
 duction is to be made greater by one half than the whole reduction which has taken place since 
 the 2d of March, 1833. 
 
 And now, sir, when, under the operation of this experiment upon the power of endurance of the 
 interests hitherto deemed worthy the guardian and fostering care of the Government, these tre- 
 mendous turns of the screw are about to be made, what is it proposed to do 1 Why, sir, to take 
 away the whole subject from the Committee on Manufactures, the natural guardian of these in- 
 terests, and send it to a committee, the natural range of whose inquiries involves no investigation 
 into the claims of those interests, an-1 which has been constituted with no view whatever to their 
 protection. To do this would be, in effect, to say that we will have no such investigation. And 
 are we prepared for this 7 Shall the present session pass without an examination of this subject ? 
 Are we to sit down and quietly submit to the operation of the act of the 23d Congress, which 
 struck, in advance, the blow under which, without the interposing arm of Congress, many of the 
 protected interests will reel and stagger on the 1st of July next? May not. this Congress be sup- 
 posed better to know with how heavy a hand these interests will now bear to be. pressed, than the 
 Congress which sat here nine years ago? Did that Congress enjoy the exclusive privilege of le- 
 gislating in regard to the-e great and vital interests for all future time? Was that one stroke of 
 nullification to inflict a perpetual paralysis upon the " American system ?" No, sir; no. There 
 is no such power in that " compromise." This 27th Congress is to legislate with no such shackles. 
 The people have sent us here to consider the present condition of the country ; to inquire into the 
 operation of existing laws upon all its great interests agricultural, commercial, and manufactur- 
 ing and to adapt our legislation to the protection of ihose interest'?. To abandon any of them blindly 
 to the perpetual control of former legislation is to abandon our duty to betray the trusts which 
 the Constitution and the country have confided to us. Especially is this true with regard to the 
 interest involved in the question now before us. For half a century, it has been our policy to 
 cherish it as among the cardinal interests of the country. The second act passed by the Con- 
 gress of the United States expressly asserted its claim to "encouragement and protection." 
 To foster and sustain this interest was deemed by the men of the Revolution, whose wise 
 and patriotic counsels infused its spirit so largely into our early legislation, to lie essential to the 
 maintenance of our independence, and the full development of the resources of our emancipated 
 country. I have sketched the history of that policy through successive administrations of the Gov- 
 ernment, and shown how steadily they have acted on the principle that it was to be the settled 
 and enduring policy of the country. A just Government will not treat lightly the pledge implied 
 in such a course of policy, especially when it is considered how extensively the skill, and industry, 
 and capital of the country have adapted themselves to this policy. If I could avail mysrlf of the
 
 IT 
 
 statistics obtained in the process of taking the late census, (which are not yet published,) I might 
 show what extensive investments have, upon the faith of a continuance of the protective policy,* 
 been made in manufacturing establishments, and in various departments of productive industry de- 
 pendent on them. The results, even of the imperfect examinations which have been made, will, 
 I doubt not, astonish the country, when they shall have been fully spread out before it.* 
 
 There is one of these results in a branch of investment in which my constituents are especially 
 interested, which I am enabled, by an examination of the returns in the Department, of State, to 
 present to the House, and which furnishes an argument for a continuance of the protective policy, 
 which I am sure must strongly commend itself to the judgments of all who hear me. I allude to 
 the wool-growing interest. 
 
 There were in the United States in 1840, according to the returns of the marshals, 19,311,374 
 sheep. The present number may be computed at not less than twenty millions. It probably ex- 
 ceeds that. Indeed, the number returned by the marshals was probably below the true num- 
 ber in 1840. The capital invested, estimating the sheep at $2 a head, and the land necessa- 
 ry for their subsistence being at the rate of one acre for three sheep at $12 per acre, would 
 amount to $120,000,000 ; to which should be added the investments necessary for the support of 
 those engaged in the care of the sheep, the clipping of the wool, and its transportation to market, 
 amounting, probably, to $10,000,000 more. 
 
 The annual product of wool, at an average of two and a half pounds a head, is fifty millions of 
 pounds. 
 
 Of these 20,000,000 of sheep, Vermont, with a population of but 292,000 souls, has 1,681,819, 
 being an average of five and three-quarters to every man, woman, and child, in the Slate. The 
 capital invested, upon the basis of the estimate ol $130,000,000 for the whole country, is about 
 $11,000,000 equivalent to $38 to every soul in the State. 
 
 Of the 20,000,000 of sheep, r\ T ew England, New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, have over 
 13,000,000. 
 
 The owners of this amount of capital are cultivators of the soil. The evils which have been 
 supposed by some to be inseparably connected with labor in manufacturing establishments, it will 
 not be pretended attach to the employment of the shepherd. All the influences connected with 
 this employment are the most favorable to moral purity and genuine independence ; and I may 
 proudly point to the well-known character of the people of my own State, as evidence of the truth 
 of this assertion. 
 
 The claim', on the score of justice, of the people who have made such large investments, to a 
 legislation which shall not abandon them, is too obvious to need comment. I pass to the broader 
 view of the subject, which regards the wool-growing interest as a national concent. 
 
 Wool is a raw material of vast importance in a national point of view. It is a leading object 
 in the protecting policy to render our country independent of foreign countries in time of war, as 
 to articles of indispensable necessity and comfort to the people at large, as well as to the troops 
 engaged in our defence. In these respects, the various forms of woollen manufactures are second to 
 none which our soil and our industry can produce. It is a fact which ought to be remembered, that, 
 at the commencement of the last war, we found ourselves dependent on our enemy for munitions 
 of war and clothing for our armies supplies of which were, to a considerable extent, obtained 
 through an illicit commerce with that enemy. The price of wool rose during the war to two and 
 three dollars a pound, and of woollen cloths to ten, twelve, fifteen, and eighteen dollars a yard. 
 
 Can any wise statesman, in this view of the subject, be indifferent to the great woollens interest, 
 both manufacturing and agricultural, which has come into being under the combined influences of 
 ".he last war and the protecting legislation which followed it? Shall we learn no wisdom by the 
 things we have suffered 1 Can we shut our eyes to the possibility the probability, even of war 1 
 In other respects we do not^ and why should we in this 1 We expend millions, annually, upon 
 fortifications;, ships of war, the procuring of ordnance an-d ordnance stores, and in the manufac- 
 ture of various descriptions of arms suited to our defence. In this we act wisely at least in ac- 
 cordance with the maxims which have hitherto governed the world. We regard these preparations 
 as indispensable ; and yet have we no wisdom to see that the fostering and sustaining of the inte- 
 
 * Since this speech was delivered, I have ascertained, from an examination at the Department of State, that the 
 total of capital invested directly in manufacturfs, (not including the dependent interests.) in the United States, as re- 
 turned by the marshals, amounti-d in 1840, to the sum of TWO HUNDRED AND SIXTY-SEVEN MILLIONS SEVEN HUNDRED 
 AND TWENTY six THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED AND SEVKHTY-NiNE DOLLARS, distributed among the States and Terri- 
 tories, as follows : 
 
 Maine - -' - 7, 105,620 
 
 New Hampshire - - 9,252,448 
 
 Massachusetts - 41,774,446 
 
 Rhode Island - 10,696,136 
 
 Connecticut - 13,669,139 
 
 Vermont - - 4,326,440 
 
 New York 55,232,779 
 
 New Jersey - 11.517,582 
 
 Pennsylvania - 31,815,105 
 
 Delaware - - 1,589,215 
 
 Maryland - - 86,450,284 I Ohio - - - 16,905,257 
 
 Virginia - - - ll,36u,861 
 
 North Carolina - - 3,838,900 
 
 South Carolina - - 3,216,970 
 
 Georgia . - - 2,899,565 
 
 Alabama - . - . - . 2,130,064 
 
 Mississippi - - 1,797,727 
 
 Louisiana - - - 6,430,699 
 
 Tennessee - - 3,731,580 
 
 Kentucky - - 5.945,259 
 
 Indiana - - 4,132,043 
 
 Illinois - - 3,136,512 
 
 Misssuri- - - 2,704,405 
 
 Arkansas - - 424,467 
 
 Michigan - - 3,112,240 
 
 Florida - - - 669,490 
 
 Wiskonsan - - 635,926 
 
 Iowa - - 199,645 
 
 District of Columbia - 1,005.7^5
 
 18 
 
 rest to which I have referred, as well as the iron and other interests, are also indispensable T We 
 have committed to us the power to make war; and we may be involved in war with the most 
 powerful nations in the world ; and yet the opponents of the protecting policy would disarm us ol 
 the power possessed by every other nation upon the face of the earth that of developing and ma- 
 luring all the resources necessary to the putting forth of their utmost strength in the conflicts we 
 may have with them. 
 
 Let us, then, carry out the policy which has not only brought into existence manufacturing es- 
 tablishments connected with the wool-growing interest, which need continued protection, but 
 which has produced large investments in the production of the raw material, which it would be 
 unjust to abandon, and which cannot be abandoned without the hazard of our being again placed 
 in a state of humiliating dependence in the event of another war. 
 
 And, sir, we ought to protect wool, and its manufactures, not only to save from sacrifice pre- 
 sent investments, but with a view to an increased production in these departments of industry. A 
 just regard to our safety and our independence demands that the almost boundless capacities of 
 our country in these respects should be developed and improved. 
 
 I have spoken of wool as an important raw material. My remarks are applicable, of course, to 
 the raw materials connected with the manufacture of iron and other manufactures of great national 
 importance, in regard to which we ought to be independent of the world. 
 
 There is one important raw material for which we are not dependent. I refer to cotton. But 
 what laid the foundation of this independence 1 ? Sir, it was protection. By the revenue law of 
 1739, cotton was protected by a duty of three cents a pound, which has been continued ever since. 
 It is asserted that it does not need the duty now. Whether this be true or not, it needed it then ,- 
 and it is by no means certain that it will not again require it. The cotton interest grew up 
 under that protection. And should not the growers of cotton be willing to aid, by protecting le- 
 gislation, in giving stability to the great wool-growing interest, which needs like protection 1 Will 
 the South be insensible to this appeal, because, unlike the wool-growers, the cotton planters are 
 not dependent for their market upon the demand of our own country 1 Can the fact that Great 
 Britain does not receive a pound of our wool in exchange for the millions of her woollen fabrics 
 sold to us annually, while she takes millions of the Southern staple, have the effect of rendering the 
 South indifferent to the claims of the wool-grower upon the fostering care of a wise and an impar- 
 tial legislation 1 Have we not " one country and one destiny ?" And shall any part of this "one 
 country" find, in its exemption from excluding foreign legislation, a motive for indifference to the 
 interests of another part, which is subjected to the injurious effects of that legislation ? Nothing, 
 it seems to me, can be more selfish and monopolizing than this, unless it be that British legisla- 
 tion which, for the sake of employing British looms and spindles and pauper labor, receives, upon 
 a small duty, the great Southern staple, while, to protect the landed interest of the kingdom, it 
 excludes, or burdens with excessive duties, all the productions of our Northern, Middle, and 
 Western agriculture. 
 
 For the purpose of showing the effects of foreign legislation upon the cotton interest, compared 
 with other interests, I present the following statements, drawn from official reports, of the exports 
 of articles the growth, produce, and manufacture of the United States. They furnish materials 
 for comparisons in the following particulars : 
 
 I. The average annual export of cotton for five years, ending September 30, 1840, compared 
 with the average export of all other productions of the United States 
 
 1. To all the world; 
 
 2. To Great Britain and her dependencies ; 
 
 3. To England, Scotland, and Ireland. 
 
 II. The average annual export of cotton for the five years referred to, compared with the ar- 
 erage annual exports of all the agricultural products of the United State? used for the sustenance 
 of man 
 
 1. To all the world; 
 
 2. To Great Britain and her dependencies ; 
 
 3. To England, Scotland, and Ireland. 
 
 STATEMENT. 
 
 Average annual export fur 1833, '37, '38, '39, and '40, t<i all countries, of all articles flic growth, produce, 
 
 or manufacture of the United States ..-.--.... $102,588,69? 
 Average annual export of COTTON to all countries ...... 
 
 Domestic exports, other than cotton ....... $38,350,667 
 
 Average annual exports of all domestic productions lo Great Britain and her depend encieg * $60,200,131 
 
 Average export of COTTON to the *om countries - - - - - - - 45,560,647 
 
 Exports, other than cotton - 
 
 Averag" annual exports of all domestic productions to England, Scotland, and Ireland - $53,295,933 
 
 Average annual export of COTTON to same countries ------ - 45,515,137 
 
 , other than cotton - - - -. - - - - $7,780,796
 
 19 
 
 Average annual exports, for 1836, '37, '38, '39, and '40, of animals, and the product of ani- 
 mals, and vegetable food. 
 
 Articles exported. 
 
 To all countries. 
 
 To G. Britain & 
 dependencies. 
 
 To England, 
 Scotland, and 
 Ireland. 
 
 Beef, tallow, hides, and horned cattle 
 Butter and cheese ... 
 
 $501,482 
 139,340 
 
 8291,608 
 39,616 
 
 866,052 
 2,735 
 
 Pork, bacon, hams, lard, and live hogs 
 Horses, mules, and sheep 
 
 1,533,522 
 337,373 
 
 386,072 
 288,410 
 
 , 355 
 
 Wheat .... 
 
 363,413 
 
 358,495 
 
 139,338 
 
 Flour .... 
 Indian corn and meal - " - 
 
 5,447,373 
 868,864 
 
 2,608,385 
 489,885 
 
 955,523 
 12,714 
 
 Ship bread ... ... 
 
 306,319 
 
 170,064 
 
 95 
 
 Rye, rye meal, oats, and other small grain, and pulse, potatoes, 
 
 
 
 
 and apples --..-... 
 
 339,572 
 
 225,544 
 
 21,238 
 
 Rice 
 
 2,196,424 
 
 495,739 
 
 274,669 
 
 
 $11.766,615 
 
 $5,353,818 
 
 81,474,719 
 
 Comparison of the export of cotton with the results of the foregoing (able. 
 
 Average export of COTTON, for the five years i specified, to all countries - - 864,238,225 
 
 Average exports of all agricultural productions, consisting of animals, and the product of animals, and 
 vegetable food -....-....-... 11,766,615 
 
 852,471,610 
 
 Average export of COTTON to Great Britain and her dependencies 
 
 Average exports of the specified agriculiural productions to the same countries 
 
 Excess of cotton export ........ 
 
 845,560,647 
 5,353,818 
 
 840,206,829 
 
 Average export of COTTON to England, Scotland, and Ireland 
 Average exports of the specified productions to the same countries 
 
 Excess of cotton export ...... 
 
 815,515,137 
 
 1,474,719 
 
 844,040,418 
 
 Let us now look a moment at these results. They are 
 
 1. Thatt.de single article of cotton constituted a little over sixty-two and a half per cent. 
 (62.6) of the whole of our domestic exports to all foreign countries being $25,887,558 more 
 than the exports of all ihe other products of the fisheries, the forests, the agriculture, and the 
 manufactures of the entire Union. 
 
 2. That, of nil our domestic exports to Great Britain and her dependencies, cotton constituted 
 over seventy-five and one-half per cent., (75.66) being $30,921,163 more than the exports to 
 that kingdom of all our other productions. 
 
 3. That, of the $45,560, 164 of our export of cotton to Great Britain and her dependencies, 
 $45,515,137 went to England, Scotland, and Ireland, ($43,475,484 of it to England,) as a raw 
 material, to be sent to this and other couuiiies in the form of manufactures, at an advance upon its 
 cost of from 100 to 2,000 per cent., for ihe benefit of British capital and labor. 
 
 4. That that $45,515,137 worth of cotton, exported to England, Scotland, and Ireland, consti- 
 tuted more than eighty -five per tent. (85.4) of all our domestic exports to those countries; ex- 
 ceeding all such exports to them, other than cotton, by the sum of $37,734,341. 
 
 5. That our exports to all countries, of those productions of the agriculture of the United States 
 consisting of animal?, the product of animals, and vegetable food, being $11,766,615, constituted 
 but about eleven and one-half per cent. (11.47) of our whole domestic exports. 
 
 6. That the exports to Great Britain and her dependencies of all the productions of our agri- 
 culture just mentioned, being $5,353,818, constituted but about nine per cent. (8.9) of our whole 
 domestic exports to the same countries. 
 
 7. That our export of COTTON to all countries was five and a half times the amount of all our 
 exports of the agricultural productions specified in the table just presented. 
 
 8. That our exports of COTTON to Great Britain and her dependencies ($45,560,647) were 
 eight and one-half times the amount of our whole export to that kingdom and its dependencies of 
 all the productions of our agriculture specified in the table, and more than fifteen times the amount 
 of our whole export of wheat and flour to that kingdom and its dependencies, including the ex- 
 port of $963,714 worth of those articles through her North American colonies, for the benefit of 
 her navigation.* 
 
 *This g963,714 of wheat and flour was the average of five years. The amount during the first of those years was but 
 $5282,233, while in the last it was 3,028,589. So the amount of wheat and flour exported direct to England, Scotland, 
 and Ireland, during the first of the averaged vears, was buj 81,134, while in the last it was 84,072,952 showing the 
 fluctuations produced by the operation ofthe British corn laws. 
 
 Wheat is admitted into the North American colonies duty free, to be manufactured and shipped to foreign countries 
 in British vessels ; and all our productions are admitted into certain free " warehousing ports" of those colonies fre 
 of duty, to be re-exported as colonial produce in British bottoms for the benefit of British navigation
 
 20 
 
 9. That of the $5,353,818 of our agricultural exports to Great Britain and her dependencies, 
 specified in the table, but $1,474,719 was exported directly to England, Scotland, and Ireland, 
 being three and one- fourth per cent, only of the average amount of cotton exported, during the 
 years specified, to those countries ; fiom which, nevertheless, we received, during the same years, 
 merchandise, principally British manufactures, averaging $53,619,434 per annum. 
 
 Upon these results I make no comment. They are sufficiently startling to awaken the atten- 
 tion of the country, especially those portions of it whose interests are to be sacrificed, under the pre- 
 tence of " free trade," for the benefit of the cotton-growing interest the only interest in the United 
 States which the policy of foreign nations, and especially of Great Britain, will permit to enjoy 
 that freedom. 
 
 I have spoken in general terms of foreign legislation affecting the agricultural staples whose 
 export bears such a small proportion to that of cotton. Let me specify by a reference to the Brit- 
 ish tariff of duties on the leading articles. 
 
 Articles Raieofduty. 
 
 Beef.percwt. - - - - - - - ' - 12*. Od. equal 2 88 
 
 Horned cattle, prohibited. 
 
 Butter, per cwi. - - - - - - - ^ - - -100 
 
 Cheese, per cwt. -.....- .0106 
 
 Pork, salted, per cwt. 12 
 
 Pork, smoked, per cwt. - - - - - - - - - -108 
 
 Bacon and hams, per cwt. - - - - - - - - -180 672 
 
 Sausages, per pound ----.....-004 8 
 
 Swiiie, prohibited. 
 Sheep, do. 
 Wheat and flour, 
 
 RytrVe TeaTlnT&ley, \ ^"^ ^ nearly at famine prices.* 
 
 Buckwheat, oats, and oat meal, peas and beans, J 
 
 Rice,percwt. 15 3 60 
 
 Rice from British possessions, per cwt - - - - - - - 1 
 
 COTTON, per cwt., - - - - - - - - - -02 11 
 
 Cotton, the produce of, and imported from, British possessions, per cwt. 6 12 
 
 It is unnecessary to ask attention to the immense difference between the duty on cotton and 
 the duties on the other productions of our agriculture to which I have called the attention of the 
 House. The discrimination, however, between the duty on our cotton, low as it is, and that 
 which is the produce of, and imported from, British possessions, ought to attract the attention of 
 our cotton growers, as a premonitory symptom of what they may expect from the indicated policy 
 of Great Britain to supply herself with cotton from her East India possessions. As an indicalion 
 of the success of this policy, I will refer to a statement of importations of cotton from British In- 
 dia, made in an article which I find in Hunt's Merchants' Magazine for September, 1841, on the 
 subject of "the commerce of British India," which is stated in the table of contents to have been 
 written by a South Carolinian. 
 
 " In 1831 (says the writer) the imports of India cotton into EnglarijJ were 75,627 bales ; in 1835, 116,153 bales ; and 
 la 1840 we have 216,784 bales nearly trebled in nine years. The ifnportaliun iu 1839. was 47,233,959 pounds; and 
 in 1840, 76,703,295 pounds an increase without a parallel in the history of this valuable commodity. In the first 
 quarter of 1840, the imports were 28,611 bales ; and in the same term of "1841, we. find 35,433 an increase of 7.922 
 bale*." 
 
 Mr. Speaker, the people who draw from the soil of this great country the means of human sub- 
 sistence especially the UHAIX GROWING portion of them,f are beginning to inquire what proportion 
 of the people of these United States are engaged in the production of the privileged export. Why, 
 they ask, should the boundless capacities of the soil and the industry of the North, the Middle, and 
 the West, b thus restrained thus made to submit to the cotton growing power 1 They demand to 
 know why they are to be compelled to consume foreign manufactures, while payment for them 
 cannot be made in the productions of their own soil and industry. They ask loudly, and will 
 yet ask more loudly, why this perpetually exhausting process must go on for the joint benefit of 
 European capitalists and American cotton growers ? The people of whom I speak want a market, 
 and a steady market for the fruits of their labor. If they cannot have it abroad, they ask from the 
 Congress of the United States such legislation as shall give it to them at home legislation which 
 shall give a uniform and efficient protection to manufacturing industry, and save if. and them, toge- 
 ther, from the effects of a selfish, monopolizing, crushing foreign legislation. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, I do not know that the facts and arguments and appeals submitted, or to be sub- 
 mitted in the debate on this question, can make any impression upon the power that rules this 
 
 * The duties vary upon a sliding scale, corresponding with the prices of grain rising as the price falls, and falling 
 as the price rises. Thus, when the price of wheat per quarter (eight bushels) is at or over 73 shillings sterling, (equal 
 to $17 52, reckoning 50 pence to the dollar,) the duty is but one shilling sterling per quarter. As the price of wheat 
 falls, the duty, by a nearly corresponding process, rises, so that it equals the price when that descends to 43 shillings. 
 
 The duty on flour is regulated by the same rule, the barrel of flour being, by law, deemed equal to 3Si gallons of 
 wheat. 
 
 Th same mode is adopted of increasing or diminishing the duties upon Indian corn and other grains, though not 
 precisely in the same ratio, and, of course, not with reference to the same prices 
 
 The result is, as intended, n almost total exclusion of foreign grains, flour, and meal, when at moderate prices, and 
 their ad minion only in time* of extreme scarcity. 
 
 T See note at the end.
 
 21 
 
 nation. But there is one argument which will yet make an impression, and that, in my opinion, 
 at no very distant day. When our cotton shall come to be excessively burdened by the British 
 tariff, or utterly excluded from the British market, then will the appeals now made by the manu- 
 facturing and provision-raising and wool-growing portions of the country be remembered, and their 
 force felt. 
 
 I have already alluded to the recent efforts to extend the cultivation of cotton in British India. 
 The cotton growers, it is evident, are aware of these efforts, and of the success which has attend- 
 ed them. Sir, they ought to awake from their delusive dreams of on uninterrupted and perpetual 
 demand for their great staple in the British market. The" policy which has begun, will carry on, 
 and carry out, the movement to which I have alluded. And this is rendered the more certain by 
 the consideration that the motives of interest in which it originated are to be reinforced by those 
 of. high moral principle a principle which is rapidly gaining strength both in Europe and in 
 America urging a discontinuance of the use of those articles which are the production of forced 
 and unrequited labor. 
 
 It may be well for the South to consider, in this view of the matter, whether the time can be 
 very far distant when the closing of British ports against her great staple shall drive her to the 
 North for her principal market; and whether it is not wise, as well as patriotic, for her now to aid 
 in giving solidity and permanency to manufacturing establishments, and success to the numerous 
 branches of productive industry which are dependent on them for support. And she may well 
 consider, also, whether, after the North has suffered from the fluctuations of the policy which to- 
 day forces her into manufactures, and to-morrow forces her out, she will feel any very strong in- 
 ducements to purchase cotton from the South, when she can get it as cheap elsewhere ; whether, 
 when she is asked, as she certainly will be, in due time, to protect it by the continuance of the 
 present, or the imposition of a new duly, she will not feel very much inclined to leave the cottom- 
 growing interest to lake care of itself. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, it gives me no pleasure thus to speak of the probable future. Rather would I hope 
 that the South will abandon its hostility to the protecting policy ; and that, under the operation of 
 that policy, adapted by wise and prudent counsels, and in a spirit of impartial justice, to the pre- 
 sent condition of the various interests requiring protection, the diversified resources of this great 
 country will be rapidly developed, and its East and West, its North and South, be more strongly 
 bound together by the ties of mutual dependence, and urged onward in a noble rivalry of industry, 
 of knowledge, and of virtue, to the attainment of a high and a glorious destiny. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 Having referred to the great provision-raising interest as justly demanding encouragement 
 through protection to manufactures, it may be useful to look at the matter a little more in 
 detail. To show the extent of that interest, and the portions of the country most affected by the 
 neglect of its claims to our consideration, I have prepared the following tables, from an examina- 
 tion which I have been permitted to make of the corrected returns of agricultural statistics in the 
 Department of State. 
 
 The first table exhibits the amount of the articles used for human subsistence, produced in each 
 State and Territory, so far as they are included in the returns, except the " value of produce of 
 market gardeners ;" to which is added cotton, to show the amount and location of that production. 
 Oats are included in the table, because they are used, to some extent, for human subsistence, and, 
 for other reasons, bear the same relation to this subject as barley, buckwheat, &c. Sheep are 
 also included, as not only used extensively for food, but especially as furnishing a raw material 
 for an essential manufacture of great national importance. 
 
 The second table presents the leading and mo-t important articles included in the first giving 
 the amount of each in one-third of the States that is, in the nine States which give to each of 
 them the largest ratio of production, having reference to population.
 
 i 
 
 . % 
 
 i>T':rc"r ^t^-'rT *T" ' '^T t^TcTc^*o" 
 
 a 2 13 SS 8 W S "8- 
 
 U: 
 
 "SjJs! rt 
 
 ill 
 
 I J * 
 
 t6|3SSLS$a R s a 3 s|S|i| $ i i^g 
 -I 55 ils^=-^P ' ' - 00 "!""-- s ' 2<0 
 
 ef e.
 
 LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 Table shawms: the quantity nf wheat, soru, rye, and potatoes ; the number of neat cattle, swine, 
 and sheep, and the value uf butter and cheese, in the nine States which give the largest ratio 
 of production of these articles, having reference to population. 
 
 WHEAT. 
 
 CORN. 
 
 
 
 No. of Las i- 
 
 
 
 No. of bush- 
 
 8TATBS. 
 
 Bushels. 
 
 els to eac i 
 
 STATUS. 
 
 Bushels. 
 
 els to each 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 Ohio 
 
 16,571,661 
 
 10.9 
 
 Tennessee 
 
 44,986,188 
 
 54.3 
 
 Michigan 
 
 5i, 157, 108 
 
 10.1 
 
 Kentucky 
 
 39,847,120 
 
 51.1 
 
 Virginia 
 
 10,109,71fi 
 
 8.1 
 
 Arkansas 
 
 4,846,632 
 
 50. 
 
 Pennsylvania - 
 
 13,213,077 
 
 7.7 
 
 Illinois 
 
 22,634,211 
 
 47.5 
 
 Maryland 
 
 3,345,783 
 
 7.1 
 
 Missouri 
 
 17,332,524 
 
 45. 
 
 Illinois 
 
 3,335,393 
 
 7. 
 
 Indiana 
 
 28,155,887 
 
 41. 
 
 Kentucky 
 
 4,803,152 
 
 6.2 
 
 North Carolina 
 
 23,893,763 
 
 31.7 
 
 Indiana 
 
 4,049,375 
 
 5.9 
 
 Virginia - - 
 
 34,577,591 
 
 27.9 
 
 New "V ork 
 
 12,286,418 
 
 5.2 
 
 Ohio 
 
 33,668,144 
 
 22.2 
 
 Total 
 
 69,871,683 
 
 
 Total 
 
 249,942,060 
 
 
 RYE. 
 
 POTATOES. 
 
 
 
 No ol bush- 
 
 
 
 No. of bush- 
 
 STATED. 
 
 .Bushels. 
 
 els to each 
 
 STATES. 
 
 Bushels. 
 
 els to each 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 New Jersey 
 
 1,665,820 
 
 4.5 
 
 Vermont * - 
 
 8,869,751 
 
 30.4 
 
 Pennsylvania - 
 
 6,613,873 
 
 3.8 
 
 New Hampshire 
 
 6,206,606 
 
 21.5 
 
 Connecticut 
 
 734,424 
 
 3.5 
 
 Maine 
 
 10,392,280 
 
 20.5 
 
 Kentucky ' - 
 
 1,321,373 
 
 .7 
 
 Connecticut 
 
 3,414,238 
 
 16.3 
 
 Maryland 
 
 723,577 .5 
 
 New York 
 
 30,123,614 
 
 12.4 
 
 New York 
 
 2,979,323 .2 
 
 Michigan 
 
 2,109,205 
 
 9.9 
 
 Virginia 
 
 1,482,759 .2 
 
 Massachusetts 
 
 5,385,652 
 
 7.3 
 
 New Hampshire 
 
 308,148 .1 
 
 New Jersey - 
 
 2,072,069 
 
 5.6 
 
 Vermont 
 
 230,993 0.8 
 
 Pennsylvania 
 
 9,535,663 
 
 5.5 
 
 Total 
 
 16,060,330 
 
 
 Total 
 
 78,109,078 
 
 
 NEAT CATTLE. 
 
 SWINE. 
 
 STATES. 
 
 No. of cattle. 
 
 No. to each 
 
 STATES. 
 
 No. of swine. 
 
 No. to each 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 Arkansas 
 
 188,786 
 
 1.9 
 
 Arkansas 
 
 393,058 
 
 4. 
 
 Mississippi 
 
 623,197 
 
 1.7 
 
 Tennessee 
 
 2,926,607 
 
 3.5 
 
 Vermont 
 
 384,341 
 
 1.3 
 
 Missouri 
 
 1,271,161 
 
 3.3 
 
 Illinois 
 
 626,274 
 
 1.3 
 
 Illinois 
 
 1,495,254 
 
 3.1 
 
 Georgia 
 
 884,414 t.3 
 
 Kentucky 
 
 2,310,533 
 
 3. 
 
 Missouri 
 
 433,875 1.1 
 
 Mississippi 
 
 1,001,209 
 
 2.7 
 
 Alabama 
 
 668,018 .1 
 
 Alabama 
 
 1,423,873 
 
 2.4 
 
 Louisiana 
 
 381,248 l.l 
 
 Indiana 
 
 1,623,608 
 
 2.4 
 
 Kentucky 
 
 787,098 
 
 1. 
 
 North Carolina 
 
 1,649,716 
 
 2.2 
 
 Total 
 
 4,977,251 
 
 
 Total 
 
 14,095,019 
 
 
 SHEEP. 
 
 BUTTER AND CHEESE. 
 
 8TATKS. 
 
 No. of she-p. No. to each 
 
 STATES. 
 
 Value 
 
 Amt.toeach 
 
 b 
 
 
 person. 
 
 
 
 person. 
 
 Vermont 
 
 1,681,819 
 
 5.8 
 
 Vermont 
 
 #2,008,737 
 
 $6.88 
 
 New Hampshire 
 New York 
 
 617,390 
 5,118,777 
 
 2.2 
 2.1 
 
 Connecticut - 
 New Hampshire 
 
 1,376,534 
 1,638,643 
 
 6.56 
 5.76 
 
 Connecticut 
 
 403,462 
 
 1.9 
 
 New York - 
 
 10,496,021 
 
 5.49 
 
 Ohio 
 
 2,028,401 
 
 1.3 
 
 New Jersey - 
 
 1,328,032 
 
 3.56 
 
 Kentucky 
 Maine 
 
 1,008,240 
 649,264 
 
 1.3 
 
 1.3 
 
 Massachusetts 
 Maine 
 
 2,373,299 
 1,496,902 
 
 3.22 
 2.98 
 
 Virginia 
 Pennsylvania - 
 
 1,293,772 
 1,767,620 
 
 1. 
 1. 
 
 Pennsylvania 
 Ohio - 
 
 3,187,292 
 1,848,869 
 
 1.85 
 1.23 
 
 Total 
 
 14,568,745 
 
 
 Total 
 
 25,754,229 

 
 UCSB LIBRARY 
 
 24 
 
 A comparison of the results of the two tables, in regard to the articles specified in the second, 
 shows that the production of those articles in the one-thirdtof the States which give to each ot 
 them the greatest ratio of production, is 
 As to wheat, 84 per cent, of its whole production in the United States. 
 
 corn 6fi do. do. do. 
 
 rye 86 do. ' do. do. 
 
 potatoes 72 do. do. do. 
 
 cattle 33 do. do. do. 
 
 swine 53 do. do. do. 
 
 sheep 75 do. do. do. 
 
 butter and cheese 76 do. do. do. 
 
 It is evident, from a glance at the first table, that the production of oats, barley, and buckwheat, 
 in the nine States giving the largest relative production, (being in the North, the Middle, and 
 the West,) bears as large a proportion to their production in the whole Union, as is shown above in 
 respect to tl:e other grains. 
 
 It is needless to gay, that the vast region northwest of the river Ohio has but begun to develop 
 its immense agricultural resources. It u capable of producing enough, especially of the grains, 
 and particularly of WHEAT, to feed twice the present population of the United States. 
 
 No part of the country is more interested in the protecting policy than arc the people of the 
 Northwestern States and Territories. They have no steady foreign market, and^wc/i an one they 
 probably never will have ; for, though British ports should be thrown open to grain, as they are to 
 cotton, the grain growers can have no assurance that they will long remain open. They want a 
 steady home market. Will the Government neglect to secure it to them by abandoning the 
 policy of protection protection as really to them as it is to the manufacturers of iron and broad- 
 cloth? Shall they by left, with the manufacturing interests, to the sport of foreign legislation 
 the sport of " free trade" professions, and restricted trade practice? The cotton-raising inter- 
 est confined mainly to five States of this Union* says -they shall be. Impartial justice says 
 they shall not. Which shall prevail 1 Let the people awake from their party dreams, and answer. 
 
 * An examination of the first of the foregoing tables will show that of the 790,479,275 lljs of cotton, 663,198,438 Ibs. 
 were grown in South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana more than 87 per cent, of the whole 
 production of the United States.