A
OF THE
TARIFF  OF 1846,
IN
ITS EFFECT UPON THE BUSINESS AND INDUSTRY
OF THE COUNTRY,
IN A SERIES OF ARTICLES CONTRIBUTED TO THE EVENING TRANSCRIPT,
OVER TIlE SIGNATURE OF
"PROFIT AND LOSS."
VVWITH A TABLE SHOWING THE ANNUAL AMOUNT OF OUR
FOREIGN IMPORTS AND EXPORTS FOR THE
LAST TEN YEARS.
B OSTON:
-,EIDDING &- CO., 8 STATE STREMET.
1.855.




WRIG IT  AND  IIASTY,  PRINTERS,
No. 3 Water Street, Boston.




THE following short articles, which have lately appeared in the
Transcript, over the signature of "Profit and Loss," have been
deemed worthy of being collected and put into a pamphlet form,
for circulation, by the friends of a tariff sufficient to afford
ample protection to the industry of the country.
No particular merit is claimed for these articles, except that
they may serve to suggest to other minds the importance of the
subject, and lead to a more full and ample discussion, of which
the limits of a small paper do not of course admit.  In importance the subject is second to no other before the country;
and unless we return to the policy of protecting ourselves, we
can expect no permanent change in  our financial affairs.  On
the contrary, we shall, in all human probability, go on from
bad to worse.  No people have ever been more deceived than
our own in the adoption  of the Free Trade policy, as that
which is to govern our legislation in future, or rather in sending  men  to Washington  who have succeeded in forcing that
doctrine upon the country, by the passage of the tariff of 1846,
and who declare, from the highest positions in the Government,
that in the laying  of duties no regard  is to' be paid to the
protection  of our  own industry, except  incidentally,-and  of
course, as soon as possible, the protection now afforded is to be




4                         INTRODUCTION.
abandoned.  The States, cannot, of course, exercise this power,
so important, and, to a people who would be independent and rich,
so  necessary  and indispensable.   It becomes, then,  a matter
of the highest importance that the people, more especially the
working classes, should be aroused to the danger that threatens  them.   We  are  in  more  danger  from  foreign  manufactures  than  from   foreign  votes, for  if  the  latter  may
temporarily  interfere  in  our  politics, the  former are  crippling our industry, keeping  back and undeveloped the immense
resources of the country, and by draining our specie, and bringing every year a balance of trade against us, bringing us directly
as debtors into the hands of a hard creditor, as Great Britain
is usually found to be.  It is said  that there is now  not a
broadcloth  mill running  in  the  country.  A  slight protection
would enable us to turn out a better and a cheaper article than
we buy abroad, and give employment to thousands.  It is only
necessary to think of the immense amount of that article consumed in this country, to see how many millions could be retained at home, and employment given to our own people. The
above fact, in regard to so important a manufacture as broadcloth,
which is consumed so universally, and to such an enormous
extent, affords a very good commentary on the working of the
tariff of 1846.   The object of this pamphlet is, as has been
said, simply to keep the subject in the minds of the people of
this country, and to suggest to that common sense, in which
they have never been found deficient, such a policy for the
future as it is believed will bring us out of our present condition, and place us in one of permanent and lasting prosperity.
Every person in the country, East, West, North or South, whatever
may be his pursuit, has a direct interest, in building up a home
and sure market for what he produces, or makes, whether he




INTRODUCTION.                          5
labors with his hands or with his heacl; for we are mutually dependent, so that what benefits one, benefits all, and no class
or interest can suffer without injury to the rest.
BOSTON, Feb. 1, 1855.








tARD TIMES.
I noticed in your paper of yesterday the fact, that the excess
of specie shipments over last year is ten million dollars, and
that shipments are likely to continue large. This constant
drain of our specie has been going on ever since the distruction of the old tariff, and since that time money has been hard
to obtain, and business men distressed, year after year, almost
without intermission. The moment money becomes a little
easier, away go the orders for foreign goods, to be paid for in
specie. The importers are beginning to feel the effect of this
state of things, and will, no doubt, come to see that a good
tariff is not only the interest of the farmer and the mechanic,
but of themselves, —those, at least, who do a legitimate and
regular business, and mean to do a safe one. Nothing but a
tariff can ever bring prosperity to this country, because that
alone developes its labor, which is the only wealth of a country, and, at the same time, builds up a home market for the
cotton of the South, and the grain of the Middle and Western
States, more sure and less fluctuating than any foreign market
can be. In ordinary times we can send very little produce
abroad except cotton, and the balance of trade is constantly
against us. Experience shows, that in those articles which
have been protected long enough to enable us to acquire skill,
as for instance, cheap cottons, we can supply at a less cost to
the planter than he could buy abroad, besides taking a large
part of his cotton for home consumption, and helping the price
of it in foreign markets. What is true of cotton is true of all
other things; would have been true of rail-road iron by this
time had not our new tariff operated to check our own manufacture, to help to build up that of Great Britain.




We may set it down as an axiom, that the country which
manufactures will always have an advantage over the one
that it supplies. It will always have the balance of trade in
its favor, and will hold its customer more or less in dependence. It will grow rich, while its customer, who pays for its
wares in cotton, corn, flour, pork, &c., and makes up the balance in hard cash, if he can get it, will be growing poor. We
notice this everywhere, with nations and with individuals,
almost without exception.
It is the party that adds four or six fold to the value of the
raw material that gets rich, and brings the producer gradually
to be his debtor, as we are now fast becoming in debt to Great
Britain.
We talk about the Declaration of Independence. The fact
is, we have been playing into the hands of Great Britain for
years, and are doing so now, and becoming anything but independent of her  A law, protecting and encouraging our
own labor, and keeping our money at home to pay our own
workmen, is the only true Declaration of Independence,certainly the only course likely to keep us independent of foreign creditors, and is the only way in which we are again to
realize a state of financial prosperity.
The average dividends of the best factories, such as Lowell,
have been about six per cent. per annum; but if we take all
that have been started in New England, we shall find it falling far below that, —no very great business, certainly, for the
manufacturers. The gain has been to the consumer and the
country at large. Home competition (the severest kind) has
brought prices down, and prevented, and always will prevent,
large profits to the manufacturer; but the mechanic, the operative, the farmer, and so on, through all ranks and classes of
society, derive the benefits. They have good wages, cheap
clothes, and a market for the produce of their farms or plantations, if they are producers. There is no interest or individual in the community that is not benefited, directly or
indirectly, by a good tariff, not excepting the cotton planter or
importers themselves. Such an opinion I have heard from an




9
eminent and extensive importer in New York City, and, without doubt, he is right. It is now time for our people to be
waking up upon this subject, so that when Congress comes
together some effort may be made for the good of the country,
as well as for the advancement of this or that politician, or
the thousand and one projects which, compared with the importance of a proper tariff, sink into utter insignificance.
HARD TIMES.
The New York Evening Post contains some strictures upon
a short article of mine in the Transcript, upon the cause of
our pecuniary troubles. I cannot see, however, that the writer meets the difficulty at all. If our extravagance will
account for the pressure in the money market now, it must
account for it for the last six or seven years, during the whole
of which time money has been worth from twelve to eighteen
per cent., sometimes a little easier, and then a little harder;
but at no time easy at six or seven per cent.; and at no period
has it been possible for the great enterprises, that were unfortunately undertaken about the time the tariff bill of 1846 was
passed, to negotiate for funds without paying enormous and
ruinous amounts of extra interest; while the condition of the
business man has hardly been better.
These are facts, for the truth of which I appeal to the experience of every merchant in the country, and would ask the
New York editor if he thinks "extravagance" is sufficient
cause for it. There must be some deeper cause than that. If'
we had only ourselves to pay, and protected our own industry
(the real source of wealth), instead of legislating for that of
Great Britain, we should have no great reason to fear "ex2




10
travagance."  The editor says that the times are hard in
England also. That may be, just at this moment, and while
she has war on her hands; but England is the great commercial centre, making, by her protective policy, all parts of the
world her tributaries, and keeping the balance of trade always
in her favor. Her manufacturers are tempted by the reduction
of our tariff, and the facility to fraud afforded by the ad valorem system, to send out to their agents here (mostly Englishmen) large surplus stocks, to be worked off, even at a loss, in
order to relieve their own market, thereby, also, helping to
break down our own industry, drain us of our specie, and
keep us constantly in her debt. Our very rail-road iron we buy
abroad,' instead of employing our own manufactures.
It would be cheaper to pay our own people twenty-five if
not fifty per cent. more for rail-road iron than to pay the present price to the foreigner. The reason is obvious, and it
applies to a thousand other articles with the same force, viz.:
that, in the first place, we develop our own resources, and, by
paying our own workmen, enable them to buy and pay for
other things, thus benefiting every trade and pursuit in the
country; and secondly, by building up a population which
could afford to travel on the rail-road when it was done, and
thus give it that support which it now lacks. It might almost
be said, that it would be cheaper for us in the end to employ
and pay our own people to make our rail-road iron, than to
have it given to us from abroad, while it is well known, that
after a few years of protection, home competition brings down
the price below that at which it can be imported, as is the
case now with our coarse cottons, which we can export, and
beat the English in some of their East India markets, where,
it is said, some marks of our manufacturers are counterfeited.
This cotton cloth, after a few years of protection, we send to
the planter, and send him a cheaper and better article than he
could ever have obtained but for the tariff-and take his own
cotton to make it with. We consume a large and increasing
portioi of his crop, and help keep up the price of the remainder in the foreign market. In view of such benefits as these,




11
direct, tangible, and certain, how trifling and unworthy to be
hamed, appear the complaints against a tariff, which, of late
years, have been heard from our Southern neighbors. What
a complete refutation is here found, of those theories put forth
by Southern politicians to break down the protective policy of
the country. For the imaginary benefit of buying directly,
and without duties, from a foreign nation which takes their
cotton, they would give up and sacrifice the entire manufacturing industry of their own country, and return to a state of
colonial dependency on Great Britain-for such would be their
condition, though they may have nominally declared their independence.  But, besides the indirect benefits flowing tc
them from the accumulating wealth and power of their own
country, I have shown that the direct and immediate advantage of the tariff to them is such, that the small advance
they pay, for a short time, on the protected article, is not to be
named when compared with the results, which, to them, are a
cheaper and better article than they could otherwise have had;
a new market-a home market-and a sure and rapidly-increasing one for their great staple; independence of foreign
influence, by the accumulation of real wealth at home; and
providing for ourselves the sinews of war as well as those
comforts, and luxuries, and arts, which embellish and adorn
society in peace and in war, and which can alone secure to us
real independence of foreign factors, who are always in advance to us, and holding over our heads each year, the balance
that appears to be against us, to be finally paid by repudiation
and war, or by a sacrifice that reduces us to the condition of
mortgagors to foreign creditors, while our own industry is suffering for want of support. Instead of forming leagues to use
no foreign articles of dress, a much more simple and certain
way would be to form leagues to keep the articles out of the
country. We could then keep our money at home, and should
hear but occasionally, and but for short seasons only, of hard
times.
Home competition, the severest of all competitions, soon
brings down the price of the protected article, when we have




12
command of our own market. What is true of coarse cottons
would have been true of rail-road iron, broadcloth, and many
other things, had not our last tariff nipped those manufactures
in the bud, and compelled us to pay much more for our iron
and cloth than we could have bought the same for of our own
people, after a few years application of industry and enterprise, and the consequent acquisition of the requisite skill.
As a general rule, the nation that manufactures will draw
to itself the wealth of the one that produces, and will grow
rich faster than the other, in proportion as the manufactured
article is increased in value over the raw material, by the
hand of labor,-as a pound of cotton manufactured is worth
several pounds in its natural state. Instead of retaining to
ourselves the benefit of this rule, we have, by a most suicidal
policy, thrown it away, and are now suffering the consequences, not of our extravagance, but of our listening to the
syren voice of free trade, one of the greatest and most dangerous falacies which a nation like ours can adopt.
I still believe that no permanent ease will come to our
money markets until we apply the remedy, and take the necessary steps, to build up ourselves, instead of becoming every
year more in debt and dependent upon foreign nations.




13
THE HARD  TIMES.
I notice-an article in the Transcript of the 27th ult., signed'" Merchant," in reply to a short communication of mine upon
the hard times. It contains much that is plausible, and much
that is true. The writer begins by saying the present tariff is
the best we have had. If I was a large manufacturer, and
was looking to my own interests, I should say the same. If
such an one can live under the present tariff, by the application of superior skill and ingenuity, he can, when a good year
comes round, do perhaps something more than that, and stands,
on the whole, in a better condition than he would under an
increased duty upon the article he makes. In that case, new
concerns would spring up, and he would suffer more from
home competition than he does now from the foreigner. I
suppose most of our large manufacturers are in this position,
and that they would not move to alter the present tariff. But
would not new establishments springing up benefit the workman, the laborer, the consumer of the article manufactured, by
reducing its price; the man who has a bushel of wheat or
corn, or a pound of cotton, or a pair of shoes, or a pound of
butter to sell; in fact, every interest that can be named or imagined, except perhaps the very one which, in the common
view of the subject, would be the one most benefited, viz., the
manufacturer or capitalist. The tariff that developes most
rapidly the resources of the country, and adds most to its
wealth, is the best, which certainly cannot be said of the present tariff under which we go abroad, and pay millions upon
millions for the very iron upon our roads, (to speak of one
thing,) while it is lying in countless tons buried in the mountains of Pennsylvania, and the fire of our forges suffered to go
out, instead of being multiplied as they might be.
Again the writer asks, what interest has suffered in the last
six or seven years, and is it the"farmer, the manufacturer, or




14
merchant? &c. It is perfectly true, that the great interests of
the country have been prosperous. Our resources and advantages are such, that with the immense tide of emigration flowing in upon us, it would be impossible for it to be otherwise.
Hardly any legislation could repress the tremendous energies
of this new country, or retard its growth, the elements of which
we possess to an extent unparalleled in the history of the
world.  But could not legislation do much to favor that
growth? Supposing the millions we have sent to England
had been kept at home, and paid to our own people for making
such articles as we can produce here to advantage, would not
the real wealth of the country have been increased almost
beyond calculation, and is it possible to believe that our money
market would have continued in such a state as we have
seen it 3
The writer thinks that the high price of money has grown
out of the profitable use of it. That the demand for money
has been great there is no doubt, growing partly out of the
natural increase of the business of the country, the necessities
of individuals, and more especially of railroads, that must be
finished at whatever cost, or be lost entirely. How profitable
the business of those engaged in commerce may have been,
"Merchant" can perhaps better judge than the writer. I
presume, however, they would hardly agree to his statement
in regard to their profits for the last few years. I have discovered no disposition since the tariff of 1846 to enter upon any
new enterprises, excepting such as grew out of what I deem
the unfortunate discovery of gold in California, which has kept
up a fallacious appearance of prosperity, without adding anything to the wealth of the country. The mechanical and
manufacturing interests of the country (the real source of its
wealth,) have not by their increase caused any new demand
for money, and yet in the money market there seems to have
been nothing but hard times since the famine year, in which
the balance of specie was brought in our favor. Since then,
the specie has been constantly going out about as fast as it
arrives from California, while a large part of what remains




15
is shut up in the Sub-Treasury vaults (now over twenty million dollars) where it is of no use to any one.  These I deem
the reasons why we have not had money enough for all our
uses and for realizing any and all the profits that could be
offered to us, and that, too, without paying exhorbitantly for
it. This difficulty I believe a good tariff would remove, as it
would tend to keep the balance in our favor, but more especially would induce us to develop the great natural resources of
our country, to add in an immense ratio to its wealth and
independence, by opening a home market and a sure one to
every one who either raises an article of produce, or makes
anything that is called for by the wants or luxuries of men.
" Merchant" remarks that he hopes to hear no more of the
"'exploded theory of protection." I beg to ask him, what
Boston would have been without that exploded system?-what
New England would have been — where would Lowell, Lawrence, Manchester, and the hundreds of smaller manufacturing
establishments scattered through New England, have been?
The answer is, nowhere; and Boston might perhaps, now have
been a city of fifty thousand inhabitants, though probably
much less than that. Why explode a policy that, more than
all things else, has made us what we are? Why not, on the
contrary, wish to carry it out to its fullest extent, so as to see
the whole country dotted over with thriving villages and rich
cities? There is one sure way of witnessing such a result,
and but one, and that is by protecting our own industry.
That should be the first and chief care of every nation, and
then questions of currency and finance may very safely be left
to take care of themselves; the stream of wealth will then set
constantly towards our shore, and not, as since the act of 1846,
be continually running in the opposite direction.




16
ABOUT BUSINESS MATTERS.
I am tempted to trespass once more on your indulgence, in
consequence of an article in the Transcript of the 8th, signed
W., and which alludes to some previous statements of mine.
The writer observes that he is surprised that I should consider
all our pecuniary difficulties as growing out of the present
tariff. I consider that tariff, with the temptations to fraud
under the ad valorem system, to be certainly the principal
cause, though others of less importance may exist; and one
strong reason for so thinking appears to me to be this-that it
is not in fact for a present state of pecuniary distress alone
that we have to account, but substantially and with but little
variation, that same distress has extended through a period of
five or six years, during the whole of which time the pressure
in the money market has been nearly as great as at present.
I have, in course of that time, written several similar articles, always ascribing the same cause, always predicting the
same future, and always finding my predictions verified.
Now here is the difficulty, and we must look for some more
permanent cause than extravagance to account for a state of
things existing so long, and without variation or interruption.
According to my observation, though there has been at times
much and disastrous speculation in stocks, yet there have
been no enterprises undertaken based on a confidence in the
future. Merchants have been extremely cautious, and money
hard, during the whole time which -has elapsed since the year
of the famine in Ireland, which came, unfortunately, just
after the tariff act of 1846 was passed to deceive the nation
into the idea of a prosperity, which could continue only while
the call for our breadstuffs continued, and the specie returned
to pay for them. Where has been the extravagance then  I
do not see it, and more than that, I cannot believe it could possibly have existed so constantly as to cause a perpetual and




17
never ending pressure in the money market. The cause, I
say, does not exist, and if it exists, is wholly inadequate to
account for the difficulty, because that difficulty is of too long
standing, too chronic-not a sudden cold brought on by exposure or indiscretion-but a rheumatism, which, though it
allows, perhaps, of short intervals of suffering, yet keeps the
patient on his bed, or confined to his house from month to
month, and from year to year. I hear of no greater complaints now of scarcity of money than I have heard for at
least six years; and for an evil that is so permanent,: we must
look for some permanent cause. That cause I have suggested,
and have no doubt that unless the remedy is applied, the next
six years will be like the last, or, what is probable, much
worse.
1" W."' speaks of a petition to take off the duty on foreign
coal. I never saw that petition, and certainly should not sign
it. Coal has been, like some other things, higher than usual;
but no extravagant price can long continue of any such article, that can be produced to such anll unlimited extent. But
suppose I pay to Pennsylvania a dollar a ton more than to a
foreign state (and here lies the whole question of the tariff),
should I not prefer to do so, and is it not my interest to do so?
Most certainly it is. It is true I pay a dollar more, but I pay
it to my neighbor who buys goods that I make. The money
I pay is kept at home, and part of it comes back to me. I am
also encouraging him to extend his business, and develop the
hidden riches that lie embowelled in the earth, and so to increase the population, and to enrich my neighbourhood, and
thus build up a sure and home market for my own labor,
whether it is raising corn or cotton, or making shoes. Besides
all which, the increase of my neighbor's business is sure, by
competition, to bring down the price of his coal, in a short
time, to a dollar less than I can buy it for abroad. Another
reason is, that in the event of difficulty or war with the foreign states, I have secured a sure and cheap supply of so important an article at home. It may be said that Nova Scotia
will take our goods in return for coal, but that depends on




18
whether she can get them cheaper from England, and it is not
the growth of a British province that I am so desirous of promoting, as that of my neighbors in Pennsylvania, who I am
sure will buy of me. So we keep our money circulating
among ourselves instead of sending it to fill the coffers of the
Bank of England, or to be scattered on the plains of Sevastopol.
The argument in favor of securing our own market to our
own manufacturers is much stronger than when applied to
coal, for that is more of the nature of a production of the
earth, and cannot enrich a community like the manufacture of
any article (railroad iron for example) which requires a multiplicity and variety of workmen, and to which, by the hand
of labor, is added many times its value over the raw material
of which it is made. In this enhanced value consists the
wealth that is added to the country.
My argument has been simply that a nation becomes populous, independent, and wealthy so far as it fosters and protects
its manufacturing and mechanical industry, and that so far as
it neglects to do so, it loses those advantages, and gives them
up to others. The protection of these interests is the protection and advancement of each and every other interest (North
and South), without excepting, perhaps, even that of our
shipping. The power to afford this protection is among the
very most important that Government can exercise. Yet we
are informed by President Pierce, who comes from a State, no
small part of whose wealth is due directly to the tariff, that
this power is to be abandoned by our General Government.
The States certainly cannot exercise it. What then is to become of it? I commend this subject to the new party which
has just sprung up. If there ever was an American policy,
this is one, and one that deserves the attention of every one
who would not see us go on until we owe to Great Britain and
foreign nations, more than we can pay, while our own industry
languishes at our doors.




19
BUSINESS MATTERS.
I was struck with the following paragraph in your paper of
the 15th, taken from the New York Evening Post:
" From the manufacturing districts in England the advices
are, that in the almost total absence of orders from this country
for woollen and cotton goods, the goods making for this market,
which are always to some extent in reliance upon orders, will
be sent here for sale on manufacturers' account."
This is precisely what was to have been expected. Our
importers may have found out that a low tariff is, in the end,
the worst thing for them, as it no doubt is, and so not being
able to sell their present stock may cease for a time to order;
but the foreign goods are not to be so easily kept out. They
must be sold and pushed off in our markets by the agents of'
the manufacturers at some price, however low, and if not ordered will be sent without orders. This may not be so agreeable to our free trade friends of New York city, whose views
of national interests extend, it is to be feared, not far beyond
the limits of their own city; but who, it is probable, have
taken but a superficial and false view of what that interest
really is. They will find probably that if the industry of the
country languishes, that their customers will be poor pay, and
that when they cease to order, the foreigner himself steps in,
and knocks down the prices still lower than at present.
The great free trade interests of the country have naturally
centered in New York city, which is built up at the expense of
all the rest of the country, by a large foreign trade; but it may
well be a question whether her growth would not have been
more solid and permanent, and desirable, if not so rapid, when
resting upon a flourishing interior, on new cities springing up
on every side, and the accumulation of real wealth all over




20
the country, all of which would have paid tribute to her,
instead of resting upon a foreign trade which, though temporarily enriching her, is making her customers poor,and keeping
the finances of the country in a state of continued embarrassment. Our New York friends may find the poisoned chalice
commended to their own lips, and learn that they can enjoy no
real and permanent prosperity that is not based upon the prosperity and growing wealth of the whole country, of which
they form the great commercial centre.
The general tone of the press of that city has been, with
few exceptions, in favor of the doctrines of free trade, which
no doubt appear to be for the interest of our great depot for
foreign merchandise. Time, however, will show the wisdom
of such a course, and whether or not it is founded in a mistaken view of the true policy of the city as well as of the
state of New York, and of the whole country.
The cry is now from New York that real estate is falling,
and the immense amount of imported goods which have
drained us of our specie, and crippled our banks, are not to be
paid for by the purchase of them here, but the returns come in
from the West and South in the shape of protested notes and
broken  promises.  This  is, perhaps, a just retribution
for abandoning American interests and American industry,
the sole foundation of our wealth, for the temporary advantage
of a large foreign trade, which in the end enriches not even
the party that has the benefits of it, to anything like the extent
that would be realized from the real growth and increased
wealth, which an American policy would secure to the whole
country, and which would flow in large and steady streams
into our great commercial capital. We might by an efficient protective policy, add at least fifty million dollars
per annum to the wealth of the country, instead of losing,
as we do, twenty-five million dollars.  A  difference of
seventy-five million dollars could easily be effected, and our
money kept at home. We should be immense gainers if we
could keep out- everything that we can make, and we might
then admit tea, coffee, wines, &c., free of duty. Suppose that




21
then our revenue should fall short, we could well afford direct
taxation, and much better afford to raise double the present
revenue than we can now afford the indirect payment of what
is necessary for the expenses of government, or we might
raise our revenue from those articles and others that we do not
and cannot produce. If we were not a people who, as Mr.
Barnum says, delight in a certain amount of humbug, and
rather prefer it in some cases, though half conscious of it, we
should have adopted such a policy long ago, and not waited till
we were owing some two hundred million dollars to Great Brittain, or until a general crash among ourselves should open our
eyes to the suicidal policy of free trade. To us that policy has
always been, and always will be suicidal, because all the benefit
accrues to the manufacturing party, which is Great Britain.
One leg wears the boot, and the other goes barefoot. That is
precisely the operation of free trade between us and the nation
of which we have always professed so much jealousy, and declared our independence, and to which we are now becoming
a tributary, and dependent debtor.
Wherever English  influence  works its way, industry
flags and prosperity declines, whether it is in North or South
America, or the East Indies, because she looks only to her
own interest; only to raise up new markets for her own
goods; and to that end her agencies and diplomacy are constantly directed. She makes the world pay tribute to her
industry and skill regardless, of course, of the true interests
of her customers, and not desiring to see the development of
industry and skill on their part, for then they would no longer
serve the purpose of adding to her already enormous capital.




22
TRUE  AMERICAN  POLICY.
In your paper of Monday, I notice a variety of questions
propounded by your correspondent "V W." for me to answer,
upon the subject of the tariff, and in relation to the articles
lately published in pamphlet form, in which that subject is
discussed. I would suggest to " W." whether it would not be
better for him to give us his own views upon the matters embraced in these questions instead of asking for mine. If the
pamphlet to which he refers contains errors of fact or of opinion, he is, no doubt, quite able to point them out, and as I feel
not the slightest personal interest in the subject, except what
belongs to all who are interested in the permanent growth and
prosperity of the country, I shall be the more willing to admit
such errors when shown to exist, or reply to such arguments
as he may offer, so far as they may seem to affect the merits
of the question.
"W." will excuse me, therefore, if I decline to continue the
discussion in the form he has proposed. Some of these questions, he will remember, we have already discussed, and I
have endeavored to answer. I wish, however, to refer to four
inquiries which he makes, and I do so only because he seems
entirely to have misapprehended my meaning, or to have forgotten, which is probable, the language that I used. He
would not otherwise inquire of me, in question No. 7, if I
really believed that England sent over her surplus stocks for
the express purpose of breaking down the industry of this
country. He will find on examination, that I said no such
thing, but only that such was the result of sending over those
surplus stocks. England looks out for herself, no doubt, and
leaves us to do the same.
Again, in question No. 12, he seems to have misapprehended'
me. I spoke of Lowell, Lawrence, Manchester, and other
smaller manufacturing places, as owing their existence entirely




3
to the protective policy, and that without it they would have
been nowhere, which I presume " W." wxill hardly deny.
Question No. 6 would seem to show that he has not read
my articles so attentively as he might, or that he has not apprehended my argument, which on the point referred to, I should
suppose it impossible to mistake, or that it could lead to the
question proposed by " W."
His question, No. 4, would seem to imply that I had stated
that our farmers were not enjoying a fair share of prosperity.
He will find that I said no such thing, but only that they
seldom accumulated wealth at all in comparison with those
engaged in other pursuits. I stated that a producing community would be poor, compared with one that was engaged in
manufacturing and mechanical pursuits. Does "W." doubt
it? If so, I refer him to our own Southern States as a striking
example of the truth of my remark. It may be said, in their
case, that slave labor is naturally unprofitable, but that by no
means accounts for the difficulty, nor affords reason to suppose
that the result would have been very materially different, had
they employed white labor instead of the African race, and in
this connection I would state a fact which will no doubt be a
surprise to many.  By a statistical table recently prepared
and published in the New York Tribune, it appears that,
throwing out all the manufacturing and mechanical productions of the North, of which the South has scarcely any, the
agricultural products of the free States exceed those of the
slave States by more than double the whole cotton and tobacco
crop of the country, that is, by over two hundred million dollars, the hay crop alone being far greater in value than the
cotton crop.
Now my object has been to show that what the South is
with reference to us, our whole country will be with reference
to England to the extent to which we give up our own workshops and look to her as the great workshop that is to supply
us. The policy of England has been to protect everything
that a British hand could make, until she has become the richest and most powerful nation upon the globe, and is able to
control the commerce of the world.




24
Long years of protection have brought her manufactures to
such perfection, and produced such an accumulation of capital,
that she no longer fears competition, especially from us. She
is now, therefore, ready to open her ports and to invite us to
free trade, well knowing that free trade can bring her only the
cotton which she must have, and provisions to feed her population, but can bring nothing to interfere with that great source
of her wealth, her manufacturing and mechanical industry.
While she can supply us with railroad iron, broadeloths, and
a thousand other articles that pay her large profits, she is
quite willing to take our cotton and our grain, if we can send
it cheaper than it can be obtained from the Danube or the
Baltic. It has seemed to me, therefore, that our true policy
lies not in the direction of free trade to which we seem tending,
but in one directly the opposite to it. It is true, as " W." says,
that the arguments in favor of a protective tariff are old and
trite, but they may not, therefore, be the less true and important. Free trade is older than all tariffs, and belonged, no
doubt, to the earliest and most primitive states of society. It
is a natural state of things; and so is savage life, which
accumulates no wealth, nor does free trade accumulate or
create a particle of wealth; it is a common carrier, transporting the wealth of one nation in exchange for that of another.
It is a mutual accommodation, but by no means a mutual
benefit. The lion's share belongs to the party that has most
effectually protected its mechanical skill and industry, and
has, therefore, the greatest number and variety of articles to
send in exchange for produce, or the raw material it requires.
Such is the condition of the two great European powers with
reference to ourselves.  They are now for the first time united
to control the destinies of Europe; and we may hereafter find
it convenient to be independent of them really as well as
nominally. Instead of increasing oar duties, which should be
our first and chief object, we are engaged in reducing them, and
crying out free trade. It is said that " whom the gods would
destroy they first make mad."




FREE TRADE AND HARD TIMES.
The value of the principal articles imported into the port of
New York, during the year 1854, was as follows:
Segars,.....  $5,935,521
Coffee,.                           14,600,782
Steel and Iron,....  24,978,609
Tin,......  10,892,444
Lead,......   5,181,516
Hardware and Cutlery,..   9,648,501
Hides,......  13,139,780
Liquors,.....   6,270,674
Railroad Iron,....  12,295,248
Molasses,.....   2,565,233
Sugar,....  24,376,258
Tea,......  20,269,504
Tobacco,....   1,963,364
Watches,.....   9,055,023
Wines,..              5,686,642
Dry Goods,.                       77,952,733
CASH DUTIES ON IMPORTS, 1854.
January,....  $4,379,285
February,....   2,867,295
March,.....   3,627,120
April,.....   3,168,490
May,......   3,243,164
June,....   2,452,606
July,.....   4,045,746
August,.....   5,214,629
September,....    3,439,498
October,...               2,402,115
4




26
November,.                        1,751,023
December,.                        1,516,850
Total,.....         $38,107,816
I cut from the New York Herald the above statement, showing the enormous extent of the foreign trade of New York,
and showing also the immense sums we are paying for articles
that we have the means to make, or existing in countless tons
under the surface of our own soil.  Among these articles,
it will appear that we imported into New York alone, in
1854Lead, to the amount of..  $5,181,516
Steel and Iron....  24978,609
Railroad Iron..  12,295,248
Hardware and Cutlery..   9,64S,501
Dry Goods.....  77,952,733
It appears also, that we exported in part payment for this,
thirty-seven million one hundred and fifty-seven thousand
two hundred and thirty-eight dollars in specie and bullion.
Such facts would seem to carry their own arguments with
them, and it would seem, should open our eyes to the operation
of what we call Free Trade, the effect of which is perhaps too
little understood.
Free trade produces nothing; it makes nothing; it creates
no wealth, not a particle of it; it developes no resources. It
simply exchanges the wealth of one nation for the wealth of
another. That is all. Most useful to be sure it is, but in the
use that is made of it by our modern politicians, a greater fallacy was never broached. If the two nations were on an equal
footing, free trade might answer for both parties, though it
would add no wealth to either. If the two parties are not on
the same footing, as is the case with England and ourselves,
then it is obvious that the principal share of the advantage
belongs to her.
Let us take an example: I am a farmer, and raise wool,




27
and having concluded to send three thousand miles to have it
made up into cloth, 1 send say two pounds of it to be made into a
yard of broadcloth. The broadcloth when done, having employed some dozen operatives in the different processes of its
manufacture, each of which pays a profit, is worth say three
dollars and fifty cents. The two pounds of wool are worth say
one dollar. I have then to pay two dollars and fifty cents
more for the manufacture. I find that I have only four pounds
of wool left, so I send that and fifty cents in cash, which is all
the spare change I can raise, and if I find it not convenient to
raise the money, give my note for it.
The four pounds of wool are taken by the manufacturer
and worked up into two yards more of cloth, which he sells
for seven dollars; making in all eleven dollars as the result of
my fifty cents cash and six pounds of wool, for which I get
three dollars, taking pay in broadcloth. I have the yard of
cloth, however, and 1 feel greatly pleased with it, as was the
vicar's son Moses with the gross of spectacles with shagreen
cases. This free trade I think is a grand thing. My neighbor's broadcloth mill may now go down, and welcome, for all
I care, since I can do better than to look to him for what I require to clothe me.
As time rolls on, however, I find that I am each year less
able to furnish the wool and the money, because by withdrawing my support from my neighbor's mill, I have cut off my
own supplies, by destroying the only market I had for all the
rest of my produce. The foreign manufacturer I find will
take my wool, but not my potatoes, or my turnips, my butter,
or my beef, nor my squashes, or pumpkins, or apples, or hay,
my poultry or my pork, all of which I could sell to my neighbor when his broadcloth mill was running, while the shoes
that I made up in the winter were needed by the workmen,
about a hundred of whom are now unemployed, and of
course cannot buy of me, nor of any one else. I find that I
have made but a bad bargain of it, and that it would have
been far better for me to have paid my neighbor a little more
for his cloth for a short time, thus enabling him to get under




28
weigh, after which he could give me a better and cheaper
article than I have purchased abroad, pay me a good price for
my wool, and take his pay for the labor he bestows upon it in
MY WAY, SO that I could sell my produce and keep my fifty
cents in my pocket, which would help me to buy a turkey for
Thanksgiving dinner.
My neighbor,'Squire H., who has set all our folks by the
ears upon the subject of free trade, told me I should buy where
I can buy cheapest; but I find that what seemed cheapest at
first turns out to be dearest in the end, and that I am very
much in the condition of the Irishman who said he could buy
potatoes in his own country for ten cents a bushel, the only
difficulty being that he could not get the money to buy them
with.
This is free trade, and it would seem to require no argument
to show which party is getting the benefit of it. This is the
new theory that is recommended as a substitute for our former
practice of protecting and cherishing our own industry, and
depending on home-made goods for our use and consumption
-thus keeping our money at home. We are advised, especially by those who are in the interests of England, to do away
with those restrictions that hamper trade. England, having
protected her industry until she fears no competition from us
in what constitutes the great source of her wealth, opens her
ports and invites us to free trade, which means, only, freedom
to send our produce, when she cannot buy it elsewhere, and
take in return her iron, cloth, and other articles which issue
from her great laboratory of wealth. She offers us a dangerous gift. " Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes," (I fear the Greeks
when they approach us with gifts,) was the warning of
Laocoon to the Trojans, when the Greeks proffered the gift of
a wooden horse filled with armed men. His counsel was not
listened to, but the sons of Troy, pleased and delighted with
the gift, set themselves to work, and soon the fatal horse ascended the Trojan walls, though four times the clash of arms
was heard to issue from its hollow sides; and so fraud accomplished what force had failed to do.




29
We may find the gift of free trade somewhat like that of the
Trojan horse. We have warning, if we will listen to it. The
clash of arms comes to us from the hollow sides of free trade
in the shape of twelve million dollars sent abroad for railroad
iron, to make which would have employed thousands of our
own people, built up forges, and developed the rich mines that
lie scattered over the country; it comes to us in the shape of
nine million dollars for cutlery, twenty-four million dollars for
iron and steel, five million dollars for lead, and seventy-eight
million dollars for dry goods. It comes to:us from Rhode
Island, where the last broadcloth mill has closed its doors;
and from the city of New York, where the laboring classes
are holding meetings, and calling for employment, which they
cannot find, and the merchants looking out for every mail to
bring accounts of protested notes and heavy failures.  We are
so closely connected and dependent on each other, that no
great interest can suffer without dragging down others in its
train, reminding us (to continue the figure,) of those lofty
palaces of ancient Troy, fired by the treacherous Greeks:
" The Palace of DEIPHOBUS ascends
In smoky flames and catches on his friends.
UCALEGON burns next."An efficient tariff would soon put a new face upon every interest and upon every business man, for there is hardly any
interest that does not require it. Confidence would spring up
to take the place of that distrust and apprehension of the
future, which has hung like a leaden weight upon the country
for the last five or six years, during all which time we have
read over and over again the same old story of better times
coming, but which have never come, and never will come
until we go to the root of our difficulties, and adopt a policy
that will place us on some footing of equality with our great
commercial rival, who is crippling us and draining us of our
resources; until we remedy that fatal mistake of 1846, when
we checked the growth of our rising manufactures, while we




30
have been pouring out our millions to sustain those of foreign
nations.
Having beaten John Bull in a fair fight in the field and on
the sea, it would be a little remarkable if he should overreach
us in a trade, and we find ourselves not quite so shrewd as we
have the credit of being: if, by means of his agents at Washington, New York, or Boston, assisted by visionary theorists
of our own, he should succeed in blinding our eyes withk the
false lights of Free Trade, so that we can no longer see the
things that pertain to our true growth and national independence.
The truth is, we could easily employ millions of laborers
more than we have in developing the boundless and unequalled
resources of the country, if we were wise enough to reject the
fallacious theories of free trade, and return to what is called
the exploded doctrine of protecting ourselves.
My present purpose is to trespass no further upon the indulgence of your readers. In what I have said in regard to England, I would be understood not to counsel a jealousy or any
unworthy feeling. Very far from that should be the sentiment
we entertain towards the land of our origin and the bulwark
of European liberty; but we can look out for our own national
interests and entertain towards the elder branch of our family
a generous rivalry, not unworthy to exist between members of
the same household, engaged in the same pursuits, and each
pursuing by different paths his own peculiar destiny.
If I have said any thing to awaken and call attention to the
subject that has been discussed, my purpose will have been
answered, and whatever may be the result at Washington, I
shall not reproach myself with indifference, supineness or disinclination to make at least an effort, however humble, to give
the policy of the country what has seemed to me a right
direction, and the only one that can bring to us returning
prosperity.




31
FREE TRADE.
Your paper of Saturday contains an article by "W," in
which he comments on some of my previous communications.
Many of his remarks, I doubt not, are just, and they present
a fair statement of the view he takes of the subject we have
discussed. I do not think, however, that he quite meets the
difficulties I have suggested. He says: "We have no fears
for our manufacturing prosperity, with all our industry, inventive genius and skill, provided the currency is kept in a sound
state, &c." But if the system that called those manufactures
into existence, and has sustained them, is to be abandoned,
why should we have no fears 3 Few of them can stand alone,
and still fewer could ever have arisen against the tremendous
competion of Europe, by the natural process and gradual progress that " W" suggests. Many of our manufacturing establishments can hardly live now, and it is because there has
seemed to me to be great fears for them that I have undertaken
to make some suggestions in regard to the past and present
policy of our government in regard to them. I do not think it
extravagant to say that we are now a third, if not a half a
century in advance of what we should have been without the
protective system; and when it is proposed to abandon it and
return to free trade, it would seem that some very good reason
should be given for such a change.
" W." alludes to California, and agrees with me in the views
I have suggested in regard to that State. California is a goldproducing State, and of course a poor one, and will remain so
until agriculture and manufacturing take to a large extent the
place of gold-digging. We send out our goods and keep her market constantly crowded, drawing away every dollar that is dug
from the earth, and should do so if the amount was ten times
greater than it is. The gold is brought to New York, stays there
a day or two, and is then shipped where it belongs, to the great




32
manufacturing centre, where it goes to pay English workmen
and swell the amount of English capital. Why so? Why because by our tariff of 1846, aided by the ad valorem system,
which encourages fraudulent invoices, we turned ourselves to
a certain extent into a sort of California to England. She
crowds our markets, as we do those of California, takes all the
produce and money, and everything we can raise, and the end
of the year finds us still in debt to her.
Now, does it require a great deal of argument to show where
all this will lead us? If our manufactories are declining, or
stationary, and no new ones springing up-our tariff still
further reduced, and so as to weaken them still more, and,
finally, in many cases, to destroy them, while we are sending
everything we can raise, produce and money, to pay for such
enormous amounts of foreign goods, paying profits to the
foreign manufacturer instead of our own-can it be pretended
that we are in a prosperous condition? Having giving up the
real source of our wealth, is it not probable that we shall become less strong, and more dependent upon our foreign factors,
who are making their profits out of us? That such must be
the case seems to me certain. c" W." says truly, that the laws of
trade are invariable as the course of the planets in their orbits.
No cry of "C all's well," or of:" good times coming," can avert
the inevitable result. No theories about gold, whether or not
it is an article of merchandise-no theory of expansion or contraction of the currency-or of long or short credits, can reach
the difficulty, which lies deeper than all these occasional and
temporary evils which are found in every business community.
Such derangements always occur, and, like our own intemperance or excess, they are soon remedied, provided the blood
flows in recuperative energy to repair the waste; but when
our political Sangrados opened, in 1846, a vein from which the
blood has been slowly oozing ever since, they struck at the
very source of health and strength, which can only be restored
by stopping the leak, by binding up and healing the wound.
Until that is done, the currency will be deranged, and the




33
various troubles that affect our national prosperity be aggravated rather than cured.
So far as we give up our manufactures and buy abroad because we can buy cheap, so far we find ourselves in the condition of the farmer whose case I supposed in my last article,
who soon found that however cheap he could buy his goods
abroad, he became gradually less able to pay for them, because
he thereby withdrew his patronage from his neighbor who
made the same goods, and who was thus enabled to buy of
the farmer the various products of his farm. The cheaper we
buy the foreign goods the worse it is for us, for the reason that
our own industry, which is the source of our wealth, is so
much the more discouraged, and our ability to pay becomes so
much the less.
No nation can be whole in itself, no nation can be rich or
strong, and no nation can therefore be in any just sense independent, that looks to foreign nations for its supply of those
articles that are the product of manufacturing or mechanical
industry and skill. Such a nation may produce grain, or tobacco, cotton or rice, gold or diamonds; but the wealth on
which depend the arts of peace as well as the sinews of war,
it cannot have. All the producing countries in the world could
hardly support the English army in the Crimea during a
single campaign. Yet they furnish the material and foundation upon which others build up the fabric of national wealth
and power. Such was our condition at the opening of the
revolution, when we bought everything of Great Britain. We
succeeded in that struggle not because we were strong, but because we had a Washington and kindred heroes, who were
fighting upon their own soil, and at an immense distance from
the enemy's country, who for years supported armies and fleets
three thousand miles from home, while our own soldiers were
treading their own soil half clothed and barefoot.
This doctrine of free trade was not born of the common
sense of the country by any means. It is the offspring of party,
and grew out of the unfounded and wholly mistaken views of
interest taken by our Southern States and acquiesced in by
5




34
Northern politicians for party purposes, and so our great industrial interests are sacrificed by the very men who should
have protected them. I have before attempted to show that
the protective policy benefits the South as certainly, if not to
the same extent, as the North, by affording to them, after a
short time, the protected articles cheaper than they would
otherwise have been obtained, and by accumulating wealth,
strength, and independence for the whole country, in which
the South has at least an equal interest with ourselves.
If the South would break down the prosperity of the free
States, she must suffer with them. Whatever diminishes the
wealth and strength of the North diminishes that of the South,
and if our Southern neighbors would build up the interests of
England at our expense, it must also be at their expense as
long as they have an acre to defend, and as long as they remain under the stars and stripes, that our united prosperity
and strength have caused to'be respected in all lands and upon
every sea. We are one nation, and each section is benefited
directly and indirectly by the growth and prosperity of the
other. This it is to be hoped our Southern friends will some
day come to see and to realize, and that the sectional jealousies
that now so agitate the country will give place to better feelings, and more just views of national policy.
An article appears in yesterday's paper from  1" Merchant,"
also referring to the position I have taken. It would give mle
pleasure to meet him   face to face," as he suggests, and we
might perhaps be found to agree better than we now do. He
will see in what I have said to-day, the answer I should make
to his theory of the currency. Is it not possible that he may
attach more importance to that subject than it deserves, and
that it leads him to a partial rather than a comprehensive view
of our great industrial interests 3 It must be of more consequence to us whether we allow England to use us as she does
the South American States, Turkey or the East Indies, as a
market for her goods, thus crippling our industry as she does
theirs, than whether we use one or another kind of a dollar as
the measure of values. It would seem to require but half an




35
eye to see that to a new country like our own, free trade is
death, and that our only chance of maintaining a position of
relative strength and safety is to be found in prohibitory duties on such articles as our own industry and skill can produce.
The same remark will apply to the well written article of
your correspondent c" C." I would merely say in reference to
that article, that such ingenious, if not fine spun theories of
currency, seem hardly necessary when the cause of our
difficulty stares us in the face whichever way we turn, and
for which we hold in our hands a very simple remedy that we
can apply whenever we choose to do so. Instead of legislating
as in 1846, for Great Britain, we have only to legislate for ourselves, and we shall do well enough, and have no occasion to
speculate upon the relative value of our dollar and that of
Germany or of other European nations, except as a matter of
curiosity or of laudable research.
In taking leave of this subject, I have only, with " W.", to
express the hope that our discussion may not have been entirely without its use. Time, which it is said, proves all things,
will no doubt show which of such opposite opinions is more
nearly correct,-and a few years hence, should we be living,
it may be a matter of interest to us to refer to the views we
have thus expressed, and to see how far results shall have
verified our predictions.




36
FREE TRADE.
An article in your paper of the 19th, over the signature of
"' Commerce," refers to my assertion that " free trade creates
no wealth," as a sweeping one, and inquires how it consists
with the increase of ship-building since the Tariff Act of
1846.
In the first place I would say, that a large portion of that
increase is due to the opening of the California trade, which
has called for a large amount of tonnage, and is the right kind
of free trade, because it is carried on between ourselves.
In the second place, suppose that the tariff of 1846 had the
effect to increase ship-building, is it certain that it has thereby
added to the wealth of the country, especially if those vessels
have been employed in exchanging our cotton and grain for
English broadcloth and railroad iron; and considered, too,
with reference to the permanent value of the vessels whose
number has been thus increased 3
I suppose " Commerce" will hardly consider it a' "sweeping',"
or "C wholesail" assertion, to say that, with the protective policy, we have three sail upon the ocean, where without it we
should have hardly had two, for the simple reason that the
population and wealth to sustain them would have been wanting. Now suppose with the idea of benefiting commerce we
abandon that policy. The effect at first is of course to stimulate ship-building, but in the end ships must share the fate of
those interests, on which they depend.  In destroying the
tariff then, it is evident that we do but destroy the goose that
has laid the golden eggs. General prosperity is as essential
for shipping as for other interests, and though we may have
thus built more ships than usual in a short space of time, yet
they may be found to have less value than a smaller but increasing number would have had, under a system that favored
the development of our internal resources, and added largely




to the aggregate of our wealth and population. In the result,
then, is not my statement in the main true, even with reference
to what might seem the exceptional interests of shipping?
The experience of " Commerce" will perhaps suggest to him
some facts which favor this theory, which I cannot but think
will be found a correct one.
It is a curious fact that in 1816 Mr. Webster opposed a
tariff (advocated and supported by Mr. Calhoun), because
the interest of New England was supposed to lay in its commerce, while that very policy which he thus opposed because
it might injure our shipping, has whitened every sea with our
whalers and merchantmen.
" Commerce" inquires, C" what has given America the finest
mercantile marine in the world3"  I answer, A PROTECTIVE
TARIFF.
If we can build ships and sell them abroad, that is certainly
a great gain so far as it goes, and a great credit to us, considering the cheapness with which foreign vessels are built, but
can hardly be considered an offset to what we lose otherwise.
I have endeavored to show that especially in a new country
like our own, free trade is ruinous to all interests, and that our
only chance of relative strength and safety lies in protective
duties upon those articles that our own skill and industry can
produce.
I have wished, if possible, to arouse our people from the indifference and apathy into which they seem to have fallen on
a subject of such immense and such vital importance as the
one I have discussed. Because we have run along a few years
under the headway we had before obtained, we must not therefore conclude that we shall continue to do so. When the propelling force has ceased to act, we must become stationary, or
drift with this free trade current far from the port we had in
view, and were hoping to reach.
The theory upon which a protective tariff is based is wholly
sound, and has never been nor ever can be refuted.  The
argument is so simple and so plain, that it is not easy to see
how it could ever have been questioned.  Almost every intel



38
ligent merchant or artisan we meet will say the same thing;
and yet by reason of our Southern views of the inequality of
a tariff, aided by a large political party at the North, and
helped on by all the influence that English agents could bring
to bear at Washington, as well as by jealousies of our own,
we have committed the folly of lowering our duties, just when,
if we made any change, it should have been to raise them.
We have thus thrown ourselves open, to be used like the Canadas, as a consuming country for English manufactures, and
to that extent placed ourselves in the position of those and
other colonial possessions of Great Britain, and all this while
we manifest the greatest jealousy of that power. We open to
her a market for one to two hundred millions of her goods,
paying large profits, thus keeping her in strength and growing
in wealth, while we have it in our power, if we choose, to
check her at once most certainly and most effectually, and at
the same time protect and build up ourselves, and do no
injustice to her or to any individual or interest at home.
The Southern planter, the New York importer, and the
Boston shipowner have an equal interest in a protective tariff.
The first because it gives him a great and rapidly increasing
market for his cotton, and helps keep up the price of the remainder in the foreign market, gives him his goods cheaper
and better than he could ever otherwise obtain them, and adds
in a rapid ratio to the general and common wealth of both
North and South, in which the latter has perhaps the greatest
interest, if not (from the nature of her pursuits) the largest
share.
The importer is benefited by being able to pursue a legitimate and honest business, which is not ruined by unprincipled
foreign agents and fraudulent invoices under an ad valorem
system, and a market crowded by foreign manufacturers with
their surplus stocks. His customers, too, though they may
buy less, are likely to pay, because they are acquiring the
means to do so. The shipowner is benefited, of course, by
whatever helps to increase the wealth and population, or the
consuming power of the nation. He can only carry to those




39
who can consume and pay. Thus we might go through with
every pursuit or employment that can be named, all of which
depend one upon the other, and none of which can stand
alone, or say I have " no need of thee."
How strange that at this day it should be necessary to
argue such a question as the expediency and necessity of a
protective tariff. Time, however, will demonstrate that necessity as assuredly as it will bring the returning seasons in
their order. We have great and unparalleled natural resources, which, together with the large and increasing flow of emigration to our shores, and the wonderful skill and ingenuity
of our own people, keep us from noticing the gradual decline
of our manufactures (the main.spring of our wealth) and the
advantage that England is gradually but surely gaining over
us. But though it takes years to break us down and to overcome the indomitable energy of our race, yet the time must
come under the present system, sooner or later, when we shall
witness that result, and that time some of our legislators at
Washington seem desirous of hastening as fast as possible, and
of helping our great rival to accumulate out of us new stores
of wealth, and to increase her strength at our expense, so that
she can continue to control the world with her fleets and armies, as she does by her commerce; a commerce built up by
her vast manufacturing establishments, pouring their riches
into every portion of the habitable globe.
The benefit we get in this immense trade is to send all our
produce and our last dollar to pay for what we could have
made at home, and taken the profits of the manaufacture, instead
of throwing those profits away, or giving them up to a foreign
nation, which is getting rich out of us, while we are hardly
able to bring the year about, continually in debt to our rich
factors, and becoming every year more so. Yet we have those
who tell us that this is all right, it is a healthy and natural
state of things. I beg to be excused from holding any such
opinion. It is a healthy state of things for those who are
reaping the profits, but not for us out of whom they are made.




40
We may raise as many questions as we please about currency, or a natural instead of an artificial growth, credit system
or any other system, the great fact still stands and will stand,
that while we buy our manufactured articles abroad, paying
in produce, we are falling into the rear and must continue to
do so to just the extent that what we buy is more valuable
than what we pay; one pound of cotton will make four yards
of cloth, one of which pays us for the cotton, and the other
three are left to the foreign manufacturer to pay his labor with
part of it, and to swell his profits by sale of the balance in
foreign markets. It should not take a Yankee a very great
while to find out how such a trade must result, and it is no
very great compliment to his sagacity that he is willing to sit
down contentedly and solace himself with the idea that this is all
right, that we do well enough, and grow gradually and naturally. He will wake up some morning and find that it is not
all right, but all wrong, and that other nations have stolen a
march on us while we have been amusing ourselves with
theories of free trade, such as we might suppose our friends on
the other side of the water would throw out to us as a sort of
"tub to the whale," while they proceed to c" fasten to" and' lay us alongside," and thus secure a rich prize for themselves.
It is to be hoped that the question of a protective tariff may
be considered an American question, if there is any suc'<, by
the American party that has just sprung up; and that they
will take it out from between the upper and lower millstones
of the two great political parties, where it has been so long
ground and crushed, so that it may be discussed and decided
upon its own merits-a fate which attends so few of the great
questions of our day.




41
FREE TRADE.
I observe an article from "Merchant," in your paper of the
1st, in which he argues against a tariff and in favor of the free
trade policy, but I can hardly think with as much success as
has attended some of his former communications. He says we
have never had such prosperous times as since 1846, and at
the same time refers to railroads that have had neither freights
nor passengers, which is too true of our own. Now, there is
certainly some discrepancy here. If they have not had freight
and passengers, there must be some reason for it. Railroads
are, perhaps, the truest thermometers by which to ascertain
the prosperity of a community; and does "Merchant;' believe
that, with our old tariffs, our'roads would have been in their
present condition  We have built too many at once, no doubt,
but, with new manufacturing establishments springing up
along their lines, they would have paid handsomely and been
now good property. The difficulty was, we began to build
them when we had commenced to destroy what was to support
them, and made it almost impossible to finish, and save them
from entire loss.
No people need expect productive railroads, that send abroad
in one year from twelve to fifteen millions of dollars to pay for
the iron of which they are made. Such an amount of money
laid out at home, would have given us better railroad iron, (as
the American is said to be,) and at the same time build up a
population that could bring both "freight and passengers " to
the roads, when they were completed. No better illustration
of the operation of a tariff could be found than is afforded by
our railroads. In 1852, we imported iron and manufactures of
iron to the amount of $1S,000,000, and in 1853, $27,000,000,
and in 1854, $2S,000,000. If such facts as these fail to open
the eyes of our people, the case may well be considered a hopes
6




42
less one. I see, however, that the New York papers are at
last waking up to this subject. The New York Times of February 2d, contains an able editorial on the ruin that free trade
is bringing upon us, and the necessity of protection, while the
Tribune of the same date has an article in which its free trade
cotemporary, the Journal of Commerce, is reminded of "' contributions received from a Manchester fund for establishing " a
sound public opinion in America " upon the subject of free
trade.  (Very considerate on the part of our Manchester
friends, to be sure, and we have profited much by their instruction.) The writer also suggests to the free trade organ that it
will find honesty to be, in the long run, the best policy.
What the real prosperity of the last few years has been, will
be perhaps better known when the books are all posted and
the accounts closed up. Had I seen the railroads prosperous,
and new establishments springing up through the country, I
should have concluded with "Merchant " that we were in a
flourishing condition, but as it is, I believe it will be found that
no great amount of wealth has been added to the country, but
much has been taken away, while the California business and
an immense foreign importation, have given an appearance of
prosperous times, rather than the reality.
" Merchant " says that " the failure of A. B. & C., and the
depreciation of paper securities in no way affects the " solid
wealth of the country;" a very just remark, and the same may
be said of expanded or contracted currencies, of long or short
credits, and a variety of other things that begin and end with
ourselves. It is our foreign business that affects the "s solid
wealth of the country," and that perhaps   Merchant" may
yet come to realize better than he now appears to do.
I quote from his article as follows:-" Profit and Loss will
say that protection furnishes employment to a large number,
and creates a home market for the farmer, &c. If this theory
be a correct one, I suggest that government protect the whale
fisheries, by preventing the manufacture of gas." But that
would be partial or special legislation; it would be giving preference to one interest at the expense of another, and a very




43
different thing from legislating for our own at the expense of
the foreizgn article. The question, I suppose, is whether our
true policy should not be to pay something more for our New
Bedford oil, than for a foreign oil, about which I should think
there could hardly be a doubt, and the same with gas if that
could be imported, and not whether of two things which we
possess, government should undertake to discriminate in favor
of the one and against the other. The " gas." therefore, introduced by'" Merchant," fails, as it seems to me, to illuminate his
subject as much as might be expected from an article that
usually sheds so much light upon every thing about it.
In one of my former articles I have taken to illustrate the
operation of free trade, the case of the farmer who sent abroad
his wool and took broadcloth in pay for it. There are many
ways in which the same thing may be shown.
Take for instance the case of a shoemaker and a hatter, and
suppose the duty on foreign shoes and hats to be thirty per cent.,
making with freight and charges fifty per cent. protection on
those articles.  The hatter pays his neighbor six dollars
for a pair of boots instead of four dollars, but he sells to the
shoemaker a hat for six dollars, instead of four dollars. Each
pays the other fifty per cent. more than the cost abroad, but
neither of them could buy the foreign article at the less price,
having nothing to pay for it with.  They can pay each
other, and what the one pays more for a hat in consequence
of the tariff, the other pays more for the shoes. Both parties
are gainers of course, because they have employment, create
wealth, build up their neighborhood, educate their children,
and support the minister.
Suppose, however, we have no tariff, and the foreigner sends
over his hats and his shoes at four dollars a pair. The shoemaker and hatter can no longer work at their trade, and cannot of course buy the foreign hats or shoes, however cheap.
What then can they do? Turn farmers, very well. Suppose
we all turn farmers, who will buy our produce. The foreigner
will not take it in exchange for his shoes or hats, except our
cotton which he cannot do without, and some of our grain at




44
a price that must compete with the almost pauper labor of
the Provinces on the Black Sea, or the Baltic.  Of the great
variety of the farmers' produce, the foreigner will hardly take
two or three articles, and who is to buy the rest, since all
other mechanical pursuits have shared the fate of the hatter
and shoemaker, and of course are no longer consumers to the
farmer, but producers themselves.
It is said, however, that a man who makes neither hats nor
shoes loses by the tariff, because he could buy cheaper abroad.
But who is he that could buy cheaper abroad? Is it the minister or schoolmaster, who rely on the hatter and the shoemaker for their salary, or the mechanic who is building them
a house, or the storekeeper who sells to them, or the workmen
they employ? how are all these going to buy abroad, if the
very act that gives them the opportunity thus to buy, destroys
the business of those on whom their living depends?
It must not be forgotten, also, that the hatter and shoemaker,
having a fair chance for the exercise of their ingenuity and
skill, soon invent labor-saving processes, and by accumulation
of capital bring down the price of hats and shoes to five dollars, and finally to four dollars, as is the case now with some
of our coarse cottons. This is the result, then, of our protection, and in the process of realizing it, we have built up villages and cities all over the country.
This argument holds with every pursuit and calling in the
country, North and South. Suppose the cotton planter pays
for a time twelve cents per pound for cotton cloth instead of
eight.  He is paying it to his neighbors who are building
mills and creating wealth, who are helping the price of his
cotton by giving him two markets instead of one, and helping
those that will give him a home and a sure market for such
other articles as his plantation produces. The fact is, however,
that after a time he has all these advantages, besides actually
buying his cotton cloth cheaper than he could ever have obtained it but for a protective tariff.
A tariff is a very simple process for putting us on an equal
footing with those old countries that have so perfected their




45
manufactures, and have labor so cheap, that they can undersell our manufacturers or mechanics in our own market. Of
course our first step should be to find some such process,
because on these interests depend our wealth. We find a very
easy way, and a perfectly just one, which is to keep out the
foreign goods for awhile, and give to our own people our home
market. If A. has to pay a nominally higher price for a hat
in consequence, he also, gets a nominally higher price of B, for
a pair of shoes which he makes, and so on through every
trade and pursuit. It is clear that this is no hardship to any
one, but a great gain to all, in every point of view that can be
taken of it. That a measure so necessary for our protection,
and so simple and perfectly equal and just in its operation,
should have been misunderstood, can only be accounted for
by the fact that, for one reason or another, great pains have
been taken to confuse the public mind on the subject.
A tariff is represented as unequal, especially by the cotton
planter, and one reason given is, that he pays more than his
share of the public tax which is raised out of protective duties.
But he pays this tax only on such foreign articles as he buys,
and the consuming power of the South, especially for foreign
luxury is very small, compared with the North. It would
take several Slave States to consume as many articles of foreign luxury as the City and State of New York. The South
pay perhaps less than their share of the public burden, rather
than more.
So long as we buy of each other and so build up ourselves,
it is of little consequence what prices we pay as compared
with the foreign prices, because we are all moving together
and growing rich together, but when we undertake to go
abroad and neglect our neighbors because we can buy at a
nominally less price, we commit the greatest mistake, because
we thus diminish our ability to buy at any price. We can
much better afford to buy of our neighbors who patronize us,
at six dollars, than of the foreigner at four dollars; and so we
shall soon find that we have entered upon a course that must
make us poor. There can be no doubt of this, and the wonder is that it should require to be argued to a man of common




intelligence, of common shrewdness, in looking out for his
own interest.
A protective tariff is a matter not only of choice and expediency, but of necessity, in view of our youth and of the progress other nations have made in the arts, and it is to us, now
a question of self-defence; but not only so: it is a question of
the highest expediency, and I have no hesitation whatever in
asserting that the doctrine of free trade is a fallacy and a
delusion, viewed as an abstract question, and without any
reference to the existing state of things.
Suppose all nations were on an equal footing and starting
again in the race, what would be the policy of each. Most
certainly the very first thing to be done would be to secure
the foundation of national wealth and strength in the only
way it could be done, that is, by protecting and building up
each for itself its own industrial pursuits, mechanical and
manufacturing. That done, other things would take care of
themselves, questions of currency would settle themselves as
of banking and of credits, commerce would flourish by carrying not for a poor producing country, but for a rich one, such
articles as could not be produced or made at home. This is
the true use of commerce, or we might rather say it is the condition of its existence. No poor people ever had or ever can
have a flourishing commerce. The two things are of course
contradictory and incompatible.
Free trade, then, in the common use of this term, is false
and fallacious, not only for us in our present condition, but it
is so as a theory, to be adopted if we were to begin anew, if
such a thing were possible. It is false every way and has no
foundation whatever, except in the brains of speculative philosophers; and yet it is urged for one reason or another upon the
most practical people the world has ever seen, and by many
of them accepted as it were in very contrast to themselves,
their lives, pursuits, and everything that belongs to them.
Such incongruities might surprise us if our nature did not
constantly exhibit them in a great variety of shapes. One
half of the voters in Lowell are made to believe that it is for
their interest to vote against their employers and against a




47
policy without which Lowell would have had no existence,
and New England not half its present wealth and population.
The most practical man is often the most speculative in his
philosophy, and will be found advocating a course exactly the
opposite to the one he applies to his own affairs, and in direct
opposition to his interests. Such seems the only philosphical
account of the rise and progress of the free trade doctrine
among a people to whom free trade is ruinous, to just the extent in which it is adopted, and inures only for the benefit of
our old enemy, who has furnished the staple of our political
harangues, and against whom we have launched our fourth
of July thunders, for the last half century.
Unfortunately for the last twenty years, our policy seems to
have been not to create but to destroy; not to build up but to
pull down. This has been done with the idea of breaking
down monopolies as they are called, and destroying the influence of capital.
The result is just the reverse of the one anticipated. To
destroy capital is to destroy labor, and as the country is made
poorer, the distinction between the capitalist and the laborer
becomes greater, and the chance for the latter to rise above
his condition becomes less. This is the inevitable result of
hard currency and free trade doctrines, the former shutting
the door to the young man with no capital, thus leaving the
field open to the capitalist, and the latter destroying the means
by which the poorer classes were enabled to accumulate and
become gradually independent.
The credit system against which we have heard so much
for the last few years, is the breath of life to the man of moderate means; but the capitalist has no need of it. He can do
without it, and his money becomes of more value to him, and
gives him greater influence and power in proportion as the
rising competition of credit is destroyed. In such a state of
things the rich become richer, and the poor poorer, and power
is added to wealth, instead of being taken from it, by the very
means that were taken to produce the opposite result. One of
the great arguments for the destruction of the U. S. Bank and
erecting the Sub-Treasury upon its ruins, was, that it would




48
tend to break down the credit system. So far as it has had
that effect, just so far has power been added to the capitalist
and taken from the poorer and laboring classes.  "; Save me
from my friends," however honestly they may have acted,
may well be said by those classes, in view of our free trade
and hard currency legislation, which was designed for their
especial benefit, but which inures to the benefit of interests
very different from their own.
That we may see, temporarily, better times and an easier
money market, than at present, there is no doubt, but if I am
not mistaken, as soon as money becomes easy, away will go
orders for foreign goods, or they will be sent over on manufacturers' account; exchange will rise and specie go forward,
as we have seen it for the last two years, bringing back the
same state of things we have had, and it will be fortunate for
us if it be not worse. We may keep from sinking by constantly pumping out the ship, but it would be wiser for us to
stop the leak which has been for some time gaining upon us.
I ought perhaps to apologize to your readers for again appearing at such length, but the subject has led me on further
than I intended. It may not be necessary to say that if I have
spoken lightly of free trade or its advocates, it has been with
no personal application whatever. Many, no doubt, with
"Merchant," honestly hold such opinions, but they may be
mistaken, and to prove that they are mistaken, I have endeavored to show that their theory in its application to ourselves is
without foundation, either in reason or experience, while to
nations that have attained the position of England or France,
free trade is not only safe but sure to be profitable.
It is said to have been remarked by Sir Robert Peel, that in
England he should be in favor of free trade, but in this country he should of course favor protection. A very honest confession, which contains in fact the sum and substance of the
whole matter that we have discussed. A sober second thought
will, it is to be hoped, bring us to understand our own interests,
at least as well as they were understood by that eminent English
Statesman.




49
COMMERCE OF THE UNITED  STATES.
The Journal of Commerce publishes the following," full and
reliable statistics," derived from official sources, of the foreign
commerce of the United States for the last fiscal year, in connection with the returns and other statistics for several prior
years.
Imports into the United Statesfrom Foreign Ports.
Year ending                       Specie and
June 30.   Dutiable.    Free Goods.    Bullion.    Total Imports.
1845   $95,106,724 $18,077,598  $4,070,242 $117,254,564
1 846    96,924,058  20,990,007   3,777,732 121,691,797'
1847   104,773,002  17,651,347  24,121,289 146,545,638
1848   132,282,325  16,356,379   6,360,224 154,998,928
1849   125,479,774  15,726,425   6,651,240 147,857,439
1850   155,427,936  18,081,590   4,62S,792 178,138,318
1851   191,118,345  19,652,995   5,453,592 216,224,932
1852   183,252,508  24,187,890   5,505,044 212,945,442
1853   236,595,113  27,182,152   4,201,382 267,978,647
1854   272,546,431  26,327,660   6,906,162 305,780,253
The increase in the imports during the last year was less
than for the previous year: the total for the year ending June
30th, 1853, was $55,033,205 in excess of the year next before
it; the total for the last year shows a further increase of
$37,801,606.
Exportsfirom the United States to Foreign Ports.
Year ending  Domestic             Specie and
June 30.   Produce.  Foreign Produce.   ullion.    Total Exports.
1845   $98,455,330  $7,584,781  $8,606,495 $114,646,606
1846   101,718,042   7,865,206   3,905,268 1 13,488,516
1847   150,574,844   6,166,754   1,907,024 158,648,622
1848   130,203,709   7,986,806  15,841,616 154,032,131
1849   131,710,081   8,641,091   5,404,648 145,755,820
1850   134,900,233   9,475,493   7,522,994 151,898,720
1851   178,620,138  10,295,121  29,472,752 218,388,011
1852   154,931,147  12,037,043  42,674,135 209,658,366
1853   189,869 162  13,096,213  27,486,875 230,976,157
1854   215,157,504  21,661,137  41,422,423 278,241,064
7




There is a discrepancy in several of the official tables, owing,
we believe, to the addition of soine items from California after
the statements were partially completed; but the result in
each is essentially the same.
Of the specie exported as above, $38,062,570 was of domestic production. The excess of exports of specie over imports
of specie for the last year was $34,516,261.
We annex the following comparative summary of the imports into the United States of some leading articles of foreign
production and manufacture:
Year 1852.  Year 1853.   Year 1854.
Woollens,....... $17,348,184  $27,051,934  $31,119,654
Cottons,........   18,716,741   26,412,243   32,477,106
Hempen goods,...    343,777      433,604      59,824
Iron and manfa'sof,  18,843,569   26,993,082   28,288,241
Sugar,.........  13,977,393   14,168,337   11,604,656
Hemp..........        164,211      326,812     335,632
Salt,..........    1,102,101    1,041,577    1,290,976
Coal,........  405,652   488,491      585,925
We also annex a comparative statement, showing the value
of the exports of breadstuffs and provisions, and the quantity
and value of cotton exported, with the average value of the
latter per pound:
Year ending Breadstuffs and        COTTONS.
June 30.   Provisions...                 Av. price
Pounds.      Value.     Cents.
1845    $16,743,421   872,905,996 $51,789,643    5.92
1846     27,701,121   547,558,055   42,767,341    7.81
1847     68,701,921   527,219 958   53 415 848   10.34
1848     37,472,751   814,274,431   61,998,294    7.61
1849     38,155,507 1,026,602,269   66,396,967    6.04
1850    26,051,373   635,381,604   71,984,616   11.03
1851     21,948,651   927,237,089  112,315,317   12.11
1852     25,857,027 1,093,230,639   87,965,732    8.05
1853     32,985,322 1,111,570,370  109,456,404    9.85
1854     65,901,240   987,833,106   93,596,220    9.47