SPEECH 
 
 MR. JOHNSON, OE MARYLAND, 
 
 THE TARIFF. 
 
 Delivered in the Senate op the United States, July 25, 1846* 
 
 WASHINGTON: 
 
 PRINTED BY JOHN T. TOWERS. 
 
 1846. .... 
 
SPEECH 
 
 MR. JOHNSON OF MARYLAND. 
 
 Mr. President : But for the very important character of the measure now 
 submitted to the judgment of the Senate, I should not venture to participate 
 in the debate. If the subject was of ordinary character and interest, em¬ 
 bracing but few topics and admitting but few illustrations, I should have been 
 restrained, as well by respect for myself as for the Senate, from taxing its 
 time and patience further ; for all must be conscious who had the pleasure 
 of hearing the honorable Senators from Maine and Massachusetts, (Mr. Evans 
 and Mr. Davis,) who have preceded me, that, as far as the particular ques¬ 
 tions they have spoken to are concerned, the whole matter has been ex¬ 
 hausted. Bringing to the discussion great accuracy and fullness of knowl¬ 
 edge, and applying it with the most consummate ability, whoever undertakes 
 to follow them may well despair enforcing anything they have said. 
 
 It is my purpose, therefore, to avoid altogether, as far as I may be able, 
 the ground thus ably occupied. In what I am about to offer I propose to. do 
 by considering under three distinct heads the effects ofthe bill now before us— 
 
 1. I shall, in the first place, inquire into the principle of the bill. 
 
 2. I shall proceed to show, in a way which has not yet been attempted, 
 the practical effect of the bill on the domestic industry and on the laborers 
 of the country. 
 
 3. And I shall, irf the third and last place, bring forward some facts not 
 as yet presented, to show that, assuming as correct the estimates submitted 
 to us at different times by the Secretary of the Treasury, from the beginning 
 down to that which he sent us yesterday, or adopting those which the chair¬ 
 man of the Committee of Finance laid before the Senate, or those which I 
 understand have been submitted by the chairman of the corresponding com¬ 
 mittee in the other House, the bill will not produce an amount of revenue 
 sufficient to meet the wants of the country. 
 
 In the first place, then, I propose to inquire into the fundamental principle 
 of the bill. I understand it to be founded on the opinion maintained and laid 
 before Congress and the. country by the President of the United, States, in 
 his annnal message at the commencement of the present session, and by the 
 Secretary ofthe Treasury, in his annual report—that Congress possesses no 
 constitutional power to protect the domestic industry of the United States, 
 either directly, by the taxing power, or by any other power through the ex¬ 
 ercise of the taxing power. It is very true, Mr. President, that the present 
 chairman of the Committee of Foreign Relations, the distinguished gentle¬ 
 man from South Carolina (Mr. McDuffie) said yesterday that, neither in this 
 
4 
 
 debate, nor at any other time on this floor during this session, had the ques¬ 
 tion been mooted or tiic power denied ; yet I am sure that I should be doin? 
 that honorable gentleman great injustice and the other friends of the bill 
 equal injustice, if I should assume that this declaration was intended to be 
 understood as a concession, on his or on their part, that such a power did 
 exist. But, however that may bo, both the President and the Secretary of 
 the Treasury, in the discharge of their respective duties to the nation, have 
 recommended to ns a bill even more objectionable than the present, on the 
 very ground, amongst others, that there is not in the Constitution any au¬ 
 thority, expressed or implied, under which the industry of the 
 protected, in whole or in part, either directly by the taxing po 
 other power to be exerted by means of the taxing power. 
 
 Now, Mr. President, it does appear to me passing strange mat, at ims 
 period of our national existence, in the year 1846, iifty-seven years since 
 the Constitution was adopted, it should bo officially declared by two such 
 high officers of this Government that it possesses no authority to protect our 
 own labor—the industry of our own citizens—against restrictions imposed 
 by foreign legislation, and imposed to injure it; that we have no power to 
 defend our own industry against the countervailing duties of other nations, 
 no matter how destructive they are found in their practical results, nor how 
 clear it may be that they were levied lor that very end. 
 
 Mr. President, if this opinion be well founded, then there is no such pro¬ 
 tective power any where within the limits of the United States ; for, if it be 
 not in the General Government, we are entirely without it. So far as my 
 reading and my knowledge extends, the value of any nation’s industry can 
 be protected against the rival industry of other nations only by the exercise 
 of this very taxing power ; and the result is, that, notwithstanding the power 
 which has been exerted and is now exerted by all the other Governments of 
 the world for the encouragement and protection of their own commerce and 
 of every variety of their own industry, and however effective and advanta¬ 
 geous such protection may have proved, we, the people of the United States, 
 are in possession of no such power, cither in our General Government or in 
 our respective State Governments. That is the clear and undeniable con¬ 
 clusion ; and if it be so, then it is equally clear that we arc independent but 
 in name ; if it be so, then are we in a state of colonial vassalage, laboring 
 under all the evils of that condition, but without any of its countervailing 
 benefits, if there be any ; if it be so, then I aver that we are still colonies, 
 and colonies of England, without enjoying the advantages of such assistance 
 as a mother government might, in her generosity or by her interest, be dis¬ 
 posed to confer upon us. 
 
 But is it so, Mr. President! Are we without a government, so far as re¬ 
 lates to that most important of all other powers—the power of protecting our¬ 
 selves against the legislation and the rival labor of other nations of the world ? 
 A,glance (and it shall be but a glance) at the condition of things subsequent 
 to the Declaration of Independence and prior to the adoption of the present 
 Constitution, and for sometime immediately succeeding it, will bring us to a 
 ■correct result. 
 
 . ,So long as we were colonies, our industry could be most effectually pro¬ 
 tected, either by the power of the British Parliament to enact countervailing 
 laws for the benefit of their colonies, or by enacting laws authorizing the 
 colonial governments to pass such countervailing laws. This power was 
 exercised from time to time and advantageously. But we passed from the 
 
5 
 
 colonial state ; we declared ourselves independent; we achieved our inde'- 
 pendence in many a well-fought battle field, and a seven year’s war ended 
 in the recognition by the mother country of these United States as affree and 
 independent nation. The war of arms was thus caused to terminate. In 
 that war of arms we came off victorious, and in the joy of our hearts and in 
 the glow of our patriotism, thought that we had conquered for ourselves in¬ 
 dependence in fact as well as in name. But what at once succeeded ? Great 
 Britain, who had failed to subdue us by force, commenced upon us a war of 
 commercial regulations—regulations which were intended to secure to her 
 own subjects advantages over and to the injury of the people of the United 
 States in all the various pursuits of human industry. What was the effect ? 
 Our trade languished ; our public and individual credit rapidly declined ; our 
 national and individual debts largely increased, and we found, to our amaze¬ 
 ment and dismay, that, so far from enjoying the happiness, the plenty, and 
 the wealth which wo had promised ourselves in the peaceful employment of 
 our own labor, under the protection of a free and independent government 
 of our own choice, we were even worse off, in these particulars, than we had 
 been before our independence was accomplished. 
 
 From the date of the treaty of peace down to the year 1789, the state of 
 the country became absolutely'insufferable. How was this attempted to be 
 corrected ? The States of the confederacy, in the exercise of their sover¬ 
 eignty, first, each State for itself, and secondly, by the combination of sev- 
 oral States, attempted, by a system of countervailing imposts and other com¬ 
 mercial regulations, to redeem the dilapidated condition of the industry of the 
 country, to revive its credit, and to restore its general prosperity. Virginia 
 thus interfered ; Maryland thus interfered; Delaware thus interfered ; other 
 States thus interfered. But what was still the practical result? Each of 
 these States having authority only over its own ports, could not prevent free 
 importations of goods into the ports of the other States: and goods thus im¬ 
 ported duty free would, in spite of every attempt to prevent it, find their way 
 into the consumption of those States where these same goods had to pay duty. 
 Thus the attempt to which portions of the country, under distress and emer¬ 
 gency, had vainly resorted, utterly failed, and it failed not because the means 
 which they employed were not in their own nature sufficient, and would not, 
 if universally employed, have effected all that was hoped for and all that 
 was needed, but precisely for the want of power to make their operation 
 universal. I speak, sir, but the truth of history when I say that it was 
 this very difficulty, this very imbecility to which I have just referred, that 
 brought the Federal Constitution into existence. The new Federal Gov- 
 eminent, among other great and wholesome powers conferred upon it, was 
 endowed with the power to regulate commerce and to lay duties and imposts; 
 and at once, and by the exercise of these two important prerogatives, it was 
 enabled to accomplish that’which the power of the States had been inade¬ 
 quate to effect. The Constitution so came into being, and, at the time of its 
 birth, the entire South, the Middle States, and the Northern States, all held 
 the same opinion, not only as to the existence of the power in Congress to 
 encourage and protect by taxation American labor and American industry, but 
 as to the absolute necessity for its exercise. 
 
 In proof of this unanimity of sentiment, suffer me, Mr. President, to read 
 one of five memorials presented to the first Congress of the United States from 
 Boston, from New York, from Philadelphia, from Baltimore, and from Charles- 
 
<s 
 
 ton. I will read, sir, from a memorial signed by eight hundred and twenty- 
 six inhabitants of Baltimore : 
 
 To the President and Congress of the United States, the petition of the tradesmen, 
 
 mechanics and others, of the town of Baltimore, humbly shotveth: 
 
 That since the close of the late war, and the completion of the Revolution, your 
 petitioners have observed with serious regret, the manufacturing and trading in¬ 
 terests of the country rapidly declining, while the wealth of the people hath been 
 prodigally expended in the purchase of those articles, from foreigners, which out- 
 citizens, if properly encouraged, were fully competent to furnish. 
 
 To check this growing evil, applications were made by petitions, to some of the 
 State Legislatures; these guardians of the people, in several of the States, interposed 
 their authority; laws were by them enacted, with the.view of subduing, or at least 
 diminishing the rage for foreign, and encouraging domestic manufactures; but the 
 event hath clearly demonstrated to all ranks of men, that no effectual provision 
 could reasonably be expected, until one uniform efhcient government should per¬ 
 vade this wide extended country. 
 
 The happy period having now arrived, 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 pe¬ 
 titioners rejoice at the prospect this affords 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 as well 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 
 acknowledged 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 wise energetic government. 
 
 Your petitioners conceive it unnecessary to multiply arguments to so enlightened a 
 body as the one they have now the honor of addressing, to convince them of the pro¬ 
 priety and importance of attending to measures so obviously necessary, and, indeed, 
 indispensable; as every member must have observed and lamented the present 
 melancholly state of his country, the number of her poor increasing for want of 
 employment; foreign debts accumulating; houses and lands depreciating in value; 
 trade and manufactures languishing and expiring. This bejpg a feint sketch of 
 the gloomy picture this country exhibits, it is to the Suprenre Legislature of the 
 United States, as the guardians of the whole empire, that every eye is notv di¬ 
 rected ; from their united wisdom, their patriotism, their ardent love of their coun¬ 
 try, your petitioners expect to derive that aid and assistance, which alone can 
 dissipate their just apprehensions, and animate them with hopes of success in fu¬ 
 ture, by imposing 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 discounten¬ 
 ancing that trade which tends so materially to injure them, and impoverish their 
 country ; and which may, also, in their consequences, contribute to the discharge of 
 the national debt, and the due support of Government. 
 
 Your petitioners take the liberty to annex a list of such articles as are, or can 
 be manufactured in this place, on moderate terms; and they humbly trust that 
 you will fully consider their request, and grant them, in common with the other 
 mechanics and manufacturers of the United States, that relief which, in your wis¬ 
 dom, may appear proper. 
 
 I will not read the others, but they all hold substantially the same lan¬ 
 guage. The memorial from Charlestown was directed more particularly to 
 the subject of encouraging and protecting ship-building, and all the manu¬ 
 facturing industry employed in ship-building. These it prayed should be 
 encouraged by the action of the general Government. Accordingly by one 
 of the first acts of Congress, manufactures are mentioned in association with 
 other things, as objects which it was intended to protect by the passage of that 
 
7 
 
 ;act; this appears hi the very preamble of the law itself. It is in these words r 
 
 “Whereas it is necessary for the support of Government, for the discharge, of the 
 ■debts of the United States, and the-encouragement and protection op manu¬ 
 factures, that duties be laid on goods, wares, and merchandise imported.” 
 
 No man then doubted either the power, or the expediency, or the absolute 
 necessity of exercising it. The effect proved, and at once, the wisdom and 
 the patriotism ofthemen of that day. The resources of the country were devel¬ 
 oped, public and individual credit were restored, ourdrooping.energies revived, 
 and we started at once on a career of unexampled prosperity, which aston¬ 
 ished the world. From that day until a comparatively recent period, although 
 act after act was passed by Congress for the self-same purposes which were 
 avowed in the act of ’89, none, no not one, was found, with reputation, or with¬ 
 out reputation, to breathe so much as a doubt, far less to deny the power of Con¬ 
 gress, to grant such protection, or the propriety of granting it. And again, I 
 .speak but the truth of history, when I say that in proportion to the encourage¬ 
 ment and defence extended by these laws to the industry of the country, was 
 the improvement of the country. These protective acts continued to be passed 
 without dispute or question, from 1789 down to 1822. Some little doubt was 
 then, and for the first time, intimated in the State of Massachusetts, (at that 
 period extensively, and almost exclusively, engaged in commerce,) as to the 
 power. But there was not so much as a whisper of any such opinion from 
 the South, where unfortunately as I sincerely believe, for themselves, as well 
 as the whole country, such protection is now held by a portion of the people 
 to be not merely unconstitutional, but positively unjust and tyrannical. I 
 do not deny that this change in the opinion of the South is the result of honest 
 conviction, but still the fact remains that it is a change, a very great change, 
 an utter and radical change, of opinions long and patriotically maintained, 
 and long and beneficially carried out. 
 
 I shall not go into a history of the troubles which have grown out of this 
 difference of opinion, from the time it first manifested itself in the South, 
 down to the time when it proved so fruitful a source of controversy, discontent, 
 public agitation and alarm. Its effect has been to disturb all the elements 
 of our national industry. Congress has protected that industry one day, and 
 refused to protect it the next. One day it has been encouraged, the next day 
 stricken down. At length our domestic horizon was darkened by these lower¬ 
 ing clouds which arose previous to the Compromise Act, and threatened us with 
 the horrors of civil war. A distinguished Senator from Kentucky, (Mr. Clay,) 
 contrary to the judgment of many, but as the country admitted, from the purest 
 patriotism, recommended the passage of that celebrated law, and succeeded- 
 in carrying it through both Houses. It was then, and has ever since been 
 denominated the Compromise Act—but of what was it a compromise ? not 
 of the protective principle, not by surrendering that principle, or admitting 
 that the power to protect did not exist, but by determining, from a sincere con¬ 
 viction that such a course would be best for the manufacturing interest itself) 
 while at the same time it would avoid the awful calamities of civil war; that 
 the practical exercise of the power should not in the then condition of the 
 country, be carried beyond a defined limit. 
 
 The voice of pacification was heard from these walls; the warlike sounds 
 which threatened the shedding of fraternal blood were hushed. The North, 
 breathed freer, the men of the Middle States ceased to be dismayed, and the 
 men of the South rejoiced, and all had-cause to rejoice. For it is my sincere 
 belief, that if this Compromise law had not passed, and South Carolina hadL 
 
8 ; 
 
 not been satisfied, and if we had attempted by force to execute upon her the 1 
 laws of the Union, as would have been done, the end of this Government and 
 of our happy confederacy would have been. , 
 
 And now let us inquire what was the practical operation of that far r famed and. 
 patriotic Compromise Act? It resulted precisely as had been predicted, by some 
 in this unvarying fact, that just in proportion as the rate of duties descended 
 in the scale, did the general prosperity of the country fall and sink with them; 
 and when these duties had reached their lowest point, every man acquainted 
 with the history of that day, must admit that a scene of universal distress in 
 the South, as well as at the North, in the West, as well as at the East, over¬ 
 spread the entire country, to an extent never before seen. 
 
 And what were we to do? what did the patriotic statesmen of that 
 day resolve to do ? The credit of the Government was gone ; its accredited 
 agents who went to England to borrow money were, in London, and to the 
 disgrace of the United States, almost driven from ’change; we could not have 
 borrowed at the rate of sixty in a hundred; and while the public credit was 
 thus prostrate, our individual credit failed even in a greater proportion. Estab¬ 
 lishments which had cost millions, which had added tens of millions to the 
 public wealth, which had employed hundreds of thousands of industrious 
 hands, spread domestic comfort and private happiness all around them, were 
 sacrificed under the hammer, not only to the utter ruin of their proprietors, 
 but almost to the starvation of the operatives to whom they had given bread. 
 It was under this condition of things that the act of ’42, wliich the Senate is 
 now invoked to destroy, came into existence. The act was founded on the 
 principle, that the labor of the country was to be protected, and as a means 
 to this, that the capitalists were also to be protected; without whose money 
 the labor of the country could not be made to flourish. The law was passed, 
 and what has been the result? From’42, to the present period, when the 
 manufacturing portion of our community is thrown into general consternation, 
 by the fear that your new bill shall pass, what has been the state of the na¬ 
 tion ? I leave it to you, who are asking us to destroy this law, to say whether 
 the business of this country ever knew a happier or more prosperous period. 
 When was personal wealth better secured; private labor better rewarded, 
 and individual and public credit occupying a higher position ? Let any man 
 point me to a brighter period in our history. 
 
 And, Mr. President, is not the nation taken by surprise, when it finds that you 
 are in earnest in an attempt to repeal this law ? I know that it is easy for 
 gentlemen in the South to say that they would have been surprised if such 
 a bill had not been recommended, but if they will be as candid as their na¬ 
 ture prompts them to be in all other things, must they not, one and all, admit 
 that the supporters of the present Chief Magistrate in other portions of the 
 country have been equally surprised that such a bill as this has found its way 
 into these halls under his recommendation ? Must they not, as hones,t men, 
 admit, one and all, that, if Mr. Polk, when a candidate for the Presidency,, 
 with the frankness and manly independence which became him, had declared, 
 in advance, that such a bill as this should, if he succeeded, be passed under 
 his sanction, and by his influence, that he never would have been President 
 of the United States ? The Senator from Massachusetts took occasion this 
 morning to say that, when in Pennsylvania, during the last presidential can- 
 vass, he saw means resorted to (whether ignorantly or designedly) to mis¬ 
 lead the honesLand confiding democracy of Pennsylvania. I will here add 
 my testimony to the same effect. I have been myself witness once, if not 
 
9 
 
 oflener, to the same disgraceful exhibition. On my way to address a mass 
 meeting at Lancaster, in that State, I stopped at the town of Columbia, and 
 went into what I was told was a democratic tavern. On the wall of the bar¬ 
 room I saw a handbill, on which was printed, in large capitals, “ The tariff 
 act of ’42 to be preserved only by electing James K. Polk.” I wanted to 
 get possession of one of the bills to make use of it where I was going, and I 
 purchased one. 
 
 [Mr. Hayward. What did you give for it 1] 
 
 Mr. Johnson. I think I gave a quarter of a dollar, [a laugh,] but it was 
 worth more than that to Mr. Polk. It and tricks like it served to make him 
 what he is—the President. 
 
 [Mr. Dallas. I never saw the handbill,] 
 
 Mr. Johnson. If you never saw that one, sir, you must have seen several 
 very like it during the canvass. This handbill proclaimed to those whom 
 some of our friends on the other side of the chamber are fond of speaking of 
 as “the hard-fisted democracy of the country,” that there would be a meet¬ 
 ing at Columbia a few days afterwards, and urging them to come out in their 
 strength to hear the best men of the democracy explain the democratic tariff 
 of ’42—to hear that tariff vindicated from the mouths of men on whose in¬ 
 tegrity they could rely—men who were incapable of deception. Among 
 those “ best men” was, if I remember right, the present Secretary of State. 
 He was one of those who was to demonstrate to the confiding democracy 
 of Pennsylvania that the .Jariff of ’42 was a democratic measure ; that the 
 Whigs had attempted to defeat it, but could not, and who called upon them 
 to elect James K. Polk, that they might ensure the continuance of the tariff 
 of ’42, “ without the alteration of a letter.” 
 
 Now, I do not say that any honest man was engaged in such deception, 
 and I have only mentioned these facts to show that the people were deceived— 
 grossly, shamelessly, degradedly deceived—and I hazard the assertion that 
 no delegate from Pennsylvania will, deny that if, with the candor and manli¬ 
 ness which became him, Mr. Polk had written to Pennsylvania, avowing 
 that, should he become President of the United States, the tariff of ’42 should 
 not be suffered to stand a single session of Congress, he would, to this hour, 
 have remained James K. Polk. Well may the people of Pennsylvania say, 
 in their memorials, that they are astonished—that they have been betrayed 
 and shamefully defrauded; and well may they say that their only ray of hope 
 is found here, in the Senate of the United States ; and with no less truth may 
 they add, that that ray of hope proceeds from the Whig members of this body, 
 and almost from them alone. In the entire history of our party struggles— 
 in all the agitations of the political elements—in all our conflicts for power, 
 during every former period of the Government—never has there existed such 
 absolute, open, and vile deception as has been practised by Democratic 
 leaders and politicians on confiding Pennsyslvania. 
 
 I hear, or at least I see it said in some Whig papers, that Whigs have no 
 sympathy for her. That, sir, is not my case. I have sympathy, deep sym¬ 
 pathy for her. The people of Pennsylvania are an honest upright people, 
 simple-hearted and confiding, and they have been betrayed. They trusted, 
 find they have been deceived. They were prosperous and happy, and they 
 are to be impoverished. And all for what 1—for what 1 Why, to carry out 
 “ the revenue standard” of duties ! All because you have become suddenly 
 enamored of the principles of free trade. All promises made to Pennsyl¬ 
 vania, whether express or implied, are to be broken, scattered to the wind. 
 
10 
 
 Those promises were to be found in every hamlet and log-cabin in Pennsyl¬ 
 vania, in the shape of a letter written by the Democratic candidate, if not 
 written to deceive, at least deceiving. That letter, with all its soft and spe¬ 
 cious language, is now’ to be kept in the back ground ; and when those who 
 read and fondly believed it, now come here exercising their sacred privilege 
 as freemen, and lay their complaints before the Senate, that the protective 
 system is about to be destroyed, and their daily bread taken from them, they 
 are contemptuously told, in the columns of the Government organ, that they 
 could not have been deceived; that no man of common sense ever sup¬ 
 posed that, if Mr. Polk proved successful in the contest, he would not adopt 
 the principles of free trade as the leading principles of his Administration. 
 
 Hear what is said in the organ of the 17th instant. Commenting upon 
 some remarks of the Senator from Massachusetts, (Mr. Webstek,) the day 
 before, it says: 
 
 “Mr. Webster tells us that the present Administration are the most accom¬ 
 plished “ panic makers” in the country. Strange assertion, indeed, and it has no 
 other foundation than this : that the Administration and its real friends, and the 
 real friends'of the country, are carrying out a reform which has long been demand¬ 
 ed by a suffering people, which Mr. Polk has promised , and which it was known to 
 every man of sense in the coMMunitv would be carried out by the Democratic parly 
 the moment they came into power.” 
 
 I should not refer to the language of this editor, unless it had the stamp o f 
 at least a quasi Presidential authority; (and I think my friend from New 
 York over the way (Mr. Dickinson) will agree with me that this paper is 
 at least “ a quasi puMic document.” [A laugh.] 
 
 It was know'll, says the organ, to every man of sense that Mr. Polk wnts 
 no protective man, but, on the contrary, that he was a free trade man. 
 This is stultifying, at one blow’, all Democratic Pennsylvania. That is all 
 they get for w’orlung night and day in the good old Democratic cause. And 
 when her Senator comes here and presents the memorial of hundreds on 
 hundreds of his Democratic constituents, complaining of broken faith and 
 violated pledges, all he gets in reply is to be told, almost in words, upon the 
 President’s authority, that he and they w’ere fools. 
 
 But to proceed. I carried that purchase of mine to a mixed meeting else¬ 
 where, and I thought if I produced it there it w’ould be a taking thing. Ac¬ 
 cordingly, I spread it out upon the hustings, and told the people that I got it 
 in Pennsylvania; but I found it to be of no use at all. It made no impres¬ 
 sion—and why ? The Democracy were induced to believe that “ it w’as a 
 Whig trick “ that it had been gotten up to deceive the Democrats !” 
 
 And now what is the condition we are in ? I w’ould not speak words of 
 provocation—I do not speak in any offensive sense, but only as the Senator 
 from Mississippi (Mr. Sfeigiit) said a few days since, in “ a legal sense.” 
 (A laugh.) 
 
 If this tariff bill shall be passed how will it be done ? The bill came to 
 us last Monday week. A proposition was introduced to pursue the usual 
 course in this chamber by referring the bill, but that motion was voted down. 
 First, because the Finance Committee was not full. (Though it could have 
 been made full in five minutes.) And second, because the Committee w’ould 
 not have sufficient time to examine it, meaning, of course, that the Senate 
 would. What else? A week elapses, the Chairman of the Committee of 
 Finance at length appears and debates the bill with his usual ability and 
 courtesy. And what was the ground he assumed; simply this, lo show’ that 
 
11 
 
 it would raise sufficient money, and that the adoption of the ad valorem prin¬ 
 ciple would prevent frauds, and would put an end to the injustice perpetrated 
 under the former system; or to use his own words, would “ get clear of the 
 unjust, unrighteous, and villainous principle which marked the tariff of 1842, 
 and every other tariff lawthus slandering, virtually, all previous Con¬ 
 gresses, Whig and Democratic, from the days of Washington down. The 
 honorable chairman, however, touched only on the capacity of this bill to 
 raise sufficient revenue; and said he would leave all the other topics con¬ 
 nected with it to be discussed by his friends on that side of the chamber. I 
 had the Senator.from South Carolina (Mr, McDuffie) in my eye. He en¬ 
 tertains the opinion, and I know most sincerely, that the Constitutional ques¬ 
 tion is the main question involved in the bill, and I wanted to hear him dis¬ 
 cuss it. If I could have got the floor I meant to provoke him to defend it. 
 
 I wanted to hear him say that this principle of free trade had been distinctly 
 avowed by his own favorite candidate for the Presidency. 
 
 He had heard a speech made on our side of the chamber, and made with 
 distinguished ability, in which the Senator from Maine (Mr. Evans) tore to 
 atoms all the estimates of the Chairman of the Finance Committee, so that 
 he was compelled to admit that he had been in error to the amount of some 
 two or three millions. (But, in those days, that’s a small concern.} The Chair¬ 
 man said indeed it was a matter of little consequence; nor did it make much 
 difference whether the bill would raise much money or none at all; that, accord¬ 
 ing to the modern doctrine, is a question for the Administration alone';—that’s 
 their affair, not ours, nor the country’s. My friendfrom Maine after twodays of 
 scathing scrutiny, propounded certain questions to gentlemen on the other 
 side ; but no one on the other side would, it was said, debate the bill but one hon¬ 
 orable Senator. We adjourned. And when we met again that “ one” was not 
 ready. Then came the Senator from Massachusetts, (Mr. Davis,) and he 
 seemed to me to have annihilated every vestige of the bill. He pressed.them 
 again to discuss it, but the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. McDuffie) 
 appealed to the courtesy of his own side of the Senate to give me leave to 
 go on to-day. Then I was forced to infer that it was not their purpose to de¬ 
 bate it at all. Is not this most extraordinary 1 A bill which remoddles the 
 whole financial system of the countiy, which strikes down the prices of all 
 American labor; a bill which will cany dismay to the hearts of thousands 
 and hundreds of thousands of men through all the Middle and the Northern 
 States; a bill which is exciting the fearful apprehensions of tens of thousands 
 of those who agree in political sentiments with the majority here ; such a 
 bill to be suffered to pass without a word of explanation or vindication! 
 Are gentlemen dissatisfied with the details of the bill 1 Do they apprehend 
 that if it shall be discussed they may be forced to admit that it is so bad and 
 imperfect that it should not pass? What else keeps them-from speaking? 
 It is not that they have objections to speaking in this chamber; my friend 
 over there from Arkansas (Mr. Sevier) I know has no backwardness in that 
 particular. Are we not to hear from him ? Why this extraordinary and un¬ 
 exampled silence ! There can be but one reason—the bill cannot be vin¬ 
 dicated. 
 
 [Mr. McDuffie. It vindicates itself.] 
 
 Yes, it vindicates itself, and in two ways : it establishes two positions, it 
 vindicates the principle on which it is founded ; and on its own face I sup¬ 
 pose ; it proves, also on its fiice, how much money, to a dollar, will be raised 
 under it. But I think the honorable Senator is a little mistaken as to the 
 
12 
 
 principle of the hill being so very clear. But there is a position taken by 
 the Government organ concerning the operation of the bill, which is still 
 more startling than the bill itself, and that is, that it is a matter of no conse¬ 
 quence how much revenue it will raise ; whether one million or fifteen mil¬ 
 lions, or thirty millions, or not a dollar—to any body in the world but Presi¬ 
 dent Polk and his Cabinet. The paper of yesterday holds this language : 
 
 “The gist and burden of the whole attack upon the new tariff bill hitherto is 
 summed up in the general and sweeping assertion that the Administration, in 
 bringing forward this bill, is not taking proper care of itself. The bill it is said in 
 the first place, if fairly administered, will leave a deficit in the’revenue; and, in 
 the second place, that it cannot be fairly administered ; and so that deficit will be 
 enlarged by frauds. Now, in reply to this, we urge that these are matters in which 
 the opposition may, as we think, very properly leave the Administration to look 
 out for its own interests and take care of itself. If the Government measure is 
 about to injure the country—to break up the business of men and throw their af¬ 
 fairs into confusion; or, if again, the measure proposed by the Government is in 
 itself oppressive, or unjust, or unequal, or if the country want a tariff for protec¬ 
 tion, instead of a tariff for revenue—then it is very proper for an opposition, speak¬ 
 ing in behalf of the country, to demonstrate such to be the case. But our opposi¬ 
 tion seems to have a most parental and guardian anxiety lest the administration, 
 if left to itself, should hereafter find itself embarrassed by the want of funds. 
 Meaning no disrespect to any Whig gentlemen, we think they might spare them¬ 
 selves this anxiety till the Administration shall have proved itself incapable of 
 framing a f measure to raise a suitable revenue, and shall apply to them for their 
 ajd and counsel. 
 
 “ When the chancellor of the exchequer in England, or the minister of the inte¬ 
 rior in France, brings forward his budget, it is not usual for opposition members 
 and deputies to get up and say that the taxes proposed are too low, and that they 
 will leave a deficit in the revenue. On the contrary, the point which the opposi¬ 
 tion in those cases feel bound mainly to press, and the charge which it brings, 
 usually is that the taxes are too high, and that the people are unnecessarily bur* 
 
 “But with us the opposition sees fit to manage very differently. The Secretary 
 of the Treasury, acting under the direction of the Executive, frames a bill, which, 
 according to his estimate, will give to the Treasury a suitable revenue. The 
 Chairman of the Committee of Wavs and Means revises these estimates, makes 
 some alterations in the bill which he thinks are demanded by the interests of the 
 revenue, and reports the measure to the House. It passes that body, and is then 
 brought up in the Senate, without farther amendment, by the Chairman of the 
 Committee on Finance. It really appears somewhat strange that the opposition 
 should in this state of things rally upon the position that the bill does not tax the 
 people heavily enough, and that the Administration is not collecting money enough 
 to carry on the Government! 
 
 “ It is surely no answer to this te say that an issue of treasury notes is about to 
 be authorized to meet the expenses of the war. The new tariff looks to a perma. 
 nent, peace revenue. It should manifestly, in its permanent provisions, look to 
 nothing else. And the creation of a sufficient amount of such revenue is surely 
 a matter in which the Administration is abundantly interested to take care of itself. 
 It is odd that the opposition should be found crying out for heavier taxes on the 
 people, in order that the Administration may have more money to spend than it¬ 
 self sees fit to raise. 
 
 “The charge that the revenue will be defrauded under the new bill, is of the 
 same character. The first effect of. such fraud will be to embarrass the adminis¬ 
 tration. It is a matter for tlie/Administration to look to, and to guard against. 
 The Secretary of the Treasury will spare no pains to obtain in every port the 
 most competent and honest assessors. It is, to say the least, superfluous and gra¬ 
 tuitous kindness on the part of the opposition to argue at great length against the 
 
Government revenue measure, that it will cheat the Government out of revenue. 
 Have the Treasury Department and the Committees oi Ways and Meansand Finance 
 shown themselves so incompetent to do their own business, that they should thus 
 summarily be put under guardianship ? 
 
 Whether then the bill will lead to frauds or not makes no difference to any 
 body but Mr. Polk and his Secretary, Mr. Walker; they, possibly, may be some¬ 
 what embarrassed should the system work badly, but no body else has anything 
 to do, or say, or care iii the matter. If these gentlemen mean and are able 
 to make good to the Treasury all the losses it may sustain by fraud, then I 
 can understand why perhaps they alone have reason to concern themselves with 
 the operation of the bill. But if it is the nation who must make up the losses 
 and endure all the consequences, the ruinous consequences, of a want of rev¬ 
 enue, then it would seem to be the duty of Congress to inquire what will be 
 the probable effects of the measure ; and whether it will or will not produce the 
 adequate amount of revenue. Who says that it will ? Who has asserted 
 that it will? Nobody, but the Chairman of the Committee on Finance. 
 He said so, though rather doubtingly, and with several important admissions 
 of mistake. 
 
 But to proceed. Mr. President, let me ask the attention of the Senate, 
 to the new theory broached by the President and his fiscal officers, that 
 Congress has the power of protection only up to the point of a “ revenue 
 standard.” A revei me standard ? what is a revenue standard ? I do not like 
 to attempt its definition, and perhaps the only way to get at one, will be to 
 use the very words of the distinguished Secretary of the Treasury. He 
 
 “The whole power to collect taxes, whether direct or indirect, is conferred by 
 the same clause of the constitution. The words are, ‘ The Congress shall have 
 power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises.’ A direct tax or ex¬ 
 cise, not for revenue, but for protection, clearly would not be within the legitimate 
 object of taxation ; and yet it would be as much so, as a duty imposed for a simi¬ 
 lar purpose. The power is ‘ to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises.’ 
 A duty must be laid only that it may be collected ; and if it is so imposed that it 
 cannot be collected, in whole or in part, it violates the declared object of the granted 
 power. To lay all duties so high that none of them could be collected, would be a 
 prohibitory tariff. To lay a duty on any one article so high that it could not be 
 collected, would be a prohibitory tariff upon that article. If a duty of one hun¬ 
 dred per cent, were imposed upon all or upon a number of articles, so as to dimin¬ 
 ish the revenue upon all or any of them, it would operate as a partial prohibition. 
 A partial and a total prohibiton are alike in violation of the true object of the tax¬ 
 ing power. They only differ in degree, and not in principle. If the revenue limit 
 may be exceeded one per cent., it may be exceeded one hundred. If it may be ex¬ 
 ceeded upon any one article, it may be exceeded on all; and there is no escape 
 from this conclusion, but in contending that Congress may lay duties on all articles 
 so high as to collect no revenue and operate as a total prohibition.” 
 
 The President is a little more explicit. He tells us : 
 
 “ The attention of Congress is invited to the importance of making suitable modi¬ 
 fications and reductions of the rates of duly imposed by our present tariff laws. The 
 object of imposing duties on imports, should be to raise revenue to pay the necessary 
 expenses of Government. Congress may, undoubtedly, in the exercise of a sound 
 discretion, discrim nate in arranging the rates of duly on different articles; but the 
 discriminations should be within the revenue standard, and be made with the view 
 to raise money fur the support of Government .? 
 
 “It becomes important to understand distinctly, what is meant by a revenue 
 standard, the maximum of which should not be exceeded in the rates of duty 
 
14 
 
 imposed. It is conceded, and experience proves, that duties may be laid so high 
 as to diminish or prohibit altogether, the importation of any given article, and 
 thereby lessen or destroy the revenue which, at lower rates, would be derived from 
 its importation. Such duties exceed the revenue rates, and are not imposed to 
 raise money for the support of Government. If Congress levy a duty for revenue 
 of one per cent, on a given article, it will produce a given amount of money to the 
 treasury, and will incidentally and necessarily afford protection or advantage to the 
 amount of one per cent to the home manufacturer of a similar or like article over 
 the importer. If the duty be raised to ten per cent, it will produce a greater 
 amount of money, and afford greater protection. If it he still raised to twenty, 
 twenty-five, or thirty per cent., and if, as it is raised, the revenue derived from it, is 
 found to be increased, the protection or advantage will also be increased; but if 
 it be raised to thirty-one per cent., and it is found that the revenue produced at 
 that rate, is less than at thirty per cent-, it ceases to be a revenue duty. The pre¬ 
 cise point in the ascending scale of duties, at which it is ascertained from experi¬ 
 ence, that the revenue is greatest, is the maximum rate of duty, which can be 
 laid for the bona fide purpose of collecting money for the support of Government. 
 To raise the duties higher than that point, and thereby diminish the amount col¬ 
 lected, is to levy them for protection merely, and not for revenue. As long, then, 
 as Congress may gradually increase the rate of duty on a given article, and the 
 revenue is increased, by such increase of duty, they are within the revenue standard. 
 When they go beyond that point, and as they increase the duties, the revenue is 
 diminished or destroyed; the act ceases to have for its object, the raising of money 
 to support Government, but is for protection merely.” 
 
 See how this doctrine breaks down the whole domestic industry of the 
 country-. The President says, he has always been in favor of incidental pro¬ 
 tection, and he understands that to be the protection which a tax imposed 
 exclusively for revenue, gives to the manufacturer. Now- what is that tax ? 
 it is, they tell us, a tax to be limited to the wants of the Government, and 
 you are to look and see how much tax any particular article will bear, so as 
 to yield the largest practicable amount of revenue. That is the principle. 
 Well, if it is a sound principle, if it is the only constitutional principle, it will 
 be as sound and constitutional ten years hence as it is now. It is a prin¬ 
 ciple which is always to limit the fiscal legislation of Congress. Now let 
 us look at its practical operation upon the domestic industry of the country. 
 It seems to me, that its inevitable effect must be to strike it all down, in 
 illustration of this, take any taxable article, coarse cottons for example. I 
 will assume that we have now no tax on coarse cottons, that they are free 
 from duty, and that there is no competition here of a home fabric, how are 
 we to proceed that we may raise the largest practicable amount of revenue 
 on its importation. What is to be ascertained ? First—what is the amount 
 of their consumption in the United States. When we have ascertained this, 
 then how much tax they will bear without diminishing the present consump¬ 
 tion. These being found, we lay our tax, say, thirty per cent, ad valorem. 
 The people of New England, famous as we all admit them to be, for industry, 
 enterprise, and shrewdness, take it into their heads that they could make 
 the same article with the protection in the home market which a tax 
 of thirty per cent, on the foreign articles would give them; accordingly they 
 proceed to establish their factories; they produce an article as good, if not 
 better than the imported, and they make a heavy profit, perhaps more than 
 the ordinary average profit of business men around them; meanwhile, the 
 population of the country increases, the quantity of cottons consumed in- 
 creases with it, and the annexation of Texas increases the demand still fur- 
 
15 
 
 ther. As demand increases, factories are multiplied, until they have gone 
 on and invested a hundred millions of dollars in these establishments; thou¬ 
 sands and tens of thousands of operatives find good wages and constant em¬ 
 ployment ; the consumption of the country is supplied to the whole extent 
 that these factories can make ; and the domestic article vies with the foreign, 
 and is fast getting a-thead of it. What happens ? the Government gets into a 
 situation in which it needs more money; and what does the President say? 
 I want a hundred millions of dollars, and we cannot raise it, without making 
 as much out of foreign cottons imported as we can possibly get. Experience 
 shows, that under the tax of thirty per cent., foreigners do not supply our 
 market, that it discourages the importation ; we must diminish our tax, we 
 must tax foreign cottons to the revenue standard only, and what is that? 
 Why, the Secretary says, it is the lowest tax that will raise the greatest 
 revenue ; thirty per cent, is too high, it keeps out the foreign article; as long 
 as we keep on that tax, American factories will continue to rise. Millions of 
 dollars are invested; thousands of families have dedicated themselves and 
 capital to that branch of business, and they are contented and haypy, and 
 they are supplying the demand. This will never do, says the President and 
 his Secretary; we must bring in more foreign goods, wo must reduce the tax 
 so low that the foreign manufacturer can supply the whole demand; no sooner 
 said than done ; down goes the tax, and what is the result? Down go the 
 factories, down goes the price of labor; down falls the laborer and his de- 
 pendents upon his labor; down goes the agriculture of those who supply their 
 various wants; and down goes the wealth and prosperity ofthe nation. And why 
 all this ? Why, forsooth, because the only constitutional mode of laying taxes 
 is to make the tax the very lowest, which will bring the highest amount of 
 revenue. 
 
 Now let us lake another example. Let us take iron. Under the tariff 
 of ’42 the iron manufactures of the United States have grown up into a flour¬ 
 ishing condition, accumulating for their proprietors wealth, and spreading 
 around them extensive benefits to the country in all directions, Millions 
 have been invested on the faith of the tacit pledge that the system of pro¬ 
 tection was to continue. The tariff on this article was laid, I will assume, 
 to produce revenue, but the enterprise and skill of our people, availing itself 
 of the protection thus afforded, make a better and a cheaper article than that 
 imported, and an article which, in consequence of its low price and good 
 quality, is driving out the foreign article Irom the American market. Well, 
 what does the President say? He wants a larger amount of revenue from 
 iron. And how is he to get it? Congress, he says, has no constitutional 
 power to protect it directly by a duty, or even designedly to afford it inciden¬ 
 tal protection. It can lay a duty for the single purpose of raising money, 
 and in exerting that power Congress is only to inquire what money the Gov. 
 ernment wants, and how the amount can best be raised. The only question, 
 therefore, that they can legitimately look at is this. What amount of tax 
 will increase importation to such an extent that we shall get the amount of 
 revenue we want? The duty must not prevent importation in the slightest 
 degree, for the Secretary’s doctrine is, that a duty is equally unconstitutional 
 whether it prevents importation in whole or in part, because either way it is 
 contrary to the revenue standard. Well, the Secretary exerts his arithmetic 
 and figures it out. He finds that a tax on iron of fifty per cent, brings him 
 in but three millions of revenue. He needs six millions. He can’t get it 
 
by a tax of lilty per cent, because that tax keeps foreign iron out of the 
 American market, and just so far as it does this the tax is unconstitutional. 
 What, then, is he to do 1 Why he will try a tax of forty per cent. If lie 
 finds that that brings him the revenue required he lets it stand at forty, but if 
 that still leaves a part of the market to American competition, and prevents 
 to that extent importation, he lowers hi? duty to twenty per cent, and so 
 downwards till he finds the point where he gets the largest revenue, and that 
 is when the foreigner is able to supply the whole American market- Then 
 the Secretary cries—Eureka! I have got it! I have found the revenue 
 standard. 
 
 But what becomes of the American manufacture 1 It is prostrated, de¬ 
 stroyed. This is the new Executive doctrine, and this is its consequence. 
 The President and Secretary oppose a duty which has been laid by every 
 wise Government in the world to protect the industry of its own citizens. 
 Isolating himself, like Tiberius in his islands, the Secretary’s sole inquiry 
 is, How much money will the law bring me 1 If it supplies me with revenue, 
 I care not what falls or what stands ; what American interest prospers or 
 is annihilated ; what American labor flourishes or is destroyed. The same 
 illustration might be applied with proportional force to all the articles of 
 consumption or use whicli we can make and which arc protected by the ex¬ 
 isting tariff. 
 
 It behooves us, Mr. President, to look at the thing practically. When we 
 are asked to pass a new law, the first question with every wise legislator is, 
 How will it operate 1 Now, the favorite theory of the Government is, that 
 every man knows his own business best; that self-interest is the most effect¬ 
 ual application of all others to sharpen men’s wits ; that, whatever men may 
 think, or how they may differ on general subjects, each man knows what 
 hurts himself; and admit the general truth of the principle—and now what 
 do we see 1 Memorials coming up from the people, from day to day, im¬ 
 ploring Congress to pass no bill which shall operate to destroy our own in¬ 
 dustry. Gentlemen make no answer. They say it is a misapprehension ; 
 that the people suppose that protection enriches them, but that that is all a 
 mistake, for, on the contrary, it really injures them. But I turn gentlemen’s 
 doctrine upon themselves, and ask, Do not the people know their own busi¬ 
 ness better than political theorists ? This bill deals with labor, with the 
 labor that is employed on iron. It deals with those whom their professed 
 friends are continually talking about as the “ honest democracy.” It comes 
 among these men like a pestilence, bringing famine in its train. It carries 
 ruin to the furnace, to the coal-field, to the machine-shop, to the cotton-fac¬ 
 tory, to the tailor, the shoemaker, the hatter—to all forms and varieties of 
 human industry. Gentlemen say that it will injure none but the capitalist. 
 Indeed ! If you prostrate the capitalist, do you not, in the same blow, strike 
 down all who are dependent on him for employment ? The blow touches the 
 capitalist first, but it expends its desolating and destructive force on the la¬ 
 borers of the country. It strikes at wages. If it lets him live at all, it de¬ 
 grades him to the level of the serf labor of England, or. the still lower labor 
 of somei other parts of the world. It reduces free industrious American citi- 
 zens to one meal a day—to abject poverty—and when a man is brought to the 
 lowest poverty ; when the comfort of home is lost; when his happy Sabbaths 
 are gone ; when his half-clothcd children enter the Sunday school no more— 
 how long will it Ire before degradation will be followed by vice ? If it were 
 
17 
 
 the mere destruction of property, the havoc would then be great and fearful, 
 but it might be borne. But it does not stop there. It degrades men, and 
 by degrading, it demoralizes them; and to demoralize republican citizens is 
 to write the nation’s doom. The very life-blood of a free government lies in 
 the independence and virtue of its people. 
 
 I have before me a modern volume of high authority, which details the 
 wretched and starving condition of poor laborers in other countries. There 
 is no time to read it here, but let any gentleman cast his eye on the dis¬ 
 cript ions it contains of the squalid poverty, and abject degradation of those 
 foreigners who labor each day fur the food of that day, and scarce get enough 
 to sustain life. Are laborers like these fit constituents of honorable gentle¬ 
 men ? have these men the requisite intelligence to electa Chief Magistrate 
 of this gieat and powerful republic ? are they fit to sustain and carry forward 
 our system of repuplican institutions? Arc they the men to whom wo may 
 safely look to secure the blessings of freedom to us, and to our children? On 
 the contrary, does it not necessarily follow, that if your legislation reduces 
 the laborers of this country to such a level, that you thereby sap the only 
 foundation on which the liberties of this land can rest. 
 
 Look at Pennsylvania; in that great and powerful State, every department 
 of human industry is filled up, is occupied to the fiull with the exception of 
 manufactures. Agriculture is striving to make for itself a market. The 
 profits of the farmers are moderate. Where will be the constituency of the 
 Senator from Pennsylvania, if this bill shall pass ? I have before me, statisti¬ 
 cal tables, showing the number of hands who are engaged in the various 
 manufacturing establishments of the State. This bill goes directly to injure 
 every man of them ; while it destroys the wealth of the capitalists invested in 
 these establishments, it impoverishes and destroys the laborers by thousands. 
 We talk of war, and talk truly of the havoc it makes of human life, and the 
 desolation and misery which it brings into the bosom of families, but I say 
 with all sincerity, that the troubles growing out of our present war, are as 
 nothing, when compared with the individual and national losses and distresses, 
 which must inevitably follow the passage of this bill. It is an easy thing for gen¬ 
 tlemen holding seats in the halls of Congress, and who are in possession of all 
 the comforts and luxuries of life, who going from this city—the farmer, to his 
 farm ; the merchant, to his business ; the lawyer, to his occupation—it is easy 
 for such to talk with great calmness, about theories of policy, and doctrines 
 of political economy. We have enough ? No squalid poverty invades our 
 homes, no cry of want is heard in our dwellings, they are full of happiness; 
 but let us reflect, I implore you let us reflect, on the condition of the labor¬ 
 ing population, who are to be affected by what we do. Let us ask our¬ 
 selves, what is to become of the eight hundred thousand citizens immediately 
 engaged in the various branches of manufactures, and those four or five millions 
 of others who arc dependant upon their labor. They come here to the doors 
 of the Senate, and entreat you to save them from the destructive effects of a 
 measure, whose effects they well understand : a measure resting on theory 
 alone, uncalled for, and unnecessary, and fraught only with mischief. Re¬ 
 member that these laborers, many of whom are now your petitioners, with their 
 families, equal in number the whole population of this country at the time 
 our independence was declared. Why shall we, without necessity, and 
 against necessity, perpetrate an act which must annihiliate that national indus¬ 
 try, to which they owe all their comforts, their happiness, their very existence 
 
18 
 
 And what is all this ruin to be caused for ? It is because, as is alleged, 
 the tax which encourages our own labor obliges some of our citizens to give 
 more for commodities which they do not make, the tax being always added 
 to the price of the commodity, and falling upon the consumer. 
 
 Such is the plea. In the first place it is not true. The tax neither fan- 
 wholly on the consumer, nor wholly on the producer. The cotton planter 
 tells you that the tax you levy on fabrics made out of his cotton when worked 
 up is equal to a tax on his cotton; is equivalent to an export tax. Well, i:' 
 it is an export tax, then certainly it does not fall on the consumer. It can': 
 fall on the consumer and the producer lroth. ' Let me illustrate, England in:, 
 poses a tax on tobacco of four or five hundred per cent. Who pays that tax ' 
 Does the grower of the tobacco pay it ? or does the consumer pay it 1 They 
 can’t both pay the tax. If every man who uses tobacco in England is forcer 
 to pay four or five hundred per cent, on the price, of the article, because of 
 the impost, then clearly the tax docs not fall upon the grower: and if on the 
 other hand the grower gets his tobacco into England at a price less ih? 
 amount of the impost, it is equally clear that the consumer does not pay i;. 
 But the truth is that neither of them, exclusively, pays it. Its amount is a' 
 first shared between the producer and consumer, and in the end. as far as tin' 
 price is concerned, competition brings it down to what it would have bee.; 
 without the tax. 
 
 And now let me call the attention of the Senate to what the Secretary o' 
 the Treasury says that we do with the cotton we send abroad, and what wit'; 
 the cotton we sell at home, and then let us see why he prefers sending i 
 abroad to having it manufactured at home. I quote from his report : 
 
 “ At present prices, our cotton crop will yield an annual product of §72,000,000. 
 and the manufactured fabric §504,000,000, furnishing profits abroad to thou¬ 
 sands OF CAPITALISTS, AND WAGES TO HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF THE WOKEIN", 
 
 classes; all of whom would be deeply injured by any disturbance, growing out of 
 a state of war, to the direct and adequate supply of the raw material.” 
 
 Who gets the benefit ? We send abroad the raw material worth 72 mb- 
 lions, and by the process of manufacturing, its value it enhanced, says the 
 Secretary, to 504 millions. If that is done in England somebody in Eng¬ 
 land gets the benefit of the operation ; but if it were all done here, then some¬ 
 body here would get the benefit. Now, who is it that the Secretary wan*- 
 to get this difference in value ? Hear what he says, I give you itis own 
 words : 
 
 “ At present prices, our cotton crop will yield an annual product of 872,000,00 b 
 and the manufactured fabric §504,000,000, furnishing profits abroad to thou¬ 
 sands of CAPITALISTS, AND WAGES TO HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF THE WORKING 
 CLASSES.” 
 
 Now you have, the country will see, what it is the Secretary wants to tlo. 
 He wants that these profits shall be shared by the thousands abroad. That 
 is the now theory, that is the revenue standard, that is democratic in itis 
 view of the matter. Could there be a more clear, obvious, anti-American 
 policy. We, in the United States, raise a crop of cotton worth 72 millions, 
 capable of being made worth 504 millions. IIow is it to lie made 504 mil¬ 
 lions? By the process of being manufactured. And how is that to be done 1 
 The first thing is to vest capital in the requisite buildings and machinery, 
 the next to employ laborers. Here, then, is the employment of foreign cap. 
 
19 
 
 ital and foreign labor, and the fruit is to increase 72 millions to 504 mil¬ 
 lions ; an excess of 432 millions. Who gets it? The American laborer? 
 the American capitalist ? No, no ; according to Mr. Walker’s own statement, 
 that profit is furnished, and should be furnished, to “ thousands abroad.” 
 
 Is that democratic ? Yes, that is democratic; that is the essence of demo- 
 cratic wisdom; that is the quintessence of political economy; that is the ben¬ 
 efit we are to derive from progressive democracy—that progressive democ¬ 
 racy which goes beyond the United States, not confining itself to the limits 
 of our own country, [a laugh.] 
 
 Mr. President, I do not sec how it is possible there can be two opinions 
 as to the anti-national spirit and influence of such a system as this. We 
 are Americans ; wo have capital here—wc have laborers here. This Ameri¬ 
 can capital and American labor could just as well convert those seventy-two 
 millions into five hundred and four millions as English capital and English 
 labor. 'Whoever does this, enjoys the whole benefit of the difference. Let 
 that seventy-two millions go abroad, and hundreds of thousands of foreign 
 laborers are supported by those seventy-two millions of American cotton. 
 The Secretary’s philanthropic spirit is so enlarged and sublimated that it 
 takes in the whole world, and quite tbrgets home. 
 
 [Here Mr. McDuffie said something, not heard by the Reporter, about 
 Southern industry not being involved in the value of cotton.] 
 
 Mr. .Toiixsox’. I presume, if you raise cotton at the South, that somebody 
 must labor. The cotton, I take it for granted, does not hoe itself, nor pick 
 itself, nor go to market by itself. 
 
 I say again that the spirit of this comprehensive philanthropy, which seems 
 to rejoice so much in the profit that British capitalists and their army of 
 British laborers are to make out of a crop of American cotton, is, after all, 
 restricted in its energies to men beyond the Atlantic, and 'seems to feel no 
 reluctance or remorse at inflicting utter ruin on American capitalists and 
 American laborers. Now, I submit, Mr. President, that an American Sec¬ 
 retary of the Treasury would act somewhat more in character, if he turned 
 his benevolent gaze a little more on bis own fellow-citizens, and would be¬ 
 think him somewhat how he might multiply the comforts and secure the 
 prosperity of the hundreds and thousands of American laborers from whom 
 his scheme will take their daily bread. 
 
 But let us follow the Secretary a step further. His plan is to give to for¬ 
 eign labor the undisputed possession of the American market. To this end, 
 he lays a duty on foreign commodities the lowest that he possibly can con¬ 
 sistent with revenue. What becomes of that duty? Does it not go into the 
 English Treasury? Does it not contribute to support the British Govern¬ 
 ment ; to add to its revenue ; to increase its strength ; to support its aris¬ 
 tocracy ; to give splendor to its throne, and make England one of the fore¬ 
 most nations of the world ? The whole tendency of the Secretary’s scheme 
 is to add to the wealth of English capitalists, and to increase the prosperity 
 of English industry. Now, sir, if the tax is to be paid either by the pro¬ 
 ducer ar the consumer, (I speak of the whole extent of the tax,) I think, if 
 we are to buy British goods, increased in price by the whole amount of the 
 tax, it would be better policy for us to save that tax for our own Government, 
 and have it go into our own Treasury, rather than the Treasury of Great 
 Britain. In my poor apprehension, sir, it would be infinitely better to pur¬ 
 sue a policy which would enure to our own strength, our own honor, our own 
 
20 
 
 credit, our own prosperity, our own wealth, and our own industry, rather 
 than one which makes us tributary to those who have no common interest 
 and no common feeling with ourselves, at all times our rivals and competi¬ 
 tors, and who may, at any time, be thrown into open conflict and hostility 
 with us. The Secretary says, “ If our manufacturers consume four hundred 
 thousand hales, it would cost them twelve million dollars, whilst selling 
 the manufactured fabric for eighty-four million dollars.” 
 
 If we send them twelve millions of our cotton, and they work it up into 
 the value of eighty-four millions, as here alleged, it is, in part, as is said, 
 because we impose a duty which is added to the price. Does not the Sec¬ 
 retary see that, il'I buy an English tiibric, and his own theory lie right, I am 
 not only paying our own tax, but the lax also which the British Government 
 may have imposed on the fabric. He says that the tax goes into the price. 
 Shall we not, then, rather pay the tax to our own Government than to a for¬ 
 eign Government, which may be as far apart from ours in its doctrines as 
 the poles are wide asunder ? 
 
 False as this scheme is in principle, it is still worse in practice. While 
 it raises the price of every commodity which is produced by foreign labor, 
 it, at the same time, depresses and demoralizes the laborers of our own 
 country. Notwithstanding all the fancied new lights of modern times, it is 
 still admitted, I believe, as a maxim of political economy, of universal truth, 
 that every nation should, if it can, provide its own food, its own clothing, its 
 own habitations, and its own defence. Wars will continue to occur so long 
 as men continue to bo what they are now, and until, by some happy and su¬ 
 perior influence, their present natures shall lie changed. And are we to be 
 told that the twenty millions which now constitute the people of the United 
 States, and destined to increase (unless mistaken legislation shall strike 
 down their prosperity) in a greater ratio than any people ever multiplied be¬ 
 fore, and living under a Government which secures their rights better than 
 any form of Government that ever existed, must abandon the policy under 
 which they have thus become great, and put to hazard their ability to feed, 
 to clothe, to shelter themselves, and to vindicate their rights, on the sea and 
 on the land ! It is a great mistake to suppose that this is a question which 
 deals with the manufacturers only. Amongst the very first acts imposing 
 duties under this Government was the one passed on the Charleston memo¬ 
 rial. Our navigation laws protect, by heavy discriminating duties, the man¬ 
 ufacture of American shipping; but, does one man, or one class of men, 
 make a ship > Reflect on the various materials which are combined in that 
 wonderful production of human ingenuity, industry, and skill. One set of 
 men cut down and shape the limber ; a different set of men prepare the cable 
 and the. cordage: another elaborate the iron work ; another weave the. can¬ 
 vass : another make the sails ; and yet another roll out the copper by which 
 she is protected from the waves. Are these all capitalists 1 Are these over¬ 
 grown aristocrats ? Are these purse-proud manufacturers 1 Are these lords 
 of the loom, or are they laborers, whose prosperity grows out of their labor, 
 and whose labor, with all the prosperity and happiness which that labor 
 creates, is protected and encouraged by the existing laws ? Do gentlemen 
 forget the hundreds and the thousands who find employment in the construc¬ 
 tion and the navigation of our commercial marine ! 
 
 The Secretary's theory says that it is unconstitutional for Congress to lay 
 any duty whatever, the direct purpose of which is to protect American in- 
 
21 
 
 •dustry in preference to foreign, and lie holds it to be a right, and the only 
 sound policy, that all shall Vo allowed to buy where they can buy cheapest. 
 Now I ask gentlemen are they prepared to repeal the navigation laws ? Let 
 them answer aye or nay. I presume no man could answer in the affirma¬ 
 tive—but why not? You say it is-the right of the American citizen to buy 
 in the market where he can buy cheapest. This is the cardinal rule which 
 is to shape and govern all our policy in relation to trade and manufactures. 
 This is proclaimed as- the Democratic principle. Now, you all know full 
 well that you can get ships to transport your cotton to Liverpool cheaper a 
 great deal than you arc forced to pay for employing American vessels. 
 Why not, then, employ foreign ? Why . keep up your navigation laws and 
 maintain an odious monopoly in favor of American ship building. The 
 southern planter wants to send out his cotton as cheap as he can, his ob¬ 
 ject is to get as much money for it as he can, but your system of discrimina¬ 
 ting duties compels him to employ an American ship, and to pay a higher 
 freight. This must bo all wrong, if the President and Secretary are right. 
 Our navigation acts are most wicked laws, a disgrace to the statute book, 
 and never should have been passed. The South did not always think so. 
 Look at the memorial I referred to, addressed by the city of Charleston to 
 the first Congress. At the time of that memorial there was no government 
 which had power to extend protection to our own navigation. Wc had no 
 discriminating duty, and the consequence was that we were driven from the 
 sea. On all the broad expanse of the ocean the stars and stripes were rarely 
 seen, the fruits of American agriculture went abroad under the protection 
 of foreign flags. Cut how is it now 1 Why is it that our star-spangled 
 banner is seen, and known, and respected in every sea ? What remote part 
 of the ocean is not visited by our gallant seamen? How comes it that our 
 ships of war, and our fine commercial marine, arc enabled to traverse the 
 pathless ocean, and to bid defiance to the world? How happened it that in 
 the war of 1812 the heart of this nation beat fast and high with patriotic 
 delight when it beheld American skill and bravery proving themselves 
 a match for the then mistress of the seas. We owe this, we owe all of 
 it to our navigation laws, and to the principle of direct and exclusive pro¬ 
 tection, which they gave and intended to give to American capital and 
 American labor. Has this operated injuriously at the South? or have 
 they not participated largely and joyously in all the national glory which 
 thus came to be inscribed upon our naval annals ? No hearts beat higher 
 than southern hearts at the nows of our naval victories. The men of the 
 South in those days did not stop and calculate how much cent per cent, these 
 victories had cost them. These are calculations of modern times. A change 
 has come over the spirit of their dream. Now the principle of protection is 
 all wrong—all this has been done by the taxing power—it is all the result 
 of exclusive protection to American manufactures, and the South has, it now 
 fancies, most of the tax to pay, because it has the most produce to send 
 abroad. Why not, then, repeal these navigation laws ? How comes it that 
 Mr. Polk and Mr. Walker have sent us no recommendation to repeal them, 
 or to reduce them too to a revenue standard. How is it that those discrimi¬ 
 nating duties were laid, and laid avowedly for protection ? The Constitu¬ 
 tion says nothing about navigation laws any more than about a protective 
 tariff. Why, then, are not the one as unconstitutional as the other ? The 
 navigation laws have been passed under the constitutional power to regulate 
 
22 
 
 commerce. In the execution of that power you have improved your naviga¬ 
 tion, and the Supreme Court has declared that the power to regulate com¬ 
 merce includes a power to regulate the vehicle of commerce, and not only 
 so, but commerce itself. But if your doctrine is right, then I say again, you 
 must, to be consistent, repeal the navigation laws. They operate, according 
 to your theory, most oppressively, they keep out British and other foreign 
 ship builders. They have no regard to the revenue standard; and they for¬ 
 bid us to buy where we can buy cheapest. Let us, then, at once, subject 
 them to the revenue standard. And what is that ? Mr. Walker says a duty 
 of one per cent., if that will yield the most revenue. And how are we to 
 find out whether it will or not 1 Why just by lowering the discriminating 
 duty, and trying whether all the shipping of the world cannot be encouraged 
 to come into the ports of the United States. When this great national object 
 is attained, Mr. President, where is the American marine ? where the Amer¬ 
 ican ship builder ? where the American seamen ? where the means of glad¬ 
 dening the American heart on the ocean by the sight of the American flag? 
 Gone, sir, gone forever, gone try this newly invented and falsely denomina¬ 
 ted, American doctrine. Destroy the navigation laws and your days of naval 
 glory are ended. 
 
 How did you get your present immense coasting trade ? By the exer¬ 
 cise of the same protective power—the power to regulate commerce by 
 taxing foreign shipping in favor of American shipping; you got it by making 
 that protection exclusive and absolute. Yet, according to the new theory, 
 who is it that suffers under this process ? My constituents, your constituents. 
 According to the Secretary’s philosophy, you have made them pay the whole 
 tax laid for the protection of American shipping. Suppose it were now pro¬ 
 posed to us to open the whole coasting trade to the vessels of every nation : 
 who would go for the measure ? None, not one. But why not ? To lay 
 taxes for protection is said to be an unconstitutional exercise of a power 
 given to raise revenue. Every cent of tax which diminishes revenue is said 
 to be unconstitutional. All taxes laid to protect the things taxed by keeping 
 out the foreign article, are unconstitutional. We must not then prohibit 
 foreign vessels from engaging in our coasting trade. Nor may we, as we 
 now do, by giving privileges to American shipping almost prohibit foreign 
 vessels from carrying our products abroad. Oh no ! AIT these things are 
 unconstitutional. Are gentlemen willing to deprive oftheir present protection 
 all the men employed in ship-building ? Will they withhold the protection of 
 Government, which these laws give, from the various and useful mechanic 
 arts employed in this great branch of American manufactures ? No, they 
 will not do that. Why, then, are not the artizans of Pennsylvania entitled to 
 the same regard ? 
 
 The only answer to this question must be “It is not so provided in the 
 resolutions of the Baltimore Convention.” 
 
 I have tables before me showing the value of, and.number of hands employ¬ 
 ed in, the iron and coal trade of Maryland, in the building and manufacture of 
 shipping, cordage, &c.; the whole value of the iron and coal trade of Penn¬ 
 sylvania, together with the number of vessels engaged in conveying these 
 products to marketj/the number of persons employed in that transportation, 
 and the still larger number of those dependant upon their industry. All these 
 will be prostrated and ruined if this bill shall pass. But I will not detain, the 
 Senate with these statistics. 
 
Nor shall I say anything on the second head of the plan I proposed ; and 
 as I have occupied so much of the Senate’s time, I will content myself with 
 adding a word or two upon the third and last branch of the subject. 
 
 Mr. President: I want to shew to the Senate and the country what will 
 be our fiscal wants. 
 
 I have said, sir, that whether we assumed as true the calculations of the 
 Secretary of the Treasury, of the Committee of Finance, or the honorable 
 chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means in the other House, the rove- 
 nue to arise flora the bill now proposed will fall far short of meeting the 
 wants of the Treasury. 
 
 Mr. President, we have already appropriated §20,175,891. The bills in 
 the other House proposed, but not yet acted upon, amount to §46,590,777— 
 that is to say, the amount actually appropriated and the amount proposed to 
 be appropriated make the sum of §66,766,663. 
 
 [Mr. J. hero gave the items.] 
 
 From these items, it is evident that we will and must appropriate at least 
 §33, 878,298 more. This, added to §20;175,691, the sum already appro¬ 
 priated, amounts to, appropriations certain at the end of the year, §54,054,189. 
 •These are unavoidable appropriations; and there are others which may and 
 probably will be passed, and which will swell the whole amount to §66,766,668.. 
 But, however that may be, there will be the certain sum of §54,054,189, 
 which must be provided for. 
 
 Now, sir, what does our Chairman of the Committee on Finance 
 tell us this bill is to raise ? Twenty-seven or twenty-eight millions. The 
 Secretary says it will raise twenty-seven millions. But say it will raise 
 twenty-eight millions. Then I have shown that there will still be a deficit to 
 the amount of the difference between twenty-eight and fifty-four millions. 
 We now owe seventeen millions, this amount, therefore, is to be added ; and 
 so we shall certainly owe, at the end of the present fiscal year, a debt of for¬ 
 ty-three millions, and that almost certain to be increased half a million by the 
 interest on the Treasury notes which'we have authorized. 
 
 Well, we are to have a “ Revenue Standard.” But why not lay a tax upon 
 imports sufficient to meet this amount 1 “ It will not answer at the South.” 
 
 It is said that to lay more tax would lessen importations. The Secretary says 
 in his report, (what I have tried in vain to understand) that “whilst it is im¬ 
 possible to adopt any horizontal scale of duties, or even any arbitrary maxi¬ 
 mum, experience proves that, as a general rule, a duty of twenty per cent. 
 ad valorem will yield the largest revenue.” What in the name ofcommon 
 sense does this mean? He cannot mean what he says, for we have, no ex¬ 
 perience upon the subject. What then does lie mean ? Has Nature herself 
 fixed a standard of revenue ? It has been said, heretofore, that there is 
 such a thing as “ a natural rate of duty”—a natural rate of duties for.all reven¬ 
 ue bills every where, in all nations, and at all times, a kind of physical law! 
 a law established for us by our Creator, applicable to all connnoditics, nuder 
 all circumstances, and all times. Perhaps this is what he means, and that 
 twenty per cent, is the gage which Providence and Nature have ordained. 
 At all events he says that experience has shown that this is the exact rate 
 which yields the greatest amount of revenue. , (It is plain that the Chairman 
 of the Committee on Finance does not think so,, for he has gone above it and 
 below it, and his object is only revenue. He, it seems, has ascertained, 
 that by laying more than twenty per cent, or less than twentyper cent., he 
 
. 24 
 
 can get more revenue, than by conforming himself to that sacred, mystical 
 number, twenty per cent. I'have tried in vain to find out what the Secretary 
 intends. I do not understand him, and I never expect to understand him. 
 
 But I find my'selt forced to bring these remarks to a conclusion without 
 saying much that I had designed and wished to say. Arid I add only a word 
 or two more. 
 
 Mr. President, if I know myself, and I hope I mnv be nardoned for the 
 remark, I would not for the accomplishment of mere party purposes, address 
 anything to the Senate of the United States, which I did not most sincerely 
 believe ; and such, I am persuaded, is the sentiment of every member of this 
 body. There are higher duties to be discharged here, than those connected i 
 with mere honest attachment to party, and Senators on the other side, I am I 
 sure, share with me in that conviction. We differ only in the mode of ser¬ 
 ving our common country. We think upon this side of the chamber, that the 
 bill upon the table, is destructive of the best interests of the country, as re¬ 
 gards both the wealth and the laborers engaged in our domestic industry. 
 Senators on the opposite side, think differently; or otherwise, it is impossible 
 they would pass this bill. Now the remark I wish to make, is tins; that 
 if I could not, and did not look beyond party, I should greatly rejoice in the 
 passage of this bill. I venture to say, though not in the habit of making pre¬ 
 dictions if this bill passes the days of democratic 
 
 every way but downward, are at an end. But hoping as I uo, that there is ar. 
 equally solicitous desire on tiic part of our opponents, to promote the interests of 
 our common country, to secure the rights in which we all share, to maintain 
 unsullied the honor in which wc all participate, it is necessary that they ana 
 we should bo satisfied, cither that our view is right, or that theirs is right. 
 So far, however, wo have not been favored, except as to the me :e fiscal 
 operation of the bill, with any exposition of the views of our friends on 
 the other side. We are forced, therefore, to act with the aid onlv of such 
 lights as our own experience and judgment afford. These conduct us to 
 the conclusion that, if this bill shall become a law, it will ruin not [only the 
 hundreds of thousands engaged in the labor of the land, but the value of 
 the land itself; that it will bring ruin to the manufacturer ; ruin to the agri¬ 
 culturist ; ruin to the'planter; ruin to public credit; ruin to the peace, com¬ 
 fort, and virtues of the people. Wc believe that it will prostrate nine- 
 tenths of the laborers of the land ; that it will destroy those who assist us in 
 paying taxes, in building school-houses, in erecting churches, and in sus¬ 
 taining the flag and honor of the nation. Plenty will, we think, be succeeded 
 by want; industry and virtue give place to idleness and vice ; prosperous 
 villages be made desolate ; flourishing establishments perish ; public and in¬ 
 dividual debts increase. I appeal, then, to the gentlemen on the other side 
 of the chamber, I appeal to them in the spirit and wisdom of their ances¬ 
 tors, to forbear. I appeal to them in behalf of thousands of their fellow-citi¬ 
 zens, to forbear. I appeal to them, as they prefer industry to idleness, 
 happiness to misery, virtue to vice, to forbear. Do, I implore you, them 
 and you, Mr. President, leave the American laborer as you behold him, 
 peaceful and happy, enjoying the reward of honest industry, and feeling the 
 conscious pride that he is contributing to his country’s wealth and power. 
 Drive him not, I beseech you, to want and madness. Leave him, as you 
 And him, contented and a good citizen, and we shall return to our homes, one 
 and all, with the blessings of thousands on our heads, and the blessings of 
 Heaven on our country.