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MAY 10, 1830.]

The Tariff.

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less than the free men of the North? They have once taken desolation in some quarters of that State? This, sir, is the benefit from this. It has been established by the constitu- poetical part of the subject. It would not have been well tion, that, for five of their slaves, they shall pay no more finished without the sketch of a ruin or two in the picture. tax than three of us free men pay. For what did they claim To be serious, for this is a very serious part of the questhis difference? The history of that constitution will in- tion, how long will any country, any plantation, any farm, form them, that it was because the five, as they alleged, sustain a course of crops of any kind, when all which is were, for every purpose of labor, no more efficient than raised on the land is sold and carried off from it? How the three. Is it wonderful, or a matter of complaint, that long will it endure such a course, if planted with cotton the slave does less than the free man? Observe them in the and tobacco? These instances of exhausted fields and dihours of their toil. The free man works for himself. He lapidated buildings may be found in every long settled part looks forward to his reward, and is encouraged and quick of the country. Sir, they are so many monuments, in which ened in his course by hope. The slave works for another. we may read the fate of all those countries which have exHe looks back to his punishment, and is paralyzed by fear. hausted the virgin fertility of their lands, to furnish the Like the tired horse, when he feels the lash, he springs up greatest possible agricultural export. from the ground, but does not, and cannot, quicken his pace. In the language of the gentleman from Massachusetts, [Mr. GORHAM] "the free man does as much as he can; but the slave does as little as he can."

The progress of agricultural production furnishes another cause of this dereliction of old worn out plantations in South Carolina. Sugar has, in the employment of southern capital, taken the place, to a considerable extent, of cotton, as that product formerly took the place of tobacco. This could not be done without a change of residence. Men have, therefore, migrated from South Carolina to the sugar climate, and more fertile and fresher lands of Louisiana. Their moveable capital has migrated with them; and what but decay and desolation could they leave to their former seats? Solitude is in those halls because, the toil and the song of labor have departed from the fields. How then does South Carolina sustain her complaint and allegations against the American system? If demand for cotton has not been diminished, but mightily increased by that system; if reduction of the price of cotton be merely nominal, so that all other things are equally as much, and cotton cloth more reduced; if the appreciation of money (as alleged by the Southern Review) be the cause of this diminution of price; if labor be more productive, and capital more profitable in South Carolina than in the manufacturing States; if that State export more abundantly than those States; and finally, if she export more at this time, according to her population, than she did in 1816, when Mr. Lowndes and Mr. Calhoun placed the tariff upon the labor and capital of the northern States; then, sir, what damage has that State suffered by the operations of the American system? Why, then, all this complaint? this cla mor? this abuse? this crimination against that system, and the friends of that system? Would they of the South win a political boon? Would a presidency, like the medicated fruits of mythology, quiet this awaked Cerberus, whose angry roar has so often echoed through these halls? No mutter for their vigorous, increasing, and productive labor; no matter for their abundant and profitable capital, increased or various exports, cheapened and enriched consumption. No matter for all these. No, sir, no. The crafty, $7,100,000 but envious Amalekite, in the proud court of the Asiatic

South Carolina has told us that capital in that State is less profitable than in the North. Is it so? It has been shown that each man earns forty-five dollars and sixty-two and a half cents per annum. In 1824, Dr. Cooper, the great political economist of that State, said in his lectures, that to raise a prime field slave, cost two hundred and fifty dollars. The member from South Carolina has told us, in this debate, that every thing is there reduced one-half in value. Such a slave is, therefore, worth at this time one hundred and twenty-five dollars. Add to this the value of ten acres of land, cultivated in cotton, with implements of culture, at ten dollars per acre; and the whole amount is two hundred and twenty-five dollars. On this part of his capital he clears forty-five dollars and sixty-two and a half cents, equal to twenty per cent. per aunum. Onehalf of his slaves are women. The increase keeps the old stock good, and doubles it in twenty-five years. This gives two prime slaves in that time, worth one hundred and twenty-five dollars each, and both equal to two hundred and fifty dollars. This amounts to ten dollars per auuum, and is equal to four per cent. on this part of his capital. The South Carolina planter, it appears, realizes forty-five dollars and sixty-two and a half cents on the labor of each of hie men, and ten dollars each per annum on the labor of each of his women. The average is about sixteen per cent. Sir, no capital in the manufacturing States gives any thing like such a profit. This profit would soon be reduced by competition from those States, did not climate, and the condition of southern labor, secure a monopoly to the capitalist of the South.

Has oppression, indeed, made South Carolina so very poor? What are her domestic exports?

In 1827, she sent to foreign countries, in cotton,

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One-third as much to the manufacturing. States,

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To the western States, as stated in 1828, three millions of dollars; but, as now stated, about

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empire, advanced to the second rank of power, the second 2,366,666 condition of favor, the Vizier, the Viceroyalty, not of twentyfour, but of one hundred and twenty provinces, when surrounded by his congratulating family and friends, with a 2,000,000 scowl of discontent, and in the tones of malediction, exclaimed, "All this availeth me nothing, so long as Mor$11,466,666 decai the Jew sits at the king's gate. When, sir, when will The population of South Carolina is about five hundred ambition learn wisdom from the records of experience?" thousand. One-half are slaves, or capital. It is about Sir, we are told by South Carolina that words have been forty-eight dollers a head for each free man. No account invented of fraudful, sorcerous import; wherewithal the is here taken of indigo, rice, or tobacco, of which, and of manufacturing wizards of the North abuse the honest and other products, more than a million was that year export- credulous ear of the nation. These foul magicians, as it is ed. These will more than balance the amount, for any said, ery encouragement, protection, domestic industry, expenditure made on account of their labor. What State American system; and thereby raise, array, and drive a in the Union, sir, exports in a ratio to be compared with crusade against the rights and interests of the South. Sir, this? It will be found, on full examination, that South have not the managing men of that region a school for words? Carolina never exported in any year in a ratio disclosing a condition of greater prosperity. If to this be added the appreciated exchangeable value of all these exports, that State will have still less cause of complaint.

What, then, I shall be asked, is the cause of decay and
VOL. VI-117.

State rights, independent sovereignty, consolidation, slavery; what words are these? May not men conjure with such words? Have they not called up spirits by them? Aye, sir, and spirits as dark and mischievous as ever visited the moonlight of this world. In this very debate, has not a

H. OF R.]

The Tariff.

word been caught; and tortured, and abused, that men might hear, and run mad even at the very echo of it? Tax; why, sir, when just, the word makes men stare; when unjust, unequal, oppressive, it drives them frantic. Sir, these sorcerers of the sultry South have, during this debate, with the skill of masters, repeated this word either alone or coupled with most inflaming adjectives.

[MAY 10, 1830.

may hear, may consider, be convinced, and redeem themselves from the "forked councils" of crooked politicians. Are these people, then, thus grossly wronged by the American system? Does South Carolina pay a duty, a tax of forty, sixty, or any other per cent, on all, or any of her exported cotton or other products? First of all, is such duty deducted from the price of those exported proPermit me, sir, to pass within the magic circle, and, if it duets, when sold in the foreign market! This South Ca may be done, to disclose and reveal their juggling mys-rolina doctrine presupposes that all commerce is merely a teries. They announce to this nation that they, the plan- barter trade in different commodities. The gentleman tation, or, as they cabalistically call themselves, staple from Massachusetts [Mr. DAVIS] has, under that view of States, being but one-quarter or three millions of the whole the doctrine, exposed its absurdity. I will not repeat people, do, in their own proper persons, pay two-thirds of what he has so ably said. In this argument it is alleged all the taxes. To illustrate this bypothesis, they tell us that the duty on imported commodities is deducted from that South Carolina, in 1827, exported cotton amounting the price of the exported products, when sold in the foto seven million one hundred thousand dollars. On all reign market; because those products are sold in that this amount of cotton, they affirm that they did pay, and market for such commodities as, when imported, are they do now pay, on all their like export, into the treasu- charged with such duty. It is said South Carolina cotter ry of the United States, an export duty amounting to thirty, is sold in Liverpool for cotton cloth, or for woollen cloth; forty, fifty, some say sixty per cent. This duty is alleged but because such cloth cannot come into the United States, to be paid on the export, because a like duty is laid on the unless a duty of sixty per cent. is first paid upon it, the goods purchased by their export, when they are brought English manufacturer, or his agent, the Liverpool mer into the country. These gentlemen tell us that "the cus- chant, does deduct the amount of such duty from the price tom-house is a turnpike gate, and it matters not whether of the cotton, and pays the balance only to the planter whe you pay the toll when you go to market, or when you re- has raised and exported it. So long as the United States, turn from it." It is as if the collector took two or three by their protecting system, continue to place this duty on out of every five yards of cloth brought home for cotton the cottons and woollens of England, the English mavesold in England. facturer will indemnify himself, by deducting the duty charged on cloths, from the price of South Carolina cotton received in payment for them, and thereby compel the South Carolina planter to pay the whole amount of it. This is the whole argument, however it may have been expand ed by illustration, or amplified by repetition. South Caroli na cotton is sold for English cloth. Sixty per cent. is deducted from the price of the cotton in England, .because sixty per cent. duty is charged on the cloth in the United States

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If these allegations be not mere words, contrived to provoke excitement, and, under a storm of loud and boisterous passion, to obscure the true state of the question, then must they be founded on some facts and arguments by which they are supported in the minds of reasonable men. When South Carolina alleges that the exports of the United States pay all the duties imposed by the tariff on imports, she sustains this allegation, so far as she has hitherto attempted to sustain it, by one of three argu- Let us for a moment look at the course of trade. When ments. First. When the products of the South are sold, two hundred millions of pounds of cotton are exported to they are sold for goods, to be imported into the United England, and placed in the markets of Liverpool, on aeStates; and whatever duty is imposed on such goods, when count of whomsoever it may concern, for what is this cotso imported, must and will be deducted from the exported ton sold? Do manufacturers bring their cloths into that southern products, when sold abroad. Second. The im-market to barter for that cotton? No, sir; it is purchased port of the staple or plantation States being equal to their export, and their consumption being equal to such import, they, as consumers, pay all the duty on their import, and, therefore, they pay duty, or tax, as they call it, exactly in proportion to their export. Third. The tariff so diminish es the value of their export or import, or both, as that this diminution is exactly equal to the whole duty on their whole import.

by a class of merchants, who afterwards sell it out to mADUfacturers in such parcels as they may want for consump tion. These merchants have no cloths, and probably never deal in them. In all great markets the business is so divided, that the man who deals in one commodity never deals in any other. Cotton merchants are never cloth or hardware merchants. Nay, so divided and distributed is this trade, that each species of cotton will have its distinct This question is not without difficulty, for it cannot be class of merchants, who deal in that species, and in no easy to disprove what is not proved by any evidence; or to other. In what does he, and all other purchasers of cotoverthrow, by any course of reasoning, what is sustained ton, choose to pay for a purchased cargo of that commeby no argument. South Carolina avers that she pays six-dity? Why, truly, in that by which all purchases are made ty per cent. on all her eight millions of export. It is a tax in a great market; the circulating medium of all commerof four million two hundred thousand dollars per annum, cial countries. In England, this is either coin, bullion, and in ten years amounts to forty-two millions of dollars. bank notes, or bills of exchange. When the exporter of If we say, as we do say, this is not so, the allegation of South Carolina falls to the ground, as a mere cunningly devised fable, incredible in its nature, and not believed at all, unless by those who have been suitably trained to the faith, and can exclaim in the very words of ancient credulity, "I believe, because it is impossible."

South Carolina cotton goes into the Liverpool market with his cargo, for what does he choose to sell? He chooses to sell for the same medium which the cotton merchants choose to pay him: coin, bullion, bank notes, or bills of exchange. The buyer will choose to pay in these. or in some one of these, because he will have nothing else In the very onset of this argument against this South on hand with which to pay; and the seller will choose to Carolina dogma, we must encounter the most invincible take these, or some one of them, in payment, because it propensities of man; his avarice, his party spirit, pride may be what he wants, or he can with it more easily purof opinion, lust most indomitable, lust of power; and worst chase what he wants for the market of his own country. of all, if there be any thing worse, the subtle, fraudful, un- If he take coin or bullion, it will be because he wishes to dermining perseverance of demagogues, devoted to an in-ship coin or bullion to the United States. If he take bank fluence, such as finally laid the sovereignty of Athens at the notes, it will be because he has occasion for bank notes foot of the Macedonian Philip. The effort, however, is worthy of patriotism, and surely worth making. The argument may reach the South. The candid, the honest, the many

in the course of his trade. If he intends loading his ship at any other port, he will take bills of exchange on some house at such port. How, then, will the cotton merchant

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MAY 10, 1830.]

The Tariff.

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Such is the course of the cotton trade, according to the doctrines of South Carolina. Will this speculation ever be repeated? Was ever such a speculation made? It seems incredible that men of sane minds should avow such absurdities. I have nevertheless heard the avowal. Thousands, both here and elsewhere, have heard the same. Thousands of honest men are made to believe it. South Carolina planters have been told that from every hundred bales of cotton, sent abroad to market, sixty are taken by the collector, as a tax on the planter. Aye, sir, from this word, tax, the table orator of South Carolina has drawn large discourse, as the bees of Trebisond draw from certain flowers a honey that drives men mad. Since the duty on foreign wine is reduced, it may be hoped that the tariff toasts of the South will now be drank in a more generous vintage. Nothing but bad wine could have inspired such anti-American sentiments; for we are told by high authority, that "in good wine there is truth."

on any pretence, deduct fifty or sixty per cent. from the cotton of the South Carolina planter? It must be, says the South Carolina doctrine, because the article, in which he pays him, is charged with fifty or sixty per cent. duty when imported into the United States. Not so, for if he pays him in bank notes, they are put off in his trade in England, at the same rate at which all other men pass them, and without any deduction, because they have been received in pay for South Carolina cotton. If he receive bills of exchange on Amsterdam, Copenhagen, or St Petersburg, the merchants of those cities will surely not pay them at a discount of sixty per cent., because they were drawn and received in payment for South Carolina cotton. If the English cotton merchants pay the South Carolina cotton planter in coin or bullion for his exported cotton, can he deduct sixty per cent. from the price, because sixty per cent. duty will be charged, at the American customhouse, on that coin or bullion, when imported into the United States. Surely not; because no such duty, and I hasten to the second proof of unequal payment of no duty whatever, is charged on coin or bullion when imposts, as it is alleged by the South Carolina doctrine. imported into the United States under the tariff, protec- Their import and their consumption must be equal to one tion law, or American system of this country. If, then, another, and each must be equal to their export; but they the English cotton buyer do befool the South Carolina pay duty on all their consumption, and, therefore, the duty cotton planter, and deduct sixty per cent, from the price paid by them is in exact proportion to their export. The of his cotton, whenever that amount of duty is charged in whole of this argument goes on the ground that every the United States on the medium received by the planter duty added to imported commodities does, in fact, raise in payment for his cotton; yet, as he may, and always does the price of such commodities, by a sum equal to such receive in payment a medium, on which no duty is charged duty. This is sometimes true, but not always so; and it on its arrival in the United States, then no deduction from often happens that added duty does not increase the cost such price is ever made. The South Carolina doctrine to the consumer. The customers attending at any market, is a mere theoretical dogma, fit only to amuse and delude. must, if they buy, pay the cost of all commodities which It is like some other exhalations, which never appear but they buy. Men will cease to bring such commodities to in a dark and troubled atmosphere. When light and sun-market, when they cannot be reimbursed the expense of shine return to the earth, they vanish, are seen no more, and the traveller, returning to the right path, goes on his way, rejoicing.

Sir, if the South Carolina doctrine be true, what must be the condition of the exporting cotton merchant? Permit me to propose a case. A merchant of Boston, Providence, or New York, invests ten thousand dollars in cotton at Charleston, and, shipping it to Liverpool, sells the whole, with the intention of investing the amount of sales in woollen cloths, to be shipped to the United States for the American market. For the purpose of exhibiting the South Carolina doctrine in the simplest form, I will leave out of the statement all account of freight, insurance, or profits on the outward voyage; and add the freight, insurance, and duties only on the homeward. His cotton sells, in Liverpool, for ten thousand dollars. From this amount the English manufacturer, or his agent, the Liverpool cotton merchant, deducts sixty per cent., because the English woollens, which are to be received in payment, will be charged with a duty of sixty per cent. when imported into the United States: four thousand dollars remain. This sum is received in woollen cloths. Fifteen per cent. is paid for freight and insurance, equal to six hundred dollars. A duty of sixty per cent. is paid on this investment of four thousand dollars, on its arrival in the United States. This amounts to two thousand four hundred dollars. It is presumed the woollen cloths will sell for the original cost, with the freight and insurance added, together with the duties. How will the account stand?

Cost of cotton is .

Freight and insurance of woollen goods home
Duty on do. in the United States

Total amount paid out

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bringing them there. The consumption of all the world must pay the cost of the production of all the world. When manufactured fabrics are placed in the market, their cost cannot be less than the cost of the raw material, the wages of labor, and the use of capital employed by that labor in fabricating from such raw material their products, and placing them in the market. When the manufacturer has paid for the raw material and for labor, all which remains is for the use of capital. This balance is sometimes more, and sometimes less; but can never be, for any length of time, less than what is sufficient to keep his capital in good and efficient repair. If it be less, his capital must continually deteriorate, and finally be consumed. He can continue to work without profits, but he cannot continue to work at a loss. When his balance is more than enough to pay for raw material, labor, and use of capital, this surplus constitutes the profits of the manufacturer. These profits are, therefore, a part of the market price of all fabrics, when sold in the country where they are produced. When such fabrics are exported from the country where they are produced, and imported into another country, to be sold and consumed there, if a duty be imposed on their importation, this duty must either be paid by the consumer, or deducted from the profits of the producer, or it may be divided and borne partly by each of them. When the manufacturers of the importing country produce fabrics of the same kind and quality, competition for the market often compels the foreign manu facturer to deduct a part or the whole duty from his $10,000 profits. These principles are illustrated by the history of 600 the molasses trade between the United States and Cuba. 2,400 When the tariff of 1828 added five cents a gallon to the $13,000 duty on imported molasses, the manufacturers of that pro

For reimbursing this sum, the merchant will have on hand duct in Cuba took that amount from each gallon, and it

Woollen goods at cost

Feight and insurance

Amount of duty paid

Total amount receivable in return

Total amount of loss

came to the consumption of the United States without any $4,000 additional price, in consequence of the additional impost 600 2,400 duty. The planters of Cuba made this deduction from their profits, rather than hazard the loss of our market in $7,000 a competition with the planters of Louisiana. This will $6,000 always be the course of trade. So long as foreign

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manufacturers can pay for raw materials, wages, and deterioration of capital, they will, rather than lose your market, lower profits, as you raise impost duty, until all their profits are gone. Nay, trade is sometimes continued for years to one market, only to sustain labor and preserve capital, while other markets are looked after for profits; and the hope of a change of times encourages the expectation of a more prosperous condition of trade.

[MAY 10, 1830.

when he sold his crop. To take his share of the goods, as if concerned in the original adventure, and in proportion to the amount of his cotton? What claim has he to this! He sold his cotton on the wharf, took his money, and, if every bale, when shipped, had gone to the bottom, or been consumed by fire, it would have been no concern of his. The cotton planter of South Carolina has no more conexion with the commerce of the United States, than the With these general remarks, I proceed to a more par- tea planter of China has with the same commerce. He ticular examination of this part of the question. For this does not, therefore, come into the home market for foreign purpose, let it be admitted that all impost duties on im-goods, to get his share of those goods; nor is he obliged to ported commodities do, to an equal amount, add to their take the amount of his cotton crop, or any other amount, market price. By whom is this additional price paid? Is in cotton or woollen cloths, or hardware, or any other comit paid by South Carolina, because she exports seven mil-modity. His money is in his pocket, and it cannot be lion one hundred thousand dollars in cotton, and imports, drawn out but by his own option. If he must expend it and consumes a like amount in some other product? This all, he need not expend it all in the market of foreign com question cannot be answered without some examination of modities; for he will find, side by side with this, another the course of trade. The labor of our country, like that market, abounding in all the products of the land, laber, of all other countries, employs capital, either in producing and capital of our country. Here he may indulge his paraw material, or manufactured fabrics, or in buying and triotism, and satisfy his wants. selling such raw material or manufactured products. The From which of these markets is South Carolina labor, great laboring classes of our country are, accordingly, em- and the employers of that labor, supplied? The answer ployed in agriculture, manufactures, or commerce. If the to this question will determine who pays the duty on inplanters of South Carolina employ their capital in growing ported products. Does that labor consume fish! The cotton, they do not employ it in commerce. The com- planter buys them in New England, not only without merce of the country is conducted by merchants. Money bounty, but cheaper for the bounty on exported fish. The is the medium, the great machine by which they conduct bounty on exported fish enables the fisherman to supply all their transactions. Barter is no part of the trade of the home market at a reduced price; so that the bounty merchants. It belongs to a condition of society, anterior to is really divided between him and the South Carolina a perfect division of employments, and before any circulat-planter. He buys shoes. The leather was made from ing medium of exchange has been established. Accord- hides, bought in Ohio at one and a half cents a pound; ingly, we find the merchants of our country employed in the shoes manufactured by labor, fed, with corn at ten buying up and collecting all surplus products, either of and wheat at twenty-five cents a bushel, and with meat at the seas, of the forests, of the soil, or of manufactures. two cents a pound. The planter buys shoes at fifty cents For these they give, in exchange, money, the circulating a pair, shirting at six and a quarter, stripes at eight, and medium of the country, either gold or silver coin, or paper, which may, at the pleasure of the holder, be exchanged for such coin. That part of these products not wanted for home consumption, merchants export, in pursuit of a market, to foreign countries. These are not bartered, but sold by them, in such markets, for money. This money, or such part of it as may be required, is reinvested in foreign products, such as cloths, hardware, tea, coffee, sugar, aromatics, fruits, wines, spirits, silks, fancy goods, | and all such commodities as may be required in the home market, either for consumption or re-exportation. All these commodities are imported, together with the money balance, invested in gold or silver coin, or bullion. This immense importation, amounting, in some years, to one hundred millions, comes back charged with all the costs of these multifarious transactions; and, when further augmented in price by the addition of such duties as by law are imposed on each class of them, they are all placed in the markets of the United States.

The

satinets at thirty-seven cents a yard. The whole yearly clothing for a man coats less than five dollars. Not one article is of foreign manufacture. Not one article taxed with a duty, or made dearer by such a tax. Nay, not one which could, on any day of the year, be purchased cheaper in the English market. What feeds the labor of South Carolina Is it ten, coffee, sugar? Not an ounce. whole two hundred and fifty-eight thousand laborers of South Carolina do not consume to the amount of one cent of any article charged with any amount of duty, If they do, what is it? Gracious God! And notwithstanding all this, the owners of these slaves. the capitalists of South Carolina, who, in the language of the member from that State, [Mr. McDUFFIE]" drive them day and night, summer and winter, to work harder and make inore," these mild and merciful capitalists are, by their agent here, clamorous, outrageous, and abusive against the laborers of New England, because they pay less than their share of impost, of tax, on imported commodities.

If there be an efficient demand for these commodities in What do New England laborers pay? They pay the our country, and they can be sold without a loss, then who duty on all they buy and consume. They consume coffee ever buys and consumes them must pay for all their ori- at a duty of thirty per cent., tea at thirty-five, and sugar, ginal cost, together with the cost of importation, and the as the Southern Review asserts, at fifty-two per cent. All impost duty, in addition to all these various amounts. Men these are consumed by the whole labor of New England. go to this market, not to receive pay for what they had sold The skilled, or manufacturing labor, in addition to these, to merchants who purchased and exported their products; consume fancy goods. Yes, sir, fancy goods; shawls from much less do they go in quest of their share of these com England, silks from France, crapes from India, tortoise modities, as if concerned in the great adventure of send-shell combs from Canton, and Leghorns from Italy. This ing their products abroad to be exchanged, and brought home in money, or in the products of other countries. Do you find, in this great market, the whaler with the invoice of his oil; the fisherman, with that of his fish; the log-roller, showing the amount of his lumber; the peltrist, with his knotted strings of account for furs; the farmer or manufacturer, each with full statements of either provisions, or bread stuffs, or wrought fabrics How, then, does the South Carolina planter come to this market? To get pay for his cotton sold to the merchant? No: that he received

may seem a paradox to those who cannot, even in thought, separate labor from servitude; to whom work is slavery, and exemption from it freedom; " whose high and paliny condition of liberty is rendered more lofty, because ma nured, and cultured, and contrasted by a toiling, debased, and wretched servitude around it. Tell, sir, tell these high-minded votaries of factitious liberty, that the freedom of the North is felt and enjoyed the more, because it is felt and enjoyed by all; and that if southern liberty should wither and perish for lack of slavery to feed, and support

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and expeditious method of manufacturing it into cloth. By the progress of this trade, hemp for clothing is driven from the market. Flax has nearly followed it; silk is sustained as a luxury only, and sheep's wool would, at this time, were it not for the necessities created by climate, be entirely out of use.

its growth, northern freedom will grow and flourish, after | duty imposed on all the foreign goods purchased by the the sun, in the whole longitude of his course, shall have money for which all the cotton of South Carolina is sold. ceased to shine on the head of a single slave. In the In other words, if machinery and cotton spinning had been North, labor is not slavery. The persons of whom I speak, left to England, and never introduced into the United States, are the free descendants of the free and highly respected or encouraged and protected by that system, the cotton people of New England. They are the daughters or of South Carolina would now have brought in the market granddaughters of those wives and mothers who clothed, not only seven million one hundred thousand dollars, but and armed, and blessed, and hastened their husbands, and sixty per cent. or four million two hundred and sixty thousons and brothers, to the fields of Lexington and Bunker sand dollars, in addition to that amount. That State would Hill, Bennington and Saratoga. They are not mere bo- have received, in 1827, eleven million three hundred and dies, though beautiful and blooming; they have minds well sixty thousand dollars for the exported cotton of that year. instructed; they have read, and thought. You will see Let us examine this paramount absurdity. In 1789, the them, modestly ornamented by the labor of their own first Congress enacted the law providing for revenue, for hands, and accompanied by their parents and brothers, at encouragement and for protection of manufactures. South tending the anniversaries of our literary institutions, the Carolina then planted no cotton. A few years before that yearly discourses at the celebration of our national indepen- time, cotton spinning, by machinery, was brought into dence, and in the weekly assemblies for the public worship Rhode Island by Samuel Slater. England, in that year, of the great God, and Father of the whole human family. imported from all the world, and spun about one million Do you ask how those who labor in the North can af- five hundred thousand pounds of cotton. A small duty ford to consume such imported commodities? This can- was laid on imported cotton, expressly to encourage its not be done by labor in France and England. Labor is production in the Southern States. A like duty was laid paid, in any country, in proportion to the demand and sup- on imported cotton cloths, to encourage cotton spinning in ply, in the market, for the labor of that country. In this this country. From what material was the clothing of country, the demand for skilled labor is comparatively Europe and America then fabricated? Almost entirely great, and the supply comparatively small. This labor, from sheep's wool, flax, hemp, or silk. What has been therefore, receives a much greater share of the products the progress of machinery for spinning and weaving cotof labor in this country, than the same kind of labor re-ton, and what have been the effects of that progress! A ceives in England and France. This, operating alike on demand for cotton was created and increased by this new labor in all employments, prevents the manufacturer from raising the price of his products, and compels him to lower the rate of his profits. All the necessaries of life being much lower in this than in most other countries, labor not only receives a larger proportion of the annual production of the country, but can live at a much smaller expense for necessaries; and has, therefore, a much larger amount, How has this been effected? By a competition between either to lay up for future use, or to consume in accommo- the great manufacturers of England, France and the dations and ornaments. This, sir, is the great secret of United States. The inventions of one have been follownorthern prosperity; a condition not the most propitious ed by the inventions of others, and a succession of imto the capitalist, but the most beneficial to labor; and de- provements has advanced them on to perfection. The monstrating that while the labor of South Carolina con- spindle was followed by the speeder-the single by the sumes no imported products, and pays not a cent of im- double speeder. The flying picker took place of the post duty, or tax, the labor of the North, made prosperous hand, in cleaning cotton; and the power loom now almost by the American system, pays into the treasury a great-excludes manual weaving. Chemical science, applied to er amount of impost duty, of national tax, than even the bleaching, performs in a few hours what once required South Carolina capitalists themselves. For what do these days or weeks, aided by the sun, the winds, and water, for capitalists buy, and consume, from the two great markets its performance. This rivalry of nations has not only imof our country? First, what does the southern planter proved, but. multiplied machinery. In 1789, the whole buy? Carriages, harness, saddlery, horses, household furdi- number of spindles in the United States did not exceed ture. These are not imported, but, by the American sys-three hundred. The number increased but slowly for the tem, protected, and not made dearer by that protection. first fifteen years. The embargo multiplied them; the They buy fine cottons at eighteen cents a yard, which, im- non-intercourse multiplied them; the war multiplied ported in 1815, cost one dollar and twelve cents. They buy prints, carpets, glass, nails, and all quite as cheap, as such commodities can be bought in England. Of woollen cloths, hardware, iron, hemp, sailcloth, cordage, who buys most, the northern or the South Carolina capitalists? If, then, the producer of exports, whether oil, fish, lumber, peltry, provisions, bread stuffs, or cotton, sell for money, and buy for money—and buy, at his option, either foreign or domestic commodities, the amount of duties, the tax paid by him, is governed by his consumption, and his consumption is governed by his choice, and not by the amount of his export. If he sells for money, he may keep his money in his pocket, live from the produce of his own plantation, and pay not a cent for any imported commodity. The South Carolina dogma, the tax in proportion to export, is unsupported by fact, and must have been contrived to deceive, to delude, to create popular excitement, and achieve political objects.

The third and last reason for this monstrous and maddening doctrine is, that the American system does, in its operations, decrease the demand, and thereby diminish the market price of cotton to the full amount of all the

them; and, above all, the tariff of 1816, introducing the minimum principle of protection, has multiplied them; until, at this time, there cannot be a less number in the United States than one million five hundred thousand. They have, indeed, multiplied like the progeny or the patriarch in the land of their servitude; and, like that progeny, those who were once their patrons, would now throw them into the river.

The same competition has pushed forward the produc tion of England, not only in this, but in every other branch of iron and steel manufacture. English hooks fish every sea, lake, and river: English guns bring down birds of every elime, and every wing: the Arab, the Tartar, rides with English pistols in his belt; and the Sheffield blade has won more and greater victories than that of Toledo or Damascus. These are but minor products. The wars of Eutope multiplied her spindles; these are the great instruments of the wealth and power of England. Alexander by the long spear, and the compacted phalanx, pushed his conquests from the Granicus to the Ganges. England, with her spindles and looms, has manufactured a fabric of power, which, like the broad belt of the Zodiac, enwraps

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