FEB. 23, 1830.] Abolition of Duties, Taxes, &c. [SENATE. trievably gone, to the generation at least, that saw and ne- mon, nutmegs, cassia, ginger, ivory, Turkey carpets, glected the golden opportunity. We have complained, Cashmere shawls." and justly, of the burthens upon our exports in foreign Third Section. This section presents an exception to the principle of countries; a part of our tariff system rests upon the prin- the bill; it dispenses with the idea of obtaining equivalents ciple of retaliation for the injury thus done us. Retalia- in the enumerated articles. The exception is the effect of tion, heretofore, has been our only resource: but reci- necessity; the articles excepted being desirable to us, and procity of injuries is not the way to enrich nations any obtained from Powers with whom we have no treaties. more than individuals. It is an "unprofitable contest," The exception is unavoidable, but it is not wholly disad under every aspect. But the present conjuncture, pay-vantageous. We shall get the articles for one-third and ment of the public debt, in itself a rare and almost unprece-one-half less than we now pay for them; and if two or dented occurrence in the history of nations, enables us to three millions of revenue should be suddenly wanted, they enlarge our system; to present a choice of alternatives: present the ready means of raising it. The abolition beone fraught with good, the other charged with evil, to fo- ing by law alone, the duty may be laid again by law whenreign nations. The participation, or exclusion, from forty ever needed. millions of free trade, annually increasing, would not admit of a second thought, in the head of any nation with "That, from and after the 31st day of December, in which we trade. To say nothing of her gains in the par- the year 1831, a duty of thirty-three and a third per cent. ticipation in such a commerce, what would be her loss in on the value, shall be levied on all furs and raw hides imthe exclusion from it? How would England, France, or ported into the United States, from countries which shall Germany, bear the loss of their linen, silk, or wine trade, not have secured their free admission by granting equivawith the United States? How could Cuba, St. Domingo, lent advantages to the like productions of the United States." or Brazil, bear the loss of their coffee trade with us? This section, to a superficial observer, may seem to miliThey could not bear it at all. Deep and essential injury, tate against the plan of the bill; but the inconsistency is in ruin of industry, seditions, and bloodshed, and the over- appearance only. It harmonizes completely with the throw of administrations, would be the consequence of spirit of the bill. It provides for a future, eventual, and such loss. Yet such loss would be inevitable, (and not to contingent duty, upon two articles now introduced, free the few nations, or in the articles only which I have men- of duty, to a great amount. The terms in which the sectioned, for I have put a few instances only by way of ex- tion is drawn show that its object is to obtain equivalents ample) but to every nation with whom we trade, that for their future free importation; and the following table would not fall into our system, and throughout the whole of their annual imports, for the last nine years, will show list of essential articles to which our abolition extends. the great value of the argument which they will put into Our present heavy duties would continue in force against the hands of the Executive, in the negotiations to which such nations; they would be abolished in favor of their the section may give rise. rivals. We would say to them, in the language of Mr. Jefferson, free trade and navigation is not to be given in exchange for restrictions and vexations! But I feel entire confidence that it would not be necessary to use the lan-Years ending Value of Furs. Raw Hides Total Value. guage of mehace or coercion. Amicable representations, 30th Sept. addressed to their sense of self-interest, would be more agreeable, and not less effectual. The plan cannot fail! It is scarcely within the limits of possibility that it should fail! And if it did, what then? We have lost nothing. We remain as we were. Our present duties are still in force, and Congress can act upon them one or two years hence, in any way they please. The Table. Ivalue and Skins. 1821 224,193 892,530 1,116,722 1822 296,339 2,041,463 2,337,802 1823 273,088 2,084,082 2,357,170 2,465,748 2,569,031 3,164,481 1,480,349 1,827,696 1,804,202 2,292,738 2,582,442 1829 1 2,989,833 | 17,153,997 | 20,693,730 The aggregate exceeds twenty millions of dollars for And these free the short period of the last nine years. Here, then, is the peculiar recommendation to my plan, that, while it secures a chance, little short of absolute certainty, of procuring an abolition of twelve millions of duties upon our exports in foreign countries, in return for an abolition of twelve millions of duties upon imports from them, it exposes nothing to risk; the abolition of duty upon the foreign article here being contingent upon the acquisition of the equivalent advantage abroad. I close this exposition of the principles of the first sec-importations, so injurious to the fur trader, and the farmtion of my bill with the single remark, that these treaties ers who raise cattle and want, a market for their skins, for the mutual abolition of duties should be for limited are derived from countries who exclude, or heavily tax, terms, say for seven or ten years, to give room for the our furs and raw hides, and the articles manufactured modifications which time, and the varying pursuits of in- out of them. They come, chiefly, from the Southern redustry, may show to be necessary. Upon this idea, the publics and Great Britain. If such large importations are bill is framed, and the period of ten years inserted by way to continue free, let those who enjoy the benefit recipro of suggestion and exemplification of the plan. Another feature is too obvious to need a remark, that the time for tre commencement of the abolition of duties is left to the Executive, who can accommodate it to the state of the revenue and the extinction of the public debt. cate the favor. Let them abolish duties on American furs and American hats. Let them abolish duties on our raw hides; and where the privilege of sending hides would not be beneficial to us, as in the Southern republics, let something else be substituted for the abolition; as distilled spirits, manufactures of leather, cotton, glass, wood, &e. If they do not reciprocate advantages, thus offered, the pen"That, from and after the 31st day of December, in alty of their own election falls upon them. They incur the the year 1831, the duties now payable on the following ar- consequence denounced by Mr. Jefferson in the patriotic ticles, imported from countries with which the United declaration, that free trade is not to be given in exchange States have no diplomatic relations, shall be reduced one-for restrictions and vexations. Second Section.. half; and, after the 31st of December, 1833, shall cease Here, sir, I make a single remark to illustrate the neand determine entirely, to wit: teas, mace, cloves, cinna-glect with which the West has been treated in the progress SENATE.] Abolition of Duties, Taxes, &c. [FEB. 23, 1830. 1. PROTECTION; 2. RETALIATION. Under the first principle we sought a home supply of articles essential to our general independence, and to our of the tariff policy. The West produces furs and raw Under the second principle we retaliate upon other nations the evils of their own policy in piling duties upon our productions. It is not to be dissembled that the tariff policy, on both principles, has powerfully appealed to the sympathies and the patriotism of the American people, and while kept within reasonable limits had the general approbation of all quarters of the Union; North, South, West, and Centre. The tariff policy has been in force in these States forty years, and has only excited discontent within the last ten or fifteen years, and since it has been pushed beyond its own principles. The results are, increased duties at home and abroad; imports burthened, and exports burthened— the candle lit at both ends. "That, from and after the 31st day of December, in the year the amount levied on foreign tonnage for light money,' shall cease and determine, in favor of the ships of such nations as shall grant the like or an equivalent favor to the merchant ships of the United States. The object of this section is to gain some little relief for our navigating interest in foreign ports. The amount now paid by foreigners for "ligl. money," that is to say, as a tribute to our light houses, is about fifteen thousand dollars per annum. Such a sum is no object to the treasury Under the plan which I propose, the tariff question will of the United States, yet it is something to our ship own-present itself to the people in this point of view: ers, for whose benefit the abolition of this small tax is in- 1. Protection to every essential branch of industry. tended. Nominally, it is a relief to foreigners; in reality, 2. Retaliation, as an alternative, where equivalents are to our own navigators. The foreigners cannot be relieved here until the corresponding relief is secured abroad; and, as our shipping is most numerous, we may gain much more than we relinquish. Fifth Section. refused. 3. Reciprocity of benefits instead of reciprocity of injuries. 4. The abolition of twelve millions of duties, at home, on imports. 5. The abolition of an equal amount of duties, abroad, "That, from and after the 31st day of December, in the year the duties now payable on tonnage, pass-on exports. ports, and clearances, and on the re-exportation of imported articles, shall cease and determine." The amount of these little taxes and duties is about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars per annum. The treasury will have no occasion for that sum after the extinguishment of the public debt; and being left in the pockets of the ship owners and merchants, will be felt as an advantage by them, and not missed as a loss by the Government. Sixth Section. "That, from and after the 31st day of December next, the duty now payable on the importation of alum salt, coarse or ground, shall cease and determine; and from and after the same day, all laws authorizing allowances to fishing vessels, and bounties on the exportation of pickled fish, shall be, and the same hereby are, repealed.” 6. Discrimination between the articles which a wise policy requires, or does not require, to be made at home, and between the nations which grant or refuse us equiva7. Increased importations of gold and silver. lents. 8. Increased value of the internal trade with Mexico. The results of the new plan, according to this view of its advantages, would be overwhelming in its favor. Let us verify these results, and justify these views. In the first place, under the protecting principle which it contains, duties will remain on foreign articles, rivals of our own industry, to the amount of about ten millions of dollars. The support of the Government will require this sum, and the raising of this sum will give protection to our domestic industry; it will give it as an incident to the colThis section stands out as a clear exception to the pe-lection of revenue, and to this there will be no objection culiar policy of the bill-that of obtaining equivalents by in any part of the Union. treaty stipulation. The section proposes a speedy repeal In the second place, we shall terminate the unprofitable of the duty on this description of salt, and by operation of contest which we are now carrying on with foreign nations law alone. The reasons for this exception, are-first, in-a contest in which the only question is, which shall do the prime necessity and universality of the use of the most harm to the commerce of the other--and substitute for article; secondly, in the small object it would present for it a beneficial rivalry in the walks of free trade, based upon negotiation, the number of Powers from which we get salt the unfettered exchange of surplus productions, to the being above a dozen, which would render abolition by amount of forty millions at the start, to increase annually negotiation tedious and dilatory, and the amount of duty with the rapid growth and expansion of these young athrelinquished to each, too inconsiderable to affect her letic States. policy, while the aggregate to us is great; thirdly, in the In the third place, the abolition of twelve millions of necessity of repealing the fishing bounties and allowances, duties will be the repeal of sixteen millions of taxes, countwhich are dependent upon the duty on this description of ing the merchant's profit at 33 per cent; and this repeal foreign salt, and must stand or fall with that duty. will be felt in every family in the purchase of its necessa I have now finished the exposition of the features and ries, its comforts, and its luxuries. Linen for the person, principles of my bill; but justice to my plan and to myself the table, and the bed, would be one-third cheaper. Coffee will not permit me to stop here. The plan is new; and would be seven cents cheaper in the pound; tea, one-third; whatever is new has the prejudices of time and age to wines and silks, one-third; and so of all the articles enuencounter, and the fears of timidity and caution to over-merated in the bill. Every family would save one-third, come. Its novelty will excite many enemies; the reasons or upwards, of its annual store account; every State would which I may give, and which are the fruit of much re-retain, within its limits, its proportion of these sixteen search and meditation, may satisfy some and convert them millions; and all the shame and mischief of plotting and into friends. combining, and wrangling, here, about the division of so much spoil, would be avoided. It certainly presents the tariff question under a new point of view to the American people. That question has heretofore rested upon two great principles: In the fourth and fifth places, the principle of equivalents would gain an abolition of duties on our productions in foreign ports, equal to the abolition made here upon FEB. 23, 1830.] Abolition of Duties, Taxes, &c. [SENATE. foreign productions. We would buy cheaper, and sell United States; and nothing can facilitate this exchange so higher. Instead of paying the value, and, in some in- much as reductions of duty upon the articles which comstances, ten times the value of our products, for the pri- pose it. The cotton plantations and tobacco fields of the vilege of selling them in a foreign market, we would get South and West are thus the gold and silver mines of the these foreign duties reduced to a reasonable amount. Our United States; and blind, stupid, and suicidal is the policy productions are chiefly dutied in foreign countries, not which would destroy these fields and plantations! for protection, but for revenue; and the experience of all nations, and especially of Great Britain, proves that revenue is productive in proportion to its moderation and fairness; smuggling and non-consumption always disappointing the calculations of short sighted cupidity in the imposition of enormous duties. But these will be arguments for our ministers abroad, which they will handle with more ability than I can pretend to. Eighthly: In promoting the internal trade with Mexico. This trade is carried on partly in domestic, partly in European goods. Its present returns are about a quarter of a million of dollars. So far as foreign goods enter into its amount, there is a loss to the trader of the whole amount of the duty paid; the want of custom houses on the frontiers rendering the application of the drawback system difficult and objectionable. The abolition of duties on the In the sixth place, the principle of discrimination which foreign articles used in that trade, chiefly fine goods, my plan, for the first time in the progress of the tariff would put the inland trader on a footing with the shipper policy, introduces and establishes, will admit of a salutary from the sea-port, and probably enhance the returns of distinction in the selection of articles for protection, and the trade, in a brief period, from a quarter of a million, to in the application of retaliatory measures to impracticable one or two millions of dollars. nations. Thus far there has been no discrimination, either These are the results of my plan, verified, as fully as esin articles at home or nations abroad, in our tariff policy. tablished facts, fair inductions, and probabilities approachTo protect articles which can, and ought to be, made at ing to certainty, can verify any untried experiment. They home, we have dutied, and that most heavily, not only the are the results of free trade, qualified by the policy of cherished article, but all others belonging to the same protection and the necessities of revenue; two qualificabranch, though of kinds not made, nor necessary to be tions which, in my view, reduce themselves to one: for made, in the United States. Blankets and strouds for the they are convertible propositions-the revenue resulting Indian trade, fine cottons, alum salt-I mention a few arti- from the protection, and the protection from the revenue. cles by way of example-are evidences of this want of Anti-tariff citizens can have no objection to it, for they addiscrimination. Among nations, this want of discrimination mit the protection which springs from a fair exercise of has been equally palpable. Great Britain has been severe the revenue raising power; the supporters of the tariff po upon our tobacco, grain, and provisions; to retaliate upon licy, and especially the real manufacturers--not the politi hier we have been severe, not only upon her productions, cal ones--but the actual owners and workers, can have no but upon the productions of France, Germany, and all the objection to it, for it leaves them all their present protecrations with whom we trade. This want of discrimination tion, procures them better markets abroad, gives them among nations may be the necessary effect of regulating comforts and necessaries, as tea, coffee, &c. cheaper than our tariff by law alone. If so, the argument becomes still they now get them, and facilitates the acquisition of the stronger in favor of my plan by law and negotiation com- material to several branches of manufacture, as the umbined, which admits of discrimination; which offers the brella, the hat, the lady's shoe, bonnet, &c. in which silk same advantageous terms to all nations, and leaves retali- is an essential part; and which will be got one-third cheapatory duties in force against those only which justly incurer when the duty on that article is abolished. our resentment, by refusing to receive our productions This being the case, the "crowning mercy" of my plan upon the terms that we offer to receive theirs. To them would be the speedy death and burial of the tariff quesI say, in the thrice repeated language of the great Jeffer- tion, and, with its interment, a restoration of that harmony son, "Free trade is not be given in exchange for vexations of the Union which all true patriots desire, and which the and restrictions!" progress of this question has so greatly impaired. The last section of my bill still remains to be considered. It is the one which proposes to abolish the duty upon alum salt, and to repcal the laws which authorize the fishing bounties and allowances. Seventhly: in obtaining increased importations of gold and silver. The United States have no silver or gold aines, except those in my native State, (North Carolina.) They are dependent upon foreign countries for their supply of these metals. To the amount of one or two milTo spare to any gentleman [said Mr. B.] the supposed Gas they are obtained from the West Indies, and other necessity of rehearsing to me a lecture upon the importreighboring countries, in return for domestic productions, ance of the fisheries, I will premise that I have some acchictly provisions. But the main supply is obtained by quaintance with the subject; that I know the fisheries to the circuitous operation of sending our tobacco, cotton, be valuable, for the food they produce, the commerce al rice, to Europe, exchanging them for fine goods, and they create, the mariners they perfect, the employment selling these goods in the Southern republics. Our trade they give to artisans in the building of vessels, and the w Mexico is a complete illustration of this process. We consumption of wood, hemp, and iron. I also know that obtained from her, in 1828-taking the last year to which the fishermen applied for the bounties, at the commencethe returns are made up and printed-four millions of ment of our present form of Government, which the Bricollars in gold and silver, and seven hundred thousand tish give to their fisheries, and that it was denied them upon Collars' worth of other products; we exported to her about the report of the Secretary of State, (Mr. Jefferson;) and seven hundred thousand dollars' worth of our domestic I have lately read the six dozen acts of Congress, general products, just enough to balance hers, leaving the whole and particular, passed in the last forty years, from 1789 to amount of gold and silver to have been acquired by other 1829, inclusive, giving the bounties and allowances, which exchanges. What were these exchanges? They were the it is my present purpose to abolish, with the duty on alum Che cloths and cassimeres, the linens, silks, cambrics, salt, which is the foundation upon which all this superBuslins, rich carpets, wines, and porcelain, which our structure of legislative enactments has been reared. cotton and tobacco had bought in Europe, and which I say the salt tax, and especially the tax on alum salt, were either carried direct to Mexico, or re-exported from which is the kind required for the fisheries, is the foundathis country under the system of drawbacks. This makes tion of all these bounties and allowances; and that, as they clear that whatever will facilitate the exchange of our grew up together, it is fair and regular that they should cotton and tobacco for the fine goods of Europe, will sink and fall together. enhance the importation of the precious metals into the To prove this, let the laws speak. VOL. VI.-23 SENATE.] The Laws. Abolition of Duties, Taxes, &c. 1. Act of Congress, 1789, grants five cents a barrel on pickled fish and salted provisions, and five cents a quintal on dried fish, exported from the United States, in lieu of a drawback of the duties imposed on the importation of the salt used in curing such fish and provisions. [FEB. 23, 1830. 1. Because it is an article of indispensable necessity in the provision trade of the United States. No beef or pork for the army or navy, or for consumption in the South, or for exportation abroad, can be put up except in this kind of salt. If put up in common salt, it is rejected absolutely by the commissaries of the army and navy, and if taken to N. B. Duty on salt, at that time, six cents a bushel. the South must be repacked in alum salt, at an expense of 2. Act of 1790 increases the bounty in lieu of draw-one dollar and twelve and a half cents a barrel, before it back to ten cents a barrel on pickled fish and salted pro- is exported, or sold for domestic consumption. The quanvisions, and ten cents a quintal on dried fish. The duty on salt being then raised to twelve cents a bushel. 3. Act of 1792 repeals the bounty in lieu of drawback on dried fish, and in lieu of that, and as a commutation and equivalent therefor, authorizes an allowance to be paid to vessels in the cod fishery (dried fish) at the rate of one dollar and fifty cents a ton on vessels of twenty to thirty tons; two dollars and fifty cents on tonnage of vessels above thirty tons; with a limitation of one hundred and seventy dollars for the highest allowance to any vessel. 4. A supplementary act, of the same year, adds twenty per cent. to each head of these allowances. 5. Act of 1797 increases the bounty on salted provisions to eighteen cents a barrel; on pickled fish to twenty-two cents a barrel; and adds thirty-three and a third per cent. to the allowance in favor of the cod fishing vessels. Duty on salt, at the same time, being raised to twenty cents a bushel. 6. Act of 1799 increases the bounty on pickled fish to thirty cents a barrel, on salted provisions to twenty-five. 7. Act of 1800 continues all previous acts (for bounties and allowances) for ten years, and makes this proviso: That these allowances shall not be understood to be continued for a longer time than the correspondent duties on salt, respectively, for which the said additional allowances were granted, shall be payable. 8. Act of 1807 repeals all laws laying a duty on imported salt, and for paying bounties on the exportation of pickled fish and salted provisions, and making allowances to fishing vessels-Mr. Jefferson being then President. tity of provisions which require this salt, and must have it, is prodigious, and annually increasing. The exports of 1828 were, of beef sixty-six thousand barrels, of pork fifty-four thousand barrels, of bacon one million nine hun dred thousand pounds weight, butter and cheese two million pounds weight. The value of these articles was two millions and a quarter of dollars. To this amount must be added the supply for the army and navy, and all that was sent to the South for home consumption, every pound of which had to be cured in this kind of sah, for common salt will not cure it. The Western country is the great producer of provisions; and there is scarcely a farmer in the whole extent of that vast region whose interest does not require a prompt repeal of the duty on this description of salt. 2. Because no salt of this kind is made in the United States, nor any rival to it, or substitute for it. It is a foreign importation, brought from various islands in the West Indies, belonging to England, France, Spain, and Denmark; and from Lisbon, St. Ubes, Gibraltar, the Bay of Biscay, and Liverpool. The principles of the protecting system do not extend to it: for no quantity of protection can produce a home supply. The present duty, which is far beyond the rational limit of protection, has been in force near thirty years, and has not produced a pound. We are still thrown exclusively upon the foreign supply. The principles of the protecting system can only apply to common salt, the product of which is considerable in the United States; and upon that kind, the present duty is proposed to be left in full force. 9. Act of 1813 gives a bounty of twenty cents a barrel 3. Because the duty is enormous, and quadruples the on pickled fish exported, and allows to the cod fishing price of the salt to the farmer. The original value of vessels at the rate of two dollars and forty cents the ton for salt is about fifteen cents the measured bushel of eightyvessels between twenty and thirty tons, four dollars a ton four pounds. But the tariff substitutes weight for meafor vessels above thirty, with a limitation of two hundred sure, and fixes that weight at fifty-six pounds, instead of and seventy-two dollars for the highest allowance; and a eighty-four. Upon that fifty-six pounds, a duty of twenty proviso, that no bounty or allowance should be paid unless it was proved to the satisfaction of the collector that the fish was wholly cured with foreign salt, and the duty on it secured or paid. The salt duty, at the rate of twenty cents a bushel, was revived as a war tax, at the same time. Bounties on salted provisions were omitted. 10. Act of 1816 continued the act of 1813 in force, which, being for the war only, would otherwise have expired. 11. Act of 1819 increases the allowance to vessels in the cod fishery to three dollars and fifty cents a ton on vessels from five to thirty; to four dollars a ton vessels above thirty tons; with a limitation of three hundred and sixty dollars for the maximum allowance. 12. Act of 1828 authorizes the mackerel fishing vessels to take out licences like the cod fishing vessels, under which it is reported by the vigilant Secretary of the Treasury that money is illegally drawn by the mackerel vessels--the newspapers say to the amount of thirty to fifty thousand dollars per annum. These recitals of legislative enactments are sufficient to prove that the fishing bounties and allowances are bottomed upon the salt duty, and must stand or fall with that duty. I will now give my reasons for proposing to abolish the duty on alum salt, and will do it in the simplest form of narrative statement; the reasons themselves being of a nature too weighty and obvious to need, or even to admit, of coloring or exaggeration from arts of speech. cents is laid. Upon this duty, the retail merchant has his profit of eight or ten cents, and then reduces his bushel from fifty-six to fifty pounds. The consequence of all these operations is, that the farmer pays about three times as much for a weighed bushel of fifty pounds, as he would have paid for a measured bushel of eighty-four pounds, if this duty had never been imposed. 4. Because the duty is unequal in its operation, and falls heavily on some parts of the community, and produ ces profit to others. It is a heavy tax on the farmers of the West, who export provisions; and no tax at all, but rather a source of profit, to that branch of the fisheries to which the allowances of the vessels apply. Exporters of provisions have the same claim to these allowances that exporters of fish have. Both claims rest upon the same principle, and upon the principle of all drawbacks, that of refunding the duty paid on the imported salt, which is re-exported on salted fish and provisions. The same principle covers the beef and pork of the farmer which covers the fish of the fisherman; and such was the law, as I have shown, for the first eighteen years that these bounties and allowances were authorized. Fish and provisions fared alike from 1789 to 1807. Bounties and allowances began upon them together, and fell together, on the repeal of the salt tax, in the second term of Mr. Jefferson's administration. At the renewal of the salt tax, in 1813, at the commencement of the late war, they parted company, and the law, in the exact sense of the proverb, has made FEB. 24, 1830.] Mr. Foot's Resolution. [SENATE. fish of one and flesh of the other ever since. The fishing diminish the revenue, nor delay the extinguishment of the interest is now drawing about two hundred and fifty thou-public debt. It is a tax carrying money out of the treasand dollars annually from the treasury; the provision sury, as well as bringing it in. The issue is two hundred raisers draw not a cent, while they export more than dou-and fifty thousand dollars, perhaps the full amount which ble as much, and ought, upon the same principle, to draw accrues on the kind of salt to which the abolition extends. more than double as much money from the treasury. The duty, and the fishing allowances bottomed upon it, 5. Because it is the means of drawing an undue amount falling together as they did when Mr. Jefferson was Preof money from the public treasury, under the idea of an sident, would probably leave the amount of revenue unequivalent for the drawback of duty on the salts used in affected. the curing of fish. The amount of money actually drawn 9. Because it belongs to an unhappy period in the hisin that way is about four millions seven hundred and fifty tory of our Government, and came to us, in its present thousand dollars, and is now going on at the rate of two magnitude, in company with an odious and repudiated hundred and fifty thousand dollars per annum, and con- set of measures. The maximum of twenty cents a bushel stantly augmenting. That this amount is more than the on salt was fixed in the year '98, and was the fruit of the legal idea recognizes, or contemplates, is proved in various same system which produced the alien and sedition laws, ways. 1. By comparing the quantity of salt supposed to have the eight per cent. loans, the stamp act, the black cockbeen used, with the quantity of fish known to have been exade, and the standing army in time of peace. It was one ported, within a given year. This test, for the year 1828, of the contrivances of that disastrous period for extorting would exhibit about seventy millions of pounds weight of money from the people, for the support of that strong and salt on about forty millions of pounds weight of fish. This splendid Government which was then the cherished vi would suppose about a pound and three quarters of salt sion of so many exalted heads. The reforming hand of upon each pound of fish. 2. By comparing the value of Jefferson overthrew it, and all the superstructure of fishthe salt supposed to have been used, with the value of ing allowances which was erected upon it. The exigenthe fish known to have been exported. This test would cies of the late war caused it to be revived for the term of give two hundred and forty-eight thousand dollars for the the war, and the interest of some, and the neglect of salt duty on about one million of dollars' worth of fish; others, have permitted it to continue ever since. It is making the duty one-fourth of its value. On this basis, now our duty to sink it a second time. We profess to the amount of the duty on the salt used on exported pro- be disciples of the Jeffersonian school; let us act up to visions would be near six hundred thousand dollars. our profession, and complete the task which our mas 3. By comparing the increasing allowances for salt with ter set us. the decreasing exportation of fish. This test, for two This concludes what I have to say on the present ocgiven periods, the rate of allowance being the same, casion. I flatter myself that I have vindicated the title would produce this result: In the year 1820, three hun-of my bill; that I have shown it to be a bill to provide dred and twenty-one thousand four hundred and nineteen for the abolition of unnecessary duties; to relieve the peoquintals of dried fish exported, and one hundred and ple from sixteen millions of taxes; and to improve the ninety-eight thousand seven hundred and twenty-four dol- condition of the agriculture, manufactures, commerce, lars paid for the commutation of the salt drawback: 1828, and navigation, of the United States. I now submit my two hundred and sixty-five thousand two hundred and se-motion, in form, for leave to bring it in. venteen quintals of dried fish exported, and two hundred [The leave was thereupon granted, and the bill read and thirty-nine thousand one hundred and forty-five dol- the first time.] lars paid for the commutation. These comparisons establish the fact that money is unlawfully drawn from the treasury by means of these fishing allowances, bottomed on the salt duty, and that fact is expressly stated by the Secretary of the Treasury, [Mr. Ingham] in his report upon the finances, at the commencement of the present session of Congress. [See page eight of the report.] Far 6. Because it has become a practical violation of one of the most equitable clauses in the constitution of the United States--the clause which declares that duties, taxes, and excises, shall be uniform throughout the Union. There is no uniformity in the operation of this tax. from it. It empties the pockets of some, and fills the pockets of others. It returns to some five times as much as they pay, and to others it returns not a cent. It gives to the fishing interest two hundred and fifty thousand dollars per annum, and not a cent to the farming interest, which, upon the same principle, would be entitled to six hundred thousand dollars per annum. Mr. FOOT'S RESOLUTION. heretofore offered by Mr. FOOT. The Senate resumed the consideration of the resolution when he yielded to a motion to adjourn. Mr.WOODBURY addressed the Senate till three o'clock, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1830. Mr. WOODBURY resumed and concluded his remarks upon the great subjects of debate. They were to the following effect: I Perhaps [said Mr. W.] I could best repay the kind indulgence of the Senate yesterday, in adjourning so early to accommodate me, by an entire silence to-day. But it was my lot, possibly my misfortune, to offer an amendment to the resolution, which has occasioned such a long, and, in some respects, unpleasant debate. The amendment was offered in that spirit of kindness towards the West, which had rather practice, than merely profess; and, after opin7. Because this duty now rests upon a false basis--a ba- ions on the subject had become controverted, it was offersis which makes it the interest of one part of the Union ed with a view to elicit fully the real disposition felt in this to keep it up, while it is the interest of other parts to body concerning the surveys and sales of the public lands. get rid of it. It is the interest of the West to abolish this The unexpected motion to postpone both the resolution duty; it is the interest of the Northeast to perpetuate it. and the amendment, evidently tends to defeat a distinct The former loses money by it; the latter makes money by expression of opinion upon either, and has opened the it; and a tax that becomes a money making business is a door to a course of argument, and a latitude of discussion, solecism of the highest order of absurdity. Yet such is I believe, somewhat unprecedented. It seems to have the fact. The treasury records prove it, and it will af- metamorphosed the Senate, not only into a committee of ford the Northeast a brilliant opportunity to manifest their the whole on the state of the Union, but on the state of disinterested affection to the West, by giving up their own the Union in all time past, present, and to come. So be profit in this tax, to relieve the West from the burthen it it, if gentlemen please. This is not alluded to in the imposes upon her. spirit of rebuke against either side, as every Senator in 8. Because the repeal of the duty will not materially such cases is doubtless at liberty to pursue the dictates of |
