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ment, therefore, is either for the purpose of proving a truism which nobody denies, or an absurdity which no sensible man believes.

rate of duty which can be laid for the bona | whole. The President's parade of argufide purpose of collecting money for the support of government. To raise the duties higher than that point, and thereby diminish the amount collected, 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.'

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The object of the above reasoning, if we are able to comprehend it, is to prove that a certain low tariff of, say, fifteen or twenty per centum, will produce more revenue than a high tariff of forty or fifty per centum-that the precise rate of duty which will produce the most revenue may be ascertained by actual experiment, and that rate, whatever it shall be found to be, is the revenue standard. Now this is all mere hypothesis and delusion, without a single fact to support it. There is no such revenue standard, nor is it true that a low tariff will produce as much revenue as a higher one, except where the low tariff prevents smuggling; and we are much mistaken if the President's own figures do not prove this. The President and his Secretary appear to have adopted, as the basis of their system of finance, Dean Swift's celebrated paradox, that in political arithmetic two and two do not make four. If the President means to say, that a low tariff of five or ten per centum on coarse cotton fabrics, will produce more revenue from those fabrics than a high tariff of fifty or one hundred per centum would do, then he asserts a fact which nobody ever denied or disputed; for the high tariff would be equivalent to a prohibition of the import of the article, and would therefore produce no revenue at all. If this was what the President meant, it was a mere truism, and required no argument to sustain it. But if his meaning was, that an average tariff of twenty per centum on the whole importation, will produce more revenue than an average tariff of forty per centum on the whole importation, then he asserts a palpable and plain absurdity, equivalent to asserting that the half is greater than the

There is a well established principle of political economy, which neither the President, nor the Secretary of the Treasury, nor indeed any of their sect of political economists, seem ever to have learned; which shows, if not the absurdity, at least the futility of their idea of a revenue standard of duties on different articles of import.

The exports of a nation always do, and always should, control the imports, without regard to the rate of the duties. No nation should ever import more than the net proceeds of its exports. If this rule is violated, disaster immediately follows, as our own experience abundantly proves. A government, therefore, which encourages its citizens to import more than the net proceeds of their exports, violates a fundamental principle of political economy. The imports of a nation, however, always do, and always must, exceed by seven or eight per centum, the nominal exports. This excess of imports is caused by the profits, or net proceeds, of the exports above the valuation. Every merchant who exports a cargo of goods expects to realize, not only their original cost, but a profit on them. He expects to exchange his goods for others of more value to him, or for money; and these must be imported or there is an end to commerce. When a nation has got its proportion of the precious metals adjusted to its amount of property, there can be no profit on the importation of specie, because it is worth more abroad than at home, and there will be a profit on the importation of goods and exportation of money. Now, unless a high tariff on imports will prevent the export and sale of our surplus products, to those who are willing to give a good price for them, the rate of duty on the proceeds will not prevent them from being imported. So long, then, as our exports amount to a hundred millions of dollars a year, under a tariff that shall average fifty, or even one hundred per centum, our imports will equal or exceed that amount. It is true that a horizontal tariff of one hundred per

centum upon all importations, would entirely exclude a large portion of our present imports-all those that are produced, or could be conveniently produced, in the country; but other articles would be substituted in their place, so as to equal the full amount of our exports. The only effect, therefore, of a high duty on a given article, such as coarse cotton fabrics, would be to exclude that article and substitute some other in its place to an equal amount and value.

Although an increase of duty, therefore, on cotton goods, may decrease the revenue on that article, yet it does not follow, as the President seems to suppose, that the general revenue will be diminished, although such might be the case. If, for example, the duty on cotton and woollen goods should be increased to such a point as to exclude ten millions of them from our market, and articles paying no duty at all should be substituted in their place, the general amount of revenue would be diminished; but he would be but a shallow politician who could not prevent such a result.

The truth of this theory is proved by the history of every commercial nation in the world. Our imports have exceeded our exports every year since the government was established, with the exception, perhaps, of a single year. The same is true of England, and all other nations, without any regard to the rate of their tariffs. If the advocates of low tariffs will show a single exception to this rule, we will give up the argument.

There is a class of goods, however, upon which high duties will produce less revenue than low duties, although the high duties may not diminish the amount of imports. These are goods of small bulk and great value, such as jewelry, expensive laces, &c. A high duty on such goods would cause them to be smuggled to a great extent, and thus defeat the revenue. But the idea that an average high duty on the staple articles of consumption will prevent them from being imported through the custom-house, is utterly absurd. If it were otherwise, a tariff of two or three hundred per cent. on the transportation of oysters from Baltimore to Cincinnati would prevent them from being consumed in Cincinnati. If our government were to

enact a tariff which should be equivalent to an average duty of fifty per centum upon the whole import of the country, it would afford a revenue of fifty millions of dollars, so long as our exports equalled a hundred millions of dollars; and if our exports should equal one hundred and fifty millions of dollars, the duties on imports would equal seventy-five millions of dollars. The revenue has always been found to rise or fall in amount in proportion as the general average has been raised or lowered. The President's own figures

will show this.

In his message to Congress in December, 1845, he states the exports of domestic products for the fiscal year ending the 30th June, 1845, to have been of the value of ninety-nine and threetenths millions of dollars. (We omit fractions less than tenths.) The imports for consumption for the same year, were of the value of one hundred and one millions of dollars, and the receipts into the Treasury on the above amount of imports, was twenty-seven and five-tenths millions of dollars, equal, within a small fraction, to twenty-seven per centum upon the whole import of that year. This was under the tariff of 1842.

In his message to Congress, (December, 1846,) the President says: "The value of the exports for the fiscal year ending the 30th June, 1846, amounted to one hundred and two and one-tenth millions of dollars. The imports for consumption for the same year, were of the value of one hundred and ten and three-tenths millions of dollars. The duties paid into the Treasury upon the above amount of imports, was twenty-six and seven-tenths millions of dollars," equal to twenty-four and a fraction per centum upon the whole importation for that year. This was also under the tariff of 1842. Although the tariff is the same in different years, yet the average of duties will vary one or two per centum in different years, in consequence of larger proportions of free goods, or goods paying a low duty, being imported one year than another.

In his late message the President states the exports of domestic products for the fiscal year ending the 30th of June last, at one hundred and fifty and six-tenths millions of dollars. The imports for do

mestic consumption, including specie for the same year, were one hundred and sixty and seven-tenths millions of dollars in value. Excluding specie, the imports amounted to one hundred and thirty-eight and fivetenths millions of dollars, the duties upon which were twenty-three and seven-tenths millions of dollars, equal to fourteen and a fraction per centum upon the whole importation, including specie. Excluding specie, which paid no duty, the per centum of duty was seventeen and a fraction. During five months of this fiscal year, the tariff of 1842 was in operation, and in that time seven and eight-tenths millions of dollars were collected, leaving but fifteen and nine-tenths millions to be collected under the tariff of 1846. The actual average tariff of 1846 is, therefore, a good deal less than seventeen per centum; but as our cause does not require us to stand for trifles, we will allow that the average duty under the tariff of 1846 was seventeen per centum. This makes the tariff of 1846 about nine or ten per cent. lower than the tariff of 1842, and the du ties paid into the treasury from twelve to fifteen millions of dollars less than they would have been under the tariff of 1842. In 1845 twenty-seven millions of revenue were collected on one hundred and two millions of imports. In 1846 twentysix millions of revenue were collected on one hundred and ten millions of imports, and in 1847 but twenty-four millions of revenue (we give the benefit of the fraction) were collected on one hundred and thirty-eight and five-tenths millions of imports, exclusive of twenty-two millions of specie. This enormous amount of exports and consequent imports, was caused by the bountiful harvest in this country and the dearth in Europe, and not in any degree by our tariff; and yet the President and his Secretary have the hardihood, not to say audacity, to argue before the American people the superiority of the tariff of 1846 over the tariff of 1842 as a revenue

measure. These high functionaries have not only attempted to maintain the superiority of that miserable delusion, which they have christened a revenue tariff, but they have garbled and perverted the records of the Treasury Department to make them speak favorably of their bantling. Thus the President tells us that

"The net revenue from customs in the year ending on the 1st of December, 1846, being the last year under the operation of the tariff act of 1842, was $22,971,403 10; and the net revenue from customs during the year ending Dec. 1st, 1847, being the first year under the operation of the tariff act of 1846, was about $31,500,000; being an increase of revenue for the first year, under the tariff act of 1846, of more than $8,500,000 over that of the last year of the tariff of 1842."

But facts are stubborn things, and figures will not lie, even to accommodate the President. The above paragraph could have been put into the President's message for no other purpose but to deceive. The object was to make the people believe that the tariff of '46 was more productive of revenue than the tariff of '42, else why not give the exports and imports for the same period of time? Had these been given it would have appeared that twenty-two and nine-tenths millions of revenue were collected on less than one hundred millions of imports, while only thirty-one and fivetenths millions of revenue were collected on nearly or quite two hundred millions of imports, and nearly the same amount of exports. This is too paltry, if not for the man, at least for the officer who wrote it.

During the first year of the operation of the tariff of 1846, the treasury has lost from twelve to fifteen millions of dollars, which would have been raised under the tariff of 1842. But the President and the free trade sect of politicians will, no doubt, tell us, that whatever the treasury may have lost by a low rate of duty, the people have gained; that if the people have more taxes to pay in consequence of the low rate of duties, they have more to pay with; all of which is as false as their theory.

Among political economists of the old school, with Adam Smith at their head, it was held as a maxim, that whatever taxes were collected upon an article of consumption, whether it was by an excise or an impost, must be ultimately paid by the consumer; so that if twenty-five per cent. of duties were collected on an article imported for consumption, the consumer would have to pay twenty-five per cent. more for it than if no duty had been collected on it. This was a plausible but superficial theory, and it was received and

tax.

acted on for a long time; but its falsity is susceptible of invincible demonstration. An impost is not strictly speaking a Taxes are levied upon citizens and property within the jurisdiction of the government laying the tax. An impost is a bonus which the owner of property is required to pay for the privilege of bringing it within the territorial limits of another government for sale or use. The owner of the property upon which a tax is laid, has no option whether he will pay the tax or not; but the owner of property upon which an impost is laid, has his election, whether he will bring his property within the jurisdiction of the government and pay the impost, or keep it out of that jurisdiction and save the impost. If he chooses to pay the impost and bring it into the country, he will then sell it for the most he can get, without any regard to the impost he has paid on it. Should he attempt to regulate the price by the impost he had paid, he would be laughed at for his folly. Between buyer and seller the duty paid on an article is never inquired after or thought of; the market price is their standard. A large portion of the foreign goods sold in our market, and which have paid a duty of twenty-five or thirty per cent., are sold at auction, and do not bring a cent more than they would, if they had been imported free of duty. Up to about twenty-five or thirty per cent., there is no doubt whatever, but what the foreign producer, and not the consumer, pays, in some cases, threefourths, in others, seven-eighths, and in many cases the whole amount of the duties collected on the goods. It is not, therefore, true that the people have gained what the treasury may have lost, under the operation of the tariff of 1846. During the first year of that absurd measure, the country has lost from ten to twelve millions of dollars, and will continue to lose that much per annum as long as it shall be permitted to remain on the statute book. This has caused large deficits, and will continue to cause still larger deficits, in the treasury, which the President and his Secretary propose to supply by a tax on tea and coffee, now admitted free of duty, by a reduction in the price of the public lands, and by a loan, the present year, of $18,500,000.

It is perfectly right and just to lay an impost on tea and coffee. Indeed, the true policy of this country, and of every country, is to let no article of commerce be imported without paying a small duty. The nation incurs a heavy expense, annually, for the accommodation and protection of the commerce of the country; and every person, whether citizen or alien, who participates in the benefit of that commerce, ought to pay a portion of that expense, for the same reason, that every person who transports his property on railroads and canals ought to pay toll. No foreign goods, therefore, ought to be admitted into the country without paying a duty of at least five or ten per cent. It would, therefore, be good policy to lay a specific duty of at least two cents a pound on coffee, and five and ten cents a pound on tea. Notwithstanding what the President and his Secretary may say to the contrary, yet the experience of all commercial nations proves, that specific duties, where they can be laid, are preferable to ad valorem duties. But as their theory of finance is built upon paradoxes, it was to be expected that they would reject experience.

The policy of reducing the price of the public lands for the purpose of increasing the amount of revenue from them, is about as wise as reducing the rates of duty for the purpose of increasing the amount of revenue. The following quotation from the late Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, exhibits his policy in regard to the public lands, and his reasons for it. Although rather long, yet it is such a beautiful specimen of the Secretary's reasoning powers, that we have not the heart to mutilate it :

"The recommendations in my first as well as second annual Report of the reduction of the price of the public lands in favor of settlers and cultivators, together with the removal of onerous restrictions upon the pre-emption laws, are again respectfully presented to the consideration of Congress. Sales at the reduced price, it is thought, should be confined to settlers and cultivators, in limited quantities, sufficient for farms and plantations, and the pre-emption privilege extended to every bona fide settler, and embrace all lands, whether surveyed or unsurveyed, to which the Indian title may be extin guished. The lands remaining subject to entry at private sale on the first of this month were

152,101,001 acres, and the unsurveyed lands to | the revenue from them would be increased which the Indian title has been extinguished 71,048,214 acres, (per table Z.) The adoption of these two measures, for the reasons stated in my previous reports, would augment the revenue a million and a half of dollars per annum, operating as they would on 223,149,215 acres. It would, at the same time, increase the wages of labor, by enabling a much larger number of the working classes to purchase farms at the low price, whilst it would, at the same time, augment the wealth and power of the whole country.

"When the public lands have been offered a long time for a price they will not bring, the failure to reduce the price is equivalent in its effects to an enactment by Congress that these lands shall not be sold and settled for an unlimited period. The case is still stronger as to the unsurveyed lands: there being an act of Congress forbidding their sale or settlement, and denouncing as criminals, and as trespassers, the American pioneers who would desire to enter in advance into the wilderness, cover it with farms and towns, with the church and the school-house, extend over it the blessings of our free institutions, and enlarge by the axe and the plough, the cultivated area of the American Union.

"Should the system proposed be now adopted, the surveyed as well as the unsurveyed lands opened to pre-emptors, and the Indian title extinguished within the coming year, or that which succeeds it, in addition to Iowa and Wisconsin, we should soon have two new States, Winesota and Itasca, in the great valley of the West, adjoining Wisconsin and Iowa. Instead of draining the old States of their population, the graduation and pre-emption system will, in a series of years, increase their prosperity by giving them customers in the west who will carry to them their products and receive their imports or fabrics in exchange, increasing the transportation upon our railroads and canals, and augmenting our foreign as well as coastwise tonnage. The distribution of the proceeds of the sales of these lands is prevented for at least twenty years by the act of 28th January, 1847, setting apart and pledging their proceeds to the extinguishment of the public debt. So far also as distribution may have been advocated with a view to favor a protective tariff, it is now proved that a tariff for revenue not only yields a larger income than the protective system, but also advances more rapidly, in a series of years, the prosperity of the manufacturers themselves, by the augmentation of their foreign and domestic markets."

The present price of the public lands is one dollar and a quarter per acre, and the Secretary thinks, if their price was reduced to seventy-five or fifty cents per acre, (although he does not say how much,)

VOL. I. NO. IV. NEW SERIES.

26

one and a half millions of dollars per annum; and, according to the same reasoning, if they were reduced to twenty-five cents per acre, the revenue from them would be still greater, for the same reason that an average duty of twenty-five per cent. on imports, will produce more revenue than fifty per cent. would do. But whether there be a revenue standard of the public lands, or what that standard is, if there be one, we are not informed.

The

Now it strikes us that the reason more lands are not sold, is because more are not wanted for settlement and cultivation, and not because of their high price. To those who want them, the public lands are very cheap at a dollar and a quarter per acre; to those who do not want them, they would be dear at twenty-five cents an acre. A certain portion of the population of the old States desire annually to emigrate and settle on the public lands. In other words. there is a market for a given number of acres of the public lands every year. quantity wanted increases as our population increases, nor can it be essentially increased by reducing the price of the lands. If the public lands were reduced to a dime in the old States would not buy them. an acre, the great mass of the population The Secretary's project, therefore, for increasing the revenue, by a reduction in the price of the public lands, would be very likely to result as his project for increasing the revenue from imports, by reducing the rate of duty, has resulted.

By reducing the price of those lands which have been a long time in the market, he would probably divert a part of the current of emigration to those lands, and thereby prevent the sale of those of higher price, which would still farther diminish the revenue. The million and a half of revenue, therefore, anticipated from this project, is not likely to be realized, and that sum will also have to be supplied by

loan.

All the Secretary's estimates are based upon the exports, and consequent imports, of 1847, and can, therefore, never be realized except in years of famine in Europe; and yet, according to these estimates, he will want a loan of $18,500,000, to carry on the government the present year. Add to this the million and a half which he ex

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