would apply efficacious remedies. We have not, thank God, suffered in any great degree for food. But distress, resulting from the absence of a supply of the mere physical wants of our nature, is not the only, nor, perhaps, the keenest distress, to which we may be exposed. Moral and pecuniary suffering is, if possible, more poignant. It plunges its victim into hopeless despair. It poisons, it paralyzes, the spring and source of all useful exertion. Its unsparing action is collateral as well as direct. It falls with inexorable force at the same time upon the wretched family of embarrassment and insolvency, and upon its head. They are a faithful mirror, reflecting back upon him, at once, his own frightful image, and that no less appalling of the dearest objects of his affection. What is the CAUSE of this wide-spreading distress, of this deep depression, which we behold stamped on the public countenance? We are the same people. We have the same country. We cannot arraign the bounty of Providence. The showers still fall in the same grateful abundance. The sun still casts his genial and vivifying influence upon the land; and the land, fertile and diversified in its soils as ever, yields to the industrious cultivator, in boundless profusion, its accustomed fruits, its richest treasures. Our vigour is unimpaired. Our industry has not relaxed. If ever the accusation of wasteful extravagance could be made against our people, it cannot now be justly preferred. They, on the contrary, for the few last years at least, have been practising the most rigid economy. The causes, then, of our present affliction, whatever they may be, are human causes, and human causes not chargeable upon the people, in their private and individual relations.

What, again I would ask, is the CAUSE of the unhappy condition of our country, which I have faintly depicted? It is to be found in the fact that, during almost the whole existence of this government, we have shaped our industry, our navigation, and our commerce, in reference to an extraordinary war in Europe, and to foreign markets, which no longer exist; in the fact that we have depended too much upon foreign sources of supply, and excited too little the native; in the fact that, whilst we have cultivated, with assiduous care, our foreign resources, we have suffered those at home to wither in a state of neglect and abandonment. The consequence of the termination of the war of Europe, has been the resumption of European commerce, European navigation, and the extension of European agriculture and European industry, in all its branches. Europe, therefore, has no longer occasion to any thing like the same extent as that which she had during her wars, for American commerce, American navigation, the produce of American industry. Europe in commotion, and convulsed throughout all her members, is to America no longer the same Europe as she is now, tranquil, and watching with the most vigilant attention all her own peculiar interests, without regard to the operation of her policy upon us. The effect of this altered state of Europe upon us, has been to circumscribe the employment of our marine, and greatly to reduce the value of the produce of our territorial, labour. The further effect of this twofold reduction has been to decrease the value of all property, whether on the land or on the ocean, and which I suppose to be about fifty per cent. And the still further effect has been to diminish

1

the amount of our circulating medium, in a proportion not less, by its transmission abroad, or its withdrawal by the banking institutions, from a necessity which they could not control. The quantity of money, in whatever form it may be, which a nation wants, is in proportion to the total mass of its wealth, and to the activity of that wealth. A nation that has but little wealth, has but a limited want of money. In stating the fact, therefore, that the total wealth of the country has diminished, within a few years, in a ratio of about fifty per cent, we shall at once fully comprehend the inevitable reduction, which must have ensued, in the total quantity of the circulating medium of the country. A nation is most prosperous when there is a gradual and untempting addition to the aggregate of its circulating medium. It is in a condition the most adverse, when there is a rapid diminution in the quantity of the circulating medium, and a consequent depression in the value of property. In the former case, the wealth of individuals insensibly increases, and income keeps ahead of expenditure. But in the latter instance, debts have been contracted, engagements made, and habits of expense established, in reference to the existing state of wealth and of its representative. When these come to be greatly reduced, individuals find their debts still existing, their engagements unexecuted, and their habits inveterate. They see themselves in the possession of the same property, on which, in good faith, they had bound themselves. But that property, without their fault, possesses no longer the same value; and hence discontent, impoverishment, and ruin arise. Let us suppose, Mr. Chairman, that Europe was again the theatre of such a general war as recently raged throughout all her dominions--such a state of the war as existed in her greatest exertions and in our greatest prosperity: instantly there would arise a greedy demand for the surplus produce of our industry, for our commerce, for our navigation. The languor which now prevails in our cities, and in our sea-ports, would give way to an animated activity. Our roads and rivers would be crowded with the produce of the interior. Every where we should witness excited industry. The precious metals would re-flow from abroad upon us. Banks, which have maintained their credit, would revive their business; and new banks would be established, to take the place of those which have sunk beneath the general pressure. For it is a mistake to suppose that they have produced our present adversity; they may have somewhat aggravated it, but they were the effect and the evidence of our prosperity.Prices would again get up; the former value of property would be restored. And those embarrassed persons who have not been already overwhelmed by the times, would suddenly find, in the augmented value of their property, and the renewal of their business, ample means to extricate themselves from all their difficulties. The greatest want of civilized society is a market for the sale and exchange of the surplus of the produce of the labor of its members. This market may exist at home or abroad, or both, but it must exist somewhere, if society prospers; and wherever it does exist it should be competent tothe absorption of the entire surplus of production. It is most desirable that there should be both a home and a foreign market. But with respect to their relative superiority, I cannot entertain a doubt. The home market is first in order, and para

mount in importance. The object of the bill under consideration, is to create this home market, and to lay the foundations of a genuine American policy. It is opposed; and it is incumbent upon the partizans of the foreign policy (terms which I shall use without any invidious intent) to demonstrate that the foreign market is an adequate vent for the surplus produce of our labour. But is it so? 1. Foreign nations cannot, if they would, take our surplus produce. If the source of supply, no matter of what, increases in a greater ratio than the demand for that supply, a glut of the market is inevitable, even if we suppose both to remain perfectly unobstructed. The duplication of our population takes place in terms of about twenty-five years. The term will be more and more extended as our numbers multiply. But it will be a sufficient approximation to assume this ratio for the present. We increase therefore, in population, at the rate of about four per cent. per annum. Supposing the increase of our production to be in the same ratio, we should, every succeeding year, have of surplus produce, four per cent. more than that of the preceding year, without taking into the account the differences of seasons which neutralize each other. If, therefore, we are to rely upon the foreign market exclusively, foreign consumption ought to be shown to be increasing in the same ratio of four per cent. per annum, if it be an adequate vent for our surplus produce. But, as I have supposed the measure of our increasing production to be furnished by that of our increasing population; so the measure of their power of consumption must be determined by that of the increase of their population. Now the, total foreign population, who consume our surplus produce, upon an average, do not double their aggregate number in a shorter term than that of about 100 years. Our powers of production increase then in a ratio four times greater than their powers of consumption. And hence their utter inability to receive from us our surplus produce.

But 2dly, If they could, they will not. The policy of all Europe is adverse to the reception of our agricultural produce, so far as it comes into collision with its own; and under that limitation we are absolutely forbid to enter their ports, except under circumstances which deprive them of all value as a steady market. The policy of all Europe rejects those great staples of our country, which consist of objects of human subsistence. The policy of all Europe refuses to receive from us any thing but those raw materials of smaller value, essential to their manufactures, to which they can give a higher value, with the exception of tobacco and rice, which they cannot produce. Even Great Britain, to which we are its best customer, and from which we receive nearly one half in value of our whole imports, will not take from us articles of subsistence produced in our country cheaper than can be produced in Great Britain. In adopting this exclusive policy, the states of Europe do not inquire what is best for us, but what suits themselves respectively; they do not take jurisdiction of the question of our interests, but limit the object of their legislation to that of the conservation of their own peculiar interests, leaving us free to prosecute ours as we please. They do not guide themselves by that romantic philanthropy, which we see displayed here, and which invokes us to continue to purchase the produce of foreign industry, without regard to the state

or prosperity of our own, that foreigners may be pleased to purchase the few remaining articles of ours which their restricted policy has not yet absolutely excluded their consumption.

What sort of a figure would a member of the British Parliament have made; what sort of a reception would his opposition have obtained, if he had remonstrated against the passage of the Corn Law, by which British consumption is limited to the bread-stuffs of British production, to the entire exclusion of American, and stated that America could not and would not buy British manufactures, if Britain did not buy American flour?

Both the inability and the policy of foreign powers, then, forbid us to rely upon the foreign market as being an adequate vent for the surplus produce of American labour. Now let us see if this general reasoning is not fortified and confirmed by the actual experience of this country. If the foreign market may be safely relied upon, as furnishing an adequate demand for our surplus produce, then the official documents will show a progressive increase, from year to year, in the exports of our native produce, in a proportion equal to that which I have suggested. If, on the contrary, we shall find from them that for a long term of past years some of our most valuable staples have retrograded, some remained stationary, and others advanced but little, if any, in amount, with the exception of cotton, the deductions of reason and the lessons of experience will alike command us to withdraw our confidence in the competency of the foreign market. The total amount of all our exports of domestic produce for the year, beginning in 1795, and ending on the 30th September, 1796, was $40,764,097. Estimating the increase according to the ratio of the increase of our population, that is, at four per cent. per annum, the amount of the exports of the same produce in the year ending on the 30th September last, ought to have been $85,420,861. It was in fact only $47,155,408. Taking the average of five years, from 1803 to 1807, inclusive, the amount of native produce exported was $43,209,751 for each of those years. Estimating what it ought to have been, during the last year, applying the principle suggested to that amount, there should have been exported $77,766,751 instead of $47,155,408. If these comparative amounts of the aggregate actual exports and what they ought to have been, be discouraging, we shall find, on descending into particulars, still less cause of satisfaction. The export of tobacco in 1791 was 112,428 hogsheads. That was the year of the largest exportation of that article; but it is the only instance in which I have selected the maximum of exportation. The amount of what we ought to have exported last year, estimated according to the scale of increase which I have used, is 266,332 hogsheads. The actual export was 99,009 hogsheads. We exported in 1803 the quantity of 1,311,853 barrels of flour; and ought to have exported last year 2,361,333 barrels. We, in fact, exported only 756,702 barrels. Of that quantity we sent to South America, according to a statement furnished me by the diligence of a friend near me (Mr.

Poinsett) to whose valuable mass of accurate information, in regard to that interesting quarter of the world, I have had occasion frequently to apply. But that demand is temporary, growing out of the existing state of war. Whenever peace is restored to it, and I now hope that the day is not distant when its independence will be generally acknowledged, there cannot be a doubt that it will supply its own consumption. In all parts of it the soil, either from climate or from elevation, is well adapted to the culture of wheat; and no where can better wheat be produced than in some portions of Mexico and Chili. Still the market of South America is one which, on other accounts, deserves the greatest consideration. And I congratulate you, the committee, and the country, on the recent adoption of a more auspicious policy towards it.

We exported in 1803, Indian corn to the amount of 2,074,608 bushels. The quantity should have been, in 1823, 3,734,288 bushels. The actual quantity exported was 749,034 bushels, or about one-fifth of what it should have been, and a little more than one-third of what it was more than twenty years ago. We ought not then to be surprised at the extreme depression of the price of that article, of which I have heard my honourable friend (Mr. Basset) complain, nor of the distress of the corn-growing districts adjacent to Chesapeake Bay. We exported 77,934 barrels of beef in 1803, and the last year but 61,418, instead of 140,274 barrels. In the same year, (1803,) we exported 96,602 barrels of pork, and last year 55,529, instead of 173,882 barrels. Rice has not advanced, by any means in the proportion which it ought to have done. All the small articles, such as cheese, butter, candles, &c. too minute to detail, but important in their aggregate, have also materially diminished. Cotton alone has advanced. But whilst the quantity of it is augmented, its actual value is considerably diminished. The total quantity last year exceeded that of the preceding year by near thirty millions of pounds. And yet the total value of the year of smaller exportation, exceeded that of the last year by upwards of three and a half millions of dollars. If this article, the capacity of our country to produce which was scarcely known in 1790, were subtracted from the mass of our exports, the value of the residue would only be a little upwards of $27,000,000, during the last year.

The distribution of the articles of our exports throughout the United States, cannot fail to fix the attention of the Committee. Of the $47,155,408, to which they amounted last year, three articles alone, (cotton, rice, and tobacco,) composed together $28,549,177. Now these articles are chiefly produced to the South. And if we estimate that portion of our population who are actually engaged in their culture, it would probably not exceed two millions. Thus, then, less than one-fifth of the whole population of the United States produced upwards of one half, nearly two-thirds, of the entire value of the exports of the last year.