manufacturers of course are ruined. But when in the order of events the price rises, the duty rises with it, and an extraordinary cheapness is followed by an extraordinary dearness. By the first condition the home producer and by the second the consumer is oppressed. Confidence is impaired. Three fourths of the importations being at the risk and under the entire control of British exporting capitalists, no man can tell from month to month what to look for when the market will be deluged, or when it will be scant, when foreign goods will be cheap or when they will be dear the control over these circumstances being wholly in the breast of British merchants and manufacturers.

This system of subjecting our markets to the control of foreign traders works evil in such a number of ways, and disturbs and chokes up so many channels of prosperity, it would require a volume to contain their mere enumeration. Suffice then to mention a few only, of the most important.

The first effect of the lowness, but chiefly of the uncertainty, of the prices of foreign goods and their duties, is to destroy confidence in all investments in mines and manufactures. Capital, diverted from its natural channels, either lies unemployed or ceases to exist. The surplus population of the mining and agricultural districts, instead of engaging side by side with the farmer in fashioning their wool, cotton, and flax, and in that process consuming the surplus of the farmer's grain and pork, wanders off to the new regions of the West to contend there with poverty, ignorance, and disease, employed in the hard and profitless labor of pioneers; when in the natural order of events, they should be enjoying a comfortable life in villages and towns in

the older States.

But that is not all. The farmers left behind are soon borne down and impoverished by the flood of produce poured over them from the West, where their sons and brothers have gone, to compete with and to destroy them. Could a large part of them engage in new occupations, in mines and manufactures, the remainder might be able to sustain themselves, with the assistance of the markets opened for them in the manufacturing towns. But the policy of the government forbids; and

they are compelled to struggle on oppressed with debt and misery, earning a miserable pittance from a soil which they have no means of improving, and which grows poorer and poorer by that want from year to year. Such is a true picture of the condition of vast numbers of small farmers and planters in the Atlantic States.

As far as these unfortunate agriculturists are aware of their own misery, and of its causes, and it is hard to believe them ignorant of truths so simple and so obvious,-it is not difficult to account for their decision against the policy of the Administration. They knew that Western competition had destroyed, and must forever destroy their hopes of competency. They knew that European famines, even, could not benefit them much, since in the very year of the famine a surplus of food was produced more than double what was wanted to supply the foreign markets. They read in the newspapers, that England was constantly inclosing waste lands and improving her own agriculture. famines would not often occur. their only hope was either to establish a protective system, and by that means raise the price of food and provide a market at their own doors, or to sell out or give away their miserable farms and emigrate to the prairies, there to begin life anew, contending with all the miseries and discouragements of a recommencement. It was, therefore, not at all to be wondered at, that in casting their vote they should have cast it for a protective policy, with a view to provide a market for their products.

That

That

Nor is it at all remarkable that great numbers of the cotton-growers of the South should have shown by the results of this election how little they approved the policy of the government. The greatest good fortune that could happen to them, would be, to have a Manchester brought to them, or erected within reach of them; to which they could send their cotton, saving the cost of a shipment. Still more, if a second Manchester could be erected near them, and double the quantity of the produce be consumed by these two Manchesters. It was therefore very reasonable that such of them as knew this, should vote for the erection of several Manchesters, in Massachusetts, in New York, in Pennsylvania, in Georgia, in

the Carolinas and in Ohio. While the Manchesters in New England were in operation, their cotton brought them ten cents; when these, as at present, were broken down, it brought them but six cents, and even less. This was a very solid and simple reason for giving the Whigs a victory. But there were other arguments operating on the minds of cotton-growers.

The early substitution of negro for white slaves in the southern colonies, compelled them to confine their attention in a great measure to the cultivation of such products as are profitable only when cultivated by negroes, whose physical constitution and natural indolence enable them to endure the hot and unhealthy climate of the South. Though the negro requires less for his subsistence, he is notwithstanding a more expensive farm laborer than the free white man, though perhaps a better one than the white man enslaved. For while he consumes, it may be, a fourth less of food and clothing, he accomplishes at least a third less work. It is even very probable that a free white farm laborer working for wages, will accomplish double the work of a black slave. But by this very activity he is disqualified for the labor of rice, cane, and cotton fields; while the indolence and mental sluggishness of the negro enable him to live, performing moderate tasks, with abundance of sleep and rest.

This condition of things precludes the accumulation of wealth by the planter, excepting in the cultivation of such products as cannot be grown by the labor of free white men. The institution of slavery is not, however, confined to those districts where slave labor is profitable. Over wide regions of the South, where white labor would be far more profitable than that of slaves, as in Kentucky, the interior of Virginia, and the upland and table land of the continent generally, in the South and West, where the climate is free from miasma and is not visited with the alternate damps and heats of a sea-coast summer in the South, it has also an existence. In

these regions the proportion of slaves to freemen is steadily diminishing, and the white population of poor laborers feel aggrieved by the presence of slaves among them, because it is repugnant to the natural pride of a free citizen to work side by side with slaves subject to the lash.

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The honor and merit of industry is taken away by such a relation, and no free man of spirit will endure it. Slaves themselves are quick to see the dishonor of such a condition, and they do not pretend to conceal their contempt for white laborers. The poorer white population of the interior therefore extremely desirous of a change. They wish by some means, either by the entire removal of the negro population, with whom, be they slave or free, they have in general too much natural pride to engage in gross labor; or by the introduction of new and more profitable occupations, such as those of mines and manufactures, in which the slave cannot be placed in rivalry with them, to better their condition. Even if the lower drudgery of manufactures, such as the attendance upon machines, and the transportation of loads, were given to negroes, there would still be occupation in the higher departments of business, for free white men, were a new field opened for industry in manufactures and mines.

Rice

Nor are the owners of unprofitable plantations less interested in this change. The markets being already overstocked with cotton and with corn, and the hemp and tobacco lands exhausted, they cease to accumulate wealth. and sugar can be grown only in certain districts. They are therefore in the condition of capitalists whose money is invested at a low and variable rate of interest. Such of them as had hopes of employing their useless negroes, to whom they were too much attached by habit and affection, to send them to a Texas or New Orleans slave market, and whom both interest and humanity forbid their turning into the woods to starve, (for the negro turned loose in the woods of North America, cannot live like the freed slave of Jamaica, or Domingo, on the fruits of trees, or like the barbarians of Africa, but must either perish of famine or live like the aborigines, by hunting, being destitute both of the energy and the capital of the Western white emigrants,)-those impoverished planters must look with the greatest eagerness and anxiety to the least shadow of a plan for bettering their own condition and finding a new employment for their laborers. It is, therefore, not at all remarkable, that numbers of them

cast their vote at the late election in favor of a policy calculated to provide a market for the produce of their farms. A policy which, though it may for a few years add somewhat to the personal expenses of the masters, in the matter of a few dollars more for a fine broadcloth coat or a pair of French boots, must increase the value of their lands to an amount an hundred times exceeding such trivial losses, and what is of equal moment to their minds, provide means of education and employment for their slaves and children: the first of whom they are now driven to sell, and the second to colonize in the barbarous regions of New Mexico and Texas.

The governing power of the Empire had been pretty equally divided between the North and the South. Since the adoption, however, of the usurping policy so much in vogue with many southern legislators for the last twenty years, that respect and confidence so freely given to the counsels of the South by their northern brethren, has been in large part withheld. Only those legislators of the South who have shown a knowledge not only of the true interests of the country, but of their own interests; and who have set their faces against plans of disunion, of conquest, and of the extension of institutions which already encumber and impoverish them, have retained the confidence of the people, and have kept that high and honorable position which they held as the successors of Jefferson, of Madison, and of Washington.

That the influence of these liberal and powerful minds should have been thrown into the scale in support of the present candidate was indeed to be expected. They did not inquire whether he would, or would not, assist in extending the institution of slavery; all they asked from him, was a pledge that he would not interfere with the will of Congress and the people. That pledge he gave, and he received in consequence their cordial support.

In this enumeration of the causes of the success of the Whigs, at the late election, we have shown by what considerations so many of the planters and agriculturists of the older States were induced to give the Whig candidate their support. We have yet to extend the enumeration over the votes given by the commercial

classes, and by those who are concerned in banking, and in the larger operations of trade.

First, then, for the reasons of the support given to the Whig candidate by the commercial classes. The inland commerce of the country by roads, railroads, and canals, which gives subsistence to great numbers of boatmen, mechanics, and persons engaged in employments connected with trade and transportation, depends in great measure for its life and importance upon the larger commerce of the great northern lakes, the southern and western rivers, and the ports of the sea-coast. For the protection and encouragement of maritime commerce, the government expends annually a vast sum, exceeding eight millions of dollars; and in time of war would not hesitate to spend an hundred millions, if needed, in a naval armament. The harbors of the ports of entry where ships congregate, are protected by costly fortifications, in which a standing army is maintained in time of peace. All this cost is incurred for the protection of an inferior branch of commerce; for it is well known that the trade of the great lakes and rivers already exceeds in importance, and must soon be of ten times the magnitude of the maritime trade. And yet such are the odd and ridiculous prejudices of the Dynasty, that while they willingly spend millions on their maritime commerce, they grudge a dollar towards that of lakes and rivers; on which, much more than upon that of the sea, the internal prosperity and wealth of the country is dependent.

This unaccountable parsimony of the Dynasty, is also set off in fine relief by the freedom with which they voted the expenditure on the war with Mexico. The pretence and sole excuse for that war was to increase the wealth of the Union: but so far from increasing it, it must be half a century at least before it shall have paid, if it ever pays, the cost of its acquisition. But when it is understood that an hundred millions pended upon harbors and rivers for the benefit of western, northern and southern commerce, would inevitably add three times its own value to the business of the country, and that too in a few years, the contrast between the profes

ex

sions and the practice of the Dynasty becomes not only absurd, but even ludicrous, if we did not seem to see, at the bottom of it all, jealousies and hatreds the most dark and bitter, and a black ambition at work that would sacrifice the welfare of the people to gratify its aspirations.

No wonder, therefore, that the commercial classes voted in great numbers for a candidate who goes into office pledged not to interfere with the action of Congress, if that body think it just and proper that the commerce of the interior should receive at least equal protection with maritime commerce.

The representatives of the people passed a bill for the protection of the River and Lake commerce. By the provisions of this bill a moderate expenditure was allowed for the creation of harbors on the great lakes, for the protection of that commerce in corn, pork, and other commodities by which the farmers of the West are supplied with money and manufactures from the East. The Administration vetoed this bill, though it was proved by the best evidence that its passage would be the means of perhaps doubling the trade between the East and West. The reasons given for its extinction were grounded upon a general opposition to the entire scheme of internal improvements: agreeably to that misanthropical philosphy which was adopted by the Dynasty, after the results of their great experiment with the government funds in the time of their founder. They had concluded from that experiment that government should never again extend aid in any shape to the people. And now they thought that if the farmers of Wisconsin wish to have harbors built for their produce upon the lake shores of New York, why, those farmers might build these harbors themselves: and then, if it was answered that they were poor men, and had no money, they would reply, if they said anything, that that was none of their business; that it was no business of government to be looking after the affairs of the country. That the duty of the government of a great Empire under a great and stern Dynasty, was to be looking to the affairs of its neighbors; snapping up bits, corners, and angles of

territory, here and there, on this side and on that; so as to make the empire of a pleasant shape, to look pleasant on a map of the world. This was the substance of all they could say in reply to those who inquired of them the reason why the Administration refused the farmers of the West the privilege of a harbor for their produce on the shores of Lake Ontario. They gave the same answer to those of them whose position obliged them to send their corn by the great rivers of the West; in which a vast quantity is annually sunk and ruined by snags and other obstructions, to the great loss of those who engage in the transportation of goods. They would not be meddling in the matter, they said it was the business of a great empire to be making glorious wars, and sending armies into the field; and not to be debasing itself with this miserable log sawyer's job, to fill the pockets of a set of corn-growers and sugar-planters. If they wanted a port or a river conquered from Mexico or from England, on the other edge of the continent, they had no objections, but would send a troop forthwith, armed with rifles to secure it; but as for sending an army of Irish laborers, armed with saws, spades, and pickaxes, to remove logs and sandbars from rivers, or to dig out harbors, and pile breakwaters on the lakes, they thought it not only a dirty, ungentlemanly business, unworthy the ambition of a glorious Administration, but they had great suspicions it might be unconstitutional. These arguments, put forth, indeed, in a language and style of great dignity, which we dare not attempt to imitate, were all that could be offered against the River and Harbor bill.

When the great doctrine of our philosophers,-that the government of a country must never meddle with the affairs of that country, but only with the affairs of its neighbors; that it must not attempt either to educate, enrich, or protect its own citizens, but must freely engage in subduing, civilizing, protecting and enriching the citizens of neighboring nations,when this doctrine first appeared, the more sensible part of our citizens paid very little heed to it; for it was not given out in a single, distinct proposition as above, but in disjointed parts and fragments, in the speeches of the orators of

the Dynasty; wherein, of all other places, it would be least likely to be seen by a reading and reflecting public. It had been felt, but had not been clearly remarked, that ever since that beneficent act of the Hero, the giving of the public money to the banks, the stoical philosophy had been adopted as a system; and that a great and stern Administration should never trust the people in any particular, or extend aid to them in their affairs, began not only to seem philosophically reasonable, in the private thoughts of the hangers-on, and organgrinders, and wire-movers of the government, but was in very truth the practical maxim of the Administration; that it guided them to the opinion that Congress ought to have as little regard paid to it as possible, and should be snubbed and diminished of its authority on all occasions; for, being a kind of real presence of the people set up under the nose of the executive, it was constantly infected with the feelings, prejudices and interests of the populace, whom it behooved an imperial administration to govern and not to serve. That the interests of the farming and cotton-planting population were as little to be regarded; for if government should listen to every suggestion of interest that came to it, it would have its hands full indeed, and at last be turned into a mere agent of the people, in derogation of its high dignity as a conquering Power. That a corrupt, grasping, avaricious set of merchants and dealers, should look to their own affairs, and by no means pretend to solicit aid from a government occupied in preserving the balance of the world, a task arduous indeed, since that it alone on this side of the world having any power or resources, it must rival in its enterprises all those of Europe put together, and weigh down its side of the globe with conquests and acquisitions unimaginably extended. That it was quite idle for the people of the United States to be engaging in manufactures; the superior industry and ingenuity of England being already well occupied in that, and it was unphilosophical to have more than one great manufacturing people. If the farmers and planters of the Atlantic States cannot compete with the West, that is all in the course of nature; they had an equal

ness.

chance, and was a government to be boosting them with tariffs ? That if protective tariffs should be granted for a few years, the country would be deluged with all sorts of cheap manufactures, and our intercourse with England very much diminished. That there would be an injurious abundance of wealth, which would lead to vice and idleThat Democratic institutions flourished best when difficulties were created for the virtue of the people to contend with, the strife against depressing circumstances being a fine whet to the edge of private virtue. Other considerations were offered, as, that if the power of a rival manufacturing people were suffered to grow to too great a height on this side of the water, there might be danger of disturbing the balance of power in Europe, to the detriment of England, a matter which the Imperial Administration has greatly at heart. That as the trade in English goods to this country was almost entirely in the hands of English houses, who send their goods through commission houses taking the risk and profit themselves, it would betray a petty jealousy of them, to set up the interests of a million of mere laborers, a mob of mechanics, against these great capitalists. But this revulsion of feeling against the people carried the Dynasty still further, and led them to condemn and thwart the whole system of credit, by which the poorer classes who have no money are enabled to get occupation, and carry on enterprises which would never have been thought of in another country. As the working of this system is very interesting and remarkable, it will not, perhaps, be esteemed a loss of time to spend a few sentences in explanation of it, and to show in how odious a light it must appear to a stern and philosophic Administration.

It will always happen that some individuals in a community will have a little more money than they wish to use for the immediate purposes of life. This money will perhaps be a quantity of gold and silver laid by in a chest. Now, as the value of gold and silver is given to it by its use as a

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tool of trade," an instrument for facilitating the exchange of one kind of goods or labor for some other kind, it has no value,— it yields no return,-when locked up, or buried in the earth. The community will