posed a duty against us, first of 5, next of 84, then of 101, and finally of 15 per cent., which, it is supposed, will be an exclusion. It is worthy of remark, that on the single staple of tobacco, which she receives from the United States, Great Britain levies an amount of duties about equal to the total amount of customs collected on all articles imported into the United States from all foreign countries; and also about equal to the total annual expenditures of our government. The Hon. P. Triplett, of Kentucky, made a communication to the committee on manufactures, in the 27th Congress, from which are deduced the following facts: that American products consumed in Europe pay duties on entering there, equal to half of their entire value; whereas, European products consumed in the United States pay duties here equal to one fifth of their value. In 1841, imports into the United States were $127,945,000, and exports, $91,000,000. The duties raised from these imports amounted to $14,487,000, being about 11 per cent.; whereas, the duties which foreign countries obtained from exports from the United States, of that year, amounted to $113,500,000, or 124 per cent. The average of exports of tobacco from the United States to Europe, for 1839 and 1840, was $9,225,000 for each year; and the average duties imposed for each year by European governments, was $32,463,000, or 350 per cent. The duties on American tobacco in Europe have been as high as $35,000,000 a year.

But Adam Smith goes even farther, if it were possible. He says: “As there are two cases in which it will generally be advantageous to lay some burden upon foreign, for the encouragement of domestic industry, so there are two other cases in which it may sometimes be a matter of deliberation in the one, how far it is proper to continue the free importation of certain foreign goods; and in the other, how far, or in what manner, it may be proper to restore that free importation, after it has been for some time interrupted." Is not this truly astonishing? Here is the whole field open, and opened by the hand of Adam Smith. "It may be a matter of deliberation." About what?-First, as to what articles, now, or at any time, free, duties shall be put on to; and next, as to what articles, now, or at any time, subject to duty, shall be made free. Is it possible to have a more extended discretion? And the British government have always acted on this rule of " deliberation." We have shown that Sir Robert Peel's policy, in making some articles free, was precisely of this kind-not for Free Trade, but on "deliberation," according to Adam Smith's rule.

Adam Smith and his followers are for ever begging the question, that Protection is a tax. We disprove it a thousand and one times, and there they are still, making the same asseveration, without deigning to offer evidence.

We are inclined to believe, that a protective system operates the same in all countries, as in the United States. Take, for example, Dr. Bowering's report on Germany, to the British Parliament, 1840. The German Zoll-Verein treaty had then been in operation some ten years. Dr. Bowering admits, that the German manufactures, which are protected by a high-tariff duty, are better, and sold on more reasonable terms, than the like foreign articles; that the demand for agricultural products had increased, and the prices risen, under the high tariff; that land had risen from 50 to 100 per cent.; that labor was better paid; that the wages of labor, in the manufacturing districts, had risen 30 per cent. The reason of admitting these facts, is understood to have been, that if the British corn-laws were not instantly abolished, Germany would become independent, and learn too much of the benefits of Protection. The Allgemeine Zeitung said in 1841, "Within these ten years," since Protection was established, "Germany has made the advance of a century in welfare and industry, in the feeling of self-dependence, and in national energy."

Another rule laid down by Adam Smith, viz., that "the general industry of the society can never exceed what the capital of the society can employ," as an element of his grand proposition of Free Trade, only shows, first, that this is assumed in view of a given state of society, with which, peradventure, he was acquainted; and secondly, that he was totally ignorant of the condition of things in America. In England, as it then was, probably, and is now it may be, this rule might possibly apply; but every one knows, in this quarter, it does not apply here. No man, in the United States, is necessarily dependent on "the capital of the society," for employment. He can at any time go into the backwoods, and be perfectly independent; and it is because of this great open field, of this illimitable chance, into which multitudes are constantly pushing their way, and literally opening and creating a new world, thereby proving that anybody else can do it, that man, in this country, is independent of capital—certainly of that species of capital, of which Adam Smith here speaks. It is not, therefore, true here, that "the general industry of the society can never exceed what the capital of the society can employ." This only proves, that,

however well Adam Smith may have been qualified to write a system of public economy for Great Britain, he was totally unqualified to write one for the United States; and that his attempt to write for all nations, as if he could lay down principles and form a system equally applicable to all, was a very audacious one.

The cry of "monopoly," which the arts of demagogues have sent barking over the land for a few years past, like a pack of hounds let loose on the scent of game, will be found to be not only without foundation, so far as it applies to the encouragement of American manufactures; but it will appear, before we shall have done with the subject, that it is a direct persecution of American labor, hunting it down, and injuring it first and chiefly. When a party asks protection for an American product, it is a medinte application of American labor for employment and reward, without expense to anybody, and with benefit to the public and to all parties; for it is shown elsewhere, that protective duties, in the United States are not taxes, but the contrary. The capitalist, who comes with a petition to government for protection in a specific enterprise, appears as the proxy of labor, asking for a position in which he can employ labor and pay for it; and every new investment of capital, in a productive art, or pursuit, creates a new demand for labor, and tends to enhance its reward. No matter how great the profit of the investment. The greater it is, so much greater the benefit to labor; and it is labor chiefly that is benefited by advantageous outlays of capital. Labor, on an average in the United States, as before shown, is worth at least 50 per cent. on itself as capital, the value of which never diminishes, but always increases, by the encouragement given to other capital to employ it; and just in proportion as other capital finds encouragement under protection to extend its operations, does its own rate of profit decrease, while that of labor increases. This is a settled principle. It is the effect of the rivalship of capital in different hands. Large profits of capital in any employment, not invested with exclusive privileges-which alone constitute a monopoly—are like a vacuum in nature. Other capital immediately rushes to the point, till there is a surfeit. The fact of large profits can not endure-must necessarily be transient.

Adam Smith says: "As the quantity of stock [capital] to be lent at interest increases, the interest [profit] necessarily diminishes. As capitals increase in any country, the profits which can be made by employing them necessarily diminish. There arises, in consequence, a competition between different capitals. The owner of one must

not only sell what he deals in somewhat cheaper, but, in order to get it to sell, he must sometimes too buy it dearer. The demand for productive labor, by the increase of the funds which are destined to maintain it, grows every day greater and greater. Laborers easily find employment, but the owners of capitals find it difficult to get laborers to employ. Their competition raises the wages of labor, and sinks the profits of stock. But when the profits are in this manner diminished, as it were, at both ends, the rate of interest must necessarily be diminished with them."

The Hon. Daniel Webster says: "The increase of the investments of capital in great works, tends to reduce the profits on that capital. That is a necessary result. But then it has exactly the reverse action upon labor. For the more that capital is invested in the great operations, the greater is the call for labor; and therefore, the ratio is here the other way, and the rates of labor increase as the profits of capital are diminished."-(His speech in Senate, on the 25th of July, 1846.) It is impossible that investments of capital which employ labor should be multiplied or extended to the disadvantage of labor, and it is always for the interests of labor that protection should be granted, if necessary, to secure the end of such investments. Whenever capital invokes it, it is the same thing as if labor invoked it; and the fact may always be taken as the measure of graduation required by the interests of labor in fixing protection.

As labor occupies the position of parent to all other capital, it would seem to be very fair, that this thing of its own creation should be employed for its own benefit; and when the benefit can be made reciprocal, it is all the better and more satisfactory. Whenever capital asks for protection in any specific investment, for the creation of home products of any kind, against foreign competition, it is always identical with the demand of home labor for employment and reward. The protection is that of labor, ultimately and chiefly. "Capital," says the Hon. Abbott Lawrence, “has usually had the power to take care of itself, and does not require the aid of Congress to place it in any other position, than to put the labor in motion. Congress should legislate for the labor, and the capital will take care of itself."

Some have supposed that American arts and other pursuits may, under a system of protection, ultimately attain to such perfection and strength as no longer to need protection. They seem to imagine that protection is only needed to get well started. No doubt,

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for the reason already noticed, viz., that a free country, where labor is rewarded, has many inherent advantages over those whose labor is not free, and is not properly rewarded; for this reason it is doubtless true that the United States, after a long-protracted enjoyment of an adequate system of protection, would be able to run a powerful race with the European nations on a Free-Trade platform. But still it must be seen, that so long as the conditions of society in these two quarters are so greatly diverse as to create and maintain a difference of a hundred per cent., in favor of Europe and against this country, in the cost of money and labor, the contest would be most unequal; and while this difference exists, it is impossible for any one reasonably to conclude, that the necessity of protection will not also exist, however perfect may be the state of American arts and instruments of labor, and however strong their position. Justice alone would seem to require it.

It has been most unfortunate for this country that demagogues, the greatest scourge of humanity, have been able to take advantage of the natural jealousies existing in the hearts of the poor against the rich, and of the unprosperous against the prosperous, by exciting in the minds of the former a belief, that the very means of their comfort and happiness, and their chances for the improvement of their condition, are adverse to them, and the means of depriving them of their rights. As above shown, when capital asks for protection, it asks it in the name and for the benefit of labor, to increase the demand for it, and to give it better chances; and as above shown, the profits of capital diminish as the demand for labor and its reward are increased. The rivalship of capital is the harvest of labor. The more the protection of government encourages new investments of capital in forms to employ labor, so much better will be the condition and prospects of the laboring classes. For the want of such protection, laborers are injured; with it, they are benefited; for it is their protection chiefly; they are the party most deeply interested. And yet the demagogues of the country, by appealing to the natural jealousies of the people, have, to a great extent, made them believe, by misrepresentation, that capitalists, occupying such a position, under the protection of government, as to employ labor, and afford it better chances, are "monopolists," invested with and using a power to oppress labor, and to oppress the poor. Strange as it may seem, everybody knows that this is a fact. The poor laborer is made to believe, by ingenious falsehoods addressed to his natural jealousies, that they

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