The Richmond (Va.) Enquirer, of Nov. 13, 1846, says: "Our negroes are going by hundreds, yea, thousands, to the southwest. The domestic can not compete with the southwestern demand for them, for the plain reason, that the tobacco-grower can not make one half of one per cent. per annum upon slave labor, while the cotton and sugar planters make, perhaps, from fifteen to twenty per

cent."

So far as this evidence goes-and it is large and comprehensive —it proves a great deal; proves what agrees with common report and observation, viz., that cotton-planting has been one of the most lucrative, money-making pursuits in the United States; that fortunes have been made quick and easy by it; that it has been uniformly profitable; that vast estates have been amassed in this calling; that men have grown so suddenly and greatly rich as to be satisfied, and willing to sell out, when the business was worth 18 per cent.; that it is a business which is not liable to fluctuation, and never fails; that the average profit can hardly be less than 20 per cent. on the capital invested, when it has, probably a long time and extensively, been very much better than that; that, if prices have fallen from the enormous profits of former years, it has been owing to the natural tendency of capital where so much money could be made, resulting in over-production; and that the business is still one of the best in the whole country. All but the last of these statements are verified by Mr. Clay's evidence; and for the last, to wit, that this business is still the best, it is now proposed to introduce a witness whose evidence, considering the quarter from which it comes, as well as for its forcible and convincing character, will, perhaps, be somewhat surprising.

In 1844, Leavitt, Trow, & Co., New York, published a book entitled, "NOTES ON POLITICAL ECONOMY, AS APPLICABLE TO THE UNITED STATES, BY A SOUTHRN PLANTER." Among the many instructive things contained in it (it was written by a masterhand), are the following:

"Let us now calculate what cotton can be grown for when prices get down to mere support for master and slave. With the proper economy, by the owner living on his place, deriving his household and table expenses from it, and clothing and feeding his own slaves, his annual expenses, consisting of salt, iron, medicine, taxes, wrapping for his cotton, and overseer's wages, do not exceed 2 cents a pound on the product or crop. All over that is a profit in their sense, that is, over and above annual expenses. I will give the

details to make this clear. A plantation of fifty hands makes the average of seven bales to the hand, weighing four hundred and fifty pounds. This is three hundred and fifty bales. Suppose 2 cents for expenses. This amounts to $3,150 on the crop. This crop, say, sells for 4 cents a pound, net, and, clear of charges for transportation, insurance, and commission for selling, leaves $3,150 profit for the luxuries of the owner, who gets his necessaries out of the plantation by living on it. This is a very pretty sum; and half of it would be ample for him, which would reduce cotton to three cents. As to insurance, unfortunately, the slaves not only insure themselves, but give a large increase, which grows up with the owner's children, and furnishes them with outfits by the time they need them. Now, I will go into a calculation to show that two cents a pound cover the annual expenses. Here follow the items, taking a plantation of fifty hands as a basis: For overseer, $500; for salt, $20; iron, $30; medicines, $20; doctor's bill, $100, for you can contract by the year, and it is often done, at $2 a head; bagging and rope to wrap it at 12 cents for the one, and 5 cents for the other, amounts to $300; taxes, $100; sundry small things, $100; all told. The writer speaks from experience, for he is a planter of cotton, and owns slaves. All this amounts to $1,170, much below the allowance of 2 cents a pound, amounting, as we have seen, to $3,150. I only wish to show, that we can grow cotton for 3 cents a pound, and have a living profit. . . The cotton culture, then, is sure to go on in this country, at any price, from 3 cents up, that the market warrants, and with increased energies. These facts warrant us in asserting, which we do broadly and unqualifiedly, that we can grow cotton cheaper than any other people on earth, not even excepting the Hindoos. The consequence of this will be, that we will take the market of the world, and keep it supplied with cotton. . . I am not speaking hypothetically, when I say the United States can grow all the cotton wanted-have slaves and land enough to do it, and even overdo it. [This was written before there was any serious expectation of the annexation of Texas.] This country can raise 3,000,000 of bales, when that much is wanted, and then keep ahead of the consumption far enough to prevent any advance in the price. . . If we keep cotton down, not to its minimum price, but to five or six cents, it will cease to come around the cape of Good Hope, and the United States will have the market of the world, just as certainly as at three cents. England can not decline taking our cotton, because it is

cheapest, and because she has built up her manufactories on the minimum price of the raw material, and buys it wherever cheapest, and has conformed all prices of labor and goods to that principle. She has, in France and Germany, as well as in us, rivals to her cotton manufactures, and such skilful rivals, too, that she dare not pay more for the raw materials than they do. If she were to pay two cents a pound more for cotton than we do, or than the continent of Europe does, she would lose her hold on the cotton manufacture, and her opponents would take her markets. The halfpenny-u-pound duty now levied in England will have to give way to insure her success. [This duty was taken off in 1845, the next year after this remarkable prediction was uttered.] . . According to the opinions of our most deserving and most skilful commission merchants and factors, our own [American] spinners are now worth fully two cents a pound to the cotton market, each and every year, by the competition they create with the Europeans. . . Fears have been expressed that, should we get under way by the stimulus of a protective tariff, we would not only pass the dead point, but go ahead beyond our own consumption, so as to aim at supplying the whole world with manufactures. Such arguments cut like twoedged swords, and show how much might be done under protection."

The above extracts are a little more comprehensive than what is strictly pertinent to the point of the comparative profits of manufacturing and cotton-growing. Nevertheless, they exhibit some practical suggestions of great importance relative to the subject. One of them is a maximum price of cotton, five to six cents, that will be best for the country, though not, perhaps, for individual growers, except as it might prove to be their interest thus to command the market of all the world. It is clear that the prices can not be kept up as high as they have been, so long as the business is so profitable, and so attractive to capital. It may, therefore, be better for each, as it would be better for the aggregate interest, that prices should come down to that point, which will secure an exclusive market in all quarters. The idea suggested by this writer, that, in such a case, it would be policy to prevent the rise of prices above that point, is doubtless repugnant to the complaint, that they have already fallen too low. But it will be hard to disturb his reasoning. The clearness with which he has set forth the position of England, in her absolute dependence on American cotton, will be appreciated. It will be seen that it disposes of the argument

that England would purchase less of American cotton under an American protective system, and proves that she would rather be forced to purchase more, to keep her own markets, which would be exposed to American and other competition. In any case, these rival interests would necessarily enlarge the field of demand for manufactured cottons, and the world must be supplied, which necessarily increases the demand for the raw material. With those who wish to sustain and raise the price of American cotton, the two-cents-a-pound sustaining power, imparted to it by American. spinners-admitting the fact-could hardly be unwelcome to them; and it will be difficult to avoid the conclusion, that the fact is so.

With the facts afforded by the "Southern Planter," as to the expense of raising cotton, it is only necessary to find what have been the prices of cotton, during the history of its production in the United States, down to the present time, and its price now, to have a just idea of the profits of the business. In a variety of instructive and useful statistics on cotton, published in the "National Intelligencer," Sept. 8, 1846, which had been prepared with great care by a Virginia gentleman, is a column of the average price of cotton per pound, for each year, from 1790 to 1838, as follows in the note below.*

By a table in the report of the secretary of the treasury, 1845, on page 612, these average prices are brought down to 1844, inclusive. It begins with 1833:

.16

1837.

.16

1838.

The slight variation in six concurrent years, from 1833 to 1838, inclusive, in

There is enough in all this, to show, in connexion with the evidence of Mr. Clay, and the practical statements of the "Southern Planter," first, that cotton-growing in the United States, has been not only a very profitable business, down to this time, but by far the most profitable of any in the country; secondly, that it has never seen a day of adversity; and thirdly, that it occupies a commercial position, in relation to the wants of mankind, and to the rest of the world, which, for an indefinite future period, apparently for ever, is very sure to command uninterrupted prosperity and great profits.

And this is the interest which complains of the profits of manufacturing, when the latter, in its best days, never did so well as cotton-growing in its poorest days; when cotton-growing never failed-can't fail, except as the crop fails, and then the price, ordinarily, will make it up-whereas, manufacturing has broken down many times-has sunk more money, and ruined more fortunes, than has happened to any other interest in the land.

But to show how a protective system operates on the cottongrowing interest of the United States, we beg leave to call attention to a method of proof and argument of a very remarkable character, and which, we think, will conclude all controversy on the question. It is contained in "a speech of Mr. Simmons, of Rhode Island, upon the resolutions to postpone the bill introduced by Mr. M'Duffie, of South Carolina, to reduce the duties on imports, delivered in United States senate, March 27, 1844," and will be found in the note below.*

these two authorities, establishes at least the fidelity of the first, if it should sug gest that there may have been a motive in the second (it was sent to the secretary from South Carolina, in answer to one of his circulars), for making the price as low as fairness would allow. Both are doubtless worthy of confidence, and in any case are accurate enough for the present purpose.

It is proper to remark, that the higher prices of former years do not determine the question of comparative profits in the business at different times. The advantages of experience and sundry improvements, might make the prices of latter years more profitable than those of the former. The right of using Whitney's cottongin, was open to all in 1800. It will be seen that the prices have never yet come down to the maximum, five to six, which the "Southern Planter" thinks would be best for the interest, and that, for the last twenty of these years, from 1825 to 1844, inclusive, they amount to an average of 11 1-5 cents (taking the secretary's prices as far as they go), leaving nearly four times a living profit, which is three cents. The average prices of the first thirty-five years, from 1790 to 1824, inclusive, were twenty-four cents, or eight times the living profit of the present period.

"I will," said Mr. Simmons, "give a statement of the results of an exchange of one hundred bales of cotton in each country for heavy sheetings—the cheapest article in his long list, substance considered :