government.

the Federal government. The State governments have the constitutional right to protect and foster industry, and this is one of their chief duties. But the Federal government has no right to meddle with the subject. It is a compact between the States, formed for certain express purposes, and necessarily, by the very condition of its existence, limited in its action to those purposes. We cannot first determine what citizens have the right to demand of government as such, and then go and demand it of the Federal government; for it is a special government, having only certain special powers, and by no means the general powers of We have the right to demand of it only what it has the right to do; and it has the right to do only what it was expressly created for the purpose of doing. The Federal government differs from government properly so called, in the fact, that it is founded.. in compact, and is therefore restricted in its powers to the express terms of the compact. It is not, strictly speaking, a government at all, but an agency, which certain independent governments have created for their common convenience and common weal. It is therefore subject to the authorities which created it; whereas, government, properly so called, is itself supreme, and gives the law, instead of receiving it. This makes a wide difference between the Federal government and the State governments, a difference not merely specific, but generic. The powers of the latter are all the powers that belong to government, while the powers of the former are only the few which are expressly delegated to it; and these it possesses not inherently in its own right, for they still vest in the State governments, which have merely, by their ratification of the Federal Constitution, enacted that they shall be exercised by a common delegation from all the States.

We mean not, by saying that the Federal government is restricted to express powers, to say that it has no incidental powers. It has incidental powers; but the incidental powers can be exercised only for the purposes expressed in the substantive powers. The end for

which the incidental power is exercised must always be the end specified in the substantive power; for any power claimed to be incidental, not necessary to carry into effect the substantive power, cannot be said to be an incidental power. For, the moment it is a power to effect any other end, it ceases to be incidental, and becomes substantive; and then, if not expressed in the Constitution, it is unconstitutional, and not lawful to be exercised.

Now, the power to lay a tariff for the protection of any branch of industry is not a substantive power in the Constitution, as is agreed on all hands. Consequently, a tariff laid for the express purpose of protection would be unconstitutional. The substantive power touching a tariff is the right to impose a tariff for revenue, and for revenue alone. The incidental power is the right to discriminate, but to discriminate only for the general purpose of the substantive power, namely, revenue. To discriminate in favor of protection would be to contemplate an end not contemplated in the substantive power, and, therefore, to convert the incidental power into a substantive power. The right to discriminate in favor of protection, as incidental to the right to impose a tariff for revenue, can be claimed only on condition, that to discriminate for protection and to discriminate for revenue are one and the same thing. But to discriminate for protection is to discriminate against revenue. Therefore, the right to discriminate. for protection cannot be an incident of the right to impose a tariff for revenue.

Here is the error of our Democratic as well as of our Whig politicians. The Whigs care nothing for the Constitution, and are not to be affected by a constitutional argument. Their principle is, to praise the Constitution in words, and to disregard it in their deeds. But our Democratic politicians do retain some reverence for the Constitution. They see clearly, that a tariff expressly for protection would be unconstitutional; but they do not seem to see with equal clearness, that a tariff incidentally for protection is equally un

constitutional; for they do not seem to be aware, that a tariff defeats its substantive purpose of revenue just so far as it incidentally discriminates effectually for protection. A protective tariff, we all know, is repugnant to a revenue tariff, and defeats revenue just so far as it is really protective. Then, a tariff discriminating for protection is repugnant to a tariff for revenue, just so far as its discrimination is really protective. Discrimination for revenue proceeds on principles directly opposed to the principles on which proceeds discrimination for protection. This is a fact which should never be lost sight of.

A protective tariff, if true to the purpose for which it is imposed, must needs be restricted to such foreign articles as come into competition with similar articles, the growth or manufacture of our own country; but a revenue tariff, if true to its purpose, must not be so restricted, but must be lighter on these articles, and heavier on those articles which enter largely into the consumption of the people, and which are obtained only from abroad. The protective tariff must, as far as possible, shut out foreign importations, and secure the home market to the home producer; the revenue tariff must by no means shut out foreign productions, nor check importations, beyond the point where the increased rate of duty will not compensate for the diminished imports. In discriminating, that is, in laying a heavier duty on some articles, and a lighter duty on others, the same principle must be observed. A protective tariff lets in tea, coffee, and such articles as are not the growth or manufacture of this country, free of duty, or at a merely nominal duty; while it imposes a heavy tax on cottons, woollens, iron, &c. A revenue tariff reverses this, and taxes the first class of articles more heavily than the last, because, by so doing, it obtains the greater amount of revenue at the same average rate of duty. It is obvious, then, that a revenue tariff, discriminating in favor of our own industry, is unconstitutional and suicidal. Unconstitutional, because there is no substantive power in the Constitution to im

pose a tariff for protection; and suicidal, because so far as protective it defeats revenue. This is conclusive.

We regret, therefore, to hear so many of our own political friends exclaiming, "A revenue tariff with a wise discrimination for protection." Such a tariff is an absurdity, and the cry tends to deceive, to produce a false impression, to pervert the good sense of the public, and to render it impossible for the friends of sound views on the subject to obtain a fair and candid hearing. We tie up our own hands, and seal our own lips, and can henceforth neither speak nor labor for the truth. Instead of enlightening the public, and correcting the false notions the protectionists industriously circulate, we contribute to confirm those notions, and suffer the people to be misled. We do immense harm by this false doctrine; by seeming to countenance this false doctrine, we deprive ourselves of nearly all opportunity to labor for the true doctrine.

Nor less fallacious is this other watchword which some of our political friends have adopted, "The equal protection of all the great interests of the country." If this were merely an electioneering device, got up to counteract an opposing battle-cry, we would let it pass; for we have no great disposition to interfere with the manner in which politicians manage elections. Still, we may say, in passing, that we regard all such devices as discreditable to those who get them up, and insulting to the people. "Soldiers of fortune" and fourthrate politicians have a natural fondness for them, but rarely, after all, profit by them. If your cause will not stand on its own merits, bear to be stated openly, honestly, and to be advocated for what it really is in itself, your only wise course is to abandon it. Be ashamed to advocate measures you cannot avow, especially if you are one of those who make great professions of confidence in the virtue and intelligence of the people. But this is not merely an electioneering device. Hundreds and thousands are deceived by it. We do not suppose that the authors of it are deceived. In their understanding of it, it is tantamount to the cry of "No

special protection at all." But the great mass of the people, when they find men, judged to be worthy of being the candidates of a great and leading party for the presidency, apparently contending with all seriousness that all the great interests of the country should be protected alike, will not understand that it means, that the special protection now afforded to the manufacturing industry should be withdrawn, but that a similar protection should be extended to all other branches of industry; which would be very much, if it were possible, like a realization of the Whig promises in 1840, — that, if the Whigs came into power, all buyers should be able to buy cheap, and all sellers to sell dear!

The proposition to afford a positive protection to all the great industrial interests of the country is, as we have said, an absurdity; for protection is, directly or indirectly, a bounty to the protected interest, and government has nothing to give in the shape of a bounty to one interest except what it takes from some other interest or interests. The government would encourage the manufacture of woollens, and therefore lays a duty on them when imported. But it must protect all interests alike; so it lays another duty on foreign wool, which, by increasing the cost of the raw material, neutralizes, as far as it goes, the benefit the manufacturer derives from the duty on woollens. The government

imposes a duty on foreign silks, to encourage the domestic manufacture; and then destroys it, wholly or in part, by imposing another duty on the raw material, for the encouragement of the silk-grower. And this miserable quackery is wise legislation, and supported by the most eminent statesmen both of the Whig and the Democratic party, your Clays, Websters, Polks, Wrights, and Buchanans!

The government imposes a heavy duty on foreign goods for the benefit of domestic manufactures. But what is the compensating duty it can impose for the benefit of the agricultural community? The duty on imports, if it operate as a protective duty, must diminish their amount. It lessens the ability of the foreigner to