It is difficult to see any special connection of the interests of slavery with the decline of the policy. It is true that the slaveholders were becoming strict constructionists generally. They had learned from the Missouri struggle that Congress must not be allowed to magnify its powers when forming the Territories into Commonwealths, and they had learned from the tariff struggles that Congress must not be allowed to magnify its powers in regard to the regulation of foreign commerce and the raising of revenue, but, as to internal improvements, no reliable evidence of a consciousness, on the part of the slaveholders, of any particular connection between their peculiar interest and a policy upon this subject by the general Government is discoverable.
On the contrary, in the struggle for the repeal of the Tariff of 1828 the influence of the slavery interest is easily remarked, and is clearly seen to have been controlling.
| The commencement of the struggle for the repeal of the Tariff of 1828. |
On February 10th, 1829, Mr. William Smith, the senior Senator from South Carolina, presented to the Senate the protest of the legislature of South Carolina against Congressional protection to domestic manufactures. This memorial pronounced all such acts to be unconstitutional, except as incidental to raising the revenue or regulating commerce, and impolitic even then, when their operation would be unequal upon the different sections of the country, and felt by any section to be oppressive. The language of the paper was respectful, moderate, dignified, and forcible, and it contained no threats of disunion, or of violent or unlawful resistance. The legislature asked that the protest should be entered on the journal of the Senate. The Senate, however, only ordered it to be printed.
The South Carolinians promised themselves, nevertheless, some measure of relief from what they supposed would be the policy of the newly elected President. Being a Southern man, it was naturally supposed that he would recognize Southern interests in the policy upon this subject which he would recommend. But, while Jackson had not committed himself to protection for the sake of the manufacturers or of the producers of raw material, he was a strong Union man and an American, and the argument for the tariff from the point of view of national industrial independence exercised a prevailing influence in determining his attitude toward the subject.
| Jackson on the Tariff of 1828, in his first annual message. Jackson's views on the Tariff as a general policy. |
In his message of December 8th, 1829, he wrote that the Tariff of 1828 had not proved itself so beneficial to the manufacturers or so injurious to commerce and agriculture as had been anticipated; that he regretted that all nations would not abolish restrictions, and refer the management of trade to individual enterprise; that since, however, they would not do so, a tariff was the necessary policy of the United States; but that in the face of the fact that the national debt would soon be paid, and the sinking fund would not be much longer required, a modification of the existing tariff in the direction of a reduction of duties would soon be the true and necessary policy; and that the principle to be followed in making such a modification ought to be to reduce the duties upon such articles as might come into competition with home products no further than would leave to the latter a fair chance in such competition; and that from the general principle of a reduction to this point must be excepted the duties on the implements and prime necessities of war, all of which should enjoy a higher protection than that accorded to other articles. Evidently, according to this doctrine, the chief reductions should fall upon articles not coming into competition with home products, such articles as tea, coffee, etc., at that time termed the unprotected articles. Jackson had thus anticipated Clay's American system of the tariff by nearly three years, as we shall see.
The South Carolinians were greatly disappointed by this expression of the President's views, although they claimed that the message recommended substantial tariff reduction. This part of the message was referred to the committee on Manufactures, according to the rule of procedure which had prevailed in the House of Representatives for nearly a decade, and which showed that the matter of the tariff was not regarded as something purely incidental to the raising of revenue.