The district I have the honor to represent is not bounded on navigable water. So far then as it respects my constituents, (and many other districts of different States are in the same situation,) the law executes itself with rigor. From their geographical position, they are excluded the means of selling their surplus produce, while this very law operates as a bounty in effect to the citizens of other parts of the United States. I call the attention of the committee to the northern parts of the State of New York. That State binds on Lake Erie to Niagara, on the whole extent of Lake Ontario, on a great part of the river St. Lawrence, and the Lakes Champlain and George, and has an immediate, direct, easy communication with the British, in Upper and Lower Canada. The whole Genessee country, and the counties lower down, have a steady, constant market, the prices tempting, the access easy, and few or no officers to interrupt the daily supplies given to their British neighbors. We cannot shut our eyes to the fact of this commerce being steadily carried on.
The embargo, so far as it restrains places from exporting their surplus produce, goes to enhance the price of such produce in foreign markets—the enhanced price affords the temptation, and the easy access gives the means to that country to export it, and in fact, by excluding others, gives them a monopoly of supply. Near four hundred miles of northern coast, in proximity to the British settlements, gives to New York upon the lakes a steady market. Vermont binds on lakes which communicate with Canada. Passamaquoddy openly and publicly furnishes supplies to New Brunswick. In this state of things, and in the mode the law is executed, it is partial and oppressive, and my constituents and others in similar locations so feel and experience it.
But, sir, there is another portion of our fellow-citizens, on whom this law executes itself with peculiar severity, I mean the frugal, hardy, laborious and valuable fishermen of the Eastern States. I see gentlemen smile at a member of the Middle States supporting the interests of the fishermen; but, sir, I should think myself illy entitled to a seat in this House, if I did not know the value of that class of men to society and the Union. I wish, sir, their numbers, character, and usefulness, were better known and understood than I fear they are. And as on this subject my opinions may not be orthodox, I will refer to the head of the church.
Mr. Chairman, in the year 1791, the now President of the United States, then Secretary of State, made an able and luminous report on our fisheries. These are his words: first, as to the annual value of a fisherman’s labor, secondly, as to the situation and value of the whale fishery as carried on from a sand bar—
“About 100 natives on board 17 ships (for there were 150 Americans engaged by the voyage) came to 2,255 livres, or about $416 66 a man.”
“The American whale fishery is principally followed by the inhabitants of the island of Nantucket—a sand bar of about fifteen miles long and three broad—capable of maintaining by its agriculture about twenty families; but it employed on the fisheries, before the war, between five and six thousand men and boys; and in the only harbor it possesses it had one hundred and forty vessels—one hundred and thirty-two of which were of the large kind—as being employed in the southern fishery. In agriculture, then, they have no resources; and if that of their fishery cannot be pursued from their own habitations, it is natural they should seek others from which it can be followed, and prefer those where they will find a sameness of language, religion, laws, habits, and kindred. A foreign emissary has lately been among them, for the purpose of renewing the invitations to a change of situation; but, attached to their native country, they prefer continuing in it, if their continuance there can be made supportable.”—Mr. Jefferson’s report, January 10, 1791, on the subject of the fisheries.
I call the attention of the committee to every letter of this report, and then let each member ask himself the situation of the fishermen under the embargo law.
Sir, by the Treasury report laid on our desks it appears that the exportation of dried fish alone, in the last year, amounted to 473,924 quintals; and the whole product of the fisheries amounted to $2,300,000—a sum equal to the one-eighteenth part of the whole agricultural produce of the United States: thus in effect, in point of product, adding another State to the Union. Is this class of men, whose farm is the ocean and whose crop is its fish, to have their whole or nearly their whole interests sacrificed by the unequal operation of the embargo? I hope not, sir. I trust gentlemen will see the oppression of the law, and its partial operation, and remove it.
Again, sir, as, to the product, how does this law operate? The cotton planter and the tobacco planter have their articles little deteriorated by time. The embargo, to them, suspends the use of their capital only; but to those who have flour or fish, the embargo, if continued for a few months, destroys their capital—the thing itself. In this respect the embargo works partially; and in reference to its operation on particular portions of our country, on particular classes of people, or on the product, it ought to be repealed at once, and without delay.
Sir, it is a very remarkable fact, and not more remarkable than true, that if you compare the number of fishermen with the product of their labor, and the number employed in agriculture with the product of agriculture, that the value of the former to the latter is as ten to one—a people whose habits and manners are in consonance with republican institutions, and who are as valuable as the agriculturists. God has given them a noble estate in the ocean, most bountifully stocked, and diligently do they work it, with profit to themselves and advantage to their country.