That the embargo is a measure severely felt by our country at large, and by some portions of it to a very eminent degree, cannot be denied. I did not expect to hear its effects contradicted; but they have been in some measure softened by the honorable chairman of the committee. I think the pressure of this measure great, and in some places requiring all the exertion of patriotism to support it. And as a proof of it, the members on this floor from different parts of the Union have only contended which section suffered most. A member from Massachusetts, (Mr. Quincy,) because he conceives that thirty millions of dollars have been lost to the Eastern country by the measure, hence concludes that the Eastern country suffers most. The gentlemen from the Southern country say that they raise seventy millions of pounds of cotton, of which but ten millions are consumed at home, and the whole of the residue remains on hand; and that having seven-tenths of their produce unsold, conceive that they most sensibly feel the weight of this affliction in their country. A member from Virginia (Mr. Randolph) will not yield the palm of oppression to either. "I live (said the gentleman) in the centre of the tobacco country, whether you draw the line from East to West, or from North to South. We are not less pressed than others, for we have no vent for this article so obnoxious in itself, but which the taste of mankind has rendered necessary." Now, with great deference to all these gentlemen, I say that my country suffers most. The Southern country possesses its staples, which but remain on hand; their value only diminished by the non-export. Tobacco and cotton may be preserved without material injury for a length of time. We know that at the close of the Revolutionary war tobacco bore a greater price than previous to its commencement, and amply remunerated the holders. But I represent an agricultural country. What can resuscitate wheat devoured by the fly? What restore flour soured in the barrel? Our produce perishes, the subject is destroyed. So far therefore as I represent an extensive and fertile farming district, I will not yield the palm of pressure to the cotton and tobacco country. So great has been the feeling of the people that it has wrought a wondrous change in the State which I have the honor to represent; not in men who are either deluded or deceived, as intimated by the gentleman from Tennessee, (Mr. Campbell,) but men who, by the pressure of the embargo itself, have been driven to reflection, and by reflection removed the film from their eyes, and thereby seen their true interests more distinctly. In the course of the last Winter, the Legislature of the State of Maryland, believing that the Orders in Council justified the embargo, and that it was a wise measure, approved of it. Succeeding elections have taken place, and the present House of Representatives tells you that it is most ruinous and oppressive. Such certainly are its effects in the State of Maryland; and I should illy represent my own district, if I did not so declare. Gentlemen will say that I should rather be pleased with the change than regret it; but, so help me God, Mr. Speaker, I am much less anxious what description of citizens administers the affairs of the country, than that they should be well administered; that it should protect the liberty, give to labor its just reward, and promote the happiness and prosperity of the citizens.
But it is alleged, by the honorable chairman of the committee, (Mr. Campbell,) that this is a delusion; that the people do not comprehend the subject; for that it is the Orders in Council which have produced our embarrassments, and not the embargo. Here then, sir, I am precisely at issue with that learned and honorable gentleman. I contend that the pressure on the people is caused by the embargo, and not by the Orders in Council. However speculative theorists may reason, there is proof abroad, and stubborn facts to contradict their reasoning. Test the market from Boston to Savannah, as to the price which you may get at ninety days credit, the embargo being continued, or on condition that the embargo be repealed in thirty days. Is there no difference in the price under these circumstances? I know well from experience, and the whole country knows, that if the embargo be now taken off, the price of every species of produce will rise fifty per cent. The depreciation in price then flows from the embargo. Remove it and they will give you more; keep it on and they will give you less. These are stubborn facts, and every man who has gone to the market will attest their correctness. You may reason as you please; but there is not a farmer that can be reasoned out of his senses, especially when they are sharpened a little by necessity. I hold these facts to be more conclusive than any abstract reasoning to prove that the embargo does work a diminution in the value of the articles which we have for sale. If this be the case, it results, sir, that we must ascribe to the operation of that measure the loss our country now so greatly feels. Our citizens are not so uninformed as the gentleman from Tennessee imagines. He thinks, and I agree with him, that the public voice will be generally right when the people are well informed. They have seen all the official communications which have been published, and are competed to judge whether the Orders in Council justified the embargo, and whether, if the embargo had not been laid, they would have wrought that effect which we now so sensibly feel. Instead of being deluded, sir, their eyes are open, and the film removed; and they see that the embargo was not justified by necessity, and as far as their opinion has been expressed, that it was impolitic and unwise.
The gentleman seems to think that the country cannot feel much because it feeds well; but we may feel and feed at the same time. It is plenty that we complain of. Our surplus is touched by this torpedo, the embargo, and is thereby rendered useless. But gentlemen say that if the embargo were now taken off, we could not trade; and a calculation has been entered into by the gentleman from Tennessee in opposition to one made by me at the last session. I have not seen my calculation for months, sir; it is before the public—the gentleman's statement will go to the same tribunal, and I am willing to commit my slender reputation to the country for the accuracy of mine, and let the people judge between us. The gentleman tells you that we have no commerce to resort to which would be either safe or profitable. It is strange we cannot confide the decision of this question to commercial men—for what commercial man would undertake a voyage which shall be attended with certain ruin? I had thought that men of great experience and information, and whose knowledge was sharpened by interest, might be safely confided in. But merchants, whose habits of life have led them to calculate, whose information extends to every part of the world, are not to be trusted with the prosecution of their own interest, but we must kindly take it in hand for them! Sir, I contend that commerce had better be left free for merchants to find a market, which every one knows they would do, from their eagerness now to ship. If they could not export with safety, or profit, they would lay a voluntary embargo, ten thousand times better than a coercive one; the very necessity of coercion shows that our merchants would sail, were it not for the embargo. I contend that the embargo is ruinous and oppressive. Need I say any thing further on the subject? Look at the country. The courts of justice shut in one of the Southern States; executions suspended in a State contiguous to this; and Maryland reduced to the same necessity, from the circumstance of there being no market for our produce. So great is the pressure that the people have it not in their power to pay their ordinary debts; and how eloquent is the fact that in a moment of peace (for certainly there is not war) we are compelled to arrest the current of justice. The legislative acts depict the situation of the country more strikingly than volumes of argument. The State Legislatures know the inability of their citizens to pay, and hold out a kind hand to assist them.
In point of revenue how does it work? The honorable chairman of the committee, (Mr. Campbell,) in a speech of great learning and investigation, told us that the Treasury never was more full. I wish the documents were before the House to convince us of it. But did an atom of it flow in from the operation of the embargo? If there be such a surplus, it only shows the beneficial operation of the system pursued anterior to the embargo. What is to fill your Treasury now, if the people cannot sell their products? What will in this case become of your source of wealth in the Western country? The people can neither buy lands, nor buying, pay for them. Where is the impost duty which has supported the Government, and sunk to a considerable degree the national debt? The moment you prevent all importation, there is an utter extinction of impost revenue; and at home a physical inability to produce any from the people at large. We are a rich country, abounding in the necessaries of life; we have money's worth, but no money. Nor can our people by any practical means raise money to defray the expenses of State Governments, much more of that of the United States. I am in the country, sir; I cannot collect my rents, my neighbors cannot sell wheat or tobacco. All is stopped. I ask then what physical ability we have to discharge the State taxes, or any other? We have no other way of getting money but through the sale of our produce. Gentlemen say that our revenue would fall just as short, supposing the embargo to be raised. That is begging the question, sir. They assume that for a truth which they ought to prove in the first instance. Leave commerce open, and you will soon have money in return for our produce, or that which will procure it. Revenue is the life of Government, and let me suppose gentlemen to be sitting here thirteen months hence, on the first of January, 1810. Where is your revenue then to come from? You have dried up every source of the national wealth. What must you do? Either borrow or raise money by direct taxation. There is no doubt what must be resorted to; and it was touched with great ability, though slightly touched, by the gentleman from Virginia, (Mr. Randolph,) as to the consequences which must grow out of such a system of direct taxation. This species of taxation is consonant to the genius of the country, to the habits of our people—it comes too close to the pocket of the agriculturist, and is besides a source of revenue which ought to belong exclusively to the States. I hold it as a political truism, that upon the sovereignty and independence of each State, as guarantied by the constitution, do our liberties depend. I know that some of the ablest men in America opposed the adoption of the Federal Constitution on this ground: that the General Government being raised and supported on external matters only, if the time should ever arrive at which foreign commerce should cease, and internal taxes be resorted to, that great would be the conflict between the officers of the State and General Governments, which would ultimately end in the prostration of State rights. Gentlemen call the embargo, in silken phrase, a temporary suspension of commerce. I will call it by its own name; it is better known to the people by it. I contend that the embargo now laid is a perpetual embargo, and no member of this House can constitutionally say it is otherwise; for the immediate Representatives of the people have so played the game as to leave the winning trump out of their own hands, and must now have a coincidence in opinion both of the Senate and of the President of the United States to effect its repeal. If the whole of this body were to consent to a repeal, and a majority of the Senate, yet the President might resist them both. Is there any limitation to the law on the statute book? No; but there is a power given to the President to suspend it in the whole or in part, in the event of certain contingencies. Have those contingencies happened? Are they likely to happen? No, sir; and these are the views which I take of the subject. America, anxious to get red of this burden, has proffered to take it off, if either of the two belligerents would relax their edicts in our favor in relation to such one, keeping it on in relation to the other. What says the sarcastic British Minister? Why, sir, that they have no cause of complaint; that it was laid by the President as a precautionary measure; and they were told by our Minister that it was not to be considered as a hostile measure. What says France? She gives us no answer, say gentlemen. Aye, sir—and is that true? Have we indeed received no answer? I think we have one that wounds our feelings as deeply as the answer of Mr. Canning. It is the situation of our Minister abroad, who says he dare not ask for an answer, because the asking it might be injurious to our cause. What, have we a Minister abroad, and is he afraid or unwilling to make a proposition to the Government where he is resident? Surely, sir, that state of things furnishes as definite an answer as any that could be given. We have no hopes that either will remove its edicts. Sir, I consider the embargo as a premium to the commerce of Great Britain. Gentlemen say that she is a great power, a jealous power, and possessed of a monopolizing spirit. If these views be correct, by annihilating our commerce, do we not yield the seas to her, and hold out an inducement to her forever to continue her orders in force? What prospect is there that the embargo will be removed? It cannot now be got rid of by a vote of this House. We are saddled with it. If we cast our eyes to proceedings elsewhere constitutionally held on the same subject, we shall find that it is to remain still farther to oppress and burden the people of this country with increased rigor.
As a measure of finance it has laid the axe to the root. The tree is down that bore the golden fruit, and will not again grow till we ease ourselves of this measure. In a fiscal point of view I cannot then for my life think it a wise or provident measure. But as a preparation for war, it is still worse; because it produces a deficiency of that out of which war alone cannot be sustained. Instead of having money for your surplus produce, it rots upon your hands; instead of receiving a regular revenue, we have arrested its course, and dried up the very source of the fountain. As to preparation at home, which is the only preparation contemplated to make, what or whom is it against? Against France? She cannot come here. Or against England, who, with the monopoly of commerce which you leave her to enjoy, has no object further to annoy you? I believe, as a preparation for war, the best expedient would be to get as much money as we could, to send out our surplus produce and bring back the supplies necessary for an army if to be raised at all—to arm and discipline the militia. A raising of the embargo would be a preparation for war—it would bring us articles of the first necessity for our surplus. But on a continuation of the embargo, things must progress from bad to worse.
Another thing, sir; I do not now mean to take a constitutional view of the subject—but will not gentlemen pause and reflect on the continuance of the embargo? It is well known that the General Government grew out of a spirit of compromise. The great authors of that instrument were well acquainted with the term embargo. A temporary embargo for the purpose of sending out a squadron or concealing an equipment, was well understood. But I ask every one who hears me, if a question had been agitated in convention to give Congress a power to lay an embargo for one or two years, if the Eastern or commercial States would have agreed to it? Does any man believe it? No man who knows the country can believe it. With what sedulous anxiety did they say, in a negative provision of the constitution, that Congress should not lay an export duty! You are prohibited the minor power of taxing exports, and yet you stop exports altogether for an indefinite term. It is utterly inconceivable, that the States interested in commerce should have given their assent to any such powers so self-destructive. If they had given them, they ought to be most clear; not by implication, but most manifest. The exercise of powers counteracting principles most dear to every part of the community, ought to be assumed with the utmost caution. Under that view, except the measure be most wise in itself and its effects most clear, the Government ought not to continue the embargo. But why is it to be continued? We have taken some view of its effects at home. Let us see what effects may be expected to be produced by it abroad. An honorable gentleman told us an hundred millions were saved by having the embargo, a sum nearly equal to the whole exports of the United States for one year, excluding the capital employed. The first two or three seizures of vessels, sir, would have sent an alarm abroad, and the danger been so imminent, they would have voluntarily retired from destruction. There are no reasonable data from which to infer that one hundred millions of our property could at any one time have fallen a prey. Some few vessels might have been taken, but the rest would have escaped the grasp of the power which harassed them.
I will now examine the character of this measure; for upon my word, sir, it seems a political nondescript, though we feel its effects so severely. The President tells you it is a measure of precaution only; and yet we are told by the gentlemen that it is a species of war, which America can best use to coerce the two greatest powers on the earth, commanding land and sea, to truckle at our feet. I know not how gentlemen can place our connection with foreign nations in such a predicament; whilst the President officially holds out to the world that the embargo was a peaceful measure, gentlemen now say that it is a coercive one, a sort of quasi war. I recollect a gentleman at the last session making an estimate of the West Indies being worth an hundred millions to Britain, and predicting that before the measure was ninety days known in the West Indies, it would bring that nation to our feet, that it would act as a great political lever, resting its fulcrum on Jamaica, and move all Europe to our wishes. Double the number of days have elapsed, and they hold out insulting language. How then can we trust to the future predictions of gentlemen? Their error arises from a want of knowledge of the country; a little experience is worth all the theory in the world. In the years 1774-'5, an honorable feeling adopted a non-exportation and non-importation agreement, more faithfully executed by patriotism than any law since made or enacted; for every family refused to use an article which was not raised within the bosom of its own country. Did it produce starvation in the West Indies? No, sir; the politicians of that day did not so calculate. They knew the resources of those islands, and told them that if they would convert a part of their sugar plantations into corn-fields, they would not suffer. We are now in the habit of overvaluing ourselves and undervaluing our enemies. Come the day when it will, we shall have no ignoble foes to meet.
In the Revolutionary war how did England stand—how her islands? For several years she was at war with America, with Holland, with Spain, with France, whose fleets in the East and West Indies were often equal, sometimes superior to her own, and an armed neutrality in the North—during this period a French fleet blockaded the Chesapeake, and aided the capture of Cornwallis, and threatened the British islands—but how was this conflict with the world sustained? Were the islands starved during these years? did they fall? No, sir; the British nation braved the storm, and was only conquered by her sons—America was victorious and independent; but Europe retired discomfited. Sir, America can again prove victorious, but it must be by other measures than embargoes—destructive only at home and without effect abroad.
It is said that one reason why the embargo has not pressed so hard on Great Britain as it might, is, that it has not been so tightly drawn as it may be; that our citizens have evaded it. And, sir, if I have not any geographical knowledge of the country, tighten the cords as you may by revenue cutters and gunboats on the seaboard, and collectors and military on land, they will escape both. Interest, ever alert, will avail itself of our extensive coast and elude the law.
But gentlemen say they are not accountable for the failure in England, from another cause—the language of the public papers and pamphlets of the anti-embargoists. The enemy, we are told, has been induced to hold out under the idea that America will yield. Sir, would Great Britain rely for her oracles on the newspapers or pamphlets of this country? Have those causes wrought on her a perseverance in her measures? I wonder, sir, that, in the anxiety to find causes, gentlemen never cast their eyes to official documents—to a very important State paper issued on this side the Atlantic—saying that the marshals and civil force were not adequate to enforce the embargo. When the President's proclamation arrived in England, no doubt could have remained of the effect of the embargo. Another public record accompanied it—an act of one of the States arresting executions for debt during the continuance of the embargo, and for six months afterwards. With these public documents before them, the British nation would be more apt to judge, and more correctly judge, of the internal situation of the country, than from all the periodical publications of the day put together. Pamphlets also have been written in this country, of which it is said the British Ministry have availed themselves, to induce their people to believe that the United States are not capable of suffering. I believe we are. The people of America are as patriotic as any on earth, and will respect the laws, and must be made to respect them. They will obey them from principle; they must be made to obey them if they do not; for, while a law is in existence, it must be enforced. But I am somewhat surprised that gentlemen who talk of opposition publications in this country, as influencing England, should derive all their political data from British newspaper publications or opposition pamphlets. British opposition papers and pamphlets are with them the best things in the world; but nothing said here must be regarded there as correct. Even Mr. Baring has been quoted, who is a commission merchant, to the greatest extent perhaps known in the world. The Louisiana purchase of fifteen millions was nothing to him as a commission merchant. The next writer referred to, is Mr. Brougham, brought before Parliament, to assert the rights of a body of merchants confined almost exclusively to the continental trade. He came forward on their account, and the fact was demonstrated, notwithstanding his exertions, that the Orders in Council did not, but the prior French decrees did, curtail that commerce. So the majority thought and acted on that supposition. If the continuance of the embargo, then, does not produce a change in the policy of Great Britain, by its operation on the West Indies, if they resort to documents in this country, or even to speeches on this floor, they will probably continue the conflict of suffering as long as we are able to endure it, and continue our measures. For my opinion is, sir, that the extent of our seaboard affords such opportunities for evasion, that, unless we station cutters within hail of each other, on our whole coast, they will not be competent to carry our laws into effect. It will be benefiting the British colonies at the expense of our own country.