I shall not discuss the constitutional question. Without meaning any disrespect to those who raise it, if it be debatable, it has been sufficiently debated. The gentleman from South Carolina suffered it to fall unnoticed from his budget; and it was not until after he had closed his speech and resumed his seat, that it occurred to him that he had forgotten it, when he again addressed the senate, and, by a sort of protestation against any conclusion from his silence, put forward the objection. The recent free-trade convention at Philadelphia, it is well known, were divided on the question; and although the topic is noticed in their address to the public, they do not avow their own belief that the American system is unconstitutional, but represent that such is the opinion of respectable portions of the American people. Another address to the people of the United States, from a high source, during the past year, treating this subject, does not assert the opinion of the distinguished author, but states that of others to be, that it is unconstitutional. From which I infer that he did not himself believe it to be unconstitutional.
[Here the vice-president interposed, and remarked, that, if the senator from Kentucky alluded to him, he must say that his opinion was, that the measure was unconstitutional.]
When, sir, I contended with you, side by side, and with perhaps less zeal than you exhibited, in 1816, I did not understand you then to consider the policy forbidden by the constitution.
[The vice-president again interposed, and said, that the constitutional question was not debated at that time, and that he had never expressed an opinion contrary to that now intimated.]
I give way with pleasure to these explanations, which I hope will always be made when I say any thing bearing on the individual opinions of the chair. I know the delicacy of the position, and sympathize with the incumbent, whoever he may be. It is true, the question was not debated in 1816; and why not? Because it was not debatable; it was then believed not fairly to arise. It never has been made as a distinct, substantial, and leading point of objection. It never was made until the discussion of the tariff of 1824, when it was rather hinted at as against the spirit of the constitution, than formally announced as being contrary to the provisions of that instrument. What was not dreamed of before, or in 1816, and scarcely thought of in 1824, is now made, by excitedimaginations, to assume the imposing form of a serious constitutional barrier.
Such are the origin, duration, extent, and sanctions, of the policy which we are now called upon to subvert. Its beneficial effects, although they may vary in degree, have been felt in all parts of the union. To none, I verily believe, has it been prejudicial. In the north, every where, testimonials are borne to the high prosperity which it has diffused. There, all branches of industry are animated and flourishing. Commerce, foreign and domestic, active; cities and towns springing up, enlarging and beautifying; navigation fully and profitably employed, and the whole face of the country smiling with improvement, cheerfulness, and abundance. The gentleman from South Carolina has supposed that we in the west derive no advantages from this system. He is mistaken. Let him visit us, and he will find, from the head of La Belle Riviere, at Pittsburgh, to America, at its mouth, the most rapid and gratifying advances. He will behold Pittsburgh itself, Wheeling, Portsmouth, Maysville, Cincinnati, Louisville, and numerous other towns, lining and ornamenting the banks of the noble river, daily extending their limits, and prosecuting, with the greatest spirit and profit, numerous branches of the manufacturing and mechanic arts. If he will go into the interior, in the state of Ohio, he will there perceive the most astonishing progress in agriculture, in the useful arts, and in all the improvements to which they both directly conduce. Then let him cross over into my own, my favorite state, and contemplate the spectacle which is there exhibited. He will perceive numerous villages, not large, but neat, thriving, and some of them highly ornamented; many manufactories of hemp, cotton, wool, and other articles. In various parts of the country, and especially in the Elkhorn region, an endless succession of natural parks; the forests thinned; fallen trees and undergrowth cleared away; large herds and flocks feeding on luxuriant grasses; and interspersed with comfortable, sometimes elegant mansions, surrounded by extensive lawns. The honorable gentleman from South Carolina says, that a profitable trade was carried on from the west, through the Seleuda gap, in mules, horses, and other live stock, which has been checked by the operation of the tariff. It is true, that such a trade was carried on between Kentucky and South Carolina, mutually beneficial to both parties; but, several years ago, resolutions, at popular meetings, in Carolina, were adopted, not to purchase the produce of Kentucky, by way of punishment for her attachment to the tariff. They must have supposed us as stupid as the sires of one of the descriptions of the stock of which that trade consisted, if they imagined that their resolutions would affect our principles. Our drovers cracked their whips, blew their horns, and passed the Seleuda gap, to other markets, where better humors existed, and equal or greater profitswere made. I have heard, of your successor in the house of representatives, Mr. President, this anecdote: that he joined in the adoption of those resolutions, but when, about Christmas, he applied to one of his South Carolina neighbors, to purchase the regular supply of pork for the ensuing year, he found that he had to pay two prices for it; and he declared, if that were the patriotism on which the resolutions were based, he would not conform to them, and, in point of fact, laid in his annual stock of pork by purchase from the first passing Kentucky drover. The trade, now partially resumed, was maintained by the sale of western productions, on the one side, and Carolina money on the other. From that condition of it, the gentleman from South Carolina might have drawn this conclusion, that an advantageous trade may exist, although one of the parties to it pays in specie for the production which he purchases from the other; and consequently that it does not follow, if we did not purchase British fabrics, that it might not be the interest of England to purchase our raw material of cotton. The Kentucky drover received the South Carolina specie, or, taking bills, or the evidences of deposit in the banks, carried these home, and, disposing of them to the merchant, he brought out goods, of foreign or domestic manufacture, in return. Such is the circuitous nature of trade and remittance, which no nation understands better than Great Britain.
Nor has the system which has been the parent source of so much benefit to other parts of the union, proved injurious to the cotton-growing country. I cannot speak of South Carolina itself, where I have never been, with so much certainty; but of other portions of the union in which cotton is grown, especially those bordering on the Mississippi, I can confidently speak. If cotton-planting is less profitable than it was, that is the result of increased production; but I believe it to be still the most profitable investment of capital of any branch of business in the United States. And if a committee were raised, with power to send for persons and papers, I take it upon myself to say, that such would be the result of the inquiry. In Kentucky, I know many individuals who have their cotton-plantations below, and retain their residence in that state, where they remain during the sickly season; and they are all, I believe, without exception, doing well. Others, tempted by their success, are constantly engaging in the business, while scarcely any comes from the cotton region to engage in western agriculture. A friend, now in my eye, a member of this body, upon a capital of less than seventy thousand dollars, invested in a plantation and slaves, made, the year before last, sixteen thousand dollars. A member of the other house, I understand, who, without removing himself, sent some of his slaves to Mississippi, made last year about twenty per cent. Two friends of mine, in the latter state, whose annual income is from thirty to sixty thousand dollars, being desirous tocurtail their business, have offered estates for sale which they are willing to show, by regular vouchers of receipt and disbursement, yield eighteen per cent. per annum. One of my most opulent acquaintances, in a county adjoining that in which I reside, having married in Georgia, has derived a large portion of his wealth from a cotton estate there situated.
The loss of the tonnage of Charleston, which has been dwelt on, does not proceed from the tariff; it never had a very large amount, and it has not been able to retain what it had, in consequence of the operation of the principle of free trade on its navigation. Its tonnage has gone to the more enterprising and adventurous tars of the northern states, with whom those of the city of Charleston could not maintain a successful competition, in the freedom of the coasting trade, existing between the different parts of the union. That this must be the true cause, is demonstrated by the fact, that, however it may be with the port of Charleston, our coasting tonnage, generally, is constantly increasing. As to the foreign tonnage, about one half of that which is engaged in the direct trade between Charleston and Great Britain, is English; proving that the tonnage of South Carolina cannot maintain itself in a competition, under the free and equal navigation secured by our treaty with that power.
When gentlemen have succeeded in their design of an immediate or gradual destruction of the American system, what is their substitute? Free trade? Free trade! The call for free trade is as unavailing, as the cry of a spoiled child in its nurse’s arms, for the moon, or the stars that glitter in the firmament of heaven. It never has existed, it never will exist. Trade implies at least two parties. To be free, it should be fair, equal, and reciprocal. But if we throw our ports wide open to the admission of foreign productions, free of all duty, what ports of any other foreign nation shall we find open to the free admission of our surplus produce? We may break down all barriers to free trade on our part, but the work will not be complete, until foreign powers shall have removed theirs. There would be freedom on one side, and restrictions, prohibitions, and exclusions, on the other. The bolts and the bars and the chains of all other nations will remain undisturbed. It is, indeed, possible, that our industry and commerce would accommodate themselves to this unequal and unjust state of things; for, such is the flexibility of our nature, that it bends itself to all circumstances. The wretched prisoner incarcerated in a jail, after a long time, becomes reconciled to his solitude, and regularly notches down the passing days of his confinement.
Gentlemen deceive themselves. It is not free trade that they are recommending to our acceptance. It is, in effect, the British colonial system that we are invited to adopt; and, if their policy prevail, it will lead substantially to the recolonization of thesestates, under the commercial dominion of Great Britain. And whom do we find some of the principal supporters, out of congress, of this foreign system? Mr. President, there are some foreigners who always remain exotics, and never become naturalized in our country; whilst, happily, there are many others who readily attach themselves to our principles and our institutions. The honest, patient, and industrious German, readily unites with our people; establishes himself upon some of our fat land, fills his capacious barn, and enjoys in tranquillity the abundant fruits which his diligence gathers around him; always ready to fly to the standard of his adopted country, or of its laws, when called by the duties of patriotism. The gay, the versatile, the philosophic Frenchman, accommodating himself cheerfully to all the vicissitudes of life, incorporates himself without difficulty, in our society. But, of all foreigners, none amalgamate themselves so quickly with our people as the natives of the Emerald isle. In some of the visions which have passed through my imagination, I have supposed that Ireland was originally part and parcel of this continent, and that, by some extraordinary convulsion of nature, it was torn from America, and, drifting across the ocean, was placed in the unfortunate vicinity of Great Britain. The same open-heartedness; the same generous hospitality; the same careless and uncalculating indifference about human life; characterize the inhabitants of both countries. Kentucky has been sometimes called the Ireland of America. And I have no doubt, that if the current of emigration were reversed, and set from America upon the shores of Europe instead of bearing from Europe to America, every American emigrant to Ireland would there find, as every Irish emigrant here finds, a hearty welcome and a happy home!