sum advanced, and $1,500 expended in alterations, were irretrievably lost-$400 remaining due. The mortgager, John Melish, was, as may be supposed, completely ruined. The house has been since sold for $12,000-and $21,000 have, I am informed, been refused for it.

"The Manufacturing Company, of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, went into operation in 1814, with a capital, actually paid in, of $128,000, which was expended in erecting buildings and machinery, and in spinning cotton yarn and manufacturing cotton goods, until the year 1818, when, in consequence of the markets being glutted with foreign goods, it was found necessary to close the concern. Hoping for better times, they had borrowed $34,000 on the notes of some of the parties interested, who purchased the entire establishment for the amount of those notes. Thus the whole original capital was sunk. The new company continued the business for a few years, when they sold out for $4,000, the proprietors becoming responsible for debts contracted, to the amount of $18,000. The loss sustained by the companies amounted to about $150,000.

"A large and elegant house in Philadelphia, with out offices, No. 255, Walnutstreet, thirty-one feet front, and fifty-seven deep, with an extensive lot, 246 feet deep, and 61 feet wide, which, in 1817, cost $43,000, was, in 1821, sold by auction for $14,300.

"James D'Wolf, Esq. formerly member of the Senate of the United States, from Rhode-Island, purchased, at a fair and open sale, for $6,400, a cotton factory, which, according to his account, had cost $76,000, honestly expended.

"The stockholders of the Eagle Company of New-York, expended on their buildings and machinery, stock, &c. $110,000, the whole of which was sunk-as the proceeds of the property, when the establishment was broken up, were not more than sufficient to pay the debts."

Such was the state of the country, when the writer of this sketch commenced publishing in defence of the protecting system.

For this hideous state of things there were various reasons assigned, of which one was, the transition from a state of war to a state of peace. With this pretext, the most deceptious that could be conceived, our citizens were generally deluded. But a moment's reflection might have satisfied any mind, of even a moderate calibre, that to this nation the transition could not fail to be beneficial. During the war, we were excluded from nearly all the foreign markets in the world, which were opened to us by the peace. To England, which, during the war, by means of her powerful navy, carried on an extensive commerce with a considerable part of Europe, notwithstanding the decrees of Napoleon, (which commerce was immediately, on the restoration of peace, divided with other nations,) peace must have produced a temporary shock. In addition to which, myriads of her soldiers and sailors were discharged from service, and the demand for necessaries for her army and navy was, of course, very greatly diminished. With us the case was wholly different, so far as regards commerce, as will appear from the following statement of our exports for 1813 and 1814, compared with the two years that succeeded the war :

The disproportion of the domestic exports was very considerable, but not quite so great as of the total exports.

It is to be presumed that no man will seriously assert that an increase of exports, nearly four-fold, could have produced distress in the country; and, therefore, this miserable plea was wholly destitute of foundation.

Another reason assigned for the distress, was, the incorporation of what was called a litter of banks, in Pennsylvania, forty-six in number, in 1814, with a capital of $17,500,000. Now the whole amount of the capital actually paid in, was only $7,428,230; and of the banks then incorporated, there were two or three, which had been in operation for some time, without charters-the Commercial, for instance, with a capital of $1,000,000, and the others with about $500,000-so that all the real effective addition made to the banking capital of the state, by the act in question, was less than $6,000,000. And, however unwise it might have been, and certainly was, at such a crisis, to incorporate so great a number of banks, no man, in his senses, will pretend, that such an addition to the banking capital of the state, could have produced so much wretchedness as took place at that period in it, or any at all out of it. I now proceed to investigate the real causes of the distress.

From the commencement of our government, a strong jealousy prevailed of the protection of manufactures, fostered and encouraged by those citizens engaged in commerce, particularly those connected with the importation of British manufactures, whether Americans or British agents. The latter description of persons were indefatigable in their efforts to promulgate those doctrines, so essentially promotive of their dearest interests. The leading papers in the commercial cities also took this ground. The general prevalence of these opinions is not, therefore, wonderful. Neither pains nor expense were spared to impress on the public mind, that the national prosperity depended almost altogether on commerce; that the protection of manufactures by duties on imports was impolitic and unjust; that it sacrificed the interest of the many for the benefit of the few, by obliging the mass of our citizens to purchase domestic manufactures at a great advance, beyond the prices at which similar articles could be had from abroad; and that the imposition of duties on imports should be confined to the mere raising of revenue to meet the wants of government.

These doctrines, however fallacious, and contrary to the theories of the soundest political economists, and the practice of the wisest and most prosperous nations of the old world, had been almost universally adopted by our citizens, and constituted, with few exceptions, the ruling policy of our government for above twenty years. It would be endless to enumerate the various instances of the deleterious effects of this policy. I shall confine myself to two-the reasoning on which applies equally to various others. The duties on woolen and cotton goods, previous to the embargo and the restrictive system, were only twelve and a half per cent.; obviously mere revenue duties, and utterly insufficient to enable our citizens to contend with foreign manufacturers, enjoying every possible protection that their respective governments could afford, the entire of their home markets, together with the advantage of large capitals, great skill, and long experience. In consequence, although possessing a capacity to raise wool to a boundless extent, and exporting one hundred and fifty per cent. more cotton to England, than all the rest of the world, we had, before 1806, only

fifteen mills erected, working at that time only eight thousand spindles, and producing 300,000 lbs. of yarn.* Whereas our export in 1807, amounted to 63,940,459 lbs. value $14,232,000. Up to that time all the efforts of our citizens, enjoying the advantages of having the raw material, cotton, a domestic article, were defeated, except in a very few and inconsiderable instances. Many large fortunes were wasted, and numerous individuals reduced to bankruptcy, in the abortive attempts made to establish this manufacture and that of woolen goods. We might have saved to the country ten or twelve millions annually had those two manufactures been encouraged.

So entirely and shamefully were we dependent on foreign nations for most essential necessaries, that we were unable, during the operation of the nonintercourse law, to supply the Indians with blankets, due them by treaty stipulation, to the amount of about six thousand dollars, insomuch that the Secretary of War actually applied to Congress to modify that law, so as to enable him to import the blankets from Great-Britain ! A proper sequel to this miserable state of things is the important and disgraceful fact, that our soldiers suffered more, at some stages of the late war, by deficiency of clothing, than from the arms of the enemy.

In 1811, the manufacture of cottons had greatly increased. There were then, it was believed, on good grounds, eighty thousand spindles employed. In 1815, in consequence of the exclusion of foreign goods by the embargo and the war, the increase had been enormous. By a report made to Congress, the correctness of which has never, as far as I know been called in question, it appears that the capital engaged in that branch, in that year, was $40,000,000. Numbers employed, men, women, and children, 100,000. Cotton consumed annually, 90,000 bales. Wages paid annually, $15,000,000. Value of cotton goods produced, $24,000,000.

The war of thirty months closed with honor to the nation. Its flag had rode triumphant on every sea. By land, although a great want of skill and tact had been occasionally displayed, yet, on the whole, except in one or two instances, the contest had crowned the national brow with laurels. The battle of New-Orleans, and the defeat of Prevost by a far inferior force, closed the scene by land; and the signal victories in various parts of the ocean, and more particularly those on the lakes, in which whole fleets were captured, shed high honor on the naval character of the nation, and made many of those, who had been most hostile to the war, acknowledge, that, with all its manifold blunders, it was fully worth all it had cost. In a word, we were literally "not scratched by the war."

The country was, on the whole, prosperous. The demand for labor being as great as, and occasionally greater than, the supply, those of our citizens depending on their hands for support, who constitute the great mass of mankind, were well rewarded for their services. This is the soundest state of society. The contrary state, where labor is superabundant, and the demand for it incommensurate, produces degradation and misery. Commerce, it is true, was suspended; but a large portion of the capital that had been employed in it, was transferred to the immoral, the hazardous occupation of privateering, in

* See Gallatin's Report on Manufactures.

which many of our citizens were enriched, while some were on the contrary ruined. A very large portion, however, of the wealth and industry of the commercial portion of the country, was devoted to manufactures, which, wholly unaided by bounties, special privileges, immunities, or government patronage, in spite of all the difficulties arising from inexperience and slenderness of capital, had, merely from the undisturbed possession of the domestic market, arrived at a degree of perfection, in the space of two or three years, which in other countries had required a quarter, and in some, half a century to accomplish, with all the aids of bounties, immunities, and privileges which enlightened governments could bestow. Never, in any age or country, had such a wonderful progress been made, in so short a space of time, without governmental interference. M. CAREY.

Philadelphia, August 24, 1834.

LETTER XXIII..

AT length peace came "with healing on its wings," to all classes except to the manufacturers, who were devoted to destruction by an infuriate spirit of hostility which was grounded on a most calumnious charge of extortion, because the prices of various articles of domestic production, more especially woolens, had been raised during the war.

To render this envenomed and delusive cry of extortion more criminal, and (if it had not proved so fatal) more ludicrous, it is to be remarked, that in the very year in which the welkin rang with it, and in which a destructive tariff was enacted, the great staples of the country, produced by the very men who rang the changes on the extortion of the manufacturers, rose enormously, as may be seen in the annexed statement.

And further, the raw materials produced by these men, and the water-power which many of them had for sale, had risen during the war most enormously. The rise of wool was most extravagant. Grotjan's Price Current of June, 1812, states Merino wool at seventy-five cents per lb.; whereas, in June, 1814, it was 300 a 400 cents.

One fact more, and I have done. To give a monopoly to the Tobacco planters, the duties on snuff and manufactured tobacco were all but prohibitory, from the commencement of the government; and the duty on cotton-wool, by the tariff of 1789, was one hundred and fifty per cent. higher than on manufactures of cotton!

The manufacturers had been among the most zealous and ardent supporters of the war. There was scarcely a man among them that was disaffected to the cause of their country. But had they all been traitors, as black and fiendish as Arnold, a fouler spirit could not have prevailed against them, than was manifested by the Congress of 1815-16. They were the devoted victims of the grossest prejudices. Of those who felt this spirit most virulently, Gov. Wright of Maryland, and John Randolph of Roanoke, were the most conspicuous. The former offered to Congress a resolution, that no member who was concerned in cotton manufactures should be allowed to vote on the mini

mum duty on those fabrics,-a motion, of which the illiberality was so striking, that it met with no support. This miserable principle would exclude merchants from legislating on commerce, and farmers from legislating on objects connected with agriculture.

John Randolph, with his usual vehemence, gave a solemn pledge, that he would never wear, nor allow any of his people to wear, a single article of American manufacture.

This illiberal spirit had ample room for display in the discussions of the details of the tariff, which A. J. Dallas had prepared, with moderate duties, but in most cases, adequate to afford a due degree of protection to the rising manufactures of the country; but the duties were reduced on no less than forty-four articles, from two to thirty-three per cent. Thus, in an evil hour, were blasted the hopes, the happiness, the fortunes of thousands of individuals, who, seduced by the delusive expectations held out by the government,* had devoted their fortunes, and their time, and their talents, to furnish their country with the necessaries and comforts of life, at a period when she was debarred of supplies of many of them from the old world. And thus were blasted sources of national wealth and prosperity, to the rearing of which, in their respective kingdoms, the Edwards of England, the Henries of France, and the Frederics of Prussia, had devoted their cares and their fostering aid, and lavished their wealth.

The following table exhibits a statement of the duties proposed by Mr. Dallas, on various articles, and the numerous reductions which took place, the result of the cry of "mad dog," raised against the manufacturers.

"In the House of Representatives of the United States, Wednesday, the 17th of June, 1809. "Resolved, That the Secretary of the Treasury be directed to prepare and report to this House, at their next session, a plan for the application of such means as are within the power of Congress, for