The Middle Period, 1817-1858

on Manufactures-The Tariff Bill of 1823-The General Character of the Bill, and its Failure to Pass-Preside

or Internal Improvements-Passage of the Bill, and Analysis of the Vote upon it-The Bill in the Interests of the West-President Monroe's Veto, and Communication of May 4th, 1822-President Monroe's Argument, and the Vote upon the Veto-Congressional Act of 1824 for Distinguishing National from Local Improvements-Foreign Relations During Monroe's Second Term-Russia and

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lm, and had first opened the eyes of the slaveholders to the bearings of the slavery interest upon all the questions of constitutional law and public policy. From the point of view of that interest their attitude toward all these questions was more and more determined as they came to understand more and

dmiralty jurisdiction of the United States courts, to make the Senate itself a court of appeal from the regular Judiciary in

said openly and frankly that their purpose was to lessen and limit th

s of the Government rather than the structure of the political system, or, more correct

dent

prot

er

licy and the interests of slavery. The Presidents, Madison and Monroe, were utterly oblivious to it. Even after the Missouri struggle, Mr. Monroe continued to recommend the protection of manufactures for the attainment of industrial independence as the true national policy. His annual messages of

comm

nufac

subject had been referred to the committee on Ways and Means, the regular revenue-raising committee. Its reference now to the committee on Manufactures is good evidence that the House of Representatives regarded a protective tariff as a subject which Congress might deal with independently, and without any n

Ta

of

ed a tariff bill. It proposed to nearly double the existing duty upon iron, quadruple that upon coars

tons and woollens and bar iron. In fact, Mr. Tod conceded that the prohibition of the importation of coarse woollens was intended. He said that the tariff of 1816 on coarse cotton goods had given a monopoly of the domestic markets fo

eral ch

bill,

re to

ory. These facts were that the bill was a Pennsylvania measure, that the South would oppose it, and that Massachusetts and New York City would unite with the South in this opposition. It was, in fact, a Massachusetts

ent Mo

ge of

rotec

ember 2nd, 1823, he again recommended additional protection to "those articles which we are prepared to

Representatives again referred the question o

ff Bill

moderate proposition than that of the preceding session; still it p

m the necessity of creating new and more remunerative employments for labor, and from the policy of developing better home markets for agricultural products. He predicted that an ultimate reduction of the prices of manufacture

Cl

gu

s sup

t the United States dependent upon Europe for manufactured articles. And he urged the accomplishment of industrial independence as a necessary corollary of political independence. He contended that the aid granted to the manufacturing interests would impose no sacrifice upon the agricultural and commercial interests; that by the establishment of new manufacturing centres new home markets for the products of agriculture would be created, which would not only emancipate the country from the necessity of foreign markets for these products, but would give the country steady and certain markets, under its own control; and that the grow

ay's a

wer

expressi

that prot

re hostile

rtation of foreign products as to make it impossible for Europe to buy the agricultural products of the United States, since Europe would not be able to pay for them; that the promised increase of domestic markets would not at all compensate for the loss of foreign markets; that commerce would thus be destroyed both ways; and that even the manufacturing industries already established would suffer fr

view the North must pay the duties equally, at least, with the South. So long, then, as this idea was held, and so long as the commercial interests of Massachusetts, Maine, and the city of New York made common cause wi

ill a

pa

ly passing the bill by a narrow majority, it did succeed in imposing several ver

emp-growing and liquor-distilling West. It was for this reason that the House of Representatives refused to concur in them. Recourse was then had to a co

particular anything like prohibitory; it preserved the high tariff of 1816 on coarse cotton goods.

riff o

t cons

al legi

nated by the question of slavery. Some of the Southerners had, indeed, discovered that slave labor could not be employed in the mills, and that, therefore, protection of manufactures would not secure the establishment of these industries in the South, and had begun to treat the tariff question in a manner to develop a party issue out of it. But thi

Caroli

riff o

it, and the year subsequent to its enactment the South Carolina legislature denounced it as unconstitution

refer as suffering under the baleful influences of the slavery interest

orical d

doctr

l impro

ty of reporting to the Senate an opinion as to how the money appropriated in the Enabling Act for Ohio ought to be applied, recommended the use

overnment had the power to lay out and construct roads within and through the Commonwealths, by and with the consent of the Commonwealths through which they might pass. The Cumberland road was originally built by the general Government, after

on's

int

ovem

in the several Commonwealths. This bill proposed to authorize the general Government to expend the money, thus appropriated, only with the consent of the Commonwealth, or Commonwealths, in which the proposed improvement might lay, antecedently given, and distributed the sum to be spent among the Commonwealths according to the

ter them, or to exercise jurisdiction over them. He regarded all, or any of these things, as unwarranted by the Constitution. He furthermore declared that the consent of the several Commonwealth

unanimous in opposing the measure; that Virginia and North Carolina also opposed it, though less decidedly; that New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and the Northwest, together with South Carolina and Georgia, favored it; and that Kentucky and Tennessee inclined to favor it. Certainly, down to 1817, no influence of the slavery interest upon the question of internal improvements is discoverable. It was evident that the general opinion was, that the middl

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inte

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and to appoint toll-gatherers. The toll charges, and penalties for attempting to avoid paying them, and for not keeping to the left in passing, were fixed in the bill itself. That is, this bill assumed for the general Government not only the powers of appropriating and expending money for the constructio

age

nd anal

ote u

ed. The Marylanders voted for it. The Virginians were against it by a decided majority. The North Carolinians were indifferent. The South Carolinians and Georgians abandoned their high national ground of 1817, and voted unanimously against it. The Representatives from th

very large. Only the Senators from the Carolinas and Al

ounds. Certainly when we read in the "Annals of Congress," that so stanch a friend of free labor, so eminent a lawyer, and so honorable a man as John W. Taylor, of New York, said of this bill that it was so important in its character, and proposed such a

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pecially interested in the road, was either against it or indifferent to it. The Eastern Commonwealths had made their roads with Commonwealth money, and did not wish to assist the Western Commonwealths to make theirs by giving them national money with which to do it. The West, on the

ent Mo

o,

unic

y 4th

t issue, the propositions advanced are definite and intelligible. He held that the power of Congress in regard to internal improvements was to be found in the Constitution only by implication, by implication from the power to appropriate money, and that, therefore, its nature and limitations were to be drawn from the character of the power to appropriate money. He contended, on the one side, that the power of Congress to appropriate money was not limited to the objects enumerated in the Constitution, but was, on t

ent Mo

ent,

pon th

its passage, the vote in the House of Representatives was eighty-seven for, and sixty-ei

that the power of Congress to authorize the President to expend the appropriation by causing the improvements to be planned and constructed was generally regarded, in 1824, as a necessary consequence of the

ional Ac

nguishing

al impro

s were really of that character. The danger was that the appropriation bills would become log-rolling measures for the purpose of obtaining national money for matters of local concern. This difficulty was distinctly felt, and Congress undertook to m

ers had become conscious during the Missouri struggle that their interests demanded the establishment of a particularistic view of the Constitution and a particularistic practice in the working of the governmental system of the country, not much progress had been made, in the period between 1820 and 1824, in the way of twi

relation

s secon

two quarters; but in neither case did it relate immediately to the territory or inte

ia a

west

Ame

outh of the Columbia. Really this claim came into conflict only with the rights of Great Britain and Spain, but the United States, having the presentiment of its future, if not a legal claim to any part of this territory as a part of Louisiana, regarded the Russian movement with jealous discontent. And when, on September 16th, the Russian Czar

e

ian

t the reappearance of revolutionary movements anywhere. Great Britain had scented in this Holy Alliance a combination of continental powers which might prove, in some degree at least, as dangerous to her continental relations as the commercial system of Bonaparte had been. There is no doubt, too, that there was a large party in England which

Cong

Ver

its authority in Spain, the subject of aiding that Government to re-establish its authority over Spain's revolting colonies in North and South America was discussed, serious apprehensions were roused in both Great Britain and the United States. It was stated, and generally believed, in the United States, tha

Ad

arat

on

tion first. On July 17th, 1823, the Secretary of State, Mr. John Quincy Adams, declared to the Russian Minister at Washington, Baron Tuyl, that "we should contest the right of Russia to any te

Cann

pos

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claration by the British Government and the Government of the United States to Europe, that the two Governments would not remain indifferent to an intervention by the Holy Alliance Po

Cann

arat

e Pol

States had already done. The British minister was not then prepared to go so far, and the plan of the joint declaration fell through. But Mr. Canning declared for his Government to the French ambassador at St. James, Prince Polignac, that Great Britain would resist any intervention on the part of the Holy Alliance Powers in the qu

nroe Do

the Czar's Government, he said: "In the discussions to which this interest has given rise, and in the arrangements by which they may terminate, the occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interes

the defence of our own, which has been achieved by the loss of so much blood and treasure, and matured by the wisdom of our most enlightened citizens, and under which we have enjoyed unexampled felicity, this whole nation is devoted. We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers, to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere, but with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have on great consideration and on just principles acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlli

aning

propo

1

of the Holy Alliance Powers in the question between Spain and her revolting American colonies, and the forcible imposition by these powers of the jure divino monarchy upon these peoples, who had established rep

sibility of the arising of which passed entirely away before the close of the first half of this century. These opinions were simply that the United States ought to resist, and would resist, the planting of any new colonial establishments in America, or the int

re to

gre

propos

etween Spain and her revolting colonies, but the resolution which he offered to that effect was laid on the table, and never called up. Mr. Poinsett, of South Carolina, made a like attempt later, but with no more success. The

rticul

ion s

over

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men are not fit to govern themselves, but should be governed by the few who are wise and good; and it had adopted the policy of too close alliance with the commercial interests of the country. The levelling, not to say debasing, influences of the French political philosophy, which rolled like a tidal wave over the country during the last decade of the eighteenth century, and was worked up into a political dogma by Jefferson and his disciples, together with the reflex influence of the practical equality which established itself among the first adventurers who settled the lands beyond the Alleghanies, destroyed the Federal party, upon the side of principle; while the great extension of the agricultural interests, produced by these same settlements, made it intolerable upon the side of policy. The earlier advantage which the Federal party, as the upholder of centralization, enjoyed over the Republican party, as the champion of "States'-rights," had been lo