Commerce of the United States

Tuesday, January 14.

The House again resolved itself into a Committee of the whole House on the Report of the Secretary of State on the privileges and restrictions on the commerce of the United States in foreign countries; when Mr. Madison rose in reply to Mr. Smith, of South Carolina.

Mr. M. began by observing that he had expected, from what was intimated yesterday, the sequel of what was then said against the resolutions before the committee; but, as there was a silence in that quarter, and no other member has risen on either side of the question, he himself would request the attention of the committee.

It had been much pressed that, in the discussion of this subject, it should be viewed in its commercial relations only. He was perfectly willing to meet every objection that could be urged on that ground; but, as he conceived it impossible to do full justice to the interests of the United States without taking some collateral considerations into view, he should be obliged, in the course of his remarks, to point at the political disposition and conduct of some of the nations of Europe towards this country.

The propositions immediately before the committee turned on the question, whether any thing ought to be done at this time, in the way of commercial regulations, towards vindicating and advancing our national interests. Perhaps it might be made a question with some, whether, in any case, legislative regulations of commerce were consistent with its nature and prosperity.

He professed himself to be a friend to the theory which gives to industry a free course, under the impulse of individual interest and the guidance of individual sagacity. He was persuaded that it would be happy for all nations, if the barriers erected by prejudice, by avarice, and by despotism, were broken down, and a free intercourse established among them. Yet to this, as to all other general rules, there might be exceptions; and the rule itself required what did not exist—that it should be general.

To illustrate this observation, he referred to the Navigation Act of Great Britain, which, not being counterbalanced by any similar acts on the part of rival nations, had secured to Great Britain no less than eleven-twelfths of the shipping and seamen employed in her trade. It is stated that, in 1660, when the British act passed, the foreign tonnage was to the British, as one to four; in 1700, less than one to six; in 1725, as one to nineteen; in 1750, as one to twelve; in 1774, nearly the same. At the commencement of the period, the tonnage was but 95,266 tons; at the end of it, 1,136,162.

As another illustration, he mentioned the case where two countries happened to be in such a relation to each other, that the one, by discouraging the manufactures of the other, might not only invigorate its own, but transplant the manufacturers themselves. Here the gain would be a clear one, and the effect evidently consistent with the principle of the theory.

To allow trade to regulate itself is not, therefore, to be admitted as a maxim universally sound. Our own experience has taught us that, in certain cases, it is the same thing with allowing one nation to regulate it for another. Were the United States, in fact, in commercial intercourse with one nation only, and to oppose no restrictions whatever to a system of foreign restrictions, they would, of necessity, be deprived of all share in the carriage, although their vessels might be able to do it cheapest, as well as of the only resources for defence on that side where they must always be most exposed to attack. A small burden only in foreign ports on American vessels, and a perfect equality of foreign vessels with our own in our own ports, would gradually banish the latter altogether.

The subject, as had been remarked on a former occasion, was not a novel one; it was coeval with our political birth, and has at all times exercised the thoughts of reflecting citizens. As early as the year succeeding the peace, the effect of the foreign policy, which began to be felt in our trade and navigation, excited universal attention and inquietude. The first effort thought of was an application of Congress to the States for a grant of power, for a limited time, to regulate our foreign commerce, with a view to control the influence of unfavorable regulations in some cases, and to conciliate an extension of favorable ones in others. From some circumstances then incident to our situation, and particularly from a radical vice in the then political system of the United States, the experiment did not take effect.

The States next endeavored to effect their purpose by separate but concurrent regulations. Massachusetts opened a correspondence with Virginia and other States, in order to bring about the plan. Here, again, the effort was abortive.

Out of this experience grew the measures which terminated in the establishment of a Government competent to the regulation of our commercial interests and the vindication of our commercial rights.

As these were the first objects of the people in the steps taken for establishing the present Government, they were universally expected to be among the first fruits of its operation. In this expectation, the public were disappointed. An attempt was made in different forms, and received the repeated sanction of this branch of the Legislature, but they expired in the Senate—not, indeed, as was alleged, from a dislike to the attempt altogether, but the modifications given to it. It has not appeared, however, that it was ever renewed in a different form in that House, and for some time it has been allowed to sleep in both.

If the reasons which originally prevailed against measures such as those now proposed had weight in them, they can no longer furnish a pretext for opposition.

When the subject was discussed in the first Congress, at New York, it was said that we ought to try the effect of a generous policy towards Great Britain; that we ought to give time for negotiating a treaty of commerce; that we ought to await the close of negotiations for explaining and executing the treaty of peace. We have now waited a term of more than four years. The treaty of peace remains unexecuted on her part, though all pretext for delay has been removed by the steps taken on ours; no treaty of commerce is either in train or in prospect; instead of relaxations in former articles complained of, we suffer new and aggravated violations of our rights.

In the view which he took of the subject, he called the attention of the committee particularly to the subject of navigation, of manufactures, and of the discrimination proposed in the motion between some nations and others.

On the subject of navigation, he observed that we were prohibited by the British laws from carrying to Great Britain the produce of other countries from their ports, or our own produce from the ports of other countries, or the produce of other countries from our own ports, or to send our own produce from our own or other ports in the vessels of other countries. This last restriction was, he observed, felt by the United States at the present moment. It was, indeed, the practice of Great Britain, sometimes to relax her Navigation Act so far, in time of war, as to permit to neutral vessels a circuitous carriage; but, as yet, the act was in full force against the use of them for transporting the produce of the United States.

On the other hand, the laws of the United States allowed Great Britain to bring into their ports any thing she might please, from her own or from other ports, and in her own or in other vessels.

In the trade between the United States and the British West Indies, the vessels of the former were under an absolute prohibition, whilst British vessels in that trade enjoyed all the privileges granted to others, even the most favored nations, in their trade with us. The inequality in this case was the more striking, as it was evident that the West Indies were dependent on the United States for the supplies essential to them, and that the circumstances which secured to the United States this advantage, enabled their vessels to transport the supplies on far better terms than could be done by British vessels.

It might be regarded (he observed) as a general rule, that, where one nation consumed the necessaries of life produced by another, the consuming nation was dependent on the producing one. On the other hand, where the consumption consisted of superfluities, the producing nation was dependent on the consuming one. The United States were in the fortunate situation of enjoying both these advantages over Great Britain. They supply a part of her dominions with the necessaries of life; they consume superfluities which give bread to her people in another part. Great Britain, therefore, is under a double dependence on the commerce of the United States. She depends on them for what she herself consumes; she depends on them for what they consume. In proportion as a nation manufactures luxuries must be its disadvantages in contests of every sort with its customers. The reason is obvious. What is a luxury to the consumer is a necessary to the manufacturer. By changing a fashion or disappointing a fancy only, bread may be taken from the mouths of thousands whose industry is devoted to the gratification of artificial wants. He mentioned the case of a petition from a great body of buckle makers, presented a few years ago to the Prince of Wales, complaining of the use of strings instead of buckles in the shoes, and supplicating his Royal Highness, as giving the law to fashions, to save them from want and misery by discontinuing the new one. It was not (he observed) the Prince who petitioned the manufacturers to continue to make the buckles, but the manufacturers who petitioned their customer to buy them. The relation was similar between the American customers and the British manufacturers; and if a law were to pass for putting a stop to the use of their superfluities, or a stop were otherwise to be put to it, it would quickly be seen from which the distress and supplications would flow. Suppose that Great Britain received from us alone the whole of the necessaries she consumes, and that our market alone took off the luxuries with which she paid for them: here the dependence would be complete, and we might impose whatever terms we please on the exchange. This, to be sure, is not absolutely the case; but, in proportion as it is the case, her dependence is on us. The West Indies, however, are an example of complete dependence. They cannot subsist without our food. They cannot flourish without our lumber and our use of their rum. On the other hand, we depend on them for not a single necessary, and can supply ourselves with their luxuries from other sources. Sugar is the only article about which there was ever a question; and he was authorized to say that there was not, at the most, one-sixth of our consumption supplied from the British islands. In time of war or famine the dependence of the West Indies is felt in all its energy. It is sometimes such as to appeal to our humanity as well as our interest for relief. At this moment the Governor of Jamaica is making proclamation of their distresses. If ever, therefore, there was a case where one country could dictate to another the regulations of trade between them, it is the case of the United States and the British West Indies. And yet the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Smith) had considered it as a favor that we were allowed to send our provisions in British bottoms, and in these only, to the West Indies.