Mr. Buchanan's letter. any abolition of discriminating duties of tonnage or imports made by foreign nations. Mr. Buchanan pointed out with just pride that Congress twenty years previously had offered reciprocity of trade to all the world, and that England might, by complying with the fair and equitable conditions of that Act, have at any moment placed her vessels and their cargoes, both in our direct and indirect foreign trade, on the same footing with those of America. Mr. Buchanan added that, previously to 1828, reciprocity in commerce and navigation had been practically adopted by his Government in specific treaties with Denmark, Sweden, the Hanseatic Republics, and Prussia, and had since been carried out in other treaties concluded with Austria, Russia, &c., all of these being still in force.
But the following remarkable observation made by Mr. Buchanan at the close of his letter, gives conclusive testimony that when Mr. Bancroft offered "to give us all," i. e. the coasting trade, this offer was wholly unauthorized by the American Government.[1] The words of Mr. Buchanan were: "I might*
- ↑ In truth, the policy of the American Government, since that country became an independent nation, has with few exceptions been throughout in favour of Protection. When Congress was first inaugurated in 1789, one of the measures of that year (4th July) was "An Act for levying Duty on Goods," &c., and another (20th July, 1789) was passed, entitled "An Act imposing Duties on Tonnage." Indeed, so thoroughly Protectionist were the great founders of the Republic, that Mr. Adams, writing to Mr. Jay in Paris on the 26th February, 1786, says: "If the United States would come to the resolution to prevent all foreign vessels from coming to their ports, and confine all exports and imports to their own ships and seamen, they would do for anything that I know the wisest thing which human prudence could dictate." Further he says: "On the other hand, if the United States would adopt the principle of the French economists, and allow
