manufacturing in Now England, until American labour could be educated for it and the requisite skill acquired for the establishment of workshops. The Southern statesmen took the lead in the passage of a tariff to encourage and protect the manufacturing industries of the North. But in course of time these restrictive laws in England were repealed, and it then became easier for New England to import than to educate labour and skill. Nevertheless the protection continued, and was so effectual that the manufacturers of New England began to compete in foreign markets with the manufacturers of Old England. Whereupon the South said, "Enough. The North has free trade with us; the Atlantic Ocean rolls between this country and Europe; the expense of freight and transportation across it, with moderate duties for revenue alone, ought to be protection enough for these Northern industries. Therefore, let us do away with tariffs for protection. They have not, by reason of geographical laws, turned a wheel in the South; moreover, they have proved a grievous burden to our people." Northern statesmen did not see the case in that light; but fairness, right, and the Constitution were on the side of the South. She pointed to the unfair distribution of the public lands, to the unequal dispensation among the States of the Government favour and patronage, and to the fact that the New England manufacturers had gained a firm footing and were flourishing; therefore, protection had accomplished its purpose. Moreover, peace, progress, and development had, since the end of the French wars, dictated Free Trade as the true policy of all nations. Our senators proceeded to demonstrate by example the hardships of submitting any longer to tariffs for protection. In their arguments they quoted examples to this effect:—The Northern farmer clips his hundred bales of wool, and the Southern planter picks his hundred bales of cotton. So far they are equal, for up to this stage the Government affords to each equal protection in person and property. But the Government would not stop here. It went further—re-protected the industry of one section and taxed that of the other; for though it suited the farmer's interest and convenience to put his wool into his own waggon and to send it to a New England mill to have it made into one hundred bales of cloth, it also suited in a like degree the Southern planter to put his cotton in his own ships, and to send it to Old England to have it made into one
