ation. The spirit and manner in which the attack had been made, and which could not have escaped the attention of the Committee, would be left in that silence which may best express the sentiment they must have inspired. He should, indeed, have thought it less necessary to take further notice than he had already done of the matter of the gentleman's remarks, if attempts had not been made, particularly by a friend of the gentleman, [Mr. AMES,] to give a weight to his statements and inferences which it would be shown they did not merit; and if the task did not afford an opportunity of elucidating some particular points relied on by the opponents of the resolutions.

It was made a charge against the Secretary of State, that he takes no notice of the higher duty imposed by Great Britain on other foreign tobacco than is imposed on American, (the former be3s. 6d. sterling a pound, the latter 1s. 3d.,) whilst he takes care to mention the high duty imposed on the American; although the discrimination is in favor of the United States, and is against Portugal, a country in particular connexion with Great Britain; and although the high duty of 1s. 3d. is immaterial to the United States, being paid by the consumer of the tobacco in Great Britain.

It was unfortunate for the gentleman, that this charge is fallacious, in every member of it:

[JANUARY, 1794.

eat rice at the price of 10s., and the class who are willing to eat it at 17s. 4d., are prohibited the consumption by the duty. Was this a circumstance of no concern to the rice planters? The gentleman should have been reminded of his error by his own arguments.

As an apology for the duty imposed in Great Britain, he tells us it was meant to prevent the use of rice as a substitute for the bread-stuffs produced by Great Britain herself. Without the preventing duty, then, rice would have been substituted in place of wheat, in the opinion of the British Parliament, and the demand for it in the British market so far increased.

As a merit in the British West India regulations over those of France, it was stated by the gentleman that rice in the West Indies is a common food; that, in the British, the importation of it is free; in the French, subject to a duty, though an inconsiderable one. In Britain, then, where there is a high duty, rice is not an article of common food; in the Islands, where there is no duty, it is a common food; and the advantage of the British West India market to us over the French is, that the duty in the latter favors cheaper substitutes.

Another proof of the disposition of Great Britain to favor the United States in the West India 1. The discrimination is not in favor of the market, is the prohibition of all foreign rice but United States, either in its intention or in its ope- the American. The same remark may be reration; not in its intention, because it was made peated here, which was applied to the discriminain reference to this country when it was a part of tion in favor of our tobacco. It is an old Colony the British Empire, and not in reference to us as regulation that has no effect whatever. What independent States; not in its operation, because, other foreign rice could be brought to the West if the discrimination were abolished, it would Indies? Is it the East India rice? That is probring no rival of our tobacco into the British mar-hibited by its distance. Is it the rice of Portugal? ket. This is proved by the fact that in other markets, as that of France, where no such discrimination exists, the American tobacco is without a rival. It was well known that this and the other apparent favors to this country were a remnant of the old Colonial Code, which, having become a dead letter on the Statute Book, had not yet been struck out of it.

2. If the discrimination had no effect in favor of the United States, it could not, for the same reason, be a prejudice to Portugal. If it were necessary and proper to go into the inquiry, more direct proofs could be given on this point.

3. High duties do affect the United States, which produce the article, though paid by the British consumers. They have a double effect; they lessen the quantity called for; and, by lessening the competition, they lessen also the price. This was a truth that could need no comment.

It was to be remarked, however, that the zeal of the gentleman on this subject was such, that it had led him to extend the fallacy of his reasoning to rice, the staple article of his own State. This article pays a duty of 7s. 4d. sterling per hundred weight; but, like the duty on tobacco, being paid by the consumer, was said to be of little con

cern to us.

Call the price of rice 10s. sterling, the duty is 7s. 4d. The whole class of people, then, in Great Britain, between the class who cannot afford to

That is prohibited by the laws of Portugal, and probably also by the lower price of the Carolina rice.

The inference which the gentleman had drawn from the comparative regulations of Great Britain and France, on the subject of rice, was so curious that it was worth a moment's attention.

The facts, Mr. MADISON observed, stood thus: In France, the duty is per cent. In Great Britain, 7s. 4d. sterling a hundred. In the French islands, the duty is 1 per cent. In the British, free, with a prohibition of other foreign rice.

As the duty of 1 per cent. is scarcely sensible, and the prohibition, as shown, is merely nominal, the inequality in the islands may be regarded as too immaterial to affect the comparison.

Passing to the two parent States, the duty in France is per cent.; the duty in Great Britain, 50 or 60 per cent.

Here, then, is nearly an equality in one part, and a difference of 50 or 60 per cent. in the other part, of the two Dominions; and yet the gentleman could say it was not easy to pronounce whether the article of rice stands on a better footing in the system of the one than in the system of the other.

Another charge against the Secretary of State is, that his Report calls the discriminating duties in Great Britain in favor of American wood small, whereas they are considerable, and in several instances high.

Mr. MADISON said, he had not found leisure to trace this branch of our exports into all the details necessary to decide in what degree the duties were small or considerable, and in what proportion the several dutied articles went to Great Britain. He observed, in general, that the greater part of our woods were exported to the West Indies, not to Great Britain; that in the ship-woods, at least, the Baltic nations were not rivals to the United States. It was known that Sweden and Denmark were so deficient in oak, that their public navies were supplied from Germany, and that the ship timbers of Russia were transported a thousand or twelve hundred miles from her interior Dominions. The fir, of which the Swedish and Danish merchant ships were built, does not last more than seven or eight years, and could not, therefore, be a rival to the durable woods of the United States. He observed, also, that lumber, and particularly the ship-woods of the country, were so precious, and so sure of being in demand, that they never could fear a rival or need a foreign bounty. This was an article very different from such as were an annual product of the earth, and as could be raised wherever the climate and soil permitted, according to the occasional demand. The forests that were to supply the ship yards were the growth of centuries; and where once destroyed, as they generally are in Europe, are rarely replaced at all, and never can become the rival to America, which enjoys them as the spontaneous gift of nature.

To enhance the merit of the British regulations, the gentleman had told us that wood was subject to a duty of 1 per cent. in the French Islands, and in the British free, with a prohibition of other foreign wood. This was of little consequence. The duty was a trifle, and, falling on a necessary article, to be got no where else, probably was paid by the French Islanders. And the prohibition was ideal, the American wood being the only resource for the British market.

[H. of R.

the attempt to draw away the Nantucket fishermen. The fact was, that although the conduct of France was very different from what was to have been wished, as well as from what was contemplated by the Marquis LAFAYETTE, who had patronised the interest of the fishermen, yet that the project of tempting them to emigrate had originated in Great Britain, and was a counter project on the part of France. How the gentleman happened to omit the antecedent attempt of Great Britain, and thereby exaggerate that of France, Mr. MADISON did not undertake to explain; but it was the more extraordinary, as the whole account of the transaction was contained in the same page of the Report, nay, in the same paragraph, from which the gentleman had extracted his information.

Here he read the passage in that Report, and produced the British statute, inviting the whale fishermen, by an offer of certain privileges, to emigrate to Great Britain.

A further charge against the Secretary of State is, that, in his statement of the tonnage of the United States employed in the trade with the French and British Dominions, he founds it, not on the actual number of ships, but on the actual number of entries. This charge was as singular as it was uncandid.

The Report stated the fact, that the American tonnage entering our ports, from the several nations with which the United States traded, was so and so; and in this statement it pursued the official returns made on the subject. What more was to be required?

In giving the fact, the Secretary imposed on no one, because he stated the tonnage to be entry tonnage, as it really was.

He followed the best guide that existed-an official return from the proper offices.

Congress.

The first return ever made in the latter form, was called for since the resolutions on the table were proposed.

No return of the actual tonnage, as distinguished from the entry tonnage, had at the time ever been The article of fish was admitted by the gentle-made from any office or called for by any act of man himself to be more favored by the French than the British system, though he admits it with reluctance, and diminishes the difference as much as possible. The case, however, is so clear, and the facts so palpable, that they speak for themselves. Under the French regulations, this important article of our commerce is subject to duties only in Europe and the West Indies. Under the British, it is under prohibition in both. The amount of the whole export is 382,237 quintals of dry, and 57,424 barrels of pickled fish. Of this, the French consumption is 252,171 quintals, and 45,164 barrels; that is, nearly two-thirds of the dry and four-fifths of the pickled fish.

Here Mr. MADISON, proceeding to the subject of whale oil, called the attention of the Committee particularly to the representation and language of Mr. SMITH as to the conduct of France, in inviting the fishermen of Nantucket to remove and settle at Dunkirk. Mr. SMITH, he said, had not only undervalued the monopoly of the French market granted to the United States, but had, by a mutilated quotation of a Report of the Secretary of State on the fisheries, changed the true aspect of

These considerations might have restrained the gentlemen from this unwarranted attack on the accuracy of the Report.

But he ought at least to have been sure that, whilst he was charging the Secretary with following an erroneous guide, he was himself following one that was not erroneous. The examination of this point involved facts which merited the particular attention of the Committee.

The statement of the entry tonnage of the United States in foreign trade for 1792, lately called for and reported, is 415,331 tons. The statement of the actual tonnage for the same year, is 239,394 tons.

On comparing these two quantities, it was evident that both could not be right. If the entry tonnage was no more than was stated, it was inconceivable that the actual tonnage could be as much as was stated. It would allow the vessels in the European and West India trades, together,

There was a possibility, Mr. MADISON observed, that the course of trade in the two years might be such, that more of the vessels employed in the exportations to Great Britain might be entered in 1790 as coming from some other country than in 1792; but, as there was no known circumstance which authorized this solution, and as it seemed demonstrable, in general, that error existed somewhere in the statements, and most probably in those of the actual tonnage, he concluded that it ought to be referred to that source; and, conse-Re-exported quently, that the guide followed by the Secretary Rice of State (to wit: the entry tonnage, the only one Consumed, one-half he had to follow) was not more inaccurate than the actual tonnage would have been, which guided the member from South Carolina.

Another position of the Secretary of State on which a charge is founded is, "that the greater part of what Great Britain receives from the United States is re-exported." This position, Mr. Re-exported

Commerce of the United States.

815,880

3,501,067

Here, then, it appears that their exportations of the four articles alone, of tobacco, rice, indigo, and wheat, are greater than the whole consumption in Great Britain of the articles imported from the United States, although the most unfavorable year has been taken for the inquiry; and, consequently, that the position of the Secretary of State was well founded.

If it were necessary to investigate the full amount of re-exportations, several articles might have been added to the list, such as whale oil, ginseng, flaxseed, &c.

Nor would it be unfair, perhaps, to include the primitive value of the articles re-exported in the new forms given to them by art. A great proportion of what is sent from the United States to Great Britain, in a rude state, is worked into articles of merchandise, and exported in the course of trade. Take, for example, the two articles of pot and pearl ashes and indigo.

The amount of the export of the former to Great Britain is stated at $747,078; of which, if no part is re-exported in its unaltered state, the whole enters into British manufactures. Supposing one-third of these particular manufactures to be exported, which appears to be nearly the general proportion, the value of pot and pearl ashes re-exported is $249,026. The indigo used in Great Britain has appeared to be $379,064, onethird of which, re-exported as an ingredient in manufactures, is $126,3543. These two items alone amount to $375,2803; and, with many others, might be added to the mass of re-exportations. But they are stated rather to throw light on the general character of our trade with Great Britain than to be relied on in the present case, which has been sufficiently elucidated by more direct and simple views of it.

Mr. MADISON proceeded to apply the calculations he had made to the question discussed by Mr. SMITH, in relation to the comparative importance of the French and British markets to the productions of the United States.

[H. OF R

By deducting the $3,501,067 re-exported, from the $6,651,429 imported into Great Britain, he reduced her actual consumption to $3,150,362; to which, adding the $1,805,744 exported to the West. India market, the whole British consumption stands at no more than $4,956,106. On comparing this with the exports to the French Dominions, (which re-export none of any consequence,) to wit: $4,424,336, the subject took a very different aspect from that which had been given to it.

But there was, Mr. MADISON observed, a circumstance of the utmost importance to a fair view of this question, which had been wholly overlooked by the gentleman from South Carolina, and which cut up his calculations by the roots. The re-exportations from Great Britain were not only to be subtracted from the consumption of Great Britain, but, in a great degree being made to France, were to be added to the value of her market to the agriculture and commerce of the United States.

The re-exportation from Great Britain to France could not be accurately fixed by any documents to be had here. In general, they were known to be great.. He would, he said, confine himself to the two articles of tobacco and flour, of which he estimated the amount as follows:

The tobacco exported from the United States appears to be about 100,000 hogsheads. It is valued in the return of our exports at $4,349,567. It is known that France consumes about onefourth of the whole quantity exported; that is, $1,087,392. It appears, by the return of our exports, that the direct exports of this article to France stand at $384,642. The indirect supplies, then, to France, not appearing in the returns of our exports, and to be added to them, are $702,750.

Of the flour and grain sent to Great Britain, allowing, as above stated, one-fourth to have been there consumed, which is probably beyond the truth, the re-exportation amounted to $815,880. It is well understood that France was the market where these articles were finally consumed. The account may now be stated:

To the French market, directly exported for con-
sumption
$4,424,336

Tobacco indirectly exported for con-
sumption
Weat and flour indirectly exported for
consumption

Total of French consumption
Total of British consumption -
Excess of French consumption

Thus it appears, without taking into the account the other articles re-exported to France, that the market of that country for our exports was worth to the United States nearly a million more than the market of Great Britain; and yet the gentleman from South Carolina had represented the British markets as exceeding the French in the annual amount of between three and four millions; and had pronounced, without hesitation, that Great Britain, in reference to our productions,

H. OF R.]

Commerce of the United States.

[JANUARY, 1794.

was a more important customer than France, al-spoliations of our neutral commerce; on the unmost in the ratio of two to one. lawfulness of which, our Executive had grounded the remonstrance and demand of indemnification lying on the table.

Mr. MADISON, returning to the Secretary's Report, said he hoped, after what had been shown, it would be needless to trouble the Committee with In addition to this, he stated the inconsistency further remarks on the subject. In dismissing it, between those who maintained and those who rehowever, he could not do justice to his own im-jected the theory of leaving commerce perfectly pressions, without declaring his entire confidence free; the inconsistency of rejecting this theory, that the Report would be regarded by all discerning and yet refusing to meet restrictions on one side and unprejudiced judges as one of the many mon- with restrictions on the other; the inconsistency uments which its author had left behind him, of of condemning a commercial discrimination bethe zeal, the talents, and the patriotism with which tween nations, as contrary to the wise example of he had discharged the duties of his station; and Great Britain, and claiming for Great Britain the that he had carried with him into retirement a credit of making such discriminations in favor of purity, both in his public and private name, which the United States. The inconsistency of predictnothing that could be said within or without the ing that the measure would destroy the revenue, walls of Congress could tarnish. and insisting that the dutied articles would continue to be imported from the same source, through more expensive channels. The inconsistency of exclaiming against topics and remarks which may awaken the passions, and endeavoring themselves to alarm our fears; of exhorting the Committee to consult its judgment alone, and substituting for argument continued addresses to the imagination.

Having gone through the particular observations into which he had been led by the attack made on the Report of the Secretary of State before the Committee, he should proceed to a more general view of what had been urged by the opponents of the resolutions he had introduced.

Among other things, it had been alleged, in the latter stages of the debate, that the friends of the Particular pains, he remarked, had been taken resolutions had involved themselves in inconsis- to exhibit a picture of our national prosperity tency, by shifting the ground of argument from which might flatter our wishes and forbid experícommercial to political considerations. In answer ments. It was readily admitted, he said, that there to this charge, he remarked, that if in any instance were many features in the face of our affairs which of his public life he was free from the charge of were proper themes of mutual congratulation, inconsistency, it was on the subject of vindicating whether compared with the situation of other our national interest against the policy of Great countries or with our own under other circumBritain towards us; that in all the public stations stances. And it gave him much pleasure to add, with which he had been honored since the peace, that the degree of prosperity we enjoyed, though and on every occasion which had occurred, his not to be exclusively credited to the change of our conduct had been marked by an adherence to this Federal Government, or to particular measures principle; that the resolutions he had last propos- under it, according to the exaggerations of some, ed were founded on this principle; that if, in the was yet so far and so evidently the fruit of that first arguments supporting them, he had dwelt change as to do honor to the people of America in chiefly on commercial topics, it would be recollect- adopting it. He mentioned two innovations, maked that he kept the door open for political ones, if ing part of the Constitution, which must alone the turn of the discussion should require them. have had a powerful effect in meliorating the conThat he had forborne to enlarge on the political dition of this country, to wit: the prohibition of sides of the question, because he thought it defen- paper money, or other violations of contracts, and sible on commercial grounds, and was willing to the abolition of incoherent and rival regulations of meet it on those grounds, because he did not wish trade among the several States. But notwithstandto mingle, unnecessarily, irritating ideas in the dis-ing the flourishing state of our affairs, when viewed cussion, and because he had supposed that every thing relating to the Treaty of Peace, the Indians, Algerines, the spoliations, &c., were sufficiently imprinted on every mind, and would have all the effects they ought to have, without being particularly enforced.

Whilst he could thus repel the charge of inconsistency brought against himself, it must be evident, he thought, how much room there was for retorting the charge. In the early stages of the discussion, there seemed but one sentiment as to the conduct of Great Britain, at least in a political view: The difference turned on the question, whether we could or ought to counteract her conduct. In the latter stages of the discussion, palliations if not justifications had been multiplied and labored, not only with respect to her commercial policy, but with respect to the detention of the posts, the Indians, the Algerines, and even the

under certain aspects, it was equally certain that there were others which suggested very different reflections.

He then went into a review of the actual state of our commerce, particularly in relation to Great Britain, and of the several injuries of another sort which that nation had superadded to her commercial restrictions.

He repeated, what he had formerly maintained, that there was more of reciprocity in the footing of commerce between Great Britain and other countries, and between other countries and the United States, than between Great Britain and the United States. To prove the first point, he remarked that in some instances Great Britain had treaties with other countries which defined and stipulated reciprocal privileges; in other instances, her restrictions were countervailed by laws imposing restrictions on her. To prove the second