MERCHANTS' MAGAZINE. Established July, 1839, by Freeman Hunt. L. FREE TRADE AND PROTECTION: OR, A PARTIAL REVIEW OF MR. CAREY'S LETTERS TO THE PRESIDENT. By RICHARD SULLEY, Esq., of Fort Wayne, Ind. 531 II. COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL CITIES OF THE UNITED STATES. No. LXIV. OSWEGO, NEW YORK. Origin of Oswego-Population-Effect of 1836-Incorpora- tion of City-Oswego Canal-Its Connections-Trade of-Tonnage of-Railroads Con- necting Characteristics-Communications-Lake Trade and Tonnage-Foreign Tonnage -Coastwise Tonnage-Number of Vessels-Leading Articles of Import-General Lake Trade-Grain-Ontario Trade-Receipts at Oswego-Origin of the Grain-Milling Fa- cilities-Oswego River-Its Characteristics-Quantity of Water-Available Fall-Horse- Power-Number of Stores-Mills, Capacity of-Flour Received by Lake-Manufactured -Shippers-Elevators-Salt Trade-Coal, Supplies of-Water Lime-Quantity Sold- Plaster-Lumber-Climate-Health-Prospects...... III. TRADE AND COMMERCE OF FRANCE. M. Vattemere-International Exchanges- French Official Report-Events of the Last Decade-Effects upon Commerce-Official Values-Increase in General Trade-Comparison, General and Special-Imports and Exports-Merchandise and Specie-Increase of the Trade in the Metals-Change in Ratio of "Actual" to "Official"-Prices-Rise in Values-Silk Cocoons-Sugar and Coffee-Commerce by Sea and by Land-Proportion of Native Flag-Reserved Com- merce-Relative Importance of the Trade of Different Countries-Trade with England, United States-Table of Imports and Exports by Countries-Raw Materials Imported- Rise of Values-Leading Exports for Three Decades-Ratio of Actual to Official Value -Increase in Exports of Goods--Trade in Grain-Table for Thirty Years-Excess of Imports-Refined Sugar-Drawbacks--Warehousing-Transit Trade--Customs--Salt Duty-Sugar Tax-Consumption of Sugar-Beet-Root Duty-Specie Movement-Ton- IV. THE ACQUISITION OF CUBA: ARE THE UNITED STATES JUSTIFIED IN DE- V. CONSIDERATIONS ON VALUE AND THE PRECIOUS METALS. By HENRY C. BAIRD, Esq., of Philadelphia.... VI. USURY: ITS MEANING AND DEFINITION. BY WILLIAM BROWN, Esq., of Cote des 578 In Admiralty.-Undervaluation of Sugar... Collision-Practice.-Exceptions to Interrogatories Collision at Wharf-Boisterous Weather.-Decision in Admiralty-Slave Trade-Seizure...... 580 COMMERCIAL CHRONICLE AND REVIEW. Improvement in Trade-Natural Productions-No Enterprises-Abundance of Food-Ton- Dage Built-Value of--Diminished Construction -Low Freights--No Building-Food Buy- ers--Floating Capital Increasing-Conversion into Fixed-Accumulation of Means-Specie in France and Great Britain--Rate of Interest-Crops-Goods Shipped to United States-- Diminished Exports of Breadstuffs-Government Revenues-North Carolina Loan --No Employment for Money-Bank Dividends-Rate of Interest-Price of Bills-Specie Ex- ports-Destination of-Assay-Office-Philadelphia Mint-Foreign News--Imports-Goods in Bond--Goods Consumed-Exports-Southern Crops -Cotton-Sugar-Value Exported-Ef- JOURNAL OF BANKING, CURRENCY, AND FINANCE. Banks of the United States, according to Returns dated nearest to January 1, 1859... Valuation of Hartford, Connecticut.. Valuation of Baltimore.-Valuation of Louisiana.-Boston Bank Dividends... ....... 591 British Property Tax and Income Tax..... Import and Export of the Precious Metals at London. STATISTICS OF TRADE AND COMMERCE. Grain received at Buffalo in two years-Iron exported from Stockholm.... Exports and Imports of Baltimore.-Lumber Trade of St. John's, New Brunswick.. Sugar exported from Cuba -Cod Fisheries.-Trade of Denmark for 1857... Import of Iron and Steel into the United States.-Commerce of the Sandwich Islands...... Trade of Holland.-Receipts of Coal at Baltimore.--Exports of Bahia.--Lumber on the Alleghany 604 Trade of Sweden.-Exports from Porto Rico.-Shipments of Oil and Bone from Sandwich Islands 605 Mineral Oil.-Lithographs Printed in Colors..... Castor Seed.-Mustard Seed.-Protest and Appeal, under fifth section of the Tariff Act of 1857 607 610 611 612 Railroads in South Carolina.--Ohio Canals.--Operation of the Massachusetts Railways........ 619 Manufacture of Carpets.-Texas State Cotton Factory.... Enameled Cloth.-An Invention for Spinning Cotton without Ginning.. Manufactures of Switzerland.--Cotton Factories in the United Kingdom..... Minerals and Metals Produced in the United Kingdom. Bay State Mills.-Manufactures in Dublin. Cotton Consumption of Europe.-The Bleaching of Wax. The North China Sugar Cane, and the South African Imphee.. Silver in Sea-water.-Discharge of Small Debts. A New Hydro-carbon.-The Chronometer Compass... Improvement in Starch Gum and Grape Sugar Manufacture.-The Fuggers of Ausbury. Wealth of a Boston Merchant.-Character better than Credit.-Tax on Merchandise.. Acceptance of Bills of Exchange.-Wisconsin Exchanging with China.-Sugar..... HUNT'S MERCHANTS' MAGAZINE AND COMMERCIAL REVIEW. MAY, 1859. Art. I.-FREE TRADE AND PROTECTION: OR, A PARTIAL REVIEW OF MR. CAREY'S LETTERS TO THE PRESIDENT. Ir was said some time since, by a certain writer in the Merchants' Magazine, that the progress of political economy, as a science, had been slow; an assertion, whether true or not, we have no present disposition to dispute; but, on the contrary, are rather inclined to admit the proposition, at least to a certain extent. We know the views of mankind, in general, are narrow and contracted, and especially with respect to the adoption or application of philosophical principles. They look well to their own peculiar interests generally, and are lothe to merge them in that of the community; and, in a more extended sense, nations also seem equally lothe to communicate liberally with their neighbors, for fear they should lose something they might otherwise retain. And yet experience teaches, that whenever nations or individuals have been most prosperous it has been by the diligent and un-divided application of their own peculiar tastes, skill, and facilities of production, and by a free and legitimate interchange of those productions with other individuals or nations. But short-sighted and selfish predilections warp the judgments of communities, and render the adoption of principles of action, which look to the promotion of the public good, rather a matter of slow progress; and if we should trace commercial history, even up to the present time, we should find little else but restrictions, barriers, and inconveniences to intercourse, as though mankind had agreed, by common consent, pertinatiously to resist and to do all they could to prevent the laws of God and nature from having their due course and operation. Light is, however, gradually breaking upon the world, and we may hope the time is not distant when we may "see eye to eye" upon this subject. Almost all nations, as well as all unprejudiced individuals, are becoming more and more satisfied of the utter futility of protective regulations. We can find periods in history when it was thought necessary to regulate by law every commercial and industrial transaction, from the prices of food and the wages of labor, to the size and number of farms, to the number of sheep that might be kept, beside many other absurd regulations, too numerous to mention; and could only tend to prevent industry, produce poverty and fluctuations in trade, and consequent decay and misery in those communities adopting them. And yet we find persons, eminent men, of more than ordinary ability, who, while they would no doubt deride these ancient follies, would still maintain the same principles of action under another guise. That great economical evils exists in this and many other countries no one will deny, but that these evils can be obliterated, by revamping the old exploded system of protective commercial policy, seems truly absurd. It has heretofore been stated by some of our economical writers, that labor is better paid in the United States than elsewhere; and no doubt this has been the case, and may be still, for some time to come. But the question arises, what has been the cause of this superior rate of wages, and also of the present decline of prosperity? Let us inquire. In the first place, the science of political economy teaches that there is only one source from which the wages of labor can be permanently paid; and that is, the profit of capital. Therefore, when the profit of capital increases, other things remaining the same, the rate of wages will be increased, and also, there will be an increased demand for labor, and vice versa. We have only to keep these principles in view, and perhaps we may be able to unravel the present mystery. We shall see that this excess in the price of labor has arisen from the fact of our possession of a superabundant supply of capital. Up to the present time we have possessed an almost unlimited amount of virgin soil, and therefore a great portion of that profit arising from land has been absorbed by wages, which goes to rent in other countries. But now, by many years of wasteful cropping, the land has been considerably exhausted; hence it is found at present to take a larger amount of labor to obtain a given amount of produce, and to place it at any given point of consumption. Therefore we need not to be surprised if both the profits of capital and the wages of labor should be reduced, and when this operation can no longer be performed, with respect to wages, the capital must bear the whole of the burthen. The depletion of the land has been going on rapidly of late, as well in the West as in the East, but how would the adoption of a protective tariff upon manufactured goods remedy the evil? It is quite possible, under the belief at present prevalent, that increased profits would be derived from an increased tariff, that, for a short time at least, mills and factories might spring up, like mushrooms in the night, and some perhaps in the South and West; but what would be their fate? Like their predecessors they would only maintain a fitful and sickly existence. The increased price of manufactured goods, which must take place upon the adoption of a higher tariff, must of course retard consumption, and ease the tax upon foreign goods; and overproduction, overtrading, and internal competition would be the necessary consequence. The tariffs of England and other European countries would no longer prevent our breadstuffs, pork, and other similar products from entering their ports, and, therefore, no doubt for a short period, the commercial exchanges would be in our favor. Our condition would then be as nearly assimilated to that of Spain, when she obtained her colonies and the mines of Mexico and Peru, as anything we can imagine, except that the manufacturing power of Spain was at least equal, if not superior, to that of any of her rivals. What, then, should hinder us from comparatively realizing her condition? She was at least equally wealthy with any of her contemporaries, and she is now merely a poor agricultural State. Ever since the time of Adam Smith, it has always been admitted that the production of gold in her colonies was the cause of her decline; but possibly it may be objected that religious persecution also contributed to her fall. That would, however, make little difference in our favor, as manufacturing facilities already exist in other countries far superior to our own, and therefore all the elements exist at present in our own case that destroyed the power and prosperity of Spain. One thing we consider certain, that if we continue our present monetary arrangements, with our gold getting, it will gradually undermine our manufactures, and we shall shortly produce nothing that will go abroad in commerce, unless the profit of its production be equal to that of gold digging. Mr. Carey, a gentleman who has written extensively upon these evils of late, can see no remedy for them but a highly protective tariff. The time was when writers upon political economy were content to reason mainly upon general principles, about which there could be no dispute; but Mr. Carey, as he had certainly a right to do, has chosen to leave the beaten track, disregarding or contracting all former axioms, apparently depending alone upon real or hypothetical statistics for the support of his theories. It may therefore be perceived that the difference between Mr. Carey and other economical writers is radical-Mr. Carey assuming that man is governed by his aspirations, and they, that he is governed by his necessities; consequently, the exigencies of his system required this desultory and indecisive mode of support, as no other could possibly have been effective in upholding the policy of protection. Let us now turn to some of his letters to the President, and examine carefully a few of his propositions and conclusions. We quote first from his sixth letter the following passage:-"Turning now, Mr. President, to the England of a century since, we have a precisely similar state of facts, and resulting, too, from causes precisely similar-a growing dependence on distant markets. ** * * The price of wheat fell there regularly, until at length it reached 21s. 3d. per quarter, or a little more than half a dollar a bushel, manufactures remaining high in price. So soon, however, as a market had been made at home, the price rose, nearly doubling in the first decade, and further advancing to an average of 51s. 3d, at or near which point it remained for twenty-five years." Now the point which Mr. Carey gives us for the foundation of these assertions is the year 1755. But in turning to a statistical table of the prices of English wheat, (Merchants' agazine, volume xxxv., page 758,) prepared and quoted from the London Economist, we find the price varying from Mr. Carey's statement about 9s. per quarter, or nearly 50 per cent more than 21s., and there is no year in the table when the price approximated to that stated by Mr. Carey, within ten years prior to the period designated. The average price of the ten years following 1755, was only 38s. 5d. per quarter, and there was only one year in the ten that it rose as high as 51s., but it again gradually fell within the period to 24s. 8d. This is certainly not the gradual rise in price which we expected from Mr. Carey's |