tinction of having lacked the moral courage to state their opinions. So far as is known, officially, Van Buren was neither for nor against; and, like a scripture party, because he was neither hot nor cold, in 1840 the people spewed him out of politics into inglorious retirement.

1840. THE DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION condemned protection and indorsed practically free trade in its platform of 1840.

1841.-PRESIDENT WILLIAM H. HARRISON, a Whig and a strong protectionist, succeeded Mr. Van Buren, but he lived only a month after his inauguration and had no opportunity to make his opinions felt.

VICE-PRESIDENT JOHN TYLER succeeded Harrison, and while he was professedly a protectionist his Southern training and associations had made him one of a very mild type.

Fortunately, however, for the country, a strong Whig and Protectionist majority now had control in Congress, and soon made itself felt.

CHAPTER VI.

THIRD PROTECTION PERIOD-1842-1846.

1842.-PROTECTION ONCE MORE.-The state of things as set forth in the last chapter, under the Tariff of 1833, continued till 1842, when the Whigs came back to power. They found the country completely exhausted by misrule and free trade, but quickly turned the tide by passing another highly protective tariff.

It was too high, indeed, to suit President Tyler, and he vetoed it; but the country by this time had become so earnest and determined in this matter that Congress dared not yield to him, and so passed it over his veto.

RESULTS.-No sooner was this done than the financial gloom began to pass away; the sun of prosperity shone forth; business revived everywhere; and factories and other industries sprang up on every hand throughout the North. Confidence was restored, and customs receipts increased the first year (1843) seventy-five per cent over the last year of the compromise Tariff of 1833.

"After four years of real prosperity under this Tariff of 1842, how great was the change. Labor was everywhere in demand. Planters had large crops, and the domestic market was growing with a rapidity that promised better prices. The produce of the farm was in demand and prices had risen. The consumption of coal, iron, wool and cotton and woollen cloth was immense and rapidly increasing, while prices were falling because of the rapidly improving character of the machinery of production. Production of every kind was immense, and commerce, internal and external, was growing with unexampled rapidity. Shipping was in demand, and its quantity was being augmented at a rate never before known. Roads and canals were productive. Corporations had been resuscitated, and States had recommended payment, and the credit of the Union was so high that the same persons who had vilified the people and

A government of the Union-under the compromise Tariff of 1833—were now anxious to secure their custom on almost any terms." (Carey.)

So very positive and decided was the improvement that President Polk, another Democrat, and a free trader, in his annual message of December, 1846, was constrained to say :

"Labor in all its branches is receiving an ample reward; while education, science and the arts are rapidly enlarging the means of social happiness. The progress of our country in her career of greatness, not only in the vast extension of her territorial limits, and in the rapid increase of our population, but in resources and wealth, and in the happy condition of our people, is without an example in the history of nations."

Compare this condition with those of the previous free trade periods, already described, and closing in 1789, 1824 and 1842 respectively, and decide which system, in your opinion, is the better for our country.

THE SOUTH OPPOSED TO PROTECTION.-But by this time (184243) the slave power of the South had gained complete ascendency in the Democratic Party. It saw at once that this new and surprising prosperity in the North, secured as it was by means of protection to their home industries, under the new tariff, would speedily checkmate and finally lead to the overthrow of their political domination in the control of the government.

Previous to this time, the South has been favorable to protection, and its greatest statesman, John C. Calhoun, was one of the stanchest defenders of a high protective tariff. In March, 1816, Mr. Calhoun made a strong speech in favor of a protective tariff, and among other things said:

"When our manufactures are grown to a certain perfection, as they will under the fostering care of government, the farmer will find a ready market for his surplus product, and what is of almost equal consequence, a certain and cheap supply of all his wants. His prosperity will diffuse itself to every class in the community. It (a protective tariff) is calculated to bind together more closely our wide-spread Republic, and give greater nerve to the arm of government."

But no sooner did Mr. Calhoun and other Southern leaders see their "peculiar institution " (slavery) and their political ascendency menaced by It, than they decided to throw all their political power against a protective tariff. So terrible, however, had been the late financial disaster of 1837 to 1842, under free trade, especially in the North, that they were compelled to resort to political fraud and deception if they would surely win.

IN 1844 THE DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION reaffirmed in their platform their opposition to protection and their endorsement of practical free trade.

FRAUDULENT CAMPAIGN OF 1844.-In 1844, as the opponent of Henry Clay, the Whig candidate and the champion of protection, the Democratic Party nominated James K. Polk for President. He was a good man personally, but weak, and he at once became the pliant tool of the slave oligarchy.

Colonel Benton in his "Thirty Years" (Vol. II., page 591) tells us of

the private and personal intrigue made by Mr. Polk in person with the Southern leaders, by which he thoroughly satisfied them that he would be with them in matters relating to tariff, slavery extension, etc.; and Benton denounces this "intrigue" as 66 one of the most elaborate, complex and daring ever practiced in an intelligent country." Of course, this "intrigue" was not generally known, but was confined to a few managers in the South. They knew their man, however, and trusted him. He had voted against the Tariff of 1828, which was favored by Jackson; he announced himself as steadily opposed to a protective policy; declared himself against the Tariff of 1842, and required its repeal and the restoration of the Act of 1833.

Why should not the South favor his election ?

But Mr. Polk could not be elected without the electoral vote of Pennsylvania; and Pennsylvania was strongly protectionist. The protectionist supporters of General Jackson must be made to believe that the Tariff of 1842 would not be disturbed in case of Mr. Polk's election, or he could never get their votes. How was it possible to arrange this difficult

matter?

A DOUBLE-FACED CANDIDATE.-To be a "free trader" in the South, and satisfy them of his sincerity and trustworthiness; and an undoubted protectionist in Pennsylvania, was indeed difficult and dangerous, and at the same time, execrably dishonest; but it must be attempted, or Mr. Clay would certainly be elected. He, therefore, wrote his celebrated "Kane letter," occupying forty days in the process; and never were "words used to conceal ideas more skillfully or dishonorably than in this letter. His effort and intention were to convey the impression to Pennsylvanians, that he was a protectionist; to appear to say this, but in fact to say nothing of the kind. His effort was entirely successful. Το help on this fraud George M. Dallas, of Pennsylvania, a professed protectionist, was nominated with Polk for Vice-President, to awaken State local pride.

In order to be entirely consistent, the friends of Polk insiduously circulated all through Pennsylvania, the rumor that Mr. Clay was unsound on protection; that if elected, he would use all his power to repeal the Tariff of 1842; and that the only way to insure the continuance of the Tariff of 1842 was to elect Mr. Polk. And so the battle went on. In the South the rallying cry was: "Polk, Texas and Free Trade;" in the North it was: "Polk, Dallas and the Tariff of '42."

It may now seem incredible that such double dealing could have succeeded, but it must be remembered that in those days the telegraph was comparatively new and undeveloped, and that the daily newspaper had not become the tremendous and omnipresent power which it now is; that the news was disseminated mainly by the easy-going weeklies, whose circulation was generally confined to limited areas, and were delivered by country stages, instead of swiftly running railway trains; hence, that scandalous duplicity, which now would be exposed in every hamlet of the nation within twenty-four hours and cause instant political death to its author,

brought victory to Polk. Of course, one of the sections was most grossly and intentionally deceived; but it was not the South.

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POLK SEVERELY CENSURED.-Years afterward, Chace, a personal friend of Mr. Polk, wrote a 'History of Polk's Administration," and referring to Polk's connection with this letter, said: "If the principles which Mr. Polk really entertained were misunderstood, owing to the phraseology of the Kane letter, he was not himself altogether blameless. The voters in the North were deceived by the use of language which had the effect of obscuring, instead of more clearly defining his position. The statement that he was 'not in favor of a tariff for protection merely ' should have been transposed to read that he was in favor of a tariff for revenue merely."

After the election and when Dallas was presiding in the Senate, Daniel Webster characterized this deception in severest terms; and Senator Reverdy Johnson, of Maryland, excoriated Dallas in presence of the Senate, by accusing him of being a consenting party to the fraud; and closed his remarks by declaring that "in the entire history of our party struggles—in all the agitations of the political elements-in all our conflicts for power, during every former period of the government—never had there existed such absolute, open and vile deception, as had been practiced by the Democratic leaders and politicians on confiding Pennsylvania."

DEMOCRATIC ENDORSEMENT OF POLK. The sentiments of Webster and Johnson were very generally approved by this country when the facts became known; but under the lead of the free trade Democracy of the South, the Democratic Party in its National Convention in 1848,

"Resolved, That the fruits of the great political triumph of 1844, which elected James K. Polk and George M. Dallas, have fulfilled the hopes of the Democracy of the Union, in the noble impulse given to the cause of free trade by the repeal of the Tariff of 1842, and the creation of the more equal, honest and productive Tariff of 1846; that the confidence of the Democracy of the Union in the principles, capacity, firmness and integrity of James K. Polk manifested by his nomination and election in 1844, has been signally justified by the strictness of his adherence to sound Democratic doctrines."

We have already seen how "his nomination and election" were brought about, and what his personal and political friend and biographer, as well as prominent Senators, thought of Polk's conduct in that campaign; and now we see in this resolution how free trade Democracy regarded it. The reader is at liberty to form his own opinion from the recorded facts as herein transcribed.*

* I have dwelt longer on this disagreeable election than I otherwise should, because of its unfortunate and fatal influence upon the tariff legislation that followed,

CHAPTER VII.

FOURTH FREE TRADE PERIOD-1846-1861.

1846.-FREE TRADE TARIFF ONCE MORE.--It was quickly discovered after Polk was inaugurated, that a great fraud had been concealed in that cry of "Polk, Dallas, and the Tariff of '42," for no sooner were the Democrats in power than they, in 1846, repealed that very Protective Tariff of 1842 for which they had shouted so lustily; and, meanest of all, that repeal was obtained by the casting vote of that same professed protectionist, George M. Dallas; and again a tariff of very low duties became the policy of the country.

The passage of this Tariff bill was opposed most strenuously by the Whigs in Congress and by the protectionist newspapers; and the direful results that followed were almost literally pictured and described.

Daniel Webster made one of his greatest speeches, running through three days, July 25, 27 and 28, 1846, and showed its true character. He said: "You indulge in the luxury of taxing the poor man and the laborer! That is the whole tendency, the whole character, the whole effect of the bill. One may see everywhere in it the desire to revel in the delight of taking away men's employment. It is not a bill for the people or the masses. It is not a bill to add to the comforts of those in middle life, or of the poor. It is not a bill for employment. It is a bill for the relief of the highest and most luxurious classes of the country, and a bill imposing onerous duties on the great industrious masses, and for taking away the means of living from labor everywhere throughout the land." He showed clearly that this bill narrowed and diminished our industries, and thus deprived the masses of needed employment, and added: "The interest of every laboring community requires diversity of occupations, pursuits, and objects of industry. The more that diversity is multiplied, even extended, the better. To diversify employment is to increase employment and to enhance wages.

"And, sir, take this great truth; place it on the title-page of every book of Political Economy intended for the use of the United States; put it in every Farmers' Almanac; let it be the heading of the column of every Mechanics' Magazine; proclaim it everywhere, and make it a proverb, that where there is work for the hands of men, there will be work for their teeth. Where there is employment there will be bread. It is a great blessing to the poor to have cheap food, but greater than that, prior to that and of still higher value, is the blessing of being able to buy food, by honest and respectable employment. Employment feeds and clothes and instructs. Employment gives health, sobriety and morals. Constant employment and well-paid labor produce, in a country like ours, general prosperity, content, and cheerfulness."

The leading newspapers worked very hard to prevent its passage, but in vain; and after it became a law declared, with true prophetic inspiration, what would follow.