USA > Georgia > The bench and bar of Georgia: memoirs and sketches. With an appendix, containing a court roll from 1790-1857, etc., volume I > Part 8
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We have the honor to be, very respectfully, your fellow-citizens,
JOHN MACPHERSON BERRIEN,. J. BURNET, ERASTUS ROOT, ABBOTT LAWRENCE, WILLIAM S. ARCHER.
Hon. HENRY CLAY.
WASHINGTON, May 2, 1844.
GENTLEMEN :- I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter, dated yesterday at Baltimore, communicating my nomination, by the National Whig Convention there assembled, to the people of the United States as a candidate for the office of President of the United States. Confidently believing that this nomination is in conformity with the desire of a majority of the people of the United States, I accept it from a high sense of duty, and with feelings of profound gratitude. I re- quest you, gentlemen, in announcing to the Convention my acceptance of the nomination, to express the very great satisfaction I derive from the unanimity with which it has been made.
I have the honor to be, with the highest respect, faithfully your friend and fellow-citizen, H. CLAY.
Messrs. John Macpherson Berrien, Erastus Root, J. Burnet, Abbott Lawrence, and William S. Archer.
After his re-election to the Senate in 1840, and becoming more fully identified with the policy of the Whigs, Mr. Berrien so far modified his opinions on the Tariff as to give incidental protection to home manufactures. He was present at a mass meeting of the Whigs of Massachusetts, on Boston Common, in September, 1844, and, by special invitation, addressed the people at Marlborough Chapel, Boston, on the night of 19th September, being introduced to the crowded assemblage by the Hon. Daniel Webster. A por- tion of his speech is here given. After disposing of other topics, Mr. Berrien said :-
I. repeat it, fellow-citizens, the great question between us and our oppo- nents on this subject is,-
Shall we cherish the industry of our own people, or of those who are alien from our country, our institutions, our interests, and our affections ?
Shall we stimulate the productive energies of our countrymen, or suffer them to languish in hopeless inactivity ?
Shall we secure to the laboring classes among us a fair reward for their honest industry,-the means of obtaining a comfortable subsistence for themselves and their families, wherewith to rear and educate their chil- dren and to fit them for the discharge of their duties as American citi- zens? Shall we thus impart to that valuable portion of our people the high sense of personal independence which will add to our national strength, or, blindly neglecting their interests and our own, shall we suffer them to sink down to the condition of the pauper-laborers of Europe ?
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Shall this government be administered for the benefit of our own people, or the subjects of a foreign land ?
Are we willing to come back to the system of colonial vassalage, with the broken fetters of which our fathers battled for freedom, or are we honestly proud of our independence and resolutely determined to main- tain and transmit it to our children ?
Disguise it as we may, to these issues it must come at last. We may be lulled into security. Yielding to party feelings, we may blindly fol- low in the steps of party leaders, and sacrifice our own best interests at their dictation. But I overrate the intelligence of my countrymen if they can be thus deluded. I mistake their character if they will not spurn the demagogue who would seek thus to mislead them. No, fellow- citizens ! Realizing the magnitude of the interests which are involved in this controversy, remembering that "the price of liberty is eternal vigilance," you will bring to its decision the intelligence and manly firm- ness which should characterize American freemen. Forgive the momen- tary egotism : I am a Southern man, wholly unconnected with manufac- tures or with stocks of any description,-a Southern planter, depending on the cultivation of the soil and the use of such faculties as God has given me for my own and the support of a numerous family. If it be true (as our opponents contend) that, in protecting our domestic industry, the agricultural and other classes of the community are taxed for the ex- clusive benefit of the manufacturer, mine is the harder lot. When the pocket-nerve of the agriculturist is touched, mine is as liable to vibra- tion as that of another. On such a subject I could not deceive you if I would : that I would not if I could, let the simple statement prove to you.
No, fellow-citizens ! I advocate the protection of domestic industry from no merely selfish considerations. Looking to this great question in the large and comprehensive view in which, as it seems to me, it becomes an American statesman to contemplate it, I advocate this system of legis- lation to furnish a home market, to give stability to the currency, to ele- vate the national character, to preserve the public morals, and to draw closer the bond of union which connects us together as one people. Let us pause for a moment to consider these suggestions.
The protection of domestic industry tends largely to increase the sum of national wealth.
1. It does this by a division of labor. All experience teaches us that the aggregate product of the labor of any country is increased by such subdivisions. A nation of agriculturists, each of whom should minister to his own wants, should feed and clothe himself and make his own implements of labor, would advance slowly, however genial the climate and fruitful the soil which Providence has assigned to them. It is by diver- sifying the objects of individual pursuit by the skill which is requisite to furnish the necessary exchanges that the aggregate production is increased.
2. It stimulates industry. The necessity of providing for one's own wants by promptly supplying the wants of others, the increased skill which is acquired, and the consequeut ability to add to individual comfort by its industrious exercise, furnish a stimulus to exertion which cannot be found in the infancy of society, when each man endeavors to supply his own wants by the clumsy operations of his own inexperienced hand.
It adds largely to the national wealth by the additional value which it ingarts to the raw material. We shall look in vain through the pages of history for an example of great national productive labor, which was
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employed in producing raw materials, depending upon other nations for the exercise of the skill and industry which were necessary to befit them for the use and enjoyment of man. We may form some idea of the im- portance of this consideration from the following facts :-
A bale of cotton of ordinary quality, weighing 450 lbs., is worth, at 73 cents per lb., the sum of $34. If sold in a foreign market, it would add this sum, less the expenses of transportation and charges of sale, to the sum of national wealth.
The same bale of cotton manufactured here will produce 400 lbs. of cloth of No. 14 yarn, of which the present market-value would be 24 cents per lb.,-$96. In this case the value of the manufactured article is nearly threefold. The sum of $62 would thus be added to the national wealth. 480 lbs. of cotton of fine quality, worth, at 83 cents per lb., the sum of $48, would produce 400 lbs. of cloth of No. 30 yarn, worth 36 cents per lb., or $156. 450 lbs. of sea-island cotton, worth, at 16 cents cents per lb., $72, will make 400 lbs. of No. 80 yarn, worth $1 32 per lb., or $518. The aggregate value of these three bales of cotton in their raw state is $142,-in their manufactured state $759. The increased value imparted to them by the skill and industry of the manufacturer is there- fore $626.
Extend this calculation to the aggregate value of the 400,000 bales of cotton and other raw materials manufactured in this country ; compute that value in their raw and in their manufactured state, and some idea may be formed of the sum which is added to the national wealth by the skill, enterprise, and industry of the American manufacturer.
The protection of domestic industry results in the establishment of a home market.
To the extent to which such a demand can be created, it furnishes a better market even for those articles of produce which are chiefly sold abroad, as any man may satisfy himself who will calculate the product of 100 bales of cotton sold here and in the English market at current prices, and invested in English and American manufactures of equal quality. The details are too tedious for an occasion like the present; and they are already before the reading public in the very able argument of Hon. Mr. Simmons, of Rhode Island, pronounced a few months since in the Senate of the United States.
But the importance of a home market is more distinctly felt by the agriculturist, whose products will not bear the expense or delay of trans- portation abroad. It stimulates production by the demand which it creates, and which could not exist without it. Those who reside in the neighborhood of the villages, towns, and cities, which are scattered through our country, find there a demand for various agricultural produce which would otherwise be comparatively valueless, and would not there- fore be produced. Extend your view to the manufacturing establish- ments in the different States. Their operations require various products of the soil. The operatives who labor in them must be fed; and the demand thus occasioned gives an impulse to the agriculture of contiguous districts, necessarily increases production, and thus adds to the wealth of the agriculturist.
The protection of domestic industry gives stability to the currency.
The specie which is in circulation among us is not adequate to our commercial wants. We require a currency based upon specie, and easily convertible into it, extended in amount as it can be, retaining that quality.
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So long as we continue to depend on foreign supply for a large proportion of articles of comfort or necessity, the fluctuations of commerce will sub- jeet us in a greater degree to the drain of our specie, and the consequent contraction of our circulation,-thus affecting injuriously various classes of the community. It is only by enlarging our home supply of the chief articles of consumption which we are capable of producing, and keeping our imports within our exports, or our expenditures within our income, that we can prevent the frequent recurrence of these embarrassments.
With regard to the Government, the public credit, and other beneficial consequences of the Tariff of 1842, Mr. Berrien thus spoke :--
Fellow-citizens ! We have looked at this question in various aspects. There is yet another which is full of interest. It is the practical result of the Tariff of 1842 in its operation both upon the Government and the people during the short period of its existence. For a moment consider what was the condition of the Government before this law was passed. Mr. Van Buren, during his brief Presidential career, had exhausted both the ordinary and extraordinary resources of the Government, and, looking to the election which was to determine his right to a second term, feared to recommend the imposition of duties, or any other mode of taxation which would replenish the national treasury. Treasury notes constituted its only resource. A Government representing seventeen millions of free- men, and possessed of abundant means, nevertheless paid its debts and met its current expenditures, so far as they were paid and met, by pro- mises to pay! He retired from the Executive office and his Cabinet was disbanded, leaving to their successors a large amount of those treasury promises to redeem, and a much larger amount of unliquidated liabilities to provide for. They found the Government not only without resources, but also without credit. Shortly after the accession of the Whig party to power, a bill drawn upon the Treasury, and protested for non-payment, was exhibited in the Senate-Chamber. We sought to provide for the immediate wants of Government by a loan. It was partially accomplished on terms which were not creditable to us as a nation possessed of ample resources, but the acceptance of which was demanded by a regard to the public faith. For the rest, we failed entirely. An agent sent to Europe to procure the residue of the sum required returned without a dollar. We could not go into the money-market and borrow money on terms as advantageous as would be accorded to a responsible private individual. Our treasury notes were below par, and progressively depreciating. Now, why was this? No one doubted the ability of the Government to meet their engagements. It was their willingness to do so which the conduct of the late administration had drawn into question. See the proof. The Tariff Act of 1842 was passed, and instantly, even before its practical influence could be felt, in the extent in which it is now felt, the whole aspect of affairs was changed. The credit of the Government was restored. Trea- sury notes rose to par, and the stock of the United States has progres- sively advanced until it is now fifteen or sixteen per cent. above par. The Treasury has been replenished, so that at the close of the late financial year, on the 30th of June last, there were about seven millions of dollars subject to the order of the Government, to be applied to the redemption of the public debt, and to meet its current expenses.
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Such has been the operation of the Tariff on the financial condition of the Government. What has been its influence on the condition of indi- viduals let each one who hears me determine for himself by a comparison of his circumstances in 1841 and at the present day. Meantime, it is obvious to all that a new stimulus has been imparted to industry ; that confidence between man and man has been restored ; that all enjoy more largely the comforts and conveniences of life, and that we can look for- ward hopefully to the future unless we are faithless to ourselves and utterly unmindful of the lessons of experience.
Fellow-citizens ! We cannot part with a system thus beneficent in its influence upon the Government and upon every class of the people, in all their varied interests,-pecuniary, social, and moral,-unless, as our oppo- nents tell us, we have not the constitutional power to enforce it. I do not propose to detain you by an elaborate discussion of this question. The power was affirmed in the Senate-Chamber by one of your own dis- tinguished Senators, (Mr. Choate,) in an argument which challenges refu- tation ; while the historical view of the question has been recently pre- sented by another distinguished son of Massachusetts, who has so happily presided over our deliberations to-day, (Mr. Webster,) in a manner so clear and comprehensive as can scarcely fail to bring conviction to every unprejudiced mind,-to every man who can absolve himself from a slavish subjection to party. Those noble efforts of intellect and patriotism are in possession of the reading public, and to them I refer you.
This somewhat copious extract is given in justice to the public life of Mr. Berrien. No allusion has heretofore been made in this memoir to the leading part he acted in the Convention held at Philadelphia, in September, 1831, adverse to a protective tariff. The address to the people of the United States on that occasion was from his classic pen. The constitutionality of a tariff for pro- tection was denied, and its other objectionable features pointed out by the hand of a master. That address is not now in the posses- sion of the author, to speak for itself. But it is no disparagement to change opinions when convinced of error ; on the contrary, a man is entitled to praise for his candor. Mr. Calhoun publicly avowed that he did not consider his judgment on public measures so fixed, so grounded on investigation, as to bind him, until the leisure afforded by his Vice-Presidential career from 1825 to 1832 enabled him to review his opinions and work out the true character of the Government. The like privilege may be accorded to Mr. Berrien, who, in his ten years of retirement from the time he resigned his seat in the Cabinet in 1831 until his return to the Senate of the United States in 1841, had the opportunity of look- ing into the questions of the day with a mind free from sectional bias. The pith of the argument is contained in his Boston speech on the expediency of the Tariff.
From some cause, Mr. Berrien felt dissatisfied with the treat-
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ment he had received from the Whig party of Georgia ; and early in the session of the Legislature in 1845 he resigned his seat in the Senate. The Whig members consulted together and instantly re-elected him. A committee notified him of the fact. Ho met his political friends, and made a speech of considerable length, in which he touched upon various topics in vindication of himself and of the party with which he was identified. He answered all the objections, or pretences of objection, which had been made to his public course. That portion of his speech which related to the annexation of Texas is here copied to serve the ends of history :-
I voted against the resolution by which it was proposed to incorporate the State of Texas in this Union. In doing so, I expressed the almost unanimous conviction of those who had confided to mne the trust which I was called upon to execute. In my own deliberate judgment, that resolu- tion was an open, palpable violation of the Constitution which Ihad sworn to support. I placed my vote on the ground of fealty to that sacred charter, and I said to the American Senate, "On such a question, the duties and responsibilities of each individual must give the rule of his conduct. It is to be found in communion with God and his own eou- science." I abandoned the question of expediency to those who felt themselves at liberty to discuss it. I did not consider that this was my privilege. I said, "It is not expedient for me to do what, in my judg- ment, the Constitution forbids." I referred to the expression, at a pre- ceding session, of my views in relation to the expediency of this measure; but I added that I would cheerfully yield them to the wishes of my con- stituents, which I would have taken care to ascertain if the resolution on which we were acting had been compatible with the Constitution. And I added, " Georgia, sir, is my home, as it was that of him from whom I derived my being,-as it is, and will be, the home of my children. Humanly speaking, it is the boundary of my hopes and of my wishes ; and, whether for weal or for woe, I am content to share the lot of her people. As a Senator of the State of Georgia, therefore, on a question of expediency, the wishes of her people are my wishes; when made known to mne they are the rule of my eonduet."
Here is the published declaration of my views and opinions,-the recorded evidence of my conduct on this momentous and agitating ques- tion. I know that they met the approbation of my political associates at home from the many and cheering evidences of approval which were transmitted to mne; while even among my opponents there were those who looked with dismay on the inroad which had thus been made on the Constitution of the Union.
Whence, then, this denunciation, which an act of treason to the Con- stitution could alone have averted ? Let me tell you, gentlemen, it is not the condemnation of the past, but the apprehension of the future, which prompts it. Honest men, though they may be political opponents, would not require from me the commission of perjury, even for the acquisition of Texas. That act is not, therefore, the motive to this denunciation : it was the fear of the future which prompted it. The consummation of the union of Texas with this Confederate Republic remains with the American Congress ; and the apprehension is that this consummation may be resisted
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under a continued sense of constitutional obligation. On this point, so far as I am concerned, our opponents may dismiss their fears. They have a security which, under a change of circumstances, they could not give to us, alike resulting from my sense of the constitutional power and duty of an American Senator. The opinion which I am now about to state has been heretofore expressed on the floor of the Senate on another occasion in combating the doctrine then advanced by a member of that body. It is still my opinion, and must therefore guide my conduct if called to act upon this question.
In all open questions, where no previous legislation embarrasses his action, a member of Congress is not only permitted, but bound, to decide for himself how far the proposed measure conforms to or violates the Constitution of the United States. When, however, an act has received the concurring sanction of both branches of the National Legislature, and has been approved by the President, it acquires the authority of law, and it depends upon another department of the Government to decide the question of its constitutionality. So long as it remains on the statute- book, sustained by those sanctions and not annulled by such decision, it is obligatory upon legislators as well as citizens. I will exemplify this opinion. If I believed, as some of our opponents, that Congress had no constitutional power to establish a bank, and, acting on this belief, had voted against its charter, I should not consider myself authorized to refuse by a subsequent act of legislation to provide for the punishment of offences against the corporation on the ground that its charter was, in my individual judgment, unconstitutional. I presume that this must have been Mr. Jef- ferson's view when he approved an act establishing a branch of that cor- poration the constitutional validity of whose charter he had denied.
In the consummation of their wishes for the annexation of Texas, I have said that its advocates have a security which, under a change of cir- cumstances, they could not give us. With them the maxim is that each public agent is to obey the Constitution as he understands it, -a maxim signally illustrated in the House of Representatives of the United States, when, in defiance of the act for the apportionment of Representatives, they admitted to seats on that floor persons who had been elected in utter disregard of its provisions. I admit the truth of the aphorism that it is lawful to be taught by an enemy; but that lesson I am not willing to learn.
On the question of expediency, my opinion stated in the Senate remains unchanged. I did not doubt that some of our people, abandoning the worn-out fields of Georgia, might derive an immediate profit from the cultivation of the rich and virgin soil of Texas. But I love Georgia better than Texas, and I felt that I was bound to consult the welfare of her col- lective people rather than that of those who, influenced by the thirst of gain, would abandon their native land and the homes of their fathers, leaving it in comparative desolation with the resources which it had given them to build up and enrichi another State. I did not realize the truth of the proposition that the annexation of Texas was necessary to the con- servation of our peculiar domestic institutions. My personal observation had assured me that the danger with which these were said to be me- naced had been magnified by demagognes ; and my own view was, and is unchangeably, whenever that danger shall really exist, that the safer as well as loftier course for Southern men to pursue, is to cut at once the cord which binds us to fanatics, and to meet as open enemies rather than
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as confederate States those who would seck thus insolently to interfere with a subject which belonged to us, and to us alone, exclusively to regulate.
I could not doubt-since a portion of Texas, from its soil and climate, was adapted to slave-labor-that the South by its admission would ac- quire an accession of strength in the councils of the Union; but, when I looked throughout the Confederacy, and saw how many of our con- federates were in the process of change from the condition of slave to free States, and the utter impossibility that a converse change would occur in any single solitary instance, I felt that this struggle for Southern preponderance in those councils by superiority of numbers was vain and idle, -- a war against the fate to which our union with the other States of the Confederacy had destined us, only to be compensated by the essential advantages which that union secured to us; that it might tem- porarily subserve the views of those whose lives had been spent in one long dream of elevation to the Presidency of these States, but that it could not permanently promote the interests of the South. I feared, too, the influence of this precedent and the overwhelming retribution which might be brought upon us when circumstances should permit and a ma- jority of Congress should resolve upon the annexation of States resting on another border of our Confederacy ..
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