United States of America—Her independence recognised,
1783—Commercial rights—Retaliatory measures—Threatening attitude
of Massachusetts—Constitution of the United States—Good effects
of a united Government—Maritime laws and laws respecting
Neutrals—Feeling on both sides the water—Treaty between Great
Britain and United States—The right to impose a countervailing
tonnage duty reserved—Difficulty of the negotiation—Remarkable
omission respecting cotton—Indignation in France at the Treaty—The
French protest against its principles—Interest of England to
have private property free from capture at sea—Condemnation
of ships in the West Indies and great depredations—Outrages
on the Americans—Torture practised by French cruisers—The
advantages of the war to the Americans—Impulse given to
shipping—Progress of American civilisation—Advances of maritime
enterprise—Views of American statesmen—The shipwrights of
Baltimore seek protection—Great Britain imposes countervailing
duties—Effect of legislative measures on both sides—Freight and
duty compared—Conclusions drawn by the American shipowners—Alarm
in the United States at the idea of reciprocity—Objections to
the British Navigation Act—Threatened destruction to American
shipping—Popular clamour—Opinions in Congress—Great influence of
the shipowners—Early statesmen of the United States—Their efforts
to develop maritime commerce—First trade with the East—European
War of 1803—Its effect on their maritime pursuits.
[Sidenote: United States of America.]
A brief exposition has already been given of the trade and navigation
of the British colonies of North America, which in 1776 declared their
independence, and after an unwise and ineffectual resistance on the
part of Great Britain, achieved their object, and became, in 1783, the
now great transatlantic republic, known as the United States of America.
[Sidenote: Her independence recognised, 1783.]
For some time after their independence had been acknowledged, the
people of the infant republic were slow in recovering from the
extraordinary efforts they had made to secure their position as a
nation. There were domestic as well as foreign obstacles to overcome.
Each of the thirteen States at first contended for its own immediate
interests. Some of them declared for a system of free-trade; others
were in favour of protection. When a five per cent. _ad valorem_ duty
on foreign produce was proposed by Congress, with a view to pay off
the debt of the federation, the opposition of one State alone, that of
Rhode Island, was sufficient to defeat the project. And when the State
of Pennsylvania levied a duty on foreign produce, New Jersey, equally
washed by the waters of the Delaware river, admitted the same articles
brought by foreign merchant vessels free of duty, the result being that
goods could be easily smuggled into one State from the other. Nor did
the troubles of the new States end here.
[Sidenote: Commercial rights.]
[Sidenote: Retaliatory measures.]
No sooner had their independence been acknowledged than there arose,
as we have seen, in Great Britain a controversy respecting the extent
of the commercial rights which it would be advisable to concede to the
republic; the main point in contention being whether the vessels of the
United States should be excluded from her West Indian settlements, as
the vessels of all other nations were by the Navigation Act, and from
a commerce at that time constituting the most valuable branch of the
whole British trade. As this view of the question prevailed, Congress,
in 1784, recommended to the legislatures of the different States the
adoption of a law prohibiting for fifteen years the importation and
exportation of every species of merchandise in any vessels belonging to
foreign powers which had not connected themselves with the government
of the United States by commercial treaties. The recommendation of
retaliatory measures, as has too frequently been the case in all ages
and with all nations, found ready favour with the New England States,
whose people were almost exclusively engaged in maritime pursuits. The
merchants and shipowners of Boston, who had played so determined and
conspicuous a part in the great revolution, were highly exasperated
by their exclusion from the ports of the West Indies, and by the
regulations adopted with regard to British fisheries in the American
seas. They viewed also with alarm the establishment of British factors
in their country.
[Sidenote: Threatening attitude of Massachusetts.]
Massachusetts consequently passed an Act for the regulation of
navigation and commerce, whereby they prohibited the exportation of
any American produce or manufacture from their ports in vessels owned
by British subjects after the 1st of August, 1785; with a provisional
exception in favour of those British settlements whose governors should
reverse their proclamations against the admission of American vessels
into their ports. They also levied several extra duties to be paid by
vessels belonging to foreigners, and especially by British subjects.
There was, however, a proviso, containing a permission for newly-built
vessels constructed in Massachusetts, though partly or wholly owned
by British subjects, to take in cargoes upon equal terms with the
citizens of the United States, but only for their first departures.
Several States, following the example of Massachusetts, levied duties
of various kinds on foreign tonnage. In some of the States 1_s._ per
ton was imposed, while in others foreign vessels were subjected to
a tax of from 3_s._ to no less than 5_s._ per ton, counterparts, in
many respects, to the ancient navigation laws of England. However
prejudicial to other nations, these high and conflicting rates led to a
general misunderstanding among the States themselves, which contributed
about as much as any foreign competition would then have done to check
the progress of American navigation. But a common interest soon made it
manifest to the people of the United States that these differential, or
rather protective duties could not be maintained, and that some general
regulations were essential to the safety and welfare of the Union, and
to the development of its trade and navigation. In short, the different
States found it absolutely necessary to part with a portion of their
individual liberty in order to secure the combined and wholesome
action of the entire Union. Indeed they soon perceived the necessity
of confiding to Congress alone the power of regulating and controlling
their intercourse with foreign nations; and, with this object in view,
a convention was called to revise the articles of the confederation.
[Sidenote: Constitution of the United States.]
By the constitution of the United States (Art. 1, Sec. 8, 9, 10),
Congress was vested with the power of regulating commerce with foreign
nations. It was therefore stipulated, on the recommendation of the
convention, that no tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from
any State; that “no preference shall be given by any regulation of
commerce or revenue to the ports of one State over that of another;”
and that no vessels bound to or from one State should be obliged to
enter, clear, or pay duties in another. Further, that “no State shall,
without the consent of Congress, lay any impost or duty on imports
or exports except what may be absolutely necessary for executing its
respective laws; that the net produce of all duties or imposts laid by
any State on imports or exports shall be for the use of the treasury
of the United States, and that all such laws shall be subject to the
revision and control of Congress.”
[Sidenote: The good effects of a united government.]
The adoption of this paper constitution, as yet not quite in force
to its legitimate extent in some of the Southern States, conferred
upon the United States the sovereign attributes of a great nation.
It secured the domestic tranquillity then so much required, and laid
the foundation for amicable treaties of commerce and navigation with
foreign powers. Placed as the people of the United States were, without
any relations of amity with other nations, but happily unshackled with
any trading monopolies to limit their free action, it was obviously to
their interest to invite other countries to their shores, and to form
with them friendly alliances of commerce and navigation. Accordingly
their then Secretary of State, seeing that some of the States were
opposed to protection, proclaimed with great wisdom the principles of
free-trade; and in his manifesto on this subject[307] remarked that
“instead of embarrassing commerce under piles of regulating laws,
duties, and prohibitions, it should be relieved from all its shackles
in all parts of the world. Would even a single nation,” he continued,
“begin with the United States this system of free commerce, it would be
advisable to begin with that nation.”
Unfortunately other nations, and more especially Great Britain, as
well as the Northern States of America, were not then prepared to
adopt, pure and simple, the principles he propounded; and although
American vessels were then admitted to the British possessions in the
East Indies upon the most favoured footing, the great majority of the
English people had no inclination to yield one iota of their ancient
navigation laws without an equivalent, as they considered these laws
to be the chief, if not the sole cause of their maritime success and
supremacy. Nor would the English government make any concessions with
regard to Light dues and Local charges, of which the shipowners of
the United States justly complained, and have still, though to a much
less extent, some cause for complaint. The Board of Trade contended
that these charges were of ancient establishment and the property of
private persons or of corporate bodies, and that the funds arising from
them were in many instances applicable to public works or charitable
purposes.
[Sidenote: Maritime laws and laws respecting neutrals.]
[Sidenote: Feeling on both sides the water.]
With regard to maritime regulations an intimation was given by the
Lords of the Council that Great Britain might consent to insert in a
commercial treaty with the United States all the articles of maritime
law which had of late years been inserted in her commercial treaties
with other foreign powers; expressly excepting, however, any article
allowing the ships of the United States to protect the property of the
enemies of Great Britain in time of war, _which should on no account
be admitted_. On the other hand, the more violent partisans in America
for unrestricted trade with the West Indies threatened to break off all
commercial intercourse with Great Britain unless their demands were
complied with. In this controversy it is amusing to observe that grave
members of the English Council actually gave an authoritative opinion:
“That the articles which the people of the United States now send to
European markets are but few, and can be obtained in equal perfection
from other countries; and,” they added, “IT IS MORE LIKELY _that the
demand for them from thence should in future_ DIMINISH RATHER THAN
INCREASE.” If these short-sighted mortals could but have opened the
book of the future, and could have contemplated the prodigious supply
of cotton, and corn, and other raw produce which have been derived from
the United States since the resources of its fertile and varied soil
have been developed, they would have paused before they hazarded such
crude and altogether erroneous vaticinations. They, moreover, decried
the trade in grain as precarious, and asserted that no system of
foreign commerce permanently profitable could be founded upon it.
[Sidenote: Treaty between Great Britain and the United States.]
Happily, however, a treaty of amity and commerce and navigation was at
last concluded between the two nations; but we need only here refer to
those portions of it which more especially affected their navigation.
By this treaty it was arranged that during the continuance of the
French war, and for two years after its termination, the citizens of
the United States might carry in vessels of their own, not exceeding
the burthen of seventy tons, to the British West Indies, all such
produce or manufactures of the United States as could be lawfully
carried from the States to the islands by British vessels; and also
that American vessels might carry back from the islands to the States
all such West Indian produce as British vessels might carry to the same
quarter; the same duties being levied by each government on the ships
of the one country as on those of the other engaged in this trade. The
United States were, however, expressly debarred from carrying molasses,
sugar, coffee, cotton, etc., the produce of the West Indies, to any
other part of the world.
[Sidenote: The right to impose a countervailing tonnage duty reserved.]
The liberty of continuing to trade to the ports of the territories of
Great Britain in the East Indies was confirmed to American vessels;
the government of the United States engaging that such vessels should
carry the goods brought away by them from India to no part of the world
except their own ports in America. By the 15th article it was agreed
that no higher duties should be charged in the ports of either country
upon vessels belonging to the other than were paid by the like vessels
on merchandise of all other nations; nor should any prohibition be
imposed upon the exportation or importation of any articles to and from
the territories of the two contracting parties respectively, which
should not equally extend to all other nations.[308] But the British
government reserved to itself the right of imposing on American vessels
entering into the British ports in Europe a tonnage duty equal to that
which was payable by British vessels in the ports of America; and also
such duty as might be adequate to countervail the difference of duty
payable on the importation of European and Asiatic goods, when imported
into the United States in British or in American vessels. Both parties
further agreed to treat with regard to a more exact equalisation of
duties. If a vessel should be taken or detained on suspicion of having
enemy’s property on board, or of carrying contraband articles, it
was stipulated that only the illegal portion of the cargo should be
condemned and made prize.
By the 21st article the two governments bound themselves not to permit
their subjects or citizens to accept commissions from the enemies of
the other, nor to permit such enemies to enlist any of their subjects
or citizens into the military service; any subject or citizen acting
contrary to this article being made punishable as a pirate. By
subsequent articles the contracting parties agreed that neither would
permit privateers, commissioned by the enemies of the other, to arm or
to trade in their ports, still less allow a vessel belonging to the
other to be taken within any of its bays, or within cannon-shot of its
coasts. In case of a rupture between the two countries, the subjects
or citizens of the one residing in the dominions of the other were
secured the privilege of remaining and continuing their trade, so
long as they committed no offence against the laws; and even if their
conduct should induce the government to order them to depart from the
country, they were allowed twelve months to remove their families and
effects.
[Sidenote: Difficulty of the negotiation.]
These were the chief articles of this treaty. The disaffected on both
sides the water found, however, as has almost invariably been the case
in commercial treaties, great fault with it. The shipowners of the
United States complained of the restrictions put upon their shipping
intercourse with the West Indies; while the cavillers in Great Britain
looked upon the permission to use vessels of seventy tons in the trade
between the United States and these islands as equivalent to the
creating a nursery of seamen for the use of America. But the treaty,
in spite of these cavillings, was signed by Lord Grenville and Mr. Jay
on the 19th of November, 1794. It was not, however, until the 25th of
October, 1795, that the ratifications between the two governments were
exchanged. The House of Representatives in the United States did not
sanction this treaty till the 30th of April, 1796, nor was the Act for
carrying its provisions into effect passed in the British Parliament
till the 4th of July, 1797.[309] Throughout the whole negotiation
Mr. Jay admits that he was apprehensive of giving umbrage to France;
but while he is eloquent about the British spoliations on American
commerce, he was forced to admit that British vessels had been captured
by French privateers, illegally armed in American ports, and that some
of them had actually been taken in the waters of the United States. The
obligation of the United States to make compensation for these captures
was also admitted by Washington. But the great difficulty of bringing
the negotiation to a satisfactory issue cannot be better described than
in the words of Mr. Wm. Jay.[310]
“On his arrival in England, the revolutionary frenzy in France was
at its height. Robespierre was revelling in all the wantonness of
unbridled power, and the French people, the unconscious vassals of a
bloody tyrant, were perpetrating acts of cruelty and impiety which
excited the astonishment and abhorrence of all who duly estimated the
claims of humanity and the obligations of religion. With this people
the British monarch was waging a war, in which he was supported by
the enthusiastic co-operation of his own subjects,[311] and by the
alliance of Russia, Austria, Spain, and Sardinia. Although in this war
the United States were _professedly neutral_, yet it was well known
that the sympathies of a large portion of their citizens were enlisted
_on the side of France_, and that they were with difficulty restrained
by their government from violating the duties of neutrality. The late
proceedings of Congress, also, had tended but little to conciliate the
goodwill of England. The American war, and the consequent independence
of her colonies, had moreover wounded the pride of Britain, and
engendered feelings towards the United States unpropitious to the
negotiation. The extent of her resources, the number of her allies, the
nature of the war in which she was engaged, and her resentments towards
the United States, all combined to indispose Great Britain either to
acknowledge the wrongs she had committed or to make reparation for
them.”
It was in this treaty that Mr. Jay proposed to insert a clause “that if
it should unfortunately happen that Great Britain and the United States
should be at war, there shall be no privateers commissioned by them
against each other.” Unhappily the clause was considered inadmissible
by Lord Grenville, and in fact, although the proposition is embraced in
Mr. Jay’s original instructions, the American government have receded
from the views they then propounded unless other nations exempt private
property from capture at sea.[312]
[Sidenote: Remarkable omission respecting cotton.]
It may seem singular that the American minister should have consented
to prohibit the exportation of cotton, one of the articles enumerated
in the clause relating to the West Indian trade. The explanation
is curious. In the original draft of the treaty, the United States
minister stipulated to prohibit during the continuance of the article
in force, all “West Indian productions and manufactures.” The
expression was, on reflection, deemed to be too general, and it was
agreed to specify the prohibited articles, and accordingly “cotton”
was inserted as a West Indian production; the cotton then used in the
United States being almost wholly brought from the West Indies.[313]
A few months prior to Mr. Jay’s departure for England, Mr. Jefferson,
the Secretary of State, in a report to Congress on the commerce of
the United States, enumerated the exports of the country, but made no
mention of cotton. It was not, in fact, then known as a production of
the United States, although it now requires for its transport a greater
amount of shipping than almost any other article in the whole range of
commerce.
[Sidenote: Indignation in France at the treaty.]
The treaty so satisfactorily concluded between Great Britain and
the United States, having been undoubtedly a successful effort of
diplomacy in bringing together two nations which had been torn asunder
by revolution, was viewed in France with the most profound alarm and
indignation. The resentment of the French scarcely knew any bounds.
They were full of the idea that the Americans owed their national
independence to the aid rendered by them to the revolted colonies, a
support which, as already explained, was furnished with a view less to
promote the cause of freedom in the United States than to aim a blow at
the maritime power of England.
[Sidenote: The French protest against its principles.]
So loud and clamorous were the complaints against the treaty, that
if the voice of the French had been listened to, an open rupture
must then have ensued. They publicly declared that it violated in a
positive and hostile manner the treaty they had concluded “in favour
of the Americans in the year 1778, by which the United States agreed
to guarantee the possessions of France in the West Indies; whereas, by
this treaty, the very furnishing of provisions to the French islands
was pronounced illegal.”[314] They alleged that it “deprived France of
all the advantages stipulated in a former treaty;” and they charged
the Americans with “the abandonment of their neutral rights, to the
injury of France,” in not maintaining the pretended principle of the
modern law of nations, that free ships make free goods, and that timber
and naval stores for the equipment and armament of vessels are not
contraband of war.
[Sidenote: Interest of England to have private property free from
capture at sea.]
On this question, of such paramount importance to England, considering
the vast amount of her maritime commerce, much has been said and
written, and every view of the subject has been argued with great care
and consummate ability. No doubt the feeling of nations is becoming
more in favour of the principle of making all goods not contraband
of war exempt from capture at sea, and the views of the more modern
English statesmen are inclining in that direction; but it is only by
taking a retrospective view of the measures unscrupulously adopted by
both France and England during their mighty struggle that a conjecture
can be formed of what will be the future effect of such or similar
compacts. While waging internecine war against each other, the people
of England and France were famishing alike for want of food. Should
such circumstances again arise, it is not easy to suppose, much less
to hope, that nations so powerful at sea as Great Britain, with their
people thus suffering, would be bound by any compact that stopped the
supply from America or elsewhere; and it is almost as futile to hope
that they would relinquish their power of hampering their enemies’
commerce at sea unless it were stipulated that neutral nations are
bound to enforce the compact. Though England still stands first as a
maritime power, and has consequently at her disposal the most extensive
means of destroying an enemy’s maritime commerce, she has, on the
other hand, by far the largest amount of property of any nation at all
times afloat, and must therefore be the largest sufferer in the event
of hostilities with any power which can equip a fleet of privateers.
Consequently, it was hoped by a large portion of the English people,
when the American government in 1856 declined to become parties to the
declaration of the European Powers assembled in conference at Paris,
unless all private property was made free from capture at sea, that
Great Britain would have readily acquiesced in the proposal.
[Sidenote: Condemnations of ships in the West Indies,]
This policy did not, however, suit France in 1797; and to show in
a practical manner their displeasure at the treaty into which the
United States had entered with England, the French republic issued in
the same year the circular, already incidentally noticed, in which
they announced that the conduct of France towards neutrals would
be regulated by the manner in which they should suffer the English
to treat them, thus opening a wide door to spoliation, in defiance
of subsisting treaty obligations. At Malaga and Cadiz the French
consuls interpreted this unprincipled notification or decree as an
authorization to capture and condemn all American merchantmen for the
single circumstance of their being destined to a British port. But
the most disastrous effect was produced in the West Indies, whose
seas swarmed with privateers and gun-boats; which were stimulated
into active operation by the latitude allowed to their depredations
by the indefinite terms of that decree, and the explanatory orders
of the agents of the French directory at Guadaloupe and St. Domingo.
These agents captured and confiscated American vessels under the most
shameless and contradictory pretexts. All neutral vessels bound to
certain enumerated ports, which it was pretended in the decree had
been given up to the English, were unceremoniously condemned. The fact
of an American vessel being bound to an English port sufficed for her
sweeping condemnation, and not unfrequently for that of her cargo. Any
informality in a bill of lading; any irregularity in the certified list
of the passengers and crew, the supercargo being, for instance, by
birth a foreigner, although a naturalised citizen of the United States;
the destruction of a paper of any kind soever, and the want of a sea
letter, were deemed sufficient to warrant the condemnation of American
property, even when the proofs of the property were indubitable.
[Sidenote: and great depredations.]
[Sidenote: Outrages on the Americans.]
In the West Indies the most audacious scenes of depredation were
exhibited; so much so that the conduct of the public agents and of the
commissioned cruisers surpassed all former examples. American vessels
were not only captured under the French decrees, but when brought to
trial in the French tribunals, they with their cargoes were condemned,
without admitting the owners or their agents to make any defence.
Indeed a system of spoliation seems to have been brought into practice
for the obvious purpose of insuring condemnations. By a monstrous abuse
in judicial proceedings, frauds and falsehoods, as well as flimsy and
shameless pretexts, passed unexamined and uncontradicted, and were made
the foundation of sentences of condemnation. American citizens were
beaten, insulted, and imprisoned; and even their prisoners of war were
exchanged with the British for Frenchmen. American property going to or
coming from neutral ports was seized, and in many cases forcibly taken
when destined for France, or actually in _French ports_, without any
pretence whatever, except that the French required it for their own
purposes.
[Sidenote: Torture practised by French cruisers.]
Nor did their wanton and outrageous conduct against the Americans stop
here. Many accounts are extant of attempts to effect condemnations
by bribing the officers and seamen of the American vessels to swear
falsely; and it was further reserved for those days, when offered
bribes were refused, and threats despised, to endeavour to accomplish
the object by _torture_. In a protest set forth by Captain Martin,
master of the _Cincinnatus_, a vessel of about two hundred and
twenty-nine tons, belonging to Baltimore, the fact of torture having
been resorted to by the French cruisers appears to be placed beyond
all doubt.[315] In this protest he states that while on his voyage from
Baltimore to London he was boarded by a French armed brig under English
colours, when he with five of his crew were taken on board, and though
the vessel’s papers when examined left no doubt of the nationality
of his ship and cargo, being American, the officer in command of the
French brig insisted that the cargo was English property, and assured
Martin that if he would admit the fact, and formally acknowledge it,
his full freight should be paid, and he should have a present of one
thousand pounds. But the overture was spurned, the master declaring
the whole to belong solely to Aquilla Brown of Baltimore, merchant.
“Whereupon the French officers thumb-screwed the said master in
the cabin of their said brig, and kept him in torture to extort a
declaration that the said cargo was English property, for nearly four
hours, but without the desired effect.” A vessel heaving in sight,
Martin was liberated, but it was not until the _Cincinnatus_ reached
the English Channel that she was relieved by H.M.S. _Galatea_, and
finally reached Dover. Mr. Rufus King, minister of the United States
in London, personally examined Captain Martin’s thumbs, and said “they
still bear the marks of the torturing screws, and the scars will go
with him to the grave.”[316]
[Sidenote: The advantages of the war to the Americans.]
But with all these drawbacks to the progress and success of American
shipping, and the great disadvantages to which neutrals are exposed
during a state of war, which often counterbalance the advantages they
enjoy of seizing upon the carrying trade of the world, it cannot
be denied that the memorable revolution of France in 1789, and the
wars consequent upon the events, created a vast demand for American
exports, and secured for the Americans a very considerable portion
of the carrying trade of Europe. They not only carried the colonial
productions to the several parent states, but they also became the
purchasers of them in the French, Spanish, and Dutch colonies. A new
era was indeed established in their commercial history, and their
merchants and shipowners increased in numbers to an extent out of all
proportion to the general state of the population.
[Sidenote: Impulse given to shipping.]
Many persons who had realised moderate capitals from mercantile and
other pursuits now become daring adventurers as carriers by sea [there
being no trading companies, whose monopolies have a withering effect
upon individual enterprise], the practice became common for Americans
to frequently change their pursuits, a practice springing out of a
native energy of the people still prevailing. Foreigners were admitted
without reservation to all the privileges of the citizens of the United
States, although the government carefully excluded them from any
participation ostensibly in the benefits arising from the possession
of ships. No aliens were permitted to be either sole or part owners
of American vessels. The predominant spirit of that period had a
powerful effect in determining the character of the rising generation,
and the brilliant prospects held out by maritime enterprise led them
to neglect for a time the mechanical and manufacturing branches of
industry.
[Sidenote: Progress of American civilisation.]
By this greatly extended intercourse with other nations the Americans
not only augmented their material wealth, but became acquainted with
the habits, manners, science, arts, resources, wealth, and power of
those countries with which they carried on a profitable trade. They
were thus enabled to avail themselves of all the stock of accumulated
experience and wisdom which the elder nations of Europe had slowly,
and, at the cost of so much labour, bloodshed, and incessant struggles,
secured. With some modification of the English constitution, the
Americans, having as yet no ancient aristocracy, chose an elective
republican form of government; but the well-framed body of English laws
formed the basis on which the whole framework of society rested. In
almost everything relating to the conduct of commercial and maritime
affairs the English code was adopted, and became transplanted and
firmly rooted in the hearts of the American people. In a natural desire
to appear free and original, they affected some changes, but these were
merely partial; and, both in theory and practice, English laws relating
to shipping, with such prudent modifications as the change of position
and circumstances required, were adopted, and formed the model of
American practice and legislation.
[Sidenote: Advances of maritime enterprise.]
With these incalculable advantages, a rich soil, an enterprising and
free people, a country indented with harbours and bathed by magnificent
navigable rivers, it is scarcely a matter for wonder that their
maritime enterprise made rapid advances. The capital of the shipowners
being thus suddenly augmented, they were enabled to explore new sources
of wealth. The entire globe was circumnavigated with a view to open new
markets. Merchants who had been long engaged in trade were confounded
by the changes so rapidly effected. The less experienced considered
the newly acquired advantages as matters of right which would remain
to them. They did not contemplate a period of general peace, when
each nation would carry its own productions in its own vessels; when
the jealousy of rivals would suggest the imposition of differential
or practically prohibitive duties; when foreign commerce would be
again fettered and limited by “enumerated articles,” and when, with
reduced profits on shipping transactions, a much greater amount of
circumspection would be necessary.
[Sidenote: Views of American statesmen.]
It was in the midst of this career of prosperity in the United States
that many far-seeing American statesmen urged on the then reluctant
attention of those of their countrymen who dwelt along the sea-board
the paramount necessity of dedicating their surplus capital to the
extension of agricultural industry. These men urged that the food
heretofore exported by America to foreign countries might not be
required for European consumption, and that many of the hands then
engaged in active hostilities, either for defence or conquest, would be
required for agriculture. Instead of there being always a deficiency of
food in Europe, it was quite possible that there might be a surplus of
provisions, the many thousands in their armies and fleets being added
to the productive classes, and thus diminishing the chief branch of
freight enjoyed by the United States shipping.
The experience of the interval from 1783 to 1791, when American trade
was so much depressed, had not been lost upon keen and calm observers,
and many able American writers incessantly pointed to the vast, rich,
fertile uncultivated lands in the south and west of the Union, as
the inexhaustible mine of wealth from which the future greatness and
power of the States must be derived, and urged their countrymen to
encourage and direct their efforts to that branch of domestic industry.
This salutary advice was not altogether lost at that time upon the
Americans; but it has since been ardently pursued, with what success
the exports of the articles of corn and cotton alone will fully
establish.
[Sidenote: The shipwrights of Baltimore seek protection.]
Nevertheless, the shipowners of the United States were at the earliest
period of their existence as a nation infected with the principles of
self-protection on which the English Navigation Act had been founded;
for in the very first session of Congress, 1789, the shipwrights of
Baltimore and South Carolina, in rehearsing their grievances to the
House of Representatives, copied identically the numerous complaints
urged on this side the water. They pointed out the diminished state of
ship-building in America, and the ruinous restrictions to which their
vessels were subject in foreign ports; and, among the advantages looked
for from the national government, was the increase of the shipping and
maritime strength of the United States of America by laws similar in
their nature and operation to that Act. Whichever way they looked,
they perceived that the United States ought soon to become as powerful
in shipping as any nation in the world. They insisted that, upon the
closest examination of the subject, they were better prepared for a
Navigation Act than England had been when the British Navigation Act
was passed in 1660. They argued that though the registered tonnage
of that kingdom did not then exceed ninety-six thousand tons, it had
reached close upon eight hundred thousand tons in 1774, an increase, in
little more than a century, of about seven hundred and four thousand
tons. Why, therefore, exclaimed the Baltimore shipwrights, why should
not we adopt a similar wise policy?
Arguments such as these, reiterated over and over during a course of
years, produced in time their effect upon Congress, many of whose
members had been strongly opposed to the treaty with England. French
influence was also brought to bear in every conceivable way against
it, and at last the protectionists of the United States were enabled
to carry a measure through the Legislature sanctioning certain
differential duties in favour of their own vessels as against those of
England trading with their ports. From this time commenced that war of
retaliation which, in one shape or other, continued between the two
nations for nearly half a century.
[Sidenote: Great Britain imposes countervailing duties.]
In the fifteenth article of the treaty of commerce and navigation the
British government had reserved the right of countervailing these
discriminating duties, and the United States had bound themselves not
to impose any new or additional duty on the tonnage of British ships
or vessels, or to increase the then subsisting difference between the
duties payable on the importation of any article in British American
ships; so that when Congress imposed increased duties, the English
Parliament exercised the reserved right stipulated in the treaty,
and thus by the Act of Geo. III., c. 97, countervailing duties were
imposed, payable on the importation of American goods in American
vessels, in addition to the duties payable on their importation in
British ships.[317] Additional duties were also imposed upon certain
specified articles, and three per cent. _ad valorem_ upon enumerated
articles.
[Sidenote: Effect of legislative measures on both sides.]
Such, then, was the legislation on both sides, as it most materially
affected merchant shipping. The American shipowners and merchants
looked upon every proceeding on the part of the British Legislature
as levelled especially against themselves; and, jealous of everything
which militated against their own interest, they contended that the
Parliament of Great Britain had exceeded the fair intent and meaning
of the treaty of 1794, and had secured for the British shipowners
the exclusive carriage to Great Britain, in time of peace, of some
of the most important objects of American exportation. They pointed
out that the English had selected fish, oil, and tobacco, articles of
great bulk, as objects on which the highest countervailing duties had
been imposed. They alleged that in consequence of this countervailing
duty upon oil, a British ship of two hundred and fifty tons register,
carrying two hundred and fifty tuns of oil to great Britain from the
United States, would pay 453_l._ 15_s._ sterling less duty thereon than
the same oil would pay if imported into Great Britain in an American
ship. By a similar operation, a British ship of two hundred and fifty
tons, carrying four hundred hogsheads of tobacco, of one thousand two
hundred pounds each, to Great Britain from the United States, would pay
360_l._ sterling less duty than would be payable on the same quantity
of tobacco imported in an American ship; the whole freight, at 35_s._
sterling per hogshead, would only amount to 700_l._ sterling, which,
after deducting the countervailing duty of 360_l._, would leave to the
American a net freight of only 344_l._ 1_s._ sterling.
It was further pointed out that rice, when imported into Great Britain
in an American ship, was charged with a duty of 8_d._ per hundredweight
more than when imported in a British ship; and that an extra duty
amounting on a tierce of rice to 3_s._ 9_d._ sterling, the freight of a
tierce of rice being then about 12_s._ sterling, was also demanded. It
was said that no person would give 15_s._ 9_d._ freight in an American
when he could have the same carried for 12_s._ in a British ship. Pot
and pearl ashes were made to pay a countervailing duty of 9_d._ per
barrel; and as the freight of such a barrel was presumed to be 5_s._ to
5_s._ 6_d._ sterling in times of peace, a difference of 9_d._ sterling
would effectually give the carrying trade to British ships of all the
ashes exported from the United States to Great Britain.
[Sidenote: Conclusions drawn by the American shipowners.]
From such arguments as these the shipowners of the United States drew
the conclusion that Great Britain, by her countervailing Act, secured
effectually the carrying, for her own wants and foreign commerce, of
the American fish-oil, tobacco, pot and pearl ashes, rice, indigo, and
cotton; and, having obtained the carriage of these bulky articles, all
minor objects, except naval stores, not being sufficiently important to
form entire cargoes, would also, of necessity, be carried in British
ships. The small _export_ duty imposed by the British Parliament, of
_one-half_ per cent. on all goods, wares, and merchandise of the growth
or manufacture of Great Britain on their exportation to any port in
Europe within the Straits of Gibraltar, and of _one_ per cent. on
similar goods when exported to any place not being in Europe or within
the Straits of Gibraltar, subjected the United States to a duty on
exports double that which was paid by the nations of Europe. Of course
this extra duty, small as it was, but utterly wrong in principle,
served to make a new grievance, and the Americans contended that this
_discriminating_, or, more properly, this _differential_, duty was in
contradiction to the spirit of the treaties which subsisted between the
United States and Great Britain.
Two modes were proposed to the American Legislature to obviate the
disadvantages resulting to the carrying trade of the United States
from these countervailing and differential duties. The one was, to
increase the American discriminating[318] (differential?) duties, so
as to counteract the injury they experienced from the operation of the
countervailing duties of other nations. The other was, to relinquish
the American duties (so far as they related to goods, wares, and
merchandise, the growth, produce, or manufacture of the nations to
which the ship in which these were imported belonged) in favour of such
foreign nations as would agree to abolish such of their discriminating
duties as were in their operation injurious to the interests of the
United States.
[Sidenote: Alarm in the United States at the idea of reciprocity.]
The mere intimation of a design to inaugurate something like a policy
of reciprocity, if not of entirely free-trade, struck alarm into the
minds of the shipowners and shipbuilders of the United States. They
held meetings, in which their patriotic feelings of indignation, as
seems to have been the case in other countries as well, were singularly
intermingled with a keen sense of self-interest, not perhaps very
wisely directed. But, carried away by popular clamour, engendered but
too often by parties who had only a very limited view of their own
and of the national interests, the great mercantile bodies of New
York, Boston, and Philadelphia strenuously opposed any remission of
the American differential tonnage duties. They insisted that, taking
anterior years as a guide, the loss to the revenue would not be less
than $450,000 per annum. They viewed the project with alarm, believing
that if carried out it must essentially injure the commerce of the
United States; as its immediate effect, by opening the market for
freight to the lowest bidder, would be to shift the carrying trade from
the hands of their own merchants to those of foreigners. In this way
the American shipowners argued that foreigners would build cheaper,
equip cheaper, and sail their vessels at less cost than they could, at
the same time intimating that Europeans were generally satisfied with a
less profit than the American merchant could afford to receive.
[Sidenote: Objections to the British Navigation Act.]
[Sidenote: Threatened destruction to American shipping.]
Accordingly, they contended that to meet the advances of Great Britain
and to repeal the American countervailing Acts, would not be to place
the two nations on an equal footing, so long as England retained her
Navigation Act. The mutual repeal of differential tonnage duties they
urged would not establish a perfect system of reciprocity; as the
Americans, in that case, would thus permit Great Britain to carry
to the United States, not only goods the growth or manufacture of
that country, but of all others, while by maintaining in force her
Navigation Act, the Americans would be expressly confined in their
trade to the carriage of goods the growth or manufacture of the United
States. British vessels would accordingly bring goods from England to
America, take a freight in one of the ports of the United States to the
British colonies, where American vessels are not admitted, and thence
a third, home, making three freights in one voyage; so that foreigners
would crowd their wharves, underbid their freight, monopolize their
markets, and “leave American vessels idly to rot in their docks.”[319]
Such was the almost universal feeling against the measure entertained
by the shipowners of the United States, who endeavoured to enlist the
agricultural and mechanical classes on their side, and employed for
this purpose arguments which have been repeated over and over again in
our own generation. They asserted that although, generally speaking,
freight is paid by the consumer, and that, therefore, it may be said it
is immaterial to the farmer how high or how low it may be, nevertheless
this is not the case when the demand ceases or slackens; it then falls
back on the husbandman. In this point of view, to transfer the American
trade to foreigners would, it was alleged, lessen very much the
certainty of the demand.
They went farther, and told the agriculturists that the active
enterprise of the American merchants and shipowners was constantly
on the alert in looking abroad to every part of the world for a
market, and if it was anywhere to be found, or if there existed only a
reasonable presumption that it might be found, the farmer was thereby
secured a ready vent for his produce. Perhaps the calculation of the
merchant might be disappointed, perhaps not even a freight would be
earned, and he might be ruined; nevertheless, this misfortune did not
reach the farmer, who had secured the benefit of a good market. But,
in the event of American vessels disappearing, he must then be left at
the mercy of chance adventurers for a market; and when the demand is
not very great, the price of the freight would be deducted from the
article itself. This serious contingency, it was argued, must tend
necessarily to lessen essentially the value of the farmer’s produce. As
nothing less than the total annihilation of the American merchant navy
was anticipated, it was pointed out to the mechanic that those numerous
bodies connected with shipbuilding, the carpenter, the blacksmith, the
sail-maker, the rope-maker, and others would of course all be thrown
out of employment; their labour would be neither wanted nor paid for.
The American ships, being, under these circumstances, banished from
their native shores, would no longer furnish a nursery for seamen,
but that valuable class of citizens would be driven to seek for their
bread in other countries, and finally, in any future European wars
which might supervene, and which were constantly liable to happen, the
American people would find themselves denuded of seamen and ships,
and would not be able to avail themselves of that neutral position
which reflection and experience equally warranted them in calculating
upon, as one of the “blessings” allied to their remote and secure
geographical position.
[Sidenote: Popular clamour.]
The history of these struggles shows that however enlightened the
members of Congress may have been, it was, even at that time,
impossible to run counter to popular clamour, although this may have
been instigated by perhaps an erroneous view of the self-interests of
the parties primarily concerned. The consumer did not feel the same
deep immediate interest in the controversy as the shipowner, whose
voice was loudly heard in Congress through the representatives of the
great ports and maritime towns.
[Sidenote: Opinions in Congress.]
Upon a consideration of all the circumstances, Congress was led
to consider that any retaliatory legislation imposing heavier
discriminating duties on foreign tonnage or goods would in its
consequences materially tend to increase the commercial warfare, and
render more serious the war of tariff between the United States and
foreign nations. The reflecting, far-seeing members perceived that if
the United States were to increase her differential duties, there was
every probability that England and other foreign nations would also
augment theirs in every instance, and that at every time the United
States pursued their plan of increase, foreign nations would repeat the
same process. But they were met at all points, as we have seen, by the
almost universal opposition of the American shipowners, who were as
eager to maintain a protectionist policy in shipping as any of their
rivals in the same business on this side the Atlantic.
[Sidenote: Great influence of the shipowners.]
Though the shipowners of the Northern States exercised for a time
considerable influence over the Legislature, a committee of the
House of Representatives passed a resolution which went no further
than to recommend to the House, “That so much of the several Acts
imposing duties on the tonnage of ships and vessels, and on goods,
wares, and merchandise imported into the United States, as imposes a
discriminating duty of tonnage between foreign vessels and vessels of
the United States, and between goods imported into the United States
in foreign vessels and vessels of the United States, _ought to be
repealed_, so far as the same respects the produce or manufactures of
the nation to which such foreign ships or vessels shall belong, such
repeal to take effect in favour of any foreign nation whenever the
President shall be satisfied that the discriminating or countervailing
duties of such foreign nation, so far as they operate to the
disadvantage of the United States, have been abolished.”
This important resolution, opening the door to reciprocal measures,
was declared to be more consistent with the true interest, as well as
with the peaceful disposition, of the United States than any retrograde
movement. Although no legislative action followed this enunciation of
the principles of reciprocity, it formed at a future period the basis
of both negotiation and legislation with foreign powers. The time,
however, had not then arrived for the avowal and practice of a much
wiser and more enlightened policy than that by which nations were
guided before, and for some years after, the close of the eighteenth
century.
[Sidenote: Early statesmen of the United States.]
[Sidenote: Their efforts to develop maritime commerce.]
Perhaps no nation of modern times has produced more enlightened
statesmen than those who regulated the affairs of the United States
for full half a century after the declaration of its independence.
They had, as we have seen, numerous difficulties to contend with, both
at home and abroad, but these were overcome with a tact and genius
which commands our admiration. Though materially assisted in their
efforts to extend and develop their shipping by the seafaring habits
of the people, by the natural maritime resources of their own country,
and by the advantages they derived as neutrals during the war which
so long raged in Europe, they were ever ready to encourage increased
intercourse with distant nations, in spite of the opposition of the
maritime States to those liberal measures which they had so frequently
propounded, and in which they had been too often thwarted.
[Sidenote: First trade with the East.]
But though the American shipowners, as a body, and as would seem to
be the case with the majority of shipowners of all countries, clung
to protection, they were individually quite as daring, and even more
energetic, than those of Great Britain. So early in their independence
as 1785 a vessel from Baltimore in Maryland displayed, for the first
time, the American flag in the Canton river, where she discharged
a cargo of American produce, and loaded in return a cargo of teas,
China ware, silk, and other produce for her own country. In September
1788, Captain Read, the commander of an American merchantman, arrived
in Philadelphia from a voyage to China, wherein he had performed the
outward passage by stretching from the Cape of Good Hope to the south
of New Holland (Australia), and running northwards along the east side
of that vast island, until he reached his port of destination. As we
have seen, other American merchant vessels had reached the British
possessions in India at a time while as yet prolonged voyages to the
most distant regions of the globe were deemed such arduous efforts of
nautical skill, as only to be performed in safety by a few experienced
commanders in the service of Spain, Portugal, Holland, and England, who
had been accustomed to the navigation of those distant seas, and were
familiar with the routes, and the prevailing periodical winds. So rapid
indeed was their progress, that out of the million tons of sea-going
vessels owned in the United States at the commencement of this century,
no less than seven hundred and twenty thousand were employed in their
trade with foreign nations. Although some historians[320] attribute
this prosperity in great measure to their protective laws, it will be
found mainly due to the facilities which the United States afford for
maritime pursuits, the abundance and cheapness of timber suitable for
shipbuilding purposes, and especially, as we have just mentioned, to
the energy of the people and the advantages they derived as a neutral
nation.
[Sidenote: War of 1803.]
[Sidenote: Its effect on maritime pursuits.]
When in May 1803, the war again broke out between France and England,
the shipowners of the United States, with their characteristic energy,
were prepared to avail themselves, to an even greater extent than they
had hitherto done, of the numerous advantages which a European war
conferred on them as neutrals. Hostilities between two great nations
must ever be a most grievous calamity, but it was greatly aggravated
in the present instance by the depredations of American privateers
hoisting, as might suit their purpose, French or English colours, under
men, too, who were almost as reckless and daring in their acts as
the English and Dutch buccaneers of the early part of the eighteenth
century, some of them frequently making capture of vessels belonging to
their own countrymen.
But though an examination of the State papers collected by the
Americans themselves furnishes abundant proof of too many unblushing
acts of piracy committed by vessels built and equipped in American
ports, and frequently manned almost exclusively by citizens of the
United States, there is no reason to suppose that their lawless acts
were committed by the consent or knowledge of the American government.
When the arm of the law is not sufficiently strong, there are always
abundance of adventurers of all nations ready to take advantage
of its weakness and, in the name of neutrals or under the flag of
belligerents, as may best suit their purpose, to fit out from neutral
ports cruisers with no other object than plunder; and there were
too many of such vessels cruising about the ocean during the last
twelve years of the mighty struggle between France and England. The
government of the Federation was as yet incapable of controlling the
ardour, love of gain, and enterprise which render similar adventures
as fascinating as they are profitable; but it exclaimed incessantly
against both England and France for alleged breaches of the laws of
nations, and did not, or would not, see the violations committed by
their own or by professing citizens sailing under the flag of the
United States in vessels built and equipped in their own harbours, and
especially in the port of Baltimore, at that time, and for some years
afterwards celebrated for the construction of vessels of great beauty
and symmetry, and of extraordinary speed.
FOOTNOTES:
[307] ‘Reports, House of Representatives,’ Feb. 23, 1791.
[308] This “most favoured footing clause” has been a fruitful source of
reclamation between the two countries.
[309] The reader will find an account of the negotiations in Mr. Jay’s
correspondence, ‘Life of John Jay,’ New York, 1833.
[310] Mr. William Jay was the son and historian of his father, John
Jay, the ambassador from the United States (_vide_ vol. i. p. 324).
[311] The most ardent supporters of the war were the shipowners: the
Whigs and the Radicals did all they could to neutralise the power of
the executive.
[312] Privateering was finally abolished by the great Powers of Europe
March, 30, 1856; but the Americans refused to agree to this unless
all private property was made free from capture at sea. The right of
blockade was also proposed to be given up. This the English government
declined assenting to, asserting “that the system of commercial
blockade was essential to its naval supremacy.” During the recent civil
war in America all the great Powers agreed in disallowing privateering,
and it was also forbidden by the Treaty of Washington; hence, when
Jefferson Davis announced his intention of issuing “letters of marque,”
Lincoln replied that the officers and men in any such ships would be
shot as pirates.
[313] Of 404,135 pounds imported into the United States in 1792, no
less than 373,350 came from the West Indian islands.
[314] The whole ground of dispute between France and the United States
is recited in a _most voluminous_ despatch, Jan. 16, 1797, from Mr.
Pickering to Mr. Pinckney, United States Minister at Paris. It will be
found in ‘American State Papers,’ vol. i. p. 559.
[315] Captain Martin’s Protest _in extenso_ will be found in the
‘American State Papers,’ vol. ii. pp. 64-65.
[316] _Vide_ letter of Rufus King, ‘State Papers,’ vol. ii. pp. 29-64.
The case seems undoubtedly well authenticated.
[317] The duties imposed were as follows:—On pig-iron, bar-iron,
and pearl ashes, ten per cent. additional, when imported without
certificate from the British Colonies in America; ten per cent. upon
the customs duties on pitch, tar, resin, turpentine, masts, yards,
bowsprits, and manufactured goods and merchandise (except wood-staves
and tobacco); and a similar percentage upon the customs duties on all
manufactured wood-staves when imported from Europe in British ships.
On oil of fish, blubber, whale-fins, and spermaceti, ten per cent.
on the customs duties payable when imported from countries not under
the dominion of Great Britain. On tobacco, one shilling and sixpence
per one hundred pounds weight; and on all other American goods, ten
per cent. upon the customs duties payable for the same when imported
in British-built vessels from the American States. The countervailing
duties were to be calculated upon the rates of duties as they stood
previously to the Act of 37 Geo. III., c. 15. By the statute above
recited, a tonnage duty of two shillings sterling was imposed on all
American vessels arriving in the ports of Great Britain.
[318] The Americans always employ the word “discriminating” for our
“differential” duty. Our sugar duties were discriminating duties. The
duties on the three categories of tea, before they were made uniform,
were discriminating duties, distinguishing qualities of different
values. The present duty on foreign and Cape wines is a _differential_
duty.
[319] If the word “British” is substituted for “American,” we have the
exact expression constantly used by the opponents in England during
the numerous meetings held in 1849 against the repeal of the British
Navigation Laws.
[320] Tybert’s ‘Statistical Annals of the United States.’