INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS AND FOREIGN TRADE
(1825-1829)
What Adams had nearest at heart in his administration was the
construction of a great system of roads and canals, irrespective of
local interests, for the nation as a whole. [Footnote: Wheeler,
Hist. of Cong., II., 154; Adams, Memoirs, VII., 59, VIII., 444; cf.
chap, xiii., above.] To "exalt the valleys and lay low the mountains
and the hills" appealed to his imagination. He hoped that the
increased price of the public lands, arising from the improved means
of communication, would in turn furnish a large and steadily
increasing fund for national turnpikes and canals. But the American
people were not anxious for a system of scientific administration,
either of the public domain or of internal improvements. Although
Benton could not secure sufficient support to carry his measure for
graduating the price of the public lands and donating those which
found no purchasers at fifty cents an acre, [Footnote: Meigs,
Benton, 165-172.] he voiced, nevertheless, a very general antagonism
to the management of the domain by the methods of the counting-
house. Nor was the president able to control legislation on internal
improvements. The report of the engineers appointed under the
general survey act of 1824 provided for the development of the
routes of national importance. [Footnote: State Papers, 18 Cong., 2
Sess., V., Doc. 83 (February 14, 1825); cf. ibid., 19 Cong., 2
Sess., II., Ex. Doc. No. 10 (December 7, 1826).] But local interests
and the pressure of corporations eager to receive federal
subscriptions to their stock quickly broke down the unity of the
system.
The Senate declined to take action on a resolution introduced
December 20, 1825, by Senator Van Buren, of New York, which denied
Congress the power to make roads and canals within the respective
states, and proposed a constitutional amendment for the grant of the
power under limitations. [Footnote: Register of Debates, 19 Cong., 1
Sess., II., pt. i., 20; Ames, Amendments of the Fed. Const. (Am.
Hist. Assoc., Report 1896), 71, 261.] Provision had been made in
1825 for extending the Cumberland Road from Wheeling to Zanesville,
Ohio, and for surveys through the other states of the northwest to
Missouri, and appropriations were annually made for the road, until
by 1833 it was completed as far as Columbus, Ohio. Nevertheless,
that highway was rapidly going to destruction, and a counter
project, ultimately successful, was already initiated for
relinquishing the road to the states through which it passed.
[Footnote: Young, Cumberland Road, chap. vii.; Hulbert, Historic
Highways, X.]
Over two and a third million dollars was appropriated for roads and
harbors during the administration of John Quincy Adams, as against
about one million during the administrations of all of his
predecessors combined. Acting on the line of least constitutional
resistance opened by Monroe, when he admitted the right of
appropriation for internal improvements, though not the right of
construction or jurisdiction, extensive appropriations were made for
roads and canals and for harbors on the Great Lakes and the
Atlantic. Far from accepting Adams's ideal of a scientific general
system irrespective of local or party interests, districts combined
with one another for local favors, corporations eagerly sought
subscriptions for their canal stock, and the rival political parties
bid against each other for the support of states which asked federal
aid for their roads and canals.
By the middle of this administration the popularity of internal
improvement appropriations seemed irresistible, although southern
states raised their voices against it and complained bitterly that
they were neglected. The example of the Erie Canal, which was open
by 1825, seemed to furnish proof of the success that awaited state
canal construction. States were learning that English capital was
ready for investment in such undertakings and that Congress could
donate lands and subscribe for stock.
By acts of 1825 and 1826, Pennsylvania initiated its extensive state
system of roads and canals to reach the Ohio, the central part of
New York, and the Great Lakes. [Footnote: Hulbert, Historic
Highways, XIII., chap, iv.; Worthington, Finances of Pennsylvania,
22.] The trunk line of this system united Philadelphia with
Pittsburgh by a horse railway to Columbia on the Susquehanna, thence
by a canal along that river and its tributary, the Juniata, to
Hollidaysburg, where stationary engines carried the freight over a
series of inclined planes across the thirty-six miles of mountains,
to reach the western section of the canal at Johnstown on the
Conemaugh, and so by the Allegheny to Pittsburgh. Sectional
jealousies delayed the work, and piled up a debt incurred partly for
branch canals in various parts of the state; but by 1830 over four
hundred miles of canal had been built in Pennsylvania and five
hundred more projected. Not until 1835 was the trunk line between
Philadelphia and Pittsburgh fully in operation, however, and in the
decade after 1822 the total expenditure for internal improvements in
the state amounted to nearly twenty-six million dollars, of which
over ten millions was contributed by individual subscription. But
the steam railroad proved too strong a competitor, the state was
plunged too deeply in debt, and it was not many years before the
public works were sold, and the era of the corporation opened.
Meanwhile the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal project [Footnote: Hulbert,
Historic Highways, XIII., chap, iii.; Ward, Chesapeake and Ohio
Canal (Johns Hopkins Univ. Studies, XVII.)] had gained great impetus
under the efforts of those who wished to turn the tide of western
commerce to the Potomac River. The innate difficulties of the task,
even more than the opposition of Baltimore, rendered abortive the
efforts of the Potomac Company to make the river navigable above
tide-water. But in 1823 public interest in Virginia and Maryland was
aroused by the plan of a great canal to run alongside of the Potomac
to its upper streams, and thence to connect with the Monongahela or
Youghiogheny in order to reach the Ohio. At a convention which met
in Washington in the fall of 1823, Maryland, Virginia, and the
District of Columbia were largely represented by delegates
enthusiastic over this new highway to the west. Even Baltimore
acquiesced in the undertaking after a provision giving the right to
tap the canal by a branch to that city, so that her western trade
should not be diverted to the Potomac cities.
By 1826 the company was duly chartered by Virginia and Maryland;
Pennsylvania's consent was also obtained; and the financiering of
the enterprise seemed feasible by joint subscription to the stock by
Maryland, Virginia, the District of Columbia, and the federal
government. Under the general survey act of 1824, the route was
surveyed, including an extension to Lake Erie by way of a canal from
the Ohio. But when, in 1826, the board of engineers published its
estimate of the cost of the canal, it was seen that the larger plans
were doomed, for the total cost was placed at over twenty-two
million dollars. This was practically prohibitive, for the whole
capital stock of the Chesapeake and Ohio Company was only six
millions. Congress made a million-dollar subscription to the stock
of the company, but only the eastern section of the canal could be
begun; the completion of navigation between the coal-fields on the
upper Ohio and Cumberland on the Potomac must be postponed.
Baltimore's interest in the grand design of canal communication
between that city and Pittsburgh quickly disappeared. Nearer to the
Ohio Valley than any other seaport, she had built turnpikes to
connect with the national road, and thus shared with Philadelphia
the western trade. But now New York and Pennsylvania were
undertaking canal systems which were certain in the long run to
destroy the advantages of Baltimore. In desperation, her far-sighted
and courageous merchants inaugurated the plan of a railroad across
the mountains to the Ohio, grasping the idea that as the canal had
shown its superiority over the turnpike, so this new device would
win the day over the canal. In 1827 and 1828 charters for the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad were granted by Maryland, Virginia, and
Pennsylvania.
At Washington, on July 4, 1828, President Adams stripped off his
coat, amid the cheers of the crowd, and thrust the spade into the
ground in signal of the beginning of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal;
but on the same day a rival celebration was in progress at
Baltimore, where the venerable signer of the Declaration of
Independence, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, placed the foundation-
stone to commemorate the commencement of the Baltimore and Ohio
Railroad, first of the iron bonds between the east and the west.
When Adams thus won the plaudits of the people for his evidence of
ability to break the conventions of polite society and use a
laborer's tool, it was perhaps the only time that he and democracy
came into sympathetic touch. But he was aiding in a losing cause,
for, though Carroll was a man of the past, destiny was working on
the side of the movement which he represented. In the field of
transportation, the initiative of individuals and of corporations
during the next two generations proved superior to that of state or
nation.
In the mean time, Ohio, eager to take advantage of the competition
of these rival routes from New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and
Washington, and wishing to develop the central region of the state,
undertook in 1825 a state system of canals connecting the Ohio with
Lake Erie. [Footnote: Morris, Internal Improvement in Ohio (Am.
Hist. Assoc., Papers, III.), 107; see also McClelland and
Huntington, Ohio Canals.] The Ohio Canal began at Portsmouth and
followed the valleys of the Scioto and the Cuyahoga to Cleveland,
while another canal extended from Cincinnati along the Miami to
Dayton. By branches connecting with the Pennsylvania system, this
net-work of water-ways was intended to give alternative outlets for
the rapidly growing surplus of the state. Wheat which sold for from
twenty-five to thirty-seven cents per bushel in central Ohio in 1825
brought double the amount in 1832 when the canal began to be
effective; and it sold for a higher price a hundred miles west of
Pittsburgh than it did sixty miles to the east of that city, where
water transportation was lacking. [Footnote: Quar. Jour. of Econ.,
XVII., 15; Dial, in Ohio Archaeological and Hist. Soc.,
Publications, XIII., 479.] An example of the rivalry of the
followers of Adams and of Jackson in conciliating western interests
is furnished in the case of Ohio, just prior to the campaign of
1828, when each party in Congress persisted in supporting its own
bill donating lands for the canals of that state. Owing to the fear
of each that the other party would gain the credit of the measure,
both bills were passed, and Ohio received double the amount
originally asked. [Footnote: Benton, Abridgment, X., 197 n.] It was
small wonder that Indiana, Illinois, and other western states
memorialized Congress for aid in their own plans for canals.
The activity of the states, no longer waiting for the federal
government to construct a national system; the rapidly growing
demand for the relinquishment of the national road to the states
within which it lay; and the activity of corporations, all pointed
to a new era in internal improvements. The states were ready to
receive appropriations, but they preferred to build their own roads
and dig their own canals. The state and the corporation were
replacing the national government as the controlling power in
internal improvements, and Adams's conception of a national system
of turnpikes and canals had failed.
Nor was President Adams successful in carrying out a system of
complete maritime reciprocity. After the War of 1812, Great Britain
and the United States agreed upon the abolition of discriminating
duties on ships or products engaged in the trade between the two
countries; [Footnote: Cf. Babcock, Am. Nationality (Am. Nation,
XIII.), chap. xvi.] but England reserved her right to exempt her
American possessions from this reciprocity. By excluding the ships
of the United States from the trade with the English West Indies,
England denied a profitable avocation to American ship-owners;
while, at the same time, the liberal arrangements of the United
States permitted her vessels freely to enter the ports of this
country with their cargoes of English manufactures, and to carry
thence to the West Indies lumber, flour, and provisions to exchange
for the molasses and sugar of the islands.
This ability to make a triangular voyage, with profits on each
transaction, gave such advantage to British ships that they were
able to carry on the trade between the United States and England at
a rate below that which American vessels could afford. Driven to
seek some remedy, the Yankee merchants and skippers turned to the
Orient. The trade with China and the East Indies developed rapidly,
and our tonnage registered for foreign trade increased from 583,000
tons in 1820 to 758,000 in 1828. [Footnote: Marvin, American
Merchant Marine, chap. ix.] Ninety per cent. of our foreign commerce
was carried in our own vessels, and, from this point of view,
American shipping enjoyed one of the most prosperous periods in its
history. [Footnote: Pitkin, Statistical View (ed. of 1835), 363;
Soley, "Maritime Industries," in Shaler (ed. of 1894), United
States, I., 538.] Smuggling was extensively carried on in the West
Indies, and a war of retaliatory legislation in regard to shipping
characterized the whole decade.
In 1825 Parliament passed a somewhat obscure act which opened the
ports on a more liberal system of reciprocity. To nations without
colonies she offered the same shipping rights in her colonies which
such nations gave to England and her possessions. The act provided
that it must be accepted within a year by nations who desired to
avail themselves of its provisions. President Adams preferred to
deal with the question by diplomacy, and Congress neglected to pass
the legislation necessary to accept the offer. When Gallatin, who
had been sent to England to treat of this matter, opened his
negotiations in 1826, he was informed that it was too late. The
stipulated time having elapsed, American vessels were definitely
excluded from the West Indies in 1826 by orders in council.
[Footnote: Adams, Gallatin, 615-620; cf. MacDonald, Jacksonian
Democracy (Am. Nation, XV.), 201.] In the campaign of 1828 Adams was
blamed for the failure to seize this opportunity, but the generally
prosperous condition of our shipping not only moderated the
discontent, but even led to a law (May 24, 1828) intended to place
American vessels in complete control of our foreign commerce by
providing for the abolition, by proclamation of the president, of
all discriminating duties against such nations as should free ships
of the United States from corresponding discriminations. In the long
run, this reciprocity act proved a mistake; the end of Adams's
administration marked the beginning of a decline in the prosperity
of the merchant marine. [Footnote: Soley, in Shaler, United States,
I., 540.]
American commerce during this period by no means kept pace with the
growing wealth and population of the country. [Footnote 2: Sterns,
Foreign Trade of the United States, 1820-1840, in Jour. Pol. Econ.,
VIII., 34, 452.] As we have seen, the staple states produced the
lion's share of the domestic exports, and the internal exchange
favored by the protective tariffs restrained the foreign
importations. Aside from the depression in 1821, following the panic
of 1819, and the extraordinary rise in 1825, the exports in general
exhibited no marked increase or decline between 1820 and 1829.
Imports showed a value of nearly seventy-four and one-half million
dollars in 1820, ninety millions in 1825, and sixty-seven millions
in 1829. [Footnote 3: Soley, in Shaler, United States, I., 538; cf.
Pitkin, Statistical View (ed. of 1835), 177; W. C. Ford, in Depew,
One Hundred Years of Am. Commerce, I., 23.] During the whole of
Adams's administration, New York preserved its easy lead in domestic
exports, although, as the west leaped up to power, New Orleans rose
rapidly to a close second in exports of domestic origin. The
southern cities retained merely the same proportion of the exports
of domestic origin which they had in 1820, in spite of the great
increase of cotton production. New York and New Orleans gained a
large fraction of this trade, and Massachusetts changed its
proportion of domestic exports only slightly during the whole
decade. Over three-fourths of the cotton went to the British Isles,
while almost all the pork and beef, and two-thirds of the flour,
went to the West Indies, South America, and Great Britain's American
colonies. [Footnote: Pitkin, Statistical View, 121-137.]
The statistics of commerce repeat the same story of increasing
national self-dependence which was told by the development of
manufactures, internal trade, and transportation, and even by the
diplomatic policy of the United States. The nation was building an
empire of its own, with sections which took the place of kingdoms.
The west was already becoming the granary of the whole country. But
in the development of this "American system," the navigating
portions of New England and the staple states of the south and
southwest found themselves at a disadvantage. Their interest lay in
a free exchange across the ocean.
Although many minor treaties of commerce and navigation were
negotiated by Clay during this administration, all his other
diplomatic efforts met with failure, among them attempts to purchase
Texas and to procure a treaty with England for the rendition of
fugitive slaves who had escaped to Canada--strange evidences of the
political concessions of the northern president.