140 THE GREEN RISING 



expression to this sentiment, and a few days later 

 he died. It is not without significance that the last 

 public utterance of Calhoun reflected the united 

 public opinion of the South. The Morrill Tariff Act 

 of 1861 was passed on the eve of the Civil War, after 

 several Southern senators had withdrawn. It re- 

 stored the rates of earlier tariff acts and again com- 

 mitted the country to a policy of protection. 



No issue in American politics has had such great 

 influence in dividing the people politically as the 

 policy of protection. It has been unfortunate that 

 an economic question of such intricacy should be- 

 come such a persistent and continuous political 

 problem. Agricultural producers usually have not 

 been given consideration in the formulation of tariff 

 schedules. Tariff rates have almost invariably been 

 determined by the interests of industrial producers. 

 Protective rates have been extended to a few raw 

 products when a compromise was necessary to secure 

 a sufficient number of votes for the passage of tariff 

 legislation. The influence of agrarian forces in re- 

 cent years has had the effect of increasing the num- 

 ber of raw products for which protective rates have 

 been provided, but the extension to such products 

 usually has been the result of compromise in the 

 interest of higher protective rates on manufactured 

 products. 



