ITS CULTURE AND MANUFACTURE. 



131 



iiig tlieir comfort, are the cause of many of tlie 

 maladies which afflict them. 



After reviewing the means placed at onr dis- 

 posal to increase the valne of our products and 

 to overcome the disadvantages of climate and 

 the gradual deterioration of the soil, allow me 

 to advert to other disadvantages and dangers 

 which in the opinion of many threaten us with 

 inevitable ruin. Two causes of alarm now ex- 

 ist amongst a large number of our fellow plant- 

 ers : the diminuliou in the value of our lands 

 which will result from the annexation of Texas, 

 and the destruction of our industry by a reduc- 

 tion of duties on foreign sugars, made before we 

 are in a situation to compete with foreign pro- 

 ducers. I am happy to say that I believe we 

 have nothing to fisar from either. 



A person looking upon the map of America, 

 and perceiving a large portion of Texas soutli 

 of Louisiana, would naturally suppose that Texas 

 is the better sugar region of the two. But the 

 Louisianian who travels in midwinter through 

 the prairies of that naked land, exposed to the 

 unmitigated fury of North-Westers, soon dis- 

 covers that he has changed climate, indeed, but 

 that he has not come to regions in which trop- 

 ical plants love to grow. I have it from a gen- 

 tleman of undoubted veracity, Mr. John C. 

 Marsh, that he has planted cane five succes.sive 

 years in the neighborhood of Galveston, and 

 tliat he has never obtained rattoons from it. You 

 may then consider it as a well-authenticated 

 fact, that in Texas, as far south ajf^ew-Orleans, 

 cane will not rattoon : the cold of winter des- 

 troys the stubble ; I do not mean to say that it 

 may not to some extent be cultivated there, but 

 I assert that the competition will be by no means 

 a dangerous one, and that upon trial it will he 

 found that the Red River parishes of this State 

 are better adapted to that cultivation than the 

 greater part of what has been called the sugar 

 region of Texas. 



Louisiana must remain the gi'eat sugar region 

 of tlie United States ; her climate and her soil 

 are the be.st, and her geographical position is 

 unrivaled. Retlect, Sir, that almost eveiy hogs- 

 head of sugar made liere, is shipped without 

 land carriage ; that planters can always obtain 

 from New-Orleans, in two or three days, any 

 machineiy they want, and that their supplies 

 and their market are both brought to their o\\'n 

 door. Compare this situation with that of the 

 Texas planter, and you will admit that there is 

 no room for apprehension. 



Among our various schools of politicians, one 

 denies to the (jcneral Government the pov^-er to 

 protect National Industry against foreign compe- 

 tition, and insists upon a horizontal tariff of du- 

 ties, or no tariff at all. But that school is not, as 

 I conceive, at the head of our att'airs. The 

 power it denies, has been asserted and acted 

 upon by all preceding Administrations, and it is 

 the will of this nation, that it shall continue to 

 be so. The people have a strong instinct of 

 self-preservation ; they know the value of our 

 present form of polity, and cannot be seduced 

 into changes. Whether the cry be against the 

 Union, against the Veto, or against the Protection 

 of National Industry, you will see the masses 

 come to the rescue, aTid uphold the substantive 

 powers of Government. The mental process 

 by which that power first came to be denied, is 

 an instance of what usually occurs when some 

 general principle is first applied to the concerns 

 of nation". Theorj' at once gives the rule, time 

 and ex])erience alone can supply the excep- 

 (•J87) 



tions. The French philosophers of the last 

 century had said that all men were bom ft-ee 

 and etiual, and the first act of the rulers of rcvo- 

 lu^onary France was to take that princijdo as 

 the base of .social organization. But they adopt- 

 ed it without the resti-aints which alone make it 

 valuable, and crime and anarchy were the re- 

 sults of their oversight. In like manner, other 

 philosophers convinced some of our statesmen 

 that trade should be free ; and, regardless of the 

 consequences upon national prosperity, they in- 

 sist that that freedom must be without restraint. 



Their great objection to the Protective system 

 is, that it operates in favor of classes. They 

 overlook the fact that, in their sense of the word, 

 all legislation is class legislation ; that, however 

 necessarj' the protection which Government 

 gives to person or property may be to the coun- 

 try at large, its direct operation is inevitably in 

 tavor of classes. 



Courts of jflstice are established and main- 

 tained at the public expense for the benefit of 

 those who have law-suits ; a class in every com- 

 munity, and happily not a numerous one. The 

 army, during peace, is mostly employed in pro- 

 tecting the class of settlers on the trontiers. — 

 The navigation laws protect the classes of ship 

 owners and ship builders ; but this last protec- 

 tion, they say, is necessary to public defence ; 

 we must have sailors. What do you want with 

 sailors ? To man the navy. What do 3-ou want 

 with a navy? Where is the national interest 

 which renders the establishment of a navy 

 necessaiy ? I conceive that England .should 

 have a navy for national purposes : she has pos- 

 sessions to protect in aU parts of the world, and 

 her rule extends over more than one-half of it. 

 But we are not tluis situated. Our Teiritoiy is 

 all contiguous, and we scarcely possess half a 

 continent. The United States have no national 

 interest to protect, beyond the range of cannon 

 shot from their shores. Let them i'ortify the ac- 

 cessible points of the coast, and keep a few 

 steam-frigates at the mouth of their harbors, and 

 they will have accomplished all that the national 

 defence requires. I will probably be told here 

 that commerce must be protected : undoubtedly 

 it must, and for its protection alone the navy is 

 maintained. But the United States are not en- 

 gaged in commerce in their sovereign capacity ; 

 commerce is like sugar-planting, a private pur- 

 suit, a class interest. And yet by unanimous 

 consent, not only the ways to the reaular mar- 

 kets abroad are lighted and guarded for its bene- 

 fit, at the public expense and forever, but Gov- 

 ernment is ready and anxious at all times to in- 

 cur the expenses attendant upon the opening of 

 new markets in all parts of the viorld. Not 

 later than last year, hovi' much was spent for 

 that purpo.se in a mission to China, and a naval 

 armament in the Chinese Seas ? And, Sir, if 

 some of the men wlio took a conspicuous part 

 in sending that mi.ssion were told by u.s, you 

 want ne^v markets, come, we \\ ill establish one 

 thousand new sugar plantations in Louisiana 

 and increase the cultivation oftho.se already es- 

 tablished ; we will create an oullct which will 

 require in the next ten years, in addition to the 

 present consumption of the State, one llunisand 

 steam engines, twenty thousand kettles, all from 

 Tennessee ; three hundred thousand horses and 

 mules; millions of barrels of provisions, corn 

 and coal, and other things iimumcrahle ; it wiFl 

 be the be.st market during peace, and war will 

 improve it; it will take the produce which other 

 nations won't have ; it will not require, as com- 



