No. 216.] 367 



clue to guide us through the labyrinth. If no public benefit shall 

 accrue, and the nation is doomed to run again the melancholy road 

 of excessive imports — contraction of the currency — panic — and 

 suspension — private fortunes may be saved and individual suffering 

 prevented. 



A thorough understanding of the science of currency, is the key 

 to unlock the mystery of national economics. Like all other subjects, 

 currency must have a science, the laws which govern it may be 

 known, and as it obviously lies at the foundation, and is the power 

 which controls both national and individual wealth, it is idle to 

 waste our efforts upon subordinate topics, until we understand the 

 principles which govern the basis upon which all other interests 

 rest. 



Assuming that after thirty years of debate in the national coun- 

 cils, the question of a " protection" or " no protection" is still un- 

 settled, there must be some defect in the principles, or the reasons 

 for them, a misapprehension of the object to be attained ; or after 

 so long a debate, the problem would have been elucidated to such an 

 extent as to leave little doubt respecting the policy which would re- 

 sult in national prosperity. 



The arguments of the advocates of protection have been various. 

 Among the foremost in the early history of the debate, was that of 

 " the balance of trade." It was gravely argued that as the premi- 

 um upon exchange with England was uniformly at nine or ten per 

 cent., therefore the balance must be sadly against us, and protection 

 was necessary that we might manufacture for ourselves, and thus 

 prevent the inequality of exchange, and the evils consequent upon 

 it. This argument, so obviously absurd, growing out of the assump- 

 tion that the pound sterling was four dollars and forty-four cents, 

 needs no further attention. It would have been a ruinous condition 

 of exchanges if true, and it is not strange that it was adopted, since 

 all elementary books, then as now, taught it to our children, and the 

 government but recently abandoned the absurdity, which deducted 

 nine per cent from every British invoice, and an equivalent amount 

 of duty when ad valorem in favor of England and against every 

 other nation. Next we had the argument " the necessity of pro- 

 tection to those pursuits whose products are essential to national 

 defence." This had more show of reason, but if protection was ne- 

 cessary to those interests, then obviously to all which the public 

 were not disposed to abandon. The present form of argument, is 



