No. 133.] 193 



ifvredonot have a 'supply at liome equal to our demand, and 

 wrest that weapon of distress from the hand which, has so long 

 v¥antoDlj violated it." 



With such heartfelt earnestness did the author of our Decla- 

 ration of Political Indep^dence, express his sentiments on this 

 subject. He had then (1810) witnessed the effect of two wars; 

 he had watched the growth of the country, and knew the causes 

 of its prosperity and adversity. lie ha I lived to see great and 

 astonishing changes in the population and extent of our Union, 

 but died before the miraculous improvements and inventions, 

 which signalize our day, were discovered and brought to perfec- 

 tion. During his administration, a New-England turnpike road, 

 scarcely forty miles in length, was thought worthy of being made 

 the subject of a special report to the general government, by Alex- 

 ander Wolcott. He de.scribes it in glowing terms, and says, " he 

 may venture to predict, without incurring the risk of being consi- 

 dered visionary, that the time is not far remote when the whole 

 distance between New- York and Boston can be traversed on a 

 tmrnpike road. This is all," he addS; " that can ever be expected." 



Mr. Jefferson was, in his time, called a dreamer ; but in no vi- 

 •ion of his wildest dream did he foTesee the wonderful advance 

 whicji tliis day witnesses in the industrial independence of our 

 nation. 



Such, then were the opinions, and such the practice of the wise 

 aud liberal statesmen, who laid the foundations of our Republic. 

 With them only one sentiment prevailed with regard to the im- 

 portance of manufactures and the mechanic arts, in administering 

 to the wants of social and domestic life, and in promoting the 

 ^lory and prosperity of our nation. They felt thatonr independ- 

 ence was incomplete while our wants were supplied by the labor 

 of a foreign qountry, and that the cause to sustain which they had 

 pledged their lives; theirfortune8,and their sacred honor, was not 

 yet fully triumphant. 



The age in which we live has been signalized by an event which 

 teaches us that nations are now struggling in the field of labor, for 



[Assembly No. 133. J l^J 



