EEMAEKS ON THE GOVERNMENT TAX. 
$160,000,000. This, however, is too low an estimate. 
The crop of 1860 was worth, perhaps, $200,000,000. 
This amount in value was exported, and even at ten cents 
per pound furnished our merchants and manufacturers, in 
supplies and exchanges, with $200,000,000. But at thirty 
cents, as we have seen (and much of it has been sold above 
that price), it yielded for those purposes $480,000,000. 
Suppose this great basis of exchange to be stricken away, 
not only would our "lords of the loom" be ruined, but our 
supply of domestic cotton goods being cut off, necessita- 
ting largely increased importations from abroad, would in- 
crease the demand for exchange to the amount of such in- 
creased importations ; while the supply of exchange would 
be $200,000,000 less than at present. Our whole exports, the 
last fiscal year, if I recollect right, including cotton, reached 
but little over half the value of our imports ; leaving a bal- 
ance of trade against us of, say, $200,000,000, which must 
be made up in gold. Take away the basis of exchange, 
furnished by cotton, and all the proceeds of gold from 
California and Australia together would be unable to meet 
the balances against us each year. The country would 
soon be drained of every dollar of its specie ; paper, with- 
out a specie basis to sustain it, would be our only currency ; 
and these paper promises to pay money, when known that 
there is no money to redeem them, would soon become 
utterly worthless. It is not difiicult to perceive the conse- 
quences. Our diminished exchanges and diminished credit 
would force diminished importations. Diminished impor- 
tations would cause diminished revenue, and necessitate 
the levying increased internal taxes. Decreased exports 
would cause diminished importations, and our navigation 
interests would to that extent be crippled. The mercan- 
tile, the manufacturing, and the shipping interests, would 
