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Indiana University Studies 
Other minor charges were brought against President 
Adams based on the loss of the British West India trade. He 
was accused of having originated the ‘‘elsewhere'’ claim in 
order “to promote the interest of the owners of the lumber 
and live stock of the Northern States”. Of course the writer 
in this case was a Southerner. A western New York paper 
however pointed out that the actual effect of the situation as 
it then existed, whether intended or not, was that the “in- 
habitants of the western part of New York and the New Eng- 
land states” had had a “monopoly . . . thrown into their 
hands”, altho the trade had “been lost to the Atlantic and 
Western States”. Here was a practical example of sec- 
tional favoritism, at any rate. Finally it was pointed out in 
a long editorial under the heading ‘‘Reasons why General Jack- 
son ought to be preferred to Mr. Adams by the people as pres- 
ident of the United States” that the latter was unfitted to be 
President because of his anti-British tendencies. 
The great and unanswerable objection to Mr. Adams we have always 
considered to be, that he laboured under such strong and unconquerable 
prejudices against the English nation, imbibed in his youth, and wil- 
fully cherished through life, as disqualified him for conducting the affairs 
of his own country whenever they related to her, with that amicable 
spirit and good temper which a regard for our interests and honor im- 
periously demanded. A sad and lamentable proof that these fears were 
not chimerical, has been given in his sacrifice of the Colonial trade to 
the annual amount of some millions of revenue, and what is of far 
greater national importance, of our best nursery for our seamen; one 
of our great sinews in war.'^®” 
Accusations such as these led to a counter-attack by the 
Administration papers which pointed out that the Opposition 
tone in America and the Tory tone in Great Britain were in 
the strictest harmony regarding the stand which the United 
States had taken on the subject of the British West India 
trade.^^^ “We are amazed”, exclaimed one paper, “at the 
arguments adduced, and at the quarter whence they come, to 
justify Great Britain at the expense of America, and are com- 
pelled to adopt the conclusion, that faction, ever ready to seize 
upon any topic, to decry those whom it would overthrow, is 
Richmond Enquirer, April 3, 1827. 
Rochester Daily Advertiser, Aug. 1, 1827, in Richmond Enquirer, Aug. 14, 1827. 
^^^Neiv York Evening Post, Oct. 30, 1827. 
National Journal, March 8 and Sept. 11, 1827. Daily National Intelligencer, April 
5, 1827. New York American (for the country), March 20, 1827. Phenix Gazette, April 
26, 1827. Niles’ Register, XXXI, 282. 
