ure, and the party of generous income with its
wise application to public improvement; the part, in short, of
Jefferson as against the party of Hamilton, the party of Jackson
as against that of Clay, the party of Buchanan and Douglas as
against that of Lincoln and Seward. Taxes, whether direct or
indirect, always interest the mass of mankind, and the differences
of the systems by which they shall be levied and collected will
always present an absorbing political issue. Public attention may
be temporarily engrossed by some exigent subject of controversy,
but the tariff alone steadily and persistently recurs for agitation,
and for what is termed settlement. Thus far in our history,
settlement has only been the basis of new agitation, and each
successive agitation leads again to new settlement.

EXPERIENCE IN TARIFF LEGISLATION.

After the experience of nearly a century on the absorbing question
of the best mode of levying duties on imports, the divergence of
opinion is as wide and as pronounced as when the subject first
engaged the attention of the Federal Government. Theories on the
side of high duties and theories on the side of low duties are
maintained with just as great vigor as in 1789. In no question of
a material or financial character has there been so much interest
displayed as in this. On a question of sentiment and of sympathy
like that of slavery, feeling is inevitable; but it has been matter
of surprise that the adjustment of a scale of duties on importations
of foreign merchandise should be accompanied, as it often has been,
by displays of excitement often amounting to passion.

The cause is readily apprehended when it is remembered that the
tariff question is always presented as one not merely affecting
the general prosperity, but as specifically involving the question
of bread to the millions who are intrusted with the suffrage. The
industrial classes study the question closely; and, in many of the
manufacturing establishments of the country, the man who is working
for day wages will be found as keenly alive to the effect of a
change in the protective duty as the stockholder whose dividends
are to be affected. Thus capital and labor coalesce in favor of
high duties to protect the manufacturer, and, united, they form a
political force which has been engaged in an economic battle from
the foundation of the government. Sometimes they have suffered
signal