oreign goods did not necessarily enhance their
cost to the consumer; that the competition among home manufacturers, and
between them and foreigners, had greatly reduced the price of nearly
every article properly protected; that foreign manufacturers always had,
and always would advance their prices according to our dependence upon
them; that domestic competition was the only safety the country had
against foreign imposition; that it was necessary we should become our
own manufacturers, in a fair degree, to render ourselves independent of
other nations in times of war, as well as to guard against the
vacillations in foreign legislation; that the South would be vastly the
gainer by having the market for its products at its own doors, to avoid
the cost of their transit across the Atlantic; that, in the event of the
repression or want of proper extension of our manufactures, by the
adoption of the free trade system, the imports of foreign goods, to meet
the public wants, would soon exceed the ability of the people to pay,
and, inevitably, involve the country in bankruptcy.

Southern politicians remained inflexible, and refused to accept any
policy except free trade, to the utter abandonment of the principle of
protection. Whether they were jealous of the greater prosperity of the
North, and desirous to cripple its energies, or whether they were truly
fearful of bankrupting the South, we shall not wait to inquire. Justice
demands, however, that we should state that the South was suffering from
the stagnation in the cotton trade existing throughout Europe. The
planters had been unused to the low prices, for that staple, they were
compelled to accept. They had no prospect of an adequate home market for
many years to come, and there were indications that they might lose the
one they already possessed. The West Indies was still slave territory,
and attempting to recover its early position in the English market. This
it had to do, or be forced into emancipation. The powerful Viceroy of
Egypt, Mehemet Ali, was endeavoring to compel his subjects to grow
cotton on an enlarged scale. The newly organized South American
republics were assuming an aspect of commercial consequence, and might
commence its cultivation. The East Indies and Brazil were supplying to
Great Britain from one-third to one-half of the cotton she was annually
manufacturing. The other half, or two-thirds, she might obtain from
other sources, and repudiate all traffic