The Protective Tariff and Free Trade controversy, at its origin, and
during its progress, was very different in its character from what many
now imagine it to have been. People, on both sides, were often in great
straits to know how to obtain a livelihood, much less to amass
fortunes. The word _ruin_ was no unmeaning phrase at that day. The news,
now, that a bank has failed, carries with it, to the depositors and
holders of its notes, no stronger feelings of consternation, than did
the report of the passage or repeal of tariff laws, then, affect the
minds of the opposing parties. We have spoken of the peculiar condition
of the South in this respect. In the West, for many years, the farmers
often received no more than _twenty-five cents_, and rarely over _forty
cents_, per bushel for their wheat, after conveying it, on horseback, or
in wagons, not unfrequently, a distance of fifty miles, to find a
market. Other products were proportionally low in price; and such was
the difficulty in obtaining money, that people could not pay their taxes
but with the greatest sacrifices. So deeply were the people interested
in these questions of national policy, that they became the basis of
political action during several Presidential elections. This led to much
vacillation in legislation on the subject, and gave alternately, to one
and then to the other section of the Union, the benefits of its favorite
policy.

The vote of the West, during this struggle, was of the first importance,
as it possessed the balance of power, and could turn the scale at will.
It was not left without inducements to co-operate with the South, in its
measures for extending slavery, that it might create a market among the
planters for its products. This appears from the particular efforts made
by the Southern members of Congress, during the debate of 1824, to win
over the West to the doctrines of free trade.

Mr. McDuffie, of South Carolina, said: "I admit that the Western people
are _embarrassed_, but I deny that they are _distressed_, in any other
sense of the word. . . . . I am well assured that the permanent prosperity
of the West depends more upon the improvement of the means of
transporting their produce to market, and of receiving the returns, than
upon every other subject to which the legislation of this government can
be directed. . . . . Gentlemen (from the West) are aware that a very
profitable trade is carried on by their constituents with the