"Whether the United States may not safely | Under these gradual, moderate and prudent "and profitably make an experiment of well encouragements commenced by the States be"devised and complete encouragements to some one branch of American manufactures; and what that branch should be ?" fore 1789, and pursued since by the federal government, a scene of domestic manufactures, reflecting honour upon the internal economy of the United States, and greatly redounding to their benefit, has imperceptibly arisen. We hazard once more a revised sketch of them, and upon mature reflection, we are not disposed to doubt the correctness of the interesting sum total. Dollars 1,000,000 An attempt to estimate certain American manufactures. Carriages for pleasure, including repairs 8,000,000 1,225,000 500,000 500,000 1,000,000 Carriages for work, including like repairs, The hole of our hemp, flax, cotton, bair, . Beer, ale, and porter, spirits, 10,000,000 gallons from Coppersmith's work, lead, pewter, and molasses, grain, fruit, &c. brass wares, 500,000 4,000,000 20,000,000 500,000 5,000,000 500,000 200,000 Many of the most early and zealous friends of American manufactures have hitherto refrained from suggesting that the productions of our domestic arts and trades should be generally encouraged by high duties on the importation of foreign rival goods. They have feared to impede the improvements of the country by excessive duties on foreign articles used in build. ing houses, stores,mills, &c. They have feared to impede the progress of knowledge by excessive duties on foreign books, and the instruments of science. They have feared to burthen the poor, the young beginners, the industrions, and the great mass of the people, by excessive duties on foreign manufactured goods, for their clothing, furniture, and general consumption. The best friends of American manufactures have feared that high general duties might embarrass or derange our finances and public credit, by affecting fair and free importation. They have prudently respected the doubts of many of our fellow-citizens about our interest in manufactures, and our abilities to produce frem. They have been uncertain about the acquisition of foreign machacry, manufacturing secrets, and artizans. They have seen the possibility that foreign trade laws might be so framed as entire-Distilled ly to prevent the importation of the properest raw materials, They have feared that too many of our farmers might be diverted from agriculture to manufactures. Other objections have occurred, and the moderation, prudence, and candour of the friends of American manu-Ships, boats, and oars, &c. including refactures have chearfully yielded to every reasonable doubt, and to every fair argument, in its full weight. It has happened, however, that for the more purposes of revenue, an impost has been laid upon all foreign rival manufactures. Tis impost has been gradually increased from 5 to 7 1-2 10 and 12 1-2 per cent. which last is, at this tiae, the lowest rate of duty. It is also true, that for the proper and Eclared encou-Wheel-barrows, hand ditto, corn fans, ragement of certain manufactures, additions to plane stocks, machinery, &c. the lowest rate of duty have been made of Paper making, including hangings, 21-2, 5, and 7 1-2 per cent. so that various Gunpowder, American manufactures are encouraged by Book printing, binding, and engraving, 1,000,000 duties on the foreign rical commodities of Besides 2 1-2, 15, 17 1-2 and 20 per cent. these, there are import duties upon particular articles, which are at higher rates. The duties, for example, of 8 cents per gallon, on all fermented malt liquors, and 20 cents per gallon on distilled grain; spirits 6 1-2 to 9 cents per lb. on refined sugars; 50 cents per doz. on wool and cotton cards; 400 cents per cat. on the twine and pack-threads; 25 cents per pair on shoes; 2 cents per . on soap and candles; 10 cents and 22 cents per lb. on manufactured tobacco and snuff, &c. &c. Tinmans' ditto, 1,000,000 3,000,000 350,000 100,000 10,000 50,000 300,000 50,000 50,000 500,000 500,000 able to the American ship owners, by employing imported molasses, sugars, skins, woods, aves, metals, hemp, flax, wool, tallow, and other raw materials and ingredients. Are we prepared to sacrifice this noble_encreasing branch of American industry?-Will we suffer ourselves to neglect it for a moment? Will we not rather continue prudently to nurse, to foster, and to encourage the useful arts and manufactures? There can be but one opinion -one reply. But it ought to be the unanimous endeavour to promote American manufactures with as much deliberation and prudence as effect. Let us take care not to disturb our necessary revenues, not to derange our well ordered finances, not to impose unreasonable burdens on the consumer, not to attempt manifest impracticabilities, not to impede our young improvements, and not to aim at too much by touching the subject with strong alternatives at too many points. It is not We cannot at this crisis encourage, by additional, encreasing and prohibitory duties, all American manufactures, without producing most of the evils we have held up, in candid prudence, in this investigation. It is not meant therefore to press upon the public consideration, at this moment, any general measures to promote American manufactures. intended here to ask even the consideration of such measures in favour of any two branches; it is merely wished that new and proper protections and encouragement may be considered in reference to some one single branch. No material or sudden diminution of our revenues can be produced by higher duties not very slowly encreasing upon a single branch; and no objection to a general forcing of manufactures more deserves to be respected than the possible injuries to our revenue, finances and public credit. These are never to be injured never to be put at hazard. Let them be for ever protected by all our prudence, and by perfect good faith. But let us proceed to select, merely by way of example, a single branch of American manufactures, and apply to its discussion our soundest principles and our best reflections. The cotton manufacture of the United States of America is proposed to be encouraged, extended, protected and established by all the means in our power. Being a single branch of manufacture, it cannot put any large sun of present revenue at hazard. The amount of cotton goods imported is very far inferior to that of the woollen goods imported; it is also supposed to be considerably inferior to the value of the linen goods imported. The iron goods imported are likewise greater in value the duties on foreign liquors, and foreign sugars are much greater. As therefore the present duties on cotton goods are not even of secondary consequence in our scale of revenue, gradual diminution of that part of the revenue could not sensibly affect our resources. As the revenue from no single article can derange our treasury business, so this particular revenue (from foreign cotton goods) cannot from its moderation be even felt; but if we raise the duty on such goods from 12 or 15 to 20 or 25 per cent. the first year, the extra duty on a less quantity imported may yield nearly an equal revenue. It is respectfully submitted, whether these considerations do not obviate the objec tions, justly urged at this time, against the dangers of universal high protecting duties destroying or deranging our impost revenue. The vast extent of country which will produce cotton, is a serious consideration to induce a selection of it for extraordinary encouragement. From the southern boundary to the fortieth degree of north latitude, cotton has certainly been produced. It may therefore prove to be worthy of the attention of all our citizens, living south of a line drawn from Tom's river, through Philadelphia and Pittsburg; and this invaluable plant does not refuse its increase in light, weak and stony soils. The manufacture of colton merits the universal consideration of the American people, because it will render cotton-wool a permanent staple article of agriculture and trade; and, by fixing it for ever upon that footing, will nake an important addition to the variety of American commodities, and of course to the stability of their prices. If all our countrymen were employed in raising rice, tobacco, wheat, and cattle, those commodities would often be distressingly low from their redundance; but if half the states shall raise tens of millions of cotton, then will our wheat, cattle, &c. support much better prices. As the cotton inanufacture is effected more than any other by labour, saving machines, it is freer from the objection of the dearness of labour than any other; and it is perfectly clear, that the dearness of labour is an argument for any labour-saving plan. As there are very few of our native citizens who understand the cotton manufacture by machines, the promotion of this branch will not divert many of our farmers from agriculture. We have an unlimited command of the powers of steam, horses, draught oxen and water, to move our cotton machines and mills. We have lately disengaged the powers of the earth to produce cotton, by the discovery and extensive use of a variety of mills and machines, to free the cotton-wool from the cotton-seed. Fifty thousand dollars have been granted by a single state to purchase the patent right of a cotton-ginning or cleaning machine within its own jurisdiction. This fact does honour to the wisdom, spirit and fairness of South Carolina.We have obtained and possess the common hand spinning jenny, which makes by one person, male or feinale, from 40 to 120 cotton threads at one time; also the carding machine to go by hand, horse, ox, or water; also the roving machine, to reduce cotton wool into ropes or yards of the size of a goose quill; also. also the rule, spinning by hand 120 fine threads; also the water-spinning machinery of Arkwright, to spin perpetually at any mill seat. We also possess the machinery for doubling and twisting thread, for hosiery, and the British and German stocking-weaver's looms, for making every article of hosiery, from feet-socks to pantaloons. In ancient Greece and Macedonia, now enslaved provinces of European Turkey, twenty thousand bales of cotton-wool, each weighing three hundred pounds, are spun annually into yarns or threads, and dyed with their own vermillion. The Greek and Macedonian women use neither the great nor the small spinningwheel, nor the jenny, the mule, the water spinning machinery, nor the carding nor roving machinery. They use only the spindle, without any addition. It is impossible then to doubt, that these states, must succeed in the manufacture of their own cotton, with the powerful and various aids of the modern Euro spin, and twist. With such aids, and with all our other means and advantages, we cannot fail to succeed in a business, in which the unhappy subjects of the civil and religious despotisin of Turkey have, for a series of years, done so much for domestic and foreign consumption. There have arrived in the United States from Europe, a very considerable number of engine and machine makers, carders, spinners, rovers, twisters, weavers, callico-printers, dyers, &c. ready to work on wages as moderate as they received in Great Britain, Ireland, and other parts of Europe. These persons want employ-pean labour-saving machinery, to card, rove, ment in their own proper lines of business. Every man among them who succeeds in this country, will induce others to follow him. There are important and unalterable circumstances in the United States to draw men to us, who are acquainted with every use ul art and manufacture. Some of the most obvious of these are, perfect religious liberty; a sober There is an important reason for promoting equality of civil righ's; the cheap and easy ac- our own cotton manufactures, arising out of quisition of freehold estates for residence, ma- the present circumstances of the East Indies. nufactories, and farms; the cheapness of go- We receive from thence great quantities of vernment, and consequent moderation of taxes; cotton goods, which are not (as the manufacthe rare phenomenon of a voluntary executive tures of Great Britain) made out of our own and legislative reduction and abolition of duties | cotton. The use of those East India cotton and excises; the non-existence of tythes, ex-goods is doubly injurious: first, because we cises, and national land-tax; the perfect secu- do not manufacture them; and, secondly, berity of property; the uniform success of nu- cause we do not produce the cotton of which merous well intentional emigrants, and par- they are made. Though those ports of India ticularly from Great Britain and Ireland, Ger- belong to Great Britain, the parliament has many, France, Holland, Switzerland, and absolutely prohibited the consumption of their Sweden. It is impossible to conceive, that cotton manufactures in Britain and Ireland. there can be any miscalculation, in confidently Those goods, of course, come to us in much relying upon every necessary acquisition of the greater quantities to rival the foreign and doaid of foreign artists to conduct the American mestic manufacturers of our cotton. If we cotton_manufactory, if it shall be vigorously were to refuse or burden the importation, the and effectually encouraged by law, when we British East Indian would extend the cultivaremember the great numbers of useful and able tion of sugar, coffee, cocoa, ginger, spices, men, who have come to us from foreign coun- pimento, arnatto, and other things adapted to tries, as ministers of religion, instructors of their climate, which we consume and do not the rising generation, agriculturists, lawyers, ourselves produce.-They would manufacture physicians, merchants, land and sea officers, more silks, more saltpetre, and other fabrics, manfacturers, mechanics, journeymen, ma- which we might require and admit, because riners, and labourers in every line. If we they do not injure our agriculture, nor interhave had such extensive advantages in procur- fere with our cautious, but steady and unceasing valuable foreign emigrants, who have been ing endeavours to establish the American mas completely successful in branches not con- nufacture of cotton goods. nected with labour saving machinery, can we doubt much more rapid and great success in branches, where the saving of labour by the ingenuity and skill of one thousand hands will yield them and us the benefits of ten thou sand? It is favourable to an attempt to establish the cotton manufacture, that a large proportion of the foreign cotton goods, which we import, are dyed, stained, printed, or in some way coloured; because, indigo, woad, madden, various barks, and other dye-stuffs are produced in the United States; and other dye-stuffs, which we do not produce, are daily imported from foreign countries, and reshipt from hence to other foreign parts, It is obvious to every man of correct information relative to the four original eastern states, that they are in a very serious situation as to wood and fuel. Their buildings are very generally of wood, and require large quantities of boards, scantling, and fogs to keep them in repair.-Much wood is also wanted for new buildings, old and new fences, ships and boats, casks for their fish, pot ash, spirits, beef, pork, molasses, &c. and for the household fuel and workman's-fuel. Their population is great and increasing. They have no mines of coal. The coal mines of the cast are all in the hands of the British colonists. On those facts an important suggestion is respectfully submitted to the the consideration of the people of the states east of the ship channel of the Hudson; that in every system of measures to promote the domestic or internal industry of those states, endeavours should be made to avoid new calls for wood and fuel of every kind. This suggestion is of a deeper intrinsic importance than may appear, at first view, to those to whom it is new. We will offer, as two examples, the British manufactures of iron, and the British manufactures of cotton. We believe that the permanent and extensive establishment of the British manufactures of iron, in the states east of the parts of the Hudson navigable by ships, would prove very difficult from the total want of mines, pit or fossil coal, from the scarcity of wood for making charcoal, from the great scarcity of peat and turf there, and from the scarcity of wood for fuel and buildings. But we believe, that, the very small use of fuel in the cotton manufacture itself, and the limited use of fuel by the people in that branch, which, effected by machinery, requires little fire to warm the small proportion of persons employed, are circumstances plainly and greatly in favour of the adoption of the cotton branch in the eastern parts of the United States. It is certain, that wood is become extremely scarce in all the old counties east of Hudson's river, and that not one productive coal-mine has been discovered between the Delaware river and the eastern boundary of the United States. The wood and timber of Maine are consuming with great rapidity, and since freights are reduced by peace, will go forth in immense quantitics. It is so distant from Connecticut, Rhode Island and Providence, and Massachusetts proper, that it will become a dear, as well as a mere temporary source of supply to them for timber and fuel, if manufactures by fire em- | ploying numerous persons, who must be kept warm in a moist and cold climate, are to be extensively and permanently pursued. The true manufacturing policy of our eastern states is to carry to the utmost all household manufactures, and establish factories by labour, saving machinery at the heads of their ship or boat navigation, where they can derive the highest possible degree of benefit of their own wood and fuel, and of wood and fuel imported coastwise or from foreign ports. Cotton it will be found, therefore, is the properest raw material for them to employ. The same remarks apply to New Jersey and Delaware in .full force. If the north-eastern moiety of the United States shall forthwith establish extensive and profitable manufactures employing cotton, which can be raised in immense quantities in the southern states, it will bind the members of our union more and more together. To defend, promote, and preserve our union, is the fondest object of every sound mind, of every VOL. III. faithful heart, native or foreign, which partakes in the numerous blessings of our country. It is beyond a doubt, that the use of cotton cloth for the under garments of man, next to the skin, contributes greatly to health in damp, chilly, and cold climates. In this view shirting, sheeting, and hosiery of cotton would prove far more salubrious than of flax, in certain seasons, in every quarter of America, and particularly in the parts east of the Hud son. Every extensive manufactory that depends on a foreign raw material, is extremely precarious, because foreign laws, treaties, and wars may diminish or prevent the importation. But as cotton is raised by ourselves, and will ever be redundant, the cotton manufacture will rest upon a more certain foundation than a manufacture which should employ any other raw material whatever. The variety of fabrics, to the making of which cotton can be applied, is a very important consideration in favour of attempting the cotton manufacture, in preference to any other. The stoutest and the coarsest blankets can be made of the refuse cotton, and cambric muslins, of the most exquisite fineness, can also be made of cotton; the most beautiful table-cloths and napkins, and coarse carpets; the stoutest corduroys, and muslins light as air; dimities, Marseilles-quilting, shirting, sheeting, tickings, pillow-cases, jeans, jeanets, fustians, denims, cottonades, fine and coarse hosiery for every age and sex, pantaloons, vests, mock cassimers, mock serges, mock coating, mock cloths, neck and pocket handkerchiefs, lining and pocketings, dress and undress, and chamber gowns, bed and window curtains, furniture covers, cravats, swansdowns, mole-skins, plushes, velvets, and in short various goods applicable, as usual, to every purpose, or as substitutes for other fabrics heretofore made of wool, hemp, flax, silk, and hair. Such is the unlimited capacity of the native North American raw material, whose future manufacture, under the protection of our government, we earnestly and respectfully recommend to the immediate consideration of all our public authorities. A FRIEND OF AGRICULTURE. Table of the Number of Christenings and Burials within the Bills of Mortality, from January to 3852 306221681053 420 280 718107812891157| 923| 612| 287 38 5219 5218 5 d. d. 9 39 d. 4 9 129 10 22/04 19 179 2193 7448 Pork 1967 d. S. d. 5 6 5 10 +45 4 6 1966 d. 22 |