CHAPTER V NATIONAL BEGINNINGS Formative Legislation The Federal Constitution. -The necessity of establishing a central government with powers adequate to the raising of a revenue, the maintenance of a uniform and stable currency, the negotiation of treaties with foreign nations, and the arbitration of interstate concerns had been rendered abundantly evident by the difficulties of the war just closed and by four years' experience of anarchy under the Confederation. The thirteen independent states were forced to set up a central authority endowed with all the powers that had been denied to the British Parliament. The Federal Congress, though fully representative of the interests of the people, was regarded with suspicion by the state governments, and power to legislate for industrial concerns, even of a general nature, was grudgingly conceded. Congress was accorded power "to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises " in order" to pay the debts and provide for the defense and general welfare of the United States," "to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several states," "to coin money and regulate the value thereof," to maintain copyrights and patents, to establish post offices and post roads. Under a liberal interpretation of these functions, the national government has done much to further the industrial interests of the country at large. The states, for their part, surrendered the right to coin money, emit bills of credit, or make anything but gold and silver legal tender in payment of debt, and agreed to lay no tonnage duties or duties on imports without the consent of Congress. The levying of such indirect taxes has been rele Elliot's V, 457-532. Dubois, The Slave gated in practice to the United States government. No state was permitted to enter into any agreement or compact with another state or with a foreign power, and exclusive authority to negotiate treaties was vested in the President and Congress. An attempt to rid the young nation of the blight of African bondage by prohibiting the importation of slaves was made in the Constitutional Convention. The opponents of slavery urged that the slave trade should be stopped at once and for all time. But the devastations of war had considCh. VI, VII. erably reduced the labor force of the Southern states, and the delegates from South Carolina and Georgia asserted that their constituents would never accept the new form of government if it meant the cutting off of farther supplies. The debate resulted in compromise. Congress was to impose no restraint on the slave trade before 1808, thus allowing the rice states an interval of twenty-one years in which to stock their plantations. The Northern states gave evidence of sincerity in the immediate prohibition of all traffic in slaves at their own ports. The off-setting concession to the commercial interests of the North was the omission from the constitution of the amendment, urged by Southern planters, requiring a two thirds' majority for the adoption of any restrictions on navigation. The merchants of the seaports, finding their trade injured by the British Navigation Act, were demanding compensating protection. Bates, Ch. VII. Legislation in Behalf of Shipping. One of the first petiAm. Marine, tions received by the Federal Congress was drawn up by the merchants of Baltimore. It stated that "among the advantages looked for from the national government is the increase of the shipping and the maritime strength of the United States of America by laws similar in their nature and The ship Am. State I, 9-11, 108. operation to the British Navigation Acts." wrights of Charleston, South Carolina, petitioned to the same effect, begging that Congress would relieve the distresses that had fallen on shipwrights throughout the United States in consequence of the decline in that branch of business. A Massachusetts representative, Mr. Goodhue, proposed that duties to the amount of sixty cents per ton be levied on all Annals of foreign vessels coming into our harbors, as an offset to the Congress, 1789-1791, charges to which American vessels were subject in British I, 176-191, and Continental ports. This tonnage duty was protested 233-289. by Tucker of South Carolina. "Some States, it is well known, have more tonnage than is sufficient to carry all their small productions to a market; of course, a duty on foreign ships will not affect them. Other States, which have considerable quantities of more bulky articles to export, and require a greater number of ships, having few or none of their own, must consequently be subjected to the whole of the additional duty; for, whether the vessels be foreign or American, the freight will be the same. Much of the produce of South Carolina is carried off by foreigners, and in American shipping a considerable quantity is exported. The duty will be paid equally, in either case, by the shipper, for the freight of American vessels will be raised to an equality with the other; and of all this money so paid, there comes into the Treasury that part only collected from foreigners; the rest, as I said before, goes as bounty to benefit the owners of American ships." Of the 437 37,641 tons of shipping employed in the commerce of the United States, about one third was owned by foreigners. The proportion varied from ten per cent foreign tonnage in the ports of Massachusetts to sixty-seven per cent in those of Georgia. It was evident that the commercial states would gain far more by discriminating duties than an agricultural state such as Virginia, where few seagoing vessels were built or owned, and where fifty-two per cent of the exports was carried by foreigners. The result of the debate was the Navigation Act of 1789, by which preference was given in the ports of the United States to vessels either built or owned by American citizens. Such ships were to pay tonnage duties at the rate of six cents per ton of hold capacity; vessels built in the United States but partly or wholly owned by foreigners must pay thirty cents per ton; vessels built and owned abroad, fifty cents. All vessels engaged in the coastwise trade and carrying American products, Annals of Congress, 1789-1791, 1, 258, 259. Marvin, Ch. XV. Abbot, Ch. IV, VI. Annals of unless they were both built and owned in the United States, were to pay fifty cents tonnage duty at every entry. The more stringent regulation of 1817 declared the forfeiture of all goods taken on board a foreign vessel to be transported from one to another United States port. The effect of this legislation was to give American shipmasters the monopoly of the coastwise trade, a monopoly that has persisted to the present time. In foreign commerce, vessels owned and built in the United States were given so considerable an advantage that they were able to offer lower freight rates than their competitors, and so to secure the lion's share of the trade. By the Tariff Act of 1789 our ships were given a farther advantage, in that ten per cent was deducted from the customs duties collected on goods imported in American bottoms. The effect of discriminating duties, and of the law of 1792 excluding foreign-built vessels from American registry, was soon evident in the rapid increase in the number of vessels flying the American flag. The shipyards were busy building vessels for the coastwise and ocean trade. Foreigners engaged in transatlantic commerce naturalized in the United States that they might participate in the privileges secured to American shipmasters. The total tonnage registered for the foreign trade rose from 123,893 in 1789 to 981,019 in 1810, and the proportion of foreign trade carried on in United States vessels increased from 23.6 per cent to 91.5 per cent during the same interval. The most notable development of these years was in trade with the Orient. Commerce with India and China, hitherto monopolized by the East India Company, was fostered by special discrimination. The tariff of 1789 levied an extra duty of 12.5 per cent on goods imported from India and China in foreign vessels. Tea paid a duty of from six to twelve cents per pound when imported in American vessels direct from China; when brought in an American vessel from a British or European port, the duty paid varied from eight to twenty-six cents. If the whole journey was made in foreign bottoms, the charge was from |