seems to have had for its object the creation of impediments to domestic commerce, and the subjugation of our farmers to the tyranny of foreign traders. Look, if you please, to the almost endless series of laws having for their object the compulsory use of gold and silver, in a country which exports the precious metals to such extent as to have driven our people, throughout a large extent of country, to the payment of three, four, and five per cent per month, for the use of the small amount of money which, even at such rates, can be obtained. Turn next to the postage law proposed by your Southern free trade friends, at the last session, by. means of which the charge for the transmission of letters was to be almost doubled. Study then the constant succession of free trade crises, by means of which our domestic commerce has been so often paralyzed. Pass on, and find the closing of furnaces and mills, followed by constant increase of difficulty in the sale of labor-constantly growing pauperism and crime and as constant increase of that dependence upon foreign markets which has, in every other country, been attended by growth of slavery among men, whether black, brown, or white. Look where you may, you will find the system of which you have been the steady advocate, leading to the adoption of measures directly opposed to the teachings of Adam Smith and those of his most distinguished successors, here endorsed by Louis Napoleon.

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Turn next to another passage of the imperial letter, and find in it that agriculture must have "its share in the benefits of the institutions of credit," and that the government must "devote annually a considerable sum to works of drainage, irrigation, and clearage." Having read this, study, if you please, the proceedings of your free trade friends, constantly engaged as they have been, in the effort to destroy the credit of banks, and to prevent the substitution of paper for gold - and thus so far destroying confidence, that tens of millions of specie are now hoarded in private vaults by men who dare not spend it, and fear to lend it at any interest whatsoever.-Turn, thence, to the condition of our treasury, and contrast it with that of France. the latter proposing to lend money to the people at low interest, while the former is constantly in the market as a borrower, and at higher rates of interest than are paid by any government that claims to rank as civilized.

Pass next to manufactures, and find the Emperor telling his minister that, "to encourage industrial production, he must liberate from every tax all raw material indispensable to industry," and that he must "allow it, exceptionally, and at a moderate rate, as has already been done for agriculture, the funds necessary to perfect its raw material"-meaning thereby, as I understand it, further grants of aid similar to those which have resulted in improving the breed of sheep, and in giving to French agriculture many products not native to the soil, and yet essential to the perfection of manufactures.-Having studied this, allow me next to request that you will examine the teachings of the author of the tariff of 1846-the tariff you have so steadily admired-and find him protesting against the imposition of "higher duties upon the manufactured fabric than upon the agricultural product out of which it is made.” Examine, then, his tariff, and find in it a systematic effort at the discouragement of industrial production by the imposition of heavy duties on the raw material of manufactures sometimes so great. even, as to

exceed those paid by the finished commodities for the production of which they were needed to be used. That done, look next at the repeated efforts of private individuals to improve our breed of sheep, and at the ruin that has been the consequence· that ruin having resulted necessarily from changes of policy that have closed our factories and sent merinos to the slaughter-house. Look in what direction you may, you will find that, with the exception of the brief and brilliant period of the tariff of 1842, the men engaged in the development of our great mineral treasures, and those engaged in introducing, extending, and fecting works of conversion, and thereby giving the farmer a market for his products, have been regarded as enemies, deserving only of the hatred of the government; as men for the accomplishment of whose ruin fraud and falsehood might justly be resorted to the holiness of the end sanctifying the-employment of any means that might be used.

Adopting these ideas, the Emperor assures his minister that he will find in them the road toward real freedom of trade the great extension of commerce producing a necessity for "successive reductions of the duty on articles of great consumption, as also the substitution of protecting duties for the prohibitive system which limits our commercial relations."Having read this, do me the favor to turn to the period of the protective tariff of 1828, and find there precisely the state of things here described the great increase of revenue having then produced a necessity for abolishing the duties that had always thus far been paid by tea and coffee. Look, next, to the working of that dispersive system, which scatters our population over the continent, and destroys the power of combination - at one moment filling the treasury to repletion by means of custom-house receipts and sales of public lands, and then leaving it bankrupt, to seek, as was done in 1842, and is now being done, for loans abroad, to keep the wheels of government in motion until the tariff can be raised.

The policy of the French Government was accurately defined, some three or four years since, by the President of the Council, and there is nothing in the Emperor's letter that is not in strict accordance with the determination then expressed, as follows:

"The Government formally rejects the principle of free trade, as incompatible with the independence and security of a great nation, and as destructive of her noblest manufactures. No doubt, our customs-tariffs contain useless and antiquated prohibitions, and we think they must be removed. Protection, however, is necessary to our manufactures. This protection must not be blind, unchangeable, or excessive; but the principle of it must be firmly maintained.”

We are told, however, that a treaty has been signed, in which there are great advances toward freedom of trade. If so, it does but prove the perfect accuracy of M. Chevalier, who is said to have been the French negociator, in regarding protection of the domestic commerce as the real and certain mode of reaching freedom of intercourse with foreign nations. "In every country," as he has told his readers, "there arises a necessity for acclimating among its people the principal branches of industry" agriculture alone becoming insufficient. Every community, considerable in numbers, and occupying an extensive territory," is therefore, as he thinks, "well inspired, when seeing to the establish

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ment, among its members, of diversity in the modes of employment. From the moment that it approaches maturity, it should seek to prepare itself therefor, and when it fails to do so, it makes a great mistake." This "combination of varied effort," as he continues, "is not only promotive of general prosperity, but it is the condition of national progress." Elsewhere, he says, that "governments are, in effect, the personification of nations, and it is required that they should exercise their influence in the direction indicated by the general interest, properly studied and carefully appreciated." Therefore does he "regard as excellent, the. desire of some of the most eminent men of the principal nations of Europe to establish around them the various branches of manufactures."

Such being the latest views of the present leading free-trade writer of France, we may, I think, feel quite assured that what he may now have done, is only what he has regarded as warranted by the advanced position occupied by French manufactures-that position having been attained by means of a steady pursuit of the protective policy. It is the point at which we have ourselves arrived in reference to every branch of manufacture that has found itself efficiently protected in the domestic market, whether by the particular circumstances of the case, or by aid of revenue laws. More steadily than to any other, was protection given to the production of coarse cottons, and hence it is, that we now export them. The newspaper is protected by locality, and that protection is absolute and complete; and hence it is, that we have now the cheapest journals in the world. The piano manufacture is protected by climate; and therefore it is, that it has attained a development exceeding that of any other country. Had iron been as well protected, our annual product would count by millions of tons, and we should be now exporting, in the forms of iron, and manufactures of iron, a quantity of food twice greater than that we send to Europe. All our experience shows, that the more perfect the security of the manufacturer in the domestic market, the greater is the tendency to that increase of competition needed for enabling us soon to commence the work of supplying the exterior world.

In your notice of the changes now proposed in the French commercial system, you speak in terms of high approval of Mons. Chevalier, as a "zealous adversary of commercial restrictions," but have you ever, my dear sir, taught the doctrines of the teacher of whom you now so much approve? Have you ever told your readers,—

That "every community is well-inspired when seeing to the establishment among its members, of diversity in the modes of employment"? That "combination of varied effort is the condition of national progress "?

That "every nation, therefore, owes it to itself to seek the establishment of diversification in the pursuits of its people, as Germany and England have already done in regard to cottons and woollens, and as France has done in reference to so many, and so widely-different kinds of manufacturing industry"?

That "governments are in effect the personification of nations, and should exercise their influence in the direction of the general interest, properly studied and fully appreciated"? And, therefore

That "it is only the accomplishment of a positive duty so to act, at

each epoch in the progress of a nation, as to favor the taking possession of all the branches of industry whose acquisition is authorized by the nature of things"?

Unhappily, such have not been the teachings of the Post. Had they been such-had your journal sustained the policy advocated by Mons. Chevalier, as here established at the date of the fearful financial crisis of 1842, should we not, even at this time, have been far advanced toward that position in which we could feel that protection would cease to be required? Unfortunately, it has taught the reverse of this- the results exhibiting themselves in a constant succession of financial crises, and paralyses of the most fearful kind -in repeated bankruptcies of the treasury, of banks, railroad companies, and merchants in an almost entire destruction of confidence in the subjugation of the poor borrower to the rich money-lender, to an extent unparalleled in any civilized country of the world—and in a growth of pauperism, slavery, and crime, that must be arrested if we would not see a perfection of anarchy established as being the condition of our national existence.

Had you and others taught the doctrines of M. Chevalier, would such be now the state of things in a country so richly endowed by nature as our own?

Not having taught them, and such having been the results of your past teachings, is it not now your duty, as a man, as a lover of liberty, and as a Christian, to study anew the doctrines of the economist you have so much commended, and satisfy yourself that you have been steadily advocating the extension of slavery while desiring to be the advocate of freedom?

Hoping that you may conclude to furnish answers to these questions, and reiterating the assurance that they shall have the largest circulation among the advocates of protection, I remain, my dear sir,

Yours, very truly,

W. C. BRYANT, Esq.

HENRY C. CAREY.

PHILADELPHIA, February 14, 1860.

LETTER EIGHTH.

DEAR SIR. For the maintenance of colonial dependence, and for the perpetuation of power to compel the colonists to make their exchanges in a foreign market from which they were allowed to carry away but onefourth of the real value of their products, it was, as you have already seen, held that they should be led to disperse themselves throughout the West- thereby almost annihilating that power of association which, as then was feared, might lead to such increase of wealth and strength as would forward the cause of independence. For the accomplishment of that great object, the aid of government was then invoked-its help being needed for providing lands and means of transportation. Since then, the British free trade system has been employed to do the work, its mode of action being that one so well described in a Parliamentary document now but a few years old, the following extract from which is here submitted for your perusal :

"The laboring classes generally, in the manufacturing districts of this country, and especially in the iron and coal districts, are very little aware of the extent to which they are often indebted for their being employed at all to the immense losses which their employers voluntarily incur in bad times, in order to destroy foreign competition, and to gain and keep possession of foreign markets. Authentic instances are well known of employers having in such times carried on their works at a loss amounting in the aggregate to three or four hundred thousand pounds in the course of three or four years. If the efforts of those who encourage the combinations to restrict the amount of labor and to produce strikes were to be successful for any length of time, the great accumulations of capital could no longer be made which enable a few of the most wealthy capitalists to overwhelm all foreign competition in times of great depression, and thus to clear the way for the whole trade to step in when prices revive, and to carry on a great business before foreign capital can again accumulate to such an extent as to be able to establish a competition in prices with any chance of success. The large capitals of this country are the great instruments of warfare against the competing capital of foreign countries, and are the most essential instruments now remaining by which our manufacturing supremacy can be maintained; the other elements-cheap labor, abundance of raw materials, means of communication, and skilled labor-being rapidly in process of being equalized."

The system here so admirably described, is very properly characterized as being a "warfare;" and it may now be proper to inquire for what purposes, and against whom, it is waged. It is a war, as you see, my dear sir, for cheapening all the commodities we have to sell, labor and raw materials-being precisely the object sought to be accomplished by that "Mercantile System," whose error was so well exposed in the Wealth of Nations. It is a war for compelling the people of all other lands to confine themselves to agriculture- for preventing the diversification of employments in other countries for retarding the development of intellect for palsying every movement, elsewhere, looking to the utili zation of the metallic treasures of the earth-for increasing the difficulty of obtaining iron-for diminishing the demand for labor-for doing all