may appear, it was no more then, than 'the action suited to the word.""* The debate resulted in the exclusion of Mr. Gallatin. Early in the year 1796, he was appointed by President Washington, minister to the Court of Great Britain, in which service he remained seven years. While abroad his relations with the literary and public men of the day, were intimate and distinguished. By the "mild dignity of his manners, and his capacity for public business, he acquired and maintained a powerful personal influence, which he exerted to advance the interests of his country." He returned to New York in 1803, and five years after removed to his estate on Long Island, where he resided until the commencement of the war of 1812, when he again entered the scenes of political life. In 1813 he was chosen by the legislature of New York, a Senator of the United States. The nation was at that time involved in a war with England. "At this momentous crisis," says one of his cotemporaries, "when many of the stoutest hearts were appalled, and the weak despaired of the Republic, Mr. King was neither idle nor dismayed. His love of country dispelled his attachments to party. No habit of opposition could induce him to forget that the United States was his country, and that the rights and honor of that country he ought to support and maintain. It has been observed that the conduct of the British, exhibited in their destruction of Washington, tended to unite all parties in America. The speech of Mr. King, in the Senate, on this occasion, while it may compare with any of his former efforts, in eloquence, has the rare and enviable distinction of being approved and applauded for its sentiments also, by the entire nation." During his attendance at Congress, in 1816, he was nominated for the office of Governor of New York. With reluctance, and after much solicitation, he acquiesced in the nomination. The result, however, was unfavorable to the expectations of his friends. In 1820 he was again returned to the Senate, where he continued until the expiration of the term, in March, 1825. The most important measures originated by him during his senatorial term are, the law requiring cash payments upon sales of the public lands, and the act of 1818, which is the foundation of the navigation system of the United States. On his retirement from Congress, he intended to close his political career; but, with the hope of contributing to the adjustment of several disputed questions between Great Britain and the United States, he accepted the mission to the British Court, tendered him by President Adams. His appointment proved satisfactory to the ministers of the British Court. On his arrival in England he was treated with distinguished and respectful consideration; but his health was so impaired, by a disease often the consequence of a voyage, that he never entered upon the active duties of his office. After remaining abroad a year, in the hope of re-establishing his health, without any improvement, he returned to his native land, where, cheered by the attentions of an affectionate family, and with resignation, he died on the 29th of April, 1827.† THE NAVIGATION ACT. THIS speech on the "American Navigation | power of nations. Agriculture is the chief and Act," was delivered by Mr. King, in the Senate of the United States, on the third day of April, 1818: Agriculture, Manufactures, and Foreign Commerce are the true source of the wealth and Delaplaine's Repository: Article Rufus King. + Maryland Gazette, 1818, and the American Annual Register. Curtis's History of the Constitution of the United States. The first section of this Act provided, "that from and after the 30th of September, 1818, the ports of the United well rewarded occupation of our people, and yields, in addition to what we want for our own use, a great surplus for exportation. Manufactures are making a sure and steady progress; and, with the abundance of food and of raw materials, which the country affords, will, at no distant day, be sufficient, in the principal States should be and should remain closed against every vessel owned, wholly or in part, by a subject or subjects of His Britannic Majesty, coming or arriving from any port or place in a colony or territory of His Britannic Majesty, that was or should be by the ordinary laws of navigation and branches, for our own consumption, and furnish | war. According to this system the colonies a valuable addition to our exports. But, without shipping and seamen, the surpluses of agriculture and of manufactures would depreciate on our hands: the cotton, tobacco, bread stuffs, provisions and manufactures would turn out to be of little worth, unless we have ships and mariners to carry them abroad, and to distribute them in the foreign markets. Nations have adopted different theories, as respects the assistance to be derived from navigation; some have been content with a passive foreign commerce-owning no ships themselves, but depending on foreigners and foreign vessels to bring them their supplies, and to purchase of them their surpluses; while others, and almost every modern nation that borders upon the ocean, have preferred an active foreign trade, carried on, as far as consistent with the reciprocal rights of others, by national ships and seamen. A dependence upon foreign navigation subjects those who are so dependent, to the known disadvantages from foreign wars, and to the expense and risk of the navigation of belligerent nations the policy of employing a national shipping is, therefore, almost universally approved and adopted: it affords not only a more certain means of prosecuting foreign commerce, but the freight, as well as the profits of trade, are added to the stock of the nation. The value and importance of national shipping and seamen, have created among the great maritime powers, and particularly in England, a strong desire to acquire, by restrictions and exclusions, a disproportionate share of the general commerce of the world. As all nations have equal rights, and each may claim equal advantages in its intercourse with others, the true theory of international commerce is one of equality, and of reciprocal benefits: this theory gives to enterprise, to skill and to capital, their just and natural advantages; any other scheme is artificial; and so far as it aims at advantages over those who adhere to the open system, it aims at profit at the expense of natural justice. The colonial system being founded in this vicious theory, has, therefore, proved to be the fruitful source of dissatisfaction, insecurity and were depressed below the rank of their fellow subjects, and the fruits of their industry and their intercourse with foreign countries, placed under different regulations from those of the inhabitants of the mother country. It was the denial to Americans of the rights enjoyed by Englishmen, that produced the American revolution-and the same cause, greatly aggravated, is producing the same effect in South America. Among the navigators and discoverers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Dutch became highly distinguished, and, by enterprise, economy and perseverance, made themselves the carriers of other nations, and their country the entrepot of Europe-and it was not until the middle of the last mentioned century, that England passed her Navigation Act, which had for its object, to curtail the navigation of the Dutch and to extend her own. According to this act, the whole trade and intercourse between England, Asia, Africa and America, were confined to the shipping and mariners of England; and the intercourse between England and the rest of Europe was placed under regulations which, in a great measure, confined the same to English ships and English seamen. This act was strenuously opposed by the Dutch, and proved the occasion of the obstinate naval wars that afterwards followed. England was victorious; persisted in her Navigation Act, and, in the end, broke down the monopoly in trade which the Dutch. had until then possessed. That in vindication of her equal right to navigate the ocean, England should have resisted the monopoly of the Dutch, and freely expended her blood and treasure to obtain her just share of the general commerce, deserved the approbation of all impartial men. But, having accomplished this object, that she should herself aim at, and in the end establish, the same exclusive system, and on a more extended scale, is neither consistent with her own laudable principles, nor compatible with the rights of others; who, relatively to her monopoly now, are in the like situation towards England, as England was towards the Dutch, when she asserted and made good her rights against them. By the English Act of Navigation, the trade of her colonies is restrained to the dominions of the mother country; and none but English ships, "whereof the master and three-fourths of her mariners are English," are allowed to engage in it. So long as colonies are within such limits as leaves to other nations a convenient resort to foreign markets for the exchange of the goods which they have to sell, for those they want to buy, so long this system is tolerable; but if the power of a state enables it to increase the number of its colonies and dependent territories, so that it becomes the mistress of the great military and commercial stations throughout the globe, this extension of dominion, and the consequent monopoly of commerce, seem to be in compatible with, and necessarily to abridge the equal rights of other states. In the late debates of the English Parliament, the minister in the House of Lords stated, "that instead of seventeen thousand men, employed abroad in 1791, forty-one thousand were then (1816) required, exclusive of those that were serving in France and in India. That England now has forty-three principal colonies, in all of which troops are necessary; that sixteen of these principal colonies were acquired since 1791, and six of them had grown into that rank from mere colonial dependencies." And in the House of Commons the minister, alluding to the acquisitions made during the late war with France, said, “that Englard had acquired what, in former days, would have been thought a romance-she had acquired the keys of every great military station. Thus the commercial aggrandizement of England has become such, as that the men who protested against monopoly, and devised the Navigation Act to break it down, could never have anticipated. And it may, ere long, concern other nations to inquire whether laws and principles, applicable to the narrow limits of English dominion and commerce, at the date of the Navigation Act, when colonies and commerce, and even navigation itself, were comparatively in their infancy; laws and principles aimed against monopoly, and adopted to secure to England her just share in the general commerce and navigation, ought to be used by England to perpetuate in her own hands a system equally as exclusive, and far more comprehensive, than that which she was the chief agent to abolish. | the Navigation Act, which she was at liberty to do, by opening a direct intercourse between the colonies and a foreign country, but controlling, which she had no authority to do, the reciprocal rights of the United States to employ their own vessels to carry it on. Colonies, being parts of the nation,* are subject to its regulations, and, according to the practice of Europe, they have been considered as a monopoly of the mother country; but, as has been stated in former discussions of this subject, when an intercourse and trade are once opened between colonies and a foreign country, the foreign country becomes a party, and thereby has a reciprocal claim to employ its own vessels and seamen equally in the intercourse and trade with such colonies, as with any other part of the nation to which they belong. Governments owe it to the trust confided to them, carefully to watch over, and by all suitable means to promote, the general welfare; and while, on account of a small or doubtful inconvenience, they will not disturb a beneficial intercourse between their own people and a foreign country, they ought not to omit the interposition of their corrective authority, whenever an important public interest is invaded, or the national reputation affected.— "It is good not to try experiments in states unless the necessity be urgent, or the utility evident; and it is well to beware, that it be the reformation that draweth on the change, and not the desire of change that pretendeth the reformation." In this case the importance of the reformation is seen and acknowledged by every one, and the delay that has occurred in the making of it may call for explanation. Our commercial system is an open one-our ports and commerce are free to all. We neither We are unable to state with accuracy the possess, nor desire to possess, colonies; nor do tonnage and seamen employed before the revowe object that others should possess them, sub-lution, in the trade between the territories of ject to the ordinary rules and regulations of the United States and the other English colonies; the colonial system, unless thereby the general | but it is known to have been a principal branch commerce of the world be so abridged, that we of the American navigation. The colonies that are restrained in our intercourse with foreign England has since acquired from France, Spain, countries wanting our supplies, and furnishing and Holland, together with the increased popuin return, those which we stand in need of. lation of the old colonies, require more ships and seamen to be employed in the trade now, than were engaged in it before the independence of the United States. Without reference to the tonnage and trade between the United States and the English West India colonies, during the late wars between England and France, which, by reason of the suspension of the English Navigation Act, and the neutrality of the United States, will not afford a correct standard by which the tonnage and trade in time of peace can be ascertained: our customhouse returns are the best documents that we It is not, however, to the colonial system, but to a new principle, which, in modern times, has been incorporated with those of the Navigation Act, that we now object. According to this act, no direct trade or intercourse can be carried on between a colony and a foreign country; but yet, by the free port bill, passed in the present reign, the English contraband trade, which had been long pursued, in violation of Spanish laws, between the English and Spanish colonies, was sanctioned and regulated by an English act of parliament; and, since the independence of the United States, England has passed laws, opening an intercourse and trade between her West India colonies and the United States, and, excluding the shipping and seamen of the United States, has confined the same to English ships and seamen; thus departing not only from the principles of side we are safe; against dangers from the ocean, a navy will prove to be our cheap, our sure, and most efficient defence. Although a subject of doubt heretofore, this truth is now so well understood, and so universally admitted, that it would be to misspend the time of the Senate to enter into its development. can consult upon this subject. According to a houses, our harbors, and our commerce, from late report from the department of the treas-foreign aggression and violence, a navy is acury, the tonnage employed in this trade during knowledged to be necessary. From the land the year 1816, which may be taken as a pretty fair average, amounted to one hundred and two thousand tons, requiring upwards of five thousand seamen. There may be some error in this return, though we are not able to detect it. The magnitude and importance of the shipping and seamen engaged in this trade will be more readily understood by comparison than other- An efficient navy never has existed, and wise. The tonnage thus employed exceeds the cannot exist, without a commercial marine, and whole tonnage employed by the English East the maritime history of Europe, which abounds India Company in its trade with Asia; is nearly with instruction on this subject, demonstrates a moiety of the American and English tonnage this political truth, that the naval power of employed between the United States and Eng-every nation is in proportion to its ships and land, and her possessions in Europe-is equal seamen. Money may build ships, but the navito the American tonnage employed between the United States and England, and is almost an eighth part of the whole registered tonnage of the United States. gation of the great ocean only can make seamen; and it is in connection with this view of the subject, that the exclusion of our shipping and seamen from the navigation between the United States and the colonies of England, derives its chief importance. To the loss of profits which would accrue from an equal participation in this trade, may be added the loss of an equal share of the The prosperity and safety of nations are profreights made by the vessels engaged in it-the moted and established, by institutions early and aggregate amount whereof must be equal to wisely adapted to these ends. A navy, being two millions of dollars, annually. Other ad- such an institution, and our experience having vantages are enjoyed by England in the posses-proved its importance, it has become the duty of sion of the exclusive navigation between the United States and her colonies, and between them and England. Freights are made by English vessels between England and the United States; between them and the English colonies, as well as between these colonies and England. English voyages are thus made on the three sides of the triangle, while those of the United States are confined to one side of it; that between the United States and England. But the money value of this great portion of our navigation, claimed and hitherto enjoyed by England, although an object that deserves | the public protection, is not the most important view in which the same should be considered by the Senate. We must learn wisdom from past times; and while the experience of the father is too often lost on the son, this ought not to be the case in the affairs of nations, which, living from age to age, and profiting by long experience, should become wiser as they grow older. The present condition of nations, and especially that of the inhabitants of our own continent, merits our watchful attention, and admonishes us to cherish our national resources, and seasonably to devise, and perseveringly to build up, those establishments that our present safety demands, and which may be commensurate with our future destiny. Congress to adopt and to enforce those regulations that are necessary to its efficient establishment. In addition to the protection of the fisheries, none more efficacious can be devised, than such as shall secure to our own shipping and seamen a full participation in the national navigation; thereby shutting out any foreign power from the exclusive enjoyment of a principal branch thereof; a branch that now educates and holds ready for service in the navy of England, and which would educate and hold ready for service in our own navy, were the United States, instead of England, in the possession thereof, a body of several thousand seamen. But, by passing this act, shall we not cut ourselves off from those foreign supplies, which our habits have rendered indispensable as well as desirable? Will not the English colonial markets for supplies hitherto purchased and exported among us, be lost to them? And shall we increase our navigation by adopting the law? The documents that have been communicated to the Senate, by the chairman of the Committee of Foreign Relations (Mr. Barbour), satisfactorily prove, that we are independent of the English colonies for a supply of sugar and coffee, for our own consumption; our annual re-exportation of these articles exceeding Justice and moderation, which, we confi- the quantity of them annually imported from dently hope, may preside over, and guide our the English colonies: and, in respect to rum, public counsels, have not been found to be a the other article imported from these colonies, sufficient armor for the defence of nations. its exclusion will be the loss to England of its "Wisdom, in the ancient mythology, was rep-best, if not only market; and its place will be resented as armed, because experience had readily supplied by other foreign rum and by proved, that good examples and noble precepts brandy: or, which is more probable, as well as fail of their efficacy, unaccompanied by a power more desirable, by domestic spirits distilled to enforce them." To defend ourselves, our from grain. The exports from the United States to the English West India colonies have been estimated at four millions of dollars annually. The problem has been disputed ever since the independence of the United States, and still remains to be solved, whether these colonies could obtain from any other quarter the supplies received from the United States. To make this experiment, effectually, further restrictions and regulations may become necessary, which it is not now deemed expedient to propose. If the question be decided in the negative, the supplies will be continued from the United States, and our shipping will be benefited. If the articles heretofore supplied from this country can be obtained elsewhere, we must find out other markets for our exports, or the labor employed in preparing them must be applied to some other branch of industry. We have the power, and hereafter it may become our policy, as it is that of other countries, to resort to measures, the effect of which would go far to balance any disadvantage arising from the loss of the English colonial markets. We import annually upwards of six million gallons of West India rum, more than half of which comes from the English colonies; we also import every year nearly seven million gallons of molasses; and as every gallon of molasses yields, by distillation, a gallon of rum, the rum imported, added to that distilled from molasses, is probably equal to twelve million gallons; which enormous quantity is chiefly consumed by citizens of the United States. If the importation of rum and molasses for distillation be prohibited, it would require, at least, four million bushels of grain for distillation to supply an equal quantity of ardent spirits; and in this way, our agriculture would be indemnified for any loss it might suffer by an exclusion from the English colonial markets. As respects the timber and lumber trade, including staves and woods, in all the forms in which we prepare them for exportation, should no foreign markets be found to supply those, which, by the imposition of high duties in England, and those, which, by the passing of this bill, we may lose in the colonies, those who are engaged in this precarious, and, generally, ill paid and unprofitable business, will hereafter confine their supplies to our domestic wants, which are constantly increasing, and to the foreign markets, that are neither affected by English duties, nor the bill before us. The timber of the country is becoming scarce, and more and more an object of public concern. The forests upon the frontier of the ocean, and on the great rivers leading to it, are nearly destroyed. In other countries, and even in Russia, the improvident waste of their timber, especially in the neighborhood of their great iron works, has become a subject of national solicitude. Masts, spars, pine, and oak timber fit for naval purposes, and for the other numerous uses for which timber and wood are wanted, were far more abundant and of better quality formerly, and within the memory of men now living, than they are at the present day; and a little more care and economy in the use of our timber, even now, would confer an important benefit on posterity. The probability, however, is, that as respects our valuable timber, we shall not want foreign markets for all we ought to spare. As a general rule, it is correct, that every person should be free to follow the business he may prefer, since, by the freedom, sagacity and enterprise of individuals, the general welfare is commonly promoted. There are, however, exceptions to this principle; and, as general rules affect unequally individual concerns, and measures adopted for the common welfare may, from the nature and end of society, sometimes interfere with private pursuits, the latter must give way for, and yield to, the former; and, in this case, the general welfare, and the interest that all have, in the encouragement and protection of the shipping and seamen of the country, take precedence over the private and individual interests of persons, whose occupations may thereby be somewhat affected. As to the last point, whether we shall increase our own navigation and seamen, by passing the bill, it may be observed: if England meets us in the temper that we hope she may, and enters into a reciprocally beneficial arrangement, concerning the navigation of the two countries, our shipping will acquire thereby a portion of the carrying trade, now exclusively possessed by her; if she persist in her exclusive system, and thus compels us to meet restriction with restriction, we shall not be losers by this course, but shall ultimately be gainers. According to the English navigation act, as well as the act of parliament, that departs from it, and opens an intercourse between the English colonies and the United States, we are excluded from any share in the navigation between these colonies and the United States. No notice is taken of the occasional relaxation of the latter act, because, by the double competition created by the Americans themselves, as sellers and buyers in the English colonies, the intercourse is probably disadvantageous, rather than beneficial to us. According to the permanent law, English shipping only brings to us her West India supplies, and takes in return the articles wanted in these colonies. If English shipping be no longer employed in this service, and the articles formerly sent to these colonies are exported to other markets, or the supplies received from them are sought for, and imported into the United States from other places, the vessels of the United States will be employed in this service, and so the navigation and mariners of the country will be encouraged and increased. It will doubtless be found, as it has been heretofore, that new markets will be discovered, as well for our surpluses, as for our wants, should those be lost with which we have formerly had intercourse. But, why has a measure of this importance |