s." He avowed his belief that "the internal competition
which takes place, soon does away with every thing like monopoly,
and by degrees reduces the price of the article to the _minimum_
of a reasonable profit on the capital employed. This accords with
the reason of the thing and with experience." He contended that
"a reduction has in several instances immediately succeeded the
establishment of domestic manufacture." But even if this result
should not follow, he maintained that "in a national view a temporary
enhancement of price must always be well compensated by a permanent
reduction of it." The doctrine of protection, even with the enlarged
experience of subsequent years, has never been more succinctly or
more felicitously stated.

Objections to the enforcement of the "protective" principle founded
on a lack of constitutional power were summarily dismissed by Mr.
Hamilton as "having no good foundation." He had been a member of
the convention that formed the Constitution, and had given attention
beyond any other member to the clauses relating to the collection
and appropriation of revenue. He said the "power to raise money"
as embodied in the Constitution "is plenary and indefinite," and
"the objects for which it may be appropriated are no less comprehensive
than the payment of the public debts, the providing for the common
defense and the _general welfare_." He gives the widest scope to
the phrase "general welfare," and declares that "it is of necessity
left to the discretion of the national Legislature to pronounce
upon the objects which concern the general welfare, and for which
under that description an appropriation of money is requisite and
proper." Mr. Hamilton elaborates his argument on this head with
consummate power, and declares that "the only qualification" to
the power of appropriation under the phrase "general welfare" is
that the purpose for which the money is applied shall "be _general_,
and not _local_, its operation extending in fact throughout the
Union, and not being confined to a particular spot." The limitations
and hypercritical objections to the powers conferred by the
Constitution, both in the raising and appropriating of money,
originated in large part after the authors of that great charter
had passed away, and have been uniformly stimulated by class
interests which were not developed when the organic law was enacted.

Some details of Mr. Hamilton's report are especially interest