would smuggle in
upon us by this distinction between agricultural produce and
manufactured produce.

"It is," say the petitioners of Bordeaux, "principally in this first
class (that which comprehends raw material, _untouched by human labor_)
that we find _the principal encouragement of our merchant vessels_.... A
wise system of political economy would require that this class should
not be taxed.... The second class (articles which have received some
preparation) may be considered as taxable. The third (articles which
have received from labor all the finish of which they are capable) we
regard as _most proper for taxation_."

"Considering," say the petitioners of Havre, "that it is indispensable
to reduce _immediately_ and to the _lowest rate_, the raw material, in
order that manufacturing industry may give employment to our merchant
vessels, which furnish its first and indispensable means of labor."

The manufacturers could not allow themselves to be behindhand in
civilities towards the ship-owners, and accordingly the petition of
Lyons demands the free introduction of raw material, "in order to
prove," it remarks, "that the interests of manufacturing towns are not
opposed to those of maritime cities."

This may be true enough; but it must be confessed that both, taken in
the sense of the petitioners, are terribly adverse to the interest of
agriculture and of consumers.

This, then, gentlemen, is the aim of all your subtle distinctions! You
wish the law to oppose the maritime transportation of _manufactured_
articles, in order that the much more expensive transportation of the
raw material should, by its larger bulk, in its rough, dirty and
unimproved condition, furnish a more extensive business to your
_merchant vessels_. And this is what you call a _wise system of
political economy_!

Why not also petition for a law requiring that fir-trees, imported from
Russia, should not be admitted without their branches, bark, and roots;
that Mexican gold should be imported in the state of ore, and Buenos
Ayres leathers only allowed an entrance into our ports, while still
hanging to the dead bones and putrefying bodies to which they belong?

The stockholders of railroads, if they can obtain a majority in the
Chambers, will no doubt soon favor us with a law forbidding the
manufacture, at Cognac, of the brandy used in Paris. For, surely, they
would consider it a wise law, which would, by forcing the transportation
of ten c