tax on lumber. The Ministers of
Canada have at once conceded this, and agree that internal duties may be
levied on all they send to us, and thus meet in advance the position of
Mr. Sumner. They have shown a desire to revive the Treaty, and to
cherish the great commerce between contiguous states. Mr. Derby reports
to the State Department that they will extend the free list, and include
our manufactures; that they will discourage illicit trade, and repeal
all discriminating tolls and duties. The position taken by the Ministers
of Canada is eminently wise and judicious. While we may not concede all
the privileges they ask, is it our policy to decline to negotiate,--to
shut out the materials we require and can command at low rates? Is it
wise to propose, as a committee of Congress has done, to reduce a free
commerce of seven millions of tons to a traffic in plaster and
millstones, and thus jeopard our fisheries and stimulate smuggling? The
Canadian Ministers, who visited Washington on business connected with
the Treaty, were kindly received by our Executive. They placed the
Provinces on the true ground by their proffered concessions and offers
to negotiate, and can stand at home upon the ground they took, while
their course in retiring after the rebuff they received from the
committee was dignified and judicious. When Congress has disposed of
reconstruction, and found leisure to attend to revenue and finance; when
it sees that we need new materials for our rising manufactures, and
require access both by the east and the west to the exhaustless pine
forests of Canada,[G] to provincial oats and barley, purchasable at
rates lower than those at which the West can afford to send them, and to
coal on coasts which Nature designed for the supply of the gas-works and
steamers of New England; when it finds proclamations issued excluding
our fishermen from the waters to which the mackerel resort,--then
Congress at last will doubtless be willing to resume negotiations, and
to give to us coal, wood, butter, grain, fish, lumber, and horses at
reasonable prices.

* * * * *

Eliminating from the summary of the Commission the items which are
condemned by their Report, we have the following result:--

REVENUE LIST OF COMMISSIONERS, EXCLUDING TAXES ON INCOME AND
TRANSPORTATION.

Customs, $130,000,000
Excise on Spirits, Tobacco, Malt Liquors
Cotton, Refined Oil, Spirits of
Turpenti