Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 7.djvu/341

1783] Power to tax refused. 309 Articles giving it power to lay a duty of five per cent, ad valorem on all imported goods. This required the assent of each State in the Union. Two flatly refused, and the scheme failed. Not discouraged by failure the Continental Congress in 1783 again asked for an amendment to the Articles, giving it power for twenty-five years to levy certain moderate duties, to be collected by officers appointed by each State. This proposed amendment consisted of two parts, relating to the impost and to the supplementary funds. The impost was to be a specific tax on tea, coffee, sugar, cocoa, molasses, pepper, and Madeira wine, and an ad valorem duty on imported goods of every other sort. The revenue so raised was to be pledged to pay the interest and the principal of the foreign debt. The supplementary funds were to be raised by a special tax levied by each State and paid into the Continental treasury to meet the current expenses of government. In the course of four years, twelve States, with many misgivings and further restrictions, consented. But New York refused, and all hope of a revenue amendment was abandoned. It mattered little, however, for by that time a third proposition to amend the Articles had been rejected; power to regulate trade with foreign nations had been refused ; and the Confederation in consequence was doomed. When the Revolution ended, it seemed not unlikely that the old commercial dependence on Great Britain was over ; and that in a little while Frenchmen, Spaniards, Dutchmen, Italians, and Portuguese would be contending for that lucrative trade which Great Britain had once enjoyed, and to secure the monopoly of which she had even risked a war. Pitt however was anxious to recover it for England, and, in March, 1783, framed a plan which did credit to his statesmanship. Vessels owned by citizens of the United States were to be treated in all respects on the same footing as those owned by the subjects of European powers. Articles grown or manufactured in the United States, and carried in American vessels to British ports, were to pay no more duty than would have been exacted had the goods been owned by British subjects and been brought in British ships. But before the plan could be put in operation, Pitt went out of office. The Ministry that succeeded him held a precisely opposite view, and obtained an Act of Parliament, which they immediately put into force, giving the King in Council power to regulate trade between the United States, Great Britain, and her dependencies. In their opinion the plan proposed by Pitt was bad, because it would ruin the merchant marine of Great Britain and foster the merchant marine of the United States, and would destroy the monopoly of British colonial trade ; and they pointed out that Congress, having no power to regulate trade, could not retaliate by counter-restrictions. They began therefore (July, 1783) by closing the ports of the West Indies to American ships and American fish, and imposed duties practically prohibitive on the importation of American goods to British ports except in British vessels. CH. IX.