Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 13.djvu/309

CALHOUN AS SECRETARY OF WAR 301 "One principle necessary to make us a great people is to protect every citizen in the lawful pursuit of his business." 3 In a speech a year later, on December 4, 1812, he asserted that "It is the duty of every citizen to bear whatever the general interest may demand, and I, Sir, am proud in representing a people pre-eminent in the exercise of this virtue. Carolina makes no complaint against the difficulties of the times. If she feels embarassments, she turns her indignation not against her own Government, but again the common enemy. She makes no comparative estimate of her sufferings with other states. . . . High tariffs have no pernicious effects and are consistent with the genius of the people and the institutions of the country/' 4 Calhoun made this last statement to answer an argument put forth by Mr. Widgery from Massachusetts, a few days before, which he considered to be an expression of New Eng- land sectionalism. 5 The Committee of Commerce and Manufactures presented a tariff bill to the House in February, 1816. Two months later Calhoun declared in support of the ARGUMENT IN measure that it required commerce, agri- FAVOR OF culture and manufactures to produce NATIONAL wealth for a nation. The United States TARIFF States possessed agriculture and com- merce, what she needed was manufac- tures, and these could not exist without protection from European competition. His argument in detail was that, "Neither agriculture, manufactures, nor commerce, taken separately, is the cause of wealth; it flows from the three combined, and cannot exist without each. . . . Without commerce, industry would have no stimulus ; without manu- factures it (U. S.) would be without the means of production; 3 Calhoun, J. C. Works. II, x. 4 Calhoun, J. C. Works, II, 31. Annals of Congress, i2th Cong., 2nd Sess., Vol. 3, page 315. 5 Just before Calhoun's speech this representative spoke against the "Mer- chant's Bonds" Measure. 310.