Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker volume 6.djvu/26

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
THOUGHTS ON AMERICA.
13

The contrast between the Spanish and the Anglo-Saxon settlements in America is amazing. A hundred years ago, Spain, the discoverer of America, had undisputed sway over all South America, except Brazil and the Guianas. All Mexico was hers—all Central America, California unbounded on the north, extending indefinitely, Louisiana, Florida, Cuba, Porto Rico, and part of Hayti. She ruled a population of twenty million men. Now Cuba trembles in her faltering hand; all the rest has dropped from the arms of that feeble mother of feeble sons. In 1750 her American colonies extended from Patagonia to Oregon. The La Plata was too far north for her southern limit, the Columbia too far south for her northern bound. The Mississippi and the Amazon were Spanish rivers, and emptied the waters of a continent into the lap of America, the Mexique Gulf, which was also a Spanish sea. But Spain allowed only eight-and-thirty vessels to ply between the mother country and the family of American daughters on both sides of the continent. The empire of Spain, mother country and colonies, extending from Barcelona to Manilla, with more sea-coast than the whole continent of Africa, employed but sixteen thousand sailors in her commercial marine. Portugal forbade Brazil to cultivate any of the products of the Indies.

Look at this day at Anglo-Saxon, and then at Spanish America. In 1606 there was not an English settlement

    The most important articles of export for five-and twenty years appear in the following

    Table of the chief articles of Export from 1825 to 1850.
    Years. Cotton. Breadstuffs and Provisions. Tobacco.
    1825 $36,846,649 $11,634,449 $6,115,623
    1830 29,674,883 12,075,430 5,586,365
    1835 64,961,302 12,009,399 8,250,577
    1840 63,870,307 19,067,535 9,883,957
    1845 51,739,643 16,743,421 7,469,819
    1850 71,484,616 26,051,373 9,951,023
    1852 87,965,732 25,857,177 10,031,283

    The greatest amount of cotton was exported in 1852, —1,093,230,639 pounds; but the greatest value of cotton was in 1851, amounting to $112,351,317. In 1847, the value of breadstuffs and provisions exported was $68,701,921.

    The government revenues for the fiscal year 1852 were $49,728,386.89, there was a balance in the treasury of $10,911,645.68; making the total means for that year $60,640,032.57. On the 1st January, 1853, the national debt amounted to $65,131,692.