Customs Duties Quotes
In this case the tariffs were imposed not to protect national industries but to simply raise revenue. In the early years of the United States, almost all of the Federal Revenue was raised this way.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910
The patriot legal position did shift over time. Like many grass roots political movements, the Americans had morality and justice on their side and did not think through the implications of their arguments when they opposed the Stamp Act. After the Revolution Leonard had to leave and he went to English Bermuda where he was rewarded for his loyalty with the position of Chief Justice.
He was one of the strongest English advocates of colonization of the New World
“Commercial imposts” are customs duties. These actually provided virtually all of the tax revenue for the early American nation. Hamilton, realized, and prepared those who would ratify the Constitution that there would have to be additional forms of revenue of the growing nation. Nonetheless, there are a few today who argue that the customs duties are the only legitimate form of Federal taxation as that was what was in existence in early America. This quotation shows that the founding fathers did not intend that the nation be bound to that single mode of taxation.
See {634234} and {634238} for more of his arguments at the Ratification Convention.
Most Republicans at the time were beholden to corporations and business who then demanded high tariffs and other protectionisms so they could maintain high prices and not have to compete with British and European imports. Roosevelt and a few other reform Republicans were free traders along with most Democrats. Roosevelt had so many other reforms in the fire that he decided not to take this one on at the same time and thought that the benefit would not be good enough for the nation to offset the open civil war of the Republican Party that would ensue. In the latter half of the 20th century, large American companies had opened or invested in foreign corporations and/or were manufacturing many of their products abroad. So they then advocated free trade. When they did, the Republican Party flip flopped and adopted free trade as one of its basic principles. Meanwhile, the Democrats who were free traders in the early 20th Century had become protectionists by the end of the 20th century as labor movement wanted to protect American jobs.
