Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow TO THOMAS JEFFERSON. - The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799)

Return to Title Page for The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799)

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO THOMAS JEFFERSON. - John Adams, The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799) [1853]

Edition used:

The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: with a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations, by his Grandson Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1856). 10 volumes. Vol. 8.

Part of: The Works of John Adams, 10 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


TO THOMAS JEFFERSON.

London, 7 August, 1785.

Dear Sir,—

I am happy to find we agree so perfectly in the change which is made in the project. The die is cast. The proposal is made; let them ruminate upon it. I thought of proposing a tariff of duties, that we might pay no more in their ports than they should pay in ours; but their taxes are so essential to their credit, that it is impossible to part with any of them, and we should not choose to oblige ourselves to lay on as heavy ones. We are at liberty, however, to do it when we please.

If the English will not abolish their alien’s duty, relatively to us, we must establish an alien duty in all the United States. An alien duty against England alone will not answer the end. She will elude it by employing Dutch, French, Swedish, or any other ships, and by Frenchifying, Dutchifying, or Swedishing her own. If the English will persevere in excluding our ships from their West India Islands, Canada, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland, and in demanding an alien duty from us in their ports within the realm, and in refusing to American built ships the privileges of British built ships, we must take higher ground,—a vantage-ground. We must do more than lay on alien duties. We must take measures by which the increase of shipping and seamen will be not only encouraged, but rendered inevitable. We must adopt in all the States the regulations that were once made in England (5 Richard II. c. 3), and ordain that no American citizen, or denizen, or alien friend or enemy, shall ship any merchandise out of, or into the United States, but only in ships built in the United States, and navigated by an American captain and three fourths American seamen. I should be sorry to adopt a monopoly; but, driven by the necessity of it, I would not do things by halves. The French deserve it of us as much as the English, for they are as much enemies to our ships and mariners. Their navigation acts are not quite so severe as those of Spain, Portugal, and England (as they relate to their colonies, I mean) but they are not much less so; and they discover as strong a lust to annihilate our navigation as anybody.

Or, might we modify a little? Might we lay a duty of ten per cent. on all goods imported in any but ships built in the United States, without saying any thing about seamen? If we were to prohibit all foreign vessels from carrying on our coasting trade, that is, from trading from one State to another, and from one port to another in the same State, we should do something; for this commerce will be so considerable as to employ many ships and many seamen, of so much the more value to us, as they will always be ready at home for the defence of their country. But, if we should only prohibit importations, except in our own bottoms, or in the bottoms of the country or nation of whose growth or production the merchandises are, we should do nothing effectual against Great Britain. She would desire nothing better than to send her productions to our ports in her own bottoms, and bring away ours in return. I hope the members of congress and the legislatures of the States will study the British acts of navigation, and make themselves masters of their letter and spirit, that they may judge how far they may be adopted by us; and, indeed, whether they are sufficient to do justice to our citizens in their commerce with Great Britain.

There is another inquiry which I hope our countrymen will enter upon, and that is, what articles of our produce will bear a duty on exportation. All such duties are paid by the consumer, and, therefore, are so much clear gain. Some of our commodities will not bear any such duties; on the contrary, they will require encouragement by bounties. But I suspect that several articles will bear a handsome impost. We shall find our commerce a complicated machine, and difficult to manage. And I fear we have not many men who have turned their thoughts to it. It must be comprehended by somebody in its system and in its detail, before it will be regulated as it should be.

I am, &c.

John Adams.