Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 2).djvu/369

 convention, that no tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any State; that "no preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or revenue to the ports of one State over that of another;" and that no vessels bound to or from one State should be obliged to enter, clear, or pay duties in another. Further, that "no State shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any impost or duty on imports or exports except what may be absolutely necessary for executing its respective laws; that the net produce of all duties or imposts laid by any State on imports or exports shall be for the use of the treasury of the United States, and that all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of Congress."

The adoption of this paper constitution, as yet not quite in force to its legitimate extent in some of the Southern States, conferred upon the United States the sovereign attributes of a great nation. It secured the domestic tranquillity then so much required, and laid the foundation for amicable treaties of commerce and navigation with foreign powers. Placed as the people of the United States were, without any relations of amity with other nations, but happily unshackled with any trading monopolies to limit their free action, it was obviously to their interest to invite other countries to their shores, and to form with them friendly alliances of commerce and navigation. Accordingly their then Secretary of State, seeing that some of the States were opposed to protection, proclaimed with great wisdom the principles of free-trade; and in his manifesto on this subject remarked that "instead of embarrassing com-*