Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol II).djvu/424

 416 or the suggestions of fear, stimulated by discontent, or carried away by phantoms of the imagination.

§ 943. But another extraordinary objection, which shows, how easily men may persuade themselves of the truth of almost any proposition, which temporary interests or excitements induce them to believe, was urged from the North; and it was, that the impost would be a partial tax; and that the southern states will pay but little in comparison with the northern. It was refuted by unanswerable reasoning; and would hardly deserve mention, if the opposite doctrine had not been recently revived and propagated with abundant zeal at the South, that duties on importations fall with the most calamitous inequality on the southern states. Nay, it has been seriously urged, that a single southern state is burthened with the payment of more than half of the whole duties levied on foreign goods throughout the Union.

§ 944. Again; it was objected, that there was no certainty, that any duties would be laid on importations; for the southern states might object to all imposts of this nature, as they have no manufactures of their own, and consume more foreign goods, than the northern states; and, therefore, direct taxes would be the common resort to supply revenue. To which no other answer need be given, than, that the rule of apportionment, as well as the inequalities of such taxes, would, undoubtedly, produce a strong disinclination in the nation, and especially in the southern states, to resort to them, unless under extraordinary circumstances.