1385. COMMERCE, Coercion of Europe by.—
War is not the best engine for us to resort
to; nature has given us one in our commerce,
which, if properly managed, will be
a better instrument for obliging the interested
nations of Europe to treat us with justice.
If the commercial regulations had been
adopted which our Legislature were at one
time proposing, we should at this moment
have been standing on such an eminence of
safety and respect as ages can never recover.
But having wandered from that, our object
should now be to get back, with as little loss
as possible, and when peace shall be restored
to the world, endeavor so to form our commercial
regulations as that justice from other
nations shall be their mechanical result.—
To Thomas Pinckney. Washington ed. iv, 177.
Ford ed., vii, 129.
(Pa.,
May. 1797)
