5867. NEUTRALITY, Provisions not contraband.—[continued].
The state of war existing
between Great Britain and France, furnishes
no legitimate right either to interrupt the agriculture
of the United States, or the peaceable
exchange of its produce with all nations; and
consequently, the assumption of it will be as
lawful hereafter as now, in peace as in war.
No ground, acknowledged by the common reason
of mankind, authorizes this act now, and
unacknowledged ground may be taken at any
time and all times. We see, then, a practice
begun, to which no time, no circumstances prescribe
any limits, and which strikes at the root
of our agriculture, that branch of industry
which gives food, clothing and comfort to the
great mass of the inhabitants of these States.
If any nation whatever has a right to shut up
to our produce all the ports of the earth except
her own, and those of her friends, she may shut
up these also, and so confine us within our own
limits. No nation can subscribe to such pretensions;
no nation can agree, at the mere will
or interest of another, to have its peaceable industry
suspended, and its citizens reduced to
idleness and want. The loss of our produce,
destined for foreign markets, or that loss which
would result from an arbitrary restraint of our
markets, is a tax too serious for us to acquiesce
in. It is not enough for a nation to say,
we and our friends will buy your produce. We
have a right to answer, that it suits us better to
sell to their enemies as well as their friends.
Our ships do not go to France to return empty.
They go to exchange the surplus of our produce,
which we can spare, for surpluses of other
kinds, which they can spare, and we want;
which they can furnish on better terms, and
more to our mind, than Great Britain or her
friends. We have a right to judge for ourselves
what market best suits us, and they have
none to forbid to us the enjoyment of the necessaries
and comforts which we may obtain from
any other independent country.—
To Thomas Pinckney. Washington ed. iv, 60.
Ford ed., vi, 413.
(Pa.,
Sep. 1793)
