Excerpt from Speech of Mr. Calhoun, of South Carolina, on the Report of Mr. Grundy, of Tennessee, in Relation to the Assumption of the Debts of the States by the Federal Government: Senate U. S., February 5, 1840
The consummation, therefore, of the system, must be one of two things: explosion, or the redue tion of the exports, so as not to exceed the amount of the unprotected articles; but either termination must prove disastrous to the system; the former by a sudden and violent overthrow, and the latter by the impoverishment of customers and raising up of rivals, as they ceased to be customers. To have a just conception of its operation in this partien ’lar, it will be necessary to bear in mind, that the South and the West are the great consumers of the products of the North and East; and that the capacity of the South to consume, depends on her great agricultural staples almost exclusively; and that their sale and consumption depend mainly on the foreign market. What, then, would be the ef feet of reducing her exports to the point indicated, say to forty or fifty millions of dollars? Most cer tainly to diminish her capacity to consume the products of the North and East in the same pro portion, followed by a corresponding diminution of the revenue, and the commerce and navigation of the country. But the evil would not end there, as great as it would be. It would have an equal or greater effect on the consumption of the West. That great and growing section is the provision portion of the Union. Dher wide and fertile re gion gives her an unlimited capacity to produce grain and stock of every description; and these, for the most part, find their market in the staple States. Cut ofi’ their exports, and their market would be destroyed; and with it, the means of the West, to a great extent, for carrying on trade with the Northern and Eastern States. To the same extent, they and the staple States would be com pelled to produce their own supplies, and would thus, from consumers be converted into rivals with the other section.
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