Mr. prosscuxn. I find, sir, in ajouriial upon which I am in the habit of relying, in an article on the British exports of ironIand steel, the statement that during the 7 months terminating Jul 31, 1865 the U.S. purchased more than 1/3rd of the railroad and bar iron exported by England. While we were thus adding to the wealth and power of England, by purchasing 1/3rd ofher entire export of railroad and bariron, ode of her “ menofwar, ” commanded by an American traitor, was destroying our unarmed whalers engaged in the peaceful pursuits of their dangerous trade, and our furnaces, forges, and rollingmills were idle, or but partially employed. The internal taxes levied directly and indirectly on a ton of American railroad iron are heavier than the duty imposed on a ton of foreign rails by our tariff, and at this time most of the furnaces and rollingmills of our count are suspended. the Pennsylvania iron wor s at Dan ville, in that State, make both pig and railroad iron. The invested capital of the company is $1, 600,000. whhen in full operation it employs 1200 men, upon whom not less than 5,000 women and children depend. The works are adapted to the production of both pig iron and rails. They cannot, however, produce an adequate supply of iron for the rollingmills, and the company are annual purchasers of p iron. Their capacit is 27,000 tons pi iron and 33,000 tons of rails. gIlieir actual production in the 2 last years was but as follows: In 1864.]. 17. 154tons. 22, 512 “ In 1865.]” 14. 758 ". Rlllfl. 15. 966 “ The Rough and Ready rollingmill, in the same town, is cableof producing about 12,000 tons o rails perannum. Its proprie tors purchase their pig iron. Its production during the 2 last years has been in the exact proportion to its capacity as that of the Pennsylvania works. The difficulty with both is that our internal taxes so far more than counterbalance the protection afforded by our tariff that when gold ranges at less than 40 British iron masters can undersell either in our own markets. Our laws instead of protecting American labor discriminate against it and in favor of that of England. The duties and internal taxes on iron evidently need revising. The interest is depressed, not only in Pennsylvania, but in every art of the count. During the latter art of the 7 mont s referre to 4 rolling mills in southeastern Ohio with a capacity of 16,000 tons of rails perannum were idle, and the blast furnaces in the region which can produce 135,000 tons of charcoal pig metal, produced in 1865 but 45,000. Of the 20 furnaces on and near the Alle gheny river, in Pennsylvania, only 8 were in blast at the close of the ear. I am told there are 9 blast furnaces in Missouricapableof producing about 45,000tons, and that but 3 are now in operation. But one of the 4 blast furnaces near Detroit was in operation in December. The 25 rollingmills of Pittsburg were, I am informed, then running but quartertime, and the production of bloom iron in the counties of NewYork bordering on Lake Chani lain was in 1865 but about 1/3rd of that o 1864. Let me ask, sir, whether Congress is faithful to the laboring men of the country when it deprives them of the oppOrtunity to enrich themselves and the country by expending their labor on the growth of our own lands. From the same journal I also learn that during the some 7 months, the U.S. imported more than 1/2 of the un wrought steel exorted from GreatBritain, while a very care ully preparedlist of the steel works of the couutr, s owing the kinds of steel made, the product or the last year, and the capacity of each, shows that the product during the last year was but 18,415 tons, though the caplacit of the works is 42,000 one an red tons. It thus a pears that we could have made of the growth o our own lands, and by the employment of our own peole, every ton of rails bar iron, and unwrou t steel we imported during that period. Will the Gentfrom Indiana [Mr. Voonnnns] sa t iat it would not have been wise to withhold this patronage from our treacherous rival and bestow it upon our toiling countrymen? The western farmer and railroad man say “Let me buy iron and steel cheap; it is my right to buy where I canbuyforlcastmone;” and their Representative, complying with their wishes, refuses to put an adequate duty upon iron and steel. it ay it n otbe pertinent to remind these gentlemen that the inanufacturers of the iron and steel they import live in houses built of British timber and ritish stone, and furnished with British furniture; that they are taught, so far as they are educated, by English teachers; attended in sickness by English (10C! tors; clothed and shed by English artisans; and that their wages are expended in confirming British supremacy by augmenting British industry and British commerce; that they are fed with wheat gathered on the banks of the Nile and the Baltic, or wherever England can buy it cheapest; and that General Jacksons assertion, that to transfer 600,000 men from agricultural to manufacturing cin ployments would give us a greater market for our agricultural products than all Europe now supplies, is as true now as it was when 1st uttered. But that, if we import the men to make the iron and steel we will need for 1866, 18:57, and 1868, the implements with which they will dig the limestone and ore, and mine the coal, will be of American production; the food they will cat will be grown on American soil; the timber of the houses they will occupy will be cut from American forests; the stones with which it will mingle will be quarried from American quarries; and the tailor, shoemaker, and hatter, the teacher, preacher, and doctor, and all others whose services they will require, and whose presence will augment the population of the village, the town, or the city “all e Americans, and depend for their supplies on American labor and may I not ask whether the farmers of the country, in being relieved from colonial dependence and having a steady market thus brought to their doora marketin which wheat from the banks of the Nile and the shores of the Baltic will never comete with and chea)en theirswould not, than they paid more dollars perton, find that they were buying their iron and steel cheaperif they gave fewer bushels of wheat for it, and less frequently consumed their surplus cm s as fuel or permitted them to rot in the lie d? He does not buy most cheaply who pays least money for the articles he gets, but he who gives the least%age of his dayls, months or years la or in exchange fora given commodity; and tested by this standard, the cheapest market in which iron and steel can be bought for American purposes will be found in the protected market of America. PROTECTION CHEAPEXS GOODS. 7 But protection begets competition and in variably cheapens the money value of commodities. This is not mere theory; it is fact established by the experience of all nations that have protected their industry. Washingtons SecyTreasury understood this as perfectly as the adept in social science understands it today. Every nation that ever protected its industry improved the quality an lessened the price o its productions; and no people, while not protecting their manufactures, have ever been able to hold a fair position among the commercial nations of the world, because they could not comete in cheapness with protected industries. Whi e Holland protected her industry more ade uately than ngland, she sold her cheap goods in that country and maintained her supremac on the seas. It was then that the Dutch raised tie ire of Andrew Yarrinton by taunting Englishmen with their want of skill, and England with lier want of civilization, in selling her raw products at the price others would give, and buying back part of them when manufactured at the price at which others would sell. But when England perfected her protective system, her superior advantages in coal and iron gave her commercial supremacy, by enabling her to cheapen articles she had believed herselfunnble to produce, and to employ British ships in cair rying English fabrics tomore growers of raw material in every part of the world. France, as I have shown, protects her industry, and her silks, places, clot s, caSsiineres and products of iron and steel hold their place tn the markets of the world in spite of Englands larger commercial marine and more abundant supply of coal and iron. Has plOtCCflOllln creased the price of anything but labor in (ier many? Belgra the establishment of the Lolly Verein or CustomsUnion she exported nothing but raw materials, and was only too happy, as I have shown, to send with these her peasantry either for war or civic purposes; but. under the influence of protection the value of man has risen in Germany, and that of German rod ucts fallen in the markets of the world, ti 1 her cloths and the multifarious products of her diversified industry compete with those of England and France in the markets of the U.S and other nations whose people devote themselves exclusively to the proaction of raw materials. Even Russia, with her 30 millions of recently freed serfs, who enter upon the duties of free men without disturbance, because the wise emperor who enfranchised them had secured employment and wages for each by protecting the industry of all, is now entering into the general markets of the world in comctition with France, Germany, Belgium, and nglund. But we enter no foreign market with productions which attest our wealth, skill, ge nius, or enterprise; and the riccs of what we do exportgrain, coarse provisions, and whiskydepend on such contingencies as drought, excessive rain, the potato rot, or other wide a read calamity for a transatlantic market. llihengood crops prevail in Europe there is no market there for us. Consistent with the experience of other nations has been our own. Under the tariffs of 1824 and 1828 the prices of all those cornuioditiesin the production of which our people engaged to any extent fell rapidly. When the tarili of 1842 went into effect our country was flooded with British hardware of every variety, from a tenpenny nail to a circu lar saw and from table cutlery to butt hinges, thumb latches, &c. But When 1847 came round, 4 years of rule uate protection had so stimulated the skill and ingenuity of Americans, and had brought from GreatBritain so many skilled workmen, that our own market, atle ast, was ours for an infinite variety of iron warc, and we have held it in many Depts of the business from that dayto this, no nation having been able to undersell us in our own streets. If, sir, We are now paying too high for iron and steelware, we are but sufferin the penalty of our folly. Had we continue the protection afforded by the tariffof1842, or mod ified it from time to time as branches of business and the condition of the market required, by transferring the duties that had defended and advanced a branch of industry to articles needing greater protection, we would now be producing an adequate supply of cheap iron for our own use, and competing with France and England in the markets of Mexico and Central and South America. We are thus, I say, paying the penalty of our own folly in having destroyed our industry and rendered the investment of capital in manufacturing enterprises insecure. Jet but the capitalists of the country know that Congress will so revise the duties on railroad iron as to give it. adequate protection over the taxation its production encounters under the law for raising internalrevenue, and competition will spring up all over the country and make from the growth of our own lands c icaperand better iron or steel rails than we can import. How can it be otherwise? Do not the people of Michigan and Wisconsin wish to develop their resources and make them available? Are the people of Missouri insensible to the advantages which would flow from deriving in come from the conversion of their mountains of ore into rails, machinery, and hardware? Will not the people of Tennessee allow the descendants of the colored men who worked his furnaces and gave Cave Johnson his majority in his 1st contest for Congress, and others like them, to enrich that devastated State by working her mines and bringing her forges and furnaces again into profitable use? and why may not the whir of the rollingmill be heard through out Kcntncky, Tennessee, Virginia. Georgia, and other southern States which are heavily under laid with iron? There will be quick demand for the ield of all if we determine to develop the wee th of our whole country and interlace "its arts, as we should, with railroads. By excl“ 1); from our markets 1/3rd of the an nual export of railroad and bar iron from Engl land we will bring hither the men who make i it. Why should we, with the capacity established in 5 yearsfor when the war began and furnished its incidental protection, the mani nfacture of steel was unknown in our countrywhy should we, who in 5 years have cre ated facilities for manufacturing about 50,000 tons of steel perannum, buy from England 1/2 of her entire export of unwrought steel? Rather let us enfee le her and strengthen our country by bringin hither the men who make it. The iron of the States I have named, and I may say of almost every State of the Union, won d give as steel as pure and tenacious as England can make. The establishment of this branch of trade would lend to immense internal commerce, and reward our railroads with business that would flow both ways in all seasons of the year. The ores of the maructte region will be in requestin every ironprohucing State as those of Sweden, N or way, Russia, and Nova Scotia are in France and England. WHY AN nxronr nurv snow) nu mm on cotrow. Mr. Chairman, permit me, in drawing to a conclusion, to repeat that we need not resort to the prohibitions which have been practiced by other countries. Our natural advantages and those which spring from our personal freedom, are sufficient to relieve us from all difficulty on this point. There is, however, one of our ug ricultural productions upon which, did the constitution crmit, I would lay an export duty; and that 15 cotton and I hope the constitution will be so amended as to permit it; for though for years for the life of more than a generation the country was ruled in the interest of slavery, to the desrruction of the interests and rights of our free laborers, by the pretended a prehcnsion that if American cotton were not ciieapened rival fields would be developed, the delusion has been dispelled, and all men know that ours are the only available cotton ficlds of the world. For 5 years we maintained along the coast of the cotton States a blockade such as never was attempted before. The people of those States planted no cotton and burned much of what they had produced, and did all that madness oringenuity could suggest to develop rival fields ifany existed; and what is the result? Necessity constrained the temporary use of Indian cotton, and Calcutta became so rich that her ryota put silver tires around their cart wheels. But when the power of our armies had reopened the cotton fields of the South, when it became known that freedmen were working upon the Sea Islands, and apparent that our Government was again to possess the cotton region of the South, there came a fearful revulsion in India, and all men acknowledged that God had given the U.S. a monopoly of the avai able cotton fields of the earth. Upon that one production we should put an export duty, and the result would be that the men of the cotton States, no longer de)cndent on England for a market for their bulky raw material, would, with their cheaperfabrics, drive her cotton goods from the markets of the world. Though I would not, by legislation, prohibit the export of the elements of any branch of manufacture or machinery, I will endeavor to retain in the country many of the elements of manufactures that now go abroad, by making them more valuable in this country than in any other, and by impressing upon the Americun people the conviction, so long ago inculcated upon the people of Ireland by can Swift, that to enrich themselves they must “Carry out their own goodsas much manufactured and bring in thoseof other: as little manufacturedas the nature of mutual commercewill allow.” To gratify our patriotic desires we need not. resort to prohibitory duties. We can nationalize our policy by relieving from duty tea, cotiee, and any raw material which we do not produce, but which eniizrs into our manufactures or arts. I would give the woolgrowers protection. but would stimulate the manufacture of carpets and increase the demand for American would by admittingfree of dutythose low grades which we do not produce; and would laylight duties on those articles in the manufacture of which machinery has been perfected and large capitals have been accumulated, especially where the original cost. of the machinery has been returned in profits; and would make them heavier and heaviest upon those branches of industry which are most feeble but give assurance of ultimate success. When we do this our country will cease to be a mere agglomeration of sections, and we will be a national people, homogeneous in our interests by reason of their immense diversity. such, sir, is my plan for enforcing the Mon roe doctrine, acquiring Canada, paying the national debt, and by relieving the South of its embarrassment, reccmenting the shattered Union. The poor whites must be weaned from the rifle, net, and line, by the inducements of wellrewarded labor. Their idle wives and children may thus be brought to habits of order, method, and industry, and in a few years we shall cease to remember that in this 19th century, and under our republican Government, there were for several decades millions of people tending rapidly to barbarism. The same inducements will disclose, even to the eye of prejudice, the manhood of the freedman, and that kindly relation between the employer and his employee which exists through out the busy North and East will spring up in the South. Oppressed and degraded as hehau been, the colored man will find that there are fields open to his enterprise, and a useful and honorable career possible to him, and will prove that, like other men, he loves property and has the energy to acquire it, the ability to retain it, and the thrift to make it advantageous to himself, his neighbors, and his country. Let us then measure our resources by experiment and openthem to the enterprise of the world; and the question whether we owe 300 or 3000 millions will, ten years hence, be one of trifling ini ortance; and Las Andrew Yarrinton showed tcpeople of hngland how to “outdo the Dutch without fightin, ” we will find peace hath her victories for us a so; Canada will come to us like ripe fruit falling into the hands of the farmer; and if Maximilian remain in Mexico, it will be as the citizen of a republic and an adherent of the Monroe doctrine. RECONSTRUCTION.