The Arkansas banner., 1845-11-05
From Me CLnrleston hlercu,u

LETTER OF HON. GEORGE MCDUFFIE.
 .Nr. Editor: I have seen with some ap- prehension the remarks of your Washington correspondent in regard to the probable course of the Administration in fulfilling their pledge to reduce the tariff to a revenue stan- dard.
 To relieve myself from the fears excited by those remarks, addressed letter to General McDullie, who l knew had great personal confidence in President Polk, to as certain his opinion on the subject, and re- eeiVe in answer the enclosed communication, which is very satisfactory to me, and think will be to the public.
 If you concur in this opinion, l hope you will give 1t place in your paper
 CHERRY HuL. Sept. 27, 1915.
 My DEAR SIR: You ask me whether, ill my opinion, ''it be possible, that the conjec- lures of the Washington correspondent of the Charleston Mercury can be true, in relation 10 he probable course ol the administration of Mr. Polk in the adjustment of the lara, ) and whether '.sueh course would not be a palpable violation of the pledge to reduce the duties upon foreign imports to the revenue standard.o
 In answer to these inquiries, l state in the first place, my confident belief that these con lectures cannot be true, and in the second place, that the course they ascribe to the Ad- ministration acoukd be ia palpable violation of the pledge to reduce the duties upon fo- reign imports to the revenue standard," and of all the pledges of the party by which Mr Polk was elected.
 A brief exposition of the true principles oi a revenue tariff and reference to Mir. Folks Inaugural Address, will be sufficient, think to hanish your apprehensions ltis obvious to remark that a revenue tariff is the fo1cCS rate of duty upon euery foreign import tha will raise the required amount of revenue.- The smallest addition to that rate upon any one article with view to increase the price of its domestic rival, is s.p!ainly and inten. tionally" protective, as conlradistinguished from revenue duty. But, if the additional duty not only enhances the price of both the foreign and domestic article, but diminishes the revenue, it would be the most barelaced mockery-the most impudent and hypocriti cal disguise by which mercenary and mer ciless oppression ever attempted to conceal lt' delormity, to call this revenue duty Nov il IS only necessary to apply these plain, not sell-evldent propositions, to the articles which 1t is the supposed intention of the Ad mnistratlon to favor and protect, by exempt ing them from the general rule of reduction Take, for example. the two leading articles o sugar and iron. Next to salt, these are ar tieles of the most general consumption by all classes of people.
 In great financial and economical reform reducing the duties upon foreign imports to general average of 20 per cent. upon wha principle of justice, equity or sound policy upon what shadow of constitutional power can a rate of duty be imposed upon these ar ticles, higher than the general rate necessary for revenue, at the same time adding to tht public burdens and diminishing the public revenue? Is it because sugar and iron art produced by a few wealthy sugar planters ant iron masters, not equal in number to one il a hundred thousand of those who consume the articles and pay from the pockets of me 1 diocrity and poverty, the contributions extor ed by free government-and let me not say "a Democratic Administration--to add tt the fortunes of moneyed oligarchy Cal l 1t be believed, that Mr. Polk, bound by th, united ties of interest and duty to sustain tht great principles of free trade and unshacklet industry, which he has so ably supported through long course of public service, vii now, when elected to the highest station tC which ambition or patriotism can aspire, be tray his political principles and sacrifice thos' popular masses, by whose voluntary and un solicited sulfrages he was raised to power Il trust not the tafen In his Inaugural Ad dress he very distinctly lays down the doe trine that revenue is the object of all dutie upon imports, and protection the incidem.
 Nothing can be more plain. If protection to particular classes dt hhe e1penSe of at oilers results from revenue duty-as it doc l from all revenue duties-it IS an unavoldabl incident not to be desired but regretted. is impossible to separate the protection givei to the sugar planter, for example, by even revenue duty of 20 per cent from the two fold burden imposed upon everybody else not only by raising to the consumers tn price of imported sugar which yields reye nue equal to the burden, but the price of dc