The first law passed by the very first congress and signed into law by by none other than Pres. Washington was the Tariff Act. That should tell you something right there about patriotism and nationalism.
“The first law passed by the very first congress and signed into law by by none other than Pres. Washington was the Tariff Act. That should tell you something right there about patriotism and nationalism.”
Exactly. And Hamilton, who basically wrote that law, expressly described it as a protectionist device to allow for the growth and prosperity of American ‘infant industries’.
The tariff wasn’t just a means of taxation, although it also was that.