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To: lentulusgracchus
Morrill Tariff, and wartime economic boom. My best answer, without stopping for a Ph.D. in history

You might be better with a couple of entry level courses in the dismal science. Any economist will tell you that a tariff like the Morrill tariff is protectionist and is not designed to enhance revenue. Instead, it should discourage imports by making domestic products more cost effective. Revenue should remain about the same or go down because of it, not increase by a factor of 20. And economic boom or not, the only reason why imports should have gone through the roof is if the Northern states had had to replace products that they no longer got from the south. What might those have been, do you think?

268 posted on 07/26/2006 6:25:04 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: Non-Sequitur
Any economist will tell you that a tariff like the Morrill tariff is protectionist and is not designed to enhance revenue.

But it did, didn't it? Ever hear of the Billion-Dollar Congress?

271 posted on 07/26/2006 7:23:43 AM PDT by lentulusgracchus ("Whatever." -- sinkspur)
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To: Non-Sequitur
....economic boom or not, the only reason why imports should have gone through the roof is if the Northern states had had to replace products that they no longer got from the south.

Or hadn't needed -- like war materiel.

What might those have been, do you think?

You have something in mind? Spit it out.

272 posted on 07/26/2006 7:26:28 AM PDT by lentulusgracchus ("Whatever." -- sinkspur)
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To: Non-Sequitur; lentulusgracchus
Any economist will tell you that a tariff like the Morrill tariff is protectionist and is not designed to enhance revenue. Instead, it should discourage imports by making domestic products more cost effective. Revenue should remain about the same or go down because of it, not increase by a factor of 20.

Perhaps you forgot about inflation. Here are some figures on net imports in 1860 dollars from an old post of mine.

Tariff rates are from Table 1 of Taussig's The Tariff History of the United States, 1910 edition: Taussig.

Yearly customs income is from Table 3 of Taussig. Same link as above. Actually, income from collected import duties was a bit lower than Customs income, but I'll use the higher figures.

Inflation rate was from Inflation Rates. I've seen higher rates than these posted for the period, but I'll be conservative and use these.

After applying the tariff rates to the revenue to determine the value of the imports, I then adjusted the number by the inflation figure. I find that the value of imports to the North relative to the total 1860 import value was:

1860: 1.00
1861: 0.82
1862: 0.50
1863: 0.52
1864: 0.54
1865: 0.38

Thomas Prentice Kettell published Southern Wealth and Northern Profits in 1860. It broke down the distribution of imports to regions by consumption. For 1859, it calculates Southern consumption of imports as $106,000,000, Western consumption as $63,000,000, and Northern consumption of imports as $149,000,000. Kettell bases the split among regions on Treasury figures from 1856.

By his figures the North and West (i.e., Michigan, Illinois, etc.) were consuming 67% of the imports in 1860. The inflation adjusted tariff income above suggests that the high tariff might have indeed reduced the imports to those regions.

Incidentally, Kettell also estimates that the North sent $240,000,000 in domestic goods (whose prices were higher because of the tariff no doubt) to the South in 1859, and that the South paid to the North some $63,000,000 in interest and brokerage.

288 posted on 07/26/2006 9:36:11 AM PDT by rustbucket
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