[Huber]

Thomas Jefferson wrote in a September 28, 1821 letter, "The government of the United States, at a very early period, when establishing its tariff on foreign importations, were very much guided in their selection of objects by a desire to encourage manufactures within ourselves."

Jefferson was a brilliant political philosopher, horticulturalist and architect, and a great statesman, but I'm less familiar with his credentials as an economist. As I recall, there was another writer named Smith, who in 1776 wrote a pretty famous book on economics, and may have differed with Jefferson on this point.

[asmith92008]

Hamilton was also pretty smart, and also had read Adam Smith, but he was not a champion of unfettered free trade.

[neutrino]

I'm confident that Jefferson was a far better economist than was a certain amateur economist (long deceased) named David Ricardo. May David Ricardo, the author of free traitin', roast in Hell for all eternity.