Absolutely not. You are clearly Whisky Papa-ing.
Some supporters of the act initially CLAIMED they were reinstating tariffs to their late 1840's level but they were in fact selling a bill of goods. By the time it reached the senate even the bill's proponents were starting to admit that it was in fact a protectionist tariff. It hiked average rates to around 35% and then to 47% the next year.
A cheap and shallow misdirection to say the least. All tariffs had high points, particularly on books, which the south disdained and often burned on import.
and that the only reason it had been altered into producing deficits by the southern cotton crowd was as part of their conspiracy to trash the Union.
That too is false. The tariff in place by 1860 had been enacted in 1857 shortly before the recession of that year. The unanticipated end to the Crimean war during that year set international markets including food staples into turmoil causing the Panic of 1857 and with it deficits. Over the next three years the federal government failed to reign in its spending and instead, led by the republicans, accelerated it through line items. Thus by 1860 they were facing a budget crisis and by 1861 after Lincoln's election, a credit crisis.
Another piece of foolish and insipid revisionism. The Congress before Lincoln was dominated by the South, as almost all Congress's prior to that time were. Any tariff the North ever put in place was quickly dismantled by the south. Tax opinions were never split cleanly on North/South lines.
As Alexander Stephens pointed out, there was simply no reason for the South to complain of the tariffs.
Stephens was in error and made that speech at a time when he was leading the fight against secession in Georgia. At the time he had been out of congress for over a year and was not a witness to the events of the Morrill tariff like his colleague Robert Toombs. Toombs accurately and early on identified the Morrill act as a protectionist measure and exposed that fact to public light.
All tariffs are protectionist, and the first industry speicific one was put in place by John C. Calhoun. The idea that southern legislators did not value them most highly is totally disingenuous and mere beer hall prattle.
She only contributed 14% of the Federal income, and reaped well over half of the financial benefit.
That too is false. Tariffs, especially protectionist ones, impose economic costs that go well beyond simple revenue collection totals. In fact the overwhelming MAJORITY of costs for your average protectionist tariff are non-revenue ones reflected in (a) the loss of the consumer surplus, (b) dead weight losses abroad, (c) the dropoff in an international market, and (d) the economic pass through of revenue costs onto others than their physical payee. The entire nation's consumers stood to lose from items (a) and (b). The south stood to lose especially so though by incurring not only (a) and (b). They also incurred two items that the rest of the nation would not experience in a significant degree: (c) since their economy made up over 75% of the entire nation's trade exports and (d) since agricultural exporters are price takers who must sell at the world price and therefore cannot pass through tariff costs onto their buyers like everybody else.
WHat piss poor drivel. LOL. Cotton was a mere drop in the bucket of GNP. You make it sound as though the US economy only operating on British pounds, and only when cotton was sold. How utterly ridiculous. YOu are obviously just trolling for the thrill of it and not at all interesting in any serious history.
An increased tariff would only have increased her annual income.
False. Just like any other tax, tariffs function on a Laffer curve relationship (which in the case of tariffs also incidentally corresponds to their use for either revenue or protection purposes). The Morrill act effectively pushed tariff rates past the curve's apex and onto the declining revenue edge. While this could indeed increase revenue collection, it also extracts a greater non-revenue cost from the economy than the previous level, thus resulting in a net economic loss.
80% of the tariff was on consumables, and at rates equivalent ot modern sales taxes. Pushing the notion that sales taxes in the US are currently the root of all of our economic woes with that rationale would surely flunk anyone studying economics at any school except one of those Tennessee 'buy your own' diploma barns.
most of them were so dirt poor they couldn't have afforded to pay the miniscule tariffs, even if they wanted or needed to, which they did not.
That is not the issue at all. Even the poorest of southern farmers were agriculture producers. As such they were also participants in the southern economy, which was overwhelmingly an export economy. Tariffs are known as trade BARRIERS for a reason - namely they kill off trade (and incidentally that is exactly what happened in the northern states right after the morrill tariff passed - within just a few months trade into the port of New York almost HALVED). When trade stops a trade-based economy dies, and when that economy dies all of its participants from the massive plantation operator to the smallest of small farmers suffers.
What a joke. You ignore the whole impact on the system of the war. Utterly facetious and deceptive strawmanship. Like I said, you have no interest in the history, only in the trolling, which is a total waste of bandwidth. Now you need to explain how it is the 'disastrous' Moriill Tariffs ruined the Northern war effort and collapsed it's economy. I can't wait to hear that joke!
In fact though, the North didn't need to pass the Morrill tariff if the war had not come and the southern states were let go. The 1860 tariffs could have easily been cut into half and still produced large surplusses for the north, where the tariffs were hardly felt at all by any one with an average income.
False. The south's departure took with it a full 75% of the entire nation's export economy. Without exports, you have only credit with which to acquire imports from abroad. Credit alone is insufficient to take on that task wholly and when it is in pieces (as was the case in late 1860) the absence of any substantial exports with which to trade is nothing short of a disaster. Trade in effect stops and when trade stops, imports also stop. When imports stop, revenues collected from those imports stops and the government goes broke.
Utter nonsense. The south's departure took away the failed economy of the south in a year when the cotton glut was so great that it couldn't even be given away. Talk about lies. You really take the cake with that one.
Whisky Papa-ing? Let's see...YOU made an unsubstantiated claim that Morrill simply reinstated non-protectionist 1840's tariffs. That is a Wlat tactic in itself. By contrast, I responded with the fact that senate debates on the act virtually forced its proponents to admit its protectionist goals (BTW, no less a source than Henry Carey called the Morrill act the most important protectionist effort in decades) and with the fact that its average rates, 35 and then 47%, were clearly protectionist at levels well beyond the pre-1857 tariff. So it would seem to me that you are the one "Whisky Papa-ing" here.
A cheap and shallow misdirection to say the least. All tariffs had high points, particularly on books, which the south disdained and often burned on import.
No misdirection at all. I am simply noting the average rate as calculated by economists and recorded by the US government. That figure is the standard economic measure of a given tariff's strength just as rate schedules for income tax today are its standard measures. If you don't like that take it up with the government's statisticians and economists.
Another piece of foolish and insipid revisionism.
And from you, another Wlat-ism. Simply calling something "revisionism" without substantiation is insufficient to demonstrate that charge. What I stated is historical fact and I stand by that fact ready to defend it. Challenge it if you desire, but calling it names and dismissing it upon your own gratuitous assertions will not suffice on this forum. Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.
The Congress before Lincoln was dominated by the South, as almost all Congress's prior to that time were.
Oh really? The US House before Lincoln's election had a northern majority and a speaker from New Jersey. The 1857 House had a northern majority and a speaker from Massachusetts. The Senate before Lincoln was elected had a northern/western state majority and a president pro tempore from Indiana. The one in 1857 had the same majority but it did have a southern president pro tempore from Texas. During that same period the previous two presidents had also been northerners, one from New Hampshire and the next from Pennsylvania. The chairman of W&M was also from Pennsylvania and so forth. So no - the south did not dominate EITHER house of congress in the period you claim.
Any tariff the North ever put in place was quickly dismantled by the south. Tax opinions were never split cleanly on North/South lines.
They certainly were as of May 10, 1860. On that day the House voted on the Morrill bill. Every southerner save one voted no. Every northerner save about 5 or 6 voted yes. It was indisputably the most sectionally split major vote on north/south lines in that entire session of congress.
All tariffs are protectionist
Actually no they are not. All tariffs do have at least a slight protectionist capacity, though certain tariffs overshadow this capacity with their revenue capacity. As any credentialed and sane economist will tell you, revenue tariffs and protectionist tariffs are two distinct types of policy. They are typically distinguished by whether they fall on the lower side or upper side of the revenue apex.
and the first industry speicific one was put in place by John C. Calhoun.
Calhoun favored protectionist tariffs briefly as a young legislator in the 1810's. A decade later he had learned the error of his ways and spent the rest of his life as one of their strongest opponents.
The idea that southern legislators did not value them most highly is totally disingenuous and mere beer hall prattle.
And that is yet another of your wholly unsubstantiated claims. Their error is further exposed by simply looking to the major tariff votes between roughly 1827 and 1861. The south became increasingly unified in its opposition to protectionism throughout that era and by 1860 was voting against them in virtual unanimaty. Only one southern senator and one southern congressman voted for the Morrill bill. The rest all vehemently opposed it.
WHat piss poor drivel.
Only on your part. It is further becoming evident that you have not the slightest clue about what you write, nor even the most basic understanding of trade economics. In light of that fact I will happily offer you a word of friendly advice before you end up subjecting yourself to the complete and utter demolition of others who have followed your course on this issue (a fact that many around here can attest to if you so desire to ask). Take a moment off and read a basic trade economics text. Freepmail me if you desire and I can even recommend some. Otherwise you cannot hope to correctly discuss the issue of tariffs any more than an uneducated grade schooler can hope to perform brain surgery upon being handed a scalpel. The choice of whether you want to learn or simply embarrass yourself is wholly yours to make. Just note that in the immortal words of John Paul Jones, I have not yet begun to fight.
LOL. Cotton was a mere drop in the bucket of GNP.
If you have data to that effect it is your burden to display it. I will endeavor to verify your claim later when I am at a place where I may look it up. In the meantime I will simply note that in 1860 cotton exports provided somewhere around 65% of the entire nation's trade exports - more than any other commodity from any region and enough to boost the southern trade contribution in excess of 75% when crops such as tobacco were also included.
You make it sound as though the US economy only operating on British pounds, and only when cotton was sold. How utterly ridiculous.
Huh?!? I don't believe I ever said a word in my previous post about British pounds or anything remotely related. I did however note the fact that the United States trade economy in 1860 was almost entirely due to southern exports and that is a simple fact of history whether you like it or not.
80% of the tariff was on consumables, and at rates equivalent ot modern sales taxes.
It is once again evident that you are way out of your league. Sales taxes and tariffs do not work the same way economically, and especially protective tariffs. Sales taxes are generally imposed at low levels on inelastic goods where they will have only minor deterent effects upon purchase of those said goods (in laymen's terms, they are imposed upon retail consumption items). Protective tariffs are installed not to reap the benefits of inelasticity but rather to shift consumer purchasing behavior from a cheaper import to a more expensive domestic substitute. As for rates being comparable, unless you know a state that charges a 40% sales tax on steel products that is simply not so.
What a joke. You ignore the whole impact on the system of the war. Utterly facetious and deceptive strawmanship.
Do you seriously believe the mindless and inane ramblings of what you post? Or do you simply take some sort of irrational and bizarre benefit out of dropping meaningless insults without the substance to back them? Once again, everything I say I also stand by as historical and economic fact. And once again, everything you have posted in attempted "response" to them constitutes little more than wholly unsubstantiated and gratuitously asserted nonsense.
Now you need to explain how it is the 'disastrous' Moriill Tariffs ruined the Northern war effort and collapsed it's economy.
They didn't ruin the northern war effort but they did severely harm the northern economy and make the war both longer and harder to fight. The Morrill tariff almost instantaneously wiped out foreign trade in the north. The largest northern port was New York City and prior to the tariff it handled more than half of the north's trade. With the Morrill act the 1860 trade totals for NYC virtually halved overnight and remained below their 1860 totals until the end of the war.
Utter nonsense.
Son, do yourself a favor and take a class on trade economics. You are essentially pushing towards the position that trade does not require reciprocal payment. After all, those goods just magically appear on the docks, right? And those foreign countries fling their money in our direction out of the kindness of their hearts, right?
The fact of the matter is that trade is and has always been a two way street. You give something of value and you get something of value in return. If you put up a barrier to either part of the exchange it all comes to a crashing halt. That is what the Morrill act was intended to do and that is exactly what the United States trade statistics for 1861-65 indicate that the Morrill act did do.
The south's departure took away the failed economy of the south in a year when the cotton glut was so great that it couldn't even be given away.
Once again that so-called "glut" of cotton was reaching all time price highs and accounted for 65% of the entire nation's exports in 1860. Igore that fact at your own peril.