Man, you just can't ever admit that you're wrong, can you? Okay, I choose to define it as Steam Boats, and I've got corroboration from a variety of sources to show that I'm right and that the number of steam boats arriving in New Orleans in any year of the period is much more like 3000 than 300. For instance:
"the first steamboat came downriver in 1812. In 1821, 287 steamboats arrived in New Orleans; by 1826, there were 700 steamboat arrivals. In 1845, 2,500 steamboats were recorded, and during the 1850's an average of 3,000 steamboats a year called at the city."
http://www.madere.com/history.html
" By 1834, the number of steamboat arrivals in New Orleans annually was 2,300, indicative of that port's trade. "
http://www.moah.org/exhibits/archives/steam.html
(are you going to claim that steamboat traffic had declined 90% between the 1830s and 1850s?
Finally, I'd point out that the heading on the table specifies steam boats and I contend that they wouldn't then have a column heading for that labelled "st. ships" and another labelled "s. boats" if the latter wasn't the steam boats of the heading.
Don't have time to wade through 1000 posts, but do the Neo-Confederates not remember the "Wimot Proviso," "36'30," John Brown, "popular sovereignty," the Fugitive Slave Law, Kansas-nebraska act, Dred Scott, the Free Soil party, the annexation of all of Texas while going to war with Mexico with the compromise to take only HALF of Oregon in the North(not slaveholding territory) or the discussions of taking Cuba or land further south, and that one guy(can't recall his name) who actually did rule Guatemala or some C American country for a short time---
The sectional conflict was fueled by slavery and the cultural and economic differences created by the institution.
So, you are left with an assumption, not fact.
And like Gianni pointed out, you and yours have apparently forgotten the point that started this discussion.
No one except you mentioned steam boats or their relevancy.