But why would the importer be the cotton planter who exports goods to Europe? The cotton planters did not own or staff or finance or insure the ships. If most goods came in through New York, it stands to reason most of the importers would be New Yorkers, not Southerners.
The end consumers would not necessarily be New Yorkers, but the fact that so much of the taxable imports were sugar, coffee, and tea suggests that states with larger populations were importing more and paying more of the tariffs. Because coffee and tea didn't grow in the US (and wine production was also limited) you weren't going to find domestic producers undercutting the imported goods. So you weren't going to find importers getting stuck with the merchandise and having to swallow the cost of the tariff.
A large share of those woolens probably went to the chilly Northern states as well. rather than to the South. If European fabric was truly of better quality, it's unlikely that a moderate tariff would keep them from being sold. "Cotton from Europe" more likely refers to fabric and thread, rather than bales of the white stuff, and what was true of wool and flax would be true of cotton goods.
X: ***”Tariffs are usually paid by the end consumer.
However, it is true, that if an importer can’t sell the goods, he can’t pass the import tax onto the end consumer.
If there is no buyer to pass the tariff cost on to, the importer gets stuck paying the cost of the tax himself.”***
Sure, but after many years merchants know what sells and what doesn’t.
You would not expect them to invest in imports without profits, would you?
That implies everything imported year after year had solid customers and were sold at profit.
So key points to remember include that some imports (i.e., coffee & tea) shipped directly to end use customers, but others (woolens, iron) became raw materials for manufacturers who then “exported” to other regions, including the South.
Such Northern “exports” to the South are said to have totalled $200 million/year and thus soaked up whatever surplus cash planters earned from cotton.
Posters like Diogeneslamp and FLT-BIRD tell us the Union absolutely depended on “Southern” exports, and would collapse economically without them.
That, they say, is why Lincoln “started war” at Fort Sumter.
Their problem is, 1861 proved them wrong — Confederate exports zeroed out and yet Union exports fell only 35% in 1861, rose in years after.
Their arguments are especially weak in claiming Lincoln “attacked” Charleston to collect tariff revenues — weak because Charleston tariffs amointed to only one tenth of one percent of total tariffs.