We can at once shut up every Southern port, destroy its commerce and bring utter ruin upon the Confederate States.
We should injure our trade somewhat, but not more, perhaps, than by our present inaction...
We may not have to exert force, but a nation that cannot do so, whenever its vital interests are assailed, inspires only contempt."
Thanks an amused spectator for that link, a number of us tried to find it, without success.
I've saved it for future reference.
This recommendation from the New York Times sounds to me exactly like our current President's recent threat to "close the border" with Mexico.
Nobody thinks he wants to, everybody understands it would be costly to us too, but something must be said or done to get Mexico's attention.
In March 1861, the New York Times is merely laying out options, what we "can" do.
But note also, there's no discussion of "money flows from Europe", instead the issue the NY Times describes is only tariff collection in Confederate ports.
But those ports combined produced only 6% of Federal revenues (and 3/4 of those from New Orleans), so this was not a crisis.
A final point -- our Lost Causers tell us the Confederate Tariff was "only 10%" compared to the new US Morrill Tariff.
This article says the old Tariff of 1857 adopted by Confederates was "at least 10% lower", meaning up to 90% the same as Morrill.