6
“Mr. Fulton’s Communication,” in Albert Gallatin, Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, on the Subject of Public Roads and Canals; Made in Pursuance of a Resoltuion of Senate, of March 2, 1807 (Washington, 1808); selection from pp. 108–109, 120–23.
Robert Fulton
Robert Fulton (1765–1815) was born in Philadelphia of Irish parents. He was an engineer and improver. His many improving devices included a double-inclined plane for canal travel and a mill for processing marble. His most famous accomplishments came out of his work with steamboats. Fulton’s first steamship, the Clermont, was launched on the Hudson in 1807. His letter to Albert Gallatin (1761–1849), a selection of which is reprinted below, was printed at the end of Gallatin’s Report on Public Roads and Canals. Fulton’s reference to Hume in the context of binding together the United States of America is interesting, especially in the light of the debate on Hume’s influence on the Founding Fathers. Fulton’s reference to Hume also suggests that Hume’s essays informed the improving spirit that was rampant in early nineteenth-century America, even though in this case the words do not appear to be Hume’s. On Fulton see C. M. Harris, “Robert Fulton,” ANB, vol. 8, pp. 568–72.
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Mr. Fulton’s Communication.
SIR,
BY your letter of the 29th of July, I am happy to find that the attention of Congress is directing itself towards the opening of communications through the United States, by means of roads and canals; and it would give me particular pleasure to aid you with useful information on such works, as I have long been contemplating their importance in many points of view.
But a year has not yet elapsed since I returned to America, and my private concerns have occupied so much of my time, that as yet I have acquired but very little local information on the several canals which have been commenced.
Such information, however, is perhaps at present not the most important branch of the subject, particularly as it can be obtained in a few months at a small expense, whenever the public mind shall be impressed with a sense of the vast advantages of a general system of cheap conveyance.
I hope, indeed, that every intelligent American will in a few years, be fully convinced of the necessity of such works to promote the national wealth, and his individual interest. Such conviction must arise from that habit of reflection which accompanies the republican principle, and points out their true interest on subjects of political economy. From such reflections arises their love of agriculture and the useful arts, knowing them to augmeut [sic] the riches and happiness of the nation; hence also their dislike to standing armies and military navies, as being the means of increasing the proportion of non-productive individuals, whose labor is not only lost, but who must be supported out of the produce of the industrious inhabitants, and diminish their enjoyments.
Such right thinking does great honor to our nation, and leads forward to the highest possible state of civilization, by directing the powers of man from useless and destructive occupations, to pursuits which multiply the productions of useful labor, and create abundance.
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Having thus in some degree considered the advantages which canals will produce in point of wealth to individuals and the nation, I will now consider their importance to the union and their political consequences.
First, their effect on raising the value of the public lands, and thereby augmenting the revenue.
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Second, on their effect in cementing the union, and extending the principles of confederated republican government. Numerous have been the speculations on the duration of our union, and intrigues have been practised to sever the western from the eastern states. The opinion endeavored to be inculcated, was, that the inhabitants beyond the mountains were cut off from the market of the Atlantic states; that consequently they had a separate interest, and should use their resources to open a communication to a market of their own; that remote from the seat of government they could not enjoy their portion of advantages arising from the union, and that sooner or later they must separate and govern for themselves.
Others by drawing their examples from European governments, and the monarchies which have grown out of the feudal habits of nations of warriors, whose minds were bent to the absolute power of the few, and the servile obedience of the many, have conceived these states of too great an extent to continue united under a republican form of government, and that the time is not distant when they will divide into little kingdoms, retrograding from common sense to ignorance, adopting all the follies and barbarities which are every day practised in the kingdoms and petty states of Europe. But those who have reasoned in this way, have not reflected that men are the creatures of habit, and that their habits as well as their interests may be so combined, as to make it impossible to separate them without falling back into a state of barbarism. Although in ancient times some specks of civilization have been effaced by hordes of uncultivated men, yet it is remarkable that since the invention of printing and general diffusion of knowledge, no nation has retrograded in science or improvements; nor is it reasonable to suppose that the Americans, who have as much, if not more information in general, than any other people, will ever abandon an advantage which they have once gained. England, which at one time was seven petty kingdoms, has by habit long been united into one. Scotland by succession became united to England, and is now bound to her by habit, by turnpike roads, canals and reciprocal interests. In like manner all the counties of England, or departments of France, are bound to each other; and when the United States shall be bound together by canals, by cheap and easy access to market in all directions, by a sense of mutual interests arising from mutual intercourse and mingled commerce; it will be no more possible to split them into independent and separate governments, each lining its frontiers with fortifications and troops, to shackle their own exports and imports to and from the neighbouring states; than it is now possible for the government of England to divide and form again into seven kingdoms.
But it is necessary to bind the states together by the people’s interests, one of which is to enable every man to sell the produce of his labor at the best market and purchase at the cheapest. This accords with the idea of Hume, “that the government of a wise people would be little more than a system of civil police; for the best interest of man is industry and a free exchange of the produce of his labor for the things which he may require.”
On this humane principle, what stronger bonds of union can be invented than those which enable each individual to transport the produce of his industry 12,00 [sic] miles for 60 cents the hundred weight? Here then is a certain method of securing the union of the states, and of rendering it as lasting as the continent we inhabit.