The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. GALLATIN) had said that no answer had been given to his objections against an additional tax on salt. He should not enter into a dispute with that gentleman upon what might be deemed an answer; but he believed many members of that House would remember that an answer was given, and probably they might also think it a satisfactory one; at least it was so to one person. The objections brought against this tax would be well-founded, if the whole revenue was proposed to be raised from it; or if it were intended as a substitute for a land tax, or any other great object; if two or three millions were wanted from it, then it might be objected to upon good ground; but when one hundred thousand dollars only were proposed to be drawn from this source, he did not think the objections would hold. Admitting, said Mr. H., that there was some inequality in the operation of this tax, those persons upon whom it fell heaviest were exonerated from many other taxes which other parts of the country had to pay. They had, for instance, just agreed to increase the duty upon a certain species of cotton goods, of which they would not purchase a single yard. The present revenue was six millions four hundred thousand dollars, of which salt pays near three hundred thousand dollars. The people on the frontier, who pay for salt, are in a great measure exempt from other articles taxed; they purchased neither foreign wines nor spirits, high priced dresses nor furniture; all they wanted was corduroys, &c., which was very unfrequent. If five cents per bushel was laid on salt, those persons would have about a dollar a year more to pay, and nine-tenths not half a dollar. What could be more easy? Indeed, except the people were told of the duty they would not know it, as its effects would be so trifling.
With respect to the price of salt at Fort Pitt, as a gentleman had observed, it might be high, but was this occasioned by a duty? No, but by the situation of the country. Ought they not, then, he asked, to devise some species of tax by which to draw some part of the revenue from the inhabitants of the back country? He thought so far from this being wrong, that justice required it. This subject did not address the understanding, but the sensibility of the House, or perhaps the sensibility of those out of the House.