From Jefferson — surrounding passage

He had already heard that something of the kind was in the wind; Madison had sounded him out some weeks before. He was not sure of his duty in the matter. Washington, for whom he had great respect, was in a difficult position, needing all the help he could get; this was the first consideration. Mr. Jefferson felt that he could manage foreign affairs well enough, probably, but if

“There are two methods, or means, and only two, whereby man's needs and desires can be satisfied. One is the production and exchange of wealth; this is the economic means. The other is the uncompensated appropriation of wealth produced by others; this is the political means.”

Moreover, by successive shiftings, the final incidence of this tax falls inevitably on production, for any governmental “bounties to capital are taxes upon industry.” Tightening his terms a little, the values absorbed by the “chartered monopoly” created by a tariff-law, must come from somewhere, and there is nowhere for them to come from, finally, but out of production. By the last analysis somebody, in Mr. Jefferson’s phrase, must “labour the earth” to produce them. Mr.