Description:

Jefferson Thomas

President John Adams, Vice President Thomas Jefferson, and 5th U.S. Congressmen deliberate on 1797 vessel registration & salt tax

 

2pp printed broadside announcing passage of two acts of legislation passed in the Fifth Congress, the first on June 27, 1797 and the second on July 8, 1797. The broadside features the printed signatures of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Jonathan Dayton, and William Bradford. It is inlaid into a slightly larger sheet. In very good condition, with light overall toning and professional restoration along folds. The larger sheet measures 7.875" x 12.25”.

 

The first act stipulated that American vessels, even though they might be seized by foreign powers, could not be given new registration. The second act concerned an increase of an existing salt tax to generate federal income.



The July 8, 1797 legislation authorized a 66% tax increase on salt after September 30, 1797. American and foreign ships were already taxed 12 cents per bushel of salt, and the July 8, 1797 law would raise it 8 cents to a total of 20 cents per bushel. Foreign salt cargo was taxed an additional 10%. Section 2 permitted a “drawback” or reduction of the tax to the New England dried and pickled fish industries.

 

An 1851 published account of 5th U.S. Congress proceedings shows that congressmen vigorously debated the advantages and disadvantages of the salt tax in the days immediately preceding the law’s passage. Proponents of the salt tax saw it as a way of closing the gap between U.S. expenditure and revenue. Critics of the salt tax, notably future House Majority Leader Albert Gallatin (1761-1849), argued that the tax would unfairly impact the poor. Gallatin asserted that if more revenue was raised through the salt tax, the government would happily spend more of it, thus enlarging the national debt still further. This same financial conservatism molded many of Gallatin’s future policies as 4th U.S. Secretary to the Treasury between 1801 and 1814.

 

The 1797 debate over the salt tax raised many of the issues that continually influence American politics today. It underscored the ideological divide between politicians, where two parties, in this case the Democratic-Republicans and Federalists, clashed over the role of government. The fledgling nation was forced to face the pecuniary realities of administrating its interests, where its expenditure far outstripped its income. Questions of equality were posed as fundamentally important: would the salt tax unfairly burden the poor, or one region more than another?

 

2nd U.S. President John Adams (1735-1826), and Vice President Thomas Jefferson (1743-1846) approved these laws. Both issues -- the seizure of American vessels by foreign ships and the salt tax -- would resurface in American politics during the War of 1812.

 

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