Again, Mr. Clay had made the rash remark that it would cost the nation, as a nation, nothing to convert our ore into iron.  Mr. Webster’s reply to this seems to us eminently worthy of consideration at the present moment, and at every moment when the tariff is a topic of debate.

“I think,” said he, “it would cost us precisely what we can least afford, that is, great labor....  Of manual labor no nation has more than a certain quantity; nor can it be increased at will....  A most important question for every nation, as well as for every individual, to propose to itself, is, how it can best apply that quantity of labor which it is able to perform....  Now, with respect to the quantity of labor, as we all know, different nations are differently circumstanced.  Some need, more than anything, work for hands; others require hands for work; and if we ourselves are not absolutely in the latter class, we are still, most fortunately, very near it.”

The applicability of these observations to the present condition of affairs in the United States—­labor very scarce, and protectionists clamoring to make it scarcer—­must be apparent to every reader.

But this was the last of Mr. Webster’s efforts in behalf of the freedom of trade.  In the spring of 1825, when it devolved upon the House of Representatives to elect a President, the few Federalists remaining in the House became, for a few days, an important body.  Mr. Webster had an hereditary love for the house of Adams; and the aged Jefferson himself had personally warned him against Andrew Jackson.  Webster it was who, in an interview with Mr. Adams, obtained such assurances as determined the Federalists to give their vote for the New England candidate; and thus terminated the existence of the great party which Hamilton had founded, with which Washington had sympathized, which had ruled the country for twelve years, and maintained a vigorous and useful opposition for a quarter of a century.  Daniel Webster was in opposition no longer.  He was a defender of the administration of Adams and Clay, supported all their important measures, and voted for, nay, advocated, the Tariff Bill of 1828, which went far beyond that of 1824 in its protective provisions.  Taunted with such a remarkable and sudden change of opinion, he said that, New England having been compelled by the act of 1824 to transfer a large part of her capital from commerce to manufactures, he was bound, as her representative, to demand the continuance of the system.  Few persons, probably, who heard him give this reason for his conversion, believed it was the true one; and few will ever believe it who shall intimately know the transactions of that winter in Washington.  But if it was the true reason, Mr. Webster, in giving it, ruled himself out of the rank of the Great,—­who, in every age and land, lead, not follow, their generation.