For the 1776th artifact to be posted in Economics in the Rear-view Mirror, I decided to search for something related to Adam Smith. I figured the Centennial, Sesquicentennial and Bicentennial of the publication of Wealth of Nations would be good places to start, so I turned to the newspapers.com archive to begin my search. The very first item I came upon was the Centennial Celebration that took place in New York City on December 12, 1876. After reading the New York Times account of the affair, I thought that more might be found in Glory M. Liu’s book Adam Smith’s America: How a Scottish Philosopher Became an Icon of American Capitalism (2022) and sure enough she uses that event as her anecdotal springboard into Chapter 3, “The Apostle of Free Trade”.
Cringe Moment: John Bigelow found himself as an understudied understudy for no-show Williams College professor Arthur Latham Perry. The role demanded that he comment on the toast to the French liberal economists, predecessors to Adam Smith. Bigelow proceeded to riff on Jean-Baptiste Colbert, poster-child of French mercantilism. I am guessing that few if any of the guests noticed the faux pas.
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The Evening Post
(New York City, December 13, 1876), p. 1.
ADAM SMITH.
Centennial Celebration of the Publication
of “The Wealth of Nations”—
Speeches by William Cullen Bryant, Parke Godwin, David A. Wells, Professor Sumner, Mr. Atkinson and Others
The dinner given at Delmonico’s last evening, to commemorate the Centennial Anniversary of the publication of Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations” was attended by about a hundred gentlemen, including many widely known as advocates of free trade. Among the persons present were Parke Godwin, Abraham L. Earle, Arthur G. Sedgwick, Professor W. G. Sumner, Horace White, Cyrus W. Field, William Cullen Bryant, David A. Wells, Edward Atkinson, of Boston, Professor Frank A. Walker [(sic) Gen. Francis Amasa Walker], President Anderson, of Rochester University; Isaac Sherman, Anson Phelps Stokes, William E. Dodge, Jr.; George Walker, Ex Surgeon-General [N.S.] Hammond, J. Crosby Brown, Secretary of State [John E.] Bigelow, Professor Atwater, of Princeton; Mr. Sidney Biddle, Mr. Balch and Mr. Brinton Coxe, of Pennsylvania; M. Henri Cernuschi, of Paris; Professor [Vincent] Botta, Robert B. Minturn, E. L. Godkin, Charles H. Marshall, F. B. Sanborn of Boston, O. C. Marsh, Howard Potter, Fred. Mason of Chicago, and Joseph S. Moore. [Also listed as having attended according to the New York Times (December 13, 1876, p 5): Charles Moran, Dr. M. K. Leverson of Colorado and Henry Arnott Brown]
After prayer by the Rev. Dr. Atwater the chair was taken by Parke Godwin, before whom lay an original edition of the “Wealth of Nations.” During the dinner, which was long and elaborate, music was furnished by an orchestra placed in the gallery.
SPEECH OF PARKE GODWIN.
The cloth having been removed, Mr. Godwin spoke as follows:
“Gentlemen, it is my duty to speak the prologue to your future performances, and I know no better way than to follow the epilogue in ‘Henry IV.,’ which says: ‘First my fears, then my courtesy and last my speech.’ I am here less because of my ambition, but because of the headlong obstinacy of my friends of the committee.” He then spoke of the large assemblage present in these times of great political excitement and said: “It is not often that men meet to do honor to a book. But we come together to commemorate not a work drawn out of the mysterious wells of the imagination, but a work treating of our every day affairs which has taken its place among the masterpieces of genius. It is just a hundred years since the work on ‘The Wealth of Nations,’ the work of an humble Scotch professor, first appeared. I take it that the only conception of the wealth of nations was that of the resources of a prince who could keep armies and fleets, subsidized allies, and pension a few very poor poets. But that labor was the real wealth, the real source of national power, they hardly conceived. Yet this work, which taught these truths, penetrated the minds of men, and now at this remote day and in this far land we are met to celebrate it as one of the greatest features of our Centennial. What was the secret of the success of this book? It can hardly be said that the author of this work was the originator of any great and important truth. Many of his conclusions had been anticipated in Italy and in England. But the earlier writers had only discovered the germs of the truth. They had not seen it to its efflorescence. The merit of Smith was that he saw the truth in its intrinsic force, he grasped it in its bearings and relations, and he developed it with such completeness and simplicity that he made it plain to the common apprehension, that he made it the property of men in the common walks of life, and not alone of the student in his closet or the speculator in his school. What a grand truth it was that such men as Smith have bequeathed to us! Kant was accustomed to say that true things filled him with awe; first, the view of the starry heavens, and second, the sense of duty in the soul of man. He might have added a third, that of the mysterious means by which the struggles of the soul in the social man is brought to an harmonious end. But what is society at large? Is there not for its stupendous ramifications of interest, for the vast enterprises which span the globe, a power which holds them in its large love and boundless thought? Aye, there is such a power; it is the power of Providence, the power of freedom, freedom of labor, freedom of interchange, which, demanding nothing of governments save the maintenance of justice and peace, is like the principle of attraction which reduces the far-flaming orbs of space into musical chimes, and will reduce our various conflicting arms into perfect order. The signal service of Adam Smith and his coadjutors was to demonstrate that the gospel was right and that human traditions were wrong. By an exposition of the productive efficacy of the co-operation of industrial groups — by a demonstration that all exchanges of products are not a one-sided spoliation, but a two sided benefit, they showed that human interests were reciprocally helpful and not mutually destructive. Attraction, not repulsion, was shown to be the true law of economic relations. When it was once seen that human interests are convergent and not divergent, the practices of individuals and of nations were made to conform to that view. Giant monopolies began to open their shut doors, and an era of emancipated industry and emancipated commerce broke over the world. Political economy, like other sciences, is still immature and imperfect: it has many deficiencies to fill out, many obscurities to clear, many problems to solve. But we who are here tonight know this — that the great beams of the edifice have been raised; that many downtrodden have found solace within the portals of this, the goodliest temple, I think, ever made — a temple in which the worship is the worship of free human uses, full of the profoundest human affections.”
The names of invited guest who were prevented from attending, and had sent letters of regret were then read. Among these were Governor Tilden, Lieutenant-Governor Dorsheimer, President Woolsey, President McCosh, Senator Bayard, William R. Morrison, L. Q. C. Lamar, Professor A. L. [Arthur Latham] Perry; the English Minister, Sir Edward Thornton; the Belgian Minister, M. Maurice Delfosse; Charles Francis Adams, Professor H. W. Longfellow, Ralph Waldo Emerson, W. Lloyd Garrison, R. H. Dana, Jr., H. W. Olcott and others [Also listed as having sent letters of regret according to the New York Times (December 13, 1876, p 5): President Elliott, President Champin, Charles Elliott Norton, Professor Dunbar, Estis Howe, James Brown].
SPEECH OF JOHN BIGELOW.
The first regular toast was read as follows:
“The Early French Economists” – Lights that preceded and announced the dawn. They were the first to discover and to proclaim that natural laws are a better basis for legislation than arbitrary authority.
In the absence of Professor [Arthur Latham] Perry [Williams College], who was expected to respond, Mr. John Bigelow spoke as follows:
“I am very sorry that Professor Perry was not able to attend. He was prevented from coming by his modesty, and he has asked me to come here to-night and represent him. I shall do so as well as I may. It is a source of regret to me that I am here in a representative capacity, and shall be unable to do full justice to the early French economists as either Professor Perry or the imaginary Mr. Bigelow you have described would have done. I will only say that they were a very noble set of people. That is all I shall say. I am sure your imaginary Mr. Bigelow could not have described them in fewer words. All the politico-economical teachers have been indebted, more than to any one else, to the man who first classified the industries of France, and by whose work the science of political economy became possible — I refer to Colbert. The work of Colbert in estimating and tabulating the work of every man in France had never been done before. Yet this was essential to the success of politico-economical science. I do not know but Bacon may have anticipated me in this remark, but if he has, so much the worse for Lord Bacon. It is a matter of regret that the Bureau of Statistics in this country has been less useful because of the inexcusable obstinacy of a gentleman present here to-night (Mr. David A. Wells) in resigning its charge. I wish to call attention to one fact in noticing upon this table the original edition of the work of Adam Smith. I don’t know why this work, the natural twin of republican institutions, has never been published complete in this country. My friend on my right says it has been. I can only ask, then, why I have never happened to meet a single copy of an American edition in this country. (A voice — that of Mr. Coxe, of Philadelphia — “An edition was edition was printed in Philadelphia in 1789.”) Then I will modify my remark and ask why we have not had an edition in the current century.” (A voice, “Give it up”) Mr. Bigelow went on to speak of the importance of a proper study of Adam Smith’s method, and said that the great drawback in this country is the waste of power in all the paths of work and business and investigation. He advocated as a great centennial work the publication of a new and complete edition of Adam Smith’s works.
SPEECH OF DAVID A. WELLS.
The second toast was:
“The Wealth of Nations”, — An imperishable monument of human genius, which laid the foundation of a science destined to revolutionize the legislation and practice of nations. At the end of a hundred years it is as instructive in its teachings and as beautiful in style as when it first attracted the attention of the world. Its author, Adam Smith, will be held in honor by his fellow men forever.
David A. Wells made the following response:
“Considering the condition of Europe from the time when it first attained a high degree of civilization, there is no question of more interest than that of the relations of nations and men. The prejudices and antagonisms, due to the belief that advantage to one community was necessarily a loss to another, naturally interfered with progress and advancement, and led to the belief, as expressed by Hobbes, that war is the natural condition of man. The restrictions that, until recently, hedged round all trades in Europe, and reduced men to practical slavery, were the outgrowths of this false idea. The right to practice a trade or profession was looked upon as an heirloom, transferred from one to another member of a family.” The results of this system in France and in the country were sketched, and Mr. Wells continued: “In this country, it even happened in 1865, under our absurd revenue law, that it became a question whether a man who mended a carriage had not really manufactured it and made himself liable to a payment of the duties on new carriages. War was often undertaken by European nations as a means of successfully monopolizing trades. It was for this cause that nearly all the battles of the eighteenth century were fought. Our own Revolution is directly traceable to the imposition of duties upon the colonies due to the economic ideas of the times. If Great Britain forbade the colonists to export wool, it made its own subjects liable to capital punishment for exporting wool. John Hancock was the prince of smugglers and was set down for trial at the time of our Revolution. Alexander Hamilton was cognizant of contraband trade by the firm which he formed during his minority. Men like these resisted the government, because they felt that every blow that they struck was a blow for liberty. Mr. Wells then sketched the work of Turgot in France in connection with economic matters. Voltaire and other of Turgot’s contemporaries, he said, supported Turgot in his schemes of economic reforms and foresaw the revolution and the reign of terror which followed after Turgot’s downfall. But afterward there came a compensation in the appearance of Smith’s great work. He then quoted the high praise awarded it by Buckle, Mackintosh and others and said: “The work then done was the greatest ever attempted since the days of Christ and his apostles. Under the light of the teachings of Adam Smith, the golden rule of ‘Do unto others as you would that they should do unto you’ was embodied in the practical affairs of life. People are benefited and never injured by the prosperity of their neighbors; this was the great truth expounded by Adam Smith. There is no class of men that submit quicker to the spirit of the times than the mercantile class, and the spirit of the times always is the aggregation of knowledge. From this point of view and in the light of the work done by Adam Smith, though the world has not recognized the source from which it came, it will be seen that the great Scotchman has fully merited the eulogiums passed upon him. He has done more than all the sleeping[?] statesmen[?] combined have ever attempted[?] to do.” [Three words unclearly printed marked with [?]]
SPEECH OF WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.
The third toast was:
“The Illustrious Teachers of Political Economy” — Say, Ricardo, Malthus, Senior, the Mills, Bastiat, Cairnes, Rossi, Chevalier and Walker, who form a galaxy of bright and shining stars whose places in the heavens will grow brighter with the lapse of time.
In reply William Cullen Bryant spoke as follows:
“Mr. President and Gentlemen: Allow me to congratulate you on the occasion which has brought you together. I am glad to see such men assembled for such a purpose — that of commemorating the publication of the great work which first clearly demonstrated to mankind the benefits of a free exchange of commodities between the nations of the world, and the mischiefs of that tyranny which seeks to check this free exchange by the strong arm of the law. The doctrine of free trade, placed on the impregnable basis of fact and reasoning, was twin born with this republic of ours, and I can only wish the republic a like perpetuity with the doctrines.
“It is now four years since a concurrence of circumstances, to which I will do no more than allude, had the effect of causing a movement in favor of free trade, which was then in considerable activity and apparently not without effect on the public mind to stagnate and almost to sleep. And what years, my friends, were these: Years of languishing enterprise, years of despairing industry, years of strikes, years of contention between the employers and the employed, years which showed the spectacle of laborers by hundreds looking in vain for occupation, and hunger-pinched families shivering in their unwarmed garrets. All this while the protective system, as it is called, has been in full force. Everything is protected — that is to say, everything imported into the country is taxed as it never was taxed before. If the protective system be the ground of commercial prosperity the country should now be prosperous beyond all its previous experience; our mills, now silent, should be in their fullest activity; our laborers should be in constant employment; not a willing arm should be idle, not a spindle should cease to hum.
“Is It not time for a reaction? Are we to go on in this manner indefinitely? We have tried the protective system as fully as is possible; we have tasted its fruits, and they are bitter. Let us now have a season of free exchange I have no doubt, for my own part, that a liberal system of revenue laws, especially combined with a return to specie payments, would make an instantaneous and most fortunate change in the condition of the country. Hundreds of commodities, the raw material of as many forms of industry, would be released from the taxation which now puts them beyond the reach of as many classes of artisans, and new life would be at once communicated to the arts both useful and ornamental. The old handicraft of shipbuilding, which made our barks the wonder of the world for speed and economy of management, would be revived. The very day that such a change in our present unhappy policy received the sanction of the Executive would see the gloom of the times dispelled as suddenly as a bright morning follows a storm, and there is no power able under these circumstances to hold back our people from plunging into enterprises which they now shrink from in despair.
“Yes, my friends, the time for a reaction has arrived, and we are determined that it shall have a fair field. Free trade has slept while its enemies have been performing their unhappy experiments upon the public welfare, and now we look to see it rise invigorated by its long slumber. Let me say here that I am in favor of protection, but protection of a kind very different from that which for many years past has dealt so cruelly with the interests of the country. I am for protecting the consumers — the class whose numbers are counted by millions — I am for protecting this class in its natural and proper right to exchange what it produces in whatever market it can exchange them to most advantage. I am for rescuing it from the hands into which it has fallen, and which plunder it with as little remorse as the rovers of the Barbary States in the early part of this century pillaged the merchant ships that entered into their seas.
“Depend upon it, my friends, this is a righteous contest on our part, and a blessing will rest upon it. I have been long a soldier in this war, and have never grown weary of it. I may I not see the day of triumph, but many of you will. The torch which I have borne for more than fifty years I shall pass to abler, doubtless, though not more faithful hands, assured that it will yet shed it rays on a glorious victory.”
SPEECH OF EDWARD ATKINSON.
The following was the fourth toast:
“Commercial freedom, or the unfettered intercourse of nations” — A glorious principle that has taken its place by the side of the freedom of the press, the freedom of speech and the freedom of assemblage, and which, like them, has demonstrated its claims to our regard by the blessings which have everywhere accompanied and followed its practical applications.
Edward Atkinson replied to this and said the charter of the Pennsylvania Railroad forbade it to build locomotives, although it allowed it to repair them, for fear of interfering with the interests of the factories. This prohibition is, however, got over by the company considering the brass label on the locomotives to be the locomotives themselves. He then said:
“The nation was now struggling against evils within which once it struggled against from without. The two great questions of the hour were evils of bad money and bad taxation. This nation might soon hope for freedom from the first, and ere long from the second. The advocates of protection now admitted that free trade was something to be desired, but claimed It was impracticable and artificial. Freetraders believed it natural. Differences now between the two parties were only regarding time and method. The question now arose, could the freetraders unite with protectionists in some compromise that would not demand a sacrifice of principle. He thought they could. The protectionists no longer based their legislation and claims upon the principles of protection, but upon principles of general utility. No one now demanded on principle more than a moderate taxation for the expenses of government, and he thought that very soon the statesmen might take the place of economists. The nation was stronger than its leaders, and order would soon come out of chaos. The admirable advantages of England should be considered; and if the advocates of free trade would only act with moderation and caution, they could soon obtain their end, practically at least.”
Remarks were also made by Brinton Coxe, of Philadelphia, who spoke of the progress which the principles of Adam Smith were making in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, that Middle Age castle of Protection.
SPEECH OF PROFESSOR SUMNER.
The next toast was:
“International freedom” — The liberty of trade and intercourse which, within the domain of the United States, prevails over so many thousand square leagues of territory, which has been so fruitful a source of prosperity, union peace and rapid development needs but to be applied to our foreign relations to establish our rightful position among the nations in wealth, in power, in influence and in the happiness of the people.
Professor W. G. Summer responded, saying that old dogmas were disappearing, utopian hopes are vanishing and positive methods are replacing them. Political economy is capable of positive and beneficial resalts. Among us economic problems are practical questions, and we are forced to turn our attention from science to the practical benefits of its old and familiar consequences to our country. This ought to be the work of politicians and statesmen, that the largest amount of human happiness may be directly produced therefrom.
* * * * * * * * * * *
The last toast given was:
“The Science of Political Economy” — It demonstrates morals. It proves that diligence, economy, prudence, truth and justice are not only among the canons of the moral law, but are also the means of a sound and stable public prosperity.
This was ably responded to by Professor Anderson. [see following item]
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Democrat and Chronicle (Rochester, NY: December 15, 1876), p. 4.
Dr. [Martin Brewer] Anderson
on Free Trade
Our report of the free-trade dinner at Demonico’s last evening requires to be supplemented by an outline of the interesting and effective remarks of President Anderson, of Rochester (N.Y.) university. He considered free trade in its moral aspects, and said that he regarded free exchange as one of the fundamental principles underlying human society, the same as the freedom of opinion and of labor. Free trade is as worthy and important an object of human endeavor as the doctrines of the declaration of independence. No bargain is either good or safe which does not confer a benefit upon both the seller and buyer, and the moral element in trade must be taken into account to secure permanent prosperity. He eulogized the abstract thinkers of the world and eloquently set forth the benefits conferred upon mankind by Adam Smith in the field of trade, Jeremy Bentham in the field of criminal law, and also cited other examples. He spoke of his own labors as a teacher of political economy, and said that during the last fifteen years he had permitted no young man to leave the institution of which he had charge who did not possess a clear notion of the fundamental doctrines of free trade. He then made the practical suggestion that an efficient free-trade club ought to be organized in this city for the purpose of free discussion. He said that economic truth propagates itself under proper conditions, and he would have the free-trade work of the colleges supplemented by systematic organization, so that young men may be preserved in economic faith and so that the influence of free-traders of all classes may be made effective.
Image Source: Adam Smith, 1723-1790. Political economist by James Tassie (1787). National Galleries of Scotland, Scottish National Portrait Gallery.
