The framers of the United States Constitution gave the federal government authority to tax, stating that Congress has the power to ""... lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States."" and also ""To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes."" Tariffs between states is prohibited by the U.S. Constitution, and all domestically made products can be imported or shipped to another state tax-free. Responding to an urgent need for revenue and a trade imbalance with England that was fast destroying the infant American industries and draining the nation of its currency, the First United States Congress passed, and President George Washington signed, the Hamilton Tariff of 1789, which authorized the collection of duties on imported goods. Customs duties as set by tariff rates up to 1860 were usually about 80–95% of all federal revenue. Having just fought a war over taxation (among other things) the U.S. Congress wanted a reliable source of income that was relatively unobtrusive and easy to collect. It also sought to protect the infant industries that had developed during the war but which were now threatened by cheaper imports, especially from England. Tariffs and excise taxes were authorized by the United States Constitution and recommended by the first United States Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton in 1789 to tax foreign imports and set up low excise taxes on whiskey and a few other products to provide the Federal Government with enough money to pay its operating expenses and to redeem at full value U.S. Federal debts and the debts the states had accumulated during the Revolutionary War. The Congress set low excise taxes on only a few goods, such as, whiskey, rum, tobacco, snuff and refined sugar. The tax on whiskey was highly controversial and set of massive protests by Western Farmers in the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794, which was suppressed by General Washington at the head of an army. The whiskey excise tax collected so little and was so despised it was abolished by President Thomas Jefferson in 1802. All tariffs were on a long list of goods (dutiable goods) with different customs rates and some goods on a "free" list. Congress spent enormous amounts of time figuring out these tariff import tax schedules. With tariffs providing the basic federal revenue, an embargo on trade, or an enemy blockade, would threaten havoc. This happened in connection with the American economic warfare against Britain in the 1807–15 period. In 1807 imports dropped by more than half and some products became much more expensive or unobtainable.