L'BRARV OF CONGRESS 
 
 OOll 898 339 
 
 HOLUNGER 
 
 pH8.5 
 
 MILL RUN F3-1543 
 

 <j1 
 
 OUR aOVERNMENTAL PO 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 OF 
 
 HON. JOHN THOMPSON, OF NEW YORK. 
 
 Delivered in the House of Representatives, January 20, 1859. 
 
 Mr. Clminnan, I sincerely regret that pen- 
 tlemen have Ijeen uuwise cnouirh to coim- 
 inerice the (lisciisaiou of party phitforins on 
 this floor. I think the gentleman irom Maine 
 on one side, and the gentleman from Kentucky 
 on the otiier, are both agri'ed in a radical error, 
 bnt deducing from it iliftercnt consequences. 
 Both substantially claim thai the llejmblican 
 ]>arty is a part^'of o«e iilrci, with the single mis- 
 sion of resisting the aggressions of the slave 
 power ; one says its work all lies yet before it, 
 and therefore it must remain true and steadfast 
 to this central idea ; the other insjt^ts that its 
 work is done, and therefore it should disband. 
 I deny the Jiff as asserted by the gentleman 
 IVom .Maine. I deny the infe/rnnc of the gen- 
 tleman from Kentucky. The Repuliiican party, 
 as I unilerstand it, has a distinct line of domes- 
 tic and foreign policy, embracing all the great 
 interests of the country, which it ju'oposes to 
 carry forward — on finance, trade, commerce, 
 internal improvement, economy in the Admin- 
 istration, as well as in respect to the govern- 
 ment of our Territories, and upon which it in- 
 vites the co-operation of all patriotic and good 
 men, Nortii and South, Kast and West, without 
 expecting that all its adherents should concur 
 to an iota in every item of its catholic creed. 
 
 Sir, it is the glory of the Repul)lican church, 
 and its strength also, that it admits of unity in 
 diversity ; banded together in a common aim, 
 and yet various in the character of its civic 
 equipments; constructing no narrow planks or 
 platforms, to operate as instruments of c.vclu- 
 sion, and elements of disunion and distrust. I 
 deny any man's right to make a new platform 
 for our party. Such an attempt WT)nld bo as- 
 sumption, by whomsoever undertaken. The 
 Northern press has not thought it wise or ex- 
 pedient to attempt it. Will any man show me 
 his commission from the sovereign people to 
 
 turn out any such piece of political carpentry? 
 
 We stand upon what is before the country, 
 
 without addition or subtraction. For myself, 
 
 T trample all new platforms under my feet. 
 
 They answer in politics to the history of creeds 
 
 in the church ; marks, often, of the narrowness 
 
 and bigotry of the hour, from which all that is 
 
 progressive is excluded ; fetters on the free 
 
 spirit of the age. I trust the path the Repub- 
 
 ; lican party travels will l)e neither " too narrow 
 
 for friendship, nor too slippery for repose ; " that 
 
 ' it does and will embrace a brotherhood suthcient- 
 
 ly liberal and enlightened to march in various 
 
 I uniforms, with different yet friendly banners to 
 
 the music of the Union and the Constitution. 
 
 j I see no reason to repudiate any principle or 
 
 I expedient on which 1 acted at the last session. 
 
 That action has been approved by the country; 
 
 j let us rest in that. I have no right to speak 
 
 I tor Maine ; but New York loves to strike hands 
 
 j with Kentucky and North Carolina and Mary- 
 
 ■ land, and any of her sister Republics, North or 
 
 I South, in the great work of National purgation 
 
 I and reform. 
 
 j We are not to be narrowed down and hedged 
 : in to the single question of how we are to gov- 
 ern the Territories, and what is the extent of 
 Congressional power over them. Nor is this 
 I the sole test and touchstone of Republicanism ; 
 : for it is only at this single point that what is 
 I so much insisted on is of any practical appli- 
 I cation. Beside, that battle is already fought 
 in all latitudes covered by the old compromise 
 I line, and of wliich Southern statesmen cannot 
 j complain, inasmuch as the compromise origin- 
 ally passed by their votes was repealed by them 
 in 1854:, to give the people an opportunity of 
 acting their own pleasure on the subject of 
 their domestic institutions ; and ^yhich pleasure, 
 long thwarted, has at length been signified, 
 and this was all the South p7'ofessed to desire. 
 
 /i) 
 

 South of that line the question remains as if it 
 had not been disturbed, except that the reopen- 
 ing of this subject in lf<r)4, and its issues, has 
 landed to make' the sentiment very general at 
 the North, that no moreshive States ought to 
 fome i^to the Union, although this is not in- 
 cluded in the Philadelphia platforni, nor is it 
 a test of Republicanism, Still, should men of 
 these sentiments'colo'nize territory south of that 
 line, invited bjl-this action pf 'Southern states- 
 men, who jireter. their-doings to that of mem- 
 bers of Congress, sworn to obey the Constitu- 
 tion ; and should the result turn out as in Kan- 
 sas, while the North will be satisfied, those at 
 the South who desired other results may not 
 have occasion greatly to admire this wonder- 
 working repeal of 18.54. So confident am I of 
 the expansibility and invincibility of free-soil 
 and free-labor principles, that J care nothing 
 for ordinances, provisoes, or any other Con- 
 gressional and parchmented fencings. Brush 
 them all away, and yet Liberty, like an oak that 
 grows stateliest in storms, will send out her 
 grasping roots in the soil, and throw up her 
 towering branches to the sky, mightier for her 
 stern wrestling, affording shelter and shade to 
 the nations. Mere statutes cannot protect 
 liiberty; her vitality and vigor spring out of 
 the strong hearts of the people. Statutes are 
 only her expression, not lier bulwark or de- 
 fence. 
 
 For myself, I have no tenacity as to party 
 names; I go for things — for the combination 
 and unity of all good and true men, Irom all 
 sections of the couiitry, after the example of 
 this House at the last session, and of several of 
 our States at the recent elections, where, l:)y 
 such combination fi)r a common object, we 
 succeeded, and where, without it, we should 
 have been dcti^ated infallibly, and shall be 
 again, whenever such unity is repudiated and 
 al)audoned. It is idle to "talk of " allies" in 
 this connection, because every man, acting in 
 behalf of a great national object, is an ally of 
 every other ; and yet, altogether, we are one. J 
 think the gentleman from Kentucky unfairly 
 charges on the Senator from New York the 
 •lictation of the views of the gentleman from 
 Maine. The Rochester speecli, as I understand 
 it, proposes no political interference by the 
 General Government in the institutions of the 
 Southern States. It announces, in principle, 
 the antagonism of the two systems of frwe and 
 slave labor, but predicts a ])eriod in the future 
 when the people of those States will, of their 
 own accord, adopt the one aud repudiate the 
 other. Here is his language : 
 
 " It remains to say on tliis point only onowor<1,to guard 
 against misapprehension. II' these Stiites arc to again bo- 
 cumn uuivi'i-saily slavcholding, I do not pi-etoni^to sav ^s•ith 
 what violations oC llic Constitution that end shall he <"icconi- 
 plished. On the, other hand, while I do eonfidCMillv believe 
 and hope that my conntry will yet become a land of uni- 
 v(M-sal FretMloui. I do not expect that it will be made so other- 
 wise than through the action of the several States, co-opera- 
 ting with the Federal Government, and all acting in strict 
 conformity with their rospecUvo Constitutions." 
 
 How absurd the misapprehension, how need- 
 less the alarm, excited on this subject. I turn 
 to other topics. A progressive people will not 
 sustain or long tolerate an unprogressive Gov- 
 ernment. The law of development is the prin- 
 ciple of our national life, and this law will have 
 its operation in spite of all statutes that woidd 
 hinder and all policies that would thwart it. 
 The course of all free Governments proves that 
 they have steadily progressed from the lower 
 to the higher, from the crude and immature to 
 the more complete, and have followed no course 
 successl'ully, and stood upon no policy any 
 longer than it was suited to the wants of the pub- 
 lic, and gave full expression to its instincts and 
 needs. Measures which the age has outgrown 
 fall away from it, or are retained by constraint 
 only to fetter its movements and derange the 
 action of its forces. And no Power can hold 
 on to a useless and worn-out policy, without be- 
 ing cast otf with it; hence all national and gov- 
 ernmental measures are essentially empirical in 
 the philosophical sense. Politics has no eternal 
 principles beyond which the State cannot go; 
 no stereotyped form of procedure which it is 
 sacrilegious to pass. Democracy has an ad- 
 vancing and changing life ; it therefore con- 
 stantly demands and creates new forms of ex- 
 pression, instrumentalities of its higher culture. 
 The wisdom of the past is admirable as a guide, 
 but no limitation upon the future ; it may light 
 us to new paths, but cannot interdict them to 
 our footsteps. 
 
 The policy and measures of a people, in their 
 foteign and domestic relations, are distinguish- 
 able from those principles upon which the Gov- 
 ernment itself is based. The equality of man ; 
 the supreme power of the people ; the derivative 
 power of the executive, legislative, and judicial 
 departments; the responsibility of these to the 
 public ; the sanctity of the Union and of the 
 Constitution, whose Federal links clasp us to- 
 gether, in every letter and line of it ; these and 
 tjie like are foundation stones — immutable 
 principles, in which our national life is rooted ; 
 but M'hat shall be t.lie precise shape of that vast 
 machinery which the nation wields, and through 
 ,i«i(\'hich it displays the energy of its forces, and 
 makes known its sovereign behests, is always 
 matter for counsel and deliberation, compro- 
 mise, concession, guided by the lights of the 
 hour and the exigencies of the occasion. This 
 Is the field for the wisdom of statesmanship — 
 the arena for the display of political science, 
 which, in a progressive age, rests necessarily 
 not so much in principles as in measures, 
 which the ever-shifting interests of a nation 
 may demand should be modified or changed. 
 What is best for the nation, in its circum- 
 stances ? is the great problem for those who 
 guide her counsels, and woe to them if they 
 mistake — for mistake here is crime. This is 
 what Burke asserted concerning measures of 
 state, and in which he has been so widely 
 misunderstood. 
 
And now, sir, let me say that I propose to 
 examine brieHy some leadin": features in the 
 policy of the present Administration, in the 
 .measures it advocates and sustains; and, in the 
 light of the principles 1 have announced, I shall 
 hold it responsible, with ample power and domi- 
 nant majorities, not only for all the new evils it 
 practices, Ijut tor all the old aliases it tolerates. 
 They are its own by adoption, whenever and 
 however they originated; ibr no partv can es- 
 cape the penalty of public condcninailon, that 
 shelters itself beneath precedi^ts it has the 
 power to alter, and skulks behind the judicial 
 fortresses which the practices of a [Kist age 
 have erected. In that day, the fetters that now 
 so gall may have been wiselv forged ; tlie can- 1 
 kers that now so corrode, mav have been the j 
 symptoms of health. Every epoch must justify ! 
 Its measures to itself, for it can take nothing ! 
 trom the past but by rcadoption. And before ' 
 noticing one or two branches of ibreign policy, 
 1 propose to consi.ler what is the character of 
 our domestic relations in — 
 
 1. The Indian department. 
 
 2. Our fiscal system. 
 H. Our bankrujit policv. 
 
 4. Our revenue and protective system. 
 
 5. Economy in our administrative depart- 
 ments. 
 
 I. No nation, except the British and French 
 for a brief period, and the Spanish for a lono-er, 
 have had this problem, ofdeaiiuL' with the sav- 
 age upon their border, to work out; to manaire 
 and mould the encounter of the untamed child 
 of the forest with the semi-barbarons white- 
 shrewd, adventurous, daring, unscrupulous- 
 wearing his grotes^iue and centaurian civiliza- 
 tion, half Christian, half Indian, more as a o-ar- 
 ment than as a life. The Frenchman. witlAhe 
 easy flexihiliy of his nation, instead of meetinrr 
 savage life with a rude shock, insensiblv melted 
 and blended them together, so that it was hardly 
 possible to say what was civilized, and what was 
 barbarian. The French emigrant, trader, and 
 trapper, sat m the wigwam with the same non- 
 chalance as he trod the Boulevards ; and smoked 
 with the chieftain, or married his squaw, as if it j 
 was all a regular and anticipated procedure ! \ 
 l<rom the mouth of the St. Lawrence to those of 
 the Mississippi, throu^rli the chain of the great 
 lakes, and down the father of wafers, the 'trap- 
 per and .lesuil paddled juMcefullv with the In- 
 dian. The result of this polic^y, with hardlv an 
 exception, was salutary, benign. If it barbar- 
 ized the Frenchman, it civilized the savage, and 
 created in the contact, and by the halfdireeds 
 of the union, a race in which" the elements of 
 improvement seemed to reside. It gave to the 
 Indian a desire fbr propertv and 'a taste for 
 agricultural life. It was a peace policy. But 
 with the English, whose measures we have 
 adopted, and the Spaniard, it was a war policv. 
 It looked to punishment, vengeance, extermin.a- 
 tion. It roused in the Indian all his traditional 
 propeusititw, aud i*timulated all his passion lor 
 
 plunder and blood. It denied his rights and 
 his nationality, cheated him of his land.i, re- 
 1 pelled his efforts at enlightenment, treated 'him 
 I as a wild beast, and provoked and maddened 
 I him to skulk round the cabin of the pioneer, 
 I that, in the scalping of a victim, the sword of 
 ; the white might exterminate or scatter a whole 
 ! tribe or nation ! 1 have no time for particulars 
 i with which the pages of our Indian policv is 
 I crimsoned : but there they stand, all over its 
 * history. 
 
 I We are called on now to vote a recompense 
 I for depredations to individuals of dilferent 
 States, which this policy has occasioued, and 
 I for wars of reprisal and extermination. All 
 [along our bc^rders, life has been sacrificed, the 
 midnight brand ajjplied. and property destroyed ; 
 to be followed in turn bv those sure and over- 
 whelming disasters of the Indian, which a civil- 
 ized nation will assuredly inflict upon him ; and 
 this same line of procedure is maintained; col- 
 lision and blood follow contact evervwhere. The 
 war policy, the cut-throat system, "is the great 
 engine we are now employing- to civilizt- the 
 Indian. What did Spain re^Ip from this policy 
 fbr more than two hundred years? The race 
 she found was in a transition state from ruder 
 to better life. They hud architecture, painting, 
 wealth, and other evidences of proi,rress. 
 Through Central and South America, "they 
 were conquered and enslaved ; but the element 
 with which we deal, in these higher latitudes, is 
 of rougher and tougher material. It disdains 
 to put on the yoke or wear the fetter. It will 
 break, but not bend. Its fibre has no element 
 of pliability, and refuses submission or toil. But 
 we have been often told— the evidence is around 
 us now, sounds in our ear, both in the Senate 
 and on this floor—that our Indian policy should 
 be, must be, that of peace. Feed the Indian, 
 and not fight him ; fill his stomach with !n-e:id, 
 and he will have "no stomach " fbr the fray. 
 Our war policy, beside being the most'un- 
 I philosophical, barbarous, inhuman, and lookiii"- 
 j only to the complete annihilation of the Indian 
 i tribes, IS the most expensive one that could be 
 pursued ! One-lburth the sum drawn out of our 
 bankrupt and borrowing Treasury to pav for 
 Indian wars, would, if expended in a peace pol- 
 icy, blunt the edge of every knife, and burv in 
 eternal amity every tomakawk west of the Mis- 
 sissippi. Claims for untold millions are now 
 unad)uste<l for impromptu and spontaneous In- 
 dian wars :^ our frontiers, in Washington, Ore- 
 gon, and 'lexas, are liable to perpetual inroada 
 and alarms ; and yet the war policy is ])ersisted 
 111. No comi)rehensivc and pacific scheme is 
 announced or projios-d in its place ! It has but 
 one sad, fearful end ! Slaughter ! slaughter 1 
 slaughter! Is the {.olitical wisdom of this great 
 ^ political nation foundered and wrecked on this 
 I Indian problem ? Are jobs and contracts and 
 :})luiuier for munitions of war, to swallow, 
 I in their remorseless jaws, every principle of 
 i leclitude, every aentiment of humanity, every 
 
politic and peaceful eflort for the adjust- 
 ment of this crying evil, and our Adminis- 
 tration to go through the mockery of feast- 
 ing and frolicking wiih a few painted braves, 
 who are annually brought here to see their 
 great father, while at the same time the inex- 
 orable decree tor the annihilation of their tribes 
 is being carried steadily forward, until, in a few 
 years, no red-skin will hunt buffalo on the prai- 
 ries, and the last wigwam will be struck on the 
 shore of the Pacific? 
 
 11. Owr Jiscal 6-i/>i/em. What is that? It is 
 called, in the party catechism, the " Independ- 
 ent Treusiin/.''' I call it a myth : a cheat ; a 
 double-distilled humljug ; the shadow of a 
 shade. It originated iu an effort to dispense 
 with banks in a commercial age ; in the charla- 
 tan enterprise of doing without promises to 
 pay; of discarding, in all Governmental affairs, 
 the credit system ; of receiving hard money 
 only ; holding the hard money, and disbursing 
 the identical hard money. If this is not done 
 universiiUy, nothing is done. It was predicted 
 at the time by the most eminent statesmen then 
 living, that no such system could be carried out 
 in a country of such wide latitudes and iar-reach- 
 iug interests, where payments were to be made 
 thousands of miles from the place of principal 
 collection, saving immense risk and expense to 
 debtor and creditor; that paper exchanges and 
 faith of man in man, of the troverument in its 
 citizens, of the citizen in the Government, could 
 not be discarded without great danger as well 
 to the material as the moral interests of the 
 nation. But the swell of the popular surges 
 that swept away the Bank of the United States 
 were too high and headlong to be resisted. 
 The credit system was to be broken down, so 
 far as the Government could break it ; and it 
 was even vainly supposed that by its accumu- 
 lation of specie it could command and control 
 all the banks of the several States. 
 
 Well, sir, what might have been effected, we 
 cannot tell. The experiment has never been 
 tried. The Treasury relies still, and must al- 
 ways rely^upon and use the ordinary exchanges 
 of the country to make its payments. The 
 system so much desired, and so loudly lauded 
 ever since, has lost all its substance ; preserves 
 the shell of appearances, while its life and soul 
 are not there. It is a sort of Democratic idol, 
 without head, hands, or feet ; a black, square 
 monster, banded, ribbed, and riveted, at whose 
 Midas shrine the party bow and worship ; the 
 Uagon of Tammany Hall, where it should be 
 removed, as a perpetual memento, to soothe the 
 spirits of the gentle sachems, and certify them 
 continually that nothing is impossible in poli- 
 tics. 
 
 Sir, in the face of all this transparent hum- 
 buggery, the affairs of the Government are, 
 and must be, carried on by the use of a more 
 sensible agency. A fiscal system could be 
 ailopted, suited to the wnuts of the age, harmo- 
 niQus with the great commercial relatioua and 
 
 interests, amidst winch it must hare its play, 
 and aiding, not impeding, that system in the 
 States, that have now so limited and fortified 
 their systems of banking, that they are as safe 
 as the ingenuity of man can make them. 
 
 This I ndependent Treasury is only a flag of hos- 
 tility, a declaration of war by the Government 
 upon all jn'omises to pay. It demands the pay 
 without the promises, and deals with its citizens 
 upon the principle that every man is a knave. 
 Sir, the " promise to pay" has effected the most 
 stupendous changes in the history of modern 
 civilization; it is written on the forefront of all 
 those movements that create new empires on 
 this continent ; it blazes on the door-posts of 
 the settler's cabin ; it lifts its wand, and " Lo ! 
 the desert and solitary place are glad ! " the 
 lowing of the cattle is heard on the hill side, and 
 the corn waves in our valleys ; it fells forests, 
 builds churches, schools, and dwellings; sends 
 the ploughshare through the bosom of the virgin 
 soil; spreads the canvas of commerce on the 
 ocean, and the network of railways on the land ; 
 it stimulates thought, enlarges intelligence, wi- 
 dens the explorations of science, and gives to 
 society its cementing elements of brotherhood 
 and faith ; and, sir, the people that use it, pay 
 what they promise. They are ennobled to ful- 
 fil ; the rule is 'that of performance, notwith- 
 standing partial and local aberrations, and the 
 distrust v/hich a miserly policy creates. I am 
 in favor of the promise to pay, and I scorn 
 and contemn that miserable subterfuge, at once 
 a hypocrisy and a blunder, that despises credit 
 while it is borrowing millions, and repudiates a 
 policy at one moment, and for })arty ends, in 
 which it constantly lives and moves, and has 
 its being. 
 
 Here is the last bugle-note sounded over this 
 mythic remnant of an unprogressive barbarous 
 age : " The operations of the Independent 
 Treasury system," says the Secretary of the 
 Treasury, " have been conducted, during the 
 last fiscal year, with the usual success ; another 
 year's experience confirms the opinions I ex- 
 pressed in my former annual report," &c. And, 
 in addition to all this, our sagacious Secretary, 
 who, in fiscal affairs, has never yet been able 
 to see to the end of the next week befi)re him, 
 proposes that each State should imitate this 
 grotesque blunder and folly, by getting up an 
 iron chest of its own for the hoarding of State 
 revenues, in imitation of the General Govern- 
 ment. Sir, we have all heard of the man of the 
 " Iron Mask."' I think we have found his 
 brother, or the man of the ''Iron Boxes." 
 
 111. Bankrupt law for corporations. But our 
 paternal Government has not yet exhausted all 
 the riches of its Avisdoni, on this pet of the past. 
 It has been found, that with all the accumula- 
 tions it could muster, it could not yet seriously 
 interfere with the fiscal affairs of our great 
 commercial centres, like New Orleans, Charles- 
 ton, rhiladel|ihia, New York, and Boston ; that 
 it simply abstracted and held so much specie, 
 
as if it was stricken out of llie countrv, but tliat 
 the enormous iniiux of gold froniGalifurniH ami 
 elscAvhere rapidly tilled up the vacanc)', and 
 that no danger exists that a relative specie 
 basis will not be preserved. 'J'lie commercial 
 system of the country laughs at this monster, 
 and defies him. A new expedient is therefore 
 concocted. The President asstnls, and his 
 {secretary endorses it with a wide show of statis- 
 tical argumentation, that the i)eople need })r()- 
 tection against tiiemselves ; against their own 
 extravagance of borrowing, lending, and specu- 
 lation. That ihey are not to be trusted with 
 these dangerous tiscal instrumentalities, or per- 
 mitted the use of banks, except under the risk 
 and penalty of having them grasped by the 
 strong hand of the Federal Government, and 
 wrenched away, with all their values and re- 
 sources, the n\oment any partial or geiu^ral 
 derangement in trade affects them or their cus- 
 tomers ; for it is the custonter of the bank, as 
 I shall show, against whom tliis war of power 
 and empiricism is waged. The President says, 
 iu his hrst message : 
 
 " Congress, in my opinion, popspssps thi' power to pass t\ 
 unilbrni bankrupt law upplicaMe to ;i|l l)anl<iM;,' inKtiliition:; 
 throughout the Uuiteil Stales, iind 1 stnmr/li/ reeonnnen'l its 
 exercise. This woulil malcc it the ir/w'/v<iW<! or^^ann; law of 
 each bank oxisteiiee, that a suspension of specie payments 
 shall produce its civil death. " 
 
 The Secretary endorses and advocates it to 
 show that it is a darling and cherished mea.sure ; 
 it is again recommended in the message to this 
 Congress, although reported again.stby the Judi- 
 ciary Committee ; and these measures advoca- 
 ted by an Adtuinistralion that Ijelieves Congress 
 has no power to charter a bank, (which I do 
 not care to disj)ute,) and modestly proposes to 
 step in and place these creatures of the several 
 States, and owned by private citizens of those 
 States, having no element of Federal interest 
 about them, and no item of Federal jurisdiction 
 in them, under the control of a Federal otlice- 
 holder, tlie moment tliey suffer any of those 
 derangements to which the commercial and 
 monetary interest of our citizens are liable; so 
 that any aberration is to be putiislicd with death ; 
 they are not to be affectetl by reverses, on pen- 
 alty of annihilation. Now, sir — 
 
 1. I deny the policy of this course of ]iro- 
 cedure, if it were feasible ; it is the shallowest 
 quackery that any statesman could ])ropound. 
 
 2. I deny the constitutional power of Con- 
 gress to ptiss any such law. 
 
 1. As to its policy, iiook at the results of 
 such a measure, if it could be carried out. What 
 would htive ))een its effect in the great crisis of 
 1857? The President says truly in his message: 
 
 " No Government could have prevented the late revulsion. 
 The whole coniraercial world seemed for years to have been 
 rushing to this catastrophe." 
 
 And yet he would have every moneyed in- 
 stitution which bowed to this storm in tiie com- 
 mercial world, not uplifted and aided to recover 
 its usefulness to the community, btit torn up by 
 the ruuU, and thrown into the fiery furnace of 
 
 Federal vengeance ; and this, too, when it was 
 a victim, and not the agent, of the ruin. 
 
 But take a bank, located in any of our small 
 towns, North or South, as a specimen. With a 
 capital of $2(K),000, it accommodates say tiireo 
 hundred tanners or planters in their purchase 
 of stock or grain; perhaps a mill, and two man- 
 ufacturing estabiisiimcnis, employing one hun- 
 dred operatives each ; iifty mechanics, three or 
 tour merchants, and tlie usual po}mlation of 
 such a town. Everything seems healthy, flour- 
 ishing, prosperous. But a crisis comes, which 
 " no Government could prevent,"' *' the whole 
 conrmercial world '' being in it, and the bank is 
 to be wound up. Why ? Because it fails to pay 
 specie, on demand, at its counter, dollar for dol- 
 lar. Why does it so fail ? Because tiie com- 
 munity to whom its loans are made cannot pay 
 specie to the bank lor their indebtedness, or, 
 indeed, any money, for a time ; tind so they are 
 in the grasp of a Federal receiver. He opens 
 the scene by denninding of the population I 
 have just named specie for their notes, dol- 
 lar for dollar ; and, in delault, every man is 
 sued, judgment obtained, and half the three 
 hundred farms, the mill, the two factories, three 
 stores and their contents, are all in the hands 
 of the marshal, to be sold at auction to the high- 
 est bidder. But where are the buyers? On the 
 supposition we make, the whole country, as iu 
 1857, is in the like condition, with some small 
 exceptions of hoarded specie stored away in 
 miserly pockets. This residue of specie would 
 buy the town. Every man owing a dollar would 
 lall a prey to the accidental owner of coin ; and 
 a scene of universal and irredeemable bank- 
 ruptcy, ruin, misery, and horror, would super- 
 vene, which the mind sickens to contemplate. 
 
 Sir, I tell you, in such a state of things, your 
 bankrupt law for corporations would be a dead 
 letter. The people would rise in their wrath, 
 and hang your receivers and marshals on the 
 first lamp-post. "W'ith beggary staring them in 
 the face, wrenching the bread from the moutha 
 of their children, and tearing the shelter from 
 over their heads, all the Federal bayonets on 
 this continent could not enforce your law iu the 
 single city of New York ; so that in a general 
 crisis it would be useless, and in partial and 
 local instances it is unnecessary ; because, iu 
 the case of tin unsound bank here and there, no 
 derangement of the currency takes j)lace, 'and 
 such institutions are safely left to the legislative 
 and jitdicial action of the State that created 
 them. The policy is unwise in every aspect of 
 it. First, it would result in universal ruin, if 
 successful. Second, the people would not sub- 
 mit to it. Third, in a general panic it would, 
 therefore, be useless. Fourth, in partial in- 
 stances it is unnecessary, and belongs to the 
 States themselves. 
 
 2. Congress has no constitutional power to 
 pass any such law — it is rank, undisguised Fed- 
 eralism, of the extremest school. It stands 
 upou a thin iiamework of iuiplicatiou, founded 
 
6 
 
 .ipon oilier implications still more unsubstantial, 
 riie power ot Congress is derived in this respect 
 Tuai the people ot the (States. The}', the States, 
 ire sovereignties ; but this term has no appli- 
 jation to the Federal Government ; it takes 
 Tilly what is '' nominated in the bond." " Con- 
 gress shall have power to establish unifOTm laws 
 '^n the subject of l)ankruptcies throughout the 
 United States," is the toundation of this power. 
 H-Ow broad is it, and what, if any, are its neces- 
 sary implications ? Can it reach out its arms 
 iiid grasp any particular State interest, and 
 Liring it within the vortex of party and class 
 legislation ? Can it select, at pleasure, banks, 
 i-ailroad companies, manutacturing companies, 
 partnerships — in tine, any of the agencies of as- 
 sociated wealth — and fix a Federal lasso about 
 ;heir necks, under pretence of passing uniform 
 laws ? 
 
 1 claim that this term '' uniform " means not 
 simply that the laws shall have one shape, form, 
 and substance in respect to themselves, but 
 shall have a uniform application to all business 
 and persons, individual, associated, or corporate, 
 throughout the United States, who are traders 
 or merchants. This is its clear and obvious 
 meaning ; otherwise, the door is open here for 
 the most odious and alarming class legislation, 
 to be applied to planters only, or lawyers only, 
 or politicians only, as well as to banks or cor- 
 porations only. So the framers of the Consti- 
 tution understood this power from the example 
 of Great Britain, where such laws were in oper- 
 ation tor three hundred years ; so the States 
 who adopted the Constitution understood it : 
 and so Congress has construed this power by 
 their action, in 184:1, in the passage of the only 
 bankrupt law ever enacted under it. Congress 
 may " levy imposts and excises," but they shall 
 be *' uuitbrm," throughout the United States, 
 says the Constitution. How uniform — upon a 
 particular class importing or holding property? 
 No ; but upon that property, into whose hands 
 soever it may pass, or by whomsoever held, in 
 any State of the Union ; for if a class of persons 
 may be selected under the Constitution, why 
 ziot of a particular district ? And thus one 
 State, or its pecular interests, as of iron, or cot- 
 ton, or sugar, be compelled to pay all the taxes 
 of this " uniform " system, and by the same rule 
 of logic that justihes the application of bank- 
 rupt laws to corporations only, or any other ex- 
 ceptive class. 
 
 When public men rush into this Federal vor- 
 tex, which ingulfs all State rights and State in- 
 stitutions, they may recommend, in their fatuity, 
 that all railroad corporations, as the Secretary 
 of the Trearury has done, or all steamship cor- 
 porations, or all cotton-growing or cotton-con- 
 suming corporations, shall be made subject to 
 such law ; but I trust Congress will never become 
 so politically insane. What! does the Executive 
 not only desire to grasp our banks, and destroy 
 our trade, but to control our means of locomo- 
 tion, aud cGxupel us to stay at home at the im- 
 
 [ perial pleasure of some Federal receiver? 
 j Could this be effected, the French Emperor 
 ! might envy the craft aud address of a Yankee 
 j rival. Sir, 1 might lay the whole stress of my 
 objection here ; that the system proposed is not 
 I uniform, that it does not apply to traders ; but 
 j 1 take higher ground that this. I plant my foot 
 I on the lotty and unsurrendered attributes of 
 State sovereignty. These corporations are the 
 creatures of State laws ; in their inception, 
 progress, and ojjeration, they are guided by 
 State wisdom and State control. Let not Fed- 
 eral authoi'ity lay its meddlesome fingers on 
 anything that belongs to them, except so for as 
 the Slates have consented, otherwise there will 
 inevitably result a shock in the system, indica- 
 tive of conflicting jurisdictions, and the tierce 
 jar of opposing forces wrestling for mastery. 1 
 am jealous as any man of this insidious spirit 
 of Federal incroachment, this invasion of power 
 upon the domain of right, this clutch of the ser- 
 vant upon the reserved wealth of his master. 
 
 1 know it is affirmed that Congress, having 
 power to " coin money and regulate the value 
 thereof," may by implication grasp hold of aud 
 manage anything used by the States or people 
 as money. But what has this implication to 
 rest on ? Congress may coin money, (not issue 
 bills,) and regulate the value of such coin ; 
 nothing else. All the General Goverument can 
 do is to refuse to take the currency of the States 
 in national transactions ; here her power ends. 
 She has no right to say that I shall not receive 
 the promise to pay of a bank of my State, any 
 more than from one of ray neighbors for goods 
 sold and delivered. 
 
 1 know, indeed, that these recommendations, 
 though twice made, have not yet met with for- 
 mal adoption by the party ; but if unrebuked 
 and unexposed, the time will come when lying 
 dormant for a season, like viper's eggs, the warm 
 sun of party success will quicken them into life 
 and vigor, and they will come forth and throw 
 their coils around these State interests, until 
 their poison shall enfeeble, and their strength 
 strangle them to death ! They shall touch no 
 interest of my State, with ray consent. The in- 
 sane war on the monetary interests of the peo- 
 ple began in iHi)?, by the Government, and, re- 
 buked tgain and again, is renewed in every form 
 of which its authors are capable. Those in 
 power are incessantly tampering with the cur- 
 rency; advocating at one time a national bank, 
 and then insisting on its repeal ; having at one 
 moment great faith in State banks, and at 
 another no confidence whatever in such institu- 
 tions ; using at one period the currency of State 
 institutions, and at another discrediting it, and 
 resorting to one exclusively metallic. They 
 have been smitten with a perpetual unrest, which 
 seems to have settled with all its disquietudes 
 on the present Executive, who benevolently in- 
 forms us that the "existence of banks, and the 
 circulation of bank paper, is so identified with 
 the habits of our people, that they cannot be 
 
suddenly abolished without much inimediato 
 injury to the country ; "' foreshadowing, however, 
 that in case of ill behaviour, Congress should 
 prohibit altogether their issuing the "promises 
 to pay." 
 
 Sir, I should like to look upon an Adniinis- 
 tratiou that would seriously enter upon this 
 tritiing task. I denounce it all as a systematic 
 conspiracy to control all the moneyed interests 
 of this country ; to clutch the purse-strings of 
 all private as well as public wealth ; and sweep 
 into the train of Federal consolidation the dis- 
 tinct agencies of individual and State enter- 
 prise But 1 can only indicate outlines at this 
 time, leaving full discussion to some other oc- 
 casion. 
 
 IV. Our revenue and protective system. On 
 this subject, I am free to confess that I sympa- 
 thize to some extent with those who desire the 
 lowest duties on imports, compatible with the 
 wants of the Government. In this age, no in- 
 terest, trade, or calling, should be protected for 
 the sake of protection ; it is, to some extent, a 
 tax on the rest of society. The theory of free 
 trade can never be refuted, provided you discard 
 the idea of separate, hostile, or dependent na- 
 tionalities. The principle as such is unanswera- 
 ble, standing alone. 
 
 But the dilticulty is, it does not stand alone. 
 It is controlled and modilied by countervailing 
 national legislation, by revenue necessities, hy 
 the balance of trade, and other disturbing forces, 
 that place it among the class of political expe- 
 dients which a people may alter, increase, or di- 
 minish, as the best interests of the times may 
 demand ; and if, in such increase or diminution, 
 discrimination can be made which will operate 
 incidentally as a protection, so let it be ; pro- 
 vided, always, if it be not so large as to stimu- 
 late an outlay which a slight or even considera- 
 ble change in the necessities of Government 
 might destroy. Our manufacturing interests 
 are not benefited so much by high as by steady 
 tariffs. Jt may as well be admitted at the out- 
 set, that American manufactures cannot meet 
 those of other countries on terms of equality, 
 that pay only one-third or one-fourth the wages 
 we are compelled to disburse ; their profit must 
 exceed ours by all this difference. I take it for 
 granted we shall never resort to direct taxation 
 for the support of the National Government, 
 however beneficial such policy might be. If 
 adopted, it would doubtless diminish the amount 
 one-half in a single year ! For what Congres- 
 sional district could, or would, pay the two hun- 
 dred and fortieth part of $80,000,000 per an- 
 num — or about three hundred and forty thou- 
 sand dollars for each district. Its collection 
 would create civil war and dissolve the Union 
 eo instanU. The people will_pay indirectly what 
 they would not directly. 
 
 But, sir, on this matter of raising revenue, 
 we are now at a stand ; wastefulness, pecula- 
 tion, jobbing, and the cormorant bi-ood that 
 feed and fatten on Executive favor, have emp- 
 tied the public Treasury so fast, that some policy 
 
 I of replenishment must be adopted, or bank- 
 I ruptcvofthis great corporation is the ine<'itable 
 result". What a spectacle ! with §70,000,000 
 income : more than sufficient for the economi- 
 cal support of Government in a time of peace, 
 I to be compelled to borrow $20,000,000, per 
 annum ! Individually, I would cut down ex- 
 j peuditures, dismiss an army of office-holders 
 I in every administrative department, and inau- 
 1 gurate a system of close and rigid economy ; 
 I this is an essential preliminary step. Still, if a 
 \ revenue must be raised by imposts, on what 
 principle should they be levied and adjusted. 
 
 1. Imposts raise reven\ie by iadiieci taxa- 
 tion. As a consequence, those who participate 
 in the benefits of Government should bear its 
 burdens, and these burdens should be so dis- 
 tributed that the greatest numbers should pay, 
 other things being equal. This is the radical 
 idea of a tax. 
 
 2. Imposts reguJcde trade and prevent ex- 
 travagant and enormous importations, especial- 
 ly of luxuries, which drain our country of its 
 specie, in which alone our foreign debt is liqui- 
 dated, and generate habits of wastefulness and 
 folly among our people. Regard should be 
 had, therefore, to this result. Any duty, the 
 slightest, has some effect on the balance of 
 trade. No statesman ^vill lose sight of it in 
 large levies ; large importations and small ex- 
 portations will soon beggar a nation ; better 
 clothe the President and members of Congress 
 in negro cloth, than bow the neck of this nation 
 before the shrine of foreign luxury and trade. 
 It subjects us to a servitude of the most humil- 
 iating character ; and mortgages the energy and 
 enterprise of the country, to fill the pockets of 
 our foreign lords. 
 
 3. Imposts operate as a protection to home 
 industry in respect to the articles on which 
 they are levied, whei'e articles of the same char- 
 acter are produced at home. The free-trade 
 school claim that incidental protection even is 
 an evil; because, just to the extent of that pro- 
 tection is an unjust tax levied on the rest of the 
 community. But this assumes two very im- 
 portant items in the account: 1. That increas- 
 ed home manufactories do not create additional 
 home markets. 2. That the consumer of the 
 article has only the same ability to pay the cost 
 and tariff that he had before such new manu- 
 factories were established. It can be demon- 
 strated, I think, that both of these assumptions 
 are unfounded ; that new home markets are in- 
 tantly opened, and that the producer of articles 
 sold, and the consumer of articles bought, is 
 far better able to pay both original cost and 
 tariff, than he was before to pay only the first 
 without such market. It is entirely fallacious 
 to look only to the amount to be paid, without 
 coui:iting upon the increased ability to pay. 
 
 Again: the free-trade school reject specific 
 and prefer ad valorem duties. I can divine no 
 reason for this, but that the latter are in fact 
 rendered less protective, in consequence of the 
 wide latitude for frauds which it opens. This, 
 
LIBRftRY OF CONGRtSS 
 
 specific duties will greatly remedy. I am in 
 favor ol" tlie President's recommeiulutiou here, 
 and will do what 1 can to carry it out. 
 
 The example of Great Britain, and the enor- 
 mous nulioual wealth she has accumulated by 
 a strict adherence to the protective policy, in 
 virtue of which she has become the workshop 
 of the wiTld, imi>orting raw material and ex- 
 porting manufactured goods to the extent of 
 $liOO,yOO,000 per annum, is worth ten thousand 
 theories and speculations oji that subject, and 
 demonstrates this general truth in jjolitical 
 economy : that a nation that exports its raw 
 material will grow poor ; while a nation that 
 exports manufactured goods will grow rich by 
 all the difference of the industrial ibrces and 
 their values expended on the articles. 
 
 Jt is true of a neighborhood. State, or nation, 
 and is susceptible of easy demonstration, all 
 free-trade theories to the contrary notwithstand- 
 ing. England's free trade to-day is simply 
 that she shall be free to crowd her manufactur- 
 ed :irticles on our markets, and take what she 
 pleases of our raw material in return, and hard 
 money for the balance, and, as in the case of to- 
 bacco and other articles, subject to tariffs beyond 
 even the original cost of the article to the 
 planter. We pay her tribute as really as if in 
 a state of colonial subjection and vassalage. 
 What avails our political enmncipation, our 
 windy fourth of July glorifications, over our 
 escape from her power, if we lay the wealth of 
 our country, the bone and muscle of all our 
 industry and enterprise and capital, willing of- 
 ferings on her commercial altars ? Well might 
 the patriotic spirit of Henry Clay chafe, like a 
 caged eagle, to see his great country reduced 
 to such humiliating conditions ! 
 
 V. More rigid economy in the administrative 
 department of (jrovernment. I have already 
 adverted to this, and have no time for details, 
 which are at hand in every bureau of the Gov- 
 ernment. Take some of our custom-houses as 
 a specimen. 1 extract the following from Mr. 
 Boyce's report on free trade : 
 
 Amount of reoenve. collected, and expeHdUures at certain cus- 
 tomlioicseSf/or tlm fiscal year ending Jiine 30. 1857. 
 
 x,„, .„„.,„ T7 ^,,,,1 K.\ceris uf 
 
 Location. 
 
 Re von no 
 collected. 
 
 Belfast, Maine - - $5,052.05 
 
 Waldoboru'. Maine - 1,368.02 
 
 Wi.scasset, Maine - 130.93 
 
 Burlington, Vormout - 8,581.70 
 
 lUHS,. «,.„_,.„,,„„„„ ■ 
 
 Bai-nstible, Mass. 
 Simdusky, Ohio - 
 Ellsworth, Maine 
 Portsmouth, N. H. 
 Biiffalo, New York 
 Oswego, New York 
 Newark, New Jersey 
 Pcnsacoia. Florida 
 Perth Amboy.N. J. 
 Astoria, Oregon - 
 Maiihias, Maine - 
 Plymouth, Mass. 
 Bridgeport, Conn. 
 Annapolis, Mnryland 
 Pooria, Illinois 
 
 1,402. 
 567.84 
 954.96 
 
 - 5,530.54 
 
 - 10,140.i53 
 
 - 6,149.09 
 
 384.30 
 ♦ 478.73 
 
 - 1,531.73 
 
 - 4,173.64 
 
 008.71 
 395.12 
 805.44 
 180.75 
 210.20 
 
 $6,012.87 
 
 •7,547.14- 
 
 7,3W.09 
 
 16,285.47 
 
 H,P53.20. 
 
 4,372.06 
 
 0,032.09 
 
 10,984.49 
 
 10,896.51 
 
 18,214.58 
 
 i;595.55 
 
 3.012.62 
 
 4;471.79 
 
 21,254.51 
 
 2,605.72 
 
 3,216.04 
 
 1,766.24 
 
 929.20 
 
 363.60 
 
 ver revenue. 
 
 $960.82 
 
 ■'6,179.12 
 
 7,228.16 
 
 7,703.77 
 
 10,490.55 
 
 3,S04.S2 
 
 4,077.13 
 
 5,453.95 
 
 6,755.98 
 
 12,005.49 
 
 1,212.55 
 
 2.033.89 
 
 2.940.06 
 
 17'.080.87 
 
 1,997.01 
 
 2,820.92 
 
 OK.n.SO 
 
 784.45 
 
 153.40 
 
 Corrupt ' llll'l Hi mil lllll lllll llil lllll (llll Id IK III Ijj 11 f rt ) ni 
 
 the surf 011 898 339 7 (Jl'^liiljit 
 unmistakable signs Ol 111.. »i.v. .... .- _ king; 
 
 and yet the President is talking complacently 
 of 6«//m/y Cubaat hundreds of millions, and ex- 
 tending a protertoraie — an armed, etlicieut pro- 
 tectorate — over Mexico and all the Gulf Stales. 
 And gentlemen here are so inflated with this 
 restless spirit of manifest destiny, that they are 
 hardly to be kept from spontaneous combus- 
 tion. Young America is become burglar and 
 pirate, and is not content to sit on the Rocky 
 Mountains and wash his feet in the Gulf of 
 Mexico, but he must grasp Cuba, to sweeten his 
 sugar-tooth, and have cheap sirup on his cakes! 
 It IS not the first time this moral and political 
 insanity has seized us, to steal what we could 
 not buy, and did not want, and had no mean.s 
 to pay tor. What can foreign nations do but 
 despise our bluster, and treat all such gascon- 
 ading as it deserves? Gentlemen seem to talk 
 here about our expansion, as if we should suf- 
 focate at once, unless we could kick up a row 
 with all creation ! 
 
 Too poor to pay our expenses in a time of 
 profound peace, we are to organize an expen- 
 sive army and naval equipment to buy or con- 
 quer new dominions. Where is the money to 
 come from ? I will tell you what is expected ; 
 from plunder of the conquered countries ! Vain 
 expectation ! They may be plundered indeed, 
 as they now are ; but it will be only the old sys- 
 tem of Roman pro-consular devastation, filling 
 the pockets of Governors, and swellitig the for- 
 tunes of a licentious soldiery, debauched by 
 such services from their integrity ; but no stray 
 copper will ever, even by accident, reach the 
 coffers of the Republic. 
 
 Sir, contiguous i.slands and States will fall 
 into us as surely as time rolls on. All the navies 
 of the civilized world cannot prevent it: but let 
 them ripen first with the fruits of self-govern- 
 ment; let their people desire the benefit of our 
 laws and institutions ; let them be educated to 
 take their places as independent States in our 
 Federal system ; let the American spirit breathe 
 over, and' burn in them, and then they will 
 come, not as rough fragments torn from the 
 side of some decaying monarchy, or tossed in 
 th(; wild uproar of civil commotion, with no ele- 
 ment of adhesiveness, and no tendency to re- 
 pose; but as new planets, orderly, harmonious, 
 they will fall into their api)ointed spheres, and 
 sweep round the central orb that attracts them, 
 part and parcel of a stupendous system that 
 moves among the nations like the sun in the 
 heavens ; glorious in the train his influence com- 
 mands, and enriched not so much by his in- 
 herent grandeur, as in the multitudinous splen- 
 dors of surrounding- constellations. 
 
 BUELL & BLANCHARD Print«rs, Washington, D. C.