Glass P o *^ 1 Book Ql^A^ ■^o^ >- zJ ■BBM^MHM 3F V^ HENRY D. GILPIN, July till, 1834„ Mifflin & Parry, Printers, 99 S. Second Street. / A SPEECH DELIVERED AT THE BB»ZOCRATZC CEIiEBRATXOH f^/4 ^ BY THE CITIZENS OF THE SECOND CONGRESSIONAL DIS- TRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA, OP THE - i ^-■ or The M^ecUiration ot Inilepenilence^ July 4tli 1834, BY HENRY D. GILPIN. [Published by the Committee of Arrangement.] ^ Holahan'a Hotel, 8th July, 1834. " To Henry D Gilpin, Esq. Dear Sir: At the request of the Committee of Arrangement for cele- brating the Anniversary of American Independence, by the Democratic citizens of the City of Philadelphia, I annex an extract from their mi- nutes of this date. Your friend and obedient servant, HENRY SIMPSON, Sec'y- On motion Resolved, That the thanks of this meeting be presented to Henry D.Gilpin for his excellent Oration, delivered on the 4th instant, and that he be requested to furnish a copy of it for publication. Philadelfihia, 9th July, 1834. To Henry Simpson, Esq. Sec'y. Dear Sir: I inclose for the, Committee of Arrangement a copy of the remarks made by me at the celebration at M'Arann's Garden on the 4th instant. I beg you to express to the committee my sense of the compli- ment they have paid me, in the request communicated by you, I aro, very respectfully, yours, H. D. GILPIN. DEMOCRATIC FESTIVAL, JULY FOURTH, 1834. President. GEORGE M. DALLAS. Vice Presidents. Henry Horn, Samuel B. Davis, William J. Lciper, Samuel Badger, Charles K. Servoss, Michael Nisbet, Wilson Taylor, Robert Adams, Joseph Worrelly Thomas Roney, George W. Try on, Lewis Taylor, William Ruff, Alexander Diamond, Levi EUmaker. i Orator of the Day. Henry D. Gilpin. Reader of the^Declaration. Henry Horn. Committee of Invitation. Henry Simpson, Wm. Ruff, Benjamin Miffli-n, Lewis Taylor, Wm. J. Leiper, Theodore Evans. GUESTS. Senators. Thos. H. Benton, of Missouri, John Tipton, of Indiana, Felix Grundy, of Tennessee, Isaac Hill, of New Hampshire, Representatives in Coivgress. Robert T. Lytle, of Ohio, George R. Gilmer, of Georgia, William Allen, of Ohio, Edward Kavenaugh, of Maine. Judge G. W. Campbell, of Tenn. Gov. Wm. Findlay, of Pa. Mr. Pope, of Va. Co). Wm. Dnane, of Pa. Mr. Sibley, of Mass. Dr. Wilmer Worlhington, of Pa. Commodore Chas. Stewart, SPEECH. More than eight hundred years after the foundation of Rome, a Grecian traveller, visiting the vast mistress of the world, found her citizens assembled to celebrate the day on which a band of shepherds had first traced the boundaries of the infant re- public. The festival had been kept sacred through each succeed- ing age. The people who then embraced, within their extended empire, all the nations of the earth; who had spread the blessings of commerce, civilization and the arts from seven little hills on the shores of the Tiber, to the remotest oceans and the wildest deserts, cherished, with sacred regard, the day when a few bold and oppressed husbandmen sought a refuge where they could establish their own institutions, and protect their own privileges, by a social compact framed among themselves. The festival was not established with the bloody rites which marked all the other days consecrated by public celebrations; no slaughtered victims stained the altars of the gods; no smoking entrails were examined by the priesthood; nothing that had life was offered to propitiate the di- vinities who had watched over the birthday of Rome; but the ministers were crowned with chaplets of flowers, the people brought offerings of early fruits, and as night closed the solem- nity, the streets of the city, the surrounding villages, and the rural abodes were lighted up by bonfires and enlivened by danc- ing and song. Year after year, the citizens of that proud repub- lic — their breasts imbued with the spirit of independence, and their rights as freemen guarded by the laws they had made — sacredly cherished the remembrance of that day. After the ancient energy was departed, even their descendants dwelt with conscious satisfaction on the period when the Roman people exerted their own majesty; when they successfully guarded the republican institutions against the secret or the open ambition of designing men, and from factions formed to elevate the wealthy or the proud upon the ruin of popular rights. The spirits yet un- corrupted loved to recur to the lessons of patriots who had cher- ished the genuine principles of freedom; to deeds where life was 2 held a trifling iacrificc if national honor was at stake; to laws and institutions calculated to preserve the direct and practical interference of the people, in all the measures connected with their own welfare. It was not until the remembrance of these things passed away, that the spirit of the republic was gone, and the liberties of its citizens were overthrown. It was not until immense wealth was gradually accumulated in the hands of comparatively few ; till privileged associations of individu- als took advantage of their powers and position to assume an in- fluence never intended to be conferred; till the silent and stealthy but sure and rapid march of intrigue, of selfishness and ambition had penetrated into the very centre of popular rights — that the republic was found only to be a name, and the people in reality nothing but instruments or slaves. Then indeed these festivities became but an idle ceremony — idle to the thoughtless, but to those whose bosoms the love of country yet warmed, the painful emblem of a freedom that existed no more — the sad proof, that if a people would guard their own power in the government of themselves, they must watch, daily and nightly, the inroads of corruption and ambition, and tear from them, before it becomes familiar to their eyes, the mask they are always ready to assume. The annual feast, which marks the birth of their republic, must not be cele- brated alone with the symbols of joy — with assemblages of those who merely recall the memory of the past; but it must bring together the people to weigh well the principles on which their institutions have been formed, to review the gradual progress of events, and see whether, under any specious pretext, they have been pervert- ed or abused; to dwell on the actual position of their affairs, and to decide whether they preserve, not merely in name, but in po- sitive and practical efficiency, all the benefits which their forefa- thers intended to secure when they laid the corner stone of the re- public. We are here assembled, fellow citizens, after fifty-eight years have passed away, to celebrate the birthday of our republic. As the Romans did, we hail it with joy ; we hang over us the emblems of festivity and peace ; we surround the names of its founders with chaplets of flowers; and we hold their deeds and memories in warm and grateful remembrance. It would be a task fraught with pleasure— our hearts would, respond to it — to cele- brate their actions, to repeat the sacred traditions of their person- al sacrifices and their public zeal. Beneath the shades of this grove we might dwell upon the past, recall to ourselves how our 7 fathers acted in their days, how our beloved country has held its onward way in arts, in happiness and in fame, and how its noble institutions and the lofty character of its sons have made it, even in this early time of its history, among the fairest of human things. But such a celebration would evince a vain and weak, if even a pardonable, feeling. It would be to let slip, in thoughtless cere- monies, the period for performing an important and patriotic duty. If we have not the same cause for bold and vigorous conduct which animated the sages of 1776, we have other duties equally sacred to perform. It was theirs to preserve hallowed rights, republican in- stitutions, the principles of a fierce democracy from a foreign foe. It is ours to see that all these are now as safe as they were at the moment our ancestors saved them from that foe. What matters it to us, if we have lost the virtuous impulses from which freedom alone can spring, whether they have been yielded to the hand of vio- lence from abroad, or sunk beneath the silent inroads of ambition, of dissention, of weakness, or of corruption at home? What mat- ters it to us, whether our liberties are avowedly lost, or whe- ther they are subverted in effect by policy altogether at vari- ance with them? As in the later days of the republic of Rome, year after year, when we thus met together, might show us the same outward forms of government, but the real, the animating spirit would be gone — the true voice of the people would be drowned by the increased and undue influence of power, meant to be subordinate; by the combinations of a false ambition, or the in- terested motives of powerful classes of individuals, who would, for purposes of transient and selfish interest, forget or overlook the real welfare of their country. The duty, then, of American citizens who assemble on the Fourth of Jul)^, is not merely to celebrate the day of their inde- pendence. It is not even mainly to do this. Their proper duty is, to examine the present, and to look forward to the future. To see that the just motives which actuated our forefathers then, actuate their descendants now. To observe whether our present mea- sures and policy are founded on, and sustain them. To watch the conduct of those who have been elevated to ofHces of trust, confidence and honor. To examine the career and explore the designs of ambitious men, who aim at personal advancement or distinction. To pledge ourselves, with a solemnity as sacred as that of the signers of the great charter which has just been read, to do in these days, as they did then, whatever is necessary to preserve what they established, honestly and usefully, not merely in theory and name. And never, my countrymen, on any previous anniversary of our independence, have American citizens assembled Avith this duty imposed upon them more sacredly than now. At no mo- ment of our political existence have they been required to weigh with greater care the measures and conduct of their public men, to examine the practical results of their policy, and to revert to the great ends of social government, and the means by which they must be maintained. No foreign enemy roams along our shores, no desolating scourge hovers over our homes. Peace ex- tends her olive wand, and heaven seems more abundantly to heap on us the prosperity and the bounteous blessings it has always showered, with a gracious hand. Yet the voice of domestic strife is not silent. The halls that should be sacred to patriotic deliberation, ring with the echoes of faction. The intrigues of am- bition, and the designs of avarice, are at work in every corner of the land, and the purposes of the one and the other are to be subserved amid the tumult they have conspired to excite. Yet in truth, the contest 'with these is never difficult, their overthrow is never doubtful, the triumph is never uncertain, when the determination is resolutely made. Fellow citizens, factions have ever been the curse of republics. The leaders of factions have ever been the designing, the disap- pointed, the malignant — those who are actuated, not by a lofty, but by a low and selfish ambition. Party must, and always does, per- haps always should exist, in free governments; but it is founded on principles, it rallies men together, it sacrifices smaller objects for the attainment of greater ends. Faction has no principle; sometimes it professes one, and at others the reverse; it is now aiming to destroy an individual, and then it becomes his accomplice or his tool; it carries its ends by corruption, it deals in falsehood and misrepresentation, it forms unnatural alliances, it digs the grave of patriotism, and pollutes the fountains of national honor. In the early days of our republic, the citizens of America, new to the political institutions they had framed, differed essentially as to the principles on which they were to be administered. Parties were formed on this difference; these opposing principles became the subject of anxious deliberation; and after a struggle, arduous but determined in its character, the democracy of the country nobly and signally prevailed. The republican party became avowedly 9 9 triumphant; the ranks of its opponents dwindled into a small mi- nority of the people. A course of policy, distinguished by the reduction of the public debt, the abolition of the bank of the United States, the security of the navigation of the Mississippi, and the extension of our boundaries to the great western ocean, was ren- dered more illustrious by the glories cf a war in which our flag waved in triumph on every ocean, and the eagle of victory perched on the standards of our armies. Throughout this long career, the mutterings of faction were not always suppressed; and the de- signs of ambition could not always be disguised. Many manly and generous spirits opposed to the principles of our party, did in- deed act nobly with us in the common cause of country, but there were not wanting those, who alike in the hour of prosperity and of trial, were deaf to the voice of patriotism, though they could listen to the whispers of selfishness and ambition. In the natural consequences of a war — the derangement of the finances, the accumulation of the public debt, the necessity of large supplies of manufactures, and the want of ready means of transpor- tation, the opponents of the republican party saw a favourable occasion to introduce into the system of our general government, those broader views of power which hitherto the people had refused to approve. Many of them, honestly actuated by the belief that they were those on which our government ought to be ad- ministered, sustained them now as they had sustained them before; while ambitious leaders, found in their ranks, as in those of all political associations, saw in these, topics which might be ser- viceably used for their own ends. Even some who maintained inflexibly original democratic sentiments, believed that a change of policy, required by the exigencies of the times, was not at variance with them. The result was the establishment of anew national bank, intended to be a useful fiscal agent, subject to strict examination and control; thd protection, by a moderate tariff, of the domestic industry of the country; and the commencement of a plan of internal improvement, limited in extent, and confined to objects of evident national utility. Well were it for us, if the system so established had been maintained in the same spirit with which it was founded. Well were it, if it had not been perverted and misused to subserve political designs. The bounda- ries, however, were quickly overleaped; the promotion of manufac- tures was converted into a scheme of partizan protection designed to aid the aspirations! of certain politicians; the expenditure of pub 10 lie money for internal improvements, became a notorious means of bargaining for the advancement of personal popularity in particular districts; and the national bank began to assume a power indepen- dent of the government, of which it was the agent, and to establish an influence over the community, which might be employed for purposes oppressive, selfish, or corrupt. These consequences, gradually developed, were at length fully displayed during the ad- ministration of John Quincy Adams — a president having less than one third of the electoral votes, and elevated to power against the will of the people, by means of a coalition, fortun- ately without a parallel in our history, a coalition with an old and avowed political rival, himself a candidate for the presidential chair, also rejected by the people. Could the consequences be doubtful? No. — The American people indignantly hurled from the offices of trust, men who had thus stolen unwarily into places of honour; the principles of the republican party were again assert- ed ; the chief place in the government was' confided to a man grown venerable in the service of his country, whose blood had been freely shed beneath her banners, whose integrity was un- sullied by the breath of suspicion, whose courage and decision were equal to every crisis, and whose cherished political maxims were those that had been ever maintained by the great democratic family. Representing as he has done the sentiments of the people, carrying out their honest wishes^ yielding to no motives of partizan ambi- tion, suffering himself to be the tool of no struggling or aspiring faction, we have seen the republican party rallying round him, and extricating us from the toils into which we had been deceitfully led. Internal commerce is no longer made the instrument of poli- ticians. The funds raised from the labours of the people, have been faithfully applied to lessen their burthens, not squandered with local, partial, and interested designs. Domestic manufactures are protected with aview to the general benefit, not'so as to excite vindictive contests. The quiet majesty of the laws is upheld against the designs of defeated political aspirants, who publish under the name of democracy doctrines which it would blush to own. The honor and fame of the American people are protected and ex- tended over distant countries, the wrongs of our citizens redressed, claims unjustly withheld readily discharged, and new sources of wealth opened to fearless enterprise. But above all this, through- out our land, the positive and practical spirit of democracy asserts its sway; the people rule now as they ruled thirty years 3go; they 11 are redeemed from the control of interested leaders; they see the government of their choice administered by men of their choice; they are carrying on triumphantly that struggle, which, in every republic, must be periodically carried on, between the great mass of the people, honest, conscientious, and straight forward, and those who, actuated by false theories, or by a misguided ambition, or by their peculiar position, or by considerations of personal inte- rest, are constantly at variance with them. Such, fellow citizens, has hitherto been the progress of affairs, gradually restoring the government, in the language of Mr. Jeffer- son, to "its republican tack." But the work is not yet accom- plished. As the contest hastens to its close, the struggle becomes more violent, and is attended with all the recklessness of anger and the fury of despair. The political events of the last eighteen months have no parallel in our domestic history. They display the last rally of a few politicians, who see close at hand the prostration of their ambitious designs; and the last struggle of a band of moneyed monopolists, who dread the inevitable termina- tion of privileges, heedlessly conferred on them, by which thek own interests have been served, at the expense of their fellow citi- zens. Disguise it as they may, the people of the United States know too well that this is now a contest between the democracy and the country on one hand, and, on the other, a coalition formed between political leaders already rejected by the peo])le, and the Bank of the United States, always distrusted by them, and only tolerated from a confidence and a hope, which have now been proved to be vain. Whatever disguise is assumed, whatever name is invoked, the evi- dent truth is this. If the clamour about executive usurpation is raised, what is it but an unflinching opposition on the part of the chief executive magistrate towards the Bank of the United States? If lamentations over popular errors are querulously uttered, what are they but a settled purpose on the part of the people to dis- card from their favour Clay, Webster, or Calhoun? Yes, fellow citizens, the history of the last eighteen months, is the history of a coalition between the bank for its selfish purposes, and a few factious politicians, for their own ambitious designs. It is to put down this coalition that all our efforts should be directed; it is the last battle the republican party has now to fight; it is a cause to which, before every other, they should pledge themselves on the anniversary of the Fourth of July. Never bave the annals of a republic presented a course of conduct 12 more presumpluouSj more intemperate, more at variance with the purity of institutions, the solemnity of public assemblies, the rights of citizens — nayj the common dictates of justice, and of public and private honour, than that displayed in the combined movements of the Bank of the United States, audits instruments and associates in Congress. Can it be doubted, that the framers of our Constitution never contemplated the existence of a corporation possessing such fearful powers, and so capable of placing itself beyond control, as the Bank of the United States? Little could they have designed that any thing, so intrinsically mean as a mere money-agent, should set itself up as the rival, nay the very master, of the people. Yet so have we permitted, year after year, this cancer to extend itself; so have we allowed this institution to advance, step by step, that we are at last startled at the power we have thoughtlessly given away — at the audacity a creature has ventured to assume, against those to whom it owes its existence. How frightful is its pow- er; how impudent its audacity! The fortunes of our citizens are elevated or depressed at its nod; the press is made silent or abusive at its decree; the laws of the land are perverted by sophis- try, or boldly violated to suit its purposes; the chosen officers of the American people are assailed with gross scurrility to gratify its malignity; and their representatives are treated with an insolent scorn, which would really be amusing, if the source whence it pro- ceeds were alone considered, and not the precedent it may afford to every public agent. These arc not matters of doubt, but they are recorded facts. They are facts which should never be for- gotten. They should serve as beacons to warn the people of the dangers upon which they were running. They should be incen- tives to renewed ardour in the present contest, for it is against these very things we are now contending — these very things are now to be put down, or else they may be always afterwards triumphantly perpetrated. Fellow citizens, you must forgive me if I repeat some of these facts. You have heard them before, but as the great char- ter of our freedom is read, over and again, every returning year, to keep its very language as well as its principles deeply impressed on our hearts, so on every occasion while our present great strug- gle goes on — the struggle between the country on one side, and the bank and its political allies on the other; between the too pa- tient master and the presumptuous servant — on every occasion when we are thus assembled, these facts should be repeated, that l3 we may perpetually see what we have heen, and still are, expected submissively to bear. > Is the value of our property to be regulated — are our private fortunes to be raised or depressed — are the public revenues to be cut off— as suits the notions of a moneyed conclave, when it chooses to dabble in politics, or speculate in stocks? Every freeman would answer — No. Yet what has been the power and policy of this bank? In June, ISIS, it raised its discounts to the community to iS41,000,000 — in December following it had reduced them to §36, 000,000. In 1S26, in the same manner, we find its dis- counts in June §35,000,000— in December reduced to §30,000,000. In December 1S30, its discounts were §42,000,000— in May 1S32, they were increased to §70,000,000— in the following December they were reduced to §61,000,000— in August 1833, they were increased to §64,000,000 — and in December 1833, they were reduced to §54,000,000. In January, 1831, it had §17,600,000 of its bank notes in circulation, sustained by §11,000,000 of specie; in January, 1832, it had increased its circulation to §23,000,000, while its specie was reduced to §7,500,000. What have been the consequences of so wanton a course ? Repeated periods of fallacious prosperity, and of unforeseen difficulty and suffering, among the people, who have been made the victims of this cupidity, without pity or remorse. No matter to what motives this conduct is to be ascribed — whether to erring judgment, to selfish speculation, or to political intrigue — it is such as no power, paramount or subordinate, can exercise, without endangering and destroj^Ing every thing we ought to hold dear. But when we come to exam- ine the times and circumstances, we find Its actions are directed with a view to operate on the political affairs of the country, and to affect the elections of the representatives of the people. Bad as this is, It does not exceed the faithlessness with which, while it was throwing out its money from one end of the na- tion to the other. It secretly made arrangements to postpone the payment of the national debt, though it had, at the very time, suffi- cient public money for the purpose in its vaults. Growing bolder, however, It wa^ not long content thus, under the forms of business, to cast its weight into the scale of politics. It was not enough to operate indirectly on the industry and resources of the people. The press, the fountain of information, was to be secretly pensioned, and the money of the government as well as 3 14 individualSj unlinown to themselves, was to be freely expended to aid the bank and its political allies. The extent to which this has been carried, and all the sums of money that have thus been lavished, are yet unknown; they are veiled mysteriously by the bank from the public eye; they are secrets it is afraid or ashamed to disclose. But may we not judge from what we do know? May we not form some estimate,, from what has been already developed, in the examinations of Congress and its own confessions? Look at them! The publishers of the New York Inquirer i^52,000 The publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer 32,000 The publisher of the United States Telegraph 20,000 The publishers of the National Intelligencer 80,000 To these are to be added the sums distributed to printers, in all parts of the United States, for publishing documents which are said to be for the defence of the bank, but which, in many in- stances, were electioneering articles or pamphlets. This sum is admitted by Ihe directors to amount to ^58,000, and makes an aggregate paid to subsidize the press, of nearly ^250,000 ? How small a proportion it may be of the whole sum thus il- legally expended, time perhaps will show; how notoriously in- sufficient is the security given for a large part of it, is already known; but the very fact is one that must alarm every virtuous citizen. , Turn from these acts to the management of the bank itself. Does the history of any institution, in any country, present evidences of misconduct more glaring, of violations of the spirit, nay, letter of a charter, more wanton and violent? The functions of directors transferred to secret committees; loans made contrary to the rules, and on security the most worthless; the expenditure of money in- trusted to an officer without control as to amount; no vouchers re- quired from him for the disbursements he thus makes; the cor- respondence seldom or never submitted to the board; in a word, all the essential duties, for which the managers of such a corpora- tion are chosen, virtually nullified. Do the officers appointed by the President and Senate oppose these illegal acts, or refuse to con- ceal them from the people? They are denounced and misrepre- sented, though their statements cannot be refuted, in manifestos issued from the bank. Does the Secretary of the Treasury exer- cise the powers given him by law, to remove the public revenue from the custody of such agents? He is attacked in language the 15 K most scurrilous, officially promulgated by the bank. Does the President of the United States express his opinions on the legality or propriety of such acts? He is assimilated to the wretched crimi- nals who counterfeit the notes of the bank. Do the immediate delegates of the American people, who have incorporated it, placed their money in its vaults, and own seven millions of its ca- pital — does the House of Representatives itself, appoint a com- mittee, as the charter authorises, to inspect its books and ex- amine its proceedings? They are treated with absolute contempt; all investigation is denied^ and, with charges openly made, which, if untrue, can be refuted at once, it shrinks, with the conscious- ness of guilt, behind the shield of legal subterfuge. Fellow citi- zens, why is it that these disclosures are refused? Why is it we are told the bank should not be called on to criminate itself? Innocence never offers such a plea — it courts the light — it chal- lenges the most searching scrutiny of the accuser. What! is it come to this — that an agent of the American people, intrusted with their public moneys; can say that he will give no account of his stewardship, because he cannot be compelled to criminate himself ! Dark must be the catalogue of offences, where it is ne- cessary to resort to a pretext such as this! Are not these facts, thus briefly recalled to your notice, strik- ing evidences of the importance of the political contest in which we are engaged? It is this institution, thus abused, thus cor- rupt, thus determined wantonly to exercise its power, thus dis- regarding its own charter, and setting at defiance the people, the constituted authorities, and the very laws of the land — it is this overgrown moneyed monopoly, the abuses of which we are now called upon to crush, or submit ourselves for the future to its re- novated arrogance and power. That we should do so, is its own design, and that of the despe- rate political leaders, who, linked with it in an unholy alliance, use it, as it uses them, to promote the interested and selfish views of one another, utterly disregarding the real welfare of the nation. To this end, all original principles, all previous views, all past an- tipathies, and all former preferences have been sacrificed ; and on the floor of congress, and from one end of the country to the other, a common feeling brings together those who uphold the bank of the United States, and those, hitherto frowned on and despised ' by the people, who yet vainly hope, by its aid, to taste the cup of success. What a spectacle is presented! All consistency is con- 16 lemptuously discarded; disunion is allowed quietly to sleep in the embraces of federalism; the praises of the bank arc chanted by lips that declaimed against it in tonesof bitterness and hatred; the force-bill has becomCj in the eyes of those lately its denouncers, a harmless manifesto; and nullification, v/hose terrors were notlonij ago depicted in hues of blood, has dwindled to an insignificant phantom. A faction, motley and deceitful, usurps the privileges of legislative power; a political harlequin, tricked off in a hundred colours, plays his antics on the stage; and a king of shreds and patches wields his gilded truncheon, as if the American people were submissive to his sway. But already has the heartless exhi- bition lasted too long; already has the mask fallen off and disclos- ed the distorted features it was meant to conceal; already are the expected sounds of applause, converted into the murmurs of dis- approbation and disgust. Who can look back, with patience, on the proceedings of the opposition party in congress, during the session that has closed? Who can fail to trace in it an alliance with the bank of the United States, having for its sole objects the perpetuation of power to that institution, and the recovery of political influence for its allies? Acting on these principles have we not seen a course of debate and partizan warfare — I cannot say legislation — hitherto unknown to our history, and I trust never to be repeated? Language, before unheard in our national halls, has been freely uttered under the sanction of legislative privilege. The President of the United States, a man whose gray hairs might have protected him from in- sult; whose long life devoted to his country might have saved him from wanton abuse; nay, whose very position, as was_ known to those who abused him, took from him the opportunity to reply; this venerable man has been insulted in debate, has been the ob- ject of public censure without the permission to defend himself, and has been refused the small right of placing, on the public records, his own vindication. The Secretary of the Treasury, a statesman of unsullied purity of character, against whose moral worth slander cannot raise a suspicion, and whose admirable talents have been proved, on every single occasion, when hia opponents ventured to meet him in argument on the measures he has proposed or sustained; this officer, whose manly firmness and sagacious judgment have won for him the ardent good wishes of his countrymen, has been fiercely' attacked where he had not the privilege to answer, and has at length been driven from the 17 councils of his country, which he so well served and adorned, a victim to political rivals, who feared the superiority of his genius, and felt little of the loftiness of his spirit. Are the sacred institu- tions of our country to be thus disgraced for the purposes of poli- tical success? Are the characters of men to be attacked under the pretext of legislative privilege? Are the executive sessions of the American Senate to be turned, by an accidental majoi'ity, into the clandestine inquisition of apolitical junto? How is a citizen to defend himself from false aspersions, when his actions are per- verted, his sentiments misrepresented, or slanders uttered against him, unknown to himself, or to which he is not allowed to reply? How is he to be protected against discussions not carried on before the face of day? Why are not the men, who thus give their votes, and pass their sentence of condemnation, called upon to make their charges where they may be fully known, and, if they can be, fairly repelled? It never was the meaning of the constitution, it never was consistent with the feelings or spirit of the American people, that a secret conclave should pass upon its citizens un- heard; should listen to the whispers of enmity or slander; should receive the letters of private informers, or be tutored by the in- structions of personal malignity. As well might we witness in our republic such days as those, the most odious that history re- cords, when three Roman candidates for power, selfishness just suppressing their bitter rivalry and distrust, met together on a little island, mutually to denounce and proscribe the spirits they could not subdue. As well might we see erected, amid the gorgeous columns of our own capitol, the lion's mouth that is now closed, even in the halls of a Venetian senate, and surrender our characters and honor to the secret malice of political opponents or personal foes. Nothing proves, fellow citizens, more clearly, that the contest we are now waging, is one in which these political leaders know that they are struggling desperately for power, than the intemperate language of their debates, and the want of manly feeling dis- played so repeatedly on the floor of congress. I do not allude to the coarse slanders of the Ewings, or the Hardins, or the small politicians, who seem to be the necessary vents of that scur- rility, to which refinement of sentiment, or the impulses of genius, ' could not condescend. But how great must be the stake — how im- perioys the requisitions of faction — when she has compelled one who lately held the second station in the republic, to sacrifice 18 himself on her polluted shrine? What is the proper designa^ tion of a man, who could, with no conceivable motive but ma- lignity towards a more honoured rival, state, without a blush, in the face of the American Senate, that his absence at the opening of successive sessions, was not a matter of design; could desert the political principles he had formerly avowed, and endeavor to over- turn the constitution he had by solemn oaths repeatedly pledged himself to support; could seek refuge in the peaceful halls of legis- lation at Washington, far from the scene of strife he had himself raised, at the very moment, when, in all human probability, his braver associates would be called on to sustain with their swords, doctrines intended to subserve his individual ambition? The terms proper to designate a course such as this, I cannot condescend to use, even by following his own example, set in the august halls of legislation, and under the sanction of legislative privi- lege. How great must be the stake for which the bank of the United States knows herself to be playing — how strong must be the influence she has brought to bear, in her contest with the peo- ple — how potent must be the means that great machine can em- ploy; when, as we have seen, fellow citizens, before our own im- mediate eyes, she can allure from its haunts, that selfishness which never before turned from a private to a public end; never before made a voluntary sacrifice in a community, where few have failed to give their little aid, to some one cause of charity, of literature or of art. To me it seems a circumstance, among the most degrading, in the conduct of the present leaders of the opposition, that those who have received large sums from the bank, either as loans or as rewards for services performed, should yet feel no hesitation to record their votes as legislators in its behalf. It is true we can scarce wonder, that men so bound to an institution, should impugn the motives of those who censure it, when unable to refute their allegations, or should indulge in petty slander on the one hand, or a natural but lamentable adulation on the other. The sensibility of a generous mind must be dead, which utters the language and adopts the arts of an advocate, while holding the position of a statesman; and who would envy that coldness, real or assumed, which affects to despise an imputation founded in truth, that can- not consist with unbiassed judgment or disinterested conduct? While the floor of congress has thus been misused, the current business of the countr}^ has been neglected, and important mea- sures have been suffered to sleep, week after ^Yeek. Heavy ex- 19 penses have been incurred during sessions occupied by this use- less declamation or vindictive attack. Large sums have been added to the contingent fund of congress and to the public appro- priations, for the purpose of upholding the publishers of partizan newspapers. The mails have been overburdened and the privi- leges of franking abused, in order to disseminate the misrepre- sentations that were profusely poured out. It appears by official documents that the publisher of the United States Telegraph, a newspaper devoted to nullification, and the organ of one por- tion of the opposition, received for public printing, including the cost of paper, Sl06,400, in a single year, that of 1832; ami that ^105, 000 have been advanced for reprinting certain pub- lic documents, which is done by the publishers of the National Intelligericer, a newspaper in the immediate ownership of the bank, and the organ of another portion of the opposition. Nay more, although in the estimate furnished by the Secretary of the Senate, before the commencement of the session just closed, he requires the large sum of ^18,000 for printing for that body, will it be believed that he was obliged to ask, before the ad- journment, an additional appropriation of ^35,500 for "printing for the current business of the Senate," making in the whole the incredible sum of ^53,500 for the printing of the Senate alone, during a single session? I have not by me the statement of the similar expenditure, in the last long session of 1832, but I have that of the preceding one of 1830, and I find the amount paid for printing to be ^1 1,408 57, or ^41,000 less than the estimate of this year. Facts like these require no comment, but they must convince the people that there are other objects in printing such voluminous masses of documents, besides the mere difiusion of information among them. To the efforts thus made, by means of official situation and power, and the extravagant or improper application of the public money, are to be added the attempts to spread distress throughout a prosperous community, by ha- rangues containing statements of the situation of various districts of country, utterly at variance with the actual situation of things. The credit of institutions has been wantonly attacked, the plana of commercial enterprize have been thwarted, and month after month has been suffered to pass away, in the hope of changing the steady purpose, and misguiding the sound sense of the people. Such, fellow citizens, is a sketch of the contest that has been > 20 waged, and the means that have been resorted to. Innuinera' hlc facts are within your recollections, illustrating them even more olearly than those to which I have referred. They prove, in a manner not to be disguised or misrepresented, the true nature of the struggle — a struggle that can only be terminated by the voices of the people, given at the polls. They show that the cries so loudly raised about executive usurpation, the destruction of com- mercial prosperity, the violations of the constitution, the union of the purse and sword, are but idle declamation, intended to conceal the real object. What executive usurpation has there been, but the change of the public nione3"s from the bank of the United States to the state banks? Where has commerce been injured, except by the direct oppression of the former, and the panic purposely ex- cited by its political allies? What clause of the constitution has been violated? In what single instance has the property of the people been unjustly taken from them, or the hand of military vio- lence displayed? No! — we are not to be thus deceived. We know and see the real meaning of all this. If the charter of the bank of the United States was renewed, there would be no cry of danger to the treasury. If Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, or Daniel Web- ster could obtain — vain hope! — the suffrages of the people, in their desperate struggle for the presidency, instead of a candidate who shall represent the principles and wishes of the vast body of the republican party, there would be no more clamour about a vi- olated constitution. It is to obtain these ends that all this turmoil has been raised; and that the country has been, for months past, kept in this state of unceasing agitation. And what is the result? Is the bank rechartcred, to aid in the coming contest, either directly by the influence of its money, or indirectly by its fearful power over the industry and property of the people? Have the obstacles and delays of the opposition been able to prevent the passage of salutary laws, called for by the exi- gencies of the country? Have the commerce and internal prosperi- ty of the land, sunk under their prophecies, their maledictions, and their unceasing efforts to injure and destroy them? No ! — the spirit of the people has not been, and cannot be, either misled or put down. The noble phalanx of the Representatives, coming di- rectly from their ranks; the bold and unflinching minority of the Senators — a minority indeed in their body, but representing a great majority of the people; the Chief Magistrate, raised to his honora- ble post v/i than enthusiasm equalled only by that