?33 .!(> 
 Y H r 
 
 REMARKS 
 
 OP 
 
 RICHARD M. YOUNG, OF ILLINOIS, 
 
 O N T H E 
 
 f 
 
 
 BILL TO GRADUATE AND REDUCE THE PRICE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 PUBLIC LANDS. 
 
 SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, JANUARY 8, 1839. 
 
 WASHINGTON: 
 
 PRINTED BY BLAIR AND RITES* 
 
 1839 * 
 

 
 ' y: • ■ T ■ * 
 
 Tt ■ 
 
 o 
 
 
 * .. 1 " ! ’I • - • • • *•? * t 
 
 . • • - . • ■: - . * 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 • * T * 
 
 v ► . 
 
 
 
 
 ■'- r i ai ?*a iiTA'tf r ,?,r - 
 
 - V < 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 V; c 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 r. :. *; 
 
 - ? r ?•- n 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ■ '''''' . • , 
 
 ' <* 
 
 
 
 
 
 H25TOFUCAL SURVEY 
 
 
 - - • . 
 
 
 
 
 '' ‘ P r 
 
 * * . 
 
 
 
 
 
 
REMARKS. 
 
 Mr. YOUNG of Illinois, said, in reply to Mr. 
 Crittenden of Kentucky: I rise not, Mr. Presi¬ 
 dent, for any purpose of crimination or recrimina¬ 
 tion, or to impugn the motives of any, on this or 
 the other side of the Chamber, much less inten¬ 
 tionally to misrepresent what may have been said 
 by honorable Senators here, in relation to this all 
 absorbing subject, of the public lands, of which 
 we have heard so much at the past and present ses¬ 
 sion of Congress. I have no feelings of ill will to 
 gratify—no personal dislikes to induce an unkind 
 expression towards any Senator who may have ta¬ 
 ken part in these discussions; but I desire, as a 
 duty I owe to the people I represent, to defend them 
 against unjust animadversion, and to put some 
 things right in relation to the debate of the last and 
 the present session, that they may know and judge 
 for themselves who has, and who has not been mis¬ 
 represented in respect to these debates, and the 
 course which has been adopted and acted upon by 
 honorable Senators here in opposition to the lead¬ 
 ing measures, which, whether well or ill directed, 
 have from time to time been brought forward to 
 facilitate the settlement, and expedite the growth 
 of that interesting section of the country which 
 stretches along the immense valley of the West. 
 Much has been said, Mr. President, in the progress 
 of the debate now going on, relative to the attitude 
 assumed by the able Senator from Kentucky, [Mr. 
 Clay,] in reference to the inhabitants of the new 
 State?, who have settled upon the public lands; and 
 as his honorable colleague [Mr. Crittenden] has 
 undertaken his defence against the charge of hos¬ 
 tility to the West, denies that there is proof to sus¬ 
 tain the accusation, and says that his colleague 
 has been misrepresented bytho.se who are deter¬ 
 mined to have him nolens volens an enemy to the 
 new Stales, 1 will attempt to show, that although 
 language may have been attributed to him which 
 he did not use, some of which I have myself seen 
 in the public prints, that still enough and more 
 than enough remains to sustain all the material 
 allegations that have been urged against him. 
 
 The Senator [Mr. Crittenden] asks, why it is, 
 that his colleague [Mr. Clay] has, alone of all others, 
 been singled out as the object of vituperation by 
 the friends of this measure; why the whole foun¬ 
 tain of bitter wafers has been poured out up¬ 
 on his devoted head; and why it is, that he alone is 
 to be offered up as a sacrifice upon the altar of 
 western interests, for having done what he con¬ 
 ceived to be his duty in respect to the greater in¬ 
 terests of the whole Union. Sir, if the Senator 
 from Kentucky [Mr. Clay] stands conspicuous as 
 the object of attack in this debate, I would ask his 
 honorable colleague, [Mr. Crittenden,] who 
 placed him in that condition? Has he not, above 
 all others, at all times, and upon all occasions, 
 when the subject of ihe public lands has been the 
 topic of discussion, taken the lead in denouncing 
 these lawless intrusions upon the public domain, as 
 he is pleased to term them? Has he not, in fact, 
 to u-e bis own express on, battled it for days to¬ 
 gether, “solittry,” if not “alone,” against our pre¬ 
 emption and graduation bills, when scarcely a man 
 
 of his party would venture to the rescue? These 
 things considered,Mr. President, and how can it be 
 matter of wonder or surprise to the Senator [Mr. 
 Crittenden] that his colleague should be met by 
 the Senators from the new States, upon the ground 
 he himself has seen fit to occupy, so far in advance 
 of his asssciates, as to have left them almost en¬ 
 tirely out of sight behind him? Mr. President, du¬ 
 ring the progress of the debate ©n the pre-emption 
 bill, at the last session of Congress, the honorable 
 Senator from Kentucky [Mr. Clay] indulged in ex¬ 
 pressions towards the settlers of the new Slates who 
 had gone upon the public lands for the purpose of 
 procuring homes for themselves and families, 
 which, in my opinion, they did not deserve; and as 
 they were repeated on mere than one occasion du¬ 
 ring the course of that protracted debate with the 
 utmost deliberation, I took note of some of them at 
 the time that they were uttered, in the precise terms 
 employed by the speaker as I understood him; and 
 as I wish to recur to these expressions, for the pur¬ 
 pose of showing how far, in this respect, the hono¬ 
 rable Senator [Mr. Clay] may or may not have 
 been misrepresented, as is supposed by his honora¬ 
 ble colleague, [Mr. Crittenden,] I will refer to 
 them as I took them down, and leave the Senate to 
 judge whether we of the new States, or the honora¬ 
 ble Senator’s colleague, has had the most cause to 
 complain of misrepresentation. The honorable Se¬ 
 nator [Mr. Clay] said, when discussing the merits 
 of the pre-emption bill, and of those who were to 
 be benefiited by its provisions, in the debate of the 
 27th of January last, according to my memoran- 
 d im, that he knew of no law or principle of pro¬ 
 priety, which authorized us to give away the pub¬ 
 lic lands as a bounty to the poor; as a bounty for a 
 violation of the law; that he viewed it (the pre¬ 
 emption bill) as a license to a set of lawless intru¬ 
 ders to go upon the public domain, and prevent its 
 sale in the manner prescribed by law; that he looked 
 upon the whole system of pre-emptions as a system 
 of boundless, heartless, scandalous, fraudulent spe¬ 
 culation; that it was full of fraud, abominable, ex¬ 
 ecrable fraud; a system that tainted, corrupt'd, ar.d 
 putrified every one who touched it; that these men 
 (the settlers upon the public lands) might, with 
 equal propriety, seize upon our forts and arsenals, 
 our ships upon the ocean, or plunder the public 
 money in the Treasury, and appropriate the spoils 
 among them, as thus to seize upon the public 
 domain, and hold it against the just demand of the 
 Government. Such, Mr. President, are some of 
 the expressions in which the Senator from Ken¬ 
 tucky [Mr. Clay] indulged at the late session of 
 Congress towards the settlers of the West. But it 
 is said that he has been misrepresented, intentionally 
 misrepresented; and that language has been attri¬ 
 buted to him on the occasion referred to which he 
 never uttered. This, sir, to some extent, may be 
 true. I have seen some newspaper reporis of that 
 debate which contained expressions which I do not 
 remember to have hear^ in the terms supposed to 
 have been employed; but the inferences drawn 
 were, nevertheless, in most instances, correct logi- 
 I cal deductions from the premises, as admitted to 
 
4 
 
 have been stated in the debate. As, (or example, 
 the Senator [Mr. Clay] did not say in so many 
 words that the settlers upon the public lands were 
 pirates , but he did say that they might, with equal 
 propriety, have seized upon our ships upon the 
 ocean, and hold them against the lawful right of 
 the nation, as thus to seize upon the public 
 lands, and defeat, by unlawful combinations, 
 a just competition at the public sales in 
 the manner prescribed by law. And what is 
 this but a charge o [piracy? And what else is a 
 man who commits an overt act of piracy, such 
 as the Sentator [Mr. Clay] has described, but a pi¬ 
 rate? He did not say that they were robbers, but 
 he characterized them as robbers, by assimilating 
 their supposed offences to a seizure of the public 
 forts and arsenals—to a plundering of the public 
 Treasury; and what is this but robbery or larceny, 
 according to the circumstance of force or no force, 
 in despoiling the Government of its property? 
 Mr. President, we have a class of speculators I 
 could mention, who are well known in the new 
 States, who are, perhaps, justly obnoxious to the 
 Senator’s charge of piracy; but they are not the pre- 
 emptioners, or the squatters on the public lands, 
 who have gone there without injury to any one, for 
 the purpose of providing homes for themselves 
 and children, and who expect to pay a reasonable 
 price for them as soon as they are brought into the 
 market. No, sir, it is an antagonist interest. The 
 land pirates 1 speak of are certain gentlemen who 
 make it their trade to go about the country seeking 
 whom they may devour—who visit this city, and 
 the other cities of the Union, purchasing up ad¬ 
 verse claims to land at a cheap rate, long since 
 abandoned and supposed to be worthless by their 
 holders—buying up old musty patents, for ten or 
 twenty dollars each, to lands that have been sold 
 for taxes many years ago, and long since passed 
 redemption; ay, dealing in all sorts of claims, 
 which have coler enough to alarm the fears of the 
 bona fide settler, and force him, howeverreluctantly, 
 to the alternative of an unjust compromise, or that 
 which is infinitely worse, a course of ruinous liti¬ 
 gation. Yes, Mr. President, in this way stripping 
 the honest settler of his hard earnings, and expos¬ 
 ing him anew to all the hardships and privations 
 incident to the life of a squatter when he first en¬ 
 ters upon the wilderness, and scarcely knows to 
 clay on what he is to subsist to-morrow. Sir, so 
 much was said to the disparagement of the.^e set¬ 
 tlers upon the public lands, that the honorable 
 Senator from Massachusetts, [Mr. Webster,] not 
 now in his place, who had just before that time 
 returned from an excursion to the West—who had 
 seen them at their humble homes, and partaken of 
 their hospitality, rude though it may have been, felt 
 himself constrained to stand forward in their de¬ 
 fence. He did defend them; and in the ac¬ 
 count he gave of them here in his place, he did 
 them ample justice. Sir, I will say no more on 
 this branch of the subject, except to add, without 
 intending any disparagement by the comparison, 
 that so far as intelligence, industry and enterprise 
 are concerned, that the people of Illinois possess 
 these attributes in as high a degree as the people of 
 Kentucky, or any of the old States; and that they 
 would be as far from knowingly committing an 
 
 offence against the laws of the Union as the Sena¬ 
 tor’s constituents, or the constituents of any other 
 gentleman upon this floor. No, sir: they never 
 have believed that in going upon the public lands 
 they thereby became lawless intruders, and despoil¬ 
 ers of the public properly; and our whole course 
 of legislation, in reference to the settlements upon 
 the public lands, since the year 1813, justifies them 
 in this position. 
 
 I will now proceed to quote some passages from 
 the Senate journal of the last session, in relation 
 to the pre-emption bill, and see how far the hono¬ 
 rable Senator’s course is reconcileable with West¬ 
 ern interests, in proposing and voting for amend¬ 
 ments which were evidently intended to embarrass 
 the progress of the bill, and ultimately, if carried, 
 to defeat its passage. There is something more 
 in these amendments, Mr. President, than mere 
 opposition to a measure of pre-emption, such as 
 was proposed by the bill of the last session—some 
 principles involved which I cannot subscribe to; an 
 import and tendency on their face, fraught with 
 much mischief, if they had been adopted. Hence 
 I desire to speak of them, and expose, if I can, 
 their deformities to the Senate and the people. On 
 the 27th of January, 1838, the Senate resumed, as 
 m Committee of the Whole, the bill to grant pre¬ 
 emption rights to settlers rn the public lands. The 
 honorable Senator from Maryland [Mr. Merrick] 
 proposed, as an amendment to the bill, the follow¬ 
 ing proviso: “Provided, That the right of pre-emp¬ 
 tion granted by this act, or the act hereby revived, 
 shall not accrue to any other persons than those 
 who were, on the 1st day of D ecember, 1837, citi¬ 
 zens of the United States; and such citizenship shall 
 in all cases be established by leeal and competent 
 testimony, to the satisfaction of the register and 
 receiver of the land district in which the lands may 
 lie, prior to any entry thereof by virtue of the pro¬ 
 visions of this act.” 
 
 On the yeas and nays being demanded by the 
 Senator from Missouti, [Mr. Benton,] the follow¬ 
 ing was the vote: 
 
 “For the amendment, Messrs. Bayard, Clay of 
 Kentucky, Clayton, Crittenden, Knight, Merrick, 
 Prentiss, Preston, Rives, Robbins, Smith of India¬ 
 na, Southard, Spence, Tallmadge, and Tipton—15. 
 Against it, Messrs. Allen, Benton, Brown, Bu- 
 c anan, Calhoun, Clay of Alabama, Cutbbert, 
 Fulton, Grundy, Hubbard, Kin<r, Linn, Lumpkin, 
 Lyon, Mouton, Nicholas, Niles, Norvell, Pierce, 
 Roane, Robinson, Sevier, Walker, Webster, 
 White, William*, Wright, and Young—28.” 
 
 llete, Mr. President, was a proposition to limit 
 the benefits of the bill to native and natural zed 
 citizens, to the exclusion of those who were fo¬ 
 reigners but not naturalize l;an attempt at a limita¬ 
 tion in our land sales hitherto unknown under the 
 different pre-emption laws parsed for the benefit of 
 the citizens of the new States, which, in my judg¬ 
 ment, was both invidious and unjust. And for this 
 the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. Clay] voted. Is 
 this not hostility to the West? I, sir, will never 
 consent to this distinction. Foreigners, Mr. Presi¬ 
 dent, are required, by the constitution and laws of 
 Illinois, to work on the public highways, to perform 
 militia duty, aad to pay taxes for the support of 
 
5 
 
 the Government; and they are permitted in return, 
 by the same constitution and laws, to purchase, 
 hold and enjoy real and other property, and after¬ 
 wards to transmit the same to heirs or assignees, by 
 will or otherwise, and, after six months residence, 
 (having become inhabitants of the State,) to vote 
 at all elections; and this, sir, before naturalization. 
 The discrimination attempted, so far at least as Il¬ 
 linois is concerned, was odious and unjust; and 
 being unjust, I, as an Illinoian, could not have 
 done otherwise than to have opposed it as I did. 
 And, sir, it met with a signal rebuke in the finale , 
 in the heavy vote that was cast against it. 
 
 The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. Clay] then 
 proposed himself to amend the bill, by adding thereto 
 the following section: 
 
 “Sec. 2. Jlndbe it further enacted , That all settle¬ 
 ments upon the public lands subsequent to the first 
 day of December, 1837, shall be, and are hereby 
 strictly prohibited; and the President shall be, and 
 hereby is authorized and required to cause all per¬ 
 sons who may settle on the public lands, subse¬ 
 quent to the day aforesaid, to be removed there¬ 
 from.” 
 
 On the yeas and nays being ordered on the de¬ 
 mand of the Senator from Kentucky, [Mr Clay,] 
 the following was the vote: For the Hon. Senator’s 
 amendment, Messrs. Bayard, Calhoun, Clay of 
 Kentucky, Clayton, Crittenden, Davis, Knight, 
 Merrick, Prentiss, Preston, Rives, Roane, Robbins, 
 Ruggles, Smith of Indiana, Southard, Spence, 
 Tallmadge, Tipton, Webster, and White—21. 
 Against it, Messrs. Allen, Benton, Brown, Bu¬ 
 chanan, Clay of Alabama, Cuthbert, Fulton, 
 Grundy, Hubbard, Linn, Lumpkin, Lyon, Mou- 
 ton, Nicholas, Niles, Norvell, Pierce, Robinson, 
 Sevier, Walker, Williams, Wiight, and Young— 
 23. 
 
 Here, sir, was a distinct proposition, not only 
 strictly prohibiting all settlements upon the public 
 lands after the first day of December, 1837, but 
 requiring the President to cause such persons as 
 might g» upon them, to be forthwith removed, by 
 a military lorce, I presume, if necessary. Is this 
 not hostility to the West? Sir, shall it be said to 
 the new States, now nine in number, in this great 
 Confederacy of twenty-six independent sove¬ 
 reignties, that the lands within their limits shall not 
 be settled, until the pleasure of the old States, how¬ 
 ever long withheld; and that, if our citizens 
 should chance to go upon them, they are to 
 be seized upon and removed hy the strong arm of 
 the Federal Government? No, sir, I deny this 
 right of making the public domain, as it is called, 
 subject matter of revenue to the prejudice of the 
 settlement of the States in which it may be situat¬ 
 ed. And here, sir, permit me to avail myself of 
 the authority of an extract from the able and con¬ 
 clusive speech, delivered before the General As¬ 
 sembly ol Virginia, by the honorable Senator, [Mr. 
 Clay ] on opening the Kentucky mission on the 
 14th ot February, 1822, in a case in point. Tae 
 extract is taken from the Richmond Enquirer, and 
 relates to a difficulty at that time existing between 
 the States ol Virginia and Kentucky, growing out 
 ot the early settlement* in Kentucky, in which 
 many of the citizens of the latter State had, either 
 through mis ake or defect of title, settled upon • 
 
 lands, which afterwards, cn investigation, turned oat 
 to belong to citizens of Virginia, and from which 
 suits had been instituted in many instances to eject 
 them. In relation to the right and duty of a State 
 not to permit large tracts of land to lie waste and 
 uncultivated within its limits, the honorable Sena¬ 
 tor [Mr. Clay] said, that “of all the attributes of 
 sovereignty, scarcely any can be deemed more 
 essential than that of adopting a policy to redeem 
 a wilderness and render it productive. That it was 
 not merely the right but the duty of a State to ad¬ 
 vance its own prosperity by the enactment of 
 wholesome and equitable laws, demanded by its 
 peculiar condition.” Had it not been for the set¬ 
 tlement and improvement of the country, he con¬ 
 tended “that the lands which composed the rich 
 virgin earth of Kentucky would have been un¬ 
 turned, her fields unploughed, the theatre of a yet 
 doubtful and dreadful war waged between civi¬ 
 lized and savage man; the silence of her luxuriant 
 forests disturbed by no other sound than the horri¬ 
 ble war whoop, and| the shriek of innocent females, 
 and the cries of help ess children expiring under 
 the agonies of the tamahawkand thescalpingknife.” 
 
 Such, sir, was the eloquent appeal of the honor¬ 
 able Senator [Mr. Cl y] in behalf of the suffering 
 squatters of Kentucky in that day of trial and tri¬ 
 bulation which, in the course of unforeseen events, 
 had come upon them. I wish, Mr. President, that 
 we of the “far West” had such an advocate at this 
 time upon this floor. What might we not antici¬ 
 pate from the energy and eloquence of one who 
 could ihus enter into all the feelings, the sympa¬ 
 thies, the privations, and the sufferings of the early 
 adventurers to the West? 
 
 The Senator from Maryland [Mr. Merrick] has 
 said that, in his judgment, it was unwise policy in 
 the General Government to bring these lands into 
 market faster than they could be disposed of and 
 settled; that emigrants ought not to be permitted 
 to run over large tracts of unappropriated land in 
 pursuit of lands more distant, so long as any of 
 that already offered, or any considerable portion of 
 it, should remain the property of the Government. 
 Sir, this is making this great question one solely of 
 revenue, a question of dollars and cents to the old 
 States, regardless of the rights of the new. Sup¬ 
 pose, Mr. President, the policy suggested and ad¬ 
 vocated by the honorable Senator from Maryland 
 [Mr. Merr ck] had been adopted at the early set¬ 
 tlement of the State of Ohio, where now would be 
 the flourishing States of Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, 
 and the more distant Arkansas? What, sir, would 
 the Delegates from Wisconsin and Iowa, in the 
 other wing of this Capitol, say to such a system of 
 policy? Ay, sir, what would the people who sent 
 them here say? Territories, Mr. President, whose 
 population and improvement have advanced with 
 a rapidity altogether beyond the most extravagant 
 computation, and which will, in a very short lime, 
 if suffered to pursue untrammelled the high road 
 which is opening up before them to wealth and 
 political distinction, have a just right to demand 
 admittance imo the Union upon a footing in all 
 respect- 1 equal to the other States of the Confede¬ 
 racy. No, sir, it is not merely the right , but it is 
 the duty of the netc States to see that such a system 
 of restrictive policy is not fastened upon them, un- 
 
6 
 
 tier any pretext, by the old Slates; to s?e that the 
 settlement and improvement of the lands within their 
 limits enter into the consideration of adjustment, 
 as well as the matter of revenue , whether collected 
 for the ordinary purposes of the Government, or 
 distribution among the States, as proposed by the 
 Senator from Kentucky. Mr. President, the rea¬ 
 sons why the people of the West object to the pro¬ 
 posed plan of distribution, so far as I know them, 
 are, because it creates an invidious distinction be¬ 
 tween the old and the new States; they are un¬ 
 willing that the new States should become as 
 so many plantations to the old States, render¬ 
 ing an annual rent or other periodical return 
 of the money arising from the sales of the lands 
 within their limits, and which is taken from 
 their pockets for purposes not contemplated in 
 the cessions of these lands to the General Go¬ 
 vernment; and lastly for the stronger and more 
 important consideration, that they do not desire to 
 see a separate moneyed interest in this way, cre¬ 
 ated for the benefit of the old States, having no 
 public lands within their limits,which must inevita¬ 
 bly tend to excite the cupidity of their citizens, and 
 make thisgreat question as to the proper disposi¬ 
 tion of the public domain, a question purely of 
 revenue, and of increased prices, for the purposes of 
 distribution, so long as an acre shall remain in the 
 market unsold. In opposition to the higher inte¬ 
 rest of the new States, in reference to the settlement 
 and improvement of the country, by making dona¬ 
 tions, -when proper, in aid of great works of inter¬ 
 nal improvement; such as the improvement of 
 our navigable rivers; the construction of roads and 
 canals; the draining of swamp lands, so as to ren¬ 
 der them healthy and fit for settlement and cultiva¬ 
 tion; the erection of colleges and other institutions 
 of learning, for the education of our youth; by giv¬ 
 ing the right of pre-emption to actual settler*; 
 by reducing the price from time to time, as the 
 best lands are taken up; and in the end, and in a 
 reasonable time, by a surrender of the unsaleable 
 lands unconditionally to the States in which they 
 lie. 
 
 These, Mr. President, are some of the reasons, 
 apart from the power to tax these lands, which in¬ 
 duce most of us from the West to oppose the gil¬ 
 ded scheme of distributions among the States, which 
 has been presented to the Senate under such an 
 alluring aspect, that scarcely the new States them¬ 
 selves could resist the temptation. In my judgment, 
 sir, it is far better for the new Slates, that the 
 avails of the public lands should come imo the 
 common fund, and be applied to the common pur¬ 
 poses of the whole Union; and if we mu*t continue 
 to beg for favors and indulgences to our citizens, 
 let us rather apply to Congress, as we have done, 
 than bo thrown upon either the charity or liberali¬ 
 ty of the Legislatures of the States. 
 
 But, sir, I have one more matter in relation to 
 the pre-emption bill of the la*t session, of which I 
 intended to speak, and I shall be done with that 
 part of the subject. Towards the close of the de¬ 
 bate, and just before the vote upon tho engross¬ 
 ment for the third and last reading was taken, the 
 honorable Senator from Vermont, [Mr. Prentiss] 
 proposed the following amendment by way of ad¬ 
 dition to the bill: 
 
 “Nor shall any person have any right, or be en¬ 
 titled to a patent, under, or by virtue of this act, 
 without paying, in addition to the statute minimum 
 price, at least one-half of the real value of the land 
 above that price, not including improvements, to 
 be ascertained by three judicious and disinterested 
 appraisers, under oath, to be appointed by the re¬ 
 gister of the land ^office in the district where the 
 land is situated.” 
 
 On the yeas and nays being demanded, the fol¬ 
 lowing was the vote : 
 
 For the the amendment, Messrs. Clay of Ken¬ 
 tucky, Clayton, Crittenden, Davis, Merrick, Pic.i- 
 tiss, Preston, Roane, Southard, and Spence—10. 
 Against it, Messrs. Allen, Ben’on, Brown, Bucha¬ 
 nan, Clay of Alabama, Cuthbert, Fulton Hubbard, 
 King, Linn, Lumpkin, Lyon, Mouton, Nicholas, 
 Niles, Norvell, Pierce, Robinson, Sevier, Smith of 
 Indiana, Tipton, Walker, Webster, White, Wil¬ 
 liams, Wright, and Young—27. 
 
 Here, Mr. President, was a direct proposition to 
 compel the settler to pay an increased price over 
 and above the price of a dollar and a quarter per 
 acre, as the price of his pre-emption, according to 
 a value to be assessed at the time of entrv, or to 
 submit to the alternative of being turned away 
 from his home, for the benefit of some fortunate 
 speculator who might be willing to pay an increas¬ 
 ed price for his improvement; and for this proposi¬ 
 tion, also, the honorable Senator from Kentucky 
 [Mr. Clay] voted. Is this not hostility to Western 
 interests? I would ask the honorable Senator from 
 Kentucky, [Mr. Clay,] and the honorable Senator 
 from Vermont, [Mr. Prentiss,] who brought it 
 forward, as well as those by whom r was advoca¬ 
 ted, if these lands are valuable, who made them sc? 
 Were they thus valuable in their wild uncultivated 
 state, or have they been made so by the labor and 
 enterprise of those who went upon them and incor¬ 
 porated their labor wi h the soil? And, sir, upon 
 this subject, again allow me to recur to the honora- 
 b'e Senator’s [MtClay’s] Richmond speech,for ar¬ 
 guments much better, and conveyed in language 
 far more eloquent and convincing, than any at my 
 command. The honorable Senator, [Mr. Clay.] 
 when speaking of the difference between land in its 
 i ci'd anxbii nproved state, said: “Land, before it is 
 improved, may be compared to the raw material, 
 with its improvements to a fabricated article. A 
 farm with all its field*, its houses, orchards, gar¬ 
 dens, lawns, and shrubberies, no more resembles 
 the same land in its native state, before these vari¬ 
 ous improvements are put upon it, than a piece of 
 Brussels lace do?s the flax out of which it is 
 wrought. And would it net be monstrous to say 
 to the innocent possessor and manufacturer of a raw 
 material, that he should surrender the article, un- 
 compensaied for his labor and expense?” 
 
 In respfct to the iule v h ch he contended should 
 prevail as to ihe va'ue of ihe land, he further sa’d: 
 “Not to go into other codes, what is the provision 
 made by the laws of our common ancestors in the 
 colony of Virginia, when ifsfiondition bore a faint 
 i resemblance to that of Kentucky?” Here Mr. 
 
 ! Ci ay queted several laws of ihe colony of Virginia, 
 passed near two centuries ago, providing that the 
 true owner should compensate the senior of land. 
 He contended that they were more unfavorable to 
 
7 
 
 the true owner than the laws of Kentucky, because 
 the first of them compensated even the squater; 
 none of them gave rents; and, although all of them 
 secured to the true owner the election to take the 
 land and improvements, upon paying ths value of 
 seating , to be assessed by a jury, or the value of the 
 land without the improvements; the land to be 
 valued at the time of seating , not that of assessment 
 
 Here, then, Mr. President, we have a practical 
 illustration of the true rule of assessment, furnishid 
 by the experience of the honorable Senator from 
 Kentucky, [Mr. Clay,] and backed by the high au¬ 
 thority of the colonial Jaws of Virginia, from whom 
 we derive the greater part of this vast public do¬ 
 main, some of v hich were passed near two centu¬ 
 ries ago. And yet the Senator [Mr. Clay] votes 
 for the proposition to compel the settlers of the new 
 States to pay according to an assessment to be made 
 at the time of the entry, and not according to the 
 value at the time they first went upon the land. So 
 much, sir, for the pre-emption bill of the last ses¬ 
 sion, and of the misrepresentation of the honorable 
 Senator’s [Mr. Clay’s] course in regard to it, and 
 other kindred measures. 
 
 I come now, sir, to submit a few remarks in re¬ 
 ference to the bill under discussion. It has been 
 said that the provisions of the bill propose to unset¬ 
 tle our whole land system. What does it propose, 
 sir? Simply to reduce the price of such lands as 
 have been in market at private entry for five years, 
 and remain unsold, to one dollar per acre; and such 
 as have been in market for ten years and upwards, 
 under the like circumstances, to seventy-five cents 
 per acre; and the operation of the bill limited to five 
 years. How does this unsettle the land system? 
 Was not the price of the public lands redu¬ 
 ced from two dollars to one dollar and 
 twenty-five cents, the present minimum price 
 of the Government in 1820; and has this reduction 
 tended to weaken and destroy the system? Surely 
 not. On the contrary, it has been found, upon ex¬ 
 perience, beneficial, in a high degree, to all the 
 parties concerned—both the Government here, and 
 the people who have purchased at the reduced 
 price. How, then, does the proposition now sub¬ 
 mitted, for a still further reduction, differ in princi¬ 
 ple from the reduction which took place at the time 
 that I have mentioned? Sir, such has been the po¬ 
 licy of all the States, as far as I have understood, 
 having waste lands within their limits, and such, in 
 my opinion, is the just policy of the General Go¬ 
 vernment towards the new States. As, for exam¬ 
 ple, in the State of Illinois, a large tract of land, 
 known as the “Gallatin county Saline Reserve,'’ 
 was ceded to the State for the purpose of encourag¬ 
 ing the manufacture of salt. In process of time 
 many of the works were abandoned by the lessees 
 of the State as unprofitable, and much of the land 
 became unnecessary for the purpose of the grant. 
 In this condition of things the Legislature of the 
 State applied to Congress for its assent to the sale 
 of a large portion of these lands, (50,000 acres,) 
 and consent was given without any restriction as 
 to the price for which they should be sold. Some 
 of them were good, none I believe first rate, but by 
 far the greater proportion was of inferior quality. 
 Well, sir, what is the result? It was in the first in¬ 
 stance, 1 believe, offered at a dollar per acre, and 
 
 a part of it went off; then at seventy-five cents, 
 when the next best portions were sold, and the re¬ 
 sidue again became unsaleable; and now by the 
 law of 1833 the price is reduced to fifty cents per 
 acre, and still a considerable part remains undis¬ 
 posed of, and must await another reduction. How 
 is it in Kentucky, the Senator’s [Mr. Critten¬ 
 den’s] own State? Some years ago, Mr. Presi¬ 
 dent, 1 had occasion to visit that part of Kentucky 
 which lies south of the Tennessee river, where the 
 State at that time owned a considerable quantity of 
 the unsettled lands, which were then in market, as 
 I was informed, at fitly cents per acre, and that in 
 Commonwealth paper, which was depreciated so 
 as only to be worth about two for one; making the 
 cash value of the land but twenty-five cents per 
 acre; and to-day I was informed by a gentleman 
 from that part of the country that the present mini¬ 
 mum price was but twelve and a half cents per 
 acre—reduced in a few years, Mr. President, from 
 fifty cents to but one-fourth of that sum. 1 men¬ 
 tion these cases to show, sir, what the policy of the 
 States has been in respect to their waste lands that 
 have been some time in market. Sir, it is their 
 policy to sell them that they may be settled; that 
 they may be taxed to support the Government; and 
 that the country may be cultivate J and improved; 
 for, in propoiuon to private wealth is the wealth of 
 a State, and its condition as to revenue improved 
 and benefitted. Of all the attributes of sovereignty, 
 Mr. President, none is so essential to the well-being 
 of a State as the taxing power; for, without mo¬ 
 ney, sir, the wheels of Government must stop; the 
 Government itself would stop and come to an end. 
 Is it right, therefore, that large tracts of land in the 
 new States should be either kept out of market or 
 held up at prices which they could not command 
 in a reasonable time, purely as a matter of reve¬ 
 nue? No, sir, it is the right of the new Slates, and 
 the. duty of the old, to see that these lands are set¬ 
 tled, to see that no impediment is thrown in the 
 way of their prosperity, if that be the tendency, un¬ 
 der any pretext whatever. 
 
 Sir, much has been said of the parental care of 
 the old States in providing and maintaining this 
 excellent land system for the benefit of the new 
 States, and of the immense emigration to the West, 
 within a recent period, under us benign influence. 
 Sir, I have nothing to object to the system; I agree 
 that it is a yery good one, as good a one, perhaps, 
 as could have been devised; but that was not ail 
 that created this immense rush to our borders. No, 
 sir, the panics have done much within a few years 
 past to add to that emigration. What was the pro¬ 
 cess, sit? Why, Mr. President, I have either read 
 it in the newspapers, or have been informed in 
 some other way, that during some of these panics 
 at the East and North, thousands of laborers have 
 been dismissed from employment by the wealthy 
 manufacturers in a week, sometimes in a day— 
 turned out of house and home to beg for bread for 
 themselves and their suffering families. Yes, sir, 
 hardy, industrious laborers, who were in the habit 
 of working day by day for their bread, in this way 
 suddenly made beggars. Well, Mr. President, 
 they must do something; they turn their eyes to the 
 West; the next you hear of them is at Buffalo, 
 crowding your steamboats to overflowing, and 
 
8 
 
 bound for Detroit, and from thence, many of them 
 to Chicago, in Illinois. Yes, sir, in this way thou¬ 
 sands find their way to our borders, and the next 
 thing you hear of your manufacturer of the East, 
 he is an independent squatter of the West, com¬ 
 fortably settled down upon the public lands, and 
 talking about pre-emptions. 
 
 It has been said, Mr. President, that the quantity 
 of refuse and unsaleable lands in the new States 
 has been greatly exaggerated. It may be so, sir. 
 I will only speak for Illinois whatl know, Mr. Pre¬ 
 sident, from long experience and personal observa¬ 
 tion. Many of the lands intended to be embraced 
 by this bill, Mr. President, (I admit there are ex¬ 
 ceptions,) are either too poor and unproductive to 
 be desirable for cultivation, or are, from other 
 causes, unfit for present use, and therefore unsale¬ 
 able at the present minimum price of the Govern¬ 
 ment. Such, sir, are large waste tracts of prairie 
 land, remote from timber, and lands that are sub¬ 
 ject to occasional inundations, or are otherwise too 
 wet for successful cultivation. I will give you an 
 instance, sir. One of my colleagues of the ether 
 House, [Gov. Casey,] told me this morning that a 
 case had been brought before the Illinois Assembly, 
 now silting, to induce action here, for sectionizing 
 a township of land on the Embarrass river, around 
 which the exterior township lines only had been 
 run by the Government surveyor, and the land re¬ 
 returned as subject to inundation, and consequent¬ 
 ly unfit for cultivation, so that it might be occupied, 
 and in some way rendered productive. Now, sir, 
 will any man say, although this may be rich bot¬ 
 tom land, that it is worth the price for which the 
 public lands are ordinarily sold? Surely net, sir: 
 for although it may be reclaimed to a considerable 
 extent for a variety of purposes, still money and la¬ 
 bor mnst be expended to render it thus valuable 
 for any purpose whatever. So it is with prairie 
 lands in general that are distant from timber. If 
 you expect to sell them, you must reduce the price, 
 s© as to affoid the inducement to purchase to such 
 as are not able to buy the better lands, and would 
 be willing to encounter the inconveniences attend¬ 
 ing these remote situations on account of the dif¬ 
 ference in the price. And, sir, one reduction should 
 follow another within reasonable periods until the 
 whole is disposed of. 
 
 But we are told, Mr. President, that we have had 
 ample donations for the establishment and main¬ 
 tenance of institutions of learning, colleges, semi¬ 
 naries, and common schools, for the purpose of 
 constructing roads and canals, for our seats of Go¬ 
 vernment, and many other purposes; and we are 
 emphatically asked what we have given in return 
 for all these advantages. I will answer, Mr. Pre¬ 
 sident, as to some things, that Illinois, at least, has 
 given in return. In the first place she exempted 
 from taxation, for three years, several millions of 
 acres which had beeH patented as bounties to the 
 soldiers of the late war; and in the second all the 
 lands for five years, amounting to many [millions 
 more than have been sold since th« first day of 
 January, 1819. Our tax on a quarter section of 
 laud, in Illinois, Mr. President, is two dollars and 
 
 forty cents for ordinary purposes, and one dollar 
 and twenty cents for the opening and repairing of 
 roads, making three dollars and Sixty cents in the 
 whole, or each 160 acres of land. Now, sir, let 
 any man make the calculation, and he will find 
 that this would amount to no inconsiderable sum. 
 But, sir, appeals have been made to the old States, 
 to the Senators from Virginia and Pennsylvania, 
 here in their places, to resist the monstrous preten¬ 
 sions of the new States, that “we of the old States 
 are required to submit to.” Sir, I trust that these 
 appeals will not have the effect of arraying the old 
 Stales against us; but that they will agree with us, 
 that it is the right of the new Slates, as well as it is 
 the duty of the old, to see that these lands are dis¬ 
 posed of, and settled in a reasonable time, and that 
 n© impediment is thrown in the way of the occu¬ 
 pation of the lands within our limits, and the culti¬ 
 vation and improvemement, by our hardy and en- 
 terprizing citizens, of the whole country, good, bad, 
 and indifferent, upon such terms as shall be just, 
 liberal, and equitable, to all the parties concerned. 
 
 Still, Mr. President, I am willing to do the Sena¬ 
 tor from Kentucky, [Mr. Clay] the justice to say, 
 that with all his opposition to our land measures, 
 and harsh expressions towads our citizens, to say the 
 least of them, that he has rendered important ser¬ 
 vices to the West. Yes, sir, he has for many years 
 stood forward a prominent advocate for that great 
 Western measure, (the Cumberland road,) in which 
 we of the West* are so much interested, and I give 
 him full credit for it. I have seen the monument 
 on this side of Wheeling, said to have been erected 
 in commemoration of these services, and I hope it 
 may long stand there. I, at least, will not be among 
 those to pull it down. I only regret, sir, that some 
 of our Southern friends, agreeing with us on most 
 other questions of national policy, cannot find it 
 within their constitutional competency so to acton 
 this all important question to many of the States, 
 as to build up similar monuments to their memo¬ 
 ry and their fame, that should endure as long as 
 this “great highway of the ycest,” which was 
 commenced under the auspices of Mr. Jefferson, and 
 continued down to the present day, under the succes¬ 
 sive administrations of Madison, Monroe, Adams, 
 Jackson, and the present incumbent, Mr. Van Bu- 
 ren, shall stand itself as a monument, in the estima¬ 
 tion of the admiring beholder, to the memory of 
 those distinguished personages I have mentioned, 
 and all those who shall stand firmly by it to the 
 end, in the day of its trial and its difficulty. 
 
 These, Mr. President, are my views in regard 
 to the feelings and interests of the people I repre¬ 
 sent, in respect to this important measure of the 
 reduction of the price of the public lands. And as 
 to their patriotism under all circumstances, whether 
 we shall succeed or not, I will only add, in the 
 language of a worthy predecessor, who once occu¬ 
 pied this seat, [the lamented Kane,] that “if that 
 time shall ever come, which God forbid, when the 
 sun of your liberty must set, it will set in the West, 
 unsullied by a single act upon your herders to se¬ 
 ver this great and happy Confederacy.”