Chapter LXXII…

Chapter LXXII

ABUSE OF THE NAVAL PENSION SYSTEM: VAIN ATTEMPT TO CORRECT IT.

The annual bill for these pensions being on its passage, an attempt was made to correct the abuse introduced by the act of 1837. That act had done four things:--1. It had carried back the commencement of invalid naval pensions to the time of receiving the inability, instead of the time of completing the proof. 2. It extended the pensions for death to all cases of death, whether incurred in the line of duty or not. 3. It extended the widows' pensions for life, when five years had been the law both in the army and the navy. 4. It pensioned children until twenty-one years of age, thereby adopting the English pension system. The effects of these changes were to absorb and bankrupt the navy pension fund--a meritorious fund created out of the government share of prize money, relinquished for that purpose;--and to throw the pensions, the previous as well as the future, upon the public treasury--where it was never intended they were to be. This act, so novel in its character--so plundering in its effects--and introducing such fatal principles into the naval pension system, and which it has been found so difficult to get rid of--was one of the deplorable instances of midnight legislation, on the last night of the session; when, in the absence of many, the haste of all, the sleepiness of some, and a pervading inattention, an enterprising member can get almost any thing passed through--and especially as an amendment. It was at a time like this that this pension act was passed, the night of March 3d, 1837--its false and deceptive title ("An act for the more equitable administration of the Navy Pension Fund") being probably as much of it as was heard by the few members who heard any thing about it; and the word "equitable," so untruly and deceptiously inserted, probably the only part of it which lodged on their minds. And in that way was passed an act which instantly pillaged a sacred fund of one million two hundred thousand dollars--which has thrown the naval pensioners upon the Treasury, instead of the old navy pension fund, for their support--which introduced the English pension system--which was so hard to repeal; and which has still all its burdens on our finances, and some of its principles in our laws. It is instructive to learn the history of such legislation, and to see its power (a power inherent in the very nature of an abuse, and the greater in proportion to the greatness of the abuse) to resist correction: and with this view the brief debate on an ineffectual attempt in the Senate to repeal the act of this session is here given--Mr. Reuel Williams, of Maine, having the honor to commence the movement.

"The naval pension appropriation bill being under consideration, Mr. WILLIAMS offered an amendment, providing for the repeal of the act of 1837; and went at some length into the reasons in favor of the adoption of the amendment. He said all admitted the injurious tendency of the act of 1837, by which the fund which had been provided by the bravery of our gallant sailors for the relief of the widows and orphans of those who had been killed in battle, or had died from wounds which had been received while in the line of their duty, had been utterly exhausted; and his amendment went to the repeal of that law."

"Mr. MANGUM hoped the amendment would not be adopted--that the system would be allowed to remain as it was until the next session. It was a subject of great complexity, and if this amendment passed it would be equivalent to the repeal of all the naval pension acts."

"Mr. WILLIAMS understood the senator from North Carolina as saying, that if they passed this amendment, and thus repealed the act of 1837, they repeal all acts which grant a pension for disability."

"Mr. MANGUM had said, if they repealed the law of '37, they would cut off every widow and orphan now on the pension list, and leave none except the seamen, officers, and marines, entitled to pensions under the act of 1800."

"Mr. WILLIAMS said the senator was entirely mistaken; and read the law of 1813, which was still in full force, and could not be affected by the repeal of the law of 1837. The law of 1813 gives a pension to the widows and orphans of all who are killed in battle, or who die from wounds received in battle; and also gives pensions to those who are disabled while in the line of their duty. This law was now in force. The additional provisions of the law of 1837 were to carry back the pensions to the time when the disability was incurred, and to extend it to the widows and children of those who died, no matter from what cause, while they were in the naval service. Thus, if an officer or seaman died from intoxication, or even committed suicide, his widow received a pension for life, and his children received pensions until they were twenty-one years of age.

"Again: if officers or seamen received a wound which did not disable them they continued in the service, receiving their full pay for years. When they thought proper they retired from the service, and applied for a pension for disability, which, by the law of 1837, they were authorized to have carried back to the time the disability was incurred, though they had, during the whole series of years subsequent to receiving the disability, and prior to the application for a pension, been receiving their full pay as officers or seamen. It was to prevent the continuance of such abuses, that the amendment was offered."

"Mr. WALKER must vote against this amendment, repealing the act of 1837, because an amendment which had been offered by him and adopted, provided for certain pensions under this very act, and which ought, in justice, to be given."

"Mr. WILLIAMS thought differently, as the specific provision in the amendment of the senator from Mississippi, would except the cases included in it from the operation of the repealing clause."

"Mr. EVANS opposed the amendment, on the ground that it cut off all the amendments adopted, and brought back again the law of 1800."

The proposed amendment of Mr. Williams was then put to the vote--and negatived--only nineteen senators voting for it. The yeas and nays were:

YEAS--Messrs. Allen, Benton, Calhoun, Clay of Alabama, Fulton, King, Linn, McRoberts, Mouton, Nicholson, Pierce, Sevier, Smith of Connecticut, Sturgeon, Tappan, Williams, Woodbury, Wright, Young--19.

NAYS--Messrs. Archer, Barrow, Bates, Bayard, Berrien, Choate, Clay of Kentucky, Clayton, Dixon, Evans, Graham, Huntington, Kerr, Mangum, Merrick, Miller, Morehead, Phelps, Porter, Prentiss, Preston, Simmons, Smith of Indiana, Southard, Tallmadge, Walker, White, Woodbridge--28.

It is remarkable that in this vote upon a palpable and enormous abuse in the navy, there was not a whig vote among the democracy for correcting it, nor a democratic vote, except one, among the negatives. A difference about a navy--on the point of how much, and of what kind--had always been a point of difference between the two great political parties of the Union, which, under whatsoever names, are always the same--each preserving its identity in principles and policy: but here the two parties divided upon an abuse which no one could deny, or defend. The excuse was to put it off to another time, which is the successful way of perpetuating abuses, as there are always in every public assembly, as in every mass of individuals, many worthy men whose easy temperaments delight in temporizations; and who are always willing to put off, temporarily, the repeal of a bad law, or even to adopt temporarily, the enactment of a doubtful one. Mr. Williams' proposed amendment was not one of repeal only, but of enactment also. It repealed the act of 1837, and revived that of 1832, and corrected some injurious principles interjected into the naval pension code--especially the ante-dating of pensions, and the abuse of drawing pay and pension at the same time. This amendment being rejected, and some minor ones adopted, the question came up upon one offered by Mr. Walker--providing that all widows or children of naval officers, seamen, or marines, now deceased, and entitled to pensions under the act of 1837, should receive the same until otherwise directed by law; and excluding all cases from future deaths. Mr. Calhoun proposed to amend this amendment by striking out the substantive part of Mr. Walker's amendment, and after providing for those now on the pension-roll under the act of 1837, confining all future pensioners to the acts of April 23d, 1800--January 24th, 1813--and the second section of the act of the 3d of March, 1814. In support of his motion Mr. Calhoun spoke briefly, and pointedly, and unanswerably; but not quite enough so to save his proposed amendment. It was lost by one vote, and that the vote of the president pro tempore, Mr. Southard. The substance of Mr. Calhoun's brief speech is thus preserved in the register of the Congress debates:

"Mr. CALHOUN said that, among the several objections to this, there was one to which he did hope the Senate would apply the correction. The amendment not only kept alive the act of 1837, as to the pensioners now on the list, under that act, but also kept it alive for all future applications which might be made under it, until it should be hereafter repealed, if it ever should be. To this he strongly objected.

"There was one point on which all were agreed, that the act in question was not only inexpedient, but something much worse--that it committed something like a fraud upon the pension fund. It is well known to the Senate that that fund was the result of prize money pledged to the use of meritorious officers and sailors who might be disabled in the service of their country. The whole of this fund, amounting to nearly a million and a half of dollars, was swept away by this iniquitous act, that passed on the third of March--the very last day of the session--introduced and carried through by nobody knows who, and for which nobody seems responsible. He ventured nothing in asserting, that if such an act was now under discussion for the first time, it would not receive a single vote with the present knowledge which the Senate has of the subject, but, on the contrary, would be cast from it with universal scorn and indignation. He went further: it would now be repealed with like unanimity, were it not that many persons had been placed upon the list under the act, which was still in force, which was felt by many to be a sort of a pledge to pay them until the act was formally repealed. But why should we go further? Why should we keep it alive to let in those who are not yet put upon the list? But one answer could be given, and that one stated by the two senators from Massachusetts, that the act partook of the nature of a contract between the government and the officers, sailors and marines, comprehended within its provisions. There might be some semblance of reason for the few cases which have occurred since the passage of the act; but not the slightest as far as it relates to that more numerous class which occurred before its passage. And yet the amendment keeps the act open for the latter as well as the former. As strong as this objection is to the amendment as it stands, there are others not less so.

"It introduces new and extraordinary principles into our pension list. It gives pensions for life--yes, beyond--to children for twenty-one years, as well as the widows of the deceased officer, sailor or marine, who may die while in service. It makes no distinction between the death of the gallant and brave in battle, or him who may die quietly in his hammock or his bed on shore, or even him who commits suicide. Nor does it even distinguish between those who have served a long or a short time. The widows and children of all, however short the service, even for a single day, whatever might be the cause of death, are entitled, under this fraudulent act, to receive pensions, the widow for life, and the children for twenty-one years. To let in this undeserving class, to this unmeasured liberality of public bounty, this act is to be kept alive for an indefinite length of time--till the Congress may hereafter choose to repeal it.

"The object of my amendment, said Mr. C., is to correct this monstrous abuse; and, for this purpose, he proposed so to modify the amendment of the senator from Mississippi, as to exclude all who are not now on the pension roll from receiving pensions under the act of 1837, and also to prevent any one from being put on the navy pension roll hereafter under any act, except those of April 23, 1800, January 20, 1813, and the second section of the act of 30th March, 1814. These acts limit the pensions to the case of officers, sailors and marines, being disabled in the line of their duty, and limit the pensions to their widows and children to five years, even in those meritorious cases. Mr. C. then sent his amendment to the chair. It proposed to strike out all after the word 'now,' and insert, 'the pension roll, under the act of 1837, shall receive their pension till otherwise decided by law, but no one shall hereafter be put on the navy pension roll, under the said act, or any other act, except that of April 23, 1800, and the act of January 24, 1813, and the second section of the act of 3d March, 1814.' The question was then taken on the amendment by a count, and the Chair announced the amendment was lost--ayes 20, noes 21. Mr. Calhoun inquired if the Chair had voted. The Chair said he had voted with the majority. Mr. Buchanan then said he would offer an amendment which he had attempted to get an opportunity of offering in committee. It was to strike out the words 'until otherwise directed by law,' and insert the words 'until the close of the next session of Congress,' so as to limit the operations of the bill to that period. The amendment was adopted, and the amendments to the bill were ordered to be engrossed, and the bill ordered to a third reading."

Mr. Pierce having been long a member of the Pension Committee had seen the abuses to which our pension laws gave rise, and spoke decidedly against their abuse--and especially in the naval branch of the service. He said:

"There were cases of officers receiving pay for full disability, when in command of line-of-battle ships. The law of 1837 gave pay to officers from the time of their disability. He had been long enough connected with the Pension Committee to understand something of it. He had now in his drawer more than fifty letters from officers of the army, neither begging nor imploring, but demanding to be placed on the same footing with the navy in regard to pensions. He thought, on his conscience, that the pension system of this country was the worst on the face of the earth, and that they could never have either an army or a navy until there were reforms of more things than pensions. He pointed to the military academy, appointments to which rested on the influence that could be brought to bear by both Houses of Congress. He had looked on that scientific institution, from which no army would ever have a commander while West Point was in the ascendency; and he would tell why. The principles on which Frederick the Great and Napoleon acted were those to make soldiers--where merit was, reward always followed, but had they not witnessed cases of men of character, courage, and capacity, asking, from day to day, in vain for the humble rank of third lieutenant in your army, who would be glad to have such appointments? I know (said Mr. P.) a man who, at the battle of the Withlacoochie, had he performed the same service under Napoleon, would have received a baton. But in ours what did he get? Three times did that gallant fellow, with his arm broken and hanging at his side, charge the Indians, and drive them from their hammocks, where they were intrenched. The poor sergeant staid in the service until his time expired, and that was all he got for his gallantry and disinterestedness. Such instances of neglect would upset any service, destroy all emulation, and check all proper pride and ambition in subordinates. If ever they were to have a good army or navy, they must promote merit in both branches of service, as every truly great general had done, and every wise government ought to do."

In the House of Representatives an instructive debate took place, chiefly between Mr. Adams, and Mr. Francis Thomas, of Maryland, in which the origin and course of the act was somewhat traced--enough to find out that it was passed in the Senate upon the faith of a committee, without any discussion in the body; and in the House by the previous question, cutting off all debate; and so quietly and rapidly as to escape the knowledge of the most vigilant members--the knowledge of Mr. Adams himself, proverbially diligent. In the course of his remarks he (Mr. Adams) said:

"Upwards of $1,200,000 in the year 1837, constituting that fund, had been accumulating for a number of years. What had become of it, if the fund was exhausted? It was wasted--it was gone. And what was it gone for? Gentlemen would tell the House that it had gone to pay those pensioners not provided for by the 8th and 9th sections of the act which had been read--the act of 1800; but to provide for the payment of others, their wives and children; and their cousins, uncles and aunts, for aught he knew--provided for by the act of 1837. It was gone. Now, he wished gentlemen who were so much attached to the economies of the present administration, to make a little comparison between the condition of the fund now and its condition in 1837, when the sum of $1,200,000 had accumulated--from the interest of which all the pensions designated in the act of 1800 were to have been paid. In the space of three little years, this fund of $1,200,000 (carrying an interest of $70,000) was totally gone--absorbed--not a dollar of it left. Yes: there were some State stocks, to be sure; about $18,000 or less; but they were unsaleable; and it was because they were unsaleable that this appropriation, in part, was wanted. How came this act of 1837 to have passed Congress? Because he saw, from the ground taken by the chairman of the committee on naval affairs, that it was Congress that had been guilty of this waste of the public money; the President had nothing to do with it--the administration had nothing to do with it. How, he asked, was this law of 1837 passed? Would the Chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs tell the House how it had been passed; by whom it had been brought in and supported; and in what manner it had been carried through both Houses of Congress? If he would, we should then hear whether it came from whigs; or from economists, retrenchers, and reformers."

Mr. Francis Thomas, now the Chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs, in answer to Mr. Adams's inquiry, as to who were the authors of this act of 1837, stated that

"It had been reported to the Senate by the honorable Mr. Robinson, of Illinois, and sent to the Committee on Naval Affairs, of which Mr. Southard was a member, and he had reported the bill to the Senate, by whom it had been passed without a division. The Senate bill coming into the House, had been referred to the Committee on Naval Affairs, in the House. Mr. T. read the names of this committee, among which that of Mr. Wise was one. The bill had been ordered to its third reading without a division, and passed by the House without amendment.

"Mr. Wise explained, stating that, though his name appeared on the naval committee, he was not responsible for the bill. He was at that time but nominally one of the committee--his attention was directed elsewhere--he had other fish to fry--and could no longer attend to the business of that committee [of which he had previously been an active member], being appointed on another, which occupied his time and thoughts."

Mr. Adams, while condemning the act of 1837, would not now refuse to pay the pensioners out of the Treasury. He continued:

"When the act of 1837 was before Congress then was the time to have inquired whether these persons were fairly entitled to such a pension--whether Congress was bound to provide for widows and children, and for relatives in the seventh degree (for aught he knew). But that was not now the inquiry. He thought that, by looking at the journals, gentlemen would see that the bill was passed through under the previous question, or something of that kind. He was in the House, but he could not say how it passed. He was not conscious of it; and the discussion must have been put down in the way in which such things were usually done in this House--by clapping the previous question upon it. No questions were asked; and that was the way in which the bill passed. He did not think he could tell the whole story; but he thought it very probable that there were those in this House who could tell if they would, and who could tell what private interests were provided for in it. He had not been able to look quite far enough behind the curtain to know these things, but he knew that the bill was passed in a way quite common since the reign of reform commenced in squandering away the public treasure. That he affirmed, and the Chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs would not, he thought, undertake to contradict it. So much for that."

Mr. Adams showed that a further loss had been sustained under this pension act of 1837, under the conduct of the House itself, at the previous session, in refusing to consider a message from the President, and in refusing to introduce a resolution to show the loss which was about to be sustained. At that time there was a part of this naval pension fund ($153,000) still on hand, but it was in stocks, greatly depreciated; and the President sent in a report from the Secretary of the Navy, that $50,000 was wanted for the half-yearly payments due the first of July; and, if not appropriated by Congress, the stocks must be sold for what they would bring. On this head, he said:

"Towards the close of the last session of Congress, a message was transmitted by the President, covering a communication from the Secretary of the Navy, suggesting that an appropriation of $50,000 was necessary to meet the payment of pensions coming due on the 1st of July last. The message was sent on the 19th of June, and there was in it a letter from the Secretary of the Navy, stating that the sum of $50,000 was required to pay pensions coming due on the then 1st of July, and that it was found impracticable to effect a sale of the stocks belonging to the fund, even at considerable loss, in time to meet the payment. What did the House do with that message? It had no time to consider it; and then it was that he had offered his resolutions. But the House would not receive them--would not allow them to be read. The time of payment came--and sacrifices of the stocks were made, which were absolutely indispensable so long as the House would not make the payment. And that $50,000 was one of the demonstrations and reductions from the expenditures of 1840, about which the President and the Secretary of the Treasury were congratulating themselves and the country. They called for the $50,000. They told the House that if that sum was not appropriated, it would be necessary to make great sacrifices. Yet the House refused to consider the subject at all.

"He had desired a long time to say this much to the House; and he said it now, although a little out of order, because he had never been allowed to say it in order. At the last session the House would not hear him upon any thing; and it was that consideration which induced him to offer the resolutions he had read, and which gave something like a sample of these things. He offered them after the very message calling for $50,000 for this very object, had come in. But no, it was not in order, and there was a gentleman here who cried out "I object!" He (Mr. A.) was not heard by the House, but he had now been heard; and he hoped that when he should again offer these resolutions, as he wished to do, they might at least be allowed to go on the journal as a record, to show that such propositions had been offered. Those resolutions went utterly and entirely against the system of purchasing State bonds above par, and selling them fifty or sixty per cent. below par."

These debates are instructive, as showing in what manner legislation can be carried on, under the silencing process of the previous question. Here was a bill, slipped through the House, without the knowledge of its vigilant members, by which a fund of one million two hundred thousand dollars was squandered at once, and a charge of about $100,000 per annum put upon the Treasury to supply the place of the squandered fund, to continue during the lives of the pensioners, so far as they were widows or invalids, and until twenty-one years of age, so far as they were children. And it is remarkable that no one took notice of the pregnant insinuation of Mr. Adams, equivalent to an affirmation, that, although he could not tell the whole story of the passage of the act of 1837, there were others in the House who could, if they would; and also could tell what private interests were provided for.

No branch of the public service requires the reforming and retrenching hand of Congress more than the naval, now costing (ocean steam mail lines included) above eighteen millions of dollars: to be precise--$18,586,547, and 41 cents; and exclusive of the coast survey, about $400,000 more; and exclusive of the naval pensions. The civil, diplomatic, and miscellaneous branch is frightful, now amounting to $17,255,929 and 59 cents: and the military, also, now counting $12,571,496 and 64 cents (not including the pensions). Both these branches cry aloud for retrenchment and reform; but not equally with the naval--which stands the least chance to receive it. The navy, being a maritime establishment, has been considered a branch of service with which members from the interior were supposed to have but little acquaintance; and, consequently, but little right of interference. I have seen many eyes open wide, when a member from the interior would presume to speak upon it. By consequence, it has fallen chiefly under the management of members from the sea-coast--the tide-water districts of the Atlantic coast: where there is an interest in its growth, and also in its abuses. Seven navy yards (while Great Britain has but two); the constant building and equally constant repairing and altering vessels; their renewed equipment; the enlistment and discharge of crews; the schools and hospitals; the dry docks and wet docks; the congregation of officers ashore; and the ample pension list: all these make an expenditure, perennial and enormous, and always increasing, creates a powerful interest in favor of every proposition to spend money on the navy--especially in the north-east, where the bulk of the money goes; and an interest not confined to the members of Congress from those districts, but including a powerful lobby force, supplied with the arguments which deceive many, and the means which seduce more. While this management remains local, reform and retrenchment are not to be expected; nor could any member accomplish any thing without the support and countenance of an administration. Besides a local interest, potential on the subject, against reform, party spirit, or policy, opposes the same obstacle. The navy has been, and still is, to some degree, a party question--one party assuming to be its guardian and protector; and defending abuses to sustain that character. So far as this question goes to the degree, and kind of a navy--whether fleets to fight battles for the dominion of the seas, or cruisers to protect commerce--it is a fair question, on which parties may differ: but as to abuse and extravagance, there should be no difference. And yet what but abuse--what but headlong, wilful, and irresponsible extravagance, could carry up our naval expenditure to 18 millions of dollars, in time of peace, without a ship of the line afloat! and without vessels enough to perform current service, without hiring and purchasing!

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LXXIII. HOME SQUADRON, AND AID TO PRIVATE STEAM LINES

Great Britain has a home squadron, and that results from her geographical structure as a cluster of islands, often invaded, more frequently threatened, and always liable to sudden descents upon some part of her coast, resulting from her proximity to continental Europe, and engaged as principal or ally in almost all the wars of that continent. A fleet for home purposes, to cruise continually along her coasts, and to watch the neighboring coasts of her often enemies, was, then, a necessity of her insular position. Not so with the United States. We are not an island, but a continent, geographically remote from Europe, and politically still more so--unconnected with the wars of Europe--having but few of our own; having but little cause to expect descents and invasions, and but little to fear from them, if they came. Piracy had disappeared from the West Indies twenty years before. We had then no need for a home squadron. But Great Britain had one; and therefore we must. That was the true reason, with the desire for a great navy, cherished by the party opposed to the democracy (no matter under what name), and now dominant in all the departments of the government, for the creation of a home squadron at this session. The Secretary of the Navy and the navy board recommended it: Mr. Thomas Butler King, from the Naval Committee of the House, reported a bill for it, elaborately recommended in a most ample report: the two Houses passed it: the President approved it: and thus, at this extra session, was fastened upon the country a supernumerary fleet of two frigates, two sloops, two schooners, and two armed steamers: for the annual subsistence and repairs of which, about nine hundred thousand dollars were appropriated. This was fifteen years ago; and the country has yet to hear of the first want, the first service, rendered by this domestic squadron. In the mean time, it furnishes comfortable pay and subsistence, and commodious living about home, to some considerable number of officers and men.

But the ample report which was drawn up, and of which five thousand extra copies were printed, and the speeches delivered in its favor were bound to produce reasons for this new precaution against the danger of invasion, now to be provided after threescore years of existence without it, and when we had grown too strong, and too well covered our maritime cities with fortresses, to dread the descent of any enemy. Reasons were necessary to be given, and were; in which the British example, of course, was omitted. But reasons were given (in addition to the main object of defence), as that it would be a school for the instruction of the young midshipmen; and that it would give employment to many junior officers then idle in the cities. With respect to the first of these reasons it was believed by some that the merchant service was the best school in which a naval officer was ever trained; and with respect to the idle officers, that the true remedy was not to create so many. The sum appropriated by the bill was in gross--so much for all the different objects named in the bill, without saying how much for each. This was objected to by Mr. McKay of North Carolina, as being contrary to democratic practice, which required specific appropriations; also as being a mere disguise for an increase of the navy; and further that it was not competent for Congress to limit the employment of a navy. He said:

"That the bill before the committee proposed to appropriate a gross sum to effect the object in view, which he deemed a departure from the wholesome rule heretofore observed in making appropriations. It was known to all that since the political revolution of 1800, which placed the democratic party in power, the doctrine had generally prevailed, that all our appropriations should be specific. Now he would suggest to the chairman whether it would not be better to pursue that course in the present instance. Here Mr. McKay enumerated the different items of expenditure to be provided for in the bill, and named the specific sum for each. This was the form, he said, in which all our naval appropriation bills had heretofore passed. He saw no reason for a departure from this wholesome practice in this instance--a practice which was the best and most effectual means of securing the accountability of our disbursing officers. There was another suggestion he would throw out for the consideration of the chairman, and he thought it possessed some weight. This bill purported to be for the establishment of a home squadron, but he looked upon it as nothing more nor less than for the increase of the navy. Again, could Congress be asked to direct the manner in which this squadron, after it was fitted out, should be employed? It was true that by the constitution, Congress alone was authorized to build and fit out a navy, but the President was the commander-in-chief, and had alone the power to direct how and where it should be employed. The title of this bill, therefore, should be 'a bill to increase the navy,' for it would not be imperative on the President to employ this squadron on our coasts. Mr. M. said he did not rise to enter into a long discussion, but merely to suggest to the consideration of the chairman of the committee, the propriety of making the appropriations in the bill specific."

"Mr. WISE said that he agreed entirely with the gentleman from North Carolina as to the doctrine of specific appropriations; and if he supposed that this bill violated that salutary principle he should be willing to amend it. But it did not; it declared a specific object, for which the money was given. He did not see the necessity of going into all the items which made up the sum. That Congress had no power to ordain that a portion of the navy should be always retained upon the coast as a home squadron, was to him a new doctrine. The bill did not say that these vessels should never be sent any where else."

"Mr. MCKAY insisted on the ground he had taken, and went into a very handsome eulogy on the principle of specific appropriations of the public money, as giving to the people the only security they had for the proper and the economical use of their money; but this, by the present shape of the bill, they would entirely be deprived of. The bill might be modified with the utmost ease, but he should move no amendments."

Mr. Thomas Butler King, the reporter of the bill, entered largely into its support, and made some comparative statements to show that much money had been expended heretofore on the navy with very inadequate results in getting guns afloat, going as high as eight millions of dollars in a year and floating but five hundred and fifty guns; and claimed an improvement now, as, for seven millions and a third they would float one thousand and seventy guns. Mr. King then said:

"He had heard much about the abuse and misapplication of moneys appropriated for the navy, and he believed it all to be true. To illustrate the truth of the charge, he would refer to the table already quoted, showing on one hand the appropriations made, and on the other the results thereby obtained. In 1800 there had been an appropriation of $2,704,148, and we had then 876 guns afloat; while in 1836, with an appropriation of $7,011,055, we had but 462 guns afloat. In 1841, with an appropriation of a little over three millions, we had 836 guns afloat; and in 1838, with an appropriation of over eight millions, we had but 554 guns afloat. These facts were sufficient to show how enormous must have been the abuses somewhere."

Mr. King also gave a statement of the French and British navies, and showed their great strength, in order to encourage our own building of a great navy to be able to cope with them on the ocean. He

"Alluded to the change which had manifested itself in the naval policy of Great Britain, in regard to a substitution of steam power for ordinary ships of war. He stated the enumeration of the British fleet, in 1840, to be as follows: ships of the line, 105; vessels of a lower grade, in all, 403; and war steamers, 87. The number of steamers had since then been stated at 300. The French navy, in 1840, consisted of 23 ships of the line, 180 lesser vessels, and 36 steamers; besides which, there had been, at that time, eight more steamers on the stocks. These vessels could be propelled by steam across the Atlantic in twelve or fourteen days. What would be the condition of the lives and property of our people, if encountered by a force of this description, without a gun to defend themselves?"

Lines of railroad, with their steam-cars, had not, at that time, taken such extension and multiplication as to be taken into the account for national defence. Now troops can come from the geographical centre of Missouri in about sixty hours (summoned by the electric telegraph in a few minutes), and arrive at almost any point on the Atlantic coast; and from all the intermediate States in a proportionately less time. The railroad, and the electric telegraph, have opened a new era in defensive war, and especially for the United States, superseding old ideas, and depriving invasion of all alarm. But the bill was passed--almost unanimously--only eight votes against it in the House; namely: Linn Boyd of Kentucky; Walter Coles of Virginia; John G. Floyd of New York; William O. Goode of Virginia; Cave Johnson, Abraham McClelland, and Hopkins L. Turney of Tennessee; and John Thompson Mason of Maryland. It passed the Senate without yeas and nays.

A part of the report in favor of the home squadron was also a recommendation to extend assistance out of the public treasury to the establishment of private lines of ocean steamers, adapted to war purposes; and in conformity to it Mr. King moved this resolution:

"Resolved, That the Secretary of the Navy is hereby directed to inquire into the expediency of aiding individuals or companies in our establishment of lines of armed steamers between some of our principal Northern and Southern ports, and to foreign ports; to advertise for proposals for the establishment of such lines as he may deem most important and practicable; and to report to this House at the next session of Congress."

This resolution was adopted, and laid the foundation for those annual enormous appropriations for private lines of ocean steamers which have subjected many members of Congress to such odious imputations, and which has taken, and is taking, so many millions of the public money to enable individuals to break down competition, and enrich themselves at the public expense. It was a measure worthy to go with the home squadron, and the worst of the two--each a useless waste of money; and each illustrating the difficulty, and almost total impossibility, of getting rid of bad measures when once passed, and an interest created for them.

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Chapter LXXIV

RECHARTER OF THE DISTRICT BANKS: MR. BENTON'S SPEECH: EXTRACTS.

Mr. BENTON then proposed the following amendment:

"And be it further enacted, That each and every of said banks be, and they are hereby, expressly prohibited from issuing or paying out, under any pretence whatever, any bill, note, or other paper, designed or intended to be used and circulated as money, of a less denomination than five dollars, or of any denomination between five and ten dollars, after one year from the passage of this bill; or between ten and twenty dollars, after two years from the same time; and for any violation of the provisions of this section, or for issuing or paying out the notes of any bank in a state of suspension, its own inclusive, the offending bank shall incur all the penalties and forfeitures to be provided and directed by the first section of this act for the case of suspension or refusal to pay in specie; to be enforced in like manner as is directed by that section."

Mr. BENTON. The design of the amendment is to suppress two great evils in our banking system: the evil of small notes, and that of banks combining to sustain each other in a state of suspension. Small notes are a curse in themselves to honest, respectable banks, and lead to their embarrassment, whether issued by themselves or others. They go into hands of laboring people, and become greatly diffused, and give rise to panics; and when a panic is raised it cannot be stopped among the holders of these small notes. Their multitudinous holders cannot go into the counting-room to examine assets, and ascertain an ultimate ability. They rush to the counter, and demand pay. They assemble in crowds, and spread alarm. When started, the alarm becomes contagious--makes a run upon all banks; and overturns the good as well as the bad. Small notes are a curse to all good banks. They are the cause of suspensions. When the Bank of England commenced operations, she issued no notes of a less denomination than one hundred pounds sterling; and when the notes were paid into the Bank, they were cancelled and destroyed. But in the course of one hundred and three years, she worked down from one hundred pound notes to one pound notes. And when did they commence reducing the amount of their notes? During the administration of Sir Robert Walpole. When the notes got down to one pound, specie was driven from circulation, and went to France and Holland, and a suspension of six and twenty years followed.

They are a curse to all good banks in another way: they banish gold and silver from the country: and when that is banished the foundation which supports the bank is removed: and the bank itself must come tumbling down. While there is gold and silver in the country--in common circulation--banks will be but little called upon for it: and if pressed can get assistance from their customers. But when it is banished the country, they alone are called upon, and get no help if hard run. All good banks should be against small notes on their own account.

These small notes are a curse to the public. They are the great source of counterfeiting. Look at any price current, and behold the catalogue of the counterfeits. They are almost all on the small denominations--under twenty dollars. And this counterfeiting, besides being a crime in itself, leads to crimes--to a general demoralization in passing them. Holders cannot afford to lose them: they cannot trace out the person from whom they got them. They gave value for them; and pass them to somebody--generally the most meritorious and least able to bear the loss--the day-laborer. Finally, they stop in somebody's hands--generally in the hands of a working man or woman.

Why are banks so fond of issuing these small notes? Why, in the first place, banks of high character are against them: it is only the predatory class that are for them: and, unfortunately, they are a numerous progeny. It is in vain they say they issue them for public accommodation. The public would be much better accommodated with silver dollars, gold dollars--with half, whole, double, and quarter eagles--whereof they would have enough if these predatory notes were suppressed. No! they are issued for profit--for dishonest profit--for the shameful and criminal purpose of getting something for nothing. It is for the wear and tear of these little pilfering messengers! for their loss in the hands of somebody! which loss is the banker's gain! the gain of a day's or a week's work from a poor man, or woman, for nothing. Shame on such a spirit, and criminal punishment on it besides. But although the gains are small individually, and in the petty larceny spirit, yet the aggregate is great; and enters into the regular calculation of profit in these paper money machines; and counts in the end. There is always a large per centum of these notes outstanding--never to come back. When, at the end of twenty-five years, Parliament repealed the privilege granted to the Bank of England to issue notes under five pounds, a large amount were outstanding; and though the repeal took place more than twenty years ago, yet every quarterly return of the Bank now shows that millions of these notes are still outstanding, which are lost or destroyed, and never will be presented. The Bank of England does not now issue any note under five pounds sterling: nor any other bank in England. The large banks repulsed the privilege for themselves, and got it denied to all the small class. To carry the iniquity of these pillaging little notes to the highest point, and to make them open swindlers, is to issue them at one place, redeemable at another. That is to double the cheat--to multiply the chance of losing the little plunderer by sending him abroad, and to get a chance of "shaving" him in if he does not go.

The statistics of crime in Great Britain show, that of all the counterfeiting of bank bills and paper securities in that kingdom, more is counterfeited on notes under five pounds than over and it is the same in this country. On whom does the loss of these counterfeit notes fall? On the poor and the ignorant--the laborer and the mechanic. Hence these banks inflict a double injury on the poorer classes; and of all the evils of the banking system, the most revolting is its imposing unequal burdens on that portion of the people the least able to bear them.

Mr. B. then instanced a case in point of an Insurance Company in St. Louis, which, in violation of law, assumed banking privileges, and circulated to a large extent the notes of a suspended bank. Up to Saturday night these notes were paid out from its counter, and the working man and mechanics of St. Louis were paid their week's wages in them. Well, when Monday morning came, the Insurance Company refused to receive one of them, and they fell at once to fifty cents on the dollar. Thus the laborer and the mechanic had three days of their labor annihilated, or had worked three days for the exclusive benefit of those who had swindled them; and all this by a bank having power to receive or refuse what paper they please, and when they please. And the Senate are now called upon to confer the same privilege upon the banks of this district.

Mr. B. said it was against the immutable principles of justice--in opposition to God's most holy canon, to make a thing of value to-day, which will be of none to-morrow. You might as well permit the dry goods merchant to call his yard measure three yards, or the grocer to call his quart three quarts, as to permit the banker to call his dollar three dollars. There is no difference in principle, though more subtle in the manner of doing it. Money is the standard of value, as the yard, and the gallon, and the pound weight, were the standards of measure.

When he proposed the amendment, he considered it a proper opportunity to bring before the people of the United States the great question, whether they should have an exclusive paper currency or not. He wished to call their attention to this war upon the currency of the constitution--a war unremitting and merciless--to establish in this country an exclusive paper currency. This war to subvert the gold and silver currency of the constitution, is waged by that party who vilify your branch mints, ridicule gold, ridicule silver, go for banks at all times and at all places; and go for a paper circulation down to notes of six and a quarter cents. He rejoiced that this question was presented in that body, on a platform so high that every American can see it--the question of a sound or depreciated currency. He was glad to see the advocates of banks, State and national, show their hand on this question.

To hear these paper-money advocates celebrate their idols--for they really seem to worship bank notes--and the smaller and meaner the better--one would be tempted to think that bank notes were the ancient and universal currency of the world, and that gold and silver were a modern invention--an innovation--an experiment--the device of some quack, who deserved no better answer than to be called humbug. To hear them discoursing of "sound banks," and "sound circulating medium," one would suppose that they considered gold and silver unsound, and subject to disease, rottenness, and death. But, why do they apply this phrase "sound" to banks and their currency? It is a phrase never applied to any thing which is not subject to unsoundness--to disease--to rottenness--to death. The very phrase brings up the idea of something subject to unsoundness; and that is true of banks of circulation and their currency: but it is not true of gold and silver: and the phrase is never applied to them. No one speaks of the gold or silver currency as being sound, and for the reason that no one ever heard of it as rotten.

Young merchants, and some old ones, think there is no living without banks--no transacting business without a paper money currency. Have these persons ever heard of Holland, where there are merchants dealing in tens of millions, and all of it in gold and silver? Have they ever heard of Liverpool and Manchester, where there was no bank of circulation, not even a branch of the Bank of England; and whose immense operations were carried on exclusively upon gold and the commercial bill of exchange? Have they ever heard of France, where the currency amounts to four hundred and fifty millions of dollars, and it all hard money? For, although the Bank of France has notes of one hundred and five hundred, and one thousand francs, they are not used as currency but as convenient bills of exchange, for remittance, or travelling. Have they ever heard of the armies, and merchants, and imperial courts of antiquity? Were the Roman armies paid with paper? did the merchant princes deal in paper? Was Nineveh and Babylon built on paper? Was Solomon's temple so built? And yet, according to these paper-money idolaters, we cannot pay a handful of militia without paper! cannot open a dry goods store in a shanty without paper! cannot build a house without paper! cannot build a village of log houses in the woods, or a street of shanties in a suburb, without a bank in their midst! This is real humbuggery; and for which the industrial classes--the whole working population, have to pay an enormous price. Does any one calculate the cost to the people of banking in our country? how many costly edifices have to be built? what an army of officers have to be maintained? what daily expenses have to be incurred? how many stockholders must get profits? in a word, what a vast sum a bank lays out before it begins to make its half yearly dividend of four or five per centum, leaving a surplus--all to come out of the productive classes of the people? And after that comes the losses by the wear and tear of small notes--by suspensions and breakings--by expansions and contractions--by making money scarce when they want to buy, and plenty when they want to sell. We talk of standing armies in Europe, living on the people: we have an army of bank officers here doing the same. We talk of European taxes; the banks tax us here as much as kings tax their subjects. And this district is crying out for banks. It has six, and wants them rechartered--Congress all the time spending more hard money among them than they can use. They had twelve banks: and what did they have to do? Send to Holland, where there is not a single bank of circulation, to borrow one million of dollars in gold, which they got at five per centum per annum; and then could not pay the interest. At the end of the third year the interest could not be paid; and Congress had to pay it to save the whole corporate effects of the city from being sold--sold to the Dutch, because the Dutch had no banks. And sold it would have been if Congress had not put up the money: for the distress warrant was out, and was to be levied in thirty days. Then what does this city want with banks of circulation? She has no use for them; but I only propose to make them a little safer by suppressing their small notes, and preventing them from dealing in the depreciated notes of suspended, or broken banks.

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Chapter LXXV

REVOLT IN CANADA: BORDER SYMPATHY: FIRMNESS OF MR. VAN BUREN: PUBLIC PEACE ENDANGERED--AND PRESERVED:--CASE OF MCLEOD.

The revolt which took place in Canada in the winter of 1837-'8 led to consequences which tried the firmness of the administration, and also tried the action of our duplicate form of government in its relations with foreign powers. The revolt commenced imposingly, with a large show of disjointed forces, gaining advantages at the start; but was soon checked by the regular local troops. The French population, being the majority of the people, were chiefly its promoters, with some emigrants from the United States; and when defeated they took refuge on an island in the Niagara River on the British side, near the Canadian coast, and were collecting men and supplies from the United States to renew the contest. From the beginning an intense feeling in behalf of the insurgents manifested itself all along the United States border, upon a line of a thousand miles--from Vermont to Michigan. As soon as blood began to flow on the Canadian side, this feeling broke out into acts on the American side, and into organization for the assistance of the revolting party--the patriots, as they were called. Men assembled and enrolled, formed themselves into companies and battalions, appointed officers--even generals--issued proclamations--forced the public stores and supplied themselves with arms and ammunition: and were certainly assembling in sufficient numbers to have enabled the insurgents to make successful head against any British forces then in the provinces. The whole border line was in a state of excitement and commotion--many determined to cross over, and assist--many more willing to see the assistance given: the smaller part only discountenanced the proceeding and wished to preserve the relations which the laws of the country, and the duties of good neighborhood, required. To the Canadian authorities these movements on the American side were the cause of the deepest solicitude; and not without reason: for the numbers, the inflamed feeling, and the determined temper of these auxiliaries, presented a force impossible for the Canadian authorities to resist, if dashing upon them, and difficult for their own government to restrain. From the first demonstration, and without waiting for any request from the British minister at Washington (Mr. FOX), the President took the steps which showed his determination to have the laws of neutrality respected. A proclamation was immediately issued, admonishing and commanding all citizens to desist from such illegal proceedings, and threatening the guilty with the utmost penalties of the law. But the President knew full well that it was not a case in which a proclamation, and a threat, were to have efficacy; and he took care to add material means to his words. Instructions were issued to all the federal law officers along the border, the marshals and district attorneys, to be vigilant in making arrests: and many were made, and prosecutions instituted. He called upon the governors of the border States to aid in suppressing the illegal movement: which they did. And to these he added all the military and naval resources which could be collected. Major-general Scott was sent to the line, with every disposable regular soldier, and with authority to call on the governors of New York and Michigan for militia and volunteers: several steamboats were chartered on Lake Erie, placed under the command of naval officers, well manned with regular soldiers, and ordered to watch the lake.

The fidelity, and even sternness with which all these lawless expeditions from the United States, were repressed and rebuked by President Van Buren, were shown by him in his last communication to Congress on the subject; in which he said:

"Information has been given to me, derived from official and other sources, that many citizens of the United States have associated together to make hostile incursions from our territory into Canada, and to aid and abet insurrection there, in violation of the obligations and laws of the United States, and in open disregard of their own duties as citizens.

"The results of these criminal assaults upon the peace and order of a neighboring country have been, as was to be expected, fatally destructive to the misguided or deluded persons engaged in them, and highly injurious to those in whose behalf they are professed to have been undertaken. The authorities in Canada, from intelligence received of such intended movements among our citizens, have felt themselves obliged to take precautionary measures against them; have actually embodied the militia, and assumed an attitude to repel the invasion to which they believed the colonies were exposed from the United States. A state of feeling on both sides of the frontier has thus been produced, which called for prompt and vigorous interference. If an insurrection existed in Canada, the amicable dispositions of the United States towards Great Britain, as well as their duty to themselves, would lead them to maintain a strict neutrality, and to restrain their citizens from all violations of the laws which have been passed for its enforcement. But this government recognizes a still higher obligation to repress all attempts on the part of its citizens to disturb the peace of a country where order prevails, or has been re-established. Depredations by our citizens upon nations at peace with the United States, or combinations for committing them, have at all times been regarded by the American government and people with the greatest abhorrence. Military incursions by our citizens into countries so situated, and the commission of acts of violence on the members thereof, in order to effect a change in its government, or under any pretext whatever, have, from the commencement of our government, been held equally criminal on the part of those engaged in them, and as much deserving of punishment as would be the disturbance of the public peace by the perpetration of similar acts within our own territory."

By these energetic means, invasions from the American side were prevented; and in a contest with the British regulars and the local troops, the disjointed insurgents, though numerous, were overpowered--dispersed--subjected--or driven out of Canada. Mr. Van Buren had discharged the duties of neutrality most faithfully, not merely in obedience to treaties and the law of nations, but from a high conviction of what was right and proper in itself, and necessary to the well-being of his own country as well as that of a neighboring power. Interruption of friendly intercourse with Great Britain, would be an evil itself, even if limited to such interruption: but the peace of the United States might be endangered: and it was not to be tolerated that bands of disorderly citizens should bring on war. He had done all that the laws, and all that a sense of right and justice required--and successfully, to the repression of hostile movements--and to the satisfaction of the British authorities. Faithfully and ably seconded by his Secretary of State (Mr. Forsyth), and by his Attorney-general (Mr. Gilpin), he succeeded in preserving our neutral relations in the most trying circumstances to which they had ever been exposed, and at large cost of personal popularity to himself: for the sympathy of the border States resented his so earnest interference to prevent aid to the insurgents.

The whole affair was over, and happily, when a most unexpected occurrence revived the difficulty--gave it a new turn--and made the soil of the United States itself, the scene of invasion--of bloodshed--of conflagration--and of abduction. Some remnant of the dispersed insurgents had taken refuge on Navy Island, near the Canadian shore; and reinforced by some Americans, were making a stand there, and threatening a descent upon the British colonies. Their whole number has been ascertained to have been no more than some five hundred--but magnified by rumor at the time to as many thousands. A small steamboat from the American side, owned by a citizen of the United States, was in the habit of carrying men and supplies to this assemblage on the island. Her practices became known to the British military authorities, encamped with some thousand men at Chippewa, opposite the island; and it was determined to take her in the fact, and destroy her. It was then the last of December. A night expedition of boats was fitted out to attack this vessel, moored to the island; but not finding her there, the vessel was sought for in her own waters--found moored to the American shore; and there attacked and destroyed. The news of this outrage was immediately communicated to the President, and by him made known to Congress in a special message--accompanied by the evidence on which the information rested, and by a statement of the steps which the President had taken in consequence. The principal evidence was from the master of the boat--her name, the Caroline--and Schlosser, on the American shore, her home and harbor. After admitting that the boat had been employed in carrying men and supplies to the assemblage on Navy Island, his affidavit continues:

"That from this point the Caroline ran to Schlosser, arriving there at three o'clock in the afternoon; that, between this time and dark, the Caroline made two trips to Navy Island, landing as before. That, at about six o'clock in the evening, this deponent caused the said Caroline to be landed at Schlosser, and made fast with chains to the dock at that place. That the crew and officers of the Caroline numbered ten, and that, in the course of the evening, twenty-three individuals, all of whom were citizens of the United States, came on board of the Caroline, and requested this deponent and other officers of the boat to permit them to remain on board during the night, as they were unable to get lodgings at the tavern near by; these requests were acceded to, and the persons thus coming on board retired to rest, as did also all of the crew and officers of the Caroline, except such as were stationed to watch during the night. That, about midnight, this deponent was informed by one of the watch, that several boats filled with men, were making towards the Caroline from the river, and this deponent immediately gave the alarm; and before he was able to reach the deck, the Caroline was boarded by some 70 or 80 men, all of whom were armed. That they immediately commenced a warfare with muskets, swords, and cutlasses, upon the defenceless crew and passengers of the Caroline, under a fierce cry of G--d damn them, give them no quarter; kill every man: fire! fire! That the Caroline was abandoned without resistance, and the only effort made by either the crew or passengers seemed to be to escape slaughter. That this deponent narrowly escaped; having received several wounds, none of which, however, are of a serious character. That immediately after the Caroline fell into the hands of the armed force who boarded her, she was set on fire, cut loose from the dock, was towed into the current of the river, there abandoned, and soon after descended the Niagara Falls: that this deponent has made vigilant search after the individuals, thirty-three in number, who are known to have been on the Caroline at the time she was boarded, and twenty-one only are to be found, one of whom, to wit, Amos Durfee, of Buffalo, was found dead upon the dock, having received a shot from a musket, the ball of which penetrated the back part of the head, and came out at the forehead. James II. King, and Captain C. F. Harding, were seriously, though not mortally wounded. Several others received slight wounds. The twelve individuals who are missing, this deponent has no doubt, were either murdered upon the steamboat, or found a watery grave in the cataract of the falls. And this deponent further says, that immediately after the Caroline was got into the current of the stream and abandoned, as before stated, beacon lights were discovered upon the Canada shore, near Chippewa; and after sufficient time had elapsed to enable the boats to reach that shore, this deponent distinctly heard loud and vociferous cheering at that point. That this deponent has no doubt that the individuals who boarded the Caroline, were a part of the British forces now stationed at Chippewa."

Ample corroborative testimony confirmed this affidavit--for which, in fact, there was no necessity, as the officer in command of the boats made his official report to his superior (Col. McNab), to the same effect--who published it in general orders; and celebrated the event as an exploit. This report varied but little from the American in any respect, and made it worse in others. After stating that he did not find the Caroline at Navy Island, "as expected," he went in search of her, and found her at Grand Island, and moored to the shore. The report proceeds:

"I then assembled the boats off the point of the Island, and dropped quietly down upon the steamer; we were not discovered until within twenty yards of her, when the sentry upon the gangway hailed us, and asked for the countersign, which I told him we would give when we got on board; he then fired upon us, when we immediately boarded and found from twenty to thirty men upon her decks, who were easily overcome, and in two minutes she was in our possession. As the current was running strong, and our position close to the Falls of Niagara, I deemed it most prudent to burn the vessel; but previously to setting her on fire, we took the precaution to loose her from her moorings, and turn her out into the stream, to prevent the possibility of the destruction of anything like American property. In short, all those on board the steamer who did not resist, were quietly put on shore, as I thought it possible there might be some American citizens on board. Those who assailed us, were of course dealt with according to the usages of war.

"I beg to add, that we brought one prisoner away, a British subject, in consequence of his acknowledging that he had belonged to Duncombe's army, and was on board the steamer to join Mackenzie upon Navy Island. Lieutenant McCormack, of the Royal Navy, and two others were wounded, and I regret to add that five or six of the enemy were killed."

This is the official report of Captain Drew, and it adds the crimes of impressment and abduction to all the other enormities of that midnight crime. The man carried away as a British subject, and because he had belonged to the insurgent forces in Canada, could not (even if these allegations had been proved upon him), been delivered up under any demand upon our government: yet he was carried off by violence in the night.

This outrage on the Caroline, reversed the condition of the parties, and changed the tenor of their communications. It now became the part of the United States to complain, and to demand redress; and it was immediately done in a communication from Mr. Forsyth, the Secretary of State, to Mr. Fox, the British minister, at Washington. Under date of January 5th, 1838, the Secretary wrote to him:

"The destruction of the property, and assassination of citizens of the United States on the soil of New York, at the moment when, as is well known to you, the President was anxiously endeavoring to allay the excitement, and earnestly seeking to prevent any unfortunate occurrence on the frontier of Canada, has produced upon his mind the most painful emotions of surprise and regret. It will necessarily form the subject of a demand for redress upon her majesty's government. This communication is made to you under the expectation that, through your instrumentality, an early explanation may be obtained from the authorities of Upper Canada, of all the circumstances of the transaction; and that, by your advice to those authorities, such decisive precautions may be used as will render the perpetration of similar acts hereafter impossible. Not doubting the disposition of the government of Upper Canada to do its duty in punishing the aggressors and preventing future outrage, the President, notwithstanding, has deemed it necessary to order a sufficient force on the frontier to repel any attempt of a like character, and to make known to you that if it should occur, he cannot be answerable for the effects of the indignation of the neighboring people of the United States."

In communicating this event to Congress, Mr. Van Buren showed that he had already taken the steps which the peace and honor of the country required. The news of the outrage, spreading through the border States, inflamed the repressed feeling of the people to the highest degree, and formidable retaliatory expeditions were immediately contemplated. The President called all the resources of the frontier into instant requisition to repress these expeditions, and at the same time took measures to obtain redress from the British government. His message to the two Houses said:

"I regret, however, to inform you that an outrage of a most aggravated character has been committed, accompanied by a hostile, though temporary invasion of our territory, producing the strongest feelings of resentment on the part of our citizens in the neighborhood, and on the whole border line; and that the excitement previously existing, has been alarmingly increased. To guard against the possible recurrence of any similar act, I have thought it indispensable to call out a portion of the militia to be posted on that frontier. The documents herewith presented to Congress show the character of the outrage committed, the measures taken in consequence of its occurrence, and the necessity for resorting to them. It will also be seen that the subject was immediately brought to the notice of the British minister accredited to this country, and the proper steps taken on our part to obtain the fullest information of all the circumstances leading to and attendant upon the transaction, preparatory to a demand for reparation."

The feeling in Congress was hardly less strong than in the border States, on account of this outrage, combining all the crimes of assassination, arson, burglary, and invasion of national territory. An act of Congress was immediately passed, placing large military means, and an appropriation of money in the President's hands, for the protection of our frontier. His demand for redress was unanimously seconded by Congress; and what had been so earnestly deprecated from the beginning, as a consequence of this border trouble--a difficulty between the two nations--had now come to pass; but entirely from the opposite side from which it had been expected. The British government delayed the answer to the demand for redress--avoided the assumption of the criminal act--excused and justified it--but did not assume it: and in fact could not, without contradicting the official reports of her own officers, all negativing the idea of any intention to violate the territory of the United States. The orders to the officer commanding the boats, was to seek the Caroline at Navy Island, where she had been during the day, and was expected to be at night. In pursuance of this order, the fleet of boats went to the island, near midnight; and not finding the offending vessel there, sought her elsewhere. This is the official report of Capt. Drew, of the Royal Navy, commanding the boats: "I immediately directed five boats to be armed, and manned with forty-five volunteers; and, at about eleven o'clock, P. M., we pushed off from the shore for Navy Island, when not finding her there, as expected, we went in search, and found her moored between the island and the main shore." The island here spoken of as the one between which and the main shore, the Caroline was found, was the American island, called Grand Island, any descent upon which, Colonel McNab had that day officially disclaimed, because it was American territory. The United States Attorney for the District of New York, (Mr. Rodgers), then on the border to enforce the laws against the violators of our neutrality, hearing that there was a design to make a descent upon Grand Island, addressed a note to Col. McNab, commanding on the opposite side of the river, to learn its truth; and received this answer:

"With respect to the report in the city of Buffalo, that certain forces under my command had landed upon Grand Island--an island within the territory of the United States--I can assure you that it is entirely without foundation; and that so far from my having any intention of the kind, such a proceeding would be in direct opposition to the wishes and intentions of her Britannic majesty's government, in this colony, whose servant I have the honor to be. Entering at once into the feeling which induced you to address me on this subject, I beg leave to call your attention to the following facts: That so far from occupying or intending to occupy, that or any other portion of the American territory, aggressions of a serious and hostile nature have been made upon the forces under my command from that island. Two affidavits are now before me, stating that a volley of musketry from Grand Island was yesterday fired upon a party of unarmed persons, some of whom were females, without the slightest provocation having been offered. That on the same day, one of my boats, unarmed, manned by British subjects, passing along the American shore, and without any cause being given, was fired upon from the American side, near Fort Schlosser, by cannon, the property, I am told, of the United States."

This was written on the 29th day of December, and it was eleven o'clock of the night of that day that the Caroline was destroyed on the American shore. It was Col. McNab, commanding the forces at Chippewa, that gave the order to destroy the Caroline. The letter and the order were both written the same day--probably within the same hour, as both were written in the afternoon: and they were coincident in import as well as in date. The order was to seek the offending vessel at Navy Island, being British territory, and where she was seen at dark: the letter disclaimed both the fact, and the intent, of invading Grand Island, because it was American territory: and besides the disclaimer for himself, Col. McNab superadded another equally positive in behalf of her Majesty's government in Canada, declaring that such a proceeding would be in direct opposition to the wishes and intentions of the colonial government. In the face of these facts the British government found it difficult, and for a long time impossible, to assume this act of destroying the Caroline as a government proceeding. It was never so assumed during the administration of Mr. Van Buren--a period of upwards of three years--to be precise--(and this is a case which requires precision)--three years and two months and seven days: that is to say, from the 29th of December, 1837, to March 3d, 1841.

When this letter of Col. McNab was read in the House of Representatives (which it was within a few days after it was written), Mr. Fillmore (afterwards President of the United States, and then a representative from the State of New York, and, from that part of the State which included the most disturbed portion of the border), stood up in his place, and said:

"The letter just read by the clerk, at his colleague's request, was written in reply to one from the district attorney as to the reported intention of the British to invade Grand Island; and in it is the declaration that there was no such intention. Now, Mr. F. would call the attention of the House to the fact that that letter was written on the 29th December, and that it was on the very night succeeding the date of it that this gross outrage was committed on the Caroline. Moreover, he would call the attention of the House to the well-authenticated fact, that, after burning the boat, and sending it over the falls, the assassins were lighted back to McNab's camp, where he was in person, by beacons lighted there for that purpose. Mr. F. certainly deprecated a war with Great Britain as sincerely as any gentleman on that floor could possibly do: and hoped, as earnestly, that these difficulties would be amicably adjusted between the two nations. Yet, he must say, that the letter of McNab, instead of affording grounds for a palliation, was, in reality, a great aggravation of the outrage. It held out to us the assurance that there was nothing of the kind to be apprehended; and yet, a few hours afterwards, this atrocity was perpetrated by an officer sent directly from the camp of that McNab."

At the time that this was spoken the order of Col. McNab to Captain Drew had not been seen, and consequently it was not known that the letter and the order were coincident in their character, and that the perfidy, implied in Mr. Fillmore's remarks, was not justly attributable to Col. McNab: but it is certain he applauded the act when done: and his letter will stand for a condemnation of it, and for the disavowal of authority to do it.

The invasion of New York was the invasion of the United States, and the President had immediately demanded redress, both for the public outrage, and for the loss of property to the owners of the boat. Mr. Van Buren's entire administration went off without obtaining an answer to these demands. As late as January, 1839--a year after the event--Mr. Stevenson, the United States minister in London, wrote: "I regret to say that no answer has yet been given to my note in the case of the Caroline." And towards the end of the same year, Mr. Forsyth, the American Secretary of State, in writing to him, expressed the belief that an answer would soon be given. He says: "I have had frequent conversations with Mr. Fox in regard to this subject--one of very recent date--and from its tone, the President expects the British government will answer your application in the case without much further delay."--Delay, however, continued; and, as late as December, 1840, no answer having yet been received, the President directed the subject again to be brought to the notice of the British government; and Mr. Forsyth accordingly wrote to Mr. Fox:

"The President deems this to be a proper occasion to remind the government of her Britannic majesty that the case of the "Caroline" has been long since brought to the attention of her Majesty's principal Secretary of State for foreign affairs, who, up to this day, has not communicated its decision thereupon. It is hoped that the government of her Majesty will perceive the importance of no longer leaving the government of the United States uninformed of its views and intentions upon a subject which has naturally produced much exasperation, and which has led to such grave consequences. I avail myself of this occasion to renew to you the assurance of my distinguished consideration."

This was near the close of Mr. Van Buren's administration, and up to that time it must be noted, first, that the British government had not assumed the act of Captain Drew in destroying the Caroline; secondly, that it had not answered (had not refused redress) for that act. Another circumstance showed that the government, in its own conduct in relation to those engaged in that affair, had not even indirectly assumed it by rewarding those who did it. Three years after the event, in the House of Commons, Lord John Russell, the premier, was asked in his place, whether it was the intention of ministers to recommend to her Majesty to bestow any reward upon Captain Drew, and others engaged in the affair of the Caroline; to which he replied negatively, and on account of the delicate nature of the subject. His answer was: "No reward had been resolved upon, and as the question involved a subject of a very delicate nature, he must decline to answer it further." Col. McNab had been knighted; not for the destruction of the Caroline on United States territory (which his order did not justify, and his letter condemned), but for his services in putting down the revolt.

Thus the affair stood till near the close of Mr. Van Buren's administration, when an event took place which gave it a new turn, and brought on a most serious question between the United States and Great Britain, and changed the relative positions of the two countries--the United States to become the injured party, claiming redress. The circumstances were these: one Alexander McLeod, inhabitant of the opposite border shore, and a British subject, had been in the habit of boasting that he had been one of the destroyers of the Caroline, and that he had himself killed one of the "damned Yankees." There were enough to repeat these boastings on the American side of the line; and as early as the spring of 1838 the Grand Jury for the county in which the outrage had been committed, found a bill of indictment against him for murder and arson. He was then in Canada, and would never have been troubled upon the indictment if he had remained there; but, with a boldness of conduct which bespoke clear innocence, or insolent defiance, he returned to the seat of the outrage--to the county in which the indictment lay--and publicly exhibited himself in the county town. This was three years after the event; but the memory of the scene was fresh, and indignation boiled at his appearance. He was quickly arrested on the indictment, also sued for damages by the owner of the destroyed boat, and committed to jail--to take his trial in the State court of the county of Niagara. This arrest and imprisonment of McLeod immediately drew an application for his release in a note from Mr. Fox to the American Secretary of State. Under date of the 13th December, 1840, he wrote:

"I feel it my duty to call upon the government of the United States to take prompt and effectual steps for the liberation of Mr. McLeod. It is well known that the destruction of the steamboat 'Caroline' was a public act of persons in her Majesty's service, obeying the order of their superior authorities.--That act, therefore, according to the usages of nations, can only be the subject of discussion between the two national governments; it cannot justly be made the ground of legal proceedings in the United States against the individuals concerned, who were bound to obey the authorities appointed by their own government. I may add that I believe it is quite notorious that Mr. McLeod was not one of the party engaged in the destruction of the steamboat 'Caroline,' and that the pretended charge upon which he has been imprisoned rests only upon the perjured testimony of certain Canadian outlaws and their abettors, who, unfortunately for the peace of that neighborhood, are still permitted by the authorities of the State of New York to infest the Canadian frontier. The question, however, of whether Mr. McLeod was or was not concerned in the destruction of the 'Caroline,' is beside the purpose of the present communication. That act was the public act of persons obeying the constituted authorities of her Majesty's province. The national government of the United States thought themselves called upon to remonstrate against it; and a remonstrance which the President did accordingly address to her Majesty's government is still, I believe, a pending subject of diplomatic discussion between her Majesty's government and the United States legation in London. I feel, therefore, justified in expecting that the President's government will see the justice and the necessity of causing the present immediate release of Mr. McLeod, as well as of taking such steps as may be requisite for preventing others of her Majesty's subjects from being persecuted, or molested in the United States in a similar manner for the future."

This note of Mr. Fox is fair and unexceptionable--free from menace--and notable in showing that the demand for redress for the affair of the Caroline was still under diplomatic discussion in London, and that the British government had not then assumed the act of Captain Drew. The answer of Mr. Forsyth was prompt and clear--covering the questions arising out of our duplicate form of government, and the law of nations--and explicit upon the rights of the States, the duties of the federal government, and the principles of national law. It is one of the few answers of the kind which circumstances have arisen to draw from our government, and deserves to be well considered for its luminous and correct expositions of the important questions of which it treats. Under date of the 28th of December, and writing under the instructions of the President, he says:

"The jurisdiction of the several States which constitute the Union is, within its appropriate sphere, perfectly independent of the federal government. The offence with which Mr. McLeod is charged was committed within the territory, and against the laws and citizens of the State of New York, and is one that comes clearly within the competency of her tribunals. It does not, therefore, present an occasion where, under the constitution and laws of the Union, the interposition called for would be proper, or for which a warrant can be found in the powers with which the federal executive is invested. Nor would the circumstances to which you have referred, or the reasons you have urged, justify the exertion of such a power, if it existed. The transaction out of which the question arises, presents the case of a most unjustifiable invasion, in time of peace, of a portion of the territory of the United States, by a band of armed men from the adjacent territory of Canada, the forcible capture by them within our own waters, and the subsequent destruction of a steamboat, the property of a citizen of the United States, and the murder of one or more American citizens. If arrested at the time, the offenders might unquestionably have been brought to justice by the judicial authorities of the State within whose acknowledged territory these crimes were committed; and their subsequent voluntary entrance within that territory, places them in the same situation. The President is not aware of any principle of international law, or, indeed, of reason or justice, which entitles such offenders to impunity before the legal tribunals, when coming voluntarily within their independent and undoubted jurisdiction, because they acted in obedience to their superior authorities, or because their acts have become the subject of diplomatic discussion between the two governments. These methods of redress, the legal prosecution of the offenders, and the application of their government for satisfaction, are independent of each other, and may be separately and simultaneously pursued. The avowal or justification of the outrages by the British authorities might be a ground of complaint with the government of the United States, distinct from the violation of the territory and laws of the State of New York. The application of the government of the Union to that of Great Britain, for the redress of an authorized outrage of the peace, dignity, and rights of the United States, cannot deprive the State of New York of her undoubted right of vindicating, through the exercise of her judicial power, the property and lives of her citizens. You have very properly regarded the alleged absence of Mr. McLeod from the scene of the offence at the time when it was committed, as not material to the decision of the present question. That is a matter to be decided by legal evidence; and the sincere desire of the President is, that it may be satisfactorily established. If the destruction of the Caroline was a public act of persons in her Majesty's service, obeying the order of their superior authorities, this fact has not been communicated to the government of the United States by a person authorized to make the admission; and it will be for the court which has taken cognizance of the offence with which Mr. McLeod is charged, to decide upon its validity when legally established before it."

This answer to Mr. Fox, was read in the two Houses of Congress, on the 5th of January, and was heard with great approbation--apparently unanimous in the Senate. It went to London, and on the 8th and 9th of February, gave rise to some questions and answers, which showed that the British government did not take its stand in approving the burning of the Caroline, until after the presidential election of 1840--until after that election had ensured a change of administration in the United States. On the 8th of February, to inquiries as to what steps had been taken to secure the liberation of McLeod, the answers were general from Lord Palmerston and Lord Melbourne, "That her Majesty's ministers would take those measures which, in their estimation, would be best calculated to secure the safety of her Majesty's subjects, and to vindicate the honor of the British nation." This answer was a key to the instructions actually given to Mr. Fox, showing that they were framed upon a calculation of what would be most effective, and not upon a conviction of what was right. They would do what they thought would accomplish the purpose; and the event showed that the calculation led them to exhibit the war attitude--to assume the offence of McLeod, and to bully the new administration. And here it is to be well noted that the British ministry, up to that time, had done nothing to recognize the act of Captain Drew. Neither to the American minister in London, nor to the Secretary of State here, had they assumed it. More than that: they carefully abstained from indirect, or implied assumption, by withholding pensions to their wounded officers in that affair--one of whom had five severe wounds. This fact was brought out at this time by a question from Mr. Hume in the House of Commons to Lord John Russell, in which--

"He wished to ask the noble lord a question relating to a matter of fact. He believed that, in the expedition which had been formed for the destruction of the Caroline, certain officers, who held commissions in her Majesty's army and navy, were concerned in that affair, and that some of these officers had, in the execution of the orders which were issued, received wounds. The question he wished to ask was, whether or not her Majesty's government had thought proper to award pensions to those officers, corresponding in amount with those which were usually granted for wounds received in the regular service of her Majesty."

This was a pointed question, and carrying an argument along with it. Had the wounded officers received the usual pension? If not, there must be a reason for departing from the usual practice; and the answer showed that the practice had been departed from. Lord John Russell replied:

"That he was not aware of any pensions having been granted to those officers who were wounded in the expedition against the Caroline."

This was sufficiently explicit, and showed that up to the 8th day of February, 1841, the act of Captain Drew had not been even indirectly, or impliedly recognized. But the matter did not stop there. Mr. Hume, a thoroughly business member, not satisfied with an answer which merely implied that the government had not sanctioned the measure, followed it up with a recapitulation of circumstances to show that the government had not answered, one way or the other, during the three years that the United States had been calling for redress; and ending with a plain interrogatory for information on that point.

"He said that the noble lord (Palmerston), had just made a speech in answer to certain questions which had been put to him by the noble lord, the member for North Lancashire; but he (Mr. Hume) wished to ask the House to suspend their opinion upon the subject until they had the whole of the papers laid before the House. He had himself papers in his possession, that would explain many things connected with this question, and which, by-the-bye, were not exactly consistent with the statement which had just been made. It appeared by the papers which he had in his possession, that in January, 1838, a motion was made in the U. S. House of Representatives, calling upon the President to place upon the table of the House, all the papers respecting the Caroline, and all the correspondence which had passed between the government of the United States and the British government on the subject of the destruction of the Caroline. In consequence of that motion, certain papers were laid upon the table, including one from Mr. Stevenson, the present minister here from the U. States. These were accompanied by a long letter, dated the 15th of May, 1838, from that gentleman, and in that letter, the burning of the Caroline was characterized in very strong language. He also stated, that agreeably to the orders of the President, he had laid before the British government the whole of the evidence relating to the subject, which had been taken upon the spot, and Mr. Stevenson denied he had ever been informed that the expedition against the Caroline was authorized or sanctioned by the British government. Now, from May, 1838, the time when the letter had been written, up to this hour, no answer had been given to that letter, nor had any satisfaction been given by the British government upon this subject. In a letter dated from London, the 2d of July, Mr. Stevenson stated that he had not received any answer upon the subject, and that he did not wish to press the subject further; but if the government of the United States wished him to do so, he prayed to be informed of it. By the statement which had taken place in the House of Congress, it appeared that the government of the United States had been ignorant of any information that could lead them to suppose that the enterprise against the Caroline had been undertaken by the orders of the British government, or by British authority. That he believed was the ground upon which Mr. Forsyth acted as he had done. He takes his objections, and denies the allegation of Mr. Fox, that neither had he nor her Majesty's government made any communication to him or the authorities of the United States, that the British government had authorized the destruction of the Caroline. He (Mr. Hume) therefore hoped that no discussion would take place, until all the papers connected with the matter were laid before the House. He wished to know what the nature of those communications was with Mr. Stevenson and her Majesty's government which had induced him to act as he had done."

Thus the ministry were told to their faces, and in the face of the whole Parliament, that for the space of three years, and under repeated calls, they had never assumed the destruction of the Caroline: and to that assertion the ministry then made no answer. On the following day the subject was again taken up, "and in the course of it Lord Palmerston admitted that the government approved of the burning of the Caroline." So says the Parliamentary Register of Debates, and adds: "The conversation was getting rather warm, when Sir Robert Peel interposed by a motion on the affairs of Persia." This was the first knowledge that the British parliament had of the assumption of that act, which undoubtedly had just been resolved upon. It is clear that Lord Palmerston was the presiding spirit of this resolve. He is a bold man, and a man of judgment in his boldness. He probably never would have made such an assumption in dealing with General Jackson: he certainly made no such assumption during the three years he had to deal with the Van Buren administration. The conversation was "getting warm;" and well it might: for this pregnant assumption, so long delayed, and so given, was entirely gratuitous, and unwarranted by the facts. Col. McNab was the commanding officer, and gave all the orders that were given. Captain Drew's report to him shows that his orders were to destroy the vessel at Navy Island: McNab's letter of the same day to the United States District Attorney (Rodgers), shows that he would not authorize an expedition upon United States territory; and his sworn testimony on the trial of McLeod shows that he did not do it in his orders to Captain Drew. That testimony says:

"I do remember the last time the steamboat Caroline came down previous to her destruction; from the information I received, I had every reason to believe that she came down for the express purpose of assisting the rebels and brigands on Navy Island with arms, men, ammunition, provisions, stores, &c.; to ascertain this fact, I sent two officers with instructions to watch the movements of the boat, to note the same, and report to me; they reported they saw her land a cannon (a six or nine-pounder), several men armed and equipped as soldiers, and that she had dropped her anchor on the east side of Navy Island; on the information I had previously received from highly respectable persons in Buffalo, together with the report of these gentlemen, I determined to destroy her that night. I intrusted the command of the expedition for the purposes aforesaid, to Capt. A. Drew, royal navy; seven boats were equipped, and left the Canadian shore; I do not recollect the number of men in each boat; Captain Drew held the rank of commander in her Majesty's royal navy; I ordered the expedition, and first communicated it to Capt. Andrew Drew, on the beach, where the men embarked a short time previous to their embarkation; Captain Drew was ordered to take and destroy the Caroline wherever he could find her; I gave the order as officer in command of the forces assembled for the purposes aforesaid; they embarked at the mouth of the Chippewa river; in my orders to Captain Drew nothing was said about invading the territory of the United States, but such was their nature that Captain Drew might feel himself justified in destroying the boat wherever he might find her."

From this testimony it is clear that McNab gave no order to invade the territory of the United States; and the whole tenor of his testimony agrees with Captain Drew's report, that it was "expected" to have found the Caroline at Navy Island, where she was in fact immediately before, and where McNab saw her while planning the expedition. No such order was then given by him--nor by any other authority; for the local government in Quebec knew no more of it than the British ministry in London. Besides, Col. McNab was only the military commander to suppress the insurrection. He had no authority, for he disclaimed it, to invade an American possession; and if the British government had given such authority, which they had not, it would have been an outrage to the United States, not to be overlooked. They then assumed an act which they had not done; and assumed it! and took a war attitude! and all upon a calculation that it was the most effectual way to get McLeod released. It was in the evening of the 4th day of March that all Washington city was roused by the rumor of this assumption and demand: and on the 12th day of that month they were all formally communicated to our government. It was to the new administration that this formidable communication was addressed--and addressed at the earliest moment that decency would permit. The effect was to the full extent all that could have been calculated upon; and wholly reversed the stand taken under Mr. Van Buren's administration. The burning of the Caroline was admitted to be an act of war, for which the sovereign, and not the perpetrators, was liable: the invasion of the American soil was also an act of war: the surrender of McLeod could not be effected by an order of the federal government, because he was in the hands of a State court, charged with crimes against the laws of that State: but the United States became his defender and protector, with a determination to save him harmless: and all this was immediately communicated to Mr. Fox in unofficial interviews, before the formal communication could be drawn up and delivered. Lord Palmerston's policy was triumphant; and it is necessary to show it in order to show in what manner the Caroline affair was brought to a conclusion; and in its train that of the northeastern boundary, so long disputed; and that of the north-western boundary, never before disputed; and that of the liberated slaves on their way from one United States port to another: and all other questions besides which England wished settled. For, emboldened by the success of the Palmerstonian policy in the case of the Caroline, it was incontinently applied in all other cases of dispute between the countries--and with the same success. But of this hereafter. The point at present is, to show, as has been shown, that the assumption of this outrage was not made until three years after the event, and then upon a calculation of its efficiency, and contrary to the facts of the case; and when made, accompanied by large naval and military demonstrations--troops sent to Canada--ships to Halifax--newspapers to ourselves, the Times especially--all odorous of gunpowder and clamorous for war.

This is dry detail, but essential to the scope of this work, more occupied with telling how things were done than what was done: and in pursuing this view it is amazing to see by what arts and contrivances--by what trifles and accidents--the great affairs of nations, as well as the small ones of individuals, are often decided. The finale in this case was truly ridiculous: for, after all this disturbance and commotion--two great nations standing to their arms, exhausting diplomacy, and inflaming the people to the war point--after the formal assumption of McLeod's offence, and war threatened for his release, it turned out that he was not there! and was acquitted by an American jury on ample evidence. He had slept that night in Chippewa, and only heard of the act the next morning at the breakfast table--when he wished he had been there. Which wish afterwards ripened into an assertion that he was there! and, further, had himself killed one of the damned Yankees--by no means the first instance of a man boasting of performing exploits in a fight which he did not see. But what a lesson it teaches to nations! Two great countries brought to angry feelings, to criminative diplomacy, to armed preparation, to war threats--their governments and people in commotion--their authorities all in council, and taxing their skill and courage to the uttermost: and all to settle a national quarrel as despicable in its origin as the causes of tavern brawls; and exceedingly similar to the origin of such brawls. McLeod's false and idle boast was the cause of all this serious difficulty between two great Powers.

Mr. Fox had delivered his formal demand and threat on the 12th day of March: the administration immediately undertook McLeod's release. The assumption of his imputed act had occasioned some warm words in the British House of Commons, where it was known to be gratuitous: its communication created no warmth in our cabinet, but a cold chill rather, where every spring was immediately put in action to release McLeod. Being in the hands of a State court, no order could be given for his liberation; but all the authorities in New York were immediately applied to--governor, legislature, supreme court, local court--all in vain: and then the United States assumed his defence, and sent the Attorney-General, Mr. Crittenden, to manage his defence, and General Scott, of the United States army, to protect him from popular violence; and hastened to lay all their steps before the British minister as fast as they were taken.

The acquittal of McLeod was honorable to the jury that gave it; and his trial was honorable to the judge, who, while asserting the right to try the man, yet took care that the trial should be fair. The judges of the Supreme Court (Bronson, Nelson, and Cowan) refused the habeas corpus which would take him out of the State: the Circuit judge gave him a fair trial. It was satisfactory to the British; and put an end to their complaint against us: unhappily it seemed to put an end to our complaint against them. All was postponed for a future general treaty--the invasion of territory, the killing of citizens, the arson of the boat, the impressment and abduction of a supposed British subject--all, all were postponed to the day of general settlement: and when that day came all were given up.

The conduct of the administration in the settlement of the affair became a subject of discussion in both Houses of Congress, and was severely censured by the democracy, and zealously defended by the whigs. Mr. Charles Jared Ingersoll, after a full statement of the extraordinary and successful efforts of the administration of Mr. Van Buren to prevent any aid to the insurgents from the American side, proceeded to say:

"Notwithstanding, however, every exertion that could be and was made, it was impossible altogether to prevent some outbreaks, and among the rest a parcel of some seventy or eighty Canadians, as I have understood, with a very few Americans, took possession of a place near the Canadian shore, called Navy Island, and fortified themselves in defiance of British power. If I have not been misinformed there were not more than eight or ten Americans among them. An American steamboat supplied them with a cannon and perhaps other munitions of war: for I have no disposition to diminish whatever was the full extent of American illegality, but, in this statement of the premises, desire to present the argument with the most unreserved concessions. I am discussing nothing as the member of a party. I consider the Secretary of State as the representative of his government and country. I desire to be understood as not intending to say one word against that gentleman as an individual; as meaning to avoid every thing like personality, and addressing myself to the position he has assumed for the country, without reference to whether he is connected with one administration or another; viewing this as a controversy between the United States and a foreign government, in which all Americans should be of one party, acknowledging no distinction between the acts of Mr. Forsyth and Mr. Webster, but considering the whole affair, under both the successive administrations, as one and indivisible; and on many points, I believe this country is altogether of one and the same sentiment concerning this controversy. It seems to be universally agreed that British pirates as they were, as I will show according to the strictest legal definition of the term, in the dead of night, burglariously invaded our country, murdered at least one of our unoffending fellow-citizens, were guilty of the further crime of arson by burning what was at least the temporary dwelling of a number of persons asleep in a steamboat moored to the wharf, and finally cutting her loose, carried her into the middle of the stream, where, by romantic atrocity, unexampled in the annals of crime, they sent her over the Falls of Niagara, with how many persons in her, God only will ever know.

"Now Mr. Speaker, this, in its national aspect, was precisely the same as if perpetrated in your house or mine, and should be resented and punished accordingly. Some time afterwards one of the perpetrators, named McLeod, in a fit of that sort of infatuation with which Providence mostly betrays the guilty, strayed over from Canada to the American shore, like a fool, as he was, and there was soon arrested and imprisoned by that popular police, which is always on the alert to administer justice upon malefactors. First proceeded against, as it appears, for civil redress for the loss of the vessel, he was soon after indicted by the appropriate grand jury, and has remained ever since in custody, awaiting the regular administration of justice. Guilty or innocent, however, there he was, under the ægis of the law of the sovereign State of New York, with the full protection of every branch of the government of that State, when the present administration superseded the last, and the first moment after the late President's inauguration was ungenerously seized by the British minister to present the new Secretary of State with a letter containing the insolent, threatening, and insufferable language which I am about to read from it:

"'The undersigned is instructed to demand from the government of the United States, formally, in the name of the British government, the immediate release of Mr. Alexander McLeod. The transaction in question may have been, as her Majesty's government are of opinion that it was, a justifiable employment of force for the purpose of defending the British territory from the unprovoked attack of a band of British rebels and American pirates, who, having been permitted to arm and organize themselves within the territory of the United States, had actually invaded and occupied a portion of the territory of her Majesty; or it may have been, as alleged by Mr. Forsyth, in his note to the undersigned of the 26th of December, a most unjustifiable invasion in time of peace, of the territory of the United States.'"

"Finally, after a tissue of well elaborated diplomatic contumely, the very absurdity of part of which, in the application of the term pirates to the interfering Americans, is demonstrated by Mr. Webster--the British minister reiterates, towards the conclusion of his artfully insulting note--that 'be that as it may, her Majesty's government formally demands, upon the grounds already stated, the immediate release of Mr. McLeod; and her Majesty's government entreats the President of the United States--I pray the House to mark the sarcasm of this offensive entreaty--to take into his deliberate consideration the serious nature of the consequences which must ensue from a rejection of this demand.'

"Taken in connection with all the actual circumstances of the case--the tone of the British press, both in England and Canada, the language of members in both Houses of Parliament, and the palpable terms of Mr. Fox's letter itself, it is impossible, I think, not to see we cannot wink so hard as not to perceive that Mr. Fox's is a threatening letter. It surprises me that this should have been a subject of controversy in another part of this building, while I cannot doubt that Mr. Webster was perfectly satisfied of the menacing aspect of the first letter he received from the British minister. Anxious--perhaps laudably anxious--to avoid a quarrel so very unpromising at the very outset of a new administration, he seems to have shut his eyes to what must flash in every American face. And here was his first mistake; for his course was perfectly plain. He had nothing to do but, by an answer in the blandest terms of diplomatic courtesy, to send back the questionable phrases to Mr. Fox, with a respectful suggestion that they looked to him as if conveying a threat; that he hoped not, he believed not; he trusted for the harmony of their personal relations, and the peace of their respective nations, that he was laboring under a mistake; but he could not divest his mind of the impression, that there were in this note of Mr. Fox, certain phrases which, in all controversies among gentlemen as well as nations, inevitably put an end to further negotiation. Mr. Fox must have answered negatively or affirmatively, and the odious indignity which now rankles in the breast of at least a large proportion of the country, interpreting it as the meaning of the British communication, would have been avoided. Mr. Webster had Mr. Fox absolutely in the hollow of his hand. He had an opportunity of enlisting the manly feeling of all his countrymen, the good will of right-minded Englishmen themselves, to a firm and inoffensive stand like this, on the threshold of the correspondence. Why he did not, is not for me to imagine. With no feeling of personal disparagement to that gentleman, I charge this as an obvious, a capital, and a deplorable lapse from the position he should have assumed, in his very first attitude towards the British minister.

"The British argument addressed to him was, that 'the transaction in question was a justifiable employment of public force, with the sanction, or by order of the constituted authorities of a State, engaging individuals in military or naval enterprises in their country's cause, when it would be contrary to the universal practice of civilized nations to fix individual responsibility upon the persons engaged.' This, as I do not hesitate to pronounce it, false assumption of law, is, at once, conceded by Mr. Webster, in the remarkable terms, that the 'government of the United States,' by which he must mean himself, entertains no doubt of the asserted British principle. Mr. Webster had just before said, that 'the President is not certain that he understands precisely the meaning intended to be conveyed by her Majesty's government,' 'which doubt,' he adds, 'has occasioned with the President some hesitation.' Thus while the President entertained a doubt, the government entertained no doubt at all; which I cannot understand, otherwise, than that while the President hesitated to concede, the Secretary of State had no hesitation whatever to concede at once the whole British assumption, and surrender at discretion the whole American case. For where is the use of Mr. Webster's posterior, elaborated argument, when told by the British minister that this transaction was justifiable, and informed by the public prints that at a very early day, one of the British Secretaries, Lord John Russell, declared in open Parliament that the British government justified what is called the transaction of McLeod. The matter was ended before Mr. Webster set his powerful mind to produce an argument on the subject. The British crown had taken its position. Mr. Webster knew it had; and he may write the most elegant and pathetic letters till doomsday, with no other effect than to display the purity of his English to admiring fellow-citizens, and the infirmity of his argument to Great Britain and the world. By asserting the legal position which they assume, and justifying the transaction, together with Mr. Webster's concession of their legal position, the transaction is settled. Nothing remains to be done. Mr. Webster may write about it if he will, but Mr. Fox and the British minister hold the written acknowledgment of the American Secretary of State, that the affair is at an end. I call this, sir, a terrible mistake, a fatal blunder, irrecoverable, desperate, leaving us nothing but Mr. Webster's dreadful alternative of cold-blooded, endless, causeless war.

"Our position is false, extremely and lamentably false. The aggrieved party, as we are, and bound to insist upon redress, to require the punishment of McLeod, Drew, and McNab, and the other pirates who destroyed the Caroline, we have been brought to such a reverse of the true state of things, as to be menaced with the wrong-doer's indignation, unless we yield every thing. I care not whose fault it is, whether of this administration or that. In such an affair I consider both the present and the past, as presenting one and the same front to one and the same assailant. I cannot refrain, however, from saying, that whatever may have been our position, it has been greatly deteriorated by Mr. Webster's unfortunate concession.

"Never did man lose a greater occasion than Mr. Webster cast away, for placing himself and his country together, upon a pinnacle of just renown. Great Britain had humbled France, conquered Egypt, subdued vast tracts of India, and invaded the distant empire of China--there was nothing left but our degradation, to fill the measure of her glory, if it consists in such achievements; and she got it by merely demanding, without expecting it. And why have we yielded? Was there any occasion for it? Did she intend to realize her threat? Were the consequences which Mr. Webster was entreated to take into his consideration, the immediate and exterminating warfare, servile war and all, which belligerent newspapers, peers, and other such heralds of hostilities have proclaimed? No such thing. We may rely, I think, with confidence, upon the common good sense of the English nation, not to rush at once upon such extremities, and for such a cause. Mr. Fox took Mr. Webster in the melting mood, and conquered by a threat; that is to say, conquered for the moment; because the results, at some distant day, unless his steps are retraced, will and must be estrangement between kindred nations, and cold-blooded hostilities. I have often thought, Mr. Speaker, that this affair of McLeod is what military men call a demonstration, a feint, a false attack, to divert us from the British design on the State of Maine; of which I trust not one inch will ever be given up. And truly, when we had the best cause in the world, and were the most clearly in the right, it has been contrived, some how or other, to put us in false position, upon the defensive, instead of the offensive, and to perplex the plainest case with vexatious complication and concession."

The latter part of this speech was prophetic--that which related to the designs on the State of Maine. Successful in this experiment of the most efficacious means for the release of McLeod, the British ministry lost no time in making another trial of the same experiment, on the territory of that State--and again successfully: but of this in its proper place. Mr. John Quincy Adams, and Mr. Caleb Cushing, were the prominent defenders of the administration policy in the House of Representatives--resting on the point that the destruction of the Caroline was an act of war. Mr. Adams said:

"I take it that the late affair of the Caroline was in hostile array against the British government, and that the parties concerned in it were employed in acts of war against it: and I do not subscribe to the very learned opinion of the chief justice of the State of New York (not, I hear, the chief justice, but a judge of the Supreme Court of that State), that there was no act of war committed. Nor do I subscribe to it that every nation goes to war only on issuing a declaration or proclamation of war. This is not the fact. Nations often wage war for years, without issuing any declaration of war. The question is not here upon a declaration of war, but acts of war. And I say that in the judgment of all impartial men of other nations, we shall be held as a nation responsible; that the Caroline, there, was in a state of war against Great Britain; for purposes of war, and the worst kind of war--to sustain an insurrection; I will not say rebellion, because rebellion is a crime, and because I heard them talked of as patriots."

Mr. Cushing said:

"It is strange enough that the friends of Mr. Van Buren should deny that the attack on the Caroline was an act of war. I reply to them not only by exhibiting the reason and the principle of the thing, but by citing the authority of their own President. I hold in my hand a copy of the despatch addressed by Mr. Stevenson to Lord Palmerston, under the direction of Mr. Van Buren, making demand of reparation for the destruction of the Caroline, and in that despatch, which has been published, Mr. Stevenson pursues the only course he could pursue; he proceeds to prove the hostile nature of the act by a full exhibition of facts, and concludes and winds up the whole with declaring in these words: 'The case then is one of open, undisguised, and unwarrantable hostility.' After this, let no one complain of Mr. Webster for having put the case of the Caroline on the same precise ground which Mr. Van Buren had assumed for it, and which, indeed, is the only ground upon which the United States could undertake to hold the British government responsible. And when the gentleman from Pennsylvania is considering the first great negotiation of Mr. Webster, how does he happen to forget the famous, or rather infamous, first great negotiation undertaken by Mr. Van Buren? And is it not an act of mere madness on the part of the friends of Mr. Van Buren, to compel us to compare the two? Here is a despatch before us, addressed in a controversy between the United States and Great Britain, containing one of the ablest vindications of the honor and integrity of the United States that ever was written. Mr. Van Buren began, also, with the discussion of the question between us and Great Britain. And in what spirit?--that of a patriot, a man of honor, and an American? Is not that despatch, on the contrary, a monument of ignominy in the history of the United States? Instead of maintaining the interests of this country, did not Mr. Van Buren, on that occasion, utterly sacrifice them? Did he not dictate in that despatch, a disposition of the great question of the colony trade between the United States and Great Britain, which, from that time to this, has proved most disastrous in its effects on the commercial and navigating interests of the United States? And pernicious as was the object of the despatch, was not the spirit of it infinitely worse? in which, for the first time, party quarrels of the people of the United States were carried into our foreign affairs--in which a preceding administration was impliedly reproached for the zeal with which it had defended our interests--in which it was proclaimed that the new administration started in the world with a set purpose of concession toward Great Britain--in which the honor of the United States was laid prostrate at the foot of the British throne, and the proud name of America, to sustain which our fathers had carried on a first and a second war, as we may have to do a third--that glory which the arms of our enemy could not reach, was, in this truckling despatch, laid low for the first, and, I trust in God, the last time, before the lion of England."

The ground taken by Mr. Adams and Mr. Cushing for the defence of Mr. Webster (for they seemed to consider him, and no doubt truly, as the whole administration in this case) was only shifting the defence from one bad ground to another. The war ground they assumed could only apply between Great Britain and the insurgents: she had no war with the United States: the attack on the Caroline was an invasion of the territory of a neutral power--at peace with the invader. That is a liberty not allowed by the laws of nations--not allowed by the concern which any nation, even the most inconsiderable, feels for its own safety, and its own self-respect. A belligerent party cannot enter the territory of a neutral, even in fresh pursuit of an enemy. No power allows it. That we have seen in our own day, in the case of the Poles, in their last insurrection, driven across the Austrian frontier by the Russians; and the pursuers stopped at the line, and the fugitive Poles protected the instant they had crossed it: and in the case of the late Hungarian revolt, in which the fugitive Hungarians driven across the Turkish frontier, were protected from pursuit. The Turks protected them, Mahometans as they were; and would not give up fugitive Christians to a Christian power; and afterwards assisted the fugitives to escape to Great Britain and the United States. The British then had no right to invade the United States even in fresh pursuit of fugitive belligerents: but the Caroline and crew were not belligerents. She was an American ferry-boat carrying men and supplies to the insurgents, but she was not a combatant. And if she had been--had been a war-vessel belonging to the insurgents, and fighting for them, she could not be attacked in a neutral port. The men on board of her were not Canadian insurgents, but American citizens, amenable to their own country for any infraction of her neutrality laws: and if they had been Canadian insurgents they could not have been seized on American soil; nor even demanded under the extradition clause in the treaty of 1796, even if in force. It did not extend to political offences, either of treason or war. It only applied to the common law offences of murder and forgery. How contradictory and absurd then to claim a right to come and take by violence, what could not be demanded under any treaty or the law of nations. No power gives up a political fugitive. Strong powers protect them openly, while they demean themselves orderly: weak powers get them to go away when not able to protect them. None give them up--not even the weakest. All the countries of Europe--the smallest kingdom, the most petty principality, the feeblest republic, even San Marino--scorn to give up a political fugitive, and though unable to chastise, never fail to resent any violation of its territory to seize them. We alone, and in the case of the Caroline, acknowledge the right of Great Britain to invade our territory, seize and kill American citizens sleeping under the flag of their country, to cut out an American vessel moored in our port, and send her in flames over the Falls of Niagara. We alone do that! but we have done it but once! and history places upon it the stigma of opprobrium.

Mr. William O. Butler of Kentucky, replied to Mr. Cushing, especially to his rehash of the stale imputations, worn out at the time of Mr. Van Buren's senatorial rejection as minister to Great Britain, and said:

"He expected from the gentleman a discussion on national law; but how much was he astonished the next day, on reading his speech in the Intelligencer, and finding him making a most virulent attack on the conduct and reputation of Mr. Van Buren. The gentleman referred to the letter of instructions of Mr. Van Buren to our Minister at the Court of St. James, and compared it with the instructions of Mr. Webster to the Attorney-general; speaking of the latter as breathing the statesman and patriot throughout, while he characterizes the former as infamous. Mr. B. said he would not repeat the harsh and offensive terms in which the gentleman had spoken of Mr. Van Buren's letter; he would read what the gentleman said from his printed speech, in order that the House might see the length to which his invectives were carried. [Here Mr. B. read extracts from Mr. Cushing's speech.] The gentleman spoke of comparing the two letters together. But did he think of comparing the thing we complain of with the thing he complains of? No: that would be next to madness. The gentleman shrinks from that comparison, and goes on to compare not the thing we complain of with the letter of Mr. Van Buren, but the beautiful composition of Mr. Webster, written forty days after complying with the British minister's insulting demands, and intended to cover over the instructions to Mr. Crittenden, after which he characterizes Mr. Van Buren's letter as a monument of ignominy. Now Mr. B. said he would make the same reply that a dignified farmer of Kentucky did to a lawyer. The lawyer prosecuted the farmer for a slander, and in the course of the trial took occasion to heap on him all the abuse and invective of which the Billingsgate vocabulary is capable. Yet the jury, without leaving their box, pronounced a verdict of acquittal. The verdict of an honest and intelligent jury, said the farmer, is a sufficient answer to all your abuse. Just so it was with Mr. Van Buren. His letter had made a great noise in the country; had been extensively circulated and read, and had been assailed with the utmost virulence by the opposite party. Yet the highest jury on earth, the American people, had pronounced the acquittal of Mr. Van Buren by electing him to the Chief Magistracy. The gentleman complained that the patriotism of Mr. Webster not only had been assailed, but that the gentleman from Pennsylvania had had the temerity to attack that most beautiful of letters which the patriotic Secretary wrote to Mr. Fox. Now he (Mr. B.) would admit that it was a beautiful piece of composition, and he knew of but one that would compare with it, and that was the proclamation of General Hull, just before surrendering the Northwestern army to the British."

The friends of Mr. Webster had a fashion of extolling his intellect when his acts were in question; and on no occasion was that fashion more largely indulged in than on the present one. His letter, superscribed to Mr. Fox--brought out for home consumption forty days after the satisfactory answer had been given--was exalted to the skies for the harmony of its periods, the beauty of its composition, the cogency of its reasons! without regarding the national honor and interest which it let down into the mud and mire; and without considering that the British imperious demand required in the answer to it, nerve as well as head--and nerve most. It was a case for an iron will, more than for a shining intellect: and iron will was not the strong side of Mr. Webster's character. His intellect was great--his will small. His pursuits were civil and intellectual; and he was not the man, with a goose quill in his hand, to stand up against the British empire in arms. Throughout the debate, in both Houses of Congress, the answer to Mr. Fox was treated by Mr. Webster's friends, as his own; and, no doubt, justly--his supremacy as a jurist being so largely deferred to.

The debate in the House was on the adoption of a resolution offered by Mr. John G. Floyd, of New York, calling on the President for information in relation to the steps taken to aid the liberation of McLeod; and the fate of the resolution was significant of the temper of the House--a desire to get rid of the subject without a direct vote. It was laid upon the table by a good majority--110 to 70. The nays, being those who were for prosecuting the inquiry, were:

Messrs. Archibald H. Arrington, Charles G. Atherton, Linn Banks, Henry W. Beeson, Benjamin A. Bidlack, Samuel S. Bowne, Linn Boyd, Aaron V. Brown, Charles Brown, Edmund Burke, Reuben Chapman, James G. Clinton, Walter Coles, Edward Cross, John R. J. Daniel, Richard D. Davis, Ezra Dean, William Doan, Andrew W. Doig, Ira A. Eastman, John C. Edwards, Charles G. Ferris, John G. Floyd, Charles A. Floyd, Joseph Fornance, James Gerry, William O. Goode, Samuel Gordon, William A. Harris, John Hastings, Samuel L. Hays, Isaac E. Holmes, Jacob Houck, jr., George S. Houston, Edmund W. Hubard, Charles J. Ingersoll, William Jack, Cave Johnson, John W. Jones, George M. Keim, Abraham McClellan, Robert McClellan, James J. McKay, John McKeon, Albert G. Marchand, Alfred Marshall, John Thompson Mason, James Mathews, William Medill, John Miller, Christopher Morgan, Peter Newhard, William Parmenter, Samuel Patridge, William W. Payne, Arnold Plumer, John Reynolds, Lewis Riggs, Tristram Shaw, John Snyder, Lewis Steenrod, George Sweeny, Thomas A. Tomlinson, Hopkins L. Turney, John Van Buren, Aaron Ward, Harvey M. Watterson, John Westbrook, James W. Williams, Henry A. Wise, Fernando Wood.

The same subject was largely debated in the Senate--among others by Mr. Benton--some extracts from whose speech will constitute the next chapter.

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Chapter LXXVI

DESTRUCTION OF THE CAROLINE: ARREST AND TRIAL OF McLEOD: MR. BENTON'S SPEECH: EXTRACTS.

Mr. Benton said the history of our country contained a warning lesson to gentlemen who take the side of a foreign country against their own: he alluded to the case of Arbuthnot and Ambrister, seized among the Seminole Indians in 1818, and hung as outlaws and pirates by the orders of General Jackson. The news of that execution was heard with joy by the American people, who considered these Englishmen as a thousand times more culpable than the wretched savages whom they stimulated to the murder of women and children--men who had abandoned their own country, and the white race to which they belonged, to join savages against a country with which their own government was at peace. The country heard the news of the execution with joy: they approved the act of General Jackson. Not so with the politicians--the politicians of the federal school especially. They condemned it; partisan presses attacked it; and when Congress met, committees of each House of Congress reported against it--loudly condemned it--and were followed by a crowd of speakers. All the phrases now heard in claiming exemption for McLeod, and bewailing his fate, were then heard in deploring the fate of Arbuthnot and Ambrister. Violation of the laws of nations--inhuman--unworthy of the nineteenth century--shocking to humanity--barbarous--uncivilized--subjecting us to reprisals, and even to war from England--drawing upon us the reproaches of Christendom, and even the wrath of Heaven: such were the holiday phrases with which the two Houses of Congress then resounded. To hear what was said, and it would seem that the British lion would be instantly upon us. We were taught to tremble for the return news from England. Well! it came! and what was it? Not one word from the British government against the act of Jackson! Not the scrape of a pen from a minister on the subject! Not a word in Parliament except the unsupported complaint of some solitary members--just enough to show, by the indifference with which it was received, that the British House of Commons had no condemnation to pronounce upon the conduct of General Jackson. Their silence justified him in England, while committees and orators condemned him in his own country: and this justification from abroad, in a case where two Englishmen were actually hanged, should be a warning to gentlemen how they should commit themselves in a case where an Englishman is merely in the hands of justice, and has nothing to fear from "God and the country" if he is as innocent, as he now alleges, and which humanity would wish him to be. General Jackson was right, and the committees and orators who condemned him were wrong. He was right in the law, and in the application of the law. He had no musty volumes of national law to refer to in the swamps of Florida; and he needed none. He had the law of nature, and of nations, in his heart. He had an American heart, and that heart never led him wrong when the rights, the interest, and the honor of his country were at stake. He hung the Englishmen who were inciting savages to the murder of our women and children: and the policy of the measure has become no less apparent than its legality was clear. Before that time Englishmen were habitually in the camp and wigwam of the Indians, stimulating to war upon us: since that time no Englishman has been heard of among them. The example was impressive--its effect salutary--its lesson permanent. It has given us twenty-five years of exemption from British interference in our Indian relations; and if the assassins of the Caroline shall be hung up in like manner it will give us exemption from future British outrage along the extended line which divides the Union from the British Canadian provinces.

It is humiliating to see senators of eminent ability consulting books to find passages to justify an outrage upon their own country. Better far throw away the books, and go by the heart. Then, at least, with American hearts, they would always have the consolation of being on their country's side. Better even to take the rule of the illustrious commodore whose actions have shed so much lustre on the American name (Decatur), and go for their country, right or wrong. Then they would always have their own hearts on their side. Besides, there is no book which fits our case--none which was written for the duplicate form of government which we possess. We have State governments as well as a general government; and those governments have their rights, and are sovereign within their limits. The protection of the lives, liberty, and property of their citizens, is among these rights: the punishment of murder, arson, and burglary, are among these rights. If there was nothing in the law of nations, as written in the books, to recognize these rights, it would be necessary for us to do an act which would cause a new line to be written in these books. But this is not the case. The law of nations as it now stands, is sufficient for us. It has been read from Vattel by several senators; and is conclusive in our favor. What is it? Why, that if the citizens of one country commit an outrage upon another, you must apply to their sovereign for redress: but if the wrong-doer comes into your country, you may seize and punish him. This is the law of nations, and it fits our case; and we have followed it. The United States, as charged with our foreign relations, have made the demand for redress upon Great Britain: the State of New York, as the wronged local authority, has seized the wrong-doer, when he came upon her territory; and is giving him what he did not give her citizens--a trial for his life: and this she has a right to do: and if the federal government attempts to give up that man, she shrinks from the defence of right, violates the law of nations, and invades the jurisdiction of New York.

This brings us to the case before us. What is it? The facts of the transaction are all spread out in official documents, and sustained upon clear and undeniable testimony. Some Canadian insurgents are on an island, near the Canada shore, entrenching themselves, and receiving aid in men and arms from the American side. An American ferry-boat, the Steamer Caroline, carries that aid. She is seen in the fact--seen by the commanding officer of the British forces, as he stands on the Canadian shore, looking on. He sees her there late in the evening--saw her cast anchor near the island--and determines to destroy her there. Five boats are fitted out in the dark to go and do the work; and if they had done it there, not a word would have been said; for it was a British island, and she was there upon an unlawful business--violating the laws of neutrality, disobeying the laws of her own country, disregarding the proclamation of the President; and doing an act which might bring her own country into trouble. If she had been found there and destroyed, not a word would have been said: but she was not found there, and the captain of the boats, of his own head, contrary to the order which he had received, and which directed him to the British island, and contrary to the letter written by his commanding officer on that very day, abjuring all right and all intent to make a descent upon our coast, because it was ours: this captain, his name Drew, and an officer in the British navy without the knowledge of his commander, determines to cross the line--to steal across the river in the night--oars muffled--all noises silenced--creep upon the unsuspecting vessel, anchored at the shore, sleeping under the flag, and sheltered by the laws of her country, and the law of nations: and stealthily get on board. They run to the berths--cut, stab, slash, and shoot, all that they see--pursue the flying--kill one man on the shore--no distinction of persons--and no quarter the word. Several are killed in the boat: none escape but those whom darkness and confusion favored. Victorious in an attack upon men asleep, the conquerors draw the vessel into the middle of the river--it was just above the falls--set her on fire; and, with all her contents--the dead and the dying, the living and the wounded--send her, luminous in flames, over the frightful cataract of Niagara. One man alone had been spared, and he as a British subject, to be taken home for punishment. These are facts. What do they amount to in law--that of nations, and that of New York, where the deed was done? First, a violation of the law of nations, in invading the soil of the United States--in attacking a vessel (even if it had been a belligerent), in a neutral port--in attacking persons on neutral territory--in impressing and carrying off a man from our territory: then each of these acts was a crime against the municipal laws of New York. McLeod, one of the actors in that cowardly assassination, and conflagration, guilty upon his own boasting, and caught upon the scene of his outrage, now in the hands of justice in the State of New York, while no indemnity is offered for the outrage itself: this perpetrator we are required, and that under a threat, to release from the hands of a State, which has the legal right to try him. All this was years before--near four years before--December, 1837. The news flew upon the wings of the wind. It fired the bosoms of the border inhabitants, upon a line of fifteen hundred miles. Retaliation was in every heart, threats in every mouth, preparation open--war imminent. Mr. Van Buren was then President. To repress the popular risings, proclamations were issued: to prevent acts of retaliation, troops were stationed along the line, and armed steamers floated the river and the lakes: to punish any violation of order, instructions were issued to the district attorneys, and marshals; and the aid of the State authorities was claimed, and obtained. To obtain redress for the outrage to our citizens, and the insults to our national character, immediate application was made to the British government. That government delayed its answer to our just demand--avoided the assumption of the criminal act--excused and justified, without assuming it, either in words, or indirectly, by rewarding the actors, or even giving pensions to those wounded in the attack: for there were several of them in the dark and dastardly attack. Diplomacy was still drawing out its lengthened thread--procrastination the game, and the chapter of accidents the hope--when McLeod, the boaster in Canada of his active share in this triple crime of murder, arson, and robbery, against the State of New York, and of violated neutrality against the United States, crosses over to the United States, exhibits himself on the very spot of his exploits, and in the sight of those who had often heard of his boasts. Justice then took hold of him. He was arrested on an indictment found against him, immediately after the act; and he was also sued by the owner of the vessel. A trial, of course, in each case, was to take place in the courts of the State whose laws had been violated. Vattel prescribed that. The United States had nothing to do with it. Her business was with his sovereign. To the State it belonged to punish the violation of her own laws, the perpetrator having been caught within her jurisdiction: to the owner of the boat it belonged to sue for damages; and neither the United States, nor the State of New York, had any right to defeat his action, by releasing the defendant. It was a transitory action, and would lay any where where the defendant was caught. McLeod went to jail in both cases--the indictment, and the civil suit; and would seem to have courted that fate by coming over to defy it. The news of these proceedings fly to the British minister in this city (Mr. Henry S. Fox): that minister addresses a note to the Secretary of State (Mr. Forsyth), demanding the release of McLeod: the Secretary answered, by the direction of President Van Buren, that this man, being charged with criminal offences against the State of New York, and sued in a civil action by one of her citizens, the general government had no right to release him: and would not undertake to do so. This answer was read in this chamber on the night of the 5th of January last, when the Senate was composed very nearly as it is now--nearly all the same members--when the present Secretary of State (Mr. Webster), and the present Attorney-general (Mr. Crittenden), were both present: and we all know in what manner that answer of Mr. Forsyth was received. It received the unanimous approbation of this chamber! Mr. B. repeated the expression--unanimous approbation! and said he would pause for correction if he was mistaken. (He paused. Several senators said, yes! yes! No one said the contrary.) Mr. B. continued: I remember that letter well, and the feeling of unanimous approbation which pervaded the chamber when it was read. Every senator that spoke, expressed his approbation. No one signified dissent: and the feeling was then universal that the proper answer had been given by the American government--the answer which the law of nations, our duplicate form of government, the dignity of the Union, the rights of the State of New York, and the rights of the owner of the destroyed vessel--all required to be given. If I am wrong in my recollection, I repeat the request: let me be set right now. (Several voices exclaimed, "right! right!" No one said the contrary.) Mr. B. resumed: a great point--one vital to the case as it concerns our action, and conclusive in this debate, is now established. It is established, that in the month of January last, when the answer of the American Secretary was read in this chamber, we were all of opinion that he had given the correct and proper answer: and among the senators then present were the present Secretary of State, who has undertaken to get McLeod out of the clutches of the law in New York; and also the present attorney-general, who has gone to New York upon that errand. This is enough. Those gentlemen heard the case then, and uttered no dissent. The Senate was then unanimous--including those who dissent now. How was it in the House of Representatives, where the same papers were read at the same time? How was it there, in a body of 220, and the immediate representatives of the people? About the same that it was in the Senate--only more formally expressed. The papers were sent to the Committee of Foreign Affairs. That committee, through Mr. Pickens, its chairman, made an ample report, fully sustaining the answer of the American government: and of that report, five thousand extra copies were printed by the unanimous consent of the House, for distribution among the people.

In the month of January last, it may then be assumed, that the two Houses of Congress approved the decision of President Van Buren; and according to that decision, McLeod was neither to be given up, nor the course of justice in New York interfered with by the federal government. Mr. Fox received the answer of Mr. Forsyth--transmitted it to his government--and received from that government precise instructions to avow and assume the attack on the Caroline as a national act--to make a peremptory demand for the release of McLeod--to threaten us with serious consequences in the event of refusal; and, as the London newspapers said, to demand his passports and leave the country if his demand was not immediately complied with. It was on the evening of the 4th day of March--the day of the inauguration of the new President, so nicely had the British ministry calculated the time--that the news of these instructions arrived in this city; and along with that news came the war-threats, and the war speeches of the press and public men of Great Britain--the threat of many papers to send admirals and war-steamers to batter down our cities; and the diabolical speech of a peer of the realm (Lord Mountcashel) to excite our three millions of slaves to insurrection--to raise all the Indian tribes against us--and to destroy our finances by bursting the paper bubbles on which they floated. Yes! it was on the evening of the 4th day of March that these instructions--these threats--these war annunciations--all arrived together in this city. The new President (General Harrison) had just been inaugurated: his cabinet had just been indicated: the men who were to compose the presidential council were fully known: and I undertook at once to tell what would be done. I said to several--some now in this city if not in this chamber: McLeod will be given up--not directly, but indirectly. Underhanded springs will be set in motion to release him, and a letter will afterwards be cooked up to show to Congress and the people, and to justify what had been done. This is what I said. Persons are now in this city to whom I said it. And now let us resume the succession of events, and see what was done by this new administration which had just been inducted into office in the midst of triumphal processions--under the fire of cannon--the beating of drums--the display of flags; and all the glorious pomp and circumstance of war. Let us see what they did. On the 12th of March--the new administration having been allowed a week to organize--Mr. Fox addresses to Mr. Webster a formal demand, in the name of his government for the release of McLeod, and goes on to say:

"The grounds upon which the British government made this demand upon the government of the United States are these: that the transaction on account of which Mr. McLeod has been arrested, and is to be put upon his trial, was a transaction of a public character planned and executed by persons duly empowered by her Majesty's colonial authorities to take any steps, and to do any acts which might be necessary for the defence of her Majesty's territories, and for the protection of her Majesty's subjects; and that, consequently, those subjects of her Majesty who engaged in that transaction were performing an act of public duty, for which they cannot be made personally and individually answerable to the laws and tribunals of any foreign country."

And after enforcing this demand, by argument, contesting the answer given by Mr. Forsyth, and suggesting the innocence of McLeod, the letter proceeds to say:

"But, be that as it may, her Majesty's government formally demands, upon the grounds already stated, the immediate release of Mr. McLeod; and her Majesty's government entreat the President of the United States to take into his most deliberate consideration the serious nature of the consequences which must ensue from a rejection of this demand."

This letter to Mr. Webster bears date on the 12th of March, which was Friday, and will be considered as having been delivered on the same day. On the 15th of the same month, which was Monday, Mr. Webster delivers to the Attorney-general of the United States, a set of instructions, and delivers a copy of the same to Mr. Fox, in which he yields to the demand of this Minister, and despatches the Attorney-general to New York, to effect the discharge of the prisoner. The instructions, among other things, say:

"You are well aware that the President has no power to arrest the proceeding in the civil and criminal courts of the State of New York. If this indictment were pending in one of the courts of the United States, I am directed to say that the President, upon the receipt of Mr. Fox's last communication, would have immediately directed a nolle prosequi to be entered. Whether in this case the Governor of New York have that power, or, if he have, whether he would not feel it his duty to exercise it, are points upon which we are not informed. It is understood that McLeod is holden also on civil process, sued out against him by the owner of the Caroline. We suppose it very clear that the Executive of the State cannot interfere with such process; and, indeed, if such process were pending in the courts of the United States, the President could not arrest it. In such, and many analogous cases, the party prosecuted and sued, must avail himself of his exemption or defence, by judicial proceedings, either in the court into which he is called, or in some other court. But whether the process be criminal or civil, the fact of having acted under public authority, and in obedience to the orders of lawful superiors, must be regarded as a valid defence; otherwise, individuals would be holden responsible for injuries resulting from the acts of government, and even from the operations of public war. You will be furnished with a copy of this instruction, for the use of the Executive of New York, and the Attorney-general of that State. You will carry with you also authentic evidence of the recognition by the British government of the destruction of the Caroline, as an act of public force, done by national authority. The President is impressed with the propriety of transferring the trial from the scene of the principal excitement to some other and distant county. You will take care that this be suggested to the prisoner's counsel. The President is gratified to learn that the Governor of New York has already directed that the trial take place before the Chief Justice of the State. Having consulted with the Governor you will proceed to Lockport, or wherever else the trial may be holden, and furnish the prisoner's counsel with the evidence of which you will be in possession material to his defence. You will see that he have skilful and eminent counsel, if such be not already retained, and, although you are not desired to act as counsel yourself, you will cause it to be signified to him, and to the gentlemen who may conduct his defence, that it is the wish of this government that, in case his defence be overruled by the court in which he shall be tried, proper steps be taken immediately for removing the cause, by writ of error, to the Supreme Court of the United States. The President hopes that you will use such despatch as to make your arrival at the place of trial sure before the trial comes on; and he trusts you will keep him informed of whatever occurs by means of a correspondence through this Department."

A copy of these instructions, as I have said, was delivered to Mr. Fox at the time they were written. At the same moment they were delivered to the new Attorney-general [Mr. CRITTENDEN], who, thus equipped with written directions for his guide, and accompanied by an officer of high rank in the United States army [Major-general SCOTT], immediately proceeded on the business of his mission to the State of New York, and to the place of the impending trial, at Lockport. About forty days thereafter, namely, on the 24th day of April, Mr. Webster replies to Mr. Fox's letter of the 12th of March; elaborately reviews the case of McLeod--justifies the instructions--absolves the subject--and demands nothing from the sovereign who had assumed his offence. Thus, what I had said on the evening of the 4th of March had come to pass. Underhand springs had been set in motion to release the man; a letter was afterwards cooked up to justify the act. This, sir, is the narrative of the case--the history of it down to the point at which it now stands; and upon this case I propose to make some remarks, and, in the first place, to examine into the legality and the propriety of the mission in which our Attorney-general was employed. I mean this as a preliminary inquiry, unconnected with the general question, and solely relating to the sending of our Attorney-general into any State to interfere in any business in its courts. I believe this mission of Mr. Crittenden to New York was illegal and improper--a violation of our own statutes, and will test it by referring to the law under which the office of Attorney-general was created, and the duties of the officer defined. That law was passed in 1789, and is in these words:

"And there shall also be appointed a meet person, learned in the law, to act as Attorney-general of the United States, who shall be sworn, or affirmed, to a faithful execution of his office; whose duty it shall be to prosecute and conduct all suits in the Supreme Court in which the United States shall be concerned, and to give his advice and opinion upon questions of law, when required by the President of the United States, or when requested by any of the heads of the Departments, touching any matters that may concern their departments; and shall receive such compensation for his services as shall be by law provided."

Here, said Mr. B., are the duties of the Attorney-general. He is subject to no orders whatever from the Secretary of State. That Secretary has nothing to do with him except to request his legal advice on a matter which concerns his department. Advice on a question of municipal law was doubtless what was intended; but no advice of any kind seems to have been asked of the Attorney-general. He seems to have been treated as the official subordinate of the Secretary--as his clerk or messenger--and sent off with "instructions" which he was to read and to execute. This was certainly an illegal assumption of authority over the Attorney-general, an assumption which the statute does not recognize. In the next place, this officer is sent into a State court to assist at the defence of a person on trial in that court for a violation of the State laws, and is directed to employ eminent and skilful counsel for him--to furnish him with evidence--to suggest a change of venue--and to take a writ of error to the Supreme Court of the United States, if the defence of the prisoner be overruled by the State court. If brought to the Supreme Court by this writ of error--a novel application of the writ, it must be admitted--then the Attorney-general is to appear in this court for the prisoner, not to prosecute him in the name of the United States, but to dismiss the writ. Now, it is very clear that all this is foreign to the duty of the Attorney-general--foreign to his office--disrespectful and injurious to the State of New York--incompatible with her judicial independence--and tending to bring the general government and the State government into collision. McLeod, a foreigner, is under prosecution in a State court for the murder of its citizens; the importance of the case has induced the Governor of the State, as he has officially informed its legislature, to direct the Attorney-general of the State to repair to the spot, and to prosecute the prisoner in person; and here is the Attorney-general of the United States sent to the same place to defend the same person against the Attorney-general of the State. The admonition to Mr. Crittenden, that he was not desired to act as counsel himself, was an admission that he ought not so to act--that all he was doing was illegal and improper--and that he should not carry the impropriety so far as to make it public by making a speech. He was to oppose the State without publicly appearing to do so; and, as for his duty in the Supreme Court of the United States, he was to violate that outright, by acting for the accused, instead of prosecuting for the United States! From all this, I hold it to be clear, that our Attorney-general has been illegally and improperly employed in this business; that all that he has done, and all the expense that he has incurred, and the fee he may have promised, are not only without law but against law; and that the rights of the State of New York have not only been invaded and infringed in this interference in a criminal trial, but that the rights and interests of the owners of the Caroline, who have brought a civil action against McLeod for damages for the destruction of their property, have been also gratuitously assailed in that part of the Secretary's instructions in which he declares that such civil suit cannot be maintained. I consider the mission as illegal in itself, and involving a triple illegality, first, as it concerns the Attorney-general himself, who was sent to a place where he had no right to go; next, as it concerns the State of New York, as interfering with her administration of justice; and, thirdly, as it concerns the owners of the Caroline, who have sued McLeod for damages, and whose suit is declared to be unmaintainable.

I now proceed, Mr. President, to the main inquiry in this case, the correctness and propriety of the answer given by our Secretary of State to Mr. Fox, and its compatibility with the honor, dignity, and future welfare of this republic.

I look upon the "instructions" which were given to Mr. Crittenden, and a copy of which was sent to Mr. Fox, as being THE ANSWER to that Minister; and I deem the letter entitled an answer, and dated forty days afterwards, as being a mere afterpiece--an article for home consumption--a speech for Buncombe, as we say of our addresses to our constituents--a pleading intended for us, and not for the English, and wholly designed to excuse and defend the real answer so long before, and so promptly given. I will give some attention to this, so called, letter, before I quit the case; but for the present my business is with the "instructions," a copy of which being delivered to Mr. Fox, was the answer to his demand; and as such was transmitted to the British government, and quoted in the House of Commons as being entirely satisfactory. This quotation took place on the 6th day of May, several days before the, so called, letter of the 24th of April could possibly have reached London. Lord John Russell, in answer to a question from Mr. Hume, referred to these instructions as being satisfactory, and silenced all further inquiry about the affair, by showing that they had all they wanted.

I hold these instructions to have been erroneous, in point of national law, derogatory to us in point of national character, and tending to the future degradation and injury of this republic.

That the Secretary has mistaken the law of the case in consenting to the release of McLeod is persuasively shown by referring to the opinions of the two Houses of Congress in January last. Their opinions were then unanimous in favor of Mr. Forsyth's answer; and that answer was a peremptory refusal either to admit that McLeod ought to be released, or to interfere in his behalf with the courts of New York. The reasons urged by Mr. Fox in his letter to Mr. Forsyth for making the demand, were precisely the same with those subsequently given in the letter to Mr. Webster. The only difference in the two demands was in the formality of the latter, being under instructions from his government, and in the threat which it contained. In other respects the two demands were the same; so that, at the outset of this inquiry, we have the opinions of the Secretary of State, the Attorney-general, and the body of their friends in the two Houses of Congress to plead against themselves. Then we produce against our Secretary the law of nations, as laid down by Vattel. He says:

"However, as it is impossible for the best regulated State, or for the most vigilant and absolute sovereign to model at his pleasure all the actions of his subjects, and to confine them on every occasion to the most exact obedience, it would be unjust to impute to the nation or the sovereign every fault committed by the citizens. We ought not, then, to say, in general, that we have received an injury from a nation, because we have received it from one of its members. But if a nation or its chief approves and ratifies the act of the individual, it then becomes a public concern, and the injured party is then to consider the nation as the real author of the injury, of which the citizen was, perhaps, only the instrument. If the offended State has in her power the individual who has done the injury, she may, without scruple, bring him to justice, and punish him. If he has escaped, and returned to his own country, she ought to apply to his sovereign to have justice done in the case."

This is the case before us. The malefactor is taken, and is in the hands of justice. His imputed crime is murder, arson, and robbery. His government, by assuming his crime, cannot absolve his guilt, nor defeat our right to try and punish him according to law. The assumption of his act only adds to the number of the culpable, and gives us an additional offender to deal with them, if we choose. We may proceed against one or both; but to give up the individual when we have him, without redress from the nation, which justifies him, is to throw away the advantage which chance or fortune has put into our hands, and to make a virtual, if not actual surrender, of all claim to redress whatsoever.

The law of nations is clear, and the law of the patriot heart is equally clear. The case needs no book, no more than the hanging of Arbuthnot and Ambrister required the justification of books when General Jackson was in the hommocks and marshes of Florida. A band of foreign volunteers, without knowing what they were going to do, but ready to follow their file leader to the devil, steal across a boundary river in the night, attack unarmed people asleep upon the soil, and under the flag of their country; give no quarter--make no prisoners--distinguish not between young and old--innocent or guilty--kill all--add fire to the sword--send the vessel and its contents over the falls in flames--and run back under cover of the same darkness which has concealed their approach. All this in time of peace. And then to call this an act of war, for which the perpetrators are not amenable, and for which redress must be had by fighting, or negotiating with the nation to which they belong. This is absurd. It is futile and ridiculous. Common sense condemns it. The heart condemns it. Jackson's example in Florida condemns it; and we should render ourselves contemptible if we took any such weak and puerile course.

Mr. Fox nowhere says this act was done by the sovereign's command. He shows, in fact, that it was not so done; and we know that it was not. It was the act of volunteers, unknown to the British government until it was over, and unassumed by them for three years after it occurred. The act occurred in December, 1837; our minister, Mr. Stevenson, demanded redress for it in the spring of 1838. The British government did not then assume it, nor did they assume it at all until McLeod was caught. Then, for the first time, they assume and justify, and evidently for the mere purpose of extricating McLeod. The assumption is void. Governments cannot assume the crimes of individuals. It is only as a military enterprise that this offence can be assumed; and we know this affair was no such enterprise, and is not even represented as such by the British minister. He calls it a "transaction." Three times in one paragraph he calls it a "transaction;" and whoever heard of a fight, or a battle, being characterized as a transaction? We apply the term to an affair of business, but never to a military operation. How can we have a military operation without war? without the knowledge of the sovereign? without the forms and preliminaries which the laws of nations exact? This was no military enterprise in form, or in substance. It was no attack upon a fort, or a ship of war, or a body of troops. It was no attack of soldiers upon soldiers, but of assassins upon the sleeping and the defenceless. Our American defenders of this act go beyond the British in exalting it into a military enterprise. They take different ground, and higher ground, than the British, in setting up that defence; and are just as wrong now as they were in the case of Arbuthnot and Ambrister.

Incorrect in point of national law, I hold these instructions to have been derogatory to as in point of national character, and given with most precipitate haste when they should not have been given at all. They were given under a formal, deliberate, official threat from the minister; and a thousand unofficial threats from high and respectable sources. The minister says:

"But, be that as it may, her Majesty's government formally demands, upon the grounds already stated, the immediate release of Mr. McLeod; and her Majesty's government entreat the President of the United States to take into his most deliberate consideration the serious nature of the consequences which must ensue from a rejection of this demand."

Nothing could be more precise and formal than this demand--nothing more significant and palpable than this menace. It is such as should have prevented any answer--such as should have suspended diplomatic intercourse--until it was withdrawn. Instead of that, a most sudden and precipitate answer is given; and one that grants all that the British demanded, and more too; and that without asking any thing from them. It is given with a haste which seems to preclude the possibility of regular deliberation, cabinet council, and official form. The letter of Mr. Fox bears date the 12th of March, which was Friday, and may have been delivered in office hours of that day. The instruction to Mr. Crittenden was delivered on the 15th of March, which was Monday, and a copy delivered to Mr. Fox. This was the answer to the demand and the threat; and thus the answer was given in two days; for Sunday, as the lawyers call it, is dies non; that is to say, no day for business; and it is hardly to be presumed that an administration which seems to be returning to the church and state times of Queen Anne, had the office of the Department of State open, and the clerks at their desks on Sunday, instead of being in their pews at church. The answer, then, was given in two days; and this incontinent haste to comply with a threat contrasts wonderfully with the delay--the forty days' delay--before the letter was written which was intended for home consumption; and which, doubtless, was considered as written in good time, if written in time to be shown to Congress at this extra session.

Sir, I hold it to have been derogatory to our national character to have given any answer at all, much less the one that was given, while a threat was hanging over our heads. What must be the effect of yielding to demands under such circumstances? Certainly degradation--national degradation--and an encouragement to Great Britain to continue her aggressive course upon us. That nation is pressing us in the Northeast and Northwest; she is searching our ships on the coast of Africa; she gives liberty to our slaves wrecked on her islands in their transit from one of our ports to another; she nurtures in London the societies which produced the San Domingo insurrection, and which are preparing a similar insurrection for us; and she is the mistress of subjects who hold immense debts against our States, and for the payment of which the national guarantee, or the public lands, are wanted. She has many points of aggressive contact upon us; and what is the effect of this tame submission--this abject surrender of McLeod, without a word of redress for the affair of the Caroline, and under a public threat--what is the effect of this but to encourage her to press us and threaten us on every other point? It must increase her arrogance, and encourage her encroachments, and induce her to go on until submission to further outrage becomes impossible, and war results from the cowardice which courage would have prevented. On this head the history of many nations is full of impressive lessons, and none more so than that of Great Britain. It is a nation of brave people; but they have sometimes had ministers who were not brave, and whose timidity has ended in involving their country in all the calamities of war, after subjecting it to all the disgrace of pusillanimous submission to foreign insult. The administration of Sir Robert Walpole; long, cowardly and corrupt--tyrannical at home and cringing abroad--was a signal instance of this; and, as a warning to ourselves, I will read a passage from English history to show his conduct, and the consequences of it. I read from Smollett, and from his account of the Spanish depredations, and insults upon English subjects, which were continued the whole term of Walpole's administration, and ended in bringing on the universal war which raged throughout Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, and cost the English people so much blood and treasure. The historian says:

"The merchants of England loudly complained of these outrages; the nation was fired with resentment, and cried for vengeance; but the minister appeared cold, phlegmatic, and timorous. He knew that a war would involve him in such difficulties as must of necessity endanger his administration. The treasure which he now employed for domestic purposes must in that case be expended in military armaments; the wheels of that machine on which he had raised his influence would no longer move; the opposition would of consequence gain ground, and the imposition of fresh taxes, necessary for the maintenance of the war, would fill up the measure of popular resentment against his person and ministry. Moved by these considerations, he industriously endeavored to avoid a rupture, and to obtain some sort of satisfaction by dint of memorials and negotiations, in which he betrayed his own fears to such a degree as animated the Spaniards to persist in their depredations, and encouraged the court of Madrid to disregard the remonstrances of the British ambassador."

Such is the picture of Walpole's foreign policy; and how close is the copy we are now presenting of it! Under the scourge of Spanish outrage, he was cold, phlegmatic, and timorous; and such is the conduct of our secretary under British outrage. He wanted the public treasure for party purposes, and neglected the public defences: our ministry want the public lands and the public money for douceurs to the States, and leave the Union without forts and ships. Walpole sought some sort of satisfaction by dint of negotiation; our minister does the same. The British minister at Madrid was paralyzed by the timidity of the cabinet at home; so is ours paralyzed at London by our submission to Mr. Fox here. The result of the whole was, accumulated outrage, coalitions against England, universal war, the disgrace of the minister, and the elevation of the man to the highest place in his country, and to the highest pinnacle of glory, whom Walpole had dismissed from the lowest place in the British army--that of cornet of horse--for the political offence of voting against him. The elder William Pitt--the dismissed cornet--conducted with glory and success the war which the timidity of Walpole begat; and, that the smallest circumstances might not be wanting to the completeness of the parallel, our prime minister here has commenced his career by issuing an order for treating our military and naval officers as Pitt was treated by Walpole, and for the same identical offence.

Sir, I consider the instructions to Mr. Crittenden as most unfortunate and deplorable. They have sunk the national character in the eyes of England and of Europe. They have lost us the respect which we gained by the late war and by the glorious administration of Jackson. They bring us into contempt, and encourage the haughty British to push us to extremities. We shall feel the effect of this deplorable diplomacy in our impending controversies with that people; and happy and fortunate it will be for us if, by correcting our error, retracing our steps, recovering our manly attitude, discarding our distribution schemes, and preparing for war, we shall be able thereby to prevent war, and to preserve our rights.

I have never believed our English difficulties free from danger. I have not spoken upon the Northeastern question; but the senator from that State who sits on my right (looking at senator WILLIAMS) knows my opinion. He knows that I have long believed that nothing could save the rights of Maine but the war countenance of our government. Preparation for war might prevent war, and save the rights of the State. This has been my opinion; and to that point have all my labors tended. I have avoided speeches; I have opposed all distributions of land and money; I have gone for ships, forts and cannon--the ultima ratio of Republics as well as kings. I go for them now, and declare it as my opinion that the only way to obtain our rights, and to avoid eventual war with England, is to abandon all schemes of distribution, and to convert our public lands and surplus revenue, when we have it, into cannon, ships and forts.

Hard pressed on the instructions to Mr. Crittenden--prostrate and defenceless there--the gentlemen on the other side take refuge under the letter to Mr. Fox, and celebrate the harmony of its periods, and the beauty of its composition. I grant its merit in these particulars. I admit the beauty of the style, though attenuated into gossamer thinness and lilliputian weakness. I agree that the Secretary writes well. I admit his ability even to compose a prettier letter in less than forty days. But what has all this to do with the question of right and wrong--of honor and shame--of war and peace--with a foreign government? In a contest of rhetoricians, it would indeed be important; but in the contests of nations it dwindles into insignificance. The statesman wants knowledge, firmness, patriotism, and invincible adherence to the rights, honor, and interests of his country. These are the characteristics of the statesman; and tried by these tests, what becomes of this letter, so encomiastically dwelt upon here? Its knowledge is shown by a mistake of the law of nations--its firmness, by yielding to a threat--its patriotism, by taking the part of foreigners--its adherence to the honor, rights and interests of our own country, by surrendering McLeod without receiving, or even demanding, one word of redress or apology for the outrage upon the Caroline!

The letter, besides its fatal concessions, is deficient in manly tone--in American feeling--in nerve--in force--in resentment of injurious imputations--and in enforcement of our just claims to redress for blood spilt, territory invaded, and flag insulted.

The whole spirit of the letter is feeble and deprecatory. It does not repel, but begs off. It does not recriminate, but defends. It does not resent insult--not even the audacious threat--which is never once complained of, nor even alluded to.

This letter is every way an unfortunate production. It does not even show the expense and trouble we took to prevent our citizens from crossing the line and joining the Canadian insurgents. It does not show the expense we were at in raising a new regiment of infantry expressly for that service (several voices said yes, yes, it mentions that). Good, let it be credited accordingly. But it does not mention the appropriation of $650,000 made at one time for that object; it does not mention the numerous calls upon the militia authorities and the civil authorities along the line to assist in restraining our people; it does not mention the arrests of persons, and seizures of arms, which we made; it does not mention the prosecutions which we instituted; it does not show that for two years we were at great expense and trouble to restrain our people; and that this expense and trouble was brought upon us by the excitement produced by the affair of the Caroline. The British brought us an immense expense by that affair, for which they render us no thanks, and the Secretary fails to remind them. The letter does not repel, with the indignant energy which the declaration required, that we had "permitted" our citizens to arm and join the insurgents. It repels it, to be sure, but too feebly and gently, and it omits altogether what should never be lost sight of in this case, that the British have taken great vengeance on our people for their rashness in joining this revolt. Great numbers of them were killed in action; many were hanged; and many were transported to the extremities of the world--to Van Diemen's Land, under the antarctic circle--where they pine out a miserable existence, far, far, and for ever removed from kindred, home and friends.

The faults of the letter are fundamental and radical--no beauty of composition, no tropes and figures, no flowers of rhetoric--can balance or gloss over. The objections go to its spirit and substance--to errors of fact and law--to its tameness and timidity--and to its total omission to demand redress from the British government for the outrages on the Caroline, which that government has assumed. She has now assumed that outrage for the first time--assumed it after three years of refusal to speak; and in the assumption offers not one word of apology, or of consolation to our wounded feelings. She claps her arms akimbo, and avows the offence; and our Secretary, in his long and beautiful letter, finds no place to insert a demand for the assumed outrage. He gives up the culprit subject, and demands nothing from the imperious sovereign. He lets go the servant, and does not lay hold of the master. This is a grievous omission. It is tantamount to a surrender of all claim for any redress of any kind. McLeod, the culprit, is given up: he is given up without conditions. The British government assume his offence--demand his release--offer us no satisfaction: and we give him up, and ask no satisfaction. The letter demands nothing--literally nothing: and in that respect again degrades us as much as the surrender upon a threat had already degraded us. This is a most material point, and I mean to make it clear. I mean to show that the Secretary in giving up the alleged instrument, has demanded nothing from the assuming superiors: and this I will do him the justice to show by reading from his own letter. I have examined it carefully, and can find but two places where the slightest approach is made, not even to a demand for redress, but to the suggestion of an intimation of a wish on our side ever to hear the name of the Caroline mentioned again. These two places are on the concluding pages of the letter, as printed by our order. If there are others, let gentlemen point them out, and they shall be read. The two paragraphs I discover, are these:

"This government, therefore, not only holds itself above reproach in every thing respecting the preservation of neutrality, the observance of the principle of non-intervention, and the strictest conformity, in these respects, to the rules of international law, but it doubts not that the world will do it the justice to acknowledge that it has set an example not unfit to be followed by others, and that, by its steady legislation on this most important subject, it has done something to promote peace and good neighborhood among nations, and to advance the civilization of mankind.

"The President instructs the undersigned to say, in conclusion, that he confidently trusts that this and all other questions of difference between the two governments will be treated by both in the full exercise of such a spirit of candor, justice, and mutual respect, as shall give assurance of the long continuance of peace between the two countries."

This is all I can see that looks to the possible contingency of any future allusion to the case of the Caroline. Certainly there could not be a more effectual abandonment of our claim to redress. The first paragraph goes no further than to "trust" that the grounds may be presented which "justify"--a strange word in such a case--the local authorities in attacking and destroying this vessel; and the second buries it all up by deferring it to the general and peaceful settlement of all other questions and differences between the two countries. Certainly this is a farewell salutation to the whole affair. It is the valedictory to the Caroline. It is the parting word, and is evidently so understood by the British ministry. They have taken no notice of this beautiful letter: they have returned no answer to it; they have not even acknowledged its receipt. The ministry, the parliament, and the press, all acknowledge themselves satisfied--satisfied with the answer which was given to Mr. Fox, on the 12th of March. They cease to speak of the affair; and the miserable Caroline--plunging in flames over the frightful cataract, the dead and the dying both on board--is treated as a gone-by procession, which has lost its interest for ever. Mr. Webster has given it up, by deferring it to general settlement; and in so giving it up, has not only abandoned the rights and honor of his country, but violated the laws of diplomatic intercourse. Outrages and insults are never deferred to a general settlement. They are settled per se--and promptly and preliminarily. All other negotiations cease until the insult and outrage is settled. That is the course of Great Britain herself in this case. She assumes the arrest of McLeod to be an offence to the British crown, and dropping all other questions of difference, demands instant reparation for that offence. Mr. Webster should have done the same by the offence to his country. It was prior in time, and should have been prior in settlement--at all events the two offences should have been settled together. Instead of that he hastens to make reparation to the British--does it in person--and without waiting even to draw up a letter in reply to Mr. Fox! and then, of his own head, defers our complaint to a general settlement. This is unheard of, either in national or individual insults. What would we think of a man, who being insulted by an outrage to his family in his house, should say to the perpetrators: "We have some outstanding accounts, and some day or other we may have a general settlement; and then, I trust you will settle this outrage." What would be said of an individual in such a case, must be said of ourselves in this case. In vain do gentlemen point to the paragraph in the letter, so powerfully drawn, which paints the destruction of the Caroline, and the slaughter of the innocent as well as the guilty, asleep on board of her. That paragraph aggravates the demerit of the letter: for, after so well showing the enormity of the wrong, and our just title to redress, it abandons the case without the slightest atonement. But that letter, with all its ample beauties, found no place to rebuke the impressment and abduction of the person claimed as a British subject, because he was a fugitive rebel. Whether so, or not, he could not be seized upon American soil--could not even be given up under the extradition clause in Mr. Jay's treaty, even if in force, which only applied to personal and not to political offences. But that letter, was for Buncombe: it was for home consumption: it was to justify to the American people on the 24th of May, what had been done on the 12th of March. It was superscribed to Mr. Fox, but written for our own people: and so Mr. Fox understood it, and never even acknowledged its receipt.

But gentlemen point to a special phrase in the letter, and quote it with triumph, as showing pluck and fight in our Secretary: it is the phrase, "bloody and exasperated war"--and consider this phrase as a cure for all deficiencies. Alas! it would seem to have been the very thing which did the business for our Secretary. That blood, with war, and exasperation, seems to have hastened his submission to the British demand. But how was it with Mr. Fox? Did it hasten his inclination to pacify us? Did he take it as a thing to quicken him? or, did the British government feel it as an inducement, or stimulus to hasten atonement for the injury they had assumed? Not at all! Far from it! Mr. Fox did not take fright, and answer in two days! nor has he answered yet! nor will he ever while such gentle epistles are written to him. Its effect upon the British ministry is shown by the manner in which they have treated it--the contempt of silence. No, sir! instead of these gentle phrases, there ought to have been two brief words spoken to Mr. Fox--first, your letter contains a threat; and the American government does not negotiate under a threat; next, your government has assumed the Caroline outrage to the United States, and now atone for it: and as to McLeod, he is in the hands of justice, and will be tried for his crimes, according to the law of nations. This is the answer which ought to have been given. But not so. Instant submission on our part, was the resolve and the act. Forty days afterwards this fine letter was delivered. Unfortunate as is this boasted letter in so many respects, it has a further sin to answer for, and that is for its place, or order--its collocation and connection--in the printed document which lies before us; and also in its assumption to "enclose" the Crittenden instructions to Mr. Fox--which had been personally delivered to him forty days before. The letter is printed, in the document, before the "instructions," though written forty days after them; and purports to "enclose" what had been long before delivered. Sir, the case of McLeod is not an isolation: it is not a solitary act: it is not an atom lying by itself. But it is a feature in a large picture--a link in a long chain. It connects itself with all the aggressive conduct of Great Britain towards the United States--her encroachments on the State of Maine--her occupation of our territory on the Oregon--her insolence in searching our vessels on the coast of Africa--the liberation of our slaves, wrecked on her islands, when in transition from one part of the Union to another--her hatching in London for the Southern States, what was hatched there above forty years ago for San Domingo: and the ominous unofficial intimation to our aforesaid Secretary, that the federal government is bound for the European debts of the individual States. The McLeod case mixes itself with the whole of these; and the success which has attended British threats in his case, may bring us threats in all the other cases; and blows to back them, if not settled to British liking. Submission invites aggression. The British are a great people--a wonderful people; and can perform as well as threaten. Occupying some islands no larger than two of our States, they have taken possession of the commanding points in the four quarters of the globe, and dominate over an extent of land and water, compared to which the greatest of empires--that of Alexander, of Trajan, of the Caliphs--was a dot upon the map. War is to them a distant occupation--an ex-territorial excursion--something like piracy on a vast scale; in which their fleets go forth to capture and destroy--to circumnavigate the globe; and to return loaded with the spoil of plundered nations. Since the time of William the Conqueror, no foreign hostile foot has trod their soil; and, safe thus far from the ravages of war at home, they are the more ready to engage in ravages abroad. To bully, to terrify, to strike, to crush, to plunder--and then exact indemnities as the price of forbearance--is their policy and their practice: and they look upon us with our rich towns and extended coasts, as a fit subject for these compendious tactics. We all deprecate a war with that people--none deprecate it more than I do--not for its dangers, but for its effects on the business pursuits of the two countries, and its injury to liberal governments: but we shall never prevent war by truckling to threats, and squandering in douceurs to the States what ought to be consecrated to the defence of the country. The result of our first war with this people, when only a fifth of our present numbers, shows what we could do in a seven years' contest: the result of the second shows that, at the end of two years, having repulsed their fleets and armies at all points, we were just ready to light upon Canada with an hundred thousand volunteers, fired by the glories of New Orleans. And in any future war with that nation, woe to the statesman that woos peace at the repulse of the foe. Of all the nations of the earth, we are the people to land upon the coasts of England and Ireland. We are their kin and kith; and the visits of kindred have sympathies and affections, which statutes and proclamations cannot control.

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LXXVII. REFUSAL OF THE HOUSE TO ALLOW RECESS COMMITTEES

Two propositions submitted at this session to allow committees to sit in the recess, and collect information on industrial subjects--commerce, manufactures, and agriculture--with a view to beneficial legislation, had the effect of bringing out a very full examination into the whole subject--under all its aspects, of constitutionality and expediency. The whole debate was brought on by the principal proposition, submitted by Mr. Winthrop, from the Committee on Commerce, in these words:

"Resolved, That a committee of nine members, not more than one of whom shall be from any one State, be appointed by the Chair, to sit during the recess, for the purpose of taking evidence at the principal ports of entry and elsewhere, as to the operation of the existing system and rates of duties on imports upon the manufacturing, agricultural, and commercial interests of the country, and of procuring, generally, such information as may be useful to Congress in any revision of the revenue laws which may be attempted at the next session."

On this resolution there was but little said. The previous question was soon called, and the resolution carried by a lean majority--106 to 104. A reconsideration was instantly moved by Mr. McKeon of New York, which, after some discussion, was adopted, 106 to 90. The resolution was then laid on the table: from which it was never raised. Afterwards a modification of it was submitted by Mr. Kennedy of Maryland, from the committee on commerce, in these words:

"Resolved, That a select committee of eleven members, not more than one of which shall be from any one State, be appointed by the Chair for the purpose of taking evidence at the principal ports of entry and elsewhere as to the operation of the existing system and rates of duties on imports upon the manufacturing, commercial, and agricultural interests of the country; and of procuring, generally, such information as may be useful to Congress in any revision of the revenue laws which may be attempted at the next session.

"Resolved, further, That said committee be authorized to sit during the recess, and to employ a clerk."

A motion was made by Ingersoll which brought up the question of recess committees on their own merits, stripped of the extraneous considerations which a proposition for such a committee, for a particular purpose, would always introduce. He moved to strike out the words, "to sit during the recess." This was the proper isolation of the contested point. In this form the objections to such committees were alone considered, and found to be insuperable. In the first place, no warrant could be found in the constitution for this elongation of itself by the House by means of its committees, and it was inconsistent with that adjournment for which the constitution provides, and with those immunities to members which are limited to the term of service, and the time allowed for travelling to and from Congress. No warrant could be found for them in the constitution, and practical reasons against them presented themselves more forcibly and numerously as the question was examined. The danger of degenerating into faction and favoritism, was seen to be imminent. Committees might be appointed to perambulate the Union--at the short sessions for nine months in the year--spending their time idly, or engaged in political objects--drawing the pay and mileage of members of Congress all the time, with indefinite allowances for contingencies. If one committee might be so appointed, then as many others as the House chose: if by one House, then by both: if to perambulate the United States, then all Europe--constituting a mode of making the tour of Europe at the public expense. All Congress might be so employed: but it was probable that only the dominant party, each in its turn, would so favor its own partisans, and for its own purposes. The practical evils of the measure augmented to the view as more and more examined: and finally, the whole question was put to rest by the decided sense of the House--only sixty-two members voting against the motion to lay it on the table, not to be taken up again: a convenient, and compendious way to get rid of a subject, as it brings on the direct vote, without discussion, and without the process of the previous question to cut off debate.

Such was the decision of the House; and, what has happened in the Senate, goes to confirm the wisdom of their decision. Recess committees have been appointed from that body; and each case of such appointment has become a standing argument against their existence. The first instance was that of a senatorial committee, in the palmy days of the United States Bank, consisting of the friends of that bank, appointed on the motion of its own friends to examine it--spending the whole recess in the work: and concluding with a report lauding the management of the bank, and assailing those who opposed it. Several other senatorial recess committees have since been appointed; but under circumstances which condemn them as an example; and with consequences which exemplify the varieties of abuse to which they are subject; and of which, faction, favoritism, personal objects, ungovernable expense, and little, or no utility, constitute the heads.

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Chapter LXXVIII

REDUCTION OF THE EXPENSE OF FOREIGN MISSIONS BY REDUCING THE NUMBER.

A question of permanent and increasing interest was opened at this session, which has become more exigent with time, and deserves to be pursued until its object shall be accomplished. It was the question of reducing the expenses of foreign missions, by reducing the number, and the expediency of returning to the Jeffersonian policy of having no ministers resident, or permanent succession of ministers abroad. The question was brought on by a motion from Mr. Charles Jared Ingersoll to strike from the appropriation bill the salaries of some missions mentioned in it; and this motion brought on the question of, how far the House had a right to interfere in these missions and control them by withholding compensation? and how far it was expedient to diminish their number, and to return to the Jeffersonian policy? Chargés had been appointed to Sardinia and Naples: Mr. Ingersoll thought them unnecessary; as also the mission to Austria, and that the ministers to Spain ought to be reduced to chargéships. Mr. Caleb Cushing considered the appointment of these ministers as giving them "vested rights in their salaries," and that the House was bound to vote. Mr. Ingersoll scouted this idea of "vested rights." Mr. Adams said the office of minister was created by the law of nations, and it belonged to the President and Senate to fill it, and for the Congress to control it, if it judged it necessary, as the British parliament has a right to control the war which the king has a right to declare, namely, by withholding the supplies: but it would require an extreme case to do so after the appointment had been made. He did not think the House ought to lay aside its power to control in a case obviously improper. And he thought the introduction of an appropriation bill, like the present, a fit occasion to inquire into the propriety of every mission; and he thought it expedient to reduce the expenses of our foreign missions, by reducing the number: and with this view he should offer a resolution when it should be in order to do so. Mr. Gilmer, as one of the Committee on Retrenchment, had paid some attention to the subject of our foreign representation; and he believed, with Mr. Adams, that both the grade and the destination of our foreign agents would admit of a beneficial reduction. Mr. Ingersoll rejoined on the different branches of the question, and in favor of Mr. Jefferson's policy, and for following up the inquiry proposed by Mr. Adams; and said:

"If the stand he had now taken should eventually lead to the retrenchment alluded to in the resolution of the venerable gentleman from Massachusetts, he should be content. He still thought the House might properly exercise its withholding power, not, indeed, so as to stop the wheels of government, but merely to curtail an unnecessary expenditure; and he hoped there would be enough of constitutional feeling, of the esprit du corps, to lead them to insist upon their right. He scouted the idea of the President's appointment creating a vested interest in the appointee to his salary as minister. Such a doctrine would be monstrous. The House might be bound by high considerations of policy and propriety, but never by the force of a contract, to appropriate for an appointed minister. This was carrying the principle totally extra moenia mundi. Mr. I. disclaimed opposing these measures on the mere ground of dollars and cents; he alluded to the multiplication of missions to and from this country as introducing examples of lavish expenditure and luxurious living among our own citizens. As to the distinction between temporary and permanent missions, the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. CUSHING] perfectly well knew that originally all public missions were temporary; such a thing as a permanent foreign mission was unheard of. This was an invention of modern times; and it had been Mr. Jefferson's opinion that such missions ought not to exist. It was high time that public attention was called to the subject; and he hoped that at the next session Mr. Adams would bring forward and press his resolution of inquiry as to the expediency of reducing the whole system of foreign intercourse."

Mr. Adams afterwards introduced his proposed resolution, which was adopted by the House, and sent to the Committee on Foreign Relations; but which has not yet produced the required reform. This was his resolve:

"Resolved, That the Committee on Foreign Affairs be instructed to inquire into the expediency of reducing the expenditures in the diplomatic department of the government, by diminishing the number of ministers and other diplomatic agents abroad, and report thereon to the House."

It would be a public benefaction, and a great honor to the member who should do it, for some ardent man to take charge of this subject--revive Mr. Adams' resolution, and pursue the inquiry through all the branches which belong to it: and they are many. First: The full mission of minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary, formerly created only on extraordinary occasions, and with a few great courts, and intrusted to eminent men, are now lavished in profusion; and at secondary courts; and filled with men but little adapted to grace them; and without waiting for an occasion, but rapidly, to accommodate political partisans; and as a mere party policy, recalling a political opponent to make room for an adherent: and so keeping up a perpetual succession, and converting the envoys extraordinary into virtual ministers resident. In the second place, there are no plenipotentiaries now--no ministers with full powers--or in fact with any powers at all, except to copy what is sent to them, and sign what they are told. The Secretaries of State now do the business themselves, either actually making the treaty at home while the minister is idle abroad, or virtually by writing instructions for home effect, often published before they are delivered, and containing every word the minister is to say--with orders to apply for fresh instructions at every new turn the business takes. And communications have now become so rapid and facile that the entire negotiation may be conducted at home--the important minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary being reduced to the functions of a messenger. In the third place, all the missions have become resident, contrary to the policy and interest of our country, which wants no entangling alliances or connections abroad; and to the damage of our treasury, which is heavily taxed to keep up a numerous diplomatic establishment in Europe, not merely useless, but pernicious. In the fourth place, our foreign intercourse has become inordinately expensive, costing above three hundred thousand dollars a year; and for ministers who do not compare with the John Marshalls of Virginia, the John Quincy Adamses, the Pinckneys of South Carolina, the Pinkney of Maryland, the Rufus Kings, Albert Gallatins, James Monroes, the Livingstons, and all that class, the pride of their country, and the admiration of Europe; and which did not cost us one hundred thousand dollars a year, and had something to do, and did it--and represented a nation abroad, and not a party. Prominently among the great subjects demanding reform, is now the diplomatic intercourse of the United States. Reduction of number, no mission without an object to accomplish, no perpetual succession of ministers, no ministers resident, no exclusion of one party by the other from this national representation abroad, no rank higher than a chargé except when a special service is to be performed and then nationally composed: and the expenses inexorably brought back within one hundred thousand dollars a year. Such are the reforms which our diplomatic foreign intercourse has long required--which so loudly called for the hand of correction fifteen years ago, when Mr. Adams submitted his resolution; and all the evils of which have nearly doubled since. It is a case in which the House of Representatives, the immediate representatives of the people, and the sole constitutional originator of taxes upon them, should act as a check upon the President and Senate; and do it as the British House of Commons checks the king, the lords and the ministry--by withholding the supplies.

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