Page images
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

never do it. Mount Vernon would never allow it. Yorktown would not consent to it. All the South would oppose it. The nation was unprepared for it; the circumstances did not demand it.

Mr. CLAIBORNE, of Virginia, said he rose to support the motion made by the gentleman from Georgia, [Mr. CLAYTON.] He said he could not refrain from mingling in the discussion of a question so vitally interesting to his constituents and to the world. Were he dumb, he would make an effort to break the bands of silence, to give utterance to his feelings upon this allimportant subject. Mr. C. said he spoke on this question without premeditation, relying upon the spontaneous feelings of his heart, and the best interests of his constituents, to direct both the matter and the manner of his address. He said the winds of heaven at this moment were wafting the President's message to every portion of the civilized world. It had been asserted that the message contained no menace-no threat. But I fear, said Mr. C., it may be differently understood by the French people, and that they may look upon it as having received the sanction of the American nation. He said he believed the nation wanted, if possible, to live in peace with all foreign Powers. It was their interest as well as duty. He said he had no hesitation in asserting that, as far as he had been able to ascertain public opinion, it was adverse to war. The people were disposed to live in peace with all the world, and especially with their ancient friend and ally, France. From this determination they would not depart, as long as they could adhere to it without a sacrifice of

national honor.

Mr. C. asked, what did the President recommend? He recommended, in the event of a certain contingency, to wit, the French Chambers not making the necessary appropriations to carry into effect their treaty with us, that then, and in that event, he, the President, should be authorized by Congress to make reprisals on French property to the amount of the sum stipulated to be paid the American Government in the treaty of the 4th of July, 1881. Yes, said Mr. C., to arm him with power to seize upon the property of innocent and unoffending individuals. If this power be conferred upon him, it will be virtually conferring upon the President uncon. stitutional power--a power to declare war. For, disguise the fact as gentlemen may, I can view it in no other light than a declaration of war. Is there any gentleman on this floor who does not believe that war will be the inevitable consequence of the measure? Yes, sir, it will follow with the certainty that the peal of thun. der succeeds the electric flash in the gathering storm. Sir, I am not afraid to express my sentiments on the present occasion. I am one of the representatives of the people, and a free man. I come here to advocate the people's interest. This is the goal that I direct all my efforts to. I will support the measures of the administration when I think them right, and oppose them when I believe them wrong. I am no partisan; and if an imputation of that sort should be made against me, selfpoised and self-sustained, I will stand conscious and erect. Gentlemen have read history to little effect, if they are ready to clothe a single individual with the power of making war. If we are to derive wisdom from experience and from the admonitions of history, we will withhold it. The granting of this power improvidently has carried the sword through the fairest provinces in the world, and brought ruin to the doors of millions. When cause of war shall exist, and the honor of the nation shall demand a declaration, I will, as the representative of a proud and chivalrous people, join in meeting its horrors; but, until dire necessity shall require it, I shall use all my efforts to avoid it. Policy, sound morals, every thing tells me this is the proper determination.

VOL. XI.-49

[H. OF R.

But, Mr. Chairman, does the existing difference between the United States and France present such a case? In my humble judgment it does not. What, sir, is the state of the fact? Is not the Executive Government of France making use of every exertion to obtain from the Chambers the necessary appropriations? Does it not already appear to every gentleman, who has given himself the trouble to read the debates in the Chambers, that a respectable portion of that body do not regard the treaty as binding until ratified by them, the only constitutional power in the French Government to levy a tax upon the people? We should, in the examination of this question, have some regard to the existing state of affairs in that country. What would be our situation, if the President and Senate were to make a treaty, and in that treaty stipulate to pay a sum of money, and Congress was to refuse to grant the appropriations? The President would surely, in that case, recommend the disappointed nation to stay their hand a little, and give time to effect a change of public opinion. The Government of France and the Government of the United States are Governments founded on public opinion, and sustained by popular sentiments and popular feelings. Who says nay to this proposition? None; no, not one. It ought to be remembered, that a majority of eight only were against the necessary appropriation, at the time the question was first taken in the Chambers. cannot be forgotten, that the King has pledged himself to present it at the next meeting of the Chambers, and again urge the necessity of the appropriation; and we know that it is his fixed purpose to do all in his power to have the claim adjusted. With a knowledge of these facts, shall we indulge for one single moment in the language of menace, and provoke a war with France, our oldest and most steady friend? A people who stood by us in the hour of peril and danger, who mingled their blood and treasure with the blood and treasure of our fathers, in fighting for the liberties of our beloved country? This great citadel of republican government was erected by the joint efforts of our fathers and the French people. Were I to experience for a moment other than a wish for eternal peace between France and the United States, some ghost, smeared with blood, would rise from the plains of Monmouth to upbraid me. Do not draw wrong conclusions from what I say. I am the advocate of peace. An eloquent writer has well said, the heart that can mourn over the havoc and desolation of the fields of battle, is closely allied to the arm that is ever ready to protect innocence from outrage, and society from oppression. It is the emblem of moral courage--the daring to do what is right.

It

Sir, is it inconsistent with genuine courage, before you enter into a contest, either as private men or public functionaries, to calculate the consequences that will follow? Sir, ours is the most commercial nation on earth, except Great Britain; our merchant vessels are incessantly wafting the products of our soil from the frozen belt that encircles the northern pole, to the sandy bars which environ the antarctic circle. At this moment the surface of the ocean is whitened with the sails which cover her millions of American property. Declare war to-morrow, and two months will not have clapsed before all the unemployed shipping of other countries would apply to France for letters of marque and reprisal, and under the French flag pounce down upon and sweep this vast commerce from the ocean. Then in a brief period would be presented to your eyes the melancholy spectacle of your commerce ruined, your surplus produce unsold, your seaport towns languishing, and every village and cottage from Maine to Georgia withering be fore the blighting effects of war. Mr. Chairman, let me here say to you, that the American people should be the last on earth to go to war, and for this plain reason

[blocks in formation]

they have more at stake than any other. Our Government is the admiration of the whole world. No people among civilized nations enjoy a higher degree of freedom and happiness; none who have their civil and religious liberty better secured. This Government, administered in its purity, is an ample shield, behind which the people may stand in the full enjoyment of all the hopes of freemen; nor are we, Mr. Chairman, alone interested in the success of our Government. The enlightened and liberal in every portion of the earth pray for the preservation of our political institutions; already have foreigners come here to study our laws, and have gone home with their minds richly imbued with liberal principles, and have been enabled greatly to ameliorate the condition of their own countrymen.

Mr. C. said he felt that the mild and philosophical principles he was enforcing were in perfect accordance with the principles of the American Government, and would receive the sanction of the enlightened district which he was proud to represent.

He said he felt certain that, in the vote he should give, he should represent the feelings and wishes of his constituents. He was well satisfied that, if the naked question was submitted to them, their high sense of justice and morality would revolt at the idea of this Government seizing by force the private property of the citizens of France, to indemnify some speculating merchants for losses sustained under the Berlin and Milan decrees of France, made by way of self-preservation against the unlawful orders in council of Great Britian, in declaring not only the ports of France, but those of neutral nations, in a state of blockade. It would not be forgotten that the United States, by the passage of her non-intercourse law, adopted measures of retaliation, and thus lessened her claim to indemnification for spoliations under the Berlin and Milan decrees. They would claim indemnity for spoliations committed upon property after the repeal of those decrees by the French Govern

ment.

Mr. Chairman, I believe the French owe us fairly more than twenty five millions of francs. You are aware, however, that the French Government, at no time before the establishment of the Government of July, acknowledged that they owed this Government more than two and a half millions of dollars, and against this sum that they claimed an offset for what they conceived a violation, on the part of this Government, of the 8th article of the treaty of 1803, between France and the United States, stipulating that French vessels should be received in the ports of Louisiana upon the terms of the most favored nations, which they contend was violated when they were not put upon the same footing with those of Great Britain, after the treaty of Ghent. When such difficulties have grown up between us, said Mr. C., what is the course to be pursued? I answer and say, let us address the French Government in the language of friendship; let us say to them, we believe you owe us twenty-five millions of francs; you have agreed by treaty to pay us that sum. If you complain that you were under a misapprehension of facts-point out errors; we are ready to correct them; we want only our due, and we feel you are too magnanimous, when you are satisfied of the true amount due, to withhold it. The people of France certainly must desire to be in peace and amity with us; I have confidence that justice will be done us by the French Government; that the interruption of good feeling will be momentary, and will pass away, and be succeeded by days and years, and I hope centuries, of brotherly love. Good Americans and good Frenchmen desire this state of things; and that the peace now happily existing may exist for ever, is my most ardent wish. I could, sir, have said a great deal more, but less was impossible.

[DEC. 9, 1834.

Mr. WAYNE, chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, observed that the amendment offered by the gentleman from Georgia to the proposition of the gentleman from North Carolina, to refer to the Committee on Foreign Affairs so much of the message as relates to our concerns with foreign nations, was improper as to time, and in its matter. He thought discussion now, upon the subject to which the amendment relates, would be premature, and might do much harm. Indeed, if the admission made by the gentleman in his remarks could in any event be taken as the sense of the House, or of any portion of the people of this nation, much injury would be done to those who were interested in the faithful and speedy performance by France of the stipulations of the treaty of the 4th July, 1831. But the gentleman's admissions would have no response in this nation. He proposes to terminate all inquiry into the affair, and to prevent any action by Congress upon the message, by instructing the committee to report that it is expedient to await the further action of the French Chambersand his reason is, that the postponement of voting money for the payment of the instalments due by the treaty, has arisen from the delicate and important character of the claims referred, and the peculiar complexity of the principles involved in their adjustment. In other words, that the French legislators have been for two years and a half discussing principles which they do not understand, and still require time to enable them to come to a correct conclusion. And yet the gentleman, with nothing before him but a report of the discussions of the Chamber of Deputies, without any of the correspondence be tween the two Governments, since the failure upon the part of France to discharge her obligations under the treaty, had, in two or three short days, been able to unravel the intricacy of the whole affair, and so satisfac torily to himself that he proposes to substitute the results of his happy ability for the examination of the committee and the more deliberate judgment of the House. It would have been well at least, and a prudent man would, either for censure or praise, as he might be disposed, have postponed his conclusion until he had ascertained how far the message, relating to this affair, could be sustained by the correspondence between the two Governments since the ratification of the treaty. It would have occurred to another, that the affair, as presented to the nation by the message, imposed upon Congress the necessity of inquiring into facts, with the view of deter mining upon the propriety of the President's suggestions, and carrying them out, or of devising some other means to secure the rights of those for whose benefit the treaty had been made. Congress had now become the guardians of the rights of our citizens, vested in them by a treaty, which France must perform, or for which the United States, as a nation, must receive an indemnity, at some time or other, to the full extent of its original obligations, and all the consequences which may ensue from a refusal by any department of the French Government to fulfil the stipulations of the treaty. But the gentleman could only see in the message a declara tion of war, and all the disasters which follow in the train of war. If his object had been to fall into the current which, for some days, has been flowing in a certain channel, to produce the impression upon the public mind that the President designed to provoke a war with France, the gentleman had taken the proper course to effect his intention, notwithstanding he had disclaimed any party feeling in his movement. There was nothing in the message of a warlike character or threat. All idea of menace is in terms denied, and the French character, Government, and people, are treated with the respect and regard due from one nation to another; when either, by putting itself in the wrong, justifies the language of complaint. Nor is the message without a reference to

DEC. 9, 1834.]

Relations with France.

[H. OF R.

So much, Mr. W. deemed it right to say, in regard to the message, in reply to the misconceptions of it by his colleague, and in answer to his apprehensions of war.

But

The

those recollections which, if France will cherish by doing us justice, the United States will never forget, nor cease to acknowledge. There is a difference between a firm attitude in the pursuit of acknowledged rights, But there were two points of view in which the suband the language of menace. The President, after giving ject was presented, to the House; and from the mere a narrative of all that had taken place since the treaty intimation of them, it would be obvious that it should had been concluded, recommends, if an appropriation be sent to a committee, untrammelled by instructions. shall not be made by the French Chambers at their next The first were the rights, which our citizens had acsession, that some legislation shall be enacted by Con- quired under the treaty; and, secondly, what national gress to meet the predicament in which we shall be honor would require from Congress, if the French placed by the refusal of France to pay an acknowledged Chambers persevered in refusing to execute it. If the debt. In anticipation of that event, the rights of our amendment prevailed, it would be equivalent to a postcitizens can only be sustained by prompt measures. But ponement by Congress of the rights of our citizens. they are only to be contingent--until the refusal of The subject should be fully canvassed by a committee, France shall be complete. The refusal has already been and afterwards, upon its report, by Congress, that our as positive as it can be by one of the departments of the merchants might feel and know that their pursuits were French Government. The information received by us under the vigilant guardianship of Congress, and that all of that, fact in May last, would have justified then some the world might see, however long it may be delayed ultimate measure of redress; but the course of the King by circumstances, that there was to be a day of retribuof the French called for our forbearance. Since that tion for every outrage upon our commerce, under whattime there has been another meeting of the Chambers; ever pretence or by whatever nation it might be combut no appropriation was made, nor was any effort made mitted. The sense of this security will give life to our by the King or his ministers to procure one. Then the enterprise in every clime, and confidence to our mariChambers were prorogued to the last week in December, ners upon every sea. In this instance, the subject and now it is only possible that we can have, during this should be sent to a committee without instructions, that session of Congress, the result of the King's assurances it might deliberately inquire and report that course that it was his intention to press the appropriation at the which Congress should take as the best fitted to induce ensuing session of the Chambers. Almost three years France to fulfil her obligation, or what will most suc have passed since the appropriation for the first instal-cessfully accomplish the purpose, should it be thought ment under the treaty should have been made, and since advisable, now or hereafter, to redress ourselves. the ratification of the treaty there have been five sessions I do not propose to argue this point, at this time. of the Chambers. With this procrastination in view, intimation of it is enough to ensure the rejection of the will any one, having a proper American feeling, and amendment. . As to what national honor would require, who appreciates Government as he should do, by its if France persevered in her course, and definitively ability to give happiness to its citizens at home, and to refused to recognise our rights under the treaty, and obtain for them redress when wronged by foreign nations, also to make reparation for her delay in doing it, Mr. complain of the President because he has expressed W. was not mistaken when he said there would be but his confidence that no branch of this Government will, one sentiment among the American people as to the for a moment, entertain the idea of acquiescing in a re- course to be pursued. It would no longer be a quesfusal to execute the treaty, or because he has said further tion of dollars and cents, but of national honor, demandnegotiation is out of the question? Because, whilst dep- ing every sacrifice of money and of life to maintain it, recating the consequences of collision with France, he with the superadded obligation to sustain all that the has said, in maintaining our national rights and honor, all laws of nations required in regard to treaties. The Governments are alike to us? Or for having recom- cause would not only be ours, but that of every nation mended the mildest or only alternative short of war, having treaties, or which may have to make treaties, when one nation obstinately refuses to pay to another an with France. Mr. W. would not pursue this topic. unliquidated debt? The President has not asked that the He had thought it to be his duty, from the relation in power of authorizing reprisals should be put into his which he had been placed to the House, to make some hands. He recommends reprisals, if another sitting of remarks upon the amendment proposed by his colleague, the Chambers shall be closed without definitive action and upon his speech, that the public might be advised upon the subject; but he does not attempt to prescribe of the true state of our affairs with France, and to preor to intimate the time or manner of its being done, and vent the message from being misconceived by those who only assures Congress that its decision shall be faithfully might read the remarks of his colleague. The ordinary executed, as far as it shall authorize bim to act. By his course was, to refer subjects bearing on our foreign language, Mr. W. understood, and so he believed the relations to the Committee on Foreign Affairs. Why whole nation would understand, the President to say: do so, if the committee was to be locked up by instrucNot having shunned the responsibility of making the rec- tions, which took from it the freedom of deliberation, ommendation, I am sincere in the determination not to and confined them to report the judgment of an individshun the responsibility of executing the decision of Con- ual. His colleague had expressed himself in a speech gress, whatever that may be. professing much benevolence, and full of apparent patriotism; but the course he proposed, if countenanced by the House, would compromise the interest of a large class of his fellow-citizens, by adding to the foreign obstacles already in the way of the payment of their claims, all the prejudices of party at home. But he would say no more, for he was convinced the impropriety of his colleague's movement would be manifested by an almost unanimous rejection of the amendment, without further debate.

And as for having recommended reprisals in the event of the French Chambers again refusing to execute the stipulations in the treaty, those who may dislike such a course should remember reprisals or a tame acquiescence in the refusal, is all that we shall have left to us short of war. Reprisals, though sometimes leading to war, are more frequently the means of preventing it. In this case, will it not be so? For, besides the just cause which we shall have for resorting to it, we have the honor of the King of the three days, that he differs from the Chambers in his sense of the obligations imposed upon France by the treaty; and, without a declaration of war by himself, it cannot be made by France.

Mr. ARCHER said he had risen not to take any part in lengthening the debate, which he agreed was premature, but to suggest to the honorable gentleman from Georgia the expediency of withdrawing his amendment.

[blocks in formation]

Even supposing him to concur with that gentleman in the views he had expressed, he could not vote for his resolution; and if he should insist upon pressing it at this moment, it would only be to invoke a decision of the House against his own views. The whole object of the honorable gentleman would be equally well attained, should he allow the subject to go to the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and suffer that committee to report. Where was the advantage of pressing the resolution now? The rejection of it by the House would only counteract his object.

Mr. CLAYTON rose in reply. He said he was sorry he could not accept the suggestion of the honorable gentleman from Virginia, for whom he entertained great respect. He considered this one of those occasions on which to be found in a minority of one would be to occupy one of the proudest stations which any man could hold. He would leave it to the nation and to posterity to say whether it was not well done, to endeavor to prevent that excitement, and the rousing of all those feel ings of imbittered hostility, which would be at once let loose should the House in any degree sanction the views suggested in the executive communication. He would ask gentlemen whether they were not as well prepared now as they would be after a report was rendered, to judge on the expediency of the course proposed? The step he had taken was no unusual one. Two months of the last session had been occupied in debating a proposition introduced in precisely the same way. What, he asked, would be gained by sending this subject to the Committee on Foreign Affairs? Had not the House all the documents before them? Were they not printed, and on the table of every member? All the committee would have before them, the House had before it. There was no ambiguity of meaning; the whole case was as plain as the committee could make it.

He was willing so far to comply with the wishes of his friend from Virginia as to postpone the subject for a week. But why wait for a long report, when they could as well judge and act without it? If the House was ready at once to reject his proposition, the natural inference would be that there was a majority in that House disposed and ready to go to war with France. The gentleman (his colleague) from Georgia, it seemed, could see nothing hostile, nothing of war, or warlike, in the message of the President. But Mr. C. would appeal to the common sense of any man to say whether the language of the message did not contain a menace.

"I recommend that a law be passed, authorizing reprisals upon French property, in case provision shall not be made for the payment of the debt at the approaching session of the French Chambers."

Here the President insisted that but one session more of the Chambers shall be permitted to pass, till letters of marque and reprisal shall be issued by this Government. Who did not know that the first act of reprisal would be considered by France as an act of hostility, and met on her part with instant retaliation? As to the interest of the American claimants, to which the chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs had alluded, Mr. C's proposition was manifestly safer for them than the measure of the President. The moment we went to war, the claims were gone. When the clouds and smoke of war cleared away, the claims would all vanish with them. Whenever peace was proposed, the whole would be sacrificed. What he wanted was to give to the people of France the evidence that the people of America were not disposed to go to war with them; that we respected them as friends, and desired them to remain friends. If he thought that a long report (however able) from the Committee on Foreign Affairs would throw any new light upon the matter, he would willingly wait for it; but he could not believe but that the

[ocr errors]

[DEC. 9, 1834.

House was as ready now as it would be then. Could it be the wish, the design, of any gentleman to throw this agitating question abroad, and rouse the national feeling into a state of perturbation? He trusted not. He was sorry that he could not withdraw his motion; he was willing, however, to defer the subject for a week, as he had said, or even for a fortnight, if gentlemen insisted; farther he could not go.

Mr. R. M. JOHNSON said the gentleman from Georgia assumed, at the threshold, that the recommendation of the President was a proposition to declare war. He certainly did not so consider it, nor did the President himself. The code of civilized nations expressly recognises the right of reprisal in a nation from which a just debt is withheld, as a mode of redress compatible with the continuance of peace. But the President does not propose even this redress short of war, but under circumstances which the gentleman from Georgia says would render an appeal to arms not only just, but indispensable, to preserve the "national honor," for which he is prepared to make ten thousand times greater sacrifices than he has depicted as necessarily resulting from war. He says our claims on France are just; that we have not asked a cent more than is just; that the treaty stipulates for nothing more than is just; and tha a refusal to execute it is "a just cause of war." Well, the French Chamber of Deputies have definitively and positively refused to pay the money, which the nation has bound itself, by the most solemn of all obligations, to pay. The Chambers, after successive sessions of elaborate discussion and long deliberation, have defeated the stipulations of the treaty, by the rejection of the proposition of the King of the French to provide for the payment of our demands. The President of the United States, however, in communicating this fact to Congress, does not call upon us to act upon this peremptory refusal as "a just cause of war." He does not ask that we should consider this violation of the faith of treaties and insult to our national honor, as making proper an immediate appeal, for redress, to the remedy of reprisals, of which the late example of France, in regard to Portugal, affords a practical illustration. No, the President proposes a course of greater moderation than the principles avowed by the gentleman from Georgia, and the late precedent set by France herself, most clearly justify and invite. The message would have us overlook the wrong already inflicted, and the affront offered in the first absolute refusal of the French Chambers to comply with the treaty. It proposes, in the event of a second denial of justice by the newly elected Chambers, that then only shall the violation of the treaty be regarded as conclusive, and as shutting the door against a hope of voluntary redress on the part of France; and even after this consummation of wrongs, which have remained twenty-five years unredressed, the President does not, in his communication to us, hold the strong language of the gentleman from Georgia, and say that it forms "a just cause of war,” but only insists that it is a just cause for reprisals-that is, that we should take possession of as much French property as would be sufficient to pay the sum stipulated in the treaty; and, after retaining it a sufficient length of time to give the French Government an opportunity to redeem it, by the payment of the sum acknowledged to be due to our citizens, that it should be confiscated. as the property of our people was by France twentyfive years ago.

It is premature, however, to enter into this discussion now. The House has before it a mass of documers It was its duty, through its committee, to sift them thoroughly, and look into all the bearings of the case No man entertained more friendly feelings towards France, he said, than he did, and none would be more

DEC. 10, 1834.]

Exploring Expedition--Louisville and Portland Canal.

unwilling hastily to sever the ties of the ancient friendship which has existed between France and the United States. He would observe all the forms which are introduced into legislation, for the purpose of giving due deliberation to all proceeding in this delicate subject. The haste with which the gentleman would rush into a discussion and decision of the great and important subject, was neither respectful to those who administer the Government of France, nor to our own administration. The President, as we have seen, wishes the final action of this Government to await the final determination of the French Chambers. And there can, therefore, be no motive for the precipitation with which we are invited to express an opinion as to the intentions of the French Government, and to adopt a course predicated among our suppositions in this respect, when the final measure contemplated here is to await the full de:velopment of the intentions of France in the overt acts of its representative body. For the present, the usual course of delay, for the sake of deliberation, should, he thought, be taken by our councils. The subject should be submitted to the Committee on Foreign Relations. It was an able committee, and would, in its report, take a view of the whole ground. The question was too solemn to be sported with. He could not consent to vote for the instructions proposed, and yet he disliked to vote against the proposition of the worthy member from Georgia, towards whom he entertained the most kindly feelings. He had uttered the most patriotic sentiments, and was actuated by the most honorable motives. The gentleman had thrown out a most excellent speech, which would go to balance the effect of the President's message. But the gentleman had not examined the subject in extenso. He (Mr. J.) would, therefore, add his appeal to that which had already been made by the worthy member from Virginia, [Mr. ARCHER,] that he would consent to withdraw his motion. He had listened to the excellent speech of this member with the greatest pleasure; and he always did listen to him, whenever his multiplied occupations would at all permit, with the greatest interest and satisfaction. The gentleman could not but be aware that the instructions, should they be adopted, though they might bind the committee, would not bind the House. He trusted they would be withdrawn.

[ocr errors]

Mr. CLAYTON remarked that the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. JOHNSON] had flattered him, instead of reasoning with him. He would, therefore, withdraw his amendment.

The committee then rose; the chairman reported the resolutions to the House, and they were then adopted.

[The following gentlemen were announced as the select committee on the part of the House on the death of Lafayette: Messrs. HUBBARD, LINCOLN, White, ALLEN of Virginia, and MARSHALL.

The following gentlemen were also announced as the committee on the destruction on the Treasury building: Messrs. GILMER, ARCHER, BINNEY, BEARDSLEY, GORHAM, JOHNSON of Kentucky, SPEIGHT, HUBBARD, and CARR.]

The House then adjourned.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10.

EXPLORING EXPEDITION.

Among the petitions and memorials presented to-day was one by Mr. PEARCE, of Rhode Island, of John N. Reynolds, lately returned from a voyage of exploration in the Pacific ocean and on the Northwest coast, praying that an expedition may be fitted out to survey the islands and reefs in that ocean and on that coast. The petition was recommended by both branches of the Legislature of Rhode Island; and Mr. P. stated that the Legislatures of seve

[H. OF R.

ral other States would join in the prayer of the memorial, as would the merchants and chambers of commerce in the principal cities of the Union. To show the importance of the object in view, Mr. P. stated that there were now engaged in the whale fishery 132,000 tons of shipping; that there were employed 10,000 seamen; and that the business direct and indirect employed 170,000 tons of shipping, and more than 12,000 seamen; that more than one-tenth part of our whole navigation was engaged in it; and the capital invested was $12,000,000. He further stated that the annual loss of property, upon the islands and reefs not laid down upon any chart, was fully equal to the expense of the expedition and survey requested.

PUBLIC LANDS.

Mr. CLAY, from the Committee on Public Lands, submitted a resolution making the bill to provide for the reduction and graduation of the price of the public lands the special order of the day for the first Monday in January; also, a resolution that the said bill, and report in relation to the same, be printed.

Mr. EWING suggested that there was amendment to the bill in relation to the public lands, and he desired that it should also be committed with the original bill. Mr. CLAY had no objection. The amendment would go with the bill, as a matter of course.

The resolutions were then agreed to.

On motion of Mr. CLAYTON, 5,000 extra copies of the report of the Committee on Public Lands, on the subject of reducing and graduating the price of the public lands, were ordered to be printed.

WESTERN TERRITORY.

On motion of Mr. GILMER, it was ordered that the "bill for the establishment of the Western Territory, and the security and protection of the Indian emigrants and other tribes therein," (reported at the last session,) be made the special order of the day for the first Monday in January, and that the report and bill be printed.

CENSUS OF ARKANSAS.

On motion of Mr. SEVIER, the bill directing a census of the inhabitants of the Territory of Arkansas (reported at the last session) was made the order of the day for to-morrow week. Mr. S. gave notice that, when the bill came up, he should move an amendment to it, which, together with the bill, was, on his motion, ordered to be printed.

LOUISVILLE AND PORTLAND CANAL.

Mr. POPE moved to discharge the Committee of the Whole House from the consideration of bill No. 342, "in relation to the Louisville and Portland canal," and to refer the same to the Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union.

Mr. P. observed that his sole object in submitting the motion was to ensure a vote upon the bill at the present session. He disliked to tax the forbearance of the House; but the measure was one of such vital interest to his constituents and the whole Western country, that he felt compelled to sacrifice any scruples he might feel on that head to the demands of public duty. He briefly stated that the bill was reported at the last session of Congress, but, like all others of the same nature, remained on the calendar untouched. The object of the bill was to enable the Secretary of the Treasury to purchase, in the name of the United States, the private stock in the Louisville and Portland Canal Company, and to relieve the navigation of the canal from any tax or toll, except what was necessary to keep it in good repair. He stated that the Government now owned nearly one-third of the stock of the company; and he hoped to be able to show, on a fit occasion, that it should purchase the remainder. He

« PreviousContinue »