CHAPTER XIV.

1837–1840.

BILL TO PREVENT THE INTERFERENCE OF FEDERAL OFFICERS WITH ELECTIONS—DEVOTION OF THE FOLLOWERS OF JACKSON—THE WHIG PARTY LESS COMPACT IN CONSEQUENCE OF THE RIVALRY BETWEEN MR. CLAY AND MR. WEBSTER—RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW OF THE BANK QUESTION—THE SPECIE CIRCULAR—GREAT FINANCIAL DISASTERS.

Toward the close of General Jackson’s administration a bill was pending in the Senate to prevent the interference of certain federal officers with elections; a subject which has not yet lost its interest. On this bill, on the 14th of February, 1839, Mr. Buchanan made the following speech:

MR. PRESIDENT: The question raised for discussion by the bill now before the Senate, is very simple in its character. This bill proposes to punish, by a fine of five hundred dollars—the one moiety payable to the informer, and the other to the United States—and by a perpetual disability to hold office under the United States, any officer of this Government, below the rank of a district attorney, who “shall, by word, message, or writing, or in any other manner whatsoever, endeavor to persuade any elector to give, or dissuade any elector from giving, his vote for the choice of any person to be elector of President and Vice President of the United States,” or to be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or to be a governor or lieutenant-governor, or senator or representative, within any State of the Union, “or for the choice of any person to serve in any public office established by the law of any of the States.” The officers of the United States against whom the penalties of this bill are denounced, consist of marshals and their deputies, postmasters and their deputies, receivers and registers of land offices, and their deputies and clerks; surveyors general of the public lands, and their deputies and assistants; collectors, surveyors, naval officers, weighers, gaugers, appraisers, or other officers or persons concerned or employed in the charging, collecting, levying or managing the customs, or any branch thereof; and engineers, officers, or agents, employed or concerned in the execution or superintendence of any of the public works.

The Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Crittenden), before he commenced his remarks, moved to amend the bill by striking from it the pecuniary penalty and perpetual disability against these officers, and substituting, in their stead, the penalty of a removal from office by the President, upon the production of evidence satisfactory to him that any of them had been guilty of the offence.

Now, for myself (said Mr. B.), I shall not vote for this amendment. I will not take advantage of the amiable weakness of my friend from Kentucky, in yielding to the solicitation of others that which his own judgment approved. I will more especially not give such a vote, because the proposed amendment makes no change in the principle of the bill. There is a beautiful harmony and consistency in its provisions as it came fresh from its author which ought to be preserved. I shall not assist in marring any of its fair proportions. Let it remain in its perfect original form, and let its friends upon this floor come up to the baptismal font, and act as its sponsors; and let its avowed principles be recognized as the established doctrines of the political church to which they are all devoted. No, sir, no; if a village postmaster should dare to exercise the freedom of speech, guarantied to him by an antiquated instrument, called the Constitution of the United States, and have the audacity “to endeavor to persuade any elector” to vote for Martin Van Buren, or what would be a much more aggravated offence, dissuade any good Whig from voting for the other distinguished Senator from Kentucky, (Mr. Clay), a mere forfeiture of his office would bear no just proportion to the enormity of the crime. Let such a daring criminal be fined five hundred dollars; let him be disqualified forever from holding any office under the Government; and let him be pointed at as a man of blasted reputation all the days of his life. With honest Dogberry, in the play of “Much ado about Nothing,” I pronounce the offence to be “flat burglary as ever was committed.”

There is another reason why I shall vote against the amendment. An issue has been fairly made between the Senator from Kentucky and my friend from New Jersey, (Mr. Wall), who, from what we have heard in the course of this debate, has but a few shattered planks left on which he can escape from a total shipwreck of his fair fame. In mercy to him I would not remove any of them. Let him have a chance for his life. He has dared to make a report against the bill in its original form, as it was referred to the committee of which he is the chairman; and for this cause has encountered all the withering denunciations of the Senators from Kentucky and Virginia, (Messrs. Crittenden and Rives). In justice to him, the aspect of the question should not now be changed. Let us, then, have the bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill, against which his report was directed.

It would seem almost unnecessary to discuss the question whether this bill be constitutional or not; as the Senator from Kentucky, throughout the whole course of his argument, never once attempted to point to any clause of the Constitution on which it could be supported. It is true that he did cite some precedents in our legislation, which he supposes have a bearing on the subject; but which, I shall undertake to prove, hereafter, are wholly inapplicable. The Senator from Virginia (Mr. Rives) has gone further into the argument, and has attempted to prove that this bill is constitutional. At the proper time, I shall endeavor to furnish the proper answer to his remarks. By-the-by, this Constitution is a terrible bugbear. Whilst a member of the other House, I once heard an old gentleman exclaim, when it was cited against one of his favorite measures, “what a vast deal of good it prevents us from doing!” After this bill shall have passed, it will be a bugbear no longer, so far as the freedom of speech or the press is concerned. It will not then alarm even political children.

The gentlemen have a precedent for their bill. Yes, sir, they have a precedent in the sedition law; but it does not go far enough for their purpose. That law, which is the only true precedent on which this bill can be founded, and on which alone it can be sustained, permitted every man to write and to publish what he pleased concerning public men and public measures, and only held him responsible in case his charges should prove to be false. But this bill is a gag law. It goes to the fountain at once, and prohibits the officer not only from writing, but from speaking anything good, bad, or indifferent, whether true or false, on any subject whatever which may affect any pending election from that of a President down to a constable. It has a much broader sweep than the sedition law, which did not interfere with the liberty of speech, however much it may have abridged the freedom of the press. Indeed, among the more enlightened despotisms of Europe, I know not one which prohibits the freedom of speech on all public subjects; it is only in free and enlightened America that we propose actually to insert the gag. The sedition law was bad enough, God knows; but it extended only to the use of the pen, not to that of the tongue. There is, therefore, no parallel between the two cases.

Had it not been for the existence of the sedition law, I should have supposed it to be impossible that there could have been two opinions in regard to the utter unconstitutionality of this bill. The Constitution, in language so plain as to leave no room for misconstruction, declares that “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press.” The rule is universal. There is no exception. This bill proposes not only to abridge, but utterly to destroy the freedom of speech, and of the press; to interdict their use altogether to the enumerated officers, on all questions touching the election of any officer of the Federal or State Government. A plain man would naturally suppose that, barely to state the contradiction between the Constitution and this bill was to decide the question. Not so. An ingenious and astute lawyer, in favor of a liberal construction of that instrument, can, by inference and ingenuity, confer powers upon Congress in direct violation both of its letter and its spirit, and of which its framers never once dreamed. Such was the power to pass the sedition law. That law engrafted one limitation upon the freedom of the press. It, in effect, changed the meaning of the general terms “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press,” and excepted from their operation any law which might be passed to punish libels against the President, the Government, or either House of Congress. The present bill, in principle at least, proceeds much further. It excepts from the general prohibition of the Constitution the power of punishing all persons holding offices under the Government of the United States who shall dare either to speak or to write at all on questions which may affect the result of any election. This interpolation must be inserted, before gentlemen can show any power to pass the present bill. They cannot advance one step in their argument without it. This Constitution can never be construed according to the meaning of its framers but by men of plain, well-informed, and practical judgment. Common sense is its best expounder. Ingenious men, disposed to raise one implication upon another in favor of Federal power, and to make each previous precedent the foundation on which to proceed another step in the march toward consolidation, may soon make it mean anything or nothing. The liberties of this country can only be preserved by a strict construction of the enumerated powers granted by the States to Congress.

Before I proceed further in my argument against the constitutionality of this bill, it will be proper that I should develop some of its latent beauties. I desire to delineate a little more precisely its character—to present some of its striking features, and to show what it is in principle, and what it will prove to be in practice.

There are twenty-six sovereign States in this Confederacy, united by a Federal compact, called the Constitution of the United States. Each individual elector in this country sustains two distinct characters. He is a citizen of some one of the States, and he is also a citizen of the United States. Now, what does this bill propose? In the older States of this Confederacy, all the Federal officers which we have in the interior are postmasters. It is true that at our ports of entry there are custom-house officers; but in Pennsylvania, for example, from the Schuylkill to the Ohio and to Lake Erie, our people scarcely feel their connection with the General Government except through the medium of the Post Office Department. These postmasters are very numerous. They are planted in every village and at every cross road. They are agents for disseminating information throughout the country. I might probably say that in nine instances out of ten the office is scarcely worth holding on account of its pecuniary emoluments. In most cases, the postmaster accepts it for the accommodation of his neighbors.

Now this postmaster is generally a man of property and of character, having a deep stake in the community and in the faithful administration and execution of the laws. Two candidates are presented to the people for office; say that of a justice of the peace. If one of these village postmasters should, in the exercise of his unquestionable rights as a citizen of Pennsylvania, advise his neighbor to vote for one of these candidates, and against the other, this bill dooms him to a fine of five hundred dollars, and to a perpetual disqualification from ever holding any office under the Government of the United States. No matter whether the merits which he may have ascribed to one of the candidates be true as holy writ, and the delinquencies which he may have charged against the other may be susceptible of the clearest proof, this will not arrest the vengeance of the bill. He is doomed to remain mute, although his dearest interests may be involved, or incur its penalties. A gag is to be put into his mouth, and he is to be punished if he dare to express a preference for one candidate over the other. And let me tell the gentleman, these postmasters hold all sorts of political opinions. In my own State a considerable proportion of their number are Whigs and Antimasons, opposed to the present Administration. I might cite other examples to depict the enormity of this bill, but I consider it wholly unnecessary. I might ascend from the justice of the peace or the constable, through all the gradations of elective office, State and Federal, to the President of the United States, and show, that at each ascending grade, the violation of the rights of the citizen becomes more and more outrageous. I might enumerate the weighers and the gaugers, and the other proscribed classes of inferior office holders, and paint the mad and wanton injustice which this bill would inflict upon them. But enough.

The man who would accept office upon such terms, must forfeit all self-respect, and would become at once a fit tool for corruption and for despotism. He must be degraded in his own eyes, and degraded in the eyes of his fellow-citizens below the rank of a freeman. If you desire to depreciate the Government itself under which we live, you cannot do it more effectually than by placing such a stigma on its officers.

Why, sir, you could not, by any possibility, carry such a law into execution. If it should pass to-morrow, it would fall a dead letter upon your statute book. I would not advocate a forcible resistance to any law, and do not believe that such was the intention of my friend from New Jersey (Mr. Wall), when he spoke of resistance; but does not the Senator from Virginia know that laws may be passed of a character so odious, that nobody could be found to carry them into execution? Such are all laws which are entirely opposed to the spirit of the age, and the united and overwhelming current of public opinion. I firmly believe this to be the character of the present bill.

But suppose me to be mistaken in this opinion, and that the law could be carried into execution, what would be the consequences? The doomed officer, the postmaster, the weigher or the gauger, is placed in the midst of a thinking, acting, busy population. Everything around him is proceeding with the impetuosity of steam. Public opinion is marching onward with giant strides. The officer is talked at and talked to, daily and hourly, by the surrounding multitude, whilst the law compels him to close his lips in silence. Under such circumstances, it would be impossible for human nature long to refrain. What then? If he utters a syllable on any of the exciting political topics of the day, and these are all involved in the perpetual canvass which is proceeding for offices, high and low, he is at once seized upon by some harpy of an informer. This bill offers a most tempting bribe to such eavesdroppers. It would soon call into existence such a race, to dog and surround each officer, and to catch up every incautious word which might be construed into an endeavor to persuade or to dissuade an elector. Each individual in society is stimulated by this bill to become a common informer, by the tempting offer of a bribe of two hundred and fifty dollars in each particular case. The proscribed officer thus becomes his prey, and, in most cases, will be glad to compromise with him for the payment of a great part, or the whole, of the penalty of five hundred dollars, in order to avoid the stigma of perpetual disability to hold any office under this Government.

There is another remark which I desire to make on this branch of the subject. Whenever you attempt to violate the plain letter and spirit of the Constitution, a thousand evils, of which you have never dreamed, present themselves in the perspective. This law can alone be executed by the courts of the United States. Where are they situated? In the large States, such as Pennsylvania or Virginia, they are held at great distances from each other. A postmaster in either of these States, the income of whose office does not exceed fifty dollars per annum, may be dragged from home, a distance of one hundred and fifty or two hundred miles, to stand his trial under this bill before a federal court. The expense would be enormous, whilst he is obliged to appear before a tribunal far from the place where his character, and that of his prosecutor, are known and appreciated. Under such circumstances, he would almost be certain to become the victim of the common informer, under this most unjust and unconstitutional law. He would either be convicted, or compelled to buy his peace at almost any price.

In conferring the powers enumerated in the Constitution on the Federal Government, the States expressly reserved to themselves respectively, or to their people, all the powers not delegated by it to the United States, or prohibited by it to the States. Now, I would ask the Senator from Kentucky when, or where, or how has the State of Pennsylvania surrendered to Congress the right of depriving any of her citizens, who may accept office under the General Government, of the freedom of speech or of the press? Where is it declared by the Constitution, either in express terms, or from what clause can it fairly be inferred, that Congress may make a forfeiture of the dearest of all political rights, an indispensable condition of office? Each one of the people of Pennsylvania, under her constitution and laws, is secured in the inalienable right of speaking his thoughts. The State, as well as each individual citizen, has the deepest interest in the preservation of this right. I ask the gentleman to lay his finger on the clause of the Constitution by which it has been surrendered. Where is it declared, or from what can it be inferred, that because the States have yielded to the Federal Government their citizens to execute public trusts under the General Government, that, therefore, they have yielded the rights of those citizens to express their opinions freely concerning public men and public measures? The proposition appears to me to be full of absurdity. In regard to the qualifications of electors, the States have granted no power whatever to the United States. This subject they have expressly reserved from federal control. The legislatures of the States, and they alone, under the Constitution, possess the power of prescribing the qualifications of the electors of members of the House of Representatives in Congress. They have reserved the same power to themselves in regard to voters for the choice of electors of President and Vice President. What, then, does this bill attempt? To separate two things which reason and the Almighty himself have united beyond all power of separation. You might as well attempt, by arbitrary laws, to separate human life from the power of breathing the vital air, as to detach the elective franchise from freedom of thought, of speech, and of the press. In this atmosphere alone can it live, and move, and have its being. To speak his thoughts is every free elector’s inalienable right. Freedom of speech and of the press are both the sword and shield of our Republican institutions. To declare that when the citizens of a State accept office from the General Government, they thereby forfeit this right to express an opinion in relation to the public concerns of their own State and of the nation, is palpable tyranny. In the language referred to in the report, “it puts bridles into their mouths and saddles upon their backs,” and degrades them from the rank of a reasoning animal. The English precedent of the Senator was wiser, much wiser, in depriving these officers of the right of suffrage altogether. It does not attempt to separate by the power of man two things which Heaven itself has indissolubly united.

If, therefore, the Constitution contained no express provision whatever prohibiting Congress from passing any law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, I think I have shown conclusively that the power to pass this bill could not be inferred from any of its express grants of power. But the Constitution is not silent on the subject. Before its adoption by the States, it was dreaded by the jealous patriots of the day, that the Federal Government might usurp the liberties of the people by attacking the liberty of speech and of the press. They, therefore, insisted upon the insertion of an express provision, as an amendment, which, in all time to come, would prevent Congress from interfering with these inestimable rights. The amendment to which I have often referred was adopted, and these rights were expressly excepted from the powers of the Federal Government. And yet, in the very face of this express negative of federal power, we find the Senator from Kentucky coming forward with his bill declaring direct war against any exercise of the freedom of speech and of the press by those citizens of the States who happen to be office holders under the General Government.

But, says the Senator from Virginia, Congress possess, and have exercised, the unquestionable power of creating offices under the Constitution; and they may, therefore, annex to the holding of those offices such a condition as that prescribed by the bill, or rather the amendment of the Senator from Kentucky. Now, sir, what is this but to say that Congress may declare that any citizen of Pennsylvania, who accepts a federal office, shall take it upon condition that it shall be forfeited the moment he exercises the dearest political right guarantied to him and every other citizen, by the Constitution of the United States? Can Congress impose any such condition upon an office? If they can, they can repeal the most solemn provision of the Constitution, and render it a dead letter in regard to every person in the employment of the General Government. All mankind may then speak and publish what they please, except those individuals who have been selected, I hope, generally, for their integrity and ability, to execute the important public trusts of the country.

The Senator from Kentucky has adduced several precedents to prove that similar powers have been already exercised by Congress in other cases. Let us examine them for a moment. Congress, says he, has declared that an Indian agent who shall himself trade with the Indians, shall be punished for this act. But why? It is because this agent is vested with the power of granting to our citizens licenses to trade with the Indians, and thus to take care that they shall not be imposed upon and cheated. To allow him, therefore, to trade with them himself, would be to make him a judge in his own cause, and to withdraw from them that protection which the law intended. Besides, Congress have received from the States, by the Constitution, the power to regulate commerce with the Indian tribes. The whole subject is thus placed under their control. What, then, is this precedent worth? Is not the trading of an Indian agent with the Indians an express and palpable violation of a duty necessarily involved in his office? Can any thing be clearer than the power and the duty of Congress to punish him for this offence? But what interference can there be between the performance of the duties required by law from a postmaster, or from any other of the proscribed officers, and his expression of an opinion to his neighbor, either for or against any candidate for public office? If the postmaster, for example, performs his whole official duty, if he receives and delivers the letters entrusted to his care, and regularly settles his accounts with the department, what human power can arbitrarily place a gag in his mouth, and declare that he shall be punished for exercising the freedom of speech and of the press, upon the pretext that the exercise of these rights of a freeman are inconsistent with the duties of his office? You might just as well punish him or deprive him of his office for speaking or writing on natural philosophy, or mathematics, or any other scientific subject. You would have the same power to violate that clause in the Constitution conferring upon every man the free exercise of religion, and punish him for expressing his opinion on religious subjects, for attending prayer meetings or bible societies, or for endeavoring to persuade or dissuade any member of the religious society to which he belongs in relation to the choice of its pastor. The principle is precisely the same in both cases. Your power hath this extent, no more. You can punish the officer for neglecting or for violating the duties which appropriately belong to his office. You can not repeal the Constitution by declaring it to be an official duty that he shall abandon the constitutional right of speaking his thoughts upon any subject whatsoever, whether religious, scientific, or political. In other words, you have no right to declare that he shall become a slave when he becomes an officer.

A similar answer, if it were necessary, might be given to the Senator’s other precedents. Officers of the customs are prohibited from owning any vessel or cargo under a pecuniary penalty. And why? Because they themselves are to direct and superintend the entry of vessels and cargoes belonging to other persons and the collection of duties; and to allow them to transact this business for themselves, would be to make them judges in their own cause. It would be an evident violation of the duty naturally attached to their office. But will any one contend that their constitutional freedom of speech, in regard to candidates for office, is incompatible with the proper entry or unloading of vessels engaged either in foreign commerce or the coasting trade?

So the register of a land office is prohibited from entering lands in his own name, or, in other words, from selling lands to himself.

Such are the precedents which the Senator has cited to justify himself in depriving the officers embraced by his bill of the right of freedom of speech and of the press.

But I do not mean even to rest the constitutional question here. From the very nature of the Constitution itself, two great political parties must ever exist in this country. You may call them by what names you will, their principles must ever continue to be the same. The one, dreading federal power, will ever be friendly to a strict construction of the powers delegated to the Federal Government and to State rights. The other equally dreading federal weakness, will ever advocate such a liberal construction of the Constitution as will confer upon the General Government as much power as possible, consistently with a free interpretation of the terms of the instrument. The one party is alarmed at the danger of consolidation; the other at that of disunion. In the days of the elder Adams the party friendly to a liberal construction of the Constitution got into power. And what did they do? Among other things, in the very face of that clause of the Constitution which prohibited Congress from passing any law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, they passed the sedition law. What were its provisions? It punished false, scandalous, and malicious libels against the Government of the United States, either House of Congress, or the President, by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars and imprisonment not exceeding two years.

At the present day, it would be useless to waste the time of the Senate in proving that this law was a violation of the Constitution. It is now admitted that Congress, in passing it, had transcended their powers. If any principle has been established beyond a doubt by the almost unanimous opinion of the people of the United States, it is, that the sedition law was unconstitutional. Such is the strong and universal feeling against it, that if it could now be revived, the authors would probably meet a similar fate with those deluded and desperate men in France who have themselves lately fallen victims upon the same altar on which they had determined to sacrifice the liberty of the press.

The popular odium which followed this law was not so much excited by its particular provisions, as by the fact, that any law upon the subject was a violation of the Constitution, and would establish a precedent for giving such a construction to it as would swallow up the rights of the States and of their people in the gulf of federal power.

The Constitution had declared that “Congress shall pass no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press.” Its framers well knew that, under the laws of each of the States composing this Union, libels were punishable. They, therefore, left the character of all officers created under the Constitution and laws of the United States to be protected by the laws of the several States. They were afraid to give this Government any authority over the subject of libels, lest its colossal power might be wielded against the liberty of the press. Congress were, therefore, prohibited from passing any law upon the subject, whether good or bad. It was not merely because the law was unjust in itself, though it was bad enough, Heaven knows, that the indignant Republicans of that day rose against it; but it was because it violated the Constitution. It expired by its own limitation in March, 1801; but not until it had utterly prostrated the political party which gave it birth.

Now, sir, I shall say a few words concerning the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 1798; although the Senator from Virginia may consider it sacrilege in me to discuss this subject. I have at all times, ever since I read and understood these resolutions, held to the political doctrines which they inculcate; and I can assure the Senator I have studied them with care. I will read a few extracts from the Virginia resolutions:

The General Assembly, in the third resolution, “doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it views the powers of the Federal Government, as resulting from the compact, to which the States are parties, as limited by the plain sense and intention of the instrument constituting that compact—and as no further valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact;” and in the fourth resolution, they express their deep regret, “that a spirit has, in sundry instances, been manifested by the Federal Government, to enlarge its powers by forced constructions of the constitutional charter which defines them.” In regard to the sedition law, they declare that its passage was the exercise of “a power not delegated by the Constitution; but, on the contrary, expressly and positively forbidden by one of the amendments thereto; a power, which, more than any other, ought to produce universal alarm; because it is levelled against that right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon, which has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right.”

Now, sir, what is the essence, what is the root of all these resolutions? It consists of one plain, clear, fundamental principle, from which all others proceed as branches. It is this, that patriotism—that the permanence of our institutions—that all the principles of correct construction require, that the Federal Government shall be limited to the express powers granted to it by the States, and that no implied powers shall ever be exercised, except such as are evidently and plainly necessary to carry the express powers into effect. This is the foundation, the corner stone, the vital principle of all the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions. It was because the sedition law violated this principle, that the Republican statesmen of Virginia and Kentucky opposed it with such a determined spirit. It was, as Mr. Madison says in his report, because such a loose construction of the Constitution as would bring this law within its pale, would lay the foundation from which the friends of a strong central government might proceed to rob the States and the people of their liberties, and establish a consolidated government. It was the first stride towards a limited monarchy.

The Federalists of that day honestly believed that the Government should be strengthened at the centre, and that the pulsations of the heart were not powerful enough to extend a wholesome circulation to the extremities. They, therefore, used every effort to enlarge the powers of the Federal Government by construction. This was the touchstone which then divided parties, and which will continue to divide them until, which God forbid, the Government shall cease to exist.

Now, sir, if I have correctly stated the principle which runs through all the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions, I would ask whether the bill now before the Senate is not a more palpable violation of this principle than the sedition law. I shall now proceed to establish this position.

In the first place, then, the sedition law did not interfere with the freedom of speech. The citizen might speak what he thought and say what he pleased without subjecting himself to its penalties. Under the despotisms of Europe there is a strict censorship over the press. Everything written for publication must undergo the supervision and correction of a Government censor before it can be published. In the most despotic countries, however, some indulgence is granted to the liberty of speech on political questions. The bill establishes more than a universal censorship over the freedom of speech. It compels the officer to be silent altogether on political questions. He dare not utter a word without incurring its penalties. In this country, every public question connects itself with our elections. If there be two candidates for any State Legislature, and the election should turn upon internal improvements, or the division of a county, the officer is as much exposed to the universal sweep of this bill, in case he utters a word in favor of the one or against the other, as though it were the Presidential election. He is equally doomed to silence in the one case as in the other. Such tyranny is unknown to the sedition law.

Whilst I was abroad some years ago, I heard an anecdote highly creditable to the King of Prussia, who, although a despot, is, by his subjects, called a Democratic King. The revolutionary war of Poland against Russia was then raging, and the Polish subjects of the Prussian king were highly excited in favor of their brethren under the dominion of Russia. They talked very freely in favor of taking part in the contest; of casting off the Prussian yoke, and uniting with their brethren in re-establishing the independence of Poland. The counsellors of the king advised him to prohibit and to punish this freedom of speech. He answered that he would do no such thing; that he would suffer them to express their opinions, and that there was less danger that they would rise against his government than if they remained silent. This was the remark of a liberal and a wise man, who had been instructed in the school of adversity.

But, in this favored land of liberty, in the nineteenth century, we are about to deny to our citizens the privilege of speaking their thoughts. This is the first attempt which I have ever known or read of, either in England or in this country, to punish the expression of opinions relative to candidates for office as a crime. If ever this was done in England, even in the reigns of the Tudors or the Stuarts, it must have been a Star Chamber offence. In the more enlightened despotisms of Europe, they will learn, with astonishment, that a bill has been introduced into the Senate of the United States, proposing to punish a postmaster for expressing his opinion in favor of a candidate for office, as if this were an enormous crime, with a fine of five hundred dollars, and a perpetual disability to hold any other office under the Government. Even under the common law of England, oral slander is not punishable as a crime. The party injured by it is left to his private remedy.

In the second place, the sedition law, although it did abridge, did not, like this bill, totally destroy the freedom of the press. The sedition law deprived no man of the right or the power, in the first instance, to write and publish to the world any strictures upon the Government which he might think proper. To be sure, if in exercising this privilege he violated the truth, he was made responsible to its penalties. This bill reaches the very fountains of thought. Its object is to prevent its victims from speaking or writing at all. No matter how innocent, or praiseworthy, or true, may be the conversation or the publication, still if it can be construed into an endeavor to persuade any elector to give his vote for a particular candidate, he is doomed to a fine of five hundred dollars, and a perpetual disability to hold office.

Again: under the sedition law, the accused was permitted to protect himself against its penalties, by giving the truth of his charge in evidence. Any individual who had accused the President of the United States of being a bad and dangerous man, who was aiming a blow at the liberties of his country, and desired to usurp the powers of the Government by a latitudinarian construction of the Constitution, was protected by this law from all responsibility, provided he could prove the truth of these allegations to the satisfaction of a court and jury of his countrymen. Not so the present bill. If a postmaster, or a land officer, or a weigher, or a gauger, should endeavor to dissuade any elector from voting for a particular candidate, and should say that this candidate has been guilty of a crime, and therefore his election would be dangerous to the country, and is brought before a court and jury for trial under this bill, he must be convicted, although he may be able to prove the truth of his charge by evidence as clear as a sunbeam. The old English maxim, “the greater the truth the greater the libel,” is again revived, with some show of reason; because the language of truth would be more powerful in persuading or dissuading an elector than that of falsehood. Although every member of the court and the jury might personally know that what the accused had uttered was the truth, yet, under the provisions of this bill, they would be bound to convict and sentence him to suffer its penalties.

I think I have thus established my position that this bill is worse, and more glaringly unconstitutional, than the sedition law.

I now approach the argument of the Senator from Virginia in favor of the constitutionality of this bill. The old argument in favor of the sedition law, as stated by Mr. Madison in his report, was that the general phrases in the preamble and one clause of the Constitution were sufficiently powerful to extend the limited grants of power contained in the body of the instrument, and to confer upon Congress the authority to enact any law they might think proper for the common defence and the general welfare. This doctrine has long since been exploded, and was not adverted to by the Senator from Virginia. We are informed by the same authority, that another argument used, was, that all the State Legislatures had passed laws for the punishment of libels; and that, therefore, the same power belonged to the Government of the United States. A similar argument could not be urged by the Senator in support of this bill; because no State Legislature ever has, and I will venture to say no State Legislature ever will pass such a bill as that now before the Senate. To what argument then did the Senator resort? I shall endeavor to state it fairly. He asks if a judge were to use the freedom of speech or of the press, in canvassing the merits of a cause before the people, which it would become his duty afterwards to decide, would it be an abridgment of this freedom to punish him for such conduct? I answer, certainly not. But does not the gentleman perceive that the offence in this case is substantive and independent, and amounts to a total violation of his official duty, for which he ought to be impeached? The language, oral or printed, which he has used, is the mere agent which he has employed in the commission of the offence. This argument is a begging of the question; for it assumes that, under the Constitution, Congress possess the power to punish one citizen for persuading another, by fair argument, to give his vote for or against any candidate for office. This is the very principle to be established. Again he asks, suppose one of the officers embraced by the bill were to use the freedom of speech or of the press, in saying to an elector, if you will give your vote for such a candidate, I will procure you an office, would not such an officer be punishable? I answer, certainly he would under the State laws; because this would be an attempt to procure a vote by corrupt and improper means. It is a distinct offence, the punishment of which in no manner interferes with the liberty of speech or the press when exercised to accomplish constitutional purposes. A similar answer might be given to his interrogatory in regard to giving a challenge, by word or by writing, to fight a duel. The last question, which capped the climax of his argument, was, if a man be guilty of a false and malicious libel against an innocent person, may you not punish him, under the Constitution, without invading the freedom of speech or of the press—because it is not the words he may use which you punish, but the falsehood of the charge, the evil intention, and the injury inflicted? I ask the Senator if this argument is not a justification of the sedition law to the fullest extent? I have taken down the Senator’s words, and cannot be mistaken in their meaning. What did the sedition law declare? That the authors of “false, scandalous and malicious” libels, with the evil intentions enumerated in the act, should incur its penalties. It was not the mere words published that were punished, but it was their falsehood, their malice, and their evil intentions. The constitutionality of the sedition law is, therefore, embraced not only within the spirit, but within the very words, of the Senator’s argument. Has he not, however unconsciously, defended the sedition law? This argument, to my knowledge, never occurred to those who passed that law; but it is one which, if well founded, would give us the power to-morrow to pass another sedition law.

Do not Senators perceive that the passage of this bill would utterly disfranchise a large and respectable class of our people? Under it, what would be the condition of all the editors of your political journals, whose business and whose duty it is to enlighten public opinion in regard to the merits or demerits of candidates for office? Pass this law, and you declare that no editor of a public paper, of either party, is capable or worthy of holding any of the proscribed offices. He must at once either abandon his paper, and with it the means of supporting himself and his family, or he must surrender any little office which he may hold under the Government.

And yet this bill is supported by my friend from Virginia, who, to use his own language, “has been imbued with the principles of Democracy, and a regard for State rights, from his earliest youth.” If such a charge should ever be made against him hereafter, his speech and his vote in favor of this bill, will acquit him before any court in Christendom, where the truth may be given in evidence. I yet trust that he may never vote for its passage.

Every measure of this kind betrays a want of confidence in the intelligence and patriotism of the American people. It is founded on a distrust of their judgment and integrity. Do you suppose that when a man is appointed a collector or a postmaster, he acquires any more influence over the people than he had before? No, sir! On the contrary, his influence is often diminished, instead of being increased. The people of this country are abundantly capable of judging whether he is more influenced by love of country or love of office. If they should determine that his motives are purely mercenary for supporting a political party, this will destroy his influence. If he be a noisy, violent, and meddling politician, he will do the administration under which he has been appointed, much more harm than good. Let me assure gentlemen that the people are able to take care of themselves. They do not require the interposition of Congress to prevent them from being deceived and led astray by the influence of office holders. Whilst this is my fixed opinion, I think the number of federal officers ought to be strictly limited to the actual necessities of the Government. Pursue this course, and, my life for it, all the land officers, and postmasters, and weighers, and gaugers, which you shall send abroad over the country, can never influence the people to betray their own cause. For my own part, I entertain the most perfect confidence in their intelligence as well as integrity.

That office holders possess comparatively but little influence over the people, will conclusively appear from the brief history of the last two years, the period during which this dreaded man, Mr. Van Buren, has been in office. What has all this alarming influence of the office holders effected at the only points where they are to be found in any considerable number? In the city of Philadelphia, notwithstanding all the influence of the custom-house, the post-office, and the mint, the majority at the last election against the administration was tremendous, being, I believe, upwards of four thousand. The Prætorian guards, as they have been called, performed but little service on that day in that city. On the other hand, look at the interior of Pennsylvania. There the governor, whose patronage within the limits of the State was as great, under the old Constitution, as that of the King of England, had filled every office with enemies of the present administration. Of this I do not complain; for, whether right or wrong, it has been the long established practice of both parties. It is true that many of the postmasters were friendly to the administration; but it is equally certain, that a large proportion of them warmly espoused the cause of the opposition. What was the result? Those wielding the vast patronage were entirely routed, notwithstanding the exertions of the office holders. Gentlemen may quiet their alarms, and be assured that the people cannot be persuaded to abandon their principles by the influence of men in office.

Again: let us look at the State of New York for another example. There the Albany regency were seated in power. The Democratic party was well drilled. All the office holders of the State and of the city were friendly to the administration. Besides, in my opinion, they fought in the righteous cause; and this same abused Albany regency who were their leaders, was composed of as able and as honest men as were ever at the head of any State government. What was the result there? With all this official power and patronage, both of the State and Federal Governments, we were beaten, horse, foot and dragoons. There is not the least necessity for passing an unconstitutional law, to save the people from the influence of the office holders.

Have we not been beaten in all the large cities of the Union, where only there are federal officers in any considerable number? What has been our fate in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, and New Orleans? We have been vanquished in all of them. The hobgoblins and chimeras dire respecting the influence of office holders, which terrify gentlemen, exist only in their own imagination. The people of this country are not the tame and servile creatures who can be seduced from their purpose by the persuasion of the office holders. It is true that in 1828 I did say that the office holders were the enlisted soldiers of that administration by which they were sustained. This was too strong an expression. But admit them to be enlisted soldiers; and whilst I do not deny them some influence, there is no danger to be apprehended from it, as long as there is virtue and intelligence among our people.

And here I hope the Senator from Kentucky will pardon me for suggesting to him an amendment to his bill. He has, I think, made one or two mistakes in the classification of his officers; though, in the general, it is sufficiently perfect. The principle would seem to have been to separate what may be called the aristocracy of office holders from the plebeians. Those of the elevated class are still permitted to enjoy the freedom of speech and of the press, whilst the hard-working operatives among them are denied this privilege. The heads of departments and bureaus, the officers of the army and navy, the superintendents and officers of our mints, and our district attorneys are not affected by this bill. These gentlemen are privileged by their elevation. They are too high to be reached by its provisions. Who, then, ought to care whether weighers and gaugers, and village postmasters, and hard-handed draymen, and such inferior people shall be permitted to express their thoughts on public affairs? I would suggest, however, that the collectors of our principal seaports, the marshals of our extensive judicial districts, and the post-masters in our principal cities receive compensation sufficient to enable them to figure in “good society.” They ought to rank with the district attorneys, and should be elevated from the plebeian to the patrician rank of office holders. They ought to be allowed the freedom of speech and of the press. As to the subordinate officers, they are not worth the trouble of a thought.

To be sure there is one palpable absurdity on the face of the bill. Its avowed purpose is to prevent office holders from exercising an influence in elections. Why, then, except from its operation all those office holders, who, from their station in society, can exercise the most extensive influence, and confine its provisions to the humbler, but not less meritorious class, whose opinions can have but a limited influence over their fellow-men? The district attorney, for example, is excepted—the very man of all others, who, from his position and talents, has the best opportunity of exerting an extensive influence. He may ride over his district, and make political speeches to secure the election of his favorite candidate. He is too high a mark for the gentleman’s bill. But if the subordinates of the custom-house, or the petty postmaster at the cross-roads with an income of fifty dollars per annum, shall dare, even in private conversation, to persuade an elector to vote for or against any candidate, he is to be punished by a fine of five hundred dollars, and a perpetual disability to hold any office under the Government. Was there ever a bill more unequal or more unjust?

Now, sir, I might here, with great propriety, and very much to the relief both of my audience and myself, leave this subject; but there are still some other observations which I conceive it to be my duty to add to what I have already said. Most of them will be elicited by the very strong remarks of my friend from Virginia; for I trust that I may still be permitted to call him by that name.

He and I entered the House of Representatives almost together. I believe he came into it but two years after myself. We soon formed a mutual friendship, which has ever since, I may say, on my part, with great sincerity, continued to exist. We fought shoulder to shoulder, and his great powers were united with my feeble efforts in prostrating the administration of the younger Adams. General Jackson came into power; and during the whole period of that administration he was the steady, unwavering supporter of all its leading measures, except the Specie Circular and his advocacy of the currency bill; and, on that bill, I stood by him, in opposition to the administration. Whilst this man of destiny was in power—this mail of the lion heart, whose will the Whigs declared was law, and whose roaring terrified all the other beasts of the forest, and subdued them into silence—where was then the Senator from Virginia? He was our chosen champion in the fight. Whilst General Jackson was exerting all this tremendous influence, and marshalling all his trained bands of office holders to do his bidding, according to the language of the opposition, these denunciations had no terror for the Senator from Virginia. Never in my life did I perform a duty of friendship with greater ardor than when, on one occasion, I came to his rescue from an unjust attack made against him by the Whigs in relation to a part of his conduct whilst minister in France. After holding out so long together, ought he not, at least, to have parted from us in peace, and bade us a kind adieu? In abandoning our camp, why did he shoot Parthian arrows behind him? In taking leave of us, I hope not forever, is it not too hard for us to hear ourselves denounced by the gentleman in the language which he has used? “He is amazed and bewildered with the scenes passing before him. Whither, he asks, will the mad dominion of party carry us? His mind is filled with despondency as to the fate of his country. Shall we emulate the servility of the senate and people of Rome? You already have your Prætorian bands in this city.” I might quote from his speech other phrases of a similar character; but these are sufficient. I do not believe that any of these expressions were aimed at me personally; yet they strike me with the mass of my political friends, and I feel bound to give them a passing notice.

And why, let me ask the Senator, why did he not sooner make the discovery of the appalling danger of executive influence? Is there more to be dreaded from that cause, under the present administration, than under that which is past? Is Martin Van Buren more formidable than General Jackson was? Let his favorite author, De Tocqueville, answer this question. He says, “the power of General Jackson perpetually increases, but that of the President declines; in his hands the Federal Government is strong, _but it will pass enfeebled into the hands of his successor_.” Do not all now know this to be the truth? Has not the Government passed enfeebled into the hands of his successor? We see it, and feel it, and know it, from every thing which is passing around us. The civilian has succeeded the conqueror; and, I must be permitted to say, has exercised his high powers with great moderation and purity of purpose. In what manner has he ever abused his patronage? In this particular, of what can the gentleman complain?

In February, 1828, I did say that the office holders were the enlisted soldiers of the administration. But did I then propose to gag them? Did I propose to deprive them of the freedom of speech and of the press? No, sir, no! Notwithstanding the number of them scattered over the country, I was not afraid of their influence. On the contrary, I commended the administration for adhering to its friends. I then used the following language:

“In my humble judgment, the present administration could not have proceeded a single year, with the least hope of re-election, but for their patronage. This patronage may have been used unwisely, as my friend from Kentucky [Mr. Letcher] (and I am still proud to call him my friend, notwithstanding our political opposition) has insinuated. I have never blamed them, I shall never blame them, for adhering to their friends. Be true to your friends and they will be true to you, is the dictate both of justice and of sound policy. I shall never participate in abusing the administration for remembering their friends. If you go too much abroad with this patronage, for the purpose of making new friends, you will offend your old ones, and make but very insincere converts.”

What was my opinion in 1828, when I was in the opposition, is still my opinion in 1839, when I am in the majority. I say now, that the administration which goes abroad with its patronage to make converts of its enemies, at the expense of its friends, acts both with ingratitude and injustice. Such an administration deserves to be prostrated. Although neither from principle nor from feeling am I a root and branch man, yet, in this respect, I adopt the opinion of General Washington, the first, the greatest, the wisest, and the best of our Presidents. I prefer him either to General Jackson or to the great apostle of American liberty. This opinion, however, may proceed from the relics of old Federalism. On this subject General Washington says: “I shall not, whilst I have the honor to administer the Government, bring a man into any office of consequence, knowingly, whose political tenets are adverse to the measures which the General Government is pursuing; for this, in my opinion, would be a sort of political suicide. That it would embarrass its movements is certain.”

Now, sir, if any freak of destiny should ever place me in one of these executive departments, and I feel very certain that it never will, I shall tell you the course I would pursue. I should not become an inquisitor of the political opinions of the subordinate office holders, who are receiving salaries of some eight hundred or a thousand dollars a year. For the higher and more responsible offices, however, I would select able, faithful, and well-tried political friends who felt a deep and devoted interest in the success of my measures. And this not for the purpose of concealment, for no public officer ought to be afraid of the scrutiny of the world; but that they might cheerfully co-operate with me in promoting what I believed to be the public interest. I would have no person around me, either to hold back in the traces, or to thwart and defeat my purposes. With General Washington I believe that any other course “would be a sort of political suicide.”

In executing the duties of a public office, I should act upon the same principles that would govern my conduct in regard to a private trust. If the Senator from Virginia were to constitute me his attorney, to transact any important business, I should never employ assistants whom I believed to be openly and avowedly hostile to his interests.

But says the Senator, you already have your Prætorian bands in this city. He doubtless alludes to the officeholders in the different departments of the Government; and, I ask, is Mr. Van Buren’s influence over them greatly to be dreaded? If, sir, the President relies upon such troops he will most certainly be defeated. These Prætorian bands are, to a great extent, on the side of the Senator from Kentucky and his political friends. I would now do them great injustice if I were to call them the enlisted soldiers of the administration. Whilst General Jackson was here they did keep tolerably quiet, but now I understand that many of these heads of bureaus and clerks use the freedom of speech and of the press without reserve against the measures of his successor. Of course I speak from common report. God forbid that I should become an inquisitor as to any man’s politics. It is generally understood that about one-half of them are open enemies of the present administration. I have some acquaintance with a few of those who are called its friends; and among this few I know several, who, although they declare they are in favor of the re-election of Mr. Van Buren, yet they are decidedly opposed to all his prominent measures. Surrounded by such Prætorian bands, what has this tyrant done? Nothing, literally nothing. I believe he is the very last man in the country who can justly be charged with using his official patronage to control the freedom of elections. His forbearance towards his political enemies in office will unquestionably injure him to some extent, and especially in those States where, under the common party law, no person dreams of being permitted to hold office from his political enemies. His liberality in this respect has been condemned by many of his friends, whilst he is accused by his enemies of using his official patronage for corrupt political purposes. This is a hard fate. The Senator must, therefore, pardon me, after having his own high authority in favor of General Jackson’s administration, if, under that of his successor, I cannot now see the dangers of executive patronage in a formidable light.

There was one charge made by the Senator from Virginia against the present administration, which I should have been the first man to sustain, had I believed it to be well founded. Had the President evinced a determination, in the face of all his principles and professions, to form a permanent connection in violation of law, between the Government and the Bank of the United States, or any other State bank, he should, in this particular, have encountered my unqualified opposition. In such an event, I should have been willing to serve under the command of the Senator against the administration; and hundreds and thousands of the unbought and incorruptible Democracy would have rallied to our standard. I am convinced, however, from the reports of the Secretaries of the Treasury and of War, and from the other lights which have been shed upon the subject, that “their poverty and not their will consented” to the partial and limited connection which resulted from the sale of the bond to the Bank of the United States. Such seems to have been the general opinion on this floor, because no Senator came to the aid of the gentleman from Virginia in sustaining this charge. “Where was Roderick then?” Why did not the Senator from Kentucky come to the rescue and sustain his friend from Virginia in the accusation against the administration of having again connected itself with the Bank of the United States?

The Senator from Virginia has informed us, that in his State, a law exists, prohibiting any man who holds office under the Federal Government from holding, at the same time, a State office. This law prevents the same individual from serving two masters. A similar law, I believe, exists in every State of this Union. If there is not, there ought to be. The Federal and State Governments ought to be kept as distinct and independent of each other as possible. The General Government ought never to be permitted to insinuate itself into the concerns of the States, by using their officers as its officers. These incompatible laws proceed from a wise and wholesome jealousy of federal power, and a proper regard for State rights. I heartily approve them. Then, sir, if there be danger in trusting a postmaster of the General Government with the commission of a magistrate under State authority, how infinitely more dangerous would it be to suffer the administration to connect itself with all the State banks of the country? What immense influence over the people of the States could the Federal Government thus acquire! Suffer it to deposit the public money at pleasure with these banks, and permit them to loan it out for their own benefit, and you establish a vast federal influence, not over weighers and gaugers and postmasters, but over the presidents, and directors, and cashiers, and debtors, and creditors of these institutions. You bind them to you by the strongest of all ties, that of self-interest; and they are men who, from their position, cannot fail to exercise an extensive influence over the people of the States. I am a State rights man, and am therefore opposed to any connection between this Government and the State banks; and last of all to such a connection with the Bank of the United States, which is the most powerful of them all. This is one of the chief reasons why I am in favor of an independent Treasury. And yet, friendly to State rights as the Senator professes to be, he complains of the President for opposing such a connection with the State banks, and thereby voluntarily depriving himself of the power and influence which must ever result from such an union.

There are other reasons why I am friendly to an independent Treasury; but this is not the proper occasion to discuss them. I shall merely advert to one which, in my opinion, renders an immediate separation from the banks indispensable to the public interest. The importation of foreign goods into New York, since the commencement of the present year, very far exceeds, according to our information, the corresponding importations during the year 1836, although they were greater in that year than they had ever been since the origin of our Government. This must at once create a large debt against us in England. Meanwhile, what is our condition at home? New York has established what is called a free banking law, under whose provisions more than fifty banks had been established in the beginning of January last, and I know not how many since, with permission to increase their capital to four hundred and eighty-seven millions of dollars. These banks do not even profess to proceed upon the ancient, safe and well established principle of making the specie in their vaults bear some just and reasonable proportion to their circulation and deposits. Another and a novel principle is adopted. State loans and mortgages upon real estate are made to take the place of gold and silver; and an amount of bank notes may be issued equal to the amount of these securities deposited with the comptroller. There is no restriction whatever imposed on these banks in regard to specie, except that they are required to hold eleven pence in the dollar, not of their circulation and deposits united, but of their circulation alone. Well may that able officer have declared, in his report to the legislature, that “it is now evident that the point of danger is not an exclusive metallic currency, but an exclusive paper currency, so redundant and universal as to excite apprehensions for its stability.” The amount of paper issues of these banks, and the amount of bank credits, must rapidly expand the paper circulation, and again produce extravagant speculation. The example of New York will have a powerful influence on the other States of the Union. Already has Georgia established a free banking law; and a bill for the same purpose is now before the legislature of Pennsylvania. If the signs of the times do not deceive me, we shall have another explosion sooner, much sooner than I had anticipated. The Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Webster) nods his assent. [Here Mr. Webster said, “I think so also.”] This paper bubble must, from its nature, go on rapidly expanding, until it reaches the bursting point. The recent suspension of specie payments by the Branch Bank of Mobile, in the State of my friend from Alabama, (Mr. King), may be the remote and distant thunder premonitory of the approaching storm. This is all foreign, however, to the subject before the Senate. I desire now to declare solemnly in advance, that if this explosion should come, and the money of the people in the Treasury should again be converted into irredeemable bank paper and bank credits, the administration will be guiltless of the deed. We have tried, but tried in vain, to establish an independent Treasury, where this money would be safe, in the custody of officers responsible to the people.

There is one incident in relation to the Bank of the United States which my friend from Virginia may be curious to know. Under the Pennsylvania charter it was prohibited from issuing notes under ten dollars. I had fondly hoped that this example might be gradually followed by our legislature in regard to the other banks, until the time should arrive when our whole circulation under ten dollars should consist of gold and silver. The free banking law of New York has enabled the bank to nullify this restriction. Under this law it has established a bank in the city of New York, the capital of which may be increased to $50,000,000, and has transferred to the comptroller of that State Michigan State loan to the amount of $200,000. And what notes, Mr. President, do you suppose it has taken in lieu of this amount of loan? Not an assortment of different denominations, as the other banks have done, but forty thousand five dollar notes. These five dollar notes will be paid out and circulated by the bank at Philadelphia; and thus the wise ten dollar restriction contained in its Pennsylvania charter is completely annulled.

If, therefore, I could believe for a moment that this Government intended to form a permanent connection with the Bank of the United States, and again make it the general depository and fiscal agent of the Treasury, even if no other principle were involved than that of the enormous increase of executive patronage which must necessarily follow, I should at once stand with my friend from Virginia in opposition to the administration. But I would not go over with him to the enemy’s camp. I have somewhere read a eulogy on the wisdom of the Catholic church, for tolerating much freedom of opinion in non-essentials among its members. A pious, an enthusiastic, and an ardent spirit, which, if it belonged to any Protestant church, might produce a schism, is permitted to establish a new order, and thus to benefit, instead of injuring, the ancient establishment. I might point to a St. Dominick and a Loyola for examples. Now, sir, I admit that the Whig party is very Catholic in this respect. It tolerates great difference of opinion. Its unity almost consists in diversity. In that party we recognize “the Democratic Antimasonic” branch. Yes, sir, this is the approved name. I need not mention the names of its two distinguished leaders. The peculiar tenet of this respectable portion of the universal political Whig church is a horrible dread of the murderers of Morgan, whose ghost, like that of Hamlet’s father, walks abroad, and revisits the pale glimpses of the moon, seeking vengeance on his murderers. I wish they could be found, and punished as they deserve. Though not abolitionists in the mass, they do not absolutely reject, though they may receive with an awkward grace, the overtures and aid of the abolitionists. In my portion of the country, at least, the abolitionists are either incorporated with this branch of the party, or hang upon its outskirts. The Senator from Virginia and myself could not, I think, go over to this section of the party, nor would we be received by it into full communion. The Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Clay) will, I think, find to his cost that he has done himself great injury with this branch of the opposition, by the manly and patriotic sentiments which he expressed a few days ago on the subject of abolition.

Then comes the Whig party proper, in which the Senator from Kentucky stands pre-eminent. I need not detail its principles. Now, I humbly apprehend, that even if the President of the United States should determine to ally himself with the bank, and force us to abandon him on that account, neither the Senator from Virginia nor myself could find refuge in the bosom of this party. We have both sinned against it beyond forgiveness. We were both in favor of the removal of the deposits—an offence which, with them, like original sin, “brought death into the world, and all our woe.” For this, no penitence can atone.

Again: we both voted for the expunging resolution, which, in their opinion, was an act of base subserviency and man worship, and, withal, a palpable violation of the Constitution. So dreadful was this offence, that my friend from Delaware [Mr. Bayard] will never get over it. He has solemnly pledged himself to cry aloud and spare not, until this foul blot shall be removed from the journals of the Senate. I should be glad to know why he has not yet introduced his annual resolution to efface this unsightly stain from the record of our proceedings.

In short, we should be compelled to form a separate branch of the Whig party. We should be the deposit-removing, expunging, force bill, anti-bank Jackson Whigs. We should carry with us enough of locofocoism and other combustible materials to blow them all up. They had better have a care of us.

I hope the Senator may yet remain with us, and be persuaded that his old friends upon this floor do not resemble either the servile band in the Roman Senate under the first Cæsar, or that which afterwards degraded themselves so low as to make the favorite horse of one of his successors high priest and consul. He can never be fully received into the communion of the faithful Whigs. Although the fathers of the church here may grant him absolution, yet the rank and file of the party throughout the country will never ratify the deed.

I was pleased to hear the Senator from Virginia, on yesterday, make the explanation which he did to the Senator from North Carolina, [Mr. Strange] in regard to what he had said in favor of the British government. I cheerfully take the explanation. I did suppose he had pronounced a high-wrought eulogy upon that government; but it would not be fair to hold him, or any other Senator, to the exact meaning of words uttered in the heat and ardor of debate.

I agree with him that we are indebted for several of our most valuable institutions to our British ancestors. We have derived from them the principles of liberty established and consecrated by magna charta, the trial by jury, the petition of right, the habeus corpus act, and the revolution of 1688. And yet, notwithstanding all this, I should be very unwilling to make the British government a model for our legislation in Republican America. Look at its effects in practice. Is it a government which sheds its benign influence, like the dews of Heaven, upon all its subjects? Or is it not a government where the rights of the many are sacrificed to promote the interest of the few? The landed aristocracy have controlled the election of a majority of the members of the House of Commons; and they, themselves, compose the House of Lords. The main scope and principal object of their legislation was to promote the great landed interest, that of the large manufacturers, and of the fund holders of a national debt, amounting to more than seven hundred and fifty millions sterling. In order to accomplish these purposes, it became necessary to oppress the poor. Where is the country beneath the sun in which pauperism prevails to such a fearful extent? Is it not known to the whole world that the wages both of agricultural and manufacturing labor are reduced to the very lowest point necessary to sustain human existence? Look at Ireland,—the fairest land I have ever seen. Her laboring population is confined to the potatoe. Rarely, indeed, do they enjoy either the wheat or the beef which their country produces in such plentiful abundance. It is chiefly sent abroad for foreign consumption.

The people of England are now struggling to make their institutions more free; and I trust in God they may succeed; yet their whole system is artificial, and without breaking it down altogether, I do not perceive how the condition of the mass of the people can be much ameliorated. In the present state of the world, no friend of the human race ought probably to desire its immediate destruction. We ought to regard it rather as a beacon to warn us than as a model for our imitation. We ought never, like England, to raise up by legislation any great interests or monopolies to oppress the people, which we cannot put down without crushing the Government itself. Such is now the condition of that country. I am no admirer of the British constitution, either in church or state, as it at present exists. I desire not a splendid government for this country.

The Senator from Virginia has quoted with approbation, and sustained by argument, a sentiment from De Tocqueville to which I can never subscribe. It is this: That there is greater danger, under a Government like ours, that the Chief Magistrate may abuse his power, than under a limited monarchy; because, being elected by the people, and their sympathies being strongly enlisted in his favor, he may go on to usurp the liberties of the country with their approbation.

[Here Mr. Rives rose and explained.]

Mr. Buchanan. From the gentleman’s explaination, I find that I did not misquote either his proposition or his argument. I am sorry he speaks under the dominion of so much feeling. I have none at all on the present occasion. I shall proceed, and, at the proper time, and, I trust, in the proper manner, give my answer to this proposition.

The Senator has introduced De Tocqueville as authority on this question; and, in order to give greater weight and lustre to this authority, has pronounced him superior to Montesquieu. Montesquieu was a profound thinker, and almost every sentence of his is an apothegm of wisdom. He has stood, and ever will stand, the test of time. I cannot compare De Tocqueville with Montesquieu. I think he himself would blush at such a comparison.

I may truly say that I have never met any Frenchman or Englishman who could understand the complicated relations existing between our Federal and State Governments. In this respect, De Tocqueville has not succeeded much better than the rest. I am disposed to quarrel with him for one thing, and that is, that he is opposed to the doctrines of the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions. He is one of those old Federalists, in the true acceptation of that term, who believe that the powers of the General Government are not sufficiently strong to protect it from the encroachment of the States. Hence one great object of his book is to prove that this Government is becoming weaker and weaker, whilst that of the States is growing stronger and stronger; and although he does not think the time near, yet the final catastrophe must be, that it will be dissolved by its own weakness, and the people at length, tired of the perpetual struggles of liberty, will finally seek repose in the arms of despotism. This result, in his opinion, is not to be brought about by the strength, but by the weakness, of the Federal Government. I might adduce many quotations to this effect from his book, but I shall trouble the Senate with but a few. He says, in summing up a long chapter on this subject, “I am strangely mistaken if the Federal Government of the United States be not constantly losing strength, retiring gradually from public affairs, and narrowing its circle of action more and more. It is naturally feeble, but it now abandons even its pretensions to strength. On the other hand, I thought that I remarked a more lively sense of independence, and a more decided attachment to provincial government, in the States. The Union is to subsist, but to subsist as a shadow; it is to be strong in certain cases, and weak in all others; in time of warfare it is to be able to concentrate all the forces of the nation, and all the resources of the country in its hands; and in time of peace its existence is to be scarcely perceptible, as if this alternate debility and vigor were natural or possible.”

“I do not foresee anything for the present which may be able to check this general impulse of public opinion; the causes in which it originated do not cease to operate with the same effect. The change will therefore go on, and it may be predicted that, unless some extraordinary event occurs, the Government of the Union will grow weaker and weaker every day.” Again: “So far is the Federal Government from acquiring strength and from threatening the sovereignty of the States, as it grows older, that I maintain it to be growing weaker and weaker, and that the sovereignty of the Union alone is in danger.” And again: “It may, however, be foreseen even now, that when the Americans lose their Republican institutions, they will speedily arrive at a despotic government, without a long interval of limited monarchy.”

Speaking of the power of the President, he says: “Hitherto no citizen has shown any disposition to expose his honor and his life, in order to become the President of the United States, because the power of that office is temporary, limited and subordinate. The prize of fortune must be great to encourage adventurers in so desperate a game. No candidate has as yet been able to arouse the dangerous enthusiasm or the passionate sympathies of the people in his favor, for the very simple reason, that when he is at the head of the Government he has but little power, but little wealth, and but little glory to share amongst his friends; and his influence in the State is too small for the success or the ruin of a faction to depend upon the elevation of an individual to power.”

Now, if this greater than Montesquieu is to be believed, and his authority is to be relied on by the Senator from Virginia, whence his terror and alarm lest the power of the President might be strengthened by the influence of the lower class of federal office holders at elections? Why should they be deprived of the freedom of speech and of the press, upon the principle that the power of Mr. Van Buren is dangerous to the liberties of his country? The gentleman’s lauded authority is entirely against his own position. Now, for my own part, I differ altogether from De Tocqueville. Although I do not believe that the power and patronage of the President can with any, even the least, justice be compared with that of the King of England, yet from the very nature of things, from the rapid increase of our population, from the number of new States, from our growing revenue and expenditures, from the additional number of officers necessary to conduct the affairs of the Government, and from many other causes which I might enumerate, I am convinced that the Federal Executive is becoming stronger and stronger. Rest assured he is not that feeble thing which De Tocqueville represents him to be. Federal power ought always to be watched with vigilant jealousy, not with unjust suspicion. It ought never to be extended by the creation of new offices, except they are absolutely necessary for the transaction of the public business.

The Whigs will be astonished to learn that, in the opinion of this author, General Jackson has greatly contributed, not to strengthen, but to weaken federal power. “Far from wishing to extend it,” says he; “the President belongs to the party which is desirous of limiting that power to the bare and precise letter of the Constitution, and which never puts a construction upon that act favorable to the Government of the Union; far from standing forth as the champion of centralization, General Jackson is the agent of all the jealousies of the States; and he was placed in the lofty situation he occupies by the passions of the people which are most opposed to the central Government.” He states the means adopted by this illustrious man for destroying his own power. They are: 1. Putting down internal improvements. 2. Abandoning the Indians to the legislative tyranny of the States. 3. Destroying the Bank of the United States. 4. Yielding up the tariff as a sacrifice to appease South Carolina. In this list, he mentions the abandonment by Congress of the proceeds of the sales of the public land to the new States to satisfy their importunity. These States will be astonished to learn that Mr. Clay’s land bill, to which they were so violently opposed, gave them the greatest part of the revenue derived from this source; and my friend from Missouri [Mr. Benton] will doubtless be much disappointed to hear that President Jackson had completely adopted the principles of this bill. De Tocqueville has communicated this information to us, and he is high authority. Hear him: “Congress,” says he, “has gone on to sell, for the profit of the nation at large, the uncultivated lands which those new States contained. But the latter at length asserted that, as they were now fully constituted, they ought to enjoy the exclusive right of converting the produce of these sales to their own use. As their remonstrances became more and more threatening, Congress thought fit to deprive the Union of a portion of the privileges which it had hitherto enjoyed; and, at the end of 1832, it passed a law by which the greatest part of the revenue derived from the sale of lands was made over to the new western republics, although the lands themselves were not ceded to them.” And, in a note to this passage, the author says: “It is true that the President refused his assent to this law; but he completely adopted it in principle. See message of 8th December, 1833.”

Here, sir, is a fair sample of the information which passes current in Europe in regard to us and our institutions, and this proceeds from the modern Montesquieu! Had he been a genuine Montesquieu, I think he would have said, General Jackson has strengthened the Federal Government by arresting it in its career of usurpation, and bringing it back to its ancient constitutional course. Thus all danger of collision, or even of jealousy, between it and the States has been avoided; and within its appropriate sphere, every clog has been removed from its vigorous action. It has thus become more powerful. Love of the Union is a sentiment deeply seated in the heart of every American. It grows with his growth, and strengthens with his strength; and never was it stronger than at the present moment. One great cause of this is, that General Jackson has denied himself every power not clearly granted by the Constitution; whilst he has, with a firmness and energy peculiar to himself, exerted all those which have been clearly conferred upon the General Government. But enough of this.

Now, sir, I cannot agree with the Senator from Virginia, according to the explanation which he has given, that there is greater danger of usurpation by an elective President, than by a limited hereditary monarch. His was an argument to prove that, in this respect, a limited monarchy has the advantage over our Republican form of Government. If this be true, then our Government, in one particular at least, is worse than that of England. Now, sir, upon what argument does the gentleman predicate this conclusion? Does he not perceive that it is upon an entire want of confidence in the people of the United States? He fears their feelings may become so enlisted in favor of some popular Chief Magistrate who has been elected by their suffrages—their passions may become so excited—that he may ride upon their backs into despotic power. Now, I do not believe any such thing. I feel the utmost confidence in the people. As long as they remain intelligent and virtuous, they will both be able and willing to defend their own cause, and protect their own liberties from the assaults of an usurper, whether they be open or disguised. Their passions will never drive them to commit suicide upon themselves. It is true the people may go wrong upon some questions. In my opinion, they have recently gone wrong in some of the States; but I rely upon their sober second thought to correct the evil. On a question, however, between liberty and slavery, until they are fit to be slaves, there can be no danger.

The Senator has expressed the opinion, with great confidence, that ours is a far stronger Executive Government than that of England; and has sustained this opinion by an enumeration of office holders, and an argument to which I shall not specially refer. Let any man institute a comparison between the two, and he will find that this is but the creation of a brilliant imagination. I got a friend in the library last evening to collect some statistical information for me on this subject. Even now, in the time of peace, the British army exceeds 101,000 men, including officers; and their vessels of war in commission are one hundred and ninety-one. How will our army of 12,000 men, and our navy consisting of twenty-six vessels in commission, compare with this array of force, and this source of patronage? The officers of the British army and navy, appointed by the crown, hold seats in Parliament, and engage actively in the business of electioneering. No law prohibits them from exerting their influence at elections; and the bill of the Senator from Kentucky, in this respect, bears a close resemblance to the act of Parliament. No jealousy is manifested in either towards the higher officers. It is only those of the humble class who are deprived of their rights.

On the 5th January, 1836, the public debt of Great Britain and Ireland amounted to £760,294,554 7s. 2-¾d. sterling, say, in round numbers, to thirty-six hundred millions of dollars. The interest of every man who owns any portion of this vast national debt is involved in and identified with the power of the British government. It is by the exertion of this power alone, that the annual interest upon his money can be collected from the people. In order to pay this interest and sustain the government, there was collected from the British people, in the form of customs and internal taxes, during the year ending on the 5th January, 1836, the sum of £52,589,992 4s. 6¼d. sterling; say, in round numbers, two hundred and fifty-two millions of dollars. What a vast field for patronage is here presented! How does our revenue, of some twenty or twenty-five millions of dollars, compare with this aggregate? Then there is the patronage attached to the East and West Indies, to the Canadas, and to British possessions scattered all over the earth. The government of England is a consolidated government. It is not like ours, composed of sovereign States, all whose domestic officers are appointed by State authority. The king is the exclusive fountain of office and of honors and of nobility throughout his vast dominions. What is the fact in regard to the General Government? With the exception of post officers, its patronage is almost exclusively confined to the appointment of custom-house officers along our maritime frontier, and land officers near our western limits. Throughout the vast intermediate space, a man may grow old without ever seeing a federal civil officer, unless it be a postmaster. I adduce these facts for the purpose, not of proving that we ought not to exercise a wholesome jealousy towards the Federal Government, but for that of showing how unjust it is to compare the power and patronage of the President of the United States with that of the king of England. You might as well compare the twinkling of the most distant star in the firmament of heaven with the blaze of the meridian sun. May this ever continue to be the case!

I will tell the Senator from Kentucky how far I am willing to proceed with him in punishing public officers. If a postmaster will abuse his franking privilege, as I know to my sorrow has been done in some instances, by converting it into the means of flooding the surrounding country, with base libels in the form of electioneering pamphlets and handbills, let such an officer be instantly dismissed and punished. If any district attorney should either favor or oppress debtors to Government, for the purpose of promoting the interest of his party, he ought to share a similar fate. So if a collector will grant privileges in the execution of his office to one importer, which he denies to another, in order to subserve the views of his party, he ought to be dismissed from office and punished for his offence. I would not tolerate any such official misconduct. But whilst a man faithfully and impartially discharges all the duties of his office, let him not be punished for expressing his opinion in regard to the merits or demerits of any candidate. Above all, let us not violate the Constitution, in order to punish an officer.

The Senator from Virginia has of late appealed to us often to rise above mere party, and to go for our country. Such appeals are not calculated to produce any deep impression on my mind; because, in supporting my party, I honestly believe I am, in the best manner, promoting the interest of my country. I am, but I trust not servilely, a party man. I support the present President, not because I think him the wisest or best man alive, but because he is the faithful and able representative of my principles. As long as he shall continue to maintain these principles, he shall receive my cordial support; but not one moment longer. I do not oppose my friends on this side of the House because I entertain unkind feelings towards them personally. On the contrary, I esteem and respect many of them highly. It is against the political principles of which they are the exponents, that I make war.

I support the President, because he is in favor of a strict and limited construction of the Constitution, according to the true spirit of the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions. I firmly believe that if this Government is to remain powerful and permanent, it can only be by never assuming doubtful powers, which must necessarily bring it into collision with the States. It is not difficult to foresee what would be the termination of such a career of usurpation on the rights of the States.

I oppose the Whig party, because, according to their reading of the Constitution, Congress possess, and they think ought to exercise, powers which would endanger the rights of the States and the liberties of the people. Such a free construction of the Constitution as can derive from the simple power “to lay and collect taxes,” that of creating a National Bank, appears to me to be fraught with imminent danger to the country. I am opposed to the party so liberal in their construction of the Constitution, as to infer the existence of a power in the Federal Government to create and circulate a paper currency for the whole Union, from the clause which merely authorizes Congress “to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes.” Such constructions would establish precedents which might call into existence other alien and sedition laws; and it is such a construction which has given birth to the bill now before the Senate, denying the freedom of speech and of the press to a respectable portion of our citizens.

Should the time ever arrive when these principles shall be carried into practice, and when the Federal Government shall control the whole paper system of the country, either by the agency of a National Bank, or an immediate issue of its own paper, our liberties will then be in the greatest danger. In addition to the constitutional patronage of the President, confer upon him the influence which would result from the establishment of a National Bank, and you may make him too powerful for the people. Such a bank, spreading its branches into every State, controlling all the State institutions, and able to destroy any of them at pleasure, would be a fearful engine of executive power. It would indissolubly connect the money power with the power of the Federal Government; and such an union might, I fear, prove irresistible. The people of the States might still continue to exercise the right of suffrage; all the forms of the Constitution might be preserved, and they might delude themselves with the idea that they were yet free, whilst the moneyed influence had insinuated itself into the very vitals of the State, and was covertly controlling every election.

The personal attachment which bound to General Jackson the most distinguished men of his own party was compounded of something better than a sordid love of office. To them he was always “the old hero.” He was their political chief, and to follow him was of the essence of patriotism. They might sometimes doubt the wisdom of his measures; but they surrendered their own judgments to his, not, as their political adversaries charged, from a slavish fear, but because they regarded him as a great man, honestly and resolutely bent on serving his country. They knew, as well as his opponents, that he had an imperious will. But they knew him better than opponents who never approached him, who held themselves aloof from all contact with his mind, and who formed their ideas of his character from the stories that told how illiterate he was; how he never wrote his State papers; how ignorant he was of constitutional law; how he gave way to his passions, and swore “by the Eternal.” In nothing was the devotion of the leading men of his party to Jackson more fervid, more constant, and more true to their sense of public duty than it was in his warfare against the bank. In the whole of that conflict, in its progress and in its close, a band of men, who numbered among them the strongest intellects of the party, stood by him without the smallest sign of flinching. Some defections there were, but the seceders were not persons of much importance. The great body of his strongest supporters shared in his triumphs over the bank, and to the end of their lives it was to them a victory over a monster, as worthy of everlasting commemoration as the victory of St. Michael over the dragon.

In the opposite party convictions were not less strong, and in that party were some of the foremost minds of the age. As a parliamentary leader, Mr. Clay has been equalled by no man in our political history. With a personal fascination and a persuasive eloquence, he united a temper as dictatorial as Jackson’s; and if he had ever become President, he would, probably, have been as tyrannical as he was accustomed to say and as many believed that Jackson was. The massive logic of Webster; his profound knowledge of our constitutional system and of political history; his full equipment in the accomplishments of a statesman; his careful and comprehensive study of every public question on which he had to act; his vast reputation and his majestic presence made him a far more formidable adversary of the administration than Mr. Clay ever was. Clay had never rendered a service comparable to Webster’s defence of the Constitution against the Nullifiers and his patriotic support of General Jackson’s measures in assertion of its authority. In all the political tactics of Mr. Clay—even in his “compromise tariff,” by which he saved Mr. Calhoun and his followers from a great personal humiliation, and from a serious peril which they brought upon themselves—the public suspected, or believed that there might be reason to suspect, some personal motive. Webster, although as anxious to be President as Clay, although, like his great rival, ambitious in that lofty sense of ambition which consists in the desire to render eminent services to one’s country in the highest attainable position, had more than once in the course of his public life given proof that he could rise above party or personal objects, and could support the measures of an administration when he approved of them, and yet refrain from going over to a party against whose course in other respects he was bound by his convictions to exert his utmost resistance.

Around each of these two prominent leaders of the Whig party was gathered a body of able men, who were so far united as the bond of thinking alike concerning the Republic can unite a political party, but who, in consequence of the rivalry between their respective chiefs, were never held together so compactly as their opponents, the followers of Jackson. Perhaps Mr. Clay was more fortunate in securing and holding the personal attachment of a larger number of political friends than Mr. Webster. Twice was Clay made the candidate of his party; twice was he magnanimously and vigorously supported by Webster’s powerful aid; and twice he was defeated, the first time by Jackson, in 1832, and the second time by Polk, in 1844. In the interim between these two elections, namely, in 1836 and 1840, the Whig party, mainly in consequence of the unreconciled claims of its two greatest statesmen, resorted to a candidate who was personally and politically insignificant, but whom they succeeded in electing in 1840 through the circumstances of the time. But at the period of General Jackson’s second Presidency, the great Whig opposition was firmly united against all his measures respecting the bank and the currency. It was a period when the leading men on all sides were governed by convictions to a very remarkable degree, notwithstanding the influence which the love of office or the desire for it exerted throughout the inferior ranks of politicians in both parties; and among the Whigs the opinion which held the financial measures of General Jackson to be most injurious to the country, was not less strong and sincere than was the belief of his supporters, that the destruction of the bank was necessary to the public welfare.

After Mr. Buchanan entered the Senate, he became conspicuous among the defenders of Jackson’s financial measures. History, however fairly written, must leave it an undecided question, whether the evils and sufferings produced by Jackson’s hostility to the bank were, in the long run, compensated by its destruction, and by the establishment of the doctrine that such an institution must not be allowed to exist. To one generation at least they were not compensated. It was impossible that the connection between the Government and the bank should be severed, as it was severed by Jackson, and be followed by the measures to which he resorted, without causing a wide-spread financial disaster, the bankruptcy and ruin of thousands, and inextricable embarrassment to the Government itself. But it is sufficient for the present purpose to describe the situation in which Jackson left the affairs of the country to his successor, and the troubles through which Mr. Van Buren and his political friends had to grope their way towards a definite solution of the true relation between the Government of the United States and the currency. A short retrospect into the history of the bank will develop the principal grounds of General Jackson’s hostility to it.

There would seem to have been no reason, _a priori_, why the United States, if regarded simply as a nation, should not have a National Bank, to perform the same kind of functions that have been performed by similar institutions in other countries. In the luminous report made by Alexander Hamilton in December, 1790, on a National Bank, he set forth, with his accustomed ability, the advantage of having one fiscal corporation, which could act as the depositary of the public funds, transfer them from place to place as they are wanted at far distant points, enable the Government to borrow money, and furnish, under proper safeguards, a paper circulation of equally recognized value and security throughout the Union, thus increasing the amount of money available for the uses of legitimate business, and the means of effecting exchanges.[55] That the Bank of the United States, chartered by Congress in 1816, had down to the year 1833 well fulfilled these functions, there could be little doubt. But under the Constitution of the United States, which had established a government of enumerated and limited powers, there had always been a question whether Congress possessed authority to create such a fiscal corporation.

This question involved the fundamental rule of interpretation that ought to be applied to the powers of the Constitution:—a rule on which statesmen had differed from the day of its inauguration, and which came to be the most important dividing line between political parties, as soon as parties were formed. The chief canon of interpretation that was acted upon by those who shaped the measures of Washington’s administration, and to which the sanction of his great name was given by his signature of the first charter of a national bank, was that the express and enumerated powers of the Constitution were described in general terms, for the accomplishment of certain great objects of national concern; and that whatever particular powers are necessary as means to the full execution of the general powers described in the instrument, are to be rightfully regarded as having been granted to Congress, because they were included by an implication, without which the principal powers would be nugatory. This, it was contended, would have been a necessary and logical deduction, even if the Constitution itself had not contained a clause defining the scope of the legislative power of Congress, applicable to all the general powers enumerated in the previous recitals. But with this clause, granting to Congress authority “to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or officer thereof,” it was claimed that Congress had ample scope for a choice of means in the execution of every enumerated power granted by the Constitution. Hence arose the doctrine of what have been called “implied powers,” namely, those powers of government which result by implication from the grant of authority over certain subjects, and which, from the nature of political sovereignty, may be employed in the accomplishment of any object over which that sovereignty extends. It was not denied that the means resorted to in the exercise of an implied power must have a relation, as a means, to one or more of the express powers of the Constitution as its end. By the “strict constructionists,” however, it was claimed, first, that the doctrine of implied powers was too broad to be allowed to a government of a special and limited character; secondly, that the Constitution itself did not grant an unlimited choice of means or instruments for the execution of its enumerated powers, but confined the choice to such as are “necessary and proper,” terms that imported a restriction to those means which are indispensable in fact to the attainment of the end. In reply, it was contended by the advocates of the doctrine of implied powers that the terms “necessary and proper” did not import that the particular means employed should be so indispensable to the execution of some granted authority that the authority could not be exercised without resorting to that means; but that any means could be resorted to, which, in the exercise of a sound legislative discretion, might be found to be appropriate, convenient and conducive to the end. Such, it was argued, was the relation between a bank and certain of the express powers of the Constitution.

Satisfied by the powerful intellect and luminous pen of Hamilton that this was a correct construction of the Constitution, Washington, on the 25th of February, 1791, approved the bill which chartered the first Bank of the United States. The paper drawn up by Mr. Jefferson, on the same occasion, controverted the doctrine of implied powers with singular acuteness, and embodied those stricter principles of constitutional interpretation for which the party that he afterwards founded, and that which claimed to be its political successors, have generally contended.[56]

The charter of the first Bank of the United States expired in the year 1811, and those who had originally opposed it then defeated a bill for its renewal. In 1814–15, during the administration of Mr. Madison, while we were engaged in the war with England, it was supposed that the exigencies of the country required a national bank. A bill to create one was passed by the two houses, in January, 1815, but it was “vetoed” by Mr. Madison, and was not passed over his veto. His objections related to the details of the charter. As to the constitutional power to create a national bank, he considered that the repeated acts of all branches of the Government and a concurrence of the general will of the nation, had settled the question, although his personal opinion was adverse to the power. But in 1816, a new charter, which incorporated the last Bank of the United States, was passed by both houses and received the signature of Mr. Madison. This charter was limited to twenty years, and was consequently to expire in 1836.[57] In 1819 the question of its constitutional validity came before the Supreme Court of the United States, and the great mind of Chief Justice Marshall formulated in a judicial decision the doctrine of implied powers, and the bank was declared to be an instrument to which Congress could legitimately resort for the execution of certain of the powers enumerated in the Constitution.[58]

When President Jackson, in 1832, vetoed a bill for renewing the charter of the bank, it might, perhaps, have been wiser for him to have acquiesced, as Mr. Madison did, in the weight of authority and precedent on the question of constitutional power, especially since that weight had been greatly augmented by the decision of the Supreme Court. It was doubtless then, as it always must be, a delicate question whether a President is officially bound, in approving laws, by the opinion of the Judicial Department that such laws are constitutional. General Jackson considered that in his legislative capacity he was not so bound, but that while it was his duty to give due consideration to the reasoning on which the judicial decision rested, it was equally his duty to exercise his own judgment, upon a question of constitutional power, when asked to approve of a law. All his personal convictions, and the convictions of his official advisers, were adverse to the construction on which the constitutional validity of the bank charter depended; and perhaps he and they, believing that the bank, with a large capital and with certain practical powers over the whole paper circulation of the country, had entered the political field in hostility to his administration, did not choose to forego the use of any weapon that could be wielded against it. Aside from his personal interests as a candidate for re-election, it is but justice to believe that he honestly regarded the bank as a dangerous institution, and that he discerned, or thought he discerned, that the constitutional objection was the strongest club with which the Hydra could be assailed. In choosing this weapon, however, as his principal reliance, he enabled his opponents to represent him as a man who chose to set up his own arbitrary will against the judgment of two Congresses, two Presidents of great authority, the Supreme Court of the United States and the general acquiescence of the nation for a period of twenty years, on a question of constitutional construction. Had he placed his veto upon the renewal of its charter on grounds of expediency alone, the bank might have been compelled to wind up its concerns in a manner that would have produced less mischievous consequences to the country than those which ensued.

His next step, the removal from the bank of the public deposits, in the summer of 1833, followed by his selection of certain State banks as the keepers of the public money, and, to a certain extent, as the fiscal agents of the Government, led to a singular train of evils. Doubtless an institution, whose legal existence was to expire in three years, and which could not obtain from Congress a prolongation of its charter without using its power as a moneyed corporation to affect the politics of the country, had by this time become an unfit custodian of the public funds. Still, there was no sufficient warrant of law for placing the public funds in the custody of State banks, at the time when they were so transferred, nor had any system been matured by the executive for the consideration of Congress, which might furnish a substitute for that which had been in operation so long. The selection of certain State banks as the depositaries of the public money, was a tentative experiment, through which the country had to pass, with various disasters, before any safe and efficient substitute could be found.

The immediate effect of the withdrawal of the Government funds from the Bank of the United States, was a diminution of its loans and a consequent contraction of the currency. The immediate effect of placing those funds in a few selected State banks, was a wild speculation by their managers and other favored individuals, leading to their ruin. The assembling of Congress in December, 1833, was followed by Mr. Clay’s attack upon the President, and a session through which the Senate was constantly engaged in the discussion of questions growing out of the situation in which the Government, the country, the Bank of the United States and the State banks had been placed by the executive. At length the Whigs forced from the friends of the administration a disclosure of the President’s purpose to keep the public moneys in the State banks, to collect the public revenues through their agency, not to have any present legislation on the subject, and not to allow another national bank of any kind to be created. The adoption of Mr. Clay’s resolutions censuring the President was followed, on the 17th of April, 1834, by the President’s Protest, a document of singular ability and dignity, setting forth his views of the executive authority over all public officers, including the Secretary of the Treasury, in relation to the custody of the public funds. The Whig majority of the Senate recorded their rejection of these doctrines; but as the administration held a majority in the House of Representatives, the session terminated without any legislation to control in any way the financial experiment which the President had determined should be tried.

In the session which began in December, 1834, when Mr. Buchanan entered the Senate, the Whig majority was still unchanged, but it was destined to be overthrown by the effect of General Jackson’s constantly increasing popularity and influence, which his conduct of the foreign relations of the country greatly tended to strengthen, while in domestic affairs a majority of the people, although beginning to suffer from his measures, still approved of his course in regard to the national bank. Nothing was done, however, at this session, to develope a more definite relation of the Government to the currency; it was a session in which both parties were much occupied with the selection of candidates for the Presidency. The result was, that with the aid of General Jackson’s powerful influence, Mr. Van Buren became the Democratic candidate. In the autumn of 1836, he was elected by a majority of forty-six electoral votes, against General Harrison, the candidate of the Whigs.[59]

The last of the executive measures of General Jackson, in relation to the finances and monetary affairs of the country, was the so-called “Specie Circular,” issued by the Secretary of the Treasury on the 11th of July, 1836. It directed that after a certain period, nothing but gold and silver should be received at the land offices in payment for the public lands. The purpose of this measure was to prevent payment for the public lands in the depreciated paper of the State banks. But in the actual condition of things, its effect was to draw the specie of the country into the vaults of the deposit banks, through the land offices; and as there was then no efficient means by which the Government could transfer its funds from place to place, as they were wanted, by any paper representative of money of equal credit through the Union, specie had to be moved to and fro in masses. The State banks which were not depositaries of the Government funds were thus weakened by the want of specie; they had to curtail their loans, and a great scarcity of money ensued in many quarters. Before Congress assembled in December the internal exchanges of the country were entirely deranged, and a general suspension of specie payments by the banks was not unlikely to take place in the not distant future.

It is not improbable that at this juncture the disasters which ensued in the next year might have been averted, if the political opponents of the administration on the one hand and its friends on the other could, by mutual concessions, have found a common ground of action. To remove the obnoxious Specie Circular was evidently necessary. A bill was passed for this purpose by the two houses, before the end of the session, but at so late a period that the President did not return it, and it failed to become a law. The two opposing parties might have agreed on some provision for the necessities of the Government and the wants of the people,—some mode of providing a regulator of the paper currency,—but for two great obstacles which kept them apart, the one of which was to a great extent the consequence of the other. In the large commercial cities, the principal merchants and bankers were still in favor of the establishment of a national bank, as the true remedy for existing disorders, and thence these classes almost universally acted with the Whigs. General Jackson had resolutely determined that no such institution should ever again be allowed to exist. Although, by the first use which he made of banking corporations in the fiscal concerns of the Government, he seemed to admit the power of the Government to create such corporations, his hostility to a national bank led him and his political friends to seek for the means of divorcing the fiscal concerns of the Government from all connection with banks of any kind, and to deny that the Government of the United States had any duty to perform towards the paper currency, or to provide any currency but gold and silver. Had not the question of a national bank, in consequence of the attitude of so many of the Whigs, entered largely into the issues of the approaching Presidential election, it is not improbable that the two parties, in the session of 1836–7, might have discovered and carried out some means of averting the catastrophe which followed the election. But the result was that General Jackson turned over the Government to his successor on the 4th of March, 1837, without anything having been done for the remedy of existing disorders, and with an imperative necessity for an extra session of Congress. It was summoned by Mr. Van Buren for the 4th of September, 1837. Before that day arrived, every bank in the country had ceased to pay specie.

Footnote 55:

There is, perhaps, no other of the writings of Hamilton which more strikingly exhibits his marvellous powers, the perspicuity of his style, and his faculty of illustrating an intricate subject, than this report. When he made it he was at the age of thirty-three. It reads as if he had passed a long life in some country where banks had been established for centuries, and in some official connection with them, or in mercantile pursuits that had brought him into daily experience of their operations; yet he had never been out of the United States since he came from the Island of St. Christopher, at the age of fifteen; there had been but three banks in this country when he wrote this report; and every part of his life that had not been passed in the army, in Congress, or in the proceedings to form and establish the Constitution of the United States, had been employed in the practice of the law. This master-piece of exposition may be read with delight by any person of taste, such are the grace, precision, force and completeness with which he handles his subject. We need not wonder that it carried conviction among the members of the body to which it was addressed.

Footnote 56:

Works of Thomas Jefferson.

Footnote 57:

See the history of the various bills for creating a national bank stated more in detail in the Life of Mr. Webster, by the present writer, vol. I.

Footnote 58:

McCullough _vs._ the State of Maryland, 4 Wheaton’s R. 316.

Footnote 59:

At the time of the election of Mr. Van Buren, the whole number of electoral votes was 294, a majority being 148. There was no choice of a Vice President by the electoral colleges. Richard M. Johnson, of Kentucky, received 147 votes, and was afterwards elected Vice President by the Senate. General Harrison, the leading Whig candidate for the Presidency, received the electoral votes of Vermont, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana, seventy-three in all. The fourteen votes of Massachusetts were given to Mr. Webster. Hugh L. White, of Tennessee, received the votes of Tennessee and of Georgia, twenty-six in all. The votes of South Carolina, eleven, were given to W. P. Mangum, of North Carolina. It is apparent, therefore, that at this time the Whigs, if we comprehend in that term all the opponents of the Democratic party, were in a decided minority in the country at large. This was partly because their leading candidate was far inferior to the important men of the opposition; but it was chiefly because the great States of New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia still adhered to the financial and other measures of General Jackson, and because so many of the smaller States were still indisposed to return to the policy of a national bank.