Officers of both houses of Congress.--Vice President Mangum.--
Speaker Jones.--Members of Congress, their labors and unenviable
state.--Eloquence of members.--Senators Choate, Crittenden,
Morehead, &c. &c.--The Tariff, Oregon and Texas to go down to
the foot of the docket and be postponed until next session of our
honorable court.
OFFICERS OF BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS.
In the Senate, the Honorable WILLIE P. MANGUM presides. John Tyler, the
Vice President, on the death of General Harrison became President of
the United States. The Senate thereafter elected Samuel Southard, their
presiding officer, he dying, they elected Judge Mangum their president.
He lives, when at home, in Orange county, North Carolina. From his
name, I should suppose that his ancestors were from Wales. However that
may be, Judge Mangum’s family is an ancient one in North Carolina,
the name being found among the earliest settlers of that colony. He
presides in the Senate and occupies the Vice President’s room in the
capitol. He is a man above the common size, of fair complexion and
commanding air, rather grave in his manners, but very agreeable and
appears to be kind hearted. His voice is clear, sufficiently loud and
distinct to be heard all over the Senate chamber and its gallery. On
the whole, he is, taking him all and all, the best presiding officer,
that I ever saw in any legislative assembly. He is always at his ease,
always dignified and always agreeable. His appearance is that of a man
about forty years old. He is a whig, unwavering and unflinching, yet,
like the Kentucky Senators, not a persecuting whig, often voting to
confirm men in offices, who are not whigs, nor any thing else--long. He
appears to look more to the interests of his country than his party.
When I say this, I mean to draw no invidious distinctions between Judge
Mangum and others in the Senate. The feelings of senators must have
been often severely tried by having presented to them the names of
very incompetent men. Where the man is not decidedly a bad one, though
wanting _decision of character_, without which no man can be relied on,
in any pressing emergency, the Senate let him pass as Hopson’s choice,
because they expect nothing better. In this way they have confirmed
many nominations which I should have rejected at once, as destitute of
a qualification, without possessing which, no man is fit for any office
or any calling. So far as Ohio is concerned, not even one appointment
of a citizen of that State, has been a good one, nor such an one as
I would have made, during the last two years. I feel no hostility to
any one of these weak men, but wish they had belonged to some other
State, not to ours. Where the imbecility of a country is placed in
the offices, it shows the strength of our institutions and the virtue
of our people, which can get along tolerably well, though such weak
men are appointed to offices. To have found so much imbecility, so
carefully selected from the very surface of society, must have cost
those a vast deal of labor, care and diligence, who have succeeded so
well, so perfectly in hunting it up, and in bringing it forward to the
President and his secretaries for their acceptance and gratification!
It is a strong argument in favor of the permanency of our institutions,
which can bear such appointments. The Senate appear to be as hungry
for the nomination of men well qualified for the offices to which they
are nominated, as any trout ever was for a well baited hook--they jump
at them in a moment and unanimously confirm them. The confirmation of
CALHOUN’S appointment as Secretary of State is a case in point. The
news spread like wildfire, and fell upon the ear like the roar of a
water fall in the ear of a thirsty traveller, in the desert of Sahara.
ASBURY DICKENS is clerk of the Senate, and a better clerk of that body
could not have been found in the Union.
EDWARD DYER is sergeant-at-arms, and he is an excellent officer.
In the House of Representatives, JOHN W. JONES is the speaker. He
appears to understand the rules of the House pretty well, but owing to
the weakness of his voice, or to the structure of the room, perhaps, we
should attribute something to each cause, I cannot hear speaker Jones
at all, on any occasion, from any location in the room which I have
ever been permitted to occupy, by the courtesy of the House.
CALEB J. M’NULTY is clerk of this House, and a better clerk, a more
obliging one, more correct, more industrious, more attentive to all his
duties as a clerk, more obliging, polite, and in all respects capable
and faithful, never filled the clerk’s office. M. St. Clair Clarke,
his predecessor in office, although applauded constantly for his good
qualities of all sorts, yet our Ohio man does, for aught I can see, as
well as M. St. Clair Clarke himself ever did in his best days.
Among the ladies attending on this session of Congress, we mention
with pleasure and pride MRS. M’NULTY, wife of the clerk of the House.
She was born and educated in Ohio. She is beautiful in form and manners
and does honor to our _Buckeye State_.
This handsome couple are young in years, just beginning the world and
bid fair to live long and be useful in the world, and be ornaments of
Ohio. Prosperity and success to them!
DOCTOR LANE of Louisville, Kentucky, is the sergeant-at-arms in the
House, and he is a very gentlemanly, faithful and attentive officer.
The door-keeper, JESSE E. DOW, and the postmaster, JOHN M. JOHNSON, are
as good officers as need be, and they give general satisfaction.
Members of Congress, generally speaking, are not idle men by any means.
Besides their attendance on the daily sessions of the two houses, they
are on committees, which occupy no small portion of the day, and,
sometimes they are in their committees to a late hour at night. The
more laborious part of the members work more hours, than any farmer
does in the country. Some of them have a great correspondence with
their constituents and others. They are obliged to call at the public
offices, on the business of those whom they represent. Some members,
who represent the farmers of the interior, have little to do, and such
members, are not often chairmen of important committees, and they may
lead an easy life. Those who represent large cities, or many commercial
people, have more than they can find time to do it in. The same remark
applies to those who represent manufacturing districts. Delegates from
Territories, like the Dodges, father and son, have an immense amount
of business to do, and a great correspondence to carry on. Such men
labor night and day. Calls on them, made by their constituents and by
others from all parts of the Union, interrupt them a good deal. General
Vance, chairman of the committee of claims, performs daily a very
laborious task. So far as Ohio is concerned, in sending representatives
to both houses, I am sure that we have little reason to complain of
their remissness or inattention to the duties of their station. There
is not a dissipated man among them nor an idler. So far as I know,
they faithfully attend to all their business in Congress. Their per
diem, eight dollars, seems to be a very liberal compensation for their
services, but after paying all their bills for living here, very little
remains. Those who have families here, actually fall in debt, and have
to borrow money to pay a part of their expenses. A very considerable
number of the members have their wives with them--and where they have
daughters and female relatives, their compensation is wholly inadequate
to pay their expenses. The ladies visit the library often and there
read and amuse themselves, or they sit in the gallery of the House,
listening to the debates. The families of such members as are able
to bring them here, appear to be quite happy. By associating with
many respectable, well informed and polite people, they learn a great
deal of the world and its affairs. They become personally acquainted
with the first men in the nation. In this way they can form a more
correct estimate of such men, their character, dispositions, manners,
habits and talents. In vain do we look into newspapers, pamphlets and
periodicals for correct ideas concerning these men. They are much
better, or not so bad, as common report makes them. Though I had known
Mr. Calhoun forty years, by common report, and, although I had seen
him often presiding in the Senate chamber, yet until I sat down beside
him in his office, and had conversed with him sometime, I had never
had any correct ideas of the man at all. I had always been told, that
he was impetuous, sour and morose, but I found him to be the mildest,
kindest and most agreeable man I ever saw. I was truly astonished at
the contrast between the man as he really was, and the one he was
represented to be! I was agreeably disappointed in many others. With
the character of our western men I was in no case deceived, because I
knew them either personally or from correct sources of information.
For instance, although I had never seen the Kentucky senators, yet I
found them, Crittenden and Morehead, as agreeable, as well informed,
as friendly, kind and conciliating in their manners, as I had always
understood they were.
By mingling in such society, our young men may acquire a fund of
information, which may be of great value to them in after life.
Though I knew Colonel Benton personally well and knew him to be a
man of kind feelings towards his friends, and even towards many who
are not friendly to him, yet, he is often represented as malignant
and overbearing. It is not true, because at the bottom of his heart
there is a great deal of good feeling. He cannot always suppress
the exhibition of his better nature, even towards open and avowed
political opponents. So of our senators, Tappan and Allen, the whigs of
Ohio believe that these senators are their enemies, but I always found
them very friendly to me, doing me many favors and no injury--quite the
reverse. They have their own political creed, differing from mine in
some respects, but they endeavor to serve their constituents when they
come here, even if they are whigs.
Those who have been long in Congress can be much more useful to their
constituents, than those who have had less experience. Understanding
all the rules of proceeding, they know how to take advantage of
circumstances, when to make a motion, and the exact moment when to
oppose an opponent. They say less and more to the purpose. Young men
are quite apt to be impetuous, hasty and rash, and thus often get
overwhelmed by a more cool, deliberate member. JOHN QUINCY ADAMS is
the hardest man to deal with in the House. Understanding all the rules
of legislation, with a large store of information, he is sometimes
sarcastic and witty, sometimes profound and those who attack him always
come off second best. Of all the attacks on Mr. Adams this session,
C. J. Ingersoll’s was the most unfortunate for the assailant. Mr. Wise
related the whole of it to me in the library, immediately after the
assault was made and the chastisement which Ingersoll got. Mr. Wise
condemned C. J. Ingersoll, as every one else did, for his behaviour
towards an aged, respectable man, whose public services, years learning
and talents ought to command and do command the respect of all good
men in the nation. Any member of Congress who respects himself, will
always be treated with respect, because he deserves it. Any young man,
who thinks to obtain any advantage by assailing Mr. Adams, will find
himself to have made a false calculation.
The Senators preserve their own dignity, and do not mingle much
with the turbulence around them. They are often misrepresented by
malignant letter writers, and the falsehoods they invent, have a wide
circulation. These Senators cannot devote up their time to explanations
and contradictions of such misrepresentations. They have something else
to do.
I will state an instance in point. About the time that the speculators
in Texan land scrip, began their operations, to effect an annexation of
Texas to this Union, some letter writer pretended to tell exactly how
all the Senators would vote on that question. A number of the members
of that body told me, “that they had neither made up nor expressed any
opinion on that subject.” I afterwards ascertained from the highest
source of information, that not a few Senators would not vote as the
speculators had predicted they would, but exactly the reverse. Such
miscalculations are daily made by interested or malicious persons,
who hover around the capitol. Seeing the papers from a distance, and
conversing with the members on the subjects treated of by the letter
writers, induced me finally to distrust all I saw, coming from such a
polluted source. These falsehoods do their authors no good, but often
an injury. Placed as members of Congress are on a pinnacle, in view
of a whole nation, unless they possess well ballanced minds, they
are not to be envied. They have rivals at home, sometimes ready to
misrepresent their motives, their services and their talents. There is
always requisite, the constant exercise of one virtue, at least, which
is patience, and they must labor incessantly to gratify friends at
home, who expect at their hands more than they can do for them. To be a
member of Congress, requires talents of all sorts--great industry, great
attention to business, constant care, strength of body and strength of
mind. Members of Congress, who make a figure as orators, can do little
indeed for individuals among their friends. Moving in a higher sphere,
they aim at some high station--to be a minister abroad, a Secretary, or
to obtain some lucrative office. Apparently laboring for the public
good, their real object is frequently very selfish. Such men have
rivals among their own party, and all their political opponents are
opposed to them. If they succeed to their hearts’ content, how long
does their prosperity last? In a few short years their race is run and
they are seldom mentioned, but oblivion covers them from our view and
even from our thoughts. Those who figured on the stage at some great
era in our national affairs, and stood high then, are remembered with
affection and gratitude, but the little party politician is forgotten
as soon as he walks off the stage. In this changing world, how soon is
the mere demagogue forgotten? In his day, he impresses his retainers
with the idea, that, unless some favorite theory is adopted, all is
lost. It is exploded, he disappears from our sight, and the world
moves on in safety. There is an elasticity in the American character,
not existing to the same extent in any other nation. Under any great
national disappointment, there may be, and there is, sometimes a
season of national gloom, but recovering from such a state of mind,
our people rouse up all their wonted courage, and confiding in their
own strength, they move onward to new enterprises, entertain new
hopes, and finally realise, and frequently more than realise all
their most sanguine expectations. In the natural world, the storm and
the tornado may be as necessary as the clear sunshine and the gentle
shower, and why should the mental world differ from the natural one in
this respect? “This is a crisis,” says the demagogue--“a nation’s fate
depends on the issue of this crisis,” but the mighty crisis passes by
as harmless as the Zephyr’s breath in May moves over the meadow. These
getters up of crises are, on the whole, quite a harmless set of beings.
They keep up a ripple on the ocean of human life and prevent a dead
calm in the political ocean. In this session of Congress I have seen
none of these crises and panic makers in the two houses. The debates
on the twenty-first rule, on the Oregon question, on the army bill, on
the tariff and some other topics were ardent, long and exciting, but
they did not produce a very angry debate. These several storms passed
over without doing much harm, like a squall of wind without hail, or
even much rain descending to deluge the earth.
During Dr. HAMMET’S speech on the 21st rule, I had a place, through
the Doctor’s politeness, a seat in the body of the House, from which,
by standing on my feet, I saw every member in his place, and witnessed
the effect on the countenances of members, which that speech produced.
Those passages which turned sixty faces pale, produced convulsive
laughter among the rest of the members. The countenance of Mr. Adams
never changed from a serene aspect, whereas the Ohio members mostly
looked unmoved as marble, in no wise excited by the topics, except when
the speaker alluded to the old maids of Massachusetts. When they were
introduced into his speech, our members were taken by surprise, and
they laughed immoderately. Even Gen. Vance, Judge Dean and all, with
all their usual gravity, laughed heartily, and forgot to be grave. The
hit was a fair one and well deserved. Female fanatics are doing some
harm, and can do no good. On questions, and even doubtful ones of great
national importance, our females would show more wisdom to be silent,
than to press forward on the stage in buskins to show themselves as
players.
Many persons think the members do wrong to indulge themselves in
so much speaking, but better make long speeches than pass many bad
laws. That too many laws are made by state, territorial and national
legislation is certain. The mania for speech making is not as bad
as many suppose it to be--it is the safety valve that lets off the
superfluous steam, otherwise boilers would burst, and blow into
fragments the vessel of state. Viewed in this light, we can tolerate it
from motives of sympathy for the afflicted. Another good effect flows
from these long speeches, while they are delivered, members can go into
the library, the lobby or the rotundo and amuse themselves or converse
with their friends. The speech being made, it can be printed and sent
home to their constituents. They are pleased and thus many ends are
answered by the delivering of a speech.
ELOQUENCE OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS.--Under this head I shall not say
much, for several reasons. The chambers are but poorly calculated for
hearing in them; the places occupied by those who wish to hear and
report speeches, are not such ones as they should be, if hearing be the
object of those who sit in them; the noise necessarily made by three
hundred persons, moving about and sometimes talking and whispering;
the opening and shutting of doors and the confused din, attendant on
such an assemblage of men; the many objects, such as the LADIES in the
galleries of the House, naturally draw off the eye from the debater,
the ear from the sound of his voice and the mind from the subject in
discussion. With all these abatements and all these impediments, we
need not wonder if the speeches are not very correctly reported, they
being so imperfectly heard when they are delivered. This circumstance
gives rise to every day explanations, almost, in both houses, to
correct erroneous reports of speeches. But with all these impediments,
there is a very considerable number of good speakers, especially
in the Senate. It is possible, however, that the Senate’s chamber
being a place wherein one can hear better than in the gallery of the
other house, may have had quite an influence on my opinion in this
particular. Senator CHOATE is quite a favorite among his friends, as an
orator. His voice is clear, sufficiently loud and distinct; his method
is clear, his language elegant, often beautiful; the impression which
he makes on the hearer is highly agreeable. He rises neither too high
nor sinks too low for his subject, but flies along over the subject at
a suitable elevation. He looks as if he were a man of great labor, and
not in very good health. He appears to be care-worn, and as if he was
over-worked by the incessant toils of his station. I have no personal
acquaintance with him, and speak merely from what I saw of him a few
moments at Dr. Sewall’s, and from hearing him in the Senate chamber a
few times. He is the brother-in-law of the Doctor and lodges at his
house. Mr. Choate represents the manufacturing and commercial classes
and has a laborious task to perform, in opposition to restless men,
who, it appears to me, mistake their own interest in opposing commerce
and manufactures.
JOHN J. CRITTENDEN, a senator from Kentucky, is a most delightful
speaker. With a melodious voice, clear method, clear sentences, in
which every word is fitly chosen, so that no one could be changed for
any other word in its location that would do as well in its place. His
arguments are lucid, his manner is so fascinating that he is a model of
forensic eloquence in a parliamentary debate. Honest, candid, sincere,
pleasant, sometimes eloquent, always happy in his expressions, it is no
wonder that he is a very popular orator. On hearing him, you esteem him
as a gentleman, and love him as a man. He was nominated by Mr. Adams to
the Senate of the United States as a judge of the United States supreme
court, but was not confirmed, and Judge M’Lean fills the place to which
Mr. Crittenden was nominated. He would have made as excellent a judge,
as he made a member of General Harrison’s cabinet. He has no enemy who
personally knows him, so pure, so sincere and candid is he in all his
intercourse with the world, that even those who disagree in opinion
with him, love the man, his manners and his straight forwardness of
speech and of action. His age may be forty-eight and he is quite grey
headed, of the common size and square built. His lady has a young
look and is still handsome. She is always lady-like and agreeable in
her conversation and deportment. In these respects she resembles the
ladies of Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee. They always remind me of the
West, and recall to my mind the delightful recollections of a large
integral portion of my extended life, spent among scenes and surrounded
by a people always dear to my heart. No place, time or circumstances
will ever be able to obliterate these impressions from my vivid
recollections of a delightful past. The Western people, possessing
as they do, unflinching courage, pure patriotism, a love of liberty,
of sincerity and truth, decision of character, open heartedness and
sincerity, with broad and liberal views, and possessing too an energy
and a determination to go forward, conquering the forest and the
prairie, they will soon extend our dominion to the Pacific ocean. Such
a people will always go ahead of all national legislation and compel
Congress to come limping and halting along on crutches and stilts
behind them.
JAMES T. MOREHEAD, the other Kentucky senator, was formerly governor
of that State. He is six feet high or upwards, rather spare in flesh,
straight as an Indian, and he is so agreeable in his manners and
address, as to be as he truly is the world’s idol. His words flow along
in a constant stream, sweeter than honey. Sometimes he rises into
sublimity, and soars along on high, and like our own eagle, revelling
in the beams of a clear sun. Sometimes he can be playful, with an
arch leer on his brow when he is ironical. He can captivate with his
witchery of manner and of style. His method is good, his sentences
are clear, sometimes pointed, sarcastic and withering. His manner is
winning and his arguments convincing. He is shrewd, searching and
occasionally severe in his arguments, though not in his language. His
ideas may be hard, but his words are soft, smooth and melodies. He
labors with his pen and his books incessantly, sometimes more than his
body can well bear. Having come over into Ohio and married and carried
off a beautiful, amiable and good lady, the daughter of my excellent
friend, J. M. Espy, of Columbus, I wish I had it in my power to present
the reader a short biographical sketch of Gov. Morehead.
Under the head of eloquence, I will confess, that although I have been
months attending here, sometimes conversing with members of Congress,
sometimes with other persons from all parts of the Union--standing in
the rotundo or sitting in the library, there conversing or reading, I
always found it an unpleasant task to hear speeches, unless some one
was speaking whom I knew or greatly desired to hear. I went to hear Dr.
HAMMET of Mississippi, JOHN Q. ADAMS, GENERAL DROMGOOLE, JUDGE DEAN,
JOHN B. WELLER, SCHENCK, VINTON, FLORENCE, VAN METER, POTTER and a few
others, but I had so much difficulty to get a seat where I could hear,
that I seldom made an attempt to get a seat in the House. HALE of New
Hampshire, when he spoke, could always be heard and understood.
It appeared to me, that our western members were more eloquent on the
Oregon question than the eastern members, and that the eastern members
beat the western ones on the tariff question all hollow. The eastern
members were learned, eloquent and sensible whenever they spoke of
manufactures, commerce or trade. These speeches, properly digested,
would make an instructive and useful volume, that would be read by
every body.
I took an interest in the army bill, and contrived to hear a great deal
of its discussion. M’CAY, CAVE JOHNSON and BLACK of Carolina never
spoke a word in vain. Mr. Black deserves a great deal of credit for his
exertions to reform the abuses of the patronage of the government. The
mad ravings of the pets against him are recommendations of him to his
constituent, as their faithful sentinel in Congress. He represents a
hardy, patriotic race of men, whose ancesters fought bravely and well
for their country in the war of the revolution. The Cowpens, King’s
mountain, and all that country round about them are immortalised by
deeds of arms; and by patriotic devotion to the interests and the glory
of our common country. The nation owes that people a debt of gratitude.
I spent an evening with Mr. Black and Mr. Simpson, of Pendleton, S.
Carolina, at their lodgings in the old capitol, kept by Mrs. Hill.
They are excellent members of Congress, honest, capable and faithful
representatives--none better. They are friendly to Mr. Calhoun. Mr.
Black was born near Mr. Calhoun, that is within five miles of him, and
Mr. Simpson lives where Mr. Calhoun does, and is his near neighbor. He
thinks highly of Mr. Calhoun’s family and says that it is the happiest
and the best one he ever knew. If my memory serves me, I think there is
a sort of relationship by marriage between Mr. Simpson and Mr. Calhoun.
In the Senate are a great many good speakers. I heard Allen, Tappan,
Choate, Benton, Woodbury, Buchanan, Crittenden, Upham, Morehead and
several others, who spoke well and argued clearly, distinctly and
to the purpose. I have not room for a criticism on their manner and
matter, but I was pleased to hear them speak so well on all occasions.
I wished to hear RIVES and ARCHER, but did not get an opportunity
to hear them, or even become personally acquainted with them. As a
Senate, we need not be ashamed of that body, but the reverse in all
respects. M’DUFFIE appears to be out of health, and I fear that he is
in a decline that will carry him off before many years. I should have
been glad to hear BAYARD of Delaware, to ascertain whether he inherits
his father’s talents, but I never heard him. FOSTER of Tennessee, I
know to be a man of talents and an excellent senator, but I had not the
pleasure to hear him. He stands high at the bar as a lawyer, and no one
is more beloved than I know him to be by his neighbors in Nashville,
where he lives when at home. Talented, learned and good, Tennessee may
well be proud of her beloved son.
General KING has gone to Russia, and LEWIS has taken his place. General
King, like his friend Buchanan, is a bachelor; so he can go abroad,
having no family to detain him here.
A DIGRESSION.
The influence of the Christian religion, it appears to me, begins
to operate beneficially on our legislative assemblies, and it is
to be hoped that it will in the end melt down in its crucible our
whole people. That religion is the great fountain-head of republics.
It teaches us that our Creator is our Father, and that we are all
brethren. In some respects, there is a falling off from the practices
of our fathers--for instance, family government is not what it once
was. In former days we had infancy, youth and age, but by the present
generation youth is struck out of human life altogether. A boy or a
girl five years old, assumes the dress, the manners and the airs of
a young gentleman or a young lady. Last January, at my room, in the
Broadstreet Hotel, in New York, after hearing their youngest child read
to me, (she was only about four years old) I inquired of her, if her
sister never curled her hair? which hung in beautiful ringlets on her
head. She replied, that “her sister Sarah would, within a few days,
curl her hair, and then she was to have a beau!” The remark pleased me
greatly, because it was so characteristic of these times. No sooner
is the hippen laid aside, than the pantaloons, and the boots, and the
cocked-up hat follow, as the dress of the boy--and the girl, is dressed
like a young lady. Her locks are curled, and she looks around her for a
beau! Of these things we mean not to complain, but we merely note them
as a change effected in our manners, since the last age, whether for
better or for worse, we do not say. The days of our fathers are gone
by, and this generation assumes to be wiser than the former one was,
but whether a better one, on the whole, is at best doubtful with me.
We prefer Old Virginia, with her old principles to all her new fangled
ideas. In some things she may be behind the age, but that does not
convince me that she is the worse on that account. I prefer the
principles of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Marshall and
Upshur, to those of Aaron Burr and the spoilers. The former are pure
gold, in my estimation, and the latter are mere dross. The sons, and
the descendants generally of the Randolphs, the Lees, the Masons, and
a long list of Pendletons and other revolutionary patriots are true
to the principles of their ancesters and the republic. Long may such
men and such principles shed a lustre on the Old Dominion. Rives and
Archer represent Virginian interest and principles in the Senate of the
United States. In the other house I am ignorant, wholly, as to their
representatives, and so I say nothing of them. Gilmer was quite popular
in the House, but he is no more. SUMMERS is a western Virginian--so
western that he is exactly like an Ohioan in his manners and feelings.
He lives on the Kenhawa, and truly and efficiently represents the
people who send him to Congress.
From our digression we come back to say, on the subject of the tariff,
that the eastern members appeared to us to have the better arguments.
They said, in substance, that the tariff of 1842 had injured no
interest of our country; that agriculture was more prosperous than
before; that manufactures were more flourishing; that our navigation
was more active; public and private credit was restored, both at home
and abroad. These members then enquired, whether it was wise, prudent
and statesmanlike to change a law that worked so well? They contended
that the experience of all nations proved that sudden and frequent
changes in the laws of any country, were highly injurious to all
classes of people. We do not use the very words, but we give the sum
and the substance of what fell from the lips of many friends of the
present tariff law. It appeared to me that those who wished a new
tariff, took a very narrow view of the subject. They looked at what
they considered the interest of their several districts of country,
without looking further around them on the whole Union. It is a matter
of opinion, and feeling as I certainly did, coolly and calmly, I made
up a deliberate judgement, as disinterested as it could be. We in
Ohio are an agricultural, manufacturing and commercial people. These
interests are in reality the same; they prosper or fall together. Mr.
Jefferson, by his embargoes and restrictive measures, made the people
of New England a manufacturing people, against their wills at first,
but following his advice, they became a manufacturing as well as a
commercial people. Their industry, perseverance and energy made them
prosperous and rich. The change in their pursuits ruined thousands
of them at the time, but as soon as their prosperity was everywhere
apparent, there were not wanting those, who envied and wished to ruin
that prosperity by frequent changes in our tariff laws. Those who
wished to check their prosperity, remind us of a private soldier in the
revolutionary war, while he was suffering corporeal punishment. When
the lash fell upon his shoulders, he cried out, “strike lower, strike
lower!” but when the lash struck his loins, he cried out, “strike
higher.” Strike where the corporal would, the culprit was not at all
satisfied with the blows, nor pleased with the corporal himself. Could
all our people be willing “to live and let live,” it appears to us that
we should all be happier and better off, and in that way become an
united people in the bonds of mutual interest and mutual affection.
All laws calculated to affect a whole nation should never be changed
for slight causes, nor changed without giving the people, and the whole
people, time to duly reflect upon such changes, in all their bearings
on the whole people. Such are our ideas of that republican form of
government, which was erected by our fathers, to promote the happiness
of the people, aye, of the whole people. Keeping this great object
in view, the laws should be plain, simple and few, and be changed as
seldom as possible, otherwise no man in any business can make any safe
calculations as to the course he should pursue--what plans he should
form, or how he can execute them. There is an union of interests, not
always duly considered. The farmer, the mechanic, the manufacturer,
the merchant and the mariner have precisely the same interests in the
prosperity of all the great interests of all our people. Destroy or
greatly injure any one class of people, and the whole body politic
feels the wound and suffers by the injury. One class may feel it first,
but in the end, all feel it.
On all great national questions of policy, time, reflection, prudence
and caution seem to be required by the dictates of patriotism and true
wisdom. And our legislators, and indeed all our wise men, should always
remember, and be sure never to forget, that we Americans are a very
exciteable people, more so, much more so, than many nations are in the
north of Europe. Our southern people may be the soonest moved by any
sudden impulse, but get our northern people once fairly started, and
they move like a tornado. Knowing ourselves, and how exciteable we are,
let us endeavor to keep cool, on all the political questions, which
agitate the public mind, from time to time. Our republican institutions
have been dearly bought--with the blood of our ancestors, freely shed,
in the battle fields of glorious memory, and on the mountain waves,
where our sailors fought, bled, died and conquered in the cause, the
holy cause of liberty.--When the liberties of this country go down to
their graves, have we not reason to fear that free government all over
the world, will be overwhelmed in one universal ruin? May my eyes be
closed in death before that day arrives.
Having decided that the tariff case shall be put down to the foot
of our docket, on the principle of want of more time for national
reflection, it follows as a matter of course, almost, that we ought to
put the Oregon question at the foot of our docket also, and continue it
for a trial at the next term of our high court of judicature. Whether
the Texas case shall be disposed of in the same manner, we will not
decide, until we have ascended to our seat on the bench, and there
patiently heard the arguments of counsel learned in the law, on the
motion for a continuance of the cause until the next session of this
honorable court.
The idea that the American people are to be taken by surprise, and that
six large States ought to be added to this confederacy by legerdemain,
without notice and without sufficient time for reflection on all
the consequences of such an addition to our territory, calls for
deliberation, reflection and a solemn pause, like the stillness of a
Quaker’s silent meeting, before we decide this question--especially in
the affirmitive. Let us hear it discussed openly in the Senate, and in
all places of public resort.
Our right to Oregon, up to the fifty-fifth degree of north latitude, is
quite clear and our people will occupy that territory forthwith, and
then Congress will limp along after them, carrying our laws to them. In
the mean time, villages, towns and cities will rear their spires along
the rivers, the stage driver’s horn and the steam boat’s bell will be
heard there. The sound of the axe, the hammer and the saw, will rival
in speed the roaring of the waters rushing over mill dams, or dashing
against the rocks in the streams of Oregon. All these things will soon
be heard and seen there, but we can wait a little time yet, until the
nation is ready to rush in one mass of men, to wash their feet in the
waters of the Pacific, as they roll their briny waves on to our great
western boundary. As Mr. Owen said, in the house, “the Pacific is our
destination and our destiny.”
Lay the question over, gentlemen, till next session of Congress.
The prancing steed and the nodding plume shall be seen there and the
star spangled banner shall wave, and rustle in every breeze that
moves over the prairies, the hills and the plains of our own farthest
West. A rail-road from Astoria to Boston can transport the salmon of
the Multnomah to our farthest East. Between the salmon of Penobscot
and those of the Columbia river, let the Bostonians decide which is
preferable. We will wait, sitting with gravity in a wig and gown in our
court, until the Bostonians are called into it, to give their testimony
on a point of so much delicacy, in a matter of taste, too, about
which old Horace has said there is no disputing.--“_De gustibus non
disputandum._”