speaking, as I do, in the open air, I will return to you my heartfelt
thanks for the kindness you have shown me. I come among you a stranger.
On the day before yesterday I placed my foot, for the first time, on the
soil of the great and growing State of Indiana. Although I have lived on
terms of great intimacy and friendship with several Western gentlemen,
members of Congress, among whom is your estimable townsman near me,
(Governor Hendricks,) I have never before had an opportunity of seeing
and forming an acquaintance for myself with my fellow-citizens of this
section of the Union. I travel for this purpose. I confess that I regard
with astonishment the evidences of intelligence, enterprise, and
refinement everywhere exhibited around me, when I think of the short
time that has elapsed since the spot where I stand was a howling
wilderness. Since I entered public life, this State was unknown as a
political government. All the country west of the Alleghanies and
northwest of the Ohio constituted but one Territory, entitled to a
single delegate in the counsels of the nation, having the right to
speak, but not to vote. Since then, the States of Ohio, Indiana,
Illinois, Michigan, and the long strip of country known as the Territory
of Wisconsin, have been carved out of it. Indiana, which numbers but
twenty years since the commencement of her political existence, contains
a population of six hundred thousand, equal to the population of
Massachusetts, a State of two hundred years' duration. In age she is an
infant; in strength and resources a giant. Her appearance indicates the
full vigor of maturity, while, measured by her years, she is yet in the
cradle.
Although I reside in a part of the country most remote from you,
although I have seen you spring into existence and advance with rapid
strides in the march of prosperity and power, until your population has
equalled that of my own State, which you far surpass in fertility of
soil and mildness of climate; yet these things have excited in me no
feelings of dislike, or jealousy, or envy. On the contrary, I have
witnessed them with pride and pleasure, when I saw in them the growth of
a member of our common country; and with feelings warmer than pride,
when I recollect that there are those among you who are bone of my bone
and flesh of my flesh, who inherit my name and share my blood. When they
came to me for my advice, before leaving their hearths and homes, I did
not oppose their desires or suggest difficulties in their paths. I told
them, "Go and join your destinies with those of the hardy pioneers of
the West, share their hardships, and partake their fortunes; go, and God
speed you; only carry with you your own good principles, and whether the
sun rises on you, or sets on you, let it warm American hearts in your
bosoms."
Though, as I observed, I live in a part of the country most remote from
you, fellow-citizens, I have been no inattentive observer of your
history and progress. I have heard of the reports made in your
legislature, and the acts passed in pursuance thereof. I have traced on
the map of your State the routes marked out for extensive turnpikes,
railroads, and canals. I have read with pleasure the acts providing for
their establishment and completion. I do not pretend to offer you my
advice; it would perhaps be presumptuous; but you will permit me to say,
that, as far as I have examined them, they are conceived in wisdom, and
evince great political skill and foresight. You have commenced at the
right point. To open the means of communication, by which man may, when
he wishes, see the face of his friend, should be the first work of every
government. We may theorize and speculate about it as we please,--we may
understand all the metaphysics of politics; but if men are confined to
the narrow spot they inhabit, because they have not the means of
travelling when they please, they must go back to a state of barbarism.
Social intercourse is the corner-stone of good government. The nation
that provides no means for the improvement of its communications, has
not taken the first step in civilization. Go on, then, as you have
begun; prosecute your works with energy and perseverance; be not daunted
by imaginary difficulties, be not deterred by exaggerated calculations
of their cost. Go on; open your wilderness to the sun; turn up the soil;
and in the wide-spread and highly-cultivated fields, the smiling
villages, and the busy towns that will spring up from the bosom of the
desert, you will reap a rich reward for your investment and industry.
Another of the paramount objects of government, to which I rejoice to
see that you have turned your attention, is education. I speak not of
college education, nor of academy education, though they are of great
importance; I speak of free-school education, common-school education.
Among the luminaries in the sky of New England, the burning lights which
throw intelligence and happiness on her people, the first and most
brilliant is her system of common schools. I congratulate myself that my
first speech on entering public life was in their behalf. Education, to
accomplish the ends of good government, should be universally diffused.
Open the doors of the school-house to all the children in the land. Let
no man have the excuse of poverty for not educating his own offspring.
Place the means of education within his reach, and if they remain in
ignorance, be it his own reproach. If one object of the expenditure of
your revenue be protection against crime, you could not devise a better
or cheaper means of obtaining it. Other nations spend their money in
providing means for its detection and punishment, but it is the
principle of our government to provide for its never occurring. The one
acts by _coercion_, the other by _prevention_. On the diffusion of
education among the people rest the preservation and perpetuation of our
free institutions. I apprehend no danger to our country from a foreign
foe. The prospect of a war with any powerful nation is too remote to be
a matter of calculation. Besides, there is no nation on earth powerful
enough to accomplish our overthrow. Our destruction, should it come at
all, will be from another quarter. From the inattention of the people to
the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and
negligence, I must confess that I do apprehend some danger. I fear that
they may place too implicit a confidence in their public servants, and
fail properly to scrutinize their conduct; that in this way they may be
made the dupes of designing men, and become the instruments of their own
undoing. Make them intelligent, and they will be vigilant; give them the
means of detecting the wrong, and they will apply the remedy.
The gentleman who has just addressed me in such flattering, but
unmerited terms, has been pleased to make kind mention of my devotion to
the Constitution, and my humble efforts in its support. I claim no merit
on that account. It results from my sense of its surpassing excellences,
which must strike every man who attentively and impartially examines it.
I regard it as the work of the purest patriots and wisest statesmen that
ever existed, aided by the smiles of a benignant Providence; for when we
regard it as a system of government growing out of the discordant
opinions and conflicting interests of thirteen independent States, it
almost appears a Divine interposition in our behalf. I have always, with
the utmost zeal and the moderate abilities I possess, striven to prevent
its infraction in the slightest particular. I believed, if that bond of
union were broken, we should never again be a united people. Where,
among all the political thinkers, the constitution-makers and the
constitution-menders of the day, could we find a man to make us another?
Who would even venture to propose a reunion? Where would be the
starting-point, and what the plan? I do not expect miracles to follow
each other. No plan could be proposed that would be adopted; the hand
that destroys the Constitution rends our Union asunder for ever.
My friend has been pleased to remember, in his address, my humble
support of the constitutional right of Congress to improve the
navigation of our great internal rivers, and to construct roads through
the different States. It is well known that few persons entertain
stronger opinions on this subject than myself. Believing that the great
object of the Union is to secure the general safety and promote the
general welfare, and that the Constitution was designed to point out the
means of accomplishing these ends, I have always been in favor of such
measures as I deemed for the general benefit, under the restrictions and
limitations prescribed by the Constitution itself. I supported them with
my voice, and my vote, not because they were for the benefit of the
West, but because they were for the benefit of the whole country. That
they are local in their advantages, as well as in their construction, is
an objection that has been and will be urged against every measure of
the kind. In a country so widely extended as ours, so diversified in its
interests and in the character of its people, it is impossible that the
operation of any measure should affect all alike. Each has its own
peculiar interest, whose advancement it seeks; we have the sea-coast,
and you the noble river that flows at your feet. So it must ever be. Go
to the smallest government in the world, the republic of San Marino, in
Italy, possessing a territory of but ten miles square, and you will find
its citizens, separated but by a few miles, having some interests which,
on account of local situation, are separate and distinct. There is not
on the face of the earth a plain, five miles in extent, whose
inhabitants are all the same in their pursuits and pleasures. Some will
live on a creek, others near a hill, which, when any measure is proposed
for the general benefit, will give rise to jarring claims and opposing
interests. In such cases, it has always appeared to me that the point to
be examined was, whether the principle was general. If the principle
were general, although the application might be partial, I cheerfully
and zealously gave it my support. When an objection has been made to an
appropriation for clearing the snags out of the Ohio River, I have
answered it with the question, "Would you not vote for an appropriation
to clear the Atlantic Ocean of snags, were the navigation of your coast
thus obstructed? The people of the West contribute their portion of the
revenue to fortify your sea-coast, and erect piers, and harbors, and
light-houses, from which they derive a remote benefit, and why not
contribute yours to improve the navigation of a river whose commerce
enriches the whole country?"
It may be expected, fellow-citizens, that I should say something on a
topic which agitates and distracts the public mind, I mean the
deranged state of the currency, and the general stagnation of business.
In giving my opinions on this topic, I wish it to be distinctly
understood, that I force them on no man. I am an independent man,
speaking to independent men. I think for myself; you, of course, enjoy
and exercise the same right. I cheerfully concede to every one the
liberty of differing with me in sentiment, readily granting that he
has as good chance of being right as myself, perhaps a better. But I
have some respect for my character as a public man. The present
state of things has grown out of a series of measures, to which I have
been in uniform opposition. In speaking of their consequences, I am
doing but justice to myself in showing them in justification of my
conduct. I am performing a duty to my fellow-citizens, who have a
right to know the opinions of every public man. The present state of
things is unparalleled in the annals of our country. The general
suspension of specie payments by the banks, beginning I know not
where, and ending I know not where, but comprehending the whole
country, has produced wide-spread ruin and confusion through the
land. To you the scene is one as yet of apprehension; to us, of deep
distress. You cannot understand, my fellow-citizens, nor can I describe
it so as to enable you to understand, the embarrassment and suffering
which are depressing the spirit and crushing the energies of the people
of the sea-girt States of the East. You are agriculturists, you
produce what you consume, and always have the means of living within
your reach. We depend on others for their agricultural productions;
we live by manufactures and commerce, of which credit is the
lifeblood. The destruction of credit is the destruction of our means
of living. The man who cannot fulfil his daily engagements, or with
whom others fail to fulfil theirs, must suffer for his daily bread.
And who are those who suffer? Not the rich, for they can generally take
care of themselves. Capital is ingenious and far-sighted, ready in
resources and fertile in expedients to shelter itself from impending
storms. Shut it out from one source of increase, and it will find
other avenues of profitable investment. It is the industrious, working
part of the community, men whose hands have grown hard by holding the
plough and pulling the oar, men who depend on their daily labor and
their daily pay, who, when the operations of trade and commerce are
checked and palsied, have no prospect for themselves and their families
but beggary and starvation,--it is these who suffer. All this has
been attributed to causes as different as can be imagined; over-trading,
over-buying, over-selling, over-speculating, over-production, terms
which I acknowledge I do not very well understand. I am at a loss to
conceive how a nation can become poor by over-production, producing
more than she can sell or consume. I do not see where there has been
over-trading, except in public lands; for when every thing else was
up to such an enormous price, and the public land tied down to one
dollar and a quarter an acre, who would not have bought it if he could?
These causes could not have produced all those consequences which have
occasioned such general lamentation. They must have proceeded from some
other source. And I now request you, my fellow-citizens, to bear
witness, that here, in this good city, on the banks of the Ohio, on the
first day of June, 1837, beneath the bright sun that is shining upon us,
I declare my conscientious conviction that they have proceeded from the
measures of the general government in relation to the currency. I make
this declaration in no spirit of enmity to its authors; I follow no man
with rebukes or reproaches. To reprobate the past will not alleviate the
evils of the present. It is the duty of every good citizen to contribute
his strength, however feeble, to diminish the burden under which a
people groans. To apply the remedy successfully, however, we must first
ascertain the causes, character, and extent of the evil.
Let us go back, then, to its origin. Forty-eight years have elapsed
since the adoption of our Constitution. For forty years of that time we
had a national bank. Its establishment originated in the imperious
obligation imposed on every government to furnish its people with a
circulating medium for their commerce. No matter how rich the citizen
may be in flocks and herds, in houses and lands, if his government does
not furnish him a medium of exchange, commerce must be confined to the
petty barter suggested by mutual wants and necessities, as they exist in
savage life. The history of all commercial countries shows that the
precious metals can constitute but a small part of this circulating
medium. The extension of commerce creates a system of credit; the
transmission of money from one part of the country to the other gives
birth to the business of exchange. To keep the value of this medium and
the rates of exchange equal and certain, was imperiously required by the
necessities of the times when the bank was established. Under the old
confederacy, each of the thirteen States established and regulated its
own money, which passed for its full value within the State, and was
useless the moment it crossed the State border. The little State of
Rhode Island, for instance, (I hope no son of hers present will take
offence at what I say,) so small that an Indiana man might almost cover
her territory with his hand, was crowded with banks. A man might have
been rich at Providence, but before he could travel to Boston, forty
miles distant, he would starve for want of money to pay for his
breakfast.
Had this state of things continued, some of the provisions of the
Constitution would have been of no force or virtue. Of what value to
Congress would have been the right to levy taxes, imposts, and duties,
and to regulate commerce among different States, and of what effect or
consequence the prohibition on the different States of levying and
collecting imposts, if each and every one of them had possessed the
right of paying her taxes and duties in a currency of her own, which
would not pass one hundred miles, perhaps, from the bank whence it was
issued? The creation of a national bank presented the surest means of
remedying these evils, and accomplishing one of the principal objects of
the Constitution, the establishment and maintenance of a currency whose
value would be uniform in every part of the country. During the forty
years it existed, under the two charters, we had no general suspension
of specie payments, as at present. We got along well with it, and I am
one of those who are disposed to let _well_ alone. I am content to
travel along the good old turnpike on which I have journeyed before with
comfort and expedition, without turning aside to try a new track. I must
confess that I do not possess that soaring self-respect, that lofty
confidence in my own political sagacity and foresight, which would
induce me to set aside the experience of forty years, and risk the ruin
of the country for the sake of an _experiment_. To this is all the
distress of the country attributable. This has caused such powerful
invasions of bank paper, like sudden and succeeding flights of birds of
prey and passage, and the rapid disappearance of specie at its approach.
You all know that bank-notes have been almost as plenty as the leaves of
the forest in the summer. But of what value are they to the holder, if
he is compelled to pay his debts in specie? And who can be expected to
pay his debts in this way, when the government has withdrawn the specie
from circulation?
You have not yet felt the evil in its full extent. It is mostly in
prospect, and you are watching its approach. While you are endeavoring
to guard against it, strive to prevent its future recurrence. As you
would hunt down, with hound and horn, the wolf who is making nightly
havoc of your flocks and herds, pursue and keep down those who would
make havoc in your business and property by experiments on our
currency.
Although the country has bowed beneath the pressure, I do not fear that
it will be broken down and prostrated in the dust. Depress them as it
may, the energy and industry of the people will enable them to rise
again. We have for a long time carried a load of bad government on our
shoulders, and we are still able to bear up under it. But I do not see
that, for that reason, we should be willing and eager to carry it. I do
not see why it should prevent us from wishing to lessen it as much as
possible, if not to throw it off altogether, when we know that we can
get along so much easier and faster without it. While we are exerting
ourselves with renewed industry and economy to recover from its
blighting effects, while we plough the land and plough the sea, let us
hasten the return of things to their proper state, by such political
measures as will best accomplish the desired end. Let us inform our
public servants of our wishes, and pursue such a course as will compel
them to obey us.
In conclusion, my fellow-citizens, I return you my thanks for the
patience and attention with which you have listened to me, and pray the
beneficent Giver of all good, that he may keep you under the shadow of
his wing, and continue to bless you with peace and prosperity.
FOOTNOTES
[110] A Speech delivered at Madison, in the State of Indiana, on the
first of June 1837, on Occasion of a Public Reception by the
Citizens of that Place.
PUBLIC DINNER IN FANEUIL HALL.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
On the return of Mr. Webster from the session in which he had
particularly signalized himself by the delivery of his masterly
speeches on the sub-treasury bill, and in reply to Mr. Calhoun
(contained in a subsequent volume of this collection), a large
number of his fellow-citizens of Boston could not be restrained from
manifesting their sense of his extraordinary efforts, in exhibiting
the true character of the odious sub-treasury project, and in
procuring its ultimate rejection by Congress. He was accordingly
invited to meet them at a public dinner, on the 24th of July, 1838.
More than fifteen hundred persons attended it, every ticket having
been eagerly taken as soon as issued. Every portion of the Hall,
floor and galleries, was filled. The Governor of the Commonwealth
(Hon. Edward Everett) presided at the table, and the spirit of the
occasion and of the company may be gathered from the following
remarks with which he introduced Mr. Webster to the assembly:
"And now, fellow-citizens," said he, "I rise to discharge the most
pleasing part of my duty, which I fear you will think I have too long
postponed; the duty which devolves on me, as the organ of your feelings
toward our distinguished guest, the senior Senator of the Commonwealth.
And yet, fellow-citizens, I appeal to you, that I have approached this
duty through the succession of ideas which most naturally conducts our
minds and hearts to the grateful topic. I have proposed to you, Our
country and its prosperity. Who among the great men, his contemporaries,
has more widely surveyed and comprehended the various interests of all
its parts? I have proposed, The Union of the States. What public man is
there living, whose political course has been more steadily consecrated
to its perpetuity? I have proposed to you, The Constitution. And who of
our statesmen, from the time of its framers, has more profoundly
investigated, more clearly expounded, more powerfully vindicated and
sustained it? But these topics I may pass over. They are matters which
have been long familiar to you; they need not any comment from me.
"The events of the last year, and of the last session of Congress, and
the present state of the country, invite our attention more particularly
to the recent efforts of our distinguished guest on the subject of THE
CURRENCY. I know not but some persons may think that undue importance
has been attached to the questions which have divided parties on this
subject; that these questions are not so vital to liberty as they have
been represented. But such an opinion would be erroneous. Undoubtedly
there are countries, not free ones, in which money questions, as
connected with the government, are of minor consequence. In China, in
Turkey, in Persia, I presume they are very little discussed. In these
countries the great question is, whether a man's head at night will be
found in the same pleasing and convenient proximity to his shoulders
that it was in the morning; and this is a kind of previous question,
which, if decided against him, cuts off all others. Under those
arbitrary governments of Europe, where the prince takes what he pleases,
and when he pleases, it is of very little moment where he deposits it,
on its way from the pockets of the people to his own. But it was
remarked by Edmund Burke, more than seventy years ago, that in England,
(and _a fortiori_ in the United States, that is, under constitutional
governments,) the great struggles for liberty had been almost always
money questions, and on this ground he excused the Americans for the
stand they took in opposition to a paltry tax. But, most certainly, the
money question, as it has been agitated among us, is vastly more
important, more intimately connected with constitutional liberty, than
that which brought on the Revolution. The question with our fathers was
one of a small tax; ours, of the entire currency. Theirs concerned three
pence per pound on tea, illegally levied; ours, the entire currency
illegally disposed of, the entire medium of circulation deranged, and
for a period annihilated, the whole business of the country, in all its
great branches, brought under the control of the treasury. The noble
stand, therefore, taken by our distinguished Senator in this controversy
has been upon points which concern the dearest interests of the people,
and the elemental principles of the government.
"In fact, I know not that a policy can be imagined more at war with
the true character of the government, than that which he has been
called to combat. The past and present administrations, relying too
confidently on the popular delusions which brought them into office,
have systematically defeated one of the great original objects for
which the Union was framed, that of a uniform medium of commerce. Nor
has the manner of their policy been less objectionable than its
design. They have crowded experiment upon experiment, with the fatal
recklessness of the rash engineer who urges the fires in his furnaces
till some noble steamer bursts in an awful explosion.[111] Our Senators
and Representatives, and their associates, could they have forgotten
that a revered Constitution and a beloved country were the chief
victims, might well have folded their arms, and left the authors of
the calamity to extricate themselves, as best they might, from the
ruin. But not thus have they understood their duty; and we have seen
them with admiration, in the last days of the session, gallantly
putting out in the life-boat of the Constitution, with an eye of
fire at the top, and an arm of iron at the helm, to cruise about on the
boiling waters, and pick up all that is left undestroyed. When I have
seen the adherents of the administration rejecting, so far as they
ventured, the salutary measures proposed or supported by our
distinguished guest and his associates, for the restoration of the
currency and the reestablishment of the public credit, and clinging to
all that events have spared of their discredited measures, they have
seemed to me to resemble the sun-stricken victims of a moody madness,
who, instead of thankfully embracing the proffered relief, would
prefer to float about on the weltering waters, clinging to the broken
planks and the shivered splinters of their exploded policy, sure as
they are, at the very best, if they reach solid ground, to do so
beneath the overwhelming surge of popular indignation.
"I should take up a great deal more time than belongs to me, did I
attempt even to sketch the distinguished services of our friend and
guest in this constitutional warfare. They are impressed on your
memories, and on your hearts. In the thickest of the conflict, his
plume, like that of Henry the Fourth of France, discerned from afar, has
pointed out the spot where, to use his own language, 'the blows fall
thickest and hardest'; and there he has been found, with the banner of
the Union above his head, and the flaming cimeter of the Constitution in
his hand. If the public mind has been thoroughly awakened to the
inconsistency of the government policy with the genius of our
institutions, if, to the experience we have all had of the pernicious
operation of this policy, there has been added a clear understanding of
the false principles, as well of constitutional law as of political
economy, on which it rests, how much of this is not fairly to be
ascribed to the efforts of our distinguished guest, efforts never
stinted in or out of Congress, repeated in every form which can persuade
the judgment or influence the conduct of men, never less than cogent,
eloquent, irrefutable, but in the last session of Congress, perhaps more
than ever before, grand, masterly, and overwhelming. It has indeed been
a rare, I had almost said a sublime spectacle, to see him, unsupported
by a majority in either house, opposed by the entire influence of the
government, denounced by the administration press from one end of the
Union to the other, yet carrying resolution after resolution against the
administration, carrying them alike against the old guard and the new
recruits, and, notwithstanding their abrupt and ill-compacted alliance,
compelling them, in spite of themselves, to afford some relief to the
country.
"These are the services, fellow-citizens, for which you this day
tender your thanks to your distinguished guest. These are the
services for which, Sir, on behalf of my fellow-citizens, I thank you;
for which they thank you themselves. Behold, Sir, how they rise to
pay you a manly homage.[112] The armies of Napoleon could not coerce it;
the wealth of the Indies could not buy it; but it is freely, joyously
paid, by fifteen hundred freemen, to the man of their affections. They
thank you for having stood by them in these dark times,--at all times.
They thank you, because they think they are beginning to feel the fruit
of your exertions in the daily round of their pursuits. They ascribe it
in no small degree to you, that the iron grasp of the government
policy has been relaxed; that its bolts and chains, relics of a
barbarous age, have been shivered as soon as forged, and before they
were riveted on the necks of the people. They thank you for having
stood by the Constitution, in which their all of human hope for
themselves and their children is enshrined. They thank you as one of
themselves; and because they know that your affections are with the
people from which you sprung. They thank you because you have at all
times shown, that, as the Whig blood of the Revolution circles in your
veins, the Whig principles of the Revolution are imprinted on your
heart. They thank you for the entire manliness of your course; that
you have never joined the treacherous cry of the 'hatred of the poor
against the rich,'--a cry raised by artful men, who think to flatter the
people, while in reality they are waging war against the people's
business, the people's prosperity, and the people's Constitution.
They are willing that this day's offering should be remembered, when
all this mighty multitude shall have passed from the stage. When
that day shall have arrived, history will have written your name on
one of her brightest pages; fame will have encircled your bust with
her greenest laurels; but neither history nor fame will have paid you a
truer, heartier tribute, than that which now, beneath the arches of
this venerable hall, in the approving presence of these images of our
canonized fathers, is tendered you by this great company of your
fellow-citizens.
"I give you, Gentlemen,--
"DANIEL WEBSTER,--the statesman and the man; whose name is engraven
alike on the pillars of the Constitution and the hearts of his
fellow-citizens. He is worthy of that place in the councils of the
nation which he fills in the affections of the people."
Mr. Webster then rose, amidst enthusiastic cheering, and addressed
the meeting in the following speech.
FOOTNOTES
[111] The disaster of the Pulaski occurred about the time of the
delivery of these remarks.
[112] The entire audience rose at this moment.
PUBLIC DINNER IN FANEUIL HALL.[113]
GENTLEMEN:--I shall be happy indeed, if the state of my health and the
condition of my voice shall enable me to express, in a few words, my
deep and heartfelt gratitude for this expression of your approbation. If
public life has its cares and its trials, it has occasionally its
consolations also. Among these, one of the greatest, and the chief, is
the approbation of those whom we have honestly endeavored to serve. This
cup of consolation you have now administered,--full, crowned, abundantly
overflowing.
It is my chief desire at this time, in a few spontaneous and
affectionate words, to render you the thanks of a grateful heart. When I
lately received your invitation in New York, nothing was farther from my
thoughts or expectations, than that I should meet such an assembly as I
now behold in Boston.
But I was willing to believe that it was not meant merely as a
compliment, which it was expected would be declined, but that it was in
truth your wish, at the close of the labors of a long session of
Congress, that I should meet you in this place, that we might mingle our
mutual congratulations, and that we might enjoy together one happy,
social hour.
The president of this assembly has spoken of the late session as having
been not only long, but arduous; and, in some respects, it does deserve
to be so regarded. I may indeed say, that, in an experience of twenty
years of public life, I have never yet encountered labors or anxieties
such as this session brought with it.
With a short intermission in the autumn, so short as not to allow the
more distant members to visit their homes, we have been in continual
session from the early part of September to the 9th of July, a period of
ten months.[114] On our part, during this whole time, we have been
contending in minorities against majorities; majorities, indeed, not to
be relied on for all measures, as the event has proved, but still
acknowledged and avowed majorities, professing general attachment and
support to the measures, and to the men, of the administration. My own
object, and that of those with whom I have had the honor to act, has
been steady and uniform. That object was, to resist new theories, new
schemes, new and dangerous projects, until time could be gained for
their consideration by the people. This was our great purpose, and its
accomplishment required no slight effort. It was the commencement of a
new Congress. The organization of the two houses showed clear and
decisive administration majorities. The administration itself was new,
and had come into its fresh power with something of the popularity of
that which preceded it. It was no child's play, therefore, to resist,
successfully, its leading measures, for so long a period as should allow
time for an effectual appeal to the people, pressed, as those measures
were, with the utmost zeal and assiduity.
The president of the day has alluded in a very flattering manner to my
own exertions and efforts, made at different times, in connection with
the leading topics. But I claim no particular merit for myself. In what
I have done, I have only acted with others. I have acted, especially,
with my most estimable, able, and excellent colleague,[115] and with
the experienced and distinguished men who form the delegation of
Massachusetts in the House of Representatives, a delegation of which
any State might be justly proud. We have acted together, as men
holding, in almost all cases, common opinions, and laboring for a
common end. It gives me great pleasure to have the honor of seeing so
many of the Representatives of the State in Congress here to-day; but I
must not be prevented, even by their presence, from bearing my humble
but hearty testimony to the fidelity and ability with which they have,
in this arduous struggle, performed their public duties. The crisis has,
indeed, demanded the efforts of all; and we of Massachusetts, while we
hope we have done our duty, have done it only in concurrence with
other Whigs, whose zeal, ability, and exertions can never be too much
commended.
This is not an occasion in which it is fit or practicable to discuss
very minutely, and at length, the questions which have been chiefly
agitated during this long and laborious session of Congress. Yet, so
important is the great and general question, which, for the last twelve
or fifteen months, has been presented to the consideration of the
legislature, that I deem it proper, on this, as on all occasions, to
state, at the risk of some repetition, perhaps, what is the nature of
that important question, and briefly to advert to some of the
circumstances in which it had its origin.
Whatever subordinate questions may have been raised touching a
sub-treasury, or a constitutional treasury, or a treasury in one, or in
another, or in yet a third form, I take the question, the plain, the
paramount, the practical question, to be this; namely, whether it be
among the powers and the duties of Congress to take any further care of
the national currency than to regulate the coinage of gold and silver.
That question lies at the foundation of all. Other questions, however
multiplied or varied, have but grown out of that.
If government is bound to take care that there is a good currency for
all the country, then, of course, it will have a good currency for
itself, and need take no especial pains to provide for itself any thing
peculiar. But if, on the other hand, government is at liberty to abandon
the general currency to its fate, without concern and without remorse,
then, from necessity, it must take care of itself; amidst the general
wreck of currency and credit, it must have places of resort and a system
of shelter; it must have a currency of its own, and modes of payment and
disbursement peculiar to itself. It must burrow and hide itself in
sub-treasury vaults. Scorning credit, and having trust in nobody, it
must grasp metallic money, and act as if nothing represented, or could
represent, property, which could not be counted, paid piece by piece, or
weighed in the scales, and made to ring upon the table; or it must
resort to special deposits in banks, even in those banks whose conduct
has been so loudly denounced as flagitious and criminal, treacherous to
the government, and fraudulent towards the people. All these schemes and
contrivances are but the consequences of the general doctrine which the
administration has advanced, and attempted to recommend to the country;
that is, that Congress has nothing to do with the currency, beyond the
mere matter of coinage, except to provide for itself. How such a notion
should come to be entertained, at this day, may well be a matter of
wonder for the wise; since it is a truth capable of the clearest
demonstration, that, from the first day of the existence of the
Constitution, from the moment when a practical administration of
government drew a first breath under its provisions, the superintendence
and care over the currency of the country have been admitted to be among
the clear and unquestioned powers and duties of Congress. This was the
opinion in Washington's time, and his administration acted upon it,
vigorously and successfully. And in Mr. Madison's time, when the
peculiar circumstances of the country again brought up the subject, and
gave it new importance, it was held to be the exclusive, or at least the
paramount and unquestioned, right of Congress to take care of the
currency; to restore it when depreciated; to see that there was a sound,
convertible paper circulation, suited to the circumstances of the
country, and having equal value, and the same credit, in all parts of
it. This was Mr. Madison's judgment. He acted upon it; and both houses
of Congress concurred with him. But if we now quote Mr. Madison's
sentiments, we get no reply at all from the friends of the government
system. We may read his messages of 1815 and 1816 as often as we please.
No man answers them, and yet the party of the administration, professing
to belong to Mr. Madison's political school, acts upon directly opposite
principles.
Now, what has brought about this state of things? What has caused this
attempt, now made, at the end of half a century, to change a great
principle of administration, and to surrender a most important power of
the government? Gentlemen, it has been a crisis of party, not of the
country, which has given birth to these new sentiments. The tortuous
windings of party policy have conducted us, and nothing else could well
have conducted us, to such a point. Nothing but party pledges, nothing
but courses of political conduct entered upon for party purposes, and
pursued from necessary regard to personal and party consistency, could
so far have pushed the government out of its clear and well-trodden path
of constitutional duty. From General Washington's presidency to the last
hour of the late President's, both the government and the country have
supposed Congress to be clothed with the general duty of protecting the
currency, either as an inference from the coinage power or from the
obvious and incontestable truth, that the regulation of the currency is
naturally and plainly a branch of the commercial power. General Jackson
himself was behind no one of his predecessors in asserting this power,
and in acknowledging the corresponding duty. We all know that his very
first complaint against the late Bank of the United States was, that it
had not fulfilled the expectation of the country, by furnishing for the
use of the people a sound and uniform currency. There were many persons,
certainly, who did not agree with him in his opinions respecting the
bank and the effects of its agency on the country; but it was expressly
on the ground of this alleged failure of the bank, that he undertook
what was called the great reform. There are those, again, who think that
of this attempted reform he made a very poor and sorry business; but
still the truth is, that he undertook this reform for the very purpose
professed and avowed, that he might fulfil better than it had yet been
fulfilled the duty of government in furnishing the people with a good
currency. The President thought that the currency, in 1832 and 1833, was
not good enough; that the people had a right to expect a better; and to
meet this expectation, he began what he himself called his experiment.
He said the currency was not so sound, and so uniform, as it was the
duty of government to make it; and he therefore undertook to give us a
currency more sound and more uniform. And now, Gentlemen, let us recur
shortly to what followed; for there we shall find the origin of the
present constitutional notions and dogmas. Let us see what has changed
the Constitution in this particular.
In 1833, the public deposits were removed, by an act of the President
himself, from the Bank of the United States, and placed in certain State
banks, under regulations prescribed by the executive alone. This was the
experiment. The utmost confidence, indeed, an arrogant and intolerant
confidence, was entertained and expressed of its success; and all who
doubted were regarded as blind bigots to a national bank. When the
experiment was put into operation, it was proclaimed that its success
was found to be complete. Down to the very close of General Jackson's
administration, we heard of nothing but the wonderful success of the
experiment. It was declared, from the highest official sources, that the
State banks, used as banks of deposit, had not only shown themselves
perfectly competent to fulfil the duties of fiscal agents to government,
but also that they had sustained the currency, and facilitated the great
business of internal exchanges, with the most singular and gratifying
success, and better than the same thing had been done before. In all
this glow and fervor of self-commendation, the late administration went
out of office, having bequeathed the experiment, with all its blushing
honors and rising glories, to its successor. But a frost, a nipping
frost, was at hand. Two months after General Jackson had retired, the
banks suspended specie payments, deposit banks and all; a universal
embarrassment smote down the business and industry of the country; the
treasury was left without a dollar, and the brilliant glory of the
experiment disappeared in gloom and thick darkness! And now, Gentlemen,
came the change of sentiments, now came the new reading of the
Constitution. A national bank had already been declared by the party to
be unconstitutional, the State bank system had failed, and what more
could be done? What other plan was to be devised? How could the duty of
government over the currency be now performed? The administration had
decried a national bank, and it now felt bound to denounce all State
institutions; and what, therefore, could it do? The whole party had laid
out its entire strength, in an effort to render the late Bank of the
United States, and any bank of the United States, unpopular and odious.
It had pronounced all such institutions to be dangerous, anti-republican
and monarchical. It had, especially, declared a national bank to be
plainly and clearly unconstitutional. Now, Gentlemen, I have nothing to
say of the diffidence and modesty of men, who without hesitation or
blushing, set up their own favorite opinions on a question of this kind
against the judgment of the government and the judgment of the country,
maintained for fifty years. I will only remark, that, if we were to find
men acting thus in their own affairs, if we should find them disposing
of their own interests, or making arrangements for their own property,
in contempt of rules which they knew the legislative and the judicial
authorities had all sanctioned for half a century, we should be very
likely to think them out of their heads. Yet this ground had been taken
against the late bank, and against all national banks; and it could not
be surrendered without apparent and gross inconsistency. What, then, I
ask again, was the administration to do? You may say, it should have
retracted its error, it should have seen the necessity of a national
institution, and yielded to the general judgment of the country.
But that would have required an effort of candor and magnanimity, of
which all men are not capable. Besides, there were open, solemn, public
pledges in the way. This commitment of the party against a national
bank, and the disastrous results of its experiment on the State
institutions, brought the party into a difficulty, from which it seemed
to have no escape, but in shifting off, altogether, the duty of taking
care of the currency. I was at Wheeling, in Virginia, in May of last
year, when the banks suspended payment; and, at the risk of some
imputation of bad taste, I will refer to observations of mine made then,
to the citizens of that town, and published, in regard to the questions
which that event would necessarily bring before the country.[116] I saw
at once that we were at the commencement of a new era, and that a
controversy must arise, which would greatly excite the community.
No sooner had the State banks suspended specie payments, and among the
rest those which were depositories of the government, than a cry of
fraud and treachery was raised against them, with no better reason,
perhaps, than existed for that loud, and boisterous, and boastful
confidence, with which the late administration had spoken of their
capacity of usefulness, and had assured the country that its experiment
could not fail. But whether the suspension by the banks was a matter of
necessity with them, or not, the administration, after it had happened,
seeing itself now shut out from the use of all banks by its own declared
opinions and the results of its own policy, and seeing no means at hand
for making another attempt at reforming the currency, turned a short
corner, and in all due form denied that the government had any duty of
the kind to discharge. From the time of the veto of the bank charter, in
1832, the administration had been like a man who had voluntarily
deserted a safe bottom, on deep waters, and, having in vain sought to
support himself by laying hold on one and another piece of floating
timber, chooses rather to go down than to seek safety in returning to
what he has abandoned.
Seeing that it had deprived itself of the common means of regulating
the currency, it now denied its obligation to do so; declared it had
nothing to do with the currency beyond coinage; that it would take
care of the revenues of the government, and as for the rest, the people
must look out for themselves. This decision thus evidently grew out of
party necessity. Having deprived themselves of the ordinary and
constitutional means of performing their duty, they sought to avoid
the responsibility by declaring that there was no such duty to
perform. They have looked further into the Constitution, and examined it
by daylight and by moonlight, and cannot find any such duty or
obligation. Though General Jackson saw it very plainly, during the
whole course of his presidency, it has now vanished, and the new
commentators can nowhere discern a vestige of it. The present
administration, indeed, stood pledged to tread in the steps of its
predecessor; but here was one footprint which it could not, or would
not, occupy, or one stride too long for it to take. The message, I had
almost said the fatal message, communicated to Congress in September,
contained a formal disavowal, by the administration, of all power
under the Constitution to regulate the general actual currency of the
country.
The President says, in that message, that if he refrains from suggesting
to Congress any specific plan for regulating the exchanges, relieving
mercantile embarrassments, or interfering with the ordinary operations
of foreign or domestic commerce, it is from the conviction that such
measures are not within the constitutional provision of government.
How all this could be said, when the Constitution expressly gives to
Congress the power to regulate commerce, both foreign and domestic, I
cannot conceive. But the Constitution was not to be trifled with, and
the people are not to be trifled with. The country, I believe, by a
great majority, is of opinion that this duty _does belong_ to
government, and ought to be exercised. All the new expounders have not
been able to erase this general power over commerce, and all that
belongs to commerce. Their fate, in this respect, is like that of him in
ancient story. While endeavoring to tear up and rend asunder the
Constitution, its strong fibres have recoiled, and caught them in the
cleft. They experience
"Milo's fearful end,
Wedged in the timber which they strove to rend."
Gentlemen, this constitutional power can never be surrendered. We may as
well give up the whole commercial power at once, and throw every thing
connected with it back upon the States. If Congress surrender the power,
to whom shall it pass, or where shall it be lodged? Shall it be left to
six-and-twenty different legislatures? To eight hundred or a thousand
unconnected State banks? No, Gentlemen, to allow that authority to be
surrendered would be to abandon the vessel of state, without pilot or
helm, and to suffer her to roll, darkling, down the current of her
fate.
For the sake of avoiding all misapprehensions on this most important
subject, I wish to state my own opinion, clearly, and in few words. I
have never said, that it is an indispensable duty in Congress, under all
circumstances, to establish a national bank. No such duty, certainly, is
created by the Constitution, in express terms. I did not say _what
particular measures_ are enjoined by the Constitution, in this respect.
Congress has its discretion, and is left to its own judgment, as to the
means most proper to be employed. But I say the general duty does
exist.
I maintain that Congress is bound to take care, by some proper means, to
secure a good currency for the people; and that, while this duty remains
unperformed, one great object of the Constitution is not attained. If we
are to have as many different currencies as there are States, and these
currencies are to be liable to perpetual fluctuation, it would be folly
to say that we had reached that security and uniformity in commercial
regulation, which we know it was the purpose of the Constitution to
establish.
The banks may all resume specie payments to-morrow,--I hope they will;
but how much will this resumption accomplish? It will doubtless afford
good local currencies; but will it give the country any proper and safe
paper currency, of equal and universal value? Certainly it cannot, and
will not. Will it bring back, for any length of time, exchanges to the
state they were in when there was a national currency in existence?
Certainly, in my opinion, it will not. We may heap gold bags upon gold
bags, we may create what securities, in the constitution of local banks,
we please, but we cannot give to any such bank a character that shall
insure the receipt of its notes, with equal readiness, everywhere
throughout the valley of the Mississippi, and from the shores of the
Gulf of Mexico to the St. Lawrence. Nothing can accomplish this, but an
institution which is national in its character. The people desire to
see, in their currency, the marks of this nationality. They like to see
the spread eagle, and where they see that they have confidence.
Who, if he will look at the present state of things, is not wise
enough to see that there is much and deep cause for fear in regard
to the future, unless the government will take the subject of
currency under its own control, as it ought to do. For one, I think I
see trouble ahead, and I look for effectual prevention and remedy
only to a just exercise of the powers of Congress. I look not without
apprehension upon the creation of numerous and powerful State
institutions, full of competition and rivalry, and under no common
control. I look for other and often-repeated expansions of paper
circulation, inflations of trade, and general excess; and then, again,
for other violent ebbings of the swollen flood, ending in other
suspensions. I see no steadiness, no security, till the government of
the United States shall fulfil its constitutional duty. I shall be
disappointed, certainly, if, for any length of time, the benefits of a
sound and uniform convertible paper currency can be enjoyed, while the
whole subject is left to six-and-twenty States, and to eight hundred
local banks, all anxious for the use of money and the use of credit in
the highest degree.
As I have already said, these sub-treasury schemes are but contrivances
for getting away from a disagreeable duty. And, after all, there are
scarcely any two of the friends of the administration who can agree
upon the same sub-treasury scheme. Each has a plan of his own. One man
requires that all banks shall be discarded, and nothing but gold and
silver shall be received for revenue. Another will exclaim, "That won't
do; that's not my thunder." Another would prohibit all the small notes,
and another would banish all the large ones. Another is for a special
deposit scheme; for making the banks sub-treasuries and depositories;
for making sub-treasuries of the broken, rotten, treacherous banks; for
taking bank-notes, tying them up with red strings, depositing them in
the vaults, and paying them out again.
It has been the proposition of the administration to separate the money
of the government from the money of the people; to secure a good medium
of payments, for the use of the treasury, in collecting and disbursing
revenue, and to take no care of the general circulation of the country.
This is the sum of its policy. Looking upon this whole scheme but as an
abandonment of clear constitutional obligation, I have opposed it, in
every form in which it has been presented. My object, as I have already
said, and that of those with whom I acted, has been, to prevent the
sanction of all or any of these new projects, by authority of law, until
another Congress should be elected, which might express the will of the
people formed after the present state of things arose. In this object we
have succeeded. If we have done little positive good, we have at least
prevented the introduction and establishment of new theories and new
contrivances, and we have preserved the Constitution, in this respect,
entire. No surrender or abandonment of important powers is, as yet,
indorsed on the parchment of that instrument. No new clause is appended
to it, making its provisions a mere _non obstante_ to executive
discretion. It has been snatched from the furnace. From this furnace of
party contention, heated seven times hotter than it has been wont to be
heated, the Constitution has been rescued, and we may hold it up to the
people this day, and tell them that even the smell of the fire is not
upon it.
But now, Gentlemen, a stronger arm must be put forth. A mightier
guardianship must now interfere. Time has been gained for public
discussion and consideration, and the great result is now with the
people. That they will ultimately decide right, I have the fullest
confidence. Party attachment and party patronage, it is true, may do
much to delay the results of general opinion, but they cannot long
resist the convictions of a whole people. It is most certain that, up to
the present hour, this new policy has been most unfavorably received.
State after State has fallen off from the ranks of the administration,
on account of its promulgation, and of the persevering attempt to raise
upon it a system of legal, practical administration. The message of
September completed the list of causes necessary to produce a popular
revolution in sentiment in Maine, Ohio, New Jersey, and New York. Since
the proposition was renewed, at the late session, we have witnessed a
similar revolution in Connecticut and Louisiana, and very important
changes, perhaps equivalent to revolutions, in the strength of parties
in other States. There is little reason to doubt, if all the electors of
the country could be polled to-day, that a great and decisive majority
would be found against all this strange policy. Yet, Gentlemen, I do not
consider the question, by any means, as decided. The policy is not
abandoned. It is to be persisted in. Its friends look for a reaction in
public opinion. I think I understand their hopes and expectations. They
rely on this _reaction_. Every thing is to be accomplished by
_reaction_. A month ago, this reaction was looked for to show itself in
Louisiana. Altogether disappointed in that quarter, the friends of the
policy now stretch their hopes to the other extremity of the Union, and
look for it in Maine. In my opinion, Gentlemen, there can be no reaction
which can reconcile the people of this country to the policy at present
pursued.
There must, in my opinion, be a change. If the administration will not
change its course, it must be changed itself. But I repeat, that the
decision now lies with the people; and in that decision, when it shall
be fairly pronounced, I shall cheerfully acquiesce. We ought to address
ourselves, on this great and vital question, to the whole people, to the
candid and intelligent of all parties. We should exhibit its magnitude,
its essential consequence to the Constitution, and its infinite
superiority to all ordinary strifes of party. We may well and truly say,
that it is a new question; that the great mass of the people, of any
party, is not committed on it; and it is our duty to invoke all true
patriots, all who wish for the well-being of the government and the
country, to resist these experiments upon the Constitution, and this
wild and strange departure from our hitherto approved and successful
policy.
At the same time, Gentlemen, while we thus invoke aid from all quarters,
we must not suffer ourselves to be deceived. We must yield to no
expedients, to no schemes and projects unknown to the Constitution, and
alien to our own history and our habits. We are to be saved, if saved at
all, _in_ the Constitution, not _out_ of it. None can aid us, none can
aid the country, by any thing in the nature of mere political project,
nor can any _devices_ supply the place of regular constitutional
administration. It was to prevent, or to remedy, such a state of things
as now exists, that the Constitution was formed and adopted. The time
when there is a disordered currency, and a distracted commerce, is the
very time when its agency is required; and I hope those who wish for a
restoration of general prosperity will look steadily to the light which
the Constitution sheds on the path of duty.
As to you and me, fellow-citizens, our course is not doubtful. However
others may decide, we hold on to the Constitution, and to all its
powers, as they have been authentically expounded, and practically and
successfully experienced, for a long period. Our interests, our habits,
our affections, all bind us to the principles of our Union as our
leading and guiding star.
Gentlemen, I cannot resume my seat without again expressing my sense of
gratitude for your generous appreciation of my services. I have the
pleasure to know that this festival originated with the Boston
mechanics, a body always distinguished, always honored, always
patriotic, from the first dawn of the Revolution to the present time.
Who is here, whose father has not told him--there are some here old
enough to know it themselves--that they were Boston mechanics whose
blood reddened State Street on the memorable 5th of March. And as the
tendencies of the Revolution went forward, and times grew more and more
critical, it was the Boston mechanics who composed, to a great extent,
the crowds which frequented the old Whig head-quarters in Union Street;
which assembled, as occasion required patriots to come together, in the
Old South; or filled to suffocation this immortal Cradle of American
Liberty.
When Independence was achieved, their course was alike intelligent,
wise, and patriotic. They saw, as quick and as fully as any men in the
country, the infirmities of the old Confederation, and discerned the
means by which they might be remedied. From the first, they were ardent
and zealous friends of the present Constitution. They saw the necessity
of united councils, and common regulations, for all the States, in
matters of trade and commerce. They saw, what indeed is obvious enough,
that their interest was completely involved with that of the mercantile
class, and other classes; and that nothing but one general, uniform
system of commerce, trade, and imports could possibly give to the
business and industry of the country vigor and prosperity. When the
convention for acting on the Constitution sat in this city, and the
result of its deliberations was doubtful, the mechanics assembled at the
Green Dragon tavern, and passed the most firm and spirited resolutions
in favor of the Constitution; and when these resolutions were presented
to the Boston delegation, by a committee of which Colonel Revere was
chairman, they were asked by one of the members, how many mechanics were
at the meeting; to which Colonel Revere answered, "More than there are
stars in heaven." With statesmanlike sagacity, they foresaw the
advantages of a united government. They celebrated, therefore, the
adoption of the Constitution by rejoicings and festivals, such, perhaps,
as have not since been witnessed. Emblematic representations, long
processions of all the trades, and whatever else might contribute to the
joyous demonstration of gratified patriotism, distinguished the
occasion. Gentlemen, I can say with great truth, that an occasion
intended to manifest respect to me could have originated nowhere with
more satisfaction to myself than with the mechanics of Boston.
I am bound to make my acknowledgments to other classes of citizens who
assemble here to join with the mechanics in the purpose of this meeting.
I see with pleasure the successors and followers of the Mathers, of
Clarke, and of Cooper; and I am gratified, also, by the presence of
those of my own profession, in whose immediate presence and society so
great a portion of my life has been passed. It is natural that I should
value highly this proof of their regard. We have walked the same paths,
we have listened to the same oracles, we have been guided together by
the lights of Dana, and Parsons, and Sewall, and Parker, not to mention
living names, not unknown or unhonored either at home or abroad. As I
honor the profession, so I honor and respect its worthy members, as
defenders of truth, as supporters of law and liberty, as men who ever
act on steady principles of honor and justice, and from whom no one,
with a right cause, is turned away, though he may come clothed in rags.
Mingling in this vast assembly, I perceive, Gentlemen, many citizens who
bear an appellation which is honored, and which deserves to be honored,
wherever a spirit of enlightened liberality, humanity, and charity finds
regard and approbation among men, I mean the appellation of Boston
merchants. In a succession of generations, they have contributed
uniformly to great objects of public interest and advantage. They have
founded institutions of learning, of piety, and of charity. They have
explored the field of human misfortune and calamity; they have sought
out the causes of vice, and want, and ignorance, and have sought them
only that they might be removed and extirpated. They have poured out
like water the wealth acquired by their industry and honorable
enterprise, to relieve the necessities of poverty, administer comfort to
the wretched, soothe the ravings of distressed insanity, open the eyes
of the blind, unstop the ears of the deaf, and shed the light of
knowledge, and the reforming influences of religion where ignorance and
crime have abounded. How am I to commend, not only single acts of
benevolence, but whole lives of benevolence, such as this? May He reward
them,--may that Almighty Being reward them, in whose irreversible
judgment, in that day which is to come, the merit even of the widow's
mite shall outweigh the advantages of all the pomp and grandeur of the
world!
Gentlemen, citizens of Boston, I have been in the midst of you for
twenty years. It is nearly sixteen years since, quite unexpectedly to
myself, you saw fit to require public service at my hands and to place
me in the national legislature. If, in that long period, you have found
in my public conduct something to be approved, and more to be forgiven
than to be reprehended, and if we meet here to-day better friends for so
many years of acquaintance and mutual confidence, I may well esteem
myself happy in the enjoyment of a high reward.
I offer you again, fellow-citizens, my grateful acknowledgments, and
all my sincere and cordial good wishes; and I propose to you as a
toast:--
"The City of Boston: May it continue to be the head-quarters of good
principles, till the blood of the Revolutionary patriots shall have run
through a thousand generations!"
FOOTNOTES
[113] Speech delivered at a Public Dinner in Faneuil Hall, given by the
Citizens of Boston to Mr. Webster, at the Close of the Session
of Congress, on the 24th of July, 1838.
[114] An extra session of Congress had been called by President Van
Buren, in September, 1837, in consequence of the general
suspension of specie payments by the banks.
[115] Hon. John Davis.
[116] See the Speech above, page 383.
ROYAL AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY.[117]
In the spring of 1839, Mr. Webster went for a short time to England.
He went in no public capacity, but his reputation had preceded him,
and he was received with every mark of the most distinguished
consideration. He was present at several public festivals, and his
addresses appear to have made a deep impression on those who heard
them. The following is the only one, however, which was reported at
any length. It was delivered at the first Triennial Celebration of
the Royal Agricultural Society, held at Oxford, on the 18th of July.
Three thousand persons were at table. Earl Spencer presided, and, in
introducing Mr. Webster, said they had "already drunk the health of
a foreign minister who was present, but they had the honor and
advantage of having among them other foreigners, not employed in any
public capacity, who had come among them for the purpose of seeing a
meeting of English farmers, such as he believed never had been
witnessed before, but which he hoped might often be seen again.
Among these foreigners was one gentleman, of a most distinguished
character, from the United States of America, that great country,
whose people we were obliged legally to call foreigners, but who
were still our brethren in blood. It was most gratifying to him that
such a man was present at that meeting, that he might know what the
farmers of England really were, and be able to report to his
fellow-citizens the manner in which they were united, from every
class, in promoting their peaceful and most important objects." He
gave,--
"The health of Mr. Webster, and other distinguished strangers."
The toast was received with much applause.
MR. WEBSTER said the notice which the noble Earl at the head of the
table had been kind enough to take of him, and the friendly sentiments
which he had seen fit to express towards the country to which he
belonged, demanded his most cordial acknowledgments. He should therefore
begin by saying how much he was gratified in having it in his power to
pass one day among the proprietors, the cultivators, the farmers, of Old
England; that England of which he had been reading and conversing all
his life, and now for once had the pleasure of visiting.
I would say, in the next place, continued Mr. Webster, if I could say,
how much I have been pleased and gratified with one portion of the
exhibition for which we are indebted to the formation of the Royal
Agricultural Society, and that is, the assemblage of so large a number
of the farmers of England. When persons connected with some pursuit, of
whatever description, assemble in such numbers, I cannot look on them
but with respect and regard; but I freely confess that I am more than
ordinarily moved on all such occasions, when I see before me, on either
continent, a great assemblage of those whose interests, whose hopes,
whose objects and pursuits in life, are connected with the cultivation
of the soil.
Whatever else may tend to enrich and beautify society, that which feeds
and clothes comfortably the great mass of mankind should always be
regarded as the great foundation of national prosperity. I need not say
that the agriculture of England is instructive to all the world; as a
science, it is here better understood; as an art, it is here better
practised; as a great interest, it is here as highly esteemed as in any
other part of the globe.
The importance of agriculture to a nation is obvious to every man; but
it, perhaps, does not strike every mind so suddenly, although certainly
it is equally true, that the annual produce of English agriculture is a
great concern to the whole civilized world. The civilized and commercial
states are so connected, their interests are so blended, that it is a
matter of notoriety, that the fear or the prospect of a short crop in
England deranges and agitates the business transactions and commercial
speculations of the whole trading world.
It is natural that this should be the case in those nations which look
to the occurrence of a short crop in England as an occasion which may
enable them to dispose profitably of their own surplus produce. But the
fact goes much farther, for when such an event occurs in the English
capital,--the centre of commercial speculations, where the price of
commodities is settled and arranged for the whole world, where the
exchanges between nations are conducted and concluded,--its consequences
are felt everywhere, as no one knows better than the noble Earl who
occupies the chair. Should there be a frost in England fifteen days
later than usual in the spring, should there be an unseasonable drought,
or ten cold and wet days, instead of ten warm and dry ones, when the
harvest is reaped, every exchange in Europe and America is more or less
affected by the result.
I will not pursue these remarks. [Loud cries of "Go on! Go on!"] I must,
however, say, that I entertain not the slightest doubt of the great
advantage to the interest of agriculture which must result from the
formation and operation of this society. Is it not obvious to the most
common observer, that those who cultivate the soil have not the same
conveniences, opportunities, and facilities of daily intercourse and
comparison of opinions, as the commercial and manufacturing interests?
Those who are associated in the pursuits of commerce and manufactures
naturally congregate together in cities; they have immediate means of
frequent communication. Their sympathies, feelings, and opinions are
instantaneously circulated, like electricity, through the whole body.
But how is it with the cultivators of the soil? Separated, spread
over a thousand fields, each attentive to his own acres, they have
only occasional opportunities of communicating with each other. If
among commercial men chambers of commerce, and other institutions of
that character,--if among the trades guilds are found expedient, how
much more necessary and advisable to have some such institutions as
this society, which, at least annually, shall bring together the
representatives of the great agricultural interest!
In many parts of the country to which I belong, there are societies
upon a similar principle, which have been found very advantageous.
As with you, they offer rewards for specimens of fine animals, and for
implements of husbandry supposed to excel those which have been known
before. They turn their attention to every thing designed to facilitate
the operations of the farmer, and improve his stock, and interest in the
country. Among other means of improving agriculture, they have
imported largely from the best breeds of animals known in England. I am
sure that a gentleman who has to-day deservedly obtained many prizes
for stock will not be displeased to learn that I have seen, along the
rich pastures of the Ohio and its tributary streams, animals raised
from those which had been furnished by his farms in Yorkshire and
Northumberland.
But, apart from this subject, I beg leave to make a short response to
the very kind sentiments, which went near to my heart, as uttered by the
noble Earl at the head of the table.
The noble chairman was pleased to speak of the people of the United
States as kindred in blood with the people of England. I am an American.
I was born on that great continent and I am wedded to the fortunes of my
country, for weal or for woe. There is no other region of the earth
which I can call my country. But I know, and I am proud to know, what
blood flows in these veins.
I am happy to stand here to-day, and to remember, that, although my
ancestors, for several generations, lie buried beneath the soil of the
western continent, yet there has been a time when my ancestors and your
ancestors toiled in the same cities and villages, cultivated adjacent
fields, and worked together to build up that great structure of civil
polity which has made England what England is.
When I was about to embark for this country, some friends asked me what
I was going to England for. To be sure, Gentlemen, I came for no object
of business, public or private; but I told them I was coming to see the
elder branch of the family. I told them I was coming to see my distant
relations, my kith and kin of the old Saxon race.
With regard to whatsoever is important to the peace of the world, its
prosperity, the progress of knowledge and of just opinions, the
diffusion of the sacred light of Christianity, I know nothing more
important to the promotion of those best interests of humanity, and the
cause of the general peace, amity, and concord, than the good feeling
subsisting between the Englishmen on this side of the Atlantic, and the
descendants of Englishmen on the other.
Some little clouds have overhung our horizon,--I trust they will soon
pass away. I am sure that the age we live in does not expect that
England and America are to have controversies carried to the extreme,
upon any occasion not of the last importance to national interests and
honor.
We live in an age when nations, as well as individuals, are subject to a
moral responsibility. Neither governments nor people--thank God for
it!--can now trifle with the general sense of the civilized world; and I
am sure that the civilized world would hold your country and my country
to a very strict account, if, without very plain and apparent reason,
deeply affecting the independence and great interests of the nation, any
controversy between them should have other than an amicable issue.
I will venture to say that each country has intelligence enough to
understand all that belongs to its just rights, and is not deficient in
means to maintain them; and if any controversy between England and
America were to be pushed to the extreme of force, neither party would
or could have any signal advantage over the other, except what it could
find in the justice of its cause and the approbation of the world.
With respect to the occasion which has called us together, I beg to
repeat the gratification which I have felt in passing a day in such a
company, and to conclude with the most fervent expression of my wish for
the prosperity and usefulness of the Agricultural Society of England.
FOOTNOTES
[117] Address at the Triennial Celebration of the Royal Agricultural
Society of England, at Oxford on the 18th of July, 1839.
THE AGRICULTURE OF ENGLAND.[118]
Mr. Webster has at all periods of life cherished a strong attachment
to agricultural pursuits. Of late years, when not obliged to be at
Washington, in the discharge of his public duties, he has resided
wholly on his farm at Marshfield, Massachusetts. The condition of
the agriculture of England was one of the objects which most
received his attention, during his short visit to that country in
1839. On his return to the United States in January, 1840, a strong
desire was entertained by his friends to meet him on some public
occasion, and a wish was expressed, particularly by many members of
the Legislature of Massachusetts, who were in the habit of holding
occasional meetings for the discussion of agricultural subjects, to
learn the result of his observations on the present state of English
agriculture. These wishes were communicated to Mr. Webster, and an
early day was appointed for a meeting, at which the following
remarks were made by him.
MR. CHAIRMAN, I would observe in the outset of these remarks, that I
regard agriculture as the leading interest of society; and as having, in
all its relations, a direct and intimate bearing upon human comfort and
the national prosperity. I have been familiar with its operations in my
youth; and I have always looked upon the subject with a lively and deep
interest. I do not esteem myself to be particularly qualified to judge
of the subject in all its various aspects and departments; and I neither
myself regard, nor would I have others regard, my opinions as
authoritative. But the subject has been one of careful observation to
me, both in public and private life; and my visit to Europe, at a season
of the year particularly favorable for this purpose, has given me the
opportunity of seeing its improved husbandry, and as far as it may be
interesting, or can have a bearing upon the subject of the evening's
discussion, the agriculture of Massachusetts, I will, as the meeting
appear to expect, say a few words upon what has attracted my notice.
How far, in a question of this kind, the example of other countries is
to be followed, is an inquiry worthy of much consideration. The example
of a foreign country may be too closely followed. It will furnish a safe
rule of imitation only as far as the circumstances of the one country
correspond with those of the other.
The great objects of agriculture, and the great agricultural products of
England and of Massachusetts, are much the same. Neither country
produces olives, nor rice, nor cotton, nor the sugar-cane. Bread, meat,
and clothing are the main productions of both. But, although the great
productions are mainly the same, there are many diversities of condition
and circumstances, and various modes of culture.
The primary elements which enter into the consideration of the
agriculture of a country are four,--climate, soil, price of land, and
price of labor. In any comparison, therefore, of the agriculture of
England with that of Massachusetts, these elements are to be taken
particularly into view.
The climate of England differs essentially from that of this country.
England is on the western side of the eastern, and we on the eastern
side of the western continent. The climate of all countries is
materially affected by their respective situations in relation to the
ocean. The winds which prevail most, both in this country and in
England, are from the west. It is known that the wind blows, in our
latitude, from some point west to some point east, on an average of
years, nearly or quite three days out of four. These facts are familiar.
The consequences resulting from them are, that our winters are colder
and our summers much hotter than in England. Our latitude is about that
of Oporto, yet the temperature is very different. On these accounts,
therefore, the maturing of the crops in England, and the power of using
these crops, creates a material difference between its agriculture and
ours. It may be supposed that our climate must resemble that of China in
the same latitudes; and this fact may have an essential bearing upon
that branch of agriculture which it is proposed to introduce among us,
the production of silk.
The second point of difference between the two countries lies in the
soil. The soil of England is mainly argillaceous, a soft and unctuous
loam upon a substratum of clay. This may be considered as the
predominant characteristic in the parts which I visited. The soil in
some of the southern counties of England is thinner; some of it is what
we should call stony; much of it is a free, gravelly soil, with some
small part which, with us, would be called sandy. Through a great extent
of country, this soil rests on a deep bed of chalk. Ours is a granite
soil. There is granite in Great Britain; but this species of soil
prevails in Scotland, a part of the country which more resembles our
own. We may have some lands as good as any in England. Our alluvial
soils on Connecticut River, and in some other parts of the country, are
equal to any lands; but these have not, ordinarily, a wide extent of
clay subsoil. The soil of Massachusetts is harder, more granitic, less
abounding in clay, and altogether more stony, than the soil of England.
The surface of Massachusetts is more uneven, more broken with mountain
ridges, more diversified with hill and dale, and more abundant in
streams of water, than that of England.
The price of land in that county, another important element in
agricultural calculations, differs greatly from the price of land with
us. It is three times as high as in Massachusetts, at least.
On the other hand, the price of agricultural labor is much higher in
Massachusetts than in England. The price of labor varies considerably in
different parts of England; but it may be set down as twice as dear with
us here.
These are the general remarks which have suggested themselves to me in
regard to the state of things abroad. Now, have we any thing to learn
from them? Is there any thing in the condition of England applicable to
us, or in regard to which the agriculture of England may be of use to
Massachusetts and other countries?
The subject of agriculture, in England, has strongly attracted the
attention and inquiries of men of science. They have studied
particularly the nature of the soil. More than twenty years ago, Sir
Humphrey Davy undertook to treat the subject of the application of
chemical knowledge to agriculture in the analysis of soils and manures.
The same attention has been continued to the subject; and the
extraordinary discoveries and advances in chemical science, since his
time, are likely to operate greatly to the advantage of agriculture. The
best results may be expected from them. These inquiries are now
prosecuted in France with great enthusiasm and success. We may hope for
like beneficial results here from the application of science to the same
objects.
But although the circumstances of climate and situation, and nature of
the soil, form permanent distinctions which cannot be changed, yet there
are other differences, resulting from different modes of culture, and
different forms of applying labor; and it is to these differences that
our attention should be particularly directed. Here, there is much to
learn. English cultivation is more scientific, more systematic, and more
exact, a great deal, than ours. This is partly the result of necessity.
A vast population is to be supported on comparatively a small surface.
Lands are dear, rents are high, and hands, as well as mouths, are
numerous. Careful and skillful cultivation is the natural result of this
state of things. An English farmer looks not merely to the present
year's crop. He considers what will be the condition of the land when
that crop is off; and what it will be fit for the next year. He studies
to use his land so as not to abuse it. On the contrary, his aim is to
get crop after crop, while still the land shall be growing better and
better. If he should content himself with raising from the soil a large
crop this year, and then leave it neglected and exhausted, he would
starve. It is upon this fundamental idea of constant production without
exhaustion, that the system of English cultivation, and, indeed, of all
good cultivation, is founded. England is not original in this. Flanders,
and perhaps Italy, have been her teachers. This system is carried out in
practice by a well-considered rotation of crops. The form or manner of
this rotation, in a given case, is determined very much by the value of
the soil, and partly by the local demand for particular products. But
some rotation, some succession, some variation in the annual productions
of the same land, is essential. No tenant could obtain a lease, or, if
he should, could pay his rent and maintain his family, who should wholly
disregard this. White crops (wheat, barley, rye, oats, &c.) are not to
follow one another. Our maize, or Indian corn, must be considered a
white crop; although, from the quantity of stalk and leaf which it
produces, and which are such excellent food for cattle, it is less
exhausting than some other white crops; or, to speak more properly, it
makes greater returns to the land. The cultivation of maize has not,
however, been carried to any extent in England. Green crops are turnips,
potatoes, beets, vetches, or tares (which are usually eaten while
growing, by cattle and sheep, or cut for green food), and clover. Buck
or beech wheat, and winter oats,--thought to be a very useful
product,--are regarded also as green crops, when eaten on the land; and
so, indeed, may any crop be considered, which is used in this way. But
the turnip is the great green crop of England. Its cultivation has
wrought such changes, in fifty years, that it may be said to have
revolutionized English agriculture.
Before that time, when lands became exhausted by the repetition of
grain crops, they were left, as it was termed, fallow; that is, were
not cultivated at all, but left to recruit themselves as they might.
This occurred as often as every fourth year, so that one quarter of
the arable land was always out of cultivation, and yielded nothing.
Turnips are now substituted in the place of these naked fallows; and
now land in turnips is considered as fallow. What is the philosophy of
this? The raising of crops, even of any, the most favorable crop, does
not, in itself, enrich, but in some degree exhausts, the land. The
exhaustion of the land, however, as experience and observation have
fully demonstrated, takes place mainly when the seeds of a plant are
allowed to perfect themselves. The turnip is a biennial plant. It
does not perfect its seed before it is consumed.
There is another circumstance in respect to the turnip plant which
deserves consideration. Plants, it is well understood, derive a large
portion of their nutriment from the air. The leaves of plants are their
lungs. The leaves of turnips expose a wide surface to the atmosphere,
and derive, therefore, much of their subsistence and nutriment from
these sources. The broad leaves of the turnips likewise shade the
ground, preserve its moisture, and prevent, in some measure, its
exhaustion by the sun and air.
The turnips have a further and ultimate use. Meat and clothing come from
animals. The more animals are sustained upon a farm, the more meat and
the more clothing. These things bear, of course, a proportion to the
number of bullocks, sheep, swine, and poultry which are maintained. The
great inquiry, then, is, What kind of crops will least exhaust the land
in their cultivation, and furnish, at the same time, support to the
largest number of animals?
A very large amount of land, in England, is cultivated in turnips.
Fields of turnips of three, four, and even five hundred acres, are
sometimes seen, though the common fields are much less; and it may be
observed here, that, in the richest and best cultivated parts of
England, enclosures of ten, fifteen, twenty, or thirty acres seemed more
common. Since the introduction of the turnip culture, bullocks and sheep
have trebled in number. Turnips, for the reasons given, are not great
exhausters of the soil; and they furnish abundant food for animals. Let
us suppose that one bushel of oats or barley may be raised at the same
cost as ten bushels of turnips, and will go as far in support of stock.
The great difference in the two crops is to be found in the farmer's
barn-yard. Here is the test of their comparative value. This is the
secret of the great advantages which follow from their cultivation. The
value of manure in agriculture is well appreciated. M'Queen states the
extraordinary fact, that the value of the animal manure annually applied
to the crops in England, at current prices, surpasses in value the whole
amount of its foreign commerce. There is no doubt that it greatly
exceeds it. The turnip crop returns a vast amount of nutritive matter to
the soil. The farmer, then, from his green crops, and by a regular
system of rotation, finds green fodder for his cattle and wheat for the
market.
Among the lighter English soils is that of the county of Norfolk, a
county, however, which I had not the pleasure of visiting. Its soil, I
understand, is light, a little inclined to sand, or light loam. Such
soils are not unfavorable to roots. Here is the place of the remarkable
cultivation and distinguished improvements of that eminent cultivator,
Mr. Coke, now Earl of Leicester. In these lands, as I was told, a common
rotation is turnips, barley, clover, wheat. These lands resemble much of
the land in our county of Plymouth, and the sandy lands to be found in
the vicinity of the Connecticut and Merrimack Rivers. The cultivation of
green crops in New England deserves attention. There is no incapacity in
our soil, and there are no circumstances unfavorable to their
production. What would be the best kind of succulent vegetables to be
cultivated, whether turnips or carrots, I am not prepared to say. But
no attempts, within my knowledge, have been made among us of a
systematic agriculture; and until we enter upon some regular rotation of
crops, and our husbandry becomes more systematic, no distinguished
success can be looked for. As to our soil, as has been remarked, there
is no inherent incapacity for the production of any of the common crops.
We can raise wheat in Massachusetts. The average crop in England is
twenty-six bushels to the acre. From my own farm, where the soil is
comparatively thin and poor, I have obtained this summer seventy-six
bushels of wheat upon three acres of land. It is not, therefore, any
want of capability in the soil; but the improvement and success of our
husbandry must depend upon a succession of crops adapted to the
circumstances of our soil, climate, and peculiar condition.
In England, a large portion of the turnip crop is consumed on the land
where it grows. The sheep are fed out of doors all winter; and I saw
many large flocks, in the aggregate thousands and even millions of
sheep, which were never housed. This was matter of surprise, especially
considering the wetness of the climate; and these sheep are often
exposed in fields where a dry spot cannot be found for them to lie down
upon. Sheep are often folded in England by wattled fences, or hurdles
temporarily erected in different parts of the field, and removed from
place to place, as the portions of the crop thus fenced off are
consumed. In some cases they are folded, and the turnips dug and carried
to them. In such cases, they are always fed upon lands which are
intended the next year to be, as far as practicable, brought under
cultivation. I have seen many laborers in fields, employed in drawing
the turnips, splitting them, and scattering them over the land, for the
use of the sheep, which is considered better, often, than to leave the
sheep to dig for themselves. These laborers are so employed all winter,
and if the ground should become frozen, the turnips are taken up with a
bar. Together with the turnips, it is thought important that sheep
should have a small quantity of other food. Chopped hay, sometimes a
little oil-cake, or oats, is usually given. This is called _trough_
food, as it is eaten in troughs, standing about in the field. In so
moist a climate as that of England, some land is so wet that, in the
farmer's phrase, it will not _carry sheep_; that is, it is quite too
wet for sheep to lie out upon it. In such cases, the turnips must be
_carried_, that is, removed from the field, and fed out elsewhere. The
last season was uncommonly wet, and for that reason, perhaps, I could
not so well judge; but it appeared to me that it would be an improvement
in English husbandry, to furnish for sheep, oftener than is done, not
only a tolerably dry ground to lie on, but some sort of shelter against
the cold rains of winter. The turnips, doubtless, are more completely
consumed, when dug, split, and fed out. The Swedish turnip, I have
little doubt, is best suited to cold climates. It is scarcely injured by
being frozen in the ground in the winter, as it will thaw again, and be
still good, in spring. In Scotland, in the Lothians, where cultivation
is equal to that in any part of England, it is more the practice than
farther south to house turnips, or draw them, and cover them from frost.
I have been greatly pleased with Scotch farming, and as the climate and
soil of Scotland more resemble the soil and climate of Massachusetts
than those of England do, I hope the farmers of Massachusetts will
acquaint themselves, as well as they can, with Scotch husbandry. I had
the pleasure of passing some time in Scotland, with persons engaged in
these pursuits, and acknowledge myself much instructed by what I learned
from them, and saw in their company. The great extent of the use of
turnips and other green crops in Scotland is evidence that such crops
cannot be altogether unsuited to Massachusetts.
Among the subjects which of late years have engaged much of the
attention of agriculturists in England, few are more important than that
of tile draining. This most efficient and successful mode of draining
is getting into very extensive use. Much of the soil of England, as
I have already stated, rests on a clayey and retentive subsoil.
Excessive wetness is prejudicial and destructive to the crops.
Marginal drains, or drains on the outside of the fields, do not
produce the desired results. These tile-drains have effected most
important improvements. The tile itself is made of clay, baked like
bricks; it is about one foot in length, four inches in width, three
fourths of an inch in thickness, and it stands from six to eight
inches in height, being hemispherical, or like the half of a cylinder,
with its sides elongated. It somewhat resembles the Dutch tiles which
are seen on the roofs of the old houses in Albany and New York. A
ditch is sunk, eighteen or twenty inches in depth, and these drains
are multiplied over a field, sometimes at a distance of only seven
yards apart. The ditch or drain being dug, these tiles are laid down,
with the hollow side at bottom, on the smooth clay, or any other firm
subsoil, the sides placed near to each other, some little straw thrown
over the joints to prevent the admission of dirt, and the whole covered
up. This is not so expensive a mode of draining as might be supposed.
The ditch or drain need only be narrow, and tiles are of much cheaper
transportation than stone would be. But the result is so important as
well to justify the expense. It is estimated that this thorough
draining adds often twenty per cent. to the production of the wheat
crop. A beautiful example came under my observation in Nottinghamshire,
not long before I left England. A gentleman was showing me his grounds
for next year's crop of wheat. On one side of the lane, where the land
had been drained, the wheat was already up and growing luxuriantly; on
the other, where the land was subject to no other disadvantage than
that it had not been drained, it was still too wet to be sowed at
all. It may be thought singular enough, but it is doubtless true, that,
on stiff, clayey lands, thorough draining is as useful in dry, hot
summers as in cold and wet summers; for such land, if a wet winter
or spring be suddenly followed by hot and dry weather, is apt to become
hard and baked, so that the roots of plants cannot enter it. Thorough
draining, by giving an opportunity to the water on the surface to be
constantly escaping, corrects this evil. Draining can never be
needed to so great an extent in Massachusetts as in England and
Scotland, from the different nature of the soil; but we have yet
quantities of low meadow lands, producing wild, harsh, sour grasses,
or producing nothing, which, there is little doubt, might be rendered
most profitable hay-fields, by being well drained. When we understand
better the importance of concentrating labor, instead of scattering
it,--when we shall come to estimate duly the superior profit of "a
little farm, well tilled," over a great farm, half cultivated and half
manured, overrun with weeds, and scourged with exhausting crops,--we
shall then fill our barns, and double the winter fodder for our cattle
and sheep by the products of these waste meadows.
There is in England another mode of improvement, most important,
instances of which I have seen, and one of which I regard as the most
beautiful agricultural improvement which has ever come under my
observation. I mean irrigation, or the making of what are called _water
meadows_. I first saw them in Wiltshire, and was much struck with them,
not having before understood, from reading or conversation, exactly what
they were. But I afterwards had an opportunity of examining a most
signal and successful example of this mode of improvement, on the
estates of the Duke of Portland, in the North of England, on the borders
of Sherwood forest. Indeed, it was part of the old forest known by that
name. Sherwood forest, at least in its present state, is not like the
pine forests of Maine, the heavy, hard wood forests of the unredeemed
lands of New Hampshire and Vermont, or the still heavier timbered lands
of the West. It embraces a large extent of country, with various soils,
some of them thin and light, with beautiful and venerable oaks, of
unknown age, much open ground between them and underneath their
wide-spread branches, and this covered with heather, lichens, and fern.
Sherwood forest, indeed, is not less interesting for the natural beauty
which charms the eye, than for its venerable antiquity and historical
associations. But in many parts the soil is far enough from being rich.
Upon the borders of this forest are the water meadows of which I am
speaking. A little river runs through the forest in this part, at the
bottom of a valley with sides moderately sloping, and of considerable
extent, between the river at the bottom and the common level of the
surrounding country above. This little river, before reaching the place,
runs through a small town, and gathers, doubtless, some refuse matter in
its course. From this river, the water is taken at the upper end of the
valley, conducted along the edge, or bank, in a canal or carrier, and
from this carrier, at proper times, suffered to flow out very gently,
spreading over and irrigating the whole surface, trickling and shining,
when I saw it, (and it was then November,) among the light-green of the
new-springing grass, and collected below in another canal, from which it
is again let out, to flow in like manner over land lying still farther
down towards the bottom of the valley. Ten years ago, this land, for
production, was worth little or nothing. I was told that some of it had
been let, for no more than a shilling an acre. It has not been manured,
and yet is now most extensively productive. It is not flooded; the water
does not stand upon it; it flows gently over, and is applied several
times in a year to each part, say in March, May, July, and October. In
November, when I saw it, the farmers were taking off the third crop of
hay cut this season, and that crop was certainly not less than two tons
to the acre. This last crop is mostly used as green food for cattle.
When I speak of the number of tons, I mean tons of dried hay. After this
crop was off, sheep were to be put on it, to have lambs at Christmas, so
as to come into market in March, a time of year when they command a high
price. Upon taking off the sheep in March, the land would be watered.
The process of watering lasts two or three days, or perhaps eight or ten
days, according to circumstances, and is repeated after the taking off
of each successive crop. Although this water has no doubt considerable
sediment in it, yet the general fact shows how important water itself is
to the growth of plants, and how far, even, it may supply the place of
other sources of sustenance. Now we in Massachusetts have a more uneven
surface, more valleys with sloping sides, by many times more streams,
and such a climate that our farms suffer much oftener from drought than
farms in England. May we not learn something useful, therefore, from
such examples of irrigation in that country?
With respect to implements of husbandry, I am of opinion that the
English, upon the whole, have no advantage over us. Their wagons and
carts are no better; their ploughs, I thought, not better anywhere, and
in some counties far inferior, because unnecessarily heavy. The subsoil
plough, for which we have little use, is esteemed a useful invention,
and the mole plough, which I have seen in operation, and the use of
which is to make an underground drain, without disturbing the surface,
is an ingenious contrivance, likely to be useful in clay soils, free
from stone and gravel, but which can be little used in Massachusetts. In
general, the English utensils of husbandry seemed to me unnecessarily
cumbrous and heavy. The ploughs, especially, require a great strength of
draught. But as drill husbandry is extensively practised in England, and
very little with us, the various implements, or machines, for
drill-sowing in that country quite surpass all we have. I do not
remember to have seen the horse-rake used in England, although I saw in
operation implements for spreading hay from the swath to dry, or rather,
perhaps, for turning it, drawn by horses.
There are other matters connected with English agriculture, upon which I
might say a word or two. Crops are cultivated in England, of which we
know little. The common English field bean, a small brown bean, growing
not on a clinging vine, like some varieties of the taller bean, runs in
what is called with us the bush form, like our common white bean, upon a
slight, upright stalk, two or two and a half feet high, and producing
from twenty to forty bushels to the acre. It is valuable as food for
animals, especially for horses. This bean does not grow well in thin
soils, or what is called a hot bottom. A strong, stiff, clayey land,
well manured, suits it best. Vetches, or tares, a sort of pea, are very
much cultivated in England, although almost unknown here, and are there
either eaten green, by sheep, on the land, or cut and carried for green
food.
The raising of sheep in England is an immense interest. England probably
clips fifty millions of fleeces this year, lambs under a year old not
being shorn. The average yield may be six or seven pounds to a fleece.
There are two principal classes of sheep in England, the long-wooled and
the short-wooled. Among these are many varieties, but this is the
general division or classification. The Leicester and the South Down
belong, respectively, to these several families. The common clip of the
former may be estimated from seven to eight pounds; and of the last,
from three to three and a half, or four. I mention these particulars
only as estimates; and much more accurate information may doubtless be
obtained from many writers. In New England, we are just beginning to
estimate rightly the importance of raising sheep. England has seen it
much earlier, and is pursuing it with far more zeal and perseverance.
Our climate, as already observed, differs from that of England; but the
great inquiry, applicable in equal force to both countries, is, How can
we manage our land in order to produce the largest crops, while, at the
same time, we keep up the condition of the land, and place it, if
possible, in a course of gradual improvement? The success of farming
must depend, in a considerable degree, upon the animals produced and
supported on the farm. The farmer may calculate, in respect to animals,
upon two grounds of profit, the natural growth of the animal, and the
weight obtained by fattening. The skilful farmer, therefore, expects,
where he gains one pound in the fattening of his animal, to gain an
equal amount in the growth. The early maturity of stock is consequently
a point of much importance.
Oxen are rarely reared in England for the yoke. In Devonshire and
Cornwall, ox teams are employed; but in travelling one thousand miles in
England, I saw only one ox team, and in that case they were driven one
before the other, and in harnesses similar to those of horses. Bullocks
are raised for the market. It is highly desirable, therefore, both in
respect to neat cattle and sheep, that their growth should be rapid, and
their fattening properties favorable, that they may be early disposed
of, and the expense of production proportionably lessened.
Is it practicable, on the soil and in the climate of Massachusetts, to
pursue a succession of crops? I cannot question it; and I have entire
confidence in the improvements to our husbandry, and the other great
advantages, which would accrue from judicious rotation of products. The
capacities of the soil of Massachusetts are undoubted. One hundred
bushels of corn to an acre have been repeatedly produced, and other
crops in like abundance. But this will not effect the proper ends of a
judicious and profitable agriculture, unless we can so manage our
husbandry that, by a judicious and proper succession of the crops, land
will not only be restored after an exhausting crop, but gradually
enriched by cultivation. It is of the highest importance that our
farmers should increase their power of sustaining live stock, that they
may obtain in that way the means of improving their farms.
The breed of cattle in England is greatly improved, and still improving.
I have seen some of the best stocks, and many individual animals from
others, and think them admirable. The short-horned cattle brought to
this country are often very good specimens. I have seen the flocks from
which some of them have been selected, and they are certainly among the
best in England. But in every selection of stock, we are to regard our
own climate, and our own circumstances. We raise oxen for work, as well
as for beef; and I am of opinion that the Devonshire stock furnishes
excellent animals for our use We have suffered that old stock, brought
hither by our ancestors, to run down, and be deteriorated. It has been
kept up and greatly improved in England, and we may now usefully import
from it. The Devonshire ox is a hardy animal, of size and make suited to
the plough, and though certainly not the largest for beef, yet generally
very well fattened. I think quite well, also, of the Ayrshire cows. They
are good milkers, and, being a hardy race, are on that account well
suited to a cold climate and to the coarse and sometimes scanty
pasturage of New England. After all, I think there can be no doubt that
the improved breed of short horns are the finest cattle in the world,
and should be preferred wherever plenty of good fodder and some mildness
of climate invite them. They are well fitted to the Western States,
where there is an overflowing abundance, both of winter and summer
fodder, and where, as in England, bullocks are raised for beef only. I
have no doubt, also, that they might be advantageously raised in the
rich valleys of the Connecticut, and perhaps in some other favored parts
of the State. But for myself, as a farmer on the thin lands of Plymouth
County, and on the bleak shores of the sea, I do not feel that I could
give to animals of this breed that entertainment which their merit
deserves.
As to sheep, the Leicesters are like the short-horned cattle. They must
be kept well; they should always be fat; and, pressed by good keeping to
early maturity, they are found very profitable. "Feed well," was the
maxim of the great Roman farmer, Cato; and that short sentence comprises
much of all that belongs to the profitable economy of live stock. The
South Downs are a good breed, both for wool and mutton. They crop the
grass that grows on the thin soils, over beds of chalk, in Wiltshire,
Hampshire, and Dorsetshire. They ought not to scorn the pastures of New
England.
When we turn our thoughts to the condition of England, we must perceive
of what immense importance is every, even the smallest, degree of
improvement in its agricultural productions. Suppose that, by some new
discovery, or some improved mode of culture, only one per cent. could be
added to the annual results of English cultivation; this, of itself,
would materially affect the comfortable subsistence of millions of human
beings. It is often said that England is a garden. This is a strong
metaphor. There is poor land and some poor cultivation in England. All
people are not equally industrious, careful, and skillful. But, on the
whole, England is a prodigy of agricultural wealth. Flanders may
possibly surpass it. I have not seen Flanders; but England quite
surpasses, in this respect, whatever I have seen. In associations for
the improvement of agriculture we have been earlier than England. But
such associations now exist there. I had the pleasure of attending the
first meeting of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, and I found
it a very pleasant and interesting occasion. Persons of the highest
distinction for rank, talents, and wealth were present, all zealously
engaged in efforts for the promotion of the agricultural interest. No
man in England is so high as to be independent of the success of this
great interest; no man so low as not to be affected by its prosperity or
its decline. The same is true, eminently and emphatically true, with us.
Agriculture feeds us; to a great degree it clothes us; without it we
could not have manufactures, and we should not have commerce. These all
stand together, but they stand together like pillars in a cluster, the
largest in the centre, and that largest is agriculture. Let us remember,
too, that we live in a country of small farms and freehold tenements; a
country in which men cultivate with their own hands their own fee-simple
acres, drawing not only their subsistence, but also their spirit of
independence and manly freedom, from the ground they plough. They are at
once its owners, its cultivators, and its defenders. And, whatever else
may be undervalued or overlooked, let us never forget that the
cultivation of the earth is the most important labor of man. Man may be
civilized, in some degree, without great progress in manufactures and
with little commerce with his distant neighbors. But without the
cultivation of the earth, he is, in all countries, a savage. Until he
gives up the chase, and fixes himself in some place and seeks a living
from the earth, he is a roaming barbarian. When tillage begins, other
arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of human
civilization.
FOOTNOTES
[118] Remarks on the Agriculture of England, made at a Meeting of the
Legislature of Massachusetts, and others interested in
Agriculture, held at the State-House in Boston, on the Evening
of the 13th of January, 1840.
END OF VOLUME FIRST.
Transcriber Notes
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