The Congressional Globe, Volume 13, Part 2: Twenty-Eighth Congress, First Session Page: 457
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April) 1844.
28th Cong 1st Sess.
APPENDIX TO THE CONGRESSIONAL GLOBE.
45 r
Improvement of Rivers and Harbors~Mr. Payne.
H. of Reps.
Excess of debt paid, after Seduct-
ixtg the revSnue, received from
the sales of the public lands - 336,863,877 71
Now, sir, you perceive, that the object for which
those lands were ceded—to wit: the payment of the
nationardebt—has not yet been accomplished out of
the proceeds of the public lands; and it is worse than
nonsense to contend for a reversion to the States,
until that debt is fully li juidated out of the proceeds
of the sales of said lands.
Again: The States which ceded these lands to
the federal Union, were Connecticut, New York
Virginia and North Carolina. Georgia, it is true
ceded her waste lands also, but she received her quid
pro quo. The federal government, at the time the
cession was made, and in consideration therefor,
bound herself to extinguish the Indian title to all the
land within the limits of the State of Georgia. The
four States already named were the only States
which tranferred their waste lands to the federal
union, for the purpose of paying the national debt.
If, then, there be a reversionary interest to the land
ceded, it unquestionably must be in those four States.
What right had the Commonwealth of Massachu-
setts, (which refused to surrender her public land,) the
District of Columbia, and other States of the
Union, to a reversionary interest in the waste lands
ceded by other States? None earthly, either in law
or equity, and yet the bill to distribute the proceeds
of the public lands provides for a pro rata distribu-
tion between all the States, founded upon represent-
ation.
Sir, it is disingenuous in gentlemen to contend
that the claim to distribution is founded in an
equitable or legal reversionary interest in all
the States. Distribution is desired and in-
tended for more active and practical purposes. The
law or justice of the measure has but little influ-
ence upon those who advocate it. It is designed to
withdraw from the national treasury every resource
for raising revenue, except by duties upon foreign
imports, and thereby impose the entire burdens of
government upon custom-house revenue. That is
the object, the practical effect of which will be to
perpetuate the tariff of 1842, and thereby afford the
desired protection to the manufacturing interest of
the country. Now, sir, if gentlemen will first re-
imburse the treasury, from the sale of the public
lands, actually surrendered by the States to the fed-
eral government, for the $336,863,877 71 custom-
house revenue applied to the liquidation of the na-
tional debt, then I have no sort of objection that the
residue of this land shall revert to the particular
States by which it was surrendered to the federal
government. But, until this is done, the States have
neither an equitable nor legal claim to the reversion.
Mr. Chairman, I have thus far only spoken of the
lands actually ceded by the States to the federal Union.
There is another class of public lands owned by this
government, and acquired by purchase from foreign
countries—I mean the Louisiana territory, pur-
chased from France, at a cost of fifteen millions of
dollars; and the Florida territory, purchased from
Spain, at a cost of five millions of dollars—making the
aggregate cost of both territories, twenty millions of
dollars. "We have already seen that the money
arising from the sales of the public lands has
not paid the national debt by $336,863,877,71.
It therefore follows, as a necessary consequence that
the twenty millions of dollars, paid by this govern-
ment for the Territory of Louisiana and Florida,
was derived from custom-house revenue.
Now, sir, what reversionary interest, either in law
or equity, have the States ceding their wild lands to
the federal Union, to the lands purchased from
France and Spain' No rational man will content for
any such right: and yet the distribution bill of the
extra session distributed among the States the pro-
ceeds of the sales of those lands also? Could you
have a more striking illustration than this fact affords,
of the disingenuousness of the argument founded
upon the legal or equitable reversionary interest in
the States?
Mr. Chairman, it is useless to hoodwink this
question. The passage of the distribution bill at the
extra session was a lawless attempt to ride over the
constitution by a reckless majority, flushed with
Received from the sale of the public lands - 114.013,000 -20
Balance paid for the public lands above the
amount received .... £25,P3G,999 80
Thus it is perceived, that, as j el, not one dollar derived fi om
the sale of the public domain ha<s been applied to the liqui-
dation of the national debt, but has been a charge upon the
custom-house revenue, oi over 20 millions of dollars.
victory, and giddy from elevation. It was a deliber-
ate attempt to distribute at one single dash twenty
millions of custom-house revenue; to do which,
I maintain Congress has not the constitutional
power. In this opinion I was sustained by Mr.
Clay "himself, at no later day than July the 11th,
1832. Speaking of a distribution of the public reve-
nue, he says:
If this be collected from one portion of the people, and
given to another, it would be unjust. If it is to be given to
the States in their corporate capacity, to be used by them in
their public expenditure, I know of no prniciple in the con-
stitution which uttihoiizts the federal government to become
such collector for the States, nor of any piinciple of safety
or propriety, which admits of the States becoming sveh recip-
cents of gratuity from the general government" (See Register
of Debates, vol. 8, p. 67.)
Now, sir, the constitution is the same it was in
1832; and the same principles of "safety and proprie-
ty" which operated upon the question then, did so
in 1841. If Mr. Clay was right in 1832, he was
wrong in 1841. But I may be told, that although
Congress has no constitutional power to distribute
custom-house revenue, yet the public money may be
invested in land, as was the case in the purchase of
Louisiana and Florida; and that the land may then
be sold, and the proceeds distributed.
Sir, you can circumvent the constitution by no
such artifice. You can do nothing indirectly which
you have not the power to do directly; and any at-
tempt to do so is a dishonest evasion of official
oaths, which merits the contempt of all honest men.
The proposition, then, to distribute the money
arising from the sale of those lands, purchased from
France and Spain, and paid for with money derived
from customs, is as clearly a proposition to distri-
bute custom-house revenue as it would have been
had the money been taken directly from the treas-
ury; and, sir, every voter in November next must
set the seal of his approbation or disapprobation
upon this one of the "series" of whig measures,
which asserts, and vainly endeavored to carry into
execution, the dangerous power of taxing the peo-
ple, not for the support of government, but for dis-
tribution among the States.
Another decided objection with mc to distribution
is founded in the fact that the money distributed is
to be applied to the liquidation of debts due by the
States. Those debts were chiefly contracted to
prosecute schemes of internal improvement. The
object tff these improvements was to increase the
value of the property and capital of the State in
which they were made. Under the system of rais-
ing revenue by a direct tax, adopted by the States,
the burden of paying those debts falls upon proper-
ty and capital. This is as it should be. It was to
benefit capital and property the debt was contracted.
It is therefore*just that capital and property should
be taxed to pay the debt. But, sir, if you pay those
debts from the federal treasury, the revenue of
which is collected by an indirect tax, you exempt
capital and property from the burden of paying
those State debts, and transfer it to labor. This is
unjust, and ought not to be tolerated. I shall illus-
trate this objection more fully after I notice the last
of the "series" of whig measures originating in the
legislative programme of Mr. Clay; but I desire the
committee to bear in mind the fact already stated,
viz: that the debts due by the States have to be paid,
under existing laws, by a direct tax upon capital
and property.
Sir, I now propose to review the tariff bill of 1842.
It had its origin in the legislative programme of Mr.
Clay, at the extra session of the 27th Congress, in
these words: "The provision of an adequte revenue
for the government, by the imposition of duties.'''' How
modest the allusion—how little calculated to excite
alarm—the magnitude, unjust and hideous prop-
ositions of the matured legislative monster, it is my
duty to delineate.
Sir, I must do this as briefly as possible. My own.
strength is exhausted, and I fear I have already
wearied the patience of the committee. Before,
however, I enter upon an examination of the tariff
bill of 1842, I feel it to be my duty to examine the
position of Mr. Clay, in reference to a protective
tariff: certain it is, he is differently understood upon
this question, in the two grand divisions of the
Union. His friends upon this floor, hailing north
of the Potomac, most certainly understand him as
desiring protection to the Manufacturers, "by the en-
actment of laws designed for that purpose, and ad-
equate for it." Whereas, south of the Potomac, he
is understood to be in favor of "a revenue tariff
only," with the incidental protection afforded by it:
at least so I understand from the tone of the south-
ern press. Sir, it is a matter of some moment
how this difference of opinion originated between
the^ friends of Mr. Clay in< different sections of the'
Union. I am not quite certain that his own ambig- -
uous language has not given rise to this difference of
opinion. Sure I am, he is not in favor of a revenue -
tariff only, with such incidental protection as a strict- .
ly revenue tariff affords; nor will any of his friends.- .
upon this floor assert that he is. The gentleman
from Kentucky [Mr. White] vindicated him, the
other day, from the charge of boing opposed to pro-
tection, for protection sake; and yethis friends in the
South, maintain that he is opposed to any but a rev-
enue tariff, and to all protection, except the incident^
al protection resulting from a revenue tariff. ,
Mr. Chairman, upon this question Mr. Clay has
not acted, as 1 verily believe, openly and fairly with
the South. In his letter to Mr. Meriwether, da-
ted October the 24th, J 843, he says: "I never was
in favor of what I regarded as a high tariff." In
his letter to Mr. Bronson, of Lagrange, Georgia,
dated September 13, 1843, he remarks:
I think there is no danger of a high tarift' being ever es-
tablished. That of 182S was eminently deserving that de-
nomination. I was not in Congress when it passed, and did
not vote for it; but with its history, and with the circum-
stances which gave bath to it, 1 am well acquainted. They
were highly discreditable to American legislation; and t
hope, for its honor, will never be again repeated.
Now, sir, this is a strong condemnation of the
tariff of 1828, but upon what grounds we are not
told; whether it is condemned by Mr. Clay because
of the high protection it afforded the manufacturer,
or because of the duty imposed by it upon articles
not manufactured in the United States, is not stated. If
Mr. Clay wished to be understood as being opposed to
a high protective tariff—such as the tariff of 1828—
why did ho not say so? Why did he omit the word
protective altogether, and only speak of a high tariff?
Can it be possible Mr. Clay wrote this letter to satis-
fy the South, leaving the North in full possessibn of
all his views originally expressed upon the subject
of protection? Be that as it may, I appeal to thp
candor of the South, if they do not understand Mr.
Clay (when he said, in his letter to Mr. Meri-
wether, "I never was in favor of what I considered
a high tariff," and, in his letter to Mr. Bronson,
condemns the high tariff of 1828) to be opposed to
the high protection afforded by that bill. I am quite
sure he is so understood in that meridian. But, sir,
this is a profound error. Mr. Clay does not now,
nor did he ever, object to the protection afforded by
the tariff of 1828. When he speaks of the high
tariff of 1828, he has reference to the aggregate
amount of duty imposed by that bill, and not to the
protection which it afforded.
In proof upon this poir.t, let us examine a similar
condemnation, by Mr. Clay, of the tariff of 1828,
in a speech delivered by him in the Senate of the
United States, on the 2d day of February, 1832,
and reported in Gales & Seaton's Register of De-
bates, part 1, vol. viii, p. 263. In alluding to the
tariff he says:
An amendment of the system was proposed in 1828, to the
lustor\ of which 1 lefer with no agreeable recollections.
The bill in thot yeai, in some ol its provisions, was framed
on prmriph's directly adverse to the declared wishes of "the
friends of the policy ol protection Be that is it
may, the most exceptionable features of the bill uexe
stamped upon it against the earnest remonstrances of the
fiiends of the sjsiem, by the votes ol southern members,
upon a principle, I thinl^ as unsound in legislation as it is
mjnehensible in ethics.
Mr. Chairman, this condemnation of the tariff of
1828, by Mr. Clay in 1832, is as clear and decided
as it was in 1843.
Now, sir, let us examine the grounds of this ob-
jection to the tariff of 1828, made by Mr. Clay, in
1832, and thereby arrive at what he really means
by his condemnation of the same bill in 1843. In
1832, it will be remembered, the revenue had in-
creased beyond the wants of the public service; and
it was, therefore, deemed necessary to modify the
tariff of 1828. Mr. Clay embarked in the per-
formance of this duty. Did,he propose to diminish
the protection afforded the manufacturer by the bill
he then and now condemns, because it was "emi-
nently a high protective tariffr" No, sir. The fal-
lowing is the proposition offered by Mr. Clay for
that purpose:
Risolved, That the existing dutie? upon articles imported
from foreign countries, and net coming into competition with
similar articles made or produced in the United States, ought
to be forthwith abolished, except the duties upon wines
and silks, and they ought to be reduced; and'that the Com-
mittee on Finance be instructed to report a bill accoidingly.
—See 1st part, vol. 8, Gales Seaton's Rtgtslet of Debatei,
page 55.
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United States. Congress. The Congressional Globe, Volume 13, Part 2: Twenty-Eighth Congress, First Session, book, 1844; Washington D.C.. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth2368/m1/467/: accessed April 26, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.