H. OF R. Naval Establishment. JANUARY, 1812, 1 truce by cash, or procure a peace by arms? Can experience, levied the contribution in ber own any one be ignorant that, throughout the greater part of the world, force is the fashionable law; and they who cannot brave it must bend to it? The dissolution of the old settled rule and order of Europe in these tumultuous times, has produced a state of society among the nations there, both in its motives and actions, similar to the lex fortioris of the Asiatics. What is the inference to be drawn by a rational mind upon these things? Why, plainly, that the persons and property of the citizens of the United States, when abroad on lawful commercial enterprises, shall be directly protected by a force at hand, or, that the foreigners who violate the flag of our nation, do it at their peril, and under absolute assurance that they shall eventually be called to answer for it with an avenging arm. The high and mighty personages who rule the portion of mankind called (what a monstrous perversion!) civilized, have lost much of their respect for waxen seals and covenants on parchment. Let us, for a moment, Mr. Chairman, examine the nature of the controversy we have with Great Britain. It puts me in mind of the man and his mistress-he vowed he could not live with her, and yet, he swore he could not live without her. The controversy is not territorial. We had, it is true, a discussion about the St. Croix river, and the boundary between the district of Maine and the province of New Brunswick. There is, also, a limit, not yet ascertained by chain and compass, in the Northwest. The course from the Lake of the Woods to the head of the Mississippi, as directed by treaty, involves an impossibility. The article says it shall proceed west; geography declares it must run south; and the discordance has never been accommodated. But these differences of opinion between the parties are amicable, and have not been deemed causes of animosity, far less of rupture. Our dominion, therefore, is untouched. The controversy is not genealogical; we have no rival competitors for a throne among us; our people are not arrayed under their Tudors or Plantagenets; there is no faction distinguishing itself by the badge of the White Rose in opposition to that which decks itself with the Red. What have we to do with the blood-royal, and whether the true or spurious issue shall succeed? The right of suffrage is free, and I trust in God it will ever remain so. The electoral colleges perform their duty without molestation, and wo betide the man who shall interrupt them! ports, and collected it in the form of an export duty, by her own officers, and under her own laws; and this mode of raising money upon our consumption would have continued until this time, had not other proceedings given the alarm. It is not my intention to weary my hearers with tedious recitals, I, therefore, briefly observe that, after various moves in the game of negotiation, (and a long game it was,) our Government was told that, if we would pay a transit duty to Great Britain, or trade under licenses bought from her. we might have access to the continent of Europe; that is to say, if you will pay her for the privilege to import your Champaign and Burgundy wines, and to carry to France your fish, rice, catton, and tobacco, you may enjoy the trade, otherwise, you will be the subjects of capture and com demnation, wherever you may fall into her power. To avoid this degradation, we have declared a non-importation, and refused to be any longer one of her customers; whereupon, she has decided that, if we will not trade with her, we shall not trade at the shop of her enemy. And thus between the trade of France, which is scarcely worth having, and that from England, which we have refused to have, we are brought to our pres ent siuation. For outrages infinitely less than these, our predecessors in 1774 and 1775, resolved on resistance by force. Our adversary knows, this time, where to pinch us. She aims the blow at our vulnerable part. By a single coup de main she takes money from your people and their Government. With the same instrument of mischief she rips up their pockets and cuts to pieces the bag of the Treasury. With a foe so expert in creating individual discontent and public embarrassment, have we to contend. I am not, sir, indiscreet enough to launch all we possess upon the ocean. In my judgment, we ought not, by any means, to put the whole of our happiness afloat. Our nearest and dearest interests are on terra firma, and there they should be preserved and maintained. But, at the same time, I may be permitted to say that our rights on the ocean are too important to be sold or abandoned. It has been ingeniously contended that our people are well typified by the mammoth, a great land animal; and by oth ers, that a becoming emblem would be the levia than, a huge inhabitant of the water. If I should not provoke the risibility of the Committee by the observation, I would remark that the much derided tortoise, an amphibious creature, familiar both to land and water, was a more appropriate symbol; employing the former for the multipli cation of its race, and the latter for the better subsistence. To employ an army alone would be to fight with one hand tied behind our back. To equip Having thus endeavored to find what the dispute is not, let us try to discover what it is. If I can comprehend the nature of the altercation, it is purely commercial. I beg the Committee to observe how the matter stands. Before the Revolution Great Britain resolved to tax the colonies, but, injudiciously for her, attempted to gather the tribute in the colonial ports. This was resisted, a naval force in aid of the other is to strike with and with such effect as to overthrow the system. both hands. And, in making a trial of our en Since the Revolution, the same country, availing ergy, I wish it may be done totis viribus, with herself of our preference for her productions and might and main. The idea I have, sir, of a flost partiality to her manufactures, pursued her plan ing force is, the construction of as many armed of taxation. But, grown wiser by dear-bought | ships and vessels as are commensurate with our the vessels they insure. H. or R. Lastly, for I shall mention but one more of these contingencies, our seafaring brethren, when left too much to themselves and exposed to rapacious pirates, as well as to the boisterous elements, may conceive the project of combining and confederating the defensive efforts of the maritime cities, (as Hamburg, Lubec, and their allied towns did in the middle ages,) and of forming a new Hanseatic league in the Western hemisphere. And really, sir, the mode proposed in the bill, of adding security both to our coasting and our foreign trade, is so plain and obvious, that it is difficult for me to conceive how, in the present demoralized and distracted state of the nation, protection can be granted in any other way. abilities; and we are able to accomplish much, if | equipping convoys of their own for protecting we please. I would authorize our merchant shi ships, which, in my opinlon, have already the right to arm in their own defence, to make prize of those who wrongfully attack them. If need required, I would, on an emergency, hire ships, and arm them in defence of the people's rights. I would grant commissions to individuals who were inclined to cruise. I would make the most of the force which the gun vessels (I will not call them by their hackneyed name) afford; and I would add the succor which block-ships, fire-rafts, and torpedoes promise us. By these means a little fleet might be created which would more than protect your ports, harbors, and bays. It would cause your authority to be respected beyond the marine league from the shore. It would carry the honors of your flag to a natural and well defined boundary, the Gulf Stream, the space between which and the coast might be reckoned part of the national domain. I would not attempt, Mr. Chairman, the construction of a thou sand ships, to contend gun for gun with our opponents. Nor, had I fiity vessels, would I send a challenge to the enemy to come with an equal number, and array themselves for a pitched battle. No such gasconading and folly as that. My advice would be, so to use our vessels that, with the least unnecessary exposure to damage and capture on our part, we should give as much annoyance as possible to the foe. As the reasonings of negotiation have been ineffectual, a more conclusive logic, and a more irresistible argument are required. I am not much addicted to prophesying, but I * cannot refrain from conjecturing a few of the #consequences that may result from a torpid behaviour on this occasion. Imagine, sir, a busy and * commercial people acting without the patronage it of their own Government. Certain results may *be tolerably well foreseen. The naval stores with which our country abounds may take their departure for foreign #magazines and arsenals, and increase the strength of the nations to whom the latter belong, to do us the greatest harm. The shipwrights and artists, whose business it is to rig and repair ships, may shoulder their tools and travel for jobs and wages to the navy yards ■beyond our limits. Our native seamen may, peradventure, follow them; and through want of employ on the one part, and under bounties and tempting encouragements on the other, be induced to enlist themselves in an alien service. The merchants of the United States may possibly be induced to purchase the licenses dispensed by the stronger Powers; and, under their cover, ▸ pursue an unmolested, a lucrative, but an abhor 1 red commerce. Owners of ships and vessels may be induced to arm more extensively than heretofore practised, in their own defence. Companies of merchants and underwriters may find it expedient to lessen the chances of loss by With this view of our violated commerce, and of the inconveniences resulting from such viola❘tion, I have a firm conviction that it is worthy of peculiar regard. But, protection requires expense, and our citizens are believed to be averse to the taxation and contribution necessary to defray that expense. I feel, indeed, it is a hard and ungrateful task, to demand money from our constituents for the purposes of the Treasury. But I feel also the strongest persuasion that they will consent to the requisition when they are satisfied it is made for their own benefit, and for asserting their essential rights and interests. I know not what other members may think on this subject; but, for that section of the Union which I have the honor to represent, I have uniformly found them prompt and open-handed in works of charity, benevolence, and mercy. When liberality and public spirit are in request, it is not their custom to be wanting. And now, when under the pressure of commercial embarrassment, and the menace of the most serious evils, they are asked to aid the finances of their country, I cannot permit myself, for one moment, to imagine they will grudge their ratable proportion. Be the sum, therefore, more or less, the cause, the noble cause of which I am the advocate, justifies the expenditure. The undertaking must not be abandoned by scanting the means. Our resources are amply competent. We will put our shoulders to the wheel, and do what we can. We have an unimpaired credit to make loans. We have public lands in store, which may be pledged for the fulfilment of our engagements. Above all, we possess more than mines of gold, in our industry and enterprise. And as the objects for which we contend are of the highest importance to our successors, I am willing to draw bills upon posterity for the amount of the balance unpaid. The means are easy, then. No doubt can be entertained of the bravery of our commanders and crews. The Spaniards, the Moors, the Greeks, and even the English were astonished to behold the officers and seamen of our Navy passing the Straits of Gibraltar on their passage from New York to Tripoli, in boats so low, so small, so illy adapted to cross the Atlantic. Such a mixture of discipline and intrepidity was a phenomenon, both in the history of that war, and of navigation. 1 H. oF R. Naval Estoblishment. JANUARY, 1812. war that will require loans and taxes, and end in a new debt of at least fifty millions of dollarsand under these circumstances, when we are upon the heels of a second revolution, when the people are likely to be most pressed for the ways and means to carry on the war with vigor and certain success, the ruinous system of a great navy is pressed upon us. Upon the return of a second peace, when the British possessions shall be incorporated into the Union, and our army disbanded This voyage in boats, not vastly superior to bat- talize Somers, Wadsworth, Israel, and their asso- Here you distinguish the love of glory, that The SPEAKER laid before the House a letter from the Secretary of State, transmitting a list of the names of persons who have invented any new or useful art, machine, or manufacture, and to whom patents have issued subsequent to the twenty-eighth of December, 1810, in obedience to a resolution of the House of the 13th instant. NAVAL ESTABLISHMENT. The House again resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole on the bill concerning the Naval Establishment. of revenue in the Treasury-after meeting the Mr. JOHNSON said: I do not know, sir, why I lars. I look to the aggressions of England, and I na tail upon this happy Government perpetual taxes and a perpetually increasing national debt. The people will not support such a Naval Establishment-they have the corrective in their hands; and build this fleet of twenty seventy-fours and forty frigates, and the people will in their turn put them down. But, sir, we are told, that we are a commercial people, and that you cannot restrain a spirit of enterprise in our citizens which is limited only by the polar snows to the North and the icy mountains to the South. No person has attempted to damp that gallant spirit, that mercantile enterprise-such adventurous voyages have been fostered and cherished by every means in the power of the Government. But, sir, has this unparalleled enterprise, this gallant spirit, been carried on by a navy? Such a thing has never been thought of, which proves that this question of a navy has no connexion with this commercial enterprise; and the existence of one without the other, is positive proof of the fact. But it is also said, that agriculture and commerce are twin sisters, and the learned gentleman from New York (Mr. MITCHILL,) will not allow a more distant connexion. I have no objection to such a union, and I did expect that it would have been demonstrated what was the real relationship between these twin sisters and a permanent navy; whether it is that of cousin-german, brother, or husband. As these subjects have not been identified, I must be permitted to say that there is no connexion-unless under the disguise of protection, the navy would be the destroyer both of commerce and agriculture-by taxes upon the one and constant war upon the theatre of the other. The advocates of a navy need not expect to cover the deformity and danger of the system by telling the people they are friends to the protection of commerce-and that those who oppose it are ready to relinquish our rights upon the ocean. No, sir, this will not do. They will ask if our commerce, as great as it has been, was ever protected by a navy. They will look at the expenditure of the public money-they will see twenty-nine millions of dollars expended upon our present Naval Establishment; and though they may not complain of that prodigal waste of public money, upon so small a naval force, they will look to the effects produced by this power, and they will refuse to augment it, until, indeed, the Peace Establishment shall require augmentation. The people will look to the votes of this House, and they will see the opposers of a Navy willing at this moment to avenge the depredations upon our commerce and neutral rights by actual hostility. I am not prepared to give up our rights, whether upon the ocean or upon land, whether commercial or personal; but I may differ in the means of avenging these wrongs, and vindicating those, rights, and I shall ever differ from those who wish a navy to ride triumphant in distant seas, and, under a pretext of protection to commerce, doom the nation to galling burdens too intolerable to be borne. But we are told, sir, that this question partakes of the character of a selfevident proposition. Indeed, sir, and in what respect is it entitled to this definition of self-evident? Unless, indeed, from every consideration of history, experience and reason, it is evident that a H. oF R. the delegation from each State, we find a difference in sentiment upon this subject, whether lying on the seaboard or distant from it. The chairman of the Naval Committee has at tempted to make us believe that a navy is the anchor of our hopes, and I dare venture to say, his eloquent colleague (Mr. WILLIAMS) will in due time denounce it as the most abominable system -always employed in the fell purposes of outrage, plunder, war, and death. The same division of sentiment exists in Massachusetts as to this destructive and expensive establishment. And, sir, let me not omit to mention, the sentiments of the Republicans of 98-9, were not only entitled to the love and confidence of the people, but worthy of our imitation. Nor will I omit the resolutions of the Virginia Legislature in opposition to a navy, when they remonstrated against measures which they considered ruinous to the freedom of the United States-nor is my respect for those opinions lessened, although many Republicans in Congress at this time, and men of talents, have become great advocates for a navy, and I will put it to the people whose opinions are entitled to their approbation, whether a navy beyond the peace establishment is ruinous, or the rock of our safety. Leaving the division of sentiment in our country, let us advert to ancient and modern history, and search for examples upon this important subject. And here, sir, I will take this position, and defy history for an example, that no great naval power ever confined their naval strength to the legitimate object of protecting commerce in distant seas. I will refer to Tyre and Sidon, Crete and Rhodes, to Athens and to Carthage. No sooner had these nations ceased to confine their naval strength to their maritime defence at home, to the protection of their seacoast, than they were engaged in plunder, piracy, depredations upon other nations, or involved in wars, which certainly accelerated, if it did not produce the downfall and destruction of those Governments. Peace and tranquillity is not the natural state of a great naval power. A disregard of public law, sacred treaties, and bloodshed, would suit it better; and it has been, and ever will be, the consequences of such force. These nations furnish another example and instructive lesson to the present generation-that while their commerce and navy furnished a small part of the people with the luxuries of every country at that time known, the great mass of citizens at home were miserable and oppressed. Their rights neglected, their burdens increased, and their happiness destroyed, while their fleets and external grandeur carried astonishment and terror to distant nations. When a nation puts forth her strength upon the ocean, the interior of the country will be neglected and oppressed with contributions. Ancient history does not furnish a solitary instance of any permanent good, or long continuance of peace arising from a great naval supremacy; such overgrown power, such unnat navy is an engine of power and ambition, calcu-ural strength, must feed upon plunder, at home and lated to embroil a nation in quarrels and wars, and to fix permanent wretchedness upon the industrious class of the people. When we look to abroad. When we come to modern nations we have proof before us of the positions I have taken. We have been told of Holland, as a people exist 1 - ing in a most flourishing state of prosperous com- Admit that Great Britain, with her thousand JANUARY, 1812. rights formed one of the primary considerations not more primary than the rights of agriculture and manufactures, nor the rights of property, the rights of persons, protection from foreign invasion and aggression, or from internal foes. These rights were equally important, and not less the considerations which strengthened the bonds of the Union. And if any consideration had a pref erence, it arose from considerations of peace and war. When I look into the preamble of the Constitution, which to be sure is no specific grant of power, but is an interpretation of the objects of that great charter of our Union, I find it was to establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence and general welfare, and to secure the blessings of liberty, that the Constitution was adopted; and although maritime commerce has only a co-equal right with all others, still, the greatest means and resources of the Government have been directed to its protection. And still it would seem, if we do not ruin the nation by the establishment of a navy, we wish to make encroachments upon commerce, withstanding this, the public debt is daily increa- to damp the commercial spirit. And this we are told in the face of facts, which appear upon record, and in the face of every expensive war measure now taken and adopted. Sir, in a colonial state, it was a duty upon tea that was the immediate cause of a war, which was bloody indeed, and continued upwards of seven years; a conflict which has no parallel in history as to its beginning and termination. And at this moment, violations of our neutral rights upon the ocean is a primary cause why we are about to wage a second war with Great Britain; and still we are gravely told that we are unwilling to protect commerce, and that we are ready to abandon it, because we will not vote away the substance of the people upon a system of policy which must ruin the nation if not crushed in its infancy. The Constitu tion says, Congress shall have the power to provide and maintain a navy. And this has been read. So has it authorized Congress to raise and support armies, to lay and collect taxes, and declare war; but the Constitution does not fix the limit of these powers, and all are liable to abuse. And the Convention did not suppose that any Congress would so far abuse these powers as to keep either a standing army in time of peace, which must endanger the liberties of the people, or a permanent navy, that would involve us in continual wars with other nations, and permanent taxes upon the people. A reasonable Peace Establishment to protect our maritime and territorial frontier, consistent with strict economy, must have been contemplated; and this force, naval and military, we have maintained; and we are as secure as a nation can expect to be from savages or a maritimefoe. There would be as much reason why we should keep in pay five hundred thousand regular troops in time of peace, as your twenty vessels of seventy-four guns and your forty frigates, in addition to our present naval sing, and it is now acknowledged by all the world F 1 1 1 1 |