meanest and basest instruments. But, sir, if, contrary to all my anticipations, war shall come, whatever may be my opinions of the wretched bungling or wicked designs of its authors, I shall regard it as no longer a party matter, but as a great national question, demanding the zealous co-operation and best energies of every American citizen. I shall feel it my duty, in whatever position I may stand, to lend my humble aid to the concentration of all the resources of the country to give vigor to the public arm, and to sustain, gloriously sustain, the national character.

But, sir, I repeat that war will not come. The heads of the dominant party have peculiar and divided interests, and, consequently, divided and conflicting counsels. The present head of the Government, high-toned bold, daring, impatient, and eminently warlike, is obviously bent upon bringing France to his feet, or trying the hazards of war. His peculiar views are re-enforced and sustained by a numerous, powerful, and, for the most part, interested corps. Almost the entire official corps, the anxious expectants of place, and the greedy seekers of jobs and contracts, will be found on the side of the strongest executive measures. War necessarily brings with it vast accessions of power to the executive branch of the Government-vast accessions of officers and employees to the public service, and a corresponding increase in the expenditure of public money. Besides, the army and the navy, opposite in every thing to the mercenary tribe to which I have alluded, will be found on the side of war. Their high military spirit, their love of enterprise, their aversion to the "cankers of a calm world," and their devotion to glory, naturally and necessarily place them on the side of war. "Tis their vocation." "The pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war" have charms for the soldier not to be resisted. We are upon the eve of a presidential election. The present head of the Government, brave, bold, and warlike, is yet surrounded with the halo of glory won in many a stricken field. I have not heard that the nomiinee for the succession is particularly distinguished either for military spirit or military achievement. Though he reposes under the shade of the laurels that have sprung up on the glorious field of New Orleans, yet I have not learned that he has moistened their roots with either bis sweat or his blood.

[SENATE.

call to the head of the Government the bravest, the ablest, and most warlike? Would any eye be turned in the hour of danger upon the buzzing favorites "in the perfumed chambers of the great?" Would not a common sense of danger beget common counsels, looking to energy and ability as the best hope for honor and safety? It is in the contemplation of this state of things, of the imminent dangers to the designated succession in the event of war, that I see, or think I see, the safest guarantee for a continuance of peace.

If all apprehensions of the French war shall pass from men's minds, yet a war of subjugation will be waged upon the Senate. The dangers of this war, though less exigent, are but little less interesting to the calm and philosophical observer of the tendency of political

events.

Sir, the issue of this great struggle is to determine the fearful question whether this Government shall retain its ancient federative character, such as the framers of the constitution designed it to be, or whether it shall be ingulfed in the great Maelstrom of consolidation. It is to determine whether the sovereignty of the States is a mere ideal, visionary conception, or whether it is a sensible practical barrier against the excessive action of irregular power. In a word, it will determine the question of ascendency between well-regulated liberty and the irregular excesses of irresponsible power. Sir, this contest is most unequal, whether viewed with reference to the characters of the parties to it, or with reference to their resources for defence, annoyance, or open assault.

The Executive is essentially active, the Senate necessarily passive. The Executive, in its very unity, possesses a great element of strength. As an emanation from the popular will, it possesses great power, because of its popularity. The power of nomination and appointment, and, yet more, the power of removal from office, secures support, and subdues the spirit of resistance. It has the expenditure of vast amounts of public money in various forms, the power of creating hope and expectation in the distribution of patronage, and the distribution of money to favorite contractors. The glitter of office, rank, and station, may be held up to tempt the ambitious, and the glitter of gold to tempt the mercenary. These great and various powers, centred in a single individual, upheld and controlled by a single will, capable of indefinite expansion and the minutest contraction, like the proboscis of an elephant, now tear

Sir, the lion is a noble animal; the tiger is a powerful and fearful one; the fox is cunning, stealthy, subtle, remarkable for his doublings and nimble dexterities. The lion is lord of the woodland domain, in peace as well as in war. If, perchance, an alliance should be formed between the lion and the fox, (a most unnatural one,) or between the tiger and the fox, (less so,) it is easy to perceive that, in time of peace, the subtle reynard might rob half the tenants of the wood, and, by nimbleness of foot and dexterity in doubling, reach without harm his noble ally, lay his spoils at his feet, and crouch down at his paws for security and protection. But if the wood. land domain should be awakened by the notes of war, and the tenants of the wood should prepare for the conflict, while the lordly lion would shake the dew-drops from his mane, and rouse to maintain his ancient supremacy, the cunning little fox would hie him away to the cleft of some rock, from which he might securely scan the dangers and devastation of the battle-field.

Who would be best qualified to lead on in a war with France The French are known to be a gallant, warlike, and powerful nation. Our national pride, national honor, and national safety, would all be staked upon the issue. Might not the people, by universal acclamation, |

now overawing and subjugating a State Legislature, and now subsidizing a political hack; and all this re-enforced and sustained by an unscrupulous press, acting in perfect concert, re-echoing the word of command from the centre upon every hill and in every vale of this great confederacy; against the shafts of which a long life of virtue and integrity afford no protection, but the higher and more shining the merit, the more certainly will the poisoned arrow be sped-against all this fearful array of power and influence, how can an individual, or how can the Senate, expect to escape the doom already denounc ed against them?

The Senate, on the contrary, is merely passive; it has no patronage or gold to tempt the ambitious or mercenary. It possesses none but mere conservative powers. It is a mere staying power-a sort of political breakwater-resisting on the one side the excessive ebullitions of executive ambition, and the waves of a temporary popular fury on the other. The individual Senators have no sympathy or encouragement beyond the limits of their respective States, nor, indeed, there, unless they be pliant, or unless, what can hardly be expected, the virtue and intelligence of the people shall be able to resist this formidable array of executive power and influence.

In its legislative character, it is merely co-ordinate with the other branch of Congress. In its executive capacity, it must either follow the lead of the Executive, or be driven to the exercise of odious and unpopular powers. In the former case, it derives no strength, as there is no ascription of merit; in the latter, it has to encounter the denunciation of the Executive, its retainers, and disappointed nominees. Is it not wonderful that, in this unequal contest, the Senate, planting itself upon the ramparts of the constitution, has been able to hold out so long against an Executive as remarkable for his popularity as for the fury of his assaults? Right or wrong, does it not afford consoling evidence of individual firmness and integrity? Does it not manifest on the part of Senators a confidence in the ultimate right judgment of the people, as refreshing to our hopes as it is complimentary to the intelligence, good sense, and virtue, of our countrymen?

The events of another year, though they may not solve, yet they may throw much light upon this interesting problem. If the Senate shall be permanently broken, either by direct action upon it, or indirectly, through the State Legislatures, one of the great safeguards of liberty will have fallen. The direct and inevitable tendency will be to the centralization of all political power. If there be any truth in political science, perfectly clear it is that centralized power is but another name for despotic power. Precisely in proportion as you centralize, in the same proportion do you approach absolute power. Power begets power, and a tendency to centralization, in the long run, will reach that point.

But

To render power innocuous, it must be broken up into fragments, and such a distribution made of it that, with out the power of one department to control another, it may yet check and stay its action. To stand still is safe. To move onward with the concurrence of all the parts is accomplishing the highest object of Government. for one department to be endowed with the strength of silencing or dragging on all the others, per fas aut nefas, willing or unwilling, is to consummate the highest disas ters of an irregular and despotic Government. Opposing powers in politics are not unlike opposing powers in physics. By delicate adjustment, perfect harmony may be preserved, and a just equilibrium attained. If, in the distribution of power, all the great interests that Government is designed to protect shall be fairly represented, and that representation shall be so adjusted, upon organic principles, that no interest can act on another without the concurrence of a majority representing each and every interest, it would present a scheme corresponding to our highest conceptions of a just and wise Government. The history of all ages, and of all Governments, shows that where power has been centralized, there it has been absolute; and that liberty, in every country, has borne a direct proportion to the equality and skill with which opposing though not conflicting powers have been distributed. The characteristic difference between the Governments of Asia and Europe is, that, in the former, there is a centralization of power, and, of course, the dead level of despotism; in the latter, power is more or less distributed, and, of course, more or less liberty in exact correspondence. I will not pursue this subject, though examples drawn from history might shed a flood of light on these propositions.

Sir, the French war disposed of, and the Senate put out of the way, or rather the "factious majority" got rid of, the dominant party will at length reach the great immediate object of all their efforts; I mean, the surplus revenue, the thirty millions on hand, and the rapidly accruing revenues of the country. All the rest, sir, are mere pretexts, decoys for gulls. That stubborn majority in the Senate out of the way, a show of war must yet be kept up to decoy the people, through their feel

[FEB. 3, 1836.

ings of patriotism, to yield assent to the lavish and profligate squandering of thirty millions; yes, and all the future accruing surpluses, until thirty millions shall be more than three times told upon jobbers, contractors, favorites, and all the vampyres belonging to the set, under the guise of warlike preparations, as if war were the sole business of life. I know gentlemen are not so shallow as to attach so much importance to these gigantic schemes of national defence as their speeches might seem to indicate. The surplus revenue must be seized upon. Sir, it will be so comfortable, it will not only serve to fill their pockets, but will give a prodigious activity to all the electioneering operations in the making of their President. Sir, it is vain to speak of the intelligence and virtue of the people being able to resist the power of a party backed by thirty millions in money, and an amount not much less in the shape of the public domain. I know (said Mr. M.) that there are States, and people in some of the States, that scarcely feel the inAluence. But at other points of the line of battle, where a decisive impression is necessary to be made, it can and will be made. The Government is too rich. It must be made poor before it can be made economical and pure. As you increase the surplus means of the Government, you multiply the schemers, projectors, and sturdy beggars, who will fall upon devices that will infallibly reach and squander the money.

Sir, we stand in a new position, one wholly unknown, until now, in modern history. We have all the symptoms of a highly diseased plethora. We have too much money. Economy is rapidly giving place to a wasteful profligacy. Chimerical projects are set on foot merely to get the money expended. Public men are losing all sense of the responsibility that habits of rigid economy enforce.

Sir, when I first came to Congress, if a proposition had been introduced requiring the expenditure of thirty millions in military defences, it would have been laughed to scorn. The mover would have been derided as the merest moonstruck visionary. All would have seen then, as they must now, that it is impossible to lay out that amount annually; that the requisite skill and the necessary labor cannot be procured, if you had the power of Midas to convert the mountains into solid gold. Yet, this is the natural downward course. Twelve years ago, the annual expenses of Government were under ten millions. Under this administration, which came into power with such lavish promises of economy, and pledges to bring back the Government to the cheapness, simplicity, and purity, of its earlier and better days, the expenditure has increased to a sum largely above twenty millions, and in the future we may expect to see those expenses exceed thirty millions a year. Is there the slightest necessity for this increase? None at all. Is it possible that the people would tolerate this state of things, if they were fully awakened to it? Sir, the treasury must be reduced, or this Government will sink into profligacy, and its retainers into utter corruption. But I tell you, sir, and I tell the people, from my place here, that this administration and its active corps of supporters will not suffer this money to be taken out of their hands. I tell the people that the administration will not suffer the States and the people to take and enjoy their own money. I tell the people that every plan of equal distribution of this surplus treasure, that is not now needed, that is lying idle to be scrambled for, will be resisted to the death by the administration and its loyal supporters. I tell them that the friends of the administration will vote for the most extravagant appropriations, exceeding far, very far, in amount, the most extravagant ever known heretofore, with the view of reducing this surplus as much as possible, and for the purpose of expending it among its re

FEB. 3, 1836.]

own.

tainers and employees, for works but little needed, if at all. I say to the people, mark this prediction, and see if it shall not be verified to the letter. I tell them that these unappropriated surpluses are of no use to any one, except to the deposite banks; and that to them they serve as precisely so much capital, upon which they trade and make profit exactly as if they were their I tell the people that in this way the administration holds a power over thirty or forty banks in the different States, that, if exerted, would crush three fourths of the number in a day. I tell them that a power of life and death over thirty or forty banks is a power over the directors, stockholders, and their debtors, to a greater or less degree. It is a power, to a great extent, over the money concerns of the country, and over thousands and tens of thousands of our people. I ask the people whether this power (abused or not, or to be abused or not) is not too great and dangerous a power to be lodged in the hands of any man? I ask the people whether these privileged corporations are better entitled to have the use of the public money and to make profit out of it, as if it were their own, than the States and the people of the States, by the sweat of whose brows it was earned?

And yet the banks will keep it. The States and the people will not be permitted to have it equally distributed during this administration. Sir, it is not in the nature or temper of power to surrender any of its advantages. If this money were given up, there might not any longer be inducement for thousands and tens of thousands of those now engaged in the work to continue their efforts to appoint the successor, to make the Baltimore nominee the next President.

If the land bill were permitted to pass, this money would be handed over to the States, for the use of the people of the States. More than nine hundred thousand dollars would immediately go to my own State. In internal improvement, education, railroads, and the many other beneficial forms in which it might be applied, it would give a prodigious impulse to the wealth, prosperity, and happiness, of the people of that State. Really it seems that this surplus and useless public money had as well go to the use of the people of the States, to make them prosperous and happy, as to go to the use of the banks to build up overgrown fortunes for the stockholders. But our venerable President thinks otherwise; and what Senator shall dare to call himself the friend of the President, if he dare to think differently?

The Senator from Missouri [Mr. BENTON] distinctly says that this gigantic scheme of national defence was introduced expressly to defeat the land bill, and to prevent an equal distribution of the surplus among the States. I thank him for this frank and manly avowal.

We now understand each other. These, then, are competing propositions. Let us calmly examine the merits of each. I beg the people to examine them calmly, fairly, and dispassionately.

It is a great and interesting question. It must give rise to a keen and protracted contest. The parties on either side are strong and powerful. The States and the people, on one side, against the general Government, and its office holders, friends, and retainers, on the other. These are the parties. I take my stand on the side of the States and the people. I take it with confidence, though with certain knowledge that all our present efforts will be defeated. I rejoice to see every party compelled to take position. I am gratified to see gentlemen come up to the mark. There is no middle ground. They must fall into the ranks on the side of the States and the people, or they must fall into the ranks of this Government and its official corps. Take position, gentlemen. Let the people see where you

[SENATE.

Ma

I have said the States and the people are on one side. Is it not so? Have not the most decisive expressions of popular opinion been heard, in the old States, in favor of the land bill? Have not the Legislatures that were free from party control expressed their approbation strongly? Do they not know that the public debt is paid? Do they not know that the money here is not needed, and cannot be properly used? Do they not know that this superabundance destroys responsibility, begets extravagance, and must end in profligacy and corruption? Do they not know that it is in this form only that they can hope to be sharers in this rich and princely public domain? Do they not know that an equal distribution would awaken enterprise, stimulate industry, and enrich and embellish the States? And is it wonderful that the people every where desire the measure? But not so the politicians. To them it is wormwood and gall. To the great "spoils party" it brings terror and alarm. To all others it brings healing on its wings, unless, perchance, to a very few whose pride of opinion may be startled, or to some from the new States, who may hope by other modes to derive yet greater benefits from the public lands than this measure promises. If the measure shall pass, I know it will be vetoed. That is a great evil, and yet I would not abrogate, modify, or touch, the veto power. I regard the veto as one of the contrivances in our system to break the shock of consolidated power; a wise contrivance to break sudden excesses in legislative action. In the long run, it must yield to the settled, dispassionate judgment of the country. In this case, I venture to predict that result. But the "spoils party"-how is it that this party can have an interest distinct and separate from the communities through which it is distributed? Let us look into this matter.

This great scheme of civil and political liberty of ours, the admiration and wonder of the age, is yet but an experiment: an experiment thus far illustrating, and gloriously illustrating, the truth of the great principle upon which our whole system rests: that man is capable of self-government. This system, in its successful and splendid career, is year by year developing new symptoms, new tendencies, and unforeseen phenomena; some portending evil, others full of refreshing promise and encouragement.

In the early and purer times of the republic, parties were divided upon great principles, growing out of the workings of the system itself. With equal zeal and patriotism, they took essentially different views of the tendencies of the system. This diversity of opinion was

found in every State, connected with no local interest or sectional bias, but having reference solely to great questions, on which each and every part of the body politic had an equal interest.

These parties were the best and purest that have sprung up in our history. Time alone could settle the great questions between them, and time has settled definitively many of them. In the progress of events, these parties took a tinge from sectional prejudice and local interest, and were exposed to other occasional disturb ances and deflections, from strong and heady personal ambition. In the fulness of time, in more than half the States, they lost almost every thing but their names, and were merged in the great and fearful vortex of sectional interests, and sectional interests alone, except so far as personal ambition yet clung to them, and occasionally modified their action. This modification of parties existed at or about the time that I first took a place in the councils of the Union. I then regarded them as having taken the most dangerous, the most remorseless, and the very worst combination that was compatible with the forms of the constitution, and a reasonable guarantee of practical liberty. How shortsighted and how erroneous were my views. This modification, resting essentially upon great sectional interests, banded together for the oppression and legislative plunder of the rest, produced an irregular overaction in the political machine, as well as in the great pecuniary interests of the country. This again run into a new modification, or rather produced a political phenomenon, eluding, as yet, the calculations of the philos opher, in reference either to the probable term of its duration, or the magnitude and extent of its mischief.

We now see, for the first time in this country, a great, numerous, and powerful party, formed without reference to any great principles of national policy, without regard to sectional interests, maintaining a sort of neutral ground upon all the interesting and deeply agitating questions of the times-a middle position, from which, with a dexterous skill in the art of balancing, they may incline to the north, south, east, or west, as exigencies may require: neither tariff nor anti-tariff, neither internal improvement nor anti-internal improvement, neither abolitionists nor anti-abolitionists, different sections of the party holding antagonist principles upon all these questions; and the party itself, or rather the heads of it, holding, at different periods, opinions favorable to both sides of these as well as other vital questions. We see them disregarding or despising principle, acknowledging no test, save only that of loyalty to their chief for the time being, and the behests of party, knitted together by selfish interests; with no element of coherence but the love of office and the desire of public plunder.

This party has acquired the appropriate and significant appellation of the spoils party." The idea was first suggested by one of their high priests, who ministers with becoming devotion at the altars reeking with public spoils. They go for office and the spoils of of fice. Their greatest interests are centred in the treasury and the offices of the country. To increase the means of the treasury, and to multiply offices, contracts, and jobs, is to increase their prosperity. It is clear that the interest of the spoils party is directly opposite to the interests of the people. It is equally clear that they are a corps separate and alone, having a common interest among themselves, but no interest in common with the rest of the community. As they have a separate interest, so they have a separate organization, which, in its character, is hard, stern, and inexorable.

They are in the nature of a great military encampment in the midst of a peaceful community, living upon the fruits of honest men's labor, feared, hated, and yet for

[FEB. 3, 1836.

the most part implicitly obeyed. Their discipline is exact, and their strategy masterly. They occupy every important post throughout the Union. They are moved by a single will. An impulse at the centre is felt throughout the extremities. They are endowed with a sort of political ubiquity. A single word of command from head-quarters brings upon foot more than a hundred thousand office-holders and expectants, dispersed throughout the Union, animated by one spirit, and intent upon a single object. Re-enforced by a subsidized press, they simultaneously utter a spurious coinage of public opinion, which is borne from the extremities to the centre, whence the refluence sweeps over the entire confederacy. By this process, a man of straw, or certainly a John Den or Richard Fen, may be presented as a presidential candidate, with high claims and a commanding popularity. To consummate the scheme, another order issues for a great Baltimore convention "fresh from the people," to determine precedence between the rival pretenders to the throne. This trained band is instantly afoot, delegates are sent, some with and some without constituents. They take their seats in convention, with cap in hand, ready to register the edicts of their chief--the dispenser of the spoils; and these edicts are sent to all the ends of the earth, as the collected will and wisdom of “the great democratic republican party,"

It is easy to perceive that no merit, however exalted, no public service, however illustrious, can contend, single-handed and alone, against this stupendous array of power and influence. It is easy to see, if the President for the time being shall place himself at the head of this fearful organization, bringing his official power, patronage, and influence, to bear upon freedom of opinion and the freedom of suffrage, that successful resistance will be difficult, nay, almost impossible. It is easy to see that, if the people shall not rise in their might, while it is yet time, and brand with scorn all arrogant interference with their rights, and impudent attempts to dictate the succession, the day is not far distant when they will surrender in despair, and abandon all hope of ever seeing another President freely chosen by the unbiased suffrage of the people.

Sir, I pronounce it as my deliberate and solemn conviction, that if the people, in the pending contest, shall not rise in their strength and rebuke executive interference, and the odious dictation of a successor, unless convulsion shall produce a new state of things, we shall never see another President freely chosen. Not more surely did the Emperors of Rome, backed by their præ. torian bands, in the worst periods of her history, dictate the succession, than will this organization, headed by the President, appoint, from term to term, his successor. If this organization shall prevail at this time, where is the ground of hope for defeating it in the future? Will the people ever have a stronger case, or can the "powers that be" well have a weaker one?

Is this nominee either eminent for talent or illustrious for public service? Where are the fruits of his ability, or the monuments of his statesmanship? Where the proof of elevation of principle, broad statesmanlike views, decision of character, or pure political integrity? Where? Where? And yet, without pretension to distinguished public service, without eminence of ability, or, least of all, high public virtue, he is a powerful and formidable competitor. Who can estimate the power and influence of "the spoils party?" Look to the entire South. You see their candidate holding a doubtful struggle in every State, save one, from the Potomac to the Gulf of Mexico, against an eminent citizen of their own, with identity of views, identity of principles, and a common interest. You see him borne on without a feeling in common, a principle in common, or an inter