SENATE.] Sufferers by Fire in New York-National Defence. ready made, to place the seaboard in a proper state for defence, and promptly to provide the means for amply protecting our commerce. ANDREW JACKSON. On motion of Mr. CLAY, the message was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations, and ordered to be printed. RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN THE ARMY. Mr. SWIFT offered the following resolution; which was adopted: Resolved, That the Committee on Military Affairs be instructed to inquire into the expediency of making provision to extend to the officers and soldiers of the army the benefits of moral and religious instruction. Mr. SWIFT explained that he had offered this resolution at the instance of an officer of the army, who was well acquainted with the wishes and interests of that branch of the service. At our remote posts, both officers and soldiers were deprived of the opportunity of receiving such instruction. It was not expected that a chaplain could be appointed to every post; but an arrangement might be made by which the means of this instruction might be proportioned to the number of troops. NEW YORK SUFFERERS. Mr. WRIGHT presented the memorial of the Chamber of Commerce of the city of New York, urging the passage of the bill now before the House of Representatives for the extension of the time of payment of the duty bonds falling due in the city of New York subsequent to the great conflagration of the 16th of December last, and said he felt bound to occupy a few moments of the time of the Senate in bringing to their attention the suggestions contained in this memorial. The memorial stated that the importance of the passage of the bill had been vastly increased by the delay which had already taken place. 1st. Because, by the expectation of time for payment, excited by the passage of the bill in the Senate, a large amount of bonds had been suffered to pass the time of payment, and to remain unpaid; and that a call now for the immediate payment of these deferred bonds would produce great additional distress, and immensely endanger the solvency of the debtor merchants. 2d. Because the merchants who have bonds due and unpaid are, by a provision of the revenue laws of the United States, prohibited from entering their goods daily arriving from foreign countries, until the outstanding bonds are paid, and those merchants have, therefore, been compelled to place their goods thus arriving in the public stores, without the usual entry for the payment of duties; that their goods to the amount of many millions in value remain in the public stores "unensured;" that these goods thus stored are unusually exposed to destruction by fire, in consequence of the great severity of the winter, the almost obstructed condition of the streets by snow and ice, and the necessarily resulting difficulty of extinguishing fires, if once lighted. Mr. W. said he must remark that he was convinced the failure to ensure these goods thus situated proceeded solely from the almost entire destruction of the ensurance companies of New York by the fire referred to, and the memorial represents that the owners of these goods are imminently exposed to the danger of the further loss of the millions thus invested, and that the Government is equally exposed to the loss of the duties upon these goods, inasmuch as all hope of responsibility for the payment of duties must cease, if this further loss should be heaped upon the already severe misfortunes of that afflicted city. 3d. Because a further deposite of the importations, [FEB. 8, 1836. daily arriving, in the public stores will, when a decision upon the bill shall be finally had, impose upon the officers of the customs in the city of New York such a load of accumulated duties as to cause great and injurious delay in placing the goods in a condition for advantage ous sale. 4th. Because this mode of importation, in addition to the danger of exposure and delay, necessarily imposes upon the importing merchant great additional expense and trouble, and that every delay increases this just cause of complaint. Mr. W. said he did not pretend to have used the language of the memorial in his statement of its substance; that he had received it since he had come into the chamber; that he believed he had given a just view of its material suggestions; in any event, he had given the views which a hasty reading of the memorial had impressed upon his mind. He was aware that the memorial did not concern any bill now in the possession of the Senate. The Senate had passed the bill very many days since, and he made the remarks in the hope that they might reach the notice of the members of the other branch of Congress, in case it should be impossible to present this same memorial to that body on this day. He did hope this bill might meet an early and definitive action in that body. He would not speak of the result of that action, but decision was immensely important to the interests of his valued constituents, who, by an unexampled calamity, had been compelled to represent their embarrassments to the Legislature of the nation, and ask relief. Mr. W. then moved that the memorial, without reading, be laid on the table and printed; which motion prevailed without a division. CUMBERLAND ROAD. The unfinished business of Friday, being the bill for the continuation of the Cumberland road through Indiana and Illinois, was taken up; The pending motion being that of Mr. CALHOUN to lay the bill on the table, on which the yeas and nays had been ordered. On motion of Mr. KING, of Alabama, the order for the yeas and nays was, by unanimous consent, withdrawn, that the motion to lay on the table might also be withdrawn, to permit Mr. TIPTON to make some remarks. The further consideration of the subject was then postponed until to-morrow. NATIONAL DEFENCE. The Senate proceeded to consider the resolutions offered by Mr. BENTON. Mr. CLAYTON, who was entitled to the floor, rose and concluded his remarks; the whole of which follow entire. Mr. CLAYTON said: Mr. President, a full discussion of the leading topics which have been introduced into this debate is now demanded of us. It is due to the country that our sentiments on the great subject of national defence should be frankly expressed, and it is due to the character of the Senate that we should not suffer its former action on that subject to be misrepresented or misunderstood. It now appears that honorable gentlemen, acting here as the avowed friends of the administration, have left us no other alternative than that of silent submission to their charges, or a vindication of the past. Whether their object be to wage war on the Senate, or to prepare for war against France, mine is equally the duty of self-defence. For a war with any foreign Power which may assail us wish to be fully prepared; and I am now ready, without further preparation, to meet the war against myself and my friends. The resolution before us, as now modified, proposes to pledge this body, so far as its action can be efficient for the purpose, to set apart and apply so much of the surplus revenue (including the dividends on the bank stock of the United States) as may be necessary for the defence and security of the country. Thus stands the proposition as made by the Senator from Missouri, [Mr. BENTON,] and as by him modified on the suggestion of the Senator from Tennessee, [Mr. GRUNDY.] But with this proposition, thus made by the friends of the administration, some gentlemen on this side of the House are not fully satisfied, because in their view it contemplates the postponement of the duty of self-defence to what they consider as minor and inferior objects. The Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. WEBSTER] has said that he deems the duty of providing for the common defence to be a primary obligation imposed on us by the constitution, and is not content merely to declare that he will give the surplus for that object, if necessary, but the whole revenue; and not only that which has accrued, but that which shall accrue hereafter. The resolution does not go far enough for him; and the Senator from New Jersey [Mr. SOUTHARD] objects to its phraseology, as implying an absurdity, inasmuch as while the common defence is unprovided for, he cannot understand how any "surplus" can exist to be appropriated. My object, sir, is to change the proposition to such a shape as that, when adopted, the Senate may be understood as pledged to do its utmost for the necessary defence of the country, and to gain for this pledge, if possible, the unanimous vote of this body. I hold it to be desirable that we should make no party question of this matter, and that we should present an unbroken, undivided front to all other nations on a subject of such vital importance to the people. I shall, therefore, before I have done, move to strike out the word "surplus" from the resolution, so that it shall pledge all our resources, if necessary to be resorted to, for the objects proposed. Let us, by the unanimous adoption of such a resolution, show the world, and especially the American people, that, in the event of a struggle between Our own country and any foreign Power under the heavens, no matter how that struggle may originate, there are none here attached to any but the land that gave us birth; that there is no feeling here but the true American feeling; and no sentiment here but the true American sentiment, which holds all other nations "enemies in war, in peace friends." Let us refute by this pledge now, and by the honest redemption of it here. after, any slanderer, if such there be, who would seek to cast a stain on the character of the Senate, by the vile insinuation that we are or can be partisans of a foreign Power. Such a stain cannot be placed there without degrading the character of the proud States whose representatives we are, without the consequent humiliation of all that is elevated and noble in the American character, nor without inflicting a pang of regret upon every man who has a true American heart beating in his bosom. It is objected to the adoption of a general and extensive scheme of appropriations for defence at this time that there is danger to be apprehended from the propensities of the existing administration to expend the public money for electioneering purposes; that political favorites will, according to the system of "the spoils party," be preferred to all others in letting the contracts for the construction of the requisite public works; and that the expenditure of many millions of the public treasure by unprincipled men will lead to a still more general prostitution of the beneficent powers of the Government to party purposes than we have ever witnessed. It is true, sir, the power proposed to be conferred may be abused. But the power will be in the [SENATE. hands of those whom the people have preferred should expend it; and deeply as I regret their decision, yet I shall bow in submission to it. And let me say to my friends who anticipate the abuse of this power for party purposes, that if those who have it shall determine thus to prostrate the elective franchise by the corrupt employment of the public money, we can erect no barrier to save the republic from this danger by withholding the appropriations for the public defence. We have no other sure safeguard for the preservation of our liberties than public virtue. If public opinion can be purchased by such means, the experiment of free Government must prove a failure. Let us do our duty, then, and leave the consequences to that Providence which has thus far protected us. The patriot who shall steadily reflect upon the consequences of an accumulated surplus in the treasury, now amounting to thirty, and, unless thus disposed of, soon to increase to a hundred millions of dollars, will see far greater danger to our free institutions from this hoarded treasure than may arise from its improper expenditure at this time. If permitted to gather in the treasury until its force, when expended, shall be absolutely irresistible, it will prove for years to come a standing bribe for the exertions of party; the struggle for office must degenerate into a struggle for money only; and this wealth may at last fall into the hands of some successful partisan, who may, by an illegal seizure of it all, ensure our final downfall and his own elevation on the ruins of the constitution. Nothing is more evident than that if no common object can in the mean time be found to which it can be appropriated, it must prove a subject of ceaseless contention among the States and the people. It has been further said, that the object of the resolution is to defeat the bill to distribute the proceeds of the sales of the public domain among the States, according to their federative population. But such cannot be the effect of adopting a liberal scheme of national defence, really adapted to the wants of the country. The land bill itself provides that no part of the money which it proposes to distribute shall be disposed of according to its provisions, in case of war with any foreign country; and it never has been any part of the object of the friends of that just and salutary measure to divert one dollar of the public treasure from the object of necessary defence. The passage of that bill could have had no such effect. As a sincere friend of that bill, I do ardently desire that it may, at some future time, receive the action of Congress under more favorable auspices. At present, I cannot shut my eyes to the fact that the President has once put his veto upon it, and has even resorted to what I shall ever consider was a most un justifiable measure on his part, to prevent Congress from passing it into a law in despite of his veto, by the requisite constitutional majority of two thirds of each House. We have good reasons to know that, when we passed that bill simultaneously with the compromise act, such was the state of kind feeling which the latter had awakened in the bosoms of gentlemen, who had before voted against the land bill, towards its friends, that, had the President, who received both bills in the same hour, returned the latter to us with his qualified negative upon it, at the time when he sent back the compromise act with his approval upon that, the requisite constitutional majority of two thirds was ready in this body, as well as in the other House, to make the bill a law in despite of his veto. He chose to keep the bill until another session, and then sent it back to a new Congress, many of whose members were not members of that which passed the act. Is there any evidence of a change in his determination as to this bill; and, if not, can any man hope for the passage of the land bill into a law, while he who resorted to such means to defeat it, SENATE.] National Defence. as I have in part described, still has it in his power to resort to similar means again? No, sir; though I hold it to be my duty, uncontrolled by the executive will, to vote for the measure as often as it shall be presented, yet I feel that we must wait till other counsels shall prevail in the executive mansion before the people of any of the old States which conquered these public lands from the Crown of Great Britain, by the expenditure of their blood and treasure, can be permitted to touch a dollar of the money arising from the sale of them. But, without reference to this state of things, it is sufficient now to say, that the objection that a liberal system of appropriation for public defence might come in collision with the distribution under the land bill, proceeds upon the admission of what is erroneous in point of fact; for we have ample resources for national defence, without touching the funds which that bill was intended to affect; and, were it otherwise, I should not hesitate a moment in deciding that not a dollar should be distributed or applied to other purposes, while it remains necessary to put the country in a state of preparation to meet any and every emergency that may arise out of the unsettled state of our foreign relations. Another objection has been suggested. The honorable gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. CALHOUN] has offered a proposition, which now lies on the table, to so amend the constitution of the United States as to authorize the distribution among the States of all the surplus in the treasury not necessary for the expenses of Government, whether proceeding from the avails of the public domain, or from any other source. If it be any part of the design of his resolution to defeat the appropriations for those objects, (which, I have already observed, are, in my estimation, paramount to all others,) I have yet to learn it; and, whenever that shall be avowed as its object, or shall appear to my judgment to be its effect, I shall hold it to be my duty, without reference to any other arguments against it, to resist it to the utmost. Sir, I do not propose to discuss its merits; but I am free to declare that, in my opinion, it it is a proposition which, in its present form, can never be attended with any practical results. Many of those who desire the distribution believe that the object can be attained whenever Congress shall pass an act to ef fect it; and that the proposed amendment to the constitution is objectionable, not merely because it is unnecessary, but because it involves an admission of the want of a power already conceded to Congress. The elaborate addresses, on this subject, of a late Senator from New Jersey, [Mr. DICKERSON,] now a member of the cabinet, were made in vain, if there be no considerable number of men friendly to the object, and yet confident of the existence of a power to effect it. The President, in his annual messages to Congress, has repeatedly avowed himself friendly to the object of distributing this surplus among the States; yet he had rejected the land bill, which is the only measure that has ever been proposed by friend or foe to carry out, by a practical effort, any part of his suggestion. Considering these things, and reflecting at the same time upon the difficulty, not to say the absolute impossibility, of procuring any change in the constitution whatsoever, on any subject, I cannot view this proposition as presenting, even to the friends of the distribution which it contemplates, any ground upon which an opposition to the great measure of national defence can be rested. Sir, it is visionary. If the surplus must accumulate until that proposition shall be adopted, it will never find an avenue through which it may escape to the people, to whom it rightfully belongs. Nor does that other objection, that, by these means, the expenditures for internal improvement will be arrested, stand on any better foundation. Sir, the ex [FEB. 8, 1836. penditures for internal improvement are effectually arrested by executive action alone, no matter what may be our decision on this or any other subject. The President alone now governs the destinies of the country, so far as national improvement is involved in them. We may, indeed, rejoice if we can find useful objects for which he will permit us to expend any part of the money of those who sent us here. While a little band of us, one of the rank and file of which I am proud to avow myself, in vain oppose that construction of the constitution which has thus arrested the exercise of one of the most beneficent powers of this Government, we are borne down by the force of those who adhere to the Executive on all questions. The President's repeated exercise of the veto power on former bills for internal improvement has left no room for conjecture as to the fate of any future bill which shall contain objects of a similar character. Until the people shall desire it otherwise, and manifest that desire by the elevation of some one to the presidential power who will consent that their money shall be expended in making railroads and canals, to bind and connect together the distant sections of our country, as well as in the purchase of arms, the equipment of fleets, the raising of armies, and the erection of forts, we have no alternatives left to us but that of appropriating largely for defence, or suffering this wealth to accumulate until the sum of its enticing glories shall win the heart of some one to use it for the mastery of us all and the conquest of the liberty that is left to us. And, sir, I say again, in reference to this objection, as well as all others of a similar character, that, so long as the public money can be usefully applied to the indispensable object of the necessary protection and safety of the country, any and every other object of expenditure sinks, in my judgment, into inferiority with that. So. Still another objection to the measures proposed by the resolution before us remains to be answered. We are told there is no danger of a war. It may be that there is no immediate danger. Sir, I believe it will be found But is it wise, is it consistent with that primary obligation to "provide for the common defence," which the constitution imposes upon us, to wait till that danger comes before we take measures for security-to sleep till we hear the cannon of the enemy, without an attempt at self-protecton? The building of a navy, or the erection of a fort, is not the work of a day or a year. To build ships, and to build them so that they may, in the hands of American seamen, sustain the American character; to erect fortifications for the permanent security of our commercial cities and our important harbors, to arm them, and man them, are ends not to be attained without the preparation of years, even if we had five times the wealth of the treasury to offer for them. We must go to work, for the accomplishment of so great an object, as all others have done who have achieved any thing worthy of a nation's honor or security-not hastily, and without reflection, but with caution and circumspection, in the choice and use of all the means requisite. If we listen to the suggestion that there is no danger of war, we shall never do any thing, until it is too late to attempt it with certainty of success. When such danger is imminent, and comes upon a nation unprepared, as we are, every thing done is accomplished in confusion; but nothing is well done, and the expenses occasioned amidst hurry and excitement are enhanced greatly beyond those which a prudent and vigilant superintendence, in time of peace, would ever tolerate. Our real condition may be easily understood, without an appeal to official documents. On both sides of the House, and by gentlemen of all parties, it is reiterated that our whole seaboard is in a wretched state of de fence. The honorable chairman of our Committee on Military Affairs [Mr. BENTON] was the first to proclaim the fact in this debate, and the honorable gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. BUCHANAN] has added to the picture he presented of our naked, exposed, and defenceless situation. To enable others to understand this, let every member from the Atlantic States bear evidence of the situation of the defences existing within his own personal observation. Years have passed away, during which not a gun, from any fortification, could have been brought to bear upon a hostile squadron passing the Delaware, from Cape Henlopen to Phila delphia. Five years ago, the only effective fort known there was accidentally destroyed by fire, and no serious effort has been made to rebuild it. No, sir; every thing requisite for defence, not only in that quarter, but every where else, has been viewed as a secondary consideration, when brought into competition with a party object-to make the boast of having paid off the national debt during the existence of this administration. The honorable chairman of our Committee on Naval Affairs [Mr. SOUTHARD] has informed us, in this debate, how utterly insufficient are our naval preparations for a state of war; and, in connexion with the fact demonstrated by him, that we could not now concentrate, within any reasonable period, a sufficient naval force, upon any point of our whole Atlantic seaboard, to resist, with success, a formidable attack suddenly made by a foreign fleet, permit me again to invite your attention to the peculiar situation of the country on both sides of the Delaware. At the entrance of that bay, on whose waters floats the commerce of one of our largest cities, and of a country than which none could be more inviting to a rapacious foe, we have erected a breakwater for the protection of shipping against the effects of storms and ice. It is, indeed, a noble and enduring monument of the sagacity and wisdom of Congress, and exhibits proof of a disposition to protect the commer cial interests of the whole country, which I hope to see cherished and encouraged hereafter. It is said to have been thus far constructed on terms which prove that, in the erection of such public works as this, we are capable of performing more labor for less money than any foreign nation of whose operations, in the same way, we have any correct information; and although, in consequence of its unfinished condition, we have not yet realized all the advantages of this great work, yet, it is believed by those whose means of judging I rely on, that, by the protection which it has already given to our shipping, from nearly all parts of the Union, against the danger of shipwreck, property has been saved which is of greater value than the whole cost of the work. It furnishes now an excellent harbor; but it is a harbor, of all others, the most inviting to a hostile fleet; and not a gun is yet mounted to defend it, nor has there been any attempt to erect a fortification for its protection. Without such a defence, it will prove, in time of war with a nation of superior naval and maritime power, a curse to the country; for while it deprives us of all benefit from the operations against an enemy of our ancient allies, the winds and ice, it must become the point from which a hostile fleet may pillage our coast, blockade our vessels, and harass, in a greater or less degree, our whole commerce. The entrance to the Chesapeake and Delaware canal is also left undefended, by the burning of Fort Delaware, and the neglect to rebuild it-a neglect which, if longer continued, I shall be compelled to consider as a violation of the contract by which the State which ceded the island on which it stood to the Government stipulated, in the act of cession, for the erection and maintenance of a fortification upon it for ever after. Our Western frontier is scarcely less exposed. For [SENATE. years past we have been steadily pursuing the policy of driving the Indian tribes beyond the States; and, by the gradual operation of this system, we have thrown nearly all the ancient Indian population, formerly within their limits, on our Western border, where it now rests, strengthened by connexion with other tribes, and by a density which it never knew before. At this moment a war is raging in Florida with a remnant of this fierce and untameable people; and a feeling is enkindled in the bosoms of the whole race, which, at the slightest appearance of a rupture with a foreign Power, might, under the management of a skilful leader, bring thirty thousand savage warriors into the field to desolate our Western settlements. us. ter. Sir, it is said, and repeated with great confidence, that there is no danger of a war with France. Although I hope that God in his mercy may avert from us as a nation that worst of all scourges; although I believe that we shall be saved from it in this instance, and intend to exert all my humble means to prevent it, so long as I can do so consistently with the honor of my country, yet it is impossible to review the facts connected with the controversy between us and France without perceiving that we have arrived at that point at which the power of retreating with honor from our own position is not left to us alone, unless, indeed, the resolutions passed at the last session, that the treaty of July, 1831, ought to be insisted on, shall now be receded from by France may recede; but the negotiation has been so conducted that, unless we abandon the treaty, we cannot step backwards without dishonor. To show this, a very brief history of that controversy will be sufficient. The French spoliations on our commerce, for which that treaty provided an indemnity to us of twenty-five mil lions of francs, (about four millions seven hundred thousand dollars,) all occurred more than twenty-five years ago, and have ever since been the subject of just complaint against that nation. These spoliations were of the most unjustifiable, cruel, and outrageous characWe submitted to them at the time they were com. mitted only because they were accompanied by still more atrocious violations of neutral rights by another one of the great belligerant nations of Europe, against which we shortly afterwards declared war. Against the latter Power we proceeded, and obtained whatever satisfaction a war could give us Our claim on the other was never abandoned; it was always insisted on. The real amount of injury we had sustained far exceeded the petty sum which at last we obtained as an indemnity by a solemn treaty made on the 4th of July, 1831. commissioners appointed by Congress to ascertain and liquidate the demands of the rival claimants under this treaty, whose property had been burnt or captured by the French, have fixed those demands at sums the aggregate of which is nearly twice the sum of twenty-five millions of francs, the indemnity allowed us. Yet, with out taking into the estimate any of the spoliations com. mitted by France under the Berlin and Milan decrees, the sum assessed by the commissioners under the treaty is far below what would have been assessed by arbitra. tors, had such been appointed to settle the dispute be tween our country and France. Without now going into a statement of the principles which govern every commission, where rival claimants under the same na tion, instead of rival nations, are contending for justice against each other, I content myself with saying that there does not rest a doubt on my mind that the sum allowed us by France, by the treaty of July, 1831, was not equal to one fourth of the actual loss we had sus tained by that nation in the pride of its power, and inflicted upon us by means the most wanton, cruel, and unprovoked. Sir, I was one of those who ratified, in this ball, the treaty of July, 1831. We did it with a The SENATE.] National Defence. full knowledge that the indemnity proposed was not, in amount of money, a real indemnity for the wrongs which had been inflicted upon us. We did it with a full knowledge of all the immense advantages conceded to France by that provision in the treaty which established a discriminating duty in favor of her wines and silks, in consideration of the return of our ancient friend and ally to that justice which had marked the period of our earliest connexion with her. We thus, for the sake of harmony with France, introduced a principle into the exercise of our treaty-making power, which, if not novel, is certainly very unusual; for, in the exercise of our authority simply to ratify the treaty, we pledged our own legislative power, and that of the other House of Congress, to regulate the tariff of the nation according to the treaty. Immediately, and without delay, Congress did so regulate the tariff, and the discrimination in favor of the staples of France over those of all other nations was imbodied in our statute book. My honorable friend, but political opponent, from Pennsylvania, [Mr. BUCHANAN,] has said that, by means of this clause in the treaty, France has already gained more than the whole indem nity which she thus stipulated to pay to our citizens; that he has called upon the Secretary of the Treasury for the purpose of ascertaining the amount; and he exhibited a tabular statement, prepared at his request, which proved that, had the duties on French wines and silks remained as they were at the date of the ratification of the treaty, these articles since that time would have paid into the treasury, on the 30th September, 1834, (more than a year ago,) the sum of three million sixty-one thousand five hundred and twenty-five dollars. The honorable gentleman added, that, before the conclusion of the ten years mentioned in the treaty, France will have been freed from the payment of duties to an amount considerably above twelve millions of dollars. To this statement my honorable friend from Kentucky [Mr. CRITTENDEN justly excepts, but considers the reduction of duties as a benefit to the American consumer only. Sir, both the gentlemen are in error. The gentleman from Pennsylvania is wrong in considering that France alone has pocketed the benefit resulting from the reduction; and the gentleman from Kentucky is wrong, if he supposes that the importing merchant, as well as the producer of the articles of wines and silks in France, has not enjoyed, together with the consumer here, the advantages derived from the discrimination. The fact is, that the duty on French wines and silks was reduced, as I have stated, to take effect at the time of ratifying the treaty, and the duty of five per cent. on French silks was utterly abandoned by the subsequent act of March 2, 1833; so that the silks of France have ever since been admitted here duty free, while silks of a much better quality, coming from beyond the Cape of Good Hope, still are subjected to a duty of ten per cent. It is needless to stop here for the purpose of working out, by the different systems of political arithmetic, how much the consumer, the importing merchant, and the French producer, have respectively gained by the established reduction; but one thing I take to be certain, that, while the French treasury has not received the benefit of the sum mentioned by the gentleman from Pennsylvania, the treasury of the United States has lost every dollar of it. Foreseeing the consequences of this discrimination in favor of French products, as we certainly did at the time of ratifying the treaty, what, it may be asked, could possibly have been the motive for our ratification of that treaty? Not, sir, as has been most unjustly charged, for the sake of French gold; no, sir, not for the sake of any mere pecuniary advantage. It was not to enrich our own coffers, or to fill the pockets of American merchants whose ships had been burnt by French cruisers, [FEB. 8, 1836. although mere justice required of us to demand of France to repay them for their losses. Had money (as has been most untruly alleged) been our only object, we should never have concluded and ratified such a treaty. Our object was peace and harmony with an ancient ally and friend-with a nation towards which every pulse in the American's heart has beat with sympathy in all her sufferings, and towards which one of the most lofty, generous, and grateful of emotions which man can feel or tell of, has ever been fondly cherished and proudly expressed. The tranquillity of nations, the peace of the civilized world, and, above all other considerations, the cause of liberal principles, the preservation and maintenance of harmony between those nations whose forms of Government, so far as they preserve the seminal principle of popular representation, now form the last best hope of all men-these, sir, were the powerful arguments which impelled the American Senate to ratify this treaty, and again to offer to France not only forgiveness for the past, but benefits for the future. The honor of the nation had required of us to demand some indemnity for the past; and, however inadequate to the injuries we had suffered, we felt disposed to overlook the amount of the damages for the acknowledgment of the outrages and the confession of the wrongs inflicted. But, after all this, what was done by France? Year after year passed away after the exchange of the ratifications of this solemn treaty, during which France received an unquestioned benefit from it, and our treasury sustained an unquestioned loss by it; yet no law was passed to carry the treaty into effect, and no further act was done to admit these wrongs, or offer us a dollar of remuneration for them. Passing by all the irritating topics to which the gentleman from Pennsylvania has alluded, casting no imputation on any one branch of the French Government more than all the others, I say that France has not redeemed the pledge given in her solemn treaty with us, although we have redeemed ours to the very letter. The law to carry the treaty into effect has been once actually rejected by the French Chambers; and at last it has been passed with a precedent condition annexed, requiring an explanation of the President's message to Congress of December, 1834. This message, sir, was sent here after the first rejec tion of the treaty. It contained a recommendation to invest the President himself with the discretionary pow er to issue letters of marque and reprisal-to make a quasi war with France at his discretion. The recom mendation found no advocates in either branch of Congress that I have ever heard of. It is possible there may have been such, but I have not known them. It was, in my private opinion, an ill-advised and most imprudent message. Such may have been the opinion of the American people; such surely was the opinion of the American Congress. No motion was ever made in either House to carry out the recommendation of the message by the grant of the power asked for; and the Senate did, on the 14th of January, 1835, pass a unanimous vote, on the recommendation of our Committee on Foreign Relations, declaring, in response to the message, that no legislative provision whatever ought then to be adopted in reference to the state of our relations with France. The report which led the committee to that conclusion was drawn by their chairman, [Mr. CLAY,] and will stand for ever as one of the brightest leaves in the proud chaplet which adorns that statesman's brow. That was no partisan document. No, sir; all men, of all parties, in this body, convinced by the argument and pleased with the tone of eloquent patriotism which spoke in every sentence of that report, then concurred in the opinion that no power should be granted to the Presi dent to issue letters of marque and reprisal for the |