into the condition of the executive departments, may be perfectly just. But that gentleman regards it as useless, because, he tells us, no one now objects to the passage of the resolution in some shape or other. We shall see, sir, how this is when the vote shall be taken. But granting it to be true, still it is all-important that the shape of the resolution be such as will attain the object in view. If the form proposed by my colleague be adopted, it will justify a thorough investigation; if the amendment prevail, all inquiry may be suppressed. Gentlemen, however disposed to investigate, may be unwilling to assume the character of accusers or witnesses. They may not personally know the truth of the facts into which they would inquire, nor choose to vouch for the suspicions which are abroad. To demand a specific accusation before inquiry is to reverse the order of proceeding. The very purpose of an investigation is to ascertain whether there is or is not ground for accusation. If specific charges could be made and sustained, without a previous inquiry, inquiry would be unnecessary; we might proceed, at once, to impeach the officer, or correct the abuse. The shape of the resolution, therefore, is not matter of form merely, as gentlemen would seem to imply. In one form it will throw the door open to inquiry; in another it slams it in your face. If the form be so very immaterial that all discussion is useless, why, sir, was the resolution, originally proposed by my colleague, not accepted at once? Why has an amendment been offered So unacceptable to him and to those who concur with him? Unless this amendment was designed to prevent the full investigation they ask, what purpose could it answer, except to provoke that useless debate, of which gentlemen complain, and in which they have taken so large a share? Instead, however, of taking the vote up. on a resolution which, it is said, all are willing in some shape to adopt, it has been vehemently assailed, and a multitude of objections, utterly frivolous and inconsistent, have been arrayed against it.

The gentleman from Rhode Island [Mr. PEARCE] objects that it is not bold enough. To use his own elegant metaphor, "it does not take the bull by the horns." If gentlemen have any thing to say against the President, he desires it shall be done in due form, and then, we are to understand, full latitude would be allowed. But he immediately refutes his own objection; for he adds that, in passing upon the acts of the President's ministers, we necessarily pass upon him.

The gentleman from Louisiana, [Mr. RIPLEY,] on his part, objects to the resolution expressly upon the ground that it is a direct assault upon the President himself, that it imputes to him falsehood and corruption; and declares, that to institute an inquiry would be to sanction the charge. Thus, sir, one objects because the resolution is not bold enough, the other because it is too bold; one because it does not take the bull by the horns, the other because it does. It is impossible that both can be right in the reasons assigned, yet both will concur in voting against the resolution; and, shape our course as we may, we cannot reconcile the one without disobliging the other. None will contend that my colleague's resolution is not sufficiently broad. That, sir, is the fatal objection; it was designed to be effectual. Gentlemen complain that it is too broad; not specific enough. It is very much, says the gentleman from New York, [Mr. MANN,] in the nature of a general search-warrant; and the gentleman from Indiana, [Mr. LANE] is opposed to a roving, unlimited, unrestricted committee. Let us suppose that these objections prevail, and that a committee is appointed under the restrictions imposed by the amendment. My colleague, as chairman, proceeds at its head to the Treasury Department. The sign of Reuben M. Whitney, in large capitals, attracts bis notice. My colleague, you know, sir, has always manifested a strong desire to

[H. OF R.

investigate the nature of the alleged connexion between Whitney and the Treasury. He is about to enter. Stop, say the gentlemen, specify your charges. I make none, my colleague replies; I come to institute an inquiry. Then we cannot proceed, sir; we are not a roving, unrestricted committee. Besides, sir, this Mr. Whitney is a private gentleman; he occupies a barber's shop. Barber's shops doubtless may be found sometimes very convenient appendages to banks, to enable them to shave their customers; but my colleague might be at a loss to understand what occasion there could be for one, if it be of that description, so near the Treasury. Overruled, he proceeds to the other departments. He requests to see the official correspondence. What is your specific charge? I wish to inquire into the appointment or dismissal of such and such officers; the recent appointment of Hocker, for instance, who, it has been stated on this floor, kept back the poll-books of an election for party purposes, and has been rewarded with office in the midst of an insulted and indignant community. Do you charge corruption or abuse? No; my object is to inquire. We can only inquire into specific charges. Permit me, then, to see the books of the office. Hold, sir; what particular entry do you allege to be false or fraudulent? I cannot tell, says my colleague, what the entries may disclose before I am permitted to see them. That would be in the nature of a general search. He is again overruled; the books remain sealed books for him, and he returns from his fruitless errand, as wise as he went. But he makes a report; and how does he respond to the broad assertions of the message? Is all right? Are our public functionaries all diligent, all honest? Sir, he cannot answer the question. He has been permitted to open no book, to inspect no record. And this mock examination is to be claimed on behalf of men at the head of our executive departments; of honorable men, it is said, unjustly assailed! Were you to enter the house of a suspected felon in search of stolen goods, he might be expected to insist that general search-warrants were unconstitutional, and to forbid you to open a closet, or turn a key, until you should specify, on oath, the article alleged to have been purloined; and, if brought to trial, he might call on some quibbling attorney to seize on any flaw in the indictment to get him off. But men filling high and responsible stations cannot, without dishonor, rely upon any defence which precludes a thorough investigation into their official conduct. Such a course would justly excite suspicions, where none existed before; and where they did, would confirm them. What, sir, would you think of the clerk of a bank, or other institution, over which you might preside, who should refuse you permission to inspect his books, unless you should first make a specific charge, and designate the particular entry to prove it? Would you not infer guilt, and instantly dismiss him from your service?

Sir, the investigation now proposed on the part of the public in no respect differs from that which every pri vate institution or individual is at liberty to make. The people surely have the same right to know in what way their affairs are managed by their own agents. They will not be satisfied that such an investigation shall be denounced as inquisitorial; refused, unless their representatives shall step forward as witnesses or accusers; or, if allowed, that committees shall be sent into the public offices hoodwinked, and tied down to specific allega. tions. Still less will they agree to be told that executive officers are not the servants of the people, but the President's ministers, more sacred, even, than the minis ters of a King; that all inquiry into their conduct aball be suppressed, because the President has borne testimony to their fidelity, and to question that is to assail his veracity. Yes, sir, such are the doctrines now heard on this floor. To this complexion have we come at last.

But, sir, while one gentleman [Mr. RIPLEY] denounces the proposed inquiry as inquisitorial, and another [Mr. LANE] as wholly unprecedented, the gentleman from Rhode Island is opposed to it because it is already provided for by the rules of the House. Several of the standing committees, he tells us, among others the Committee of Ways and Means, have authority to do every thing contemplated by the resolution. If so, sir, surely the proceeding is not without precedent; and, if inquisitorial in its character, why does not the gentleman from Louisiana move to abolish the rules which require it' It is impossible to reconcile these inconsistencies. There is nothing inquisitorial or illegal demanded by the resolution. It proposes to insure the performance of an important duty which we owe to the country, and which has been too long neglected.

But if the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. LANE] will not regard the authority conferred by the rules of the House on its standing committees as a precedent in point, what will he say to the precedent in the case of the Post Of fice examination? Aware of its force, he sought to evade it by telling us that that examination was moved for by the chairman of the Post Office Committee. What then, sir? The objection is not to the power, but to the member who applies; not to the resolution, but to the mover. It would, indeed, appear so. But two days past, a resolution, offered by one of my colleagues, [Mr. GARLAND,] to inquire into the connexion between Whitney and the Treasury, was unanimously adopted-unanimouslythough, in substance, the same with that which another colleague, on a different side of the House, [Mr. WISE,] had, during a great part of the last session, struggled in vain to carry through. Yes, sir, fortunately, the Post Office investigation was moved for by a friend of the administration; it was directed, too, notwithstanding the President had proclaimed that all was well, by those who certainly did not mean to impeach his veracity. No specific charges were demanded. The committee was vested with a sweeping authority to examine, generally, into the condition and proceedings of the Post Office Department; and the result of its labors was the develop ment of a mass of iniquity, seldom surpassed in the his tory of the most corrupt Governments. Suppose, sir, the doctrine of specifications had been then enforced. Who could have specified the neglects, the frauds, the erasures, the corrupt and collusive practices of every kind, which prevailed in the Department, many of which were, for the first time, discovered in the progress of the examination, and astonished even those who suspected most? What sized document would it have required to comprise the specifications? And now, when an examination is proposed into all the departments-every one of which, it was once broadly intimated by an administration gentleman on this floor, [Mr. SMITH,] if the light should be let in, would disclose similar delinquen cies it is gravely insisted that no inquiry shall be made, or, if authorized, that it shall extend to no abuses except such as shall be specifically alleged.

Sir, there is no want of authority in this House, or of precedents, to justify a general examination into the condition and proceedings of the departments. All that is wanting is the inclination to exert it. Gentlemen should show precedent for refusing it. During the last administration, when Chilton's resolutions were under discussion, and every species of corruption imputed, the gentleman from Rhode Island, who now calls for specific charges, though then a friend of that administration, declared that the more extensive the inquiry, the more he should be pleased. He wished that a history of its whole proceedings could be written in sunbeams in the heavens, that all might see; and the administration party, to their honor, voted for the resolutions, without one dissenting voice. What a contrast does not their

[JAN. 4, 1837.

conduct exhibit to that of the party now in power, who object to inquiry, while constantly proclaiming their wil lingness to meet it, because it may wound the President; or seek to shelter the public officers under exceptions to form?

Are gentlemen serious, sir, in this demand for specific charges? Why was it, then, that a resolution, offered last session, demanding an inquiry into an alleged illicit connexion between Whitney and the Treasury, was repeatedly and finally rejected? Even the amendment offered by my colleague, from the Brunswick district, [Mr. DROMGOOLE,] proposing humbly to solicit the information from the Secretary of the Treasury, the officer implicated, ultimately failed; the gentlemen now calling for specifications, [Messrs. MANN, PEARCE, RIPLEY, and LANE, with one voice voting against the last proposition to take it up, made by my colleague from Accomack, [Mr. WISE,] and succeeding, with an administration minority of 59, in stifling all inquiry.

But, if it shall be the pleasure of the House to adopt the amendment; if specific charges must be made, it will, perhaps, not be so difficult to present them as gentle. men may have imagined. Charges have been made upon this floor, upon authority which the gentleman from Rhode Island, at least, will not question, well meriting investigation. Sir, they were made by the gentleman himself. I was not present; but I am not permitted to doubt, though it seems almost incredible, that the gentleman who, some four or five years ago, delivered a speech in this hall on the resolution relating to the Wiscasset collector, and who bore the same name, and represented the same State, is the same gentleman who offered the amendment, and whom I now behold sitting near me. Heu quantum mutatus ab illo! I beg leave to recapitulate some of the most prominent charges.

Mr. ROBERTSON then enumerated a variety of charges contained in the speech of the member from Rhode Island, in April, 1832.- (Congressional Debates, vol. 8, p. 2397.) He read passages to show that the member had substantially charged the President and his partyWith neglecting the reform and retrenchment they were pledged to effect;

With viewing those who had previously been in office as conquered enemies, and the offices themselves as the spoils of victory.

He said that the gentleman, to use his own expressive language, had taken the bull by the horns, and had charged the President himself

With improperly appointing members of Congress to office;

With using his official patronage and influence to

make Mr. Van Buren his successor;

With contemning the authority of a co-ordinate branch of the Government, the Senate; and

He said that the

With usurping or abusing the power of appointment, Mr. ROBERTSON Commented upon these charges, and the arguments and proofs adduced by the member from Rhode Island in support of them. abuses complained of had never been investigatedthat it was time to inquire whether the charges were well founded, and if so to provide a remedy.

He observed that to the list of members of Congress named by the member from Rhode Island, on whom ex. ecutive favor had been bestowed, numerous others might now be added; that the President had indulged in this practice, the corrupt tendency of which be had himself pointed out, to an unexampled extent.

To the instances adduced to prove the President's contempt for the authority of the Senate-those of Stam baugh and Rector-he would add that of Gwinn, and the more recent case of the former Speaker of this House; and argued that the President, in keeping per sons in office whom the Senate bad rejected, or keeping

offices vacant which the public service required should be filled, until the Senate should conform to his will, had, in effect, appropriated the whole power of appointment to himself, and violated the constitution, in its spirit, if not in its letter.

In regard to the charge against him of using his official patronage and influence in the election of his successor, he would only say that, if the gentleman from Rhode Island, nearly five years past, saw grounds to believe that the President had thrown "his mantle" upon Mr. Van Buren; if he thought himself justified in presenting the vivid picture he then drew of the President with his pet candidate "on his shoulders;" it was impossible he could have seen any thing since to shake his belief; on the contrary, the Gwinn letter, the Baltimore caucus, the late electioneering tour into Tennessee, were corroborating proofs, with many others, that the President had kept his eye steadily on his object, until it had been finally consummated.

While upon this subject, said Mr. R., as the merits of the President elect have been brought into discussion, I will take the occasion to say, that however reprehensible I may consider the manner of his elevation to the presidency, for one, I am unwilling to prejudge his course; still more to proclaim in advance an uncompromising hostility to his administration. He is constitutionally elected. The people have, at least, gone through the forms of an election; and we owe it to them to give his measures a candid consideration. Nor is there any thing in the course prescribed to him to justify, in my opinion, predetermined opposition from any quarter. It is true, the humiliating condition has been imposed upon him of following in the footsteps, and carrying out the principles, as they are called, of General Jackson; but this, in reality, is no restriction: it gives him full latitude; a carte blanche to steer his course to any point of the po litical compass. For what principle is there, or measure, which has ever agitated or divided the American people, in respect to which General Jackson has not, at different times, held opposite positions? Let us test the operation of this pledge upon the future policy of the administration.

Will Mr. Van Buren Favor retrenchment and reform? Why, sir, so did General Jackson: it was the very watch. word of the party. Will he set his face against them? He may plead the example of his predecessor. Will he recommend a protecting tariff? He will find full authority in the early messages of General Jackson, and in his course during the controversy with South Carolina. Will be discountenance the principle of protection? The later messages, especially the last, if they do not abandon it, fritter it away until it ceases to be of any practical importance; besides, General Jackson was always for a judicious tariff; and that we know is any tariff that is popular with the majority.

A national bank: what course will be take in relation to that? The prediction has been made, by far-sighted politicians, that four years will not elapse, certainly not five, before such an institution will be organized. I trust, sir, it is a false prophecy. But Mr. Van Buren may recommend or approve it in conformity with the opinions of General Jackson in the messages of 1829 and 1830; or he may denounce uncompromising hostility, and refer to the battle with the monster.

Internal improvement: will be oppose the doctrine? We shall be told it had been long since crushed beneath the Maysville veto. Will he sanction it? The enormous expenditures lavished on this unjust system during the present administration, greatly exceeding, it is believed, those of all the preceding administrations together, will prove that he is still following the footsteps of General Jackson.

Will be maintain inviolate the rights of the States?

[H. OF R.

Why, he and General Jackson were always Jeffersonian republicans-strict constructionists. Will he trample them beneath his feet? He may hold up the proclamation, and show that he is but carrying out the principles of General Jackson.

The surplus revenue: will be recommend its distribution among the States? The messages of 1829 and 1830 will support the recommendation, and refute every argument against its propriety. Will he deny the right of Congress to return to the people what has been unlawfully wrested from them? So does the message of 1836, which contains a full recantation of the doctrines of 1830.

So, sir, he may reward members of Gongress with executive appointments, or denounce such appointments as making corruption the order of the day; he may deprecate the use of official patronage in interfering with the freedom of elections, or employ it in securing the election of his own favorite to the presidency, and not depart from the footsteps of his predecessor.

I repeat that the pledge of Mr. Van Buren to carry out the principles of General Jackson commits him to no settled scheme of policy. There may, sir, perhaps, be one exception, on a subject of great interest to the country: I mean the disposition of the public domain. Upon that I fear, from the tenor of the last message, and more especially from what fell this morning from the gentleman from Mississippi, [Mr. CLAIBORNE,] that his policy has been already decided, and pledges given of peculiar favor to the new States. That gentleman, if I correctly apprehended his remarks, intimated that such expectations had been created, which had induced himself, and the State he represents, to support Mr. Van Buren, a stranger to them, in preference to Judge White, a highly respected friend and neighbor; and threats were held out of a refusal to vote appropriations, or to act with the party in power, unless those expectations were speedily fulfilled.

[Mr. CLAIBORNE explained. He said that, in the warmth of argument, he might have expressed himself in terms that did not properly convey his meaning. He and his constituents regarded Mr. Van Buren as every way qualified for the presidency: believing this, they were induced to support him in preference to Judge White, because they had reasons to think his election would be more favorable to the views and interests of the new States. He meant to convey no threat.] Mr. ROBERTSON.

I am incapable, sir, of misrepresenting any thing said on this floor. The gentleman's explanation leaves the matter just as I stated it. I should not have adverted to the remarks he made, had I not supposed they fully expressed his sentiments. If his judgment, upon reflection, does not approve them, I waive any further observation upon them. I must ac knowledge, however, sir, that I should have been pleased to hear what reasons the gentleman had for the expectations it seems he and his constituents entertain; and I warn him, and the party with whom he acts, that the old States, who surrendered this immense domain for the common benefit of all, will never yield their perfect right to participate equally, at least, in that which was once exclusively their own.

But except in the particular instance, Mr. Speaker, which I have just mentioned, if that be an exception, there is scarcely a single principle or measure which Mr. Van Buren may not adopt or repudiate, without violating his pledge to follow in the footsteps of General Jackson. He will be borne out in either case by the precept or practice of his predecessor. In most cases he will find both; the precept one way, and the practice the other.

Let him, then, as he may in good faith, adopt those which will bring about a reformation of the manifold

of the administration." Melvill solicited the Secretary of the Treasury to inform him for what cause he had been removed, declaring that it would be a source of consolation to him and his family to know that there were no charges against him of incompetency or neg. lect. He addressed him again, representing all the facts of his case, his support of the administration ever since the first election of General Jackson, his faithful services in office, his inability at his advanced age, if deprived of its emoluments, to support a numerous family. He ap. pealed to him for justice. The Secretary replied that his communications had been referred to the collector, with instructions to report upon his case. He requested a copy of the report; and received a brief answer, that the collector had only exercised his legal rights, and that the Department saw no occasion for its further interference, but would leave the responsibility on the collector. He repeated his request, and was answered that "the representations of collectors to the Department were, generally, of a confidential nature." He then, sir, presented his memorial to the Senate. He asked nothing for himself, but prayed that such legislation might be had as would restrain, in future, such an abuse of power as had been practised towards him.

The gentleman from Louisiana indignantly denounces all inquiry into the conduct of four executive Depart. ments, as inquisitorial. What will he say to the inquisition which those Departments themselves have avowedly established? The character of every public officer, of every citizen of the country, lies at the mercy of these secret tribunals, liable to be stabbed in the dark by the hand of an unseen assassin. Little, sir, does Levi Woodbury deserve the high encomium that gentleman passed upon him, if the document I have referred to contains the truth. If, sir, he knew and approved the oppression exercised towards Melvill, his heart is as hard as the granite rock of his native State. I go further: if the facts are as they are represented on the oath of a man whose veracity seems not to be questioned, and the Secretary of the Treasury has sanctioned these proceedings, he deserves to be disgracefully deprived of the power he abuses. Yes, sir, unless Mr. Madison, the purity of whose life and principles will exhibit a striking contrast with those of some who will figure in the annals of the present day, has strangely misconceived the nature of this offence, it is one for which the President himself would be justly subjected to impeachment and removal. An old and faithful public servant is to be dismissed because he is too poor to buy a vote, or too honest to sell

one.

He is of no further use to the party; that party, sir, who profess to be the exclusive friends of the poor; and in his old age reduced to beggary, his reputation, all that is left him, blasted, perhaps forever, and the privilege denied him of knowing the charges against him, or being confronted with his accuser. Yes, the of ficial document in the possession of the Treasury Department, which shows the real ground of his removal, and may prove his innocence, withheld, not from him only, but even from a committee of the Senate.

There is one circumstance disclosed in these proceedings that should not pass unnoticed. It shows the slavish doctrines that the system of proscription adopted by the present administration is but too well calculated to inculcate. One of the removed officers-removed, as he seems to suppose, solely upon political considerationstestifies that he informed the collector that, though officers of the United States Government might vote as they pleased in State or municipal elections, "it was his fixed opinion that a man holding an office under the Government of the United States was not justified in voting against any officer who was favorable to those who administered the Government." This, sir, is the democratic republican doctrine: that no man is worthy of an

[H. OF R.

office who is not ready to sacrifice his conscience for the good of his party; and we are not to be permitted to inquire even into the action of the Government which is thus destroying the freedom of election. It would bring suspicion upon the heads of the departments. Their reputations, we are told by the gentleman from Indiana, [Mr. LANE,] are like those of innocent women; to suspect is to damn them. Then, sir, are they damned already, beyond redemption; blasted long since, by the gentleman from Rhode Island. Sir, that gentleman, when denouncing official corruption in the case of the Wiscasset collector, said, and said truly, that innocence has nothing to fear. No; and, if we may judge of the future by the past, guilt has nothing to fear. What punishment followed the unparalleled negligence, corruption, and abuse, detected in the Post Office? It is known, sir, throughout the country. The head of the Department was forthwith removed, and promoted to one of the highest and most honorable stations in the gift of the Executive.

Every means is taken to elude investigation. The gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. RIPLEY] has even condescended to appeal to our sympathy, by representing the President as lying on his sick bed, and talks of the ingratitude of republics. Ingratitude is not so often the sin of republics as gratitude is the grave of their liberty. It is the gratitude of the people that too often overlooks the faults of some brilliant conqueror, and arms him with power-their own power-to crush them. What more would the gentleman ask for General Jackson? He has received, as well as the gentleman himself, a full share of the honors and emoluments of the country. I am grateful to both; and equally so to the poor soldier who fought under their command, and whose bones whiten the battle-fields of our country. I profess none of that sickly sensibility that yields all the glory and honor to the great and powerful, and expends itself in lamentations for their calamities. I regret to hear of the bodily suffering of the President, as much as I would of yours, sir, or of that of the gentleman from Louisiana; no more. But what connexion is there between the President's indisposition and the measure under consideration? If any gentleman will say that the President's personal attendance is necessary, I will vote to defer the inquiry until he shall be restored. But I cannot consent that all legislation shall be suspended because the President is sick; that our frontier shall be ravaged, the poor Indian robbed and massacred for his property, the peculator fatten on the public spoils, and corruption and oppression go unpunished and unexamined, because the President is sick. I will not believe that this investigation will give him pain. The gentleman from Georgia [Mr. GLASCOCK] tells us that he is authorized to say that the President desires a strict investigation; and gentlemen ought not to distrust his sincerity. Sir, sick as he is, it is better that he should sometimes hear the plain language of truth, than to be nauseated with doses of flattery served up daily from this ball.

It is time this struggle-should end. Gentlemen tell us it is too late; it is the short session, and one committee cannot perform the task. Last year I had the honor of proposing a similar investigation, and, that it might be effectual, asked a separate committee for each distinct head of inquiry. But then, sir, it was the long session. In the long session, six or seven committees are too many. In the short session, one is not enough. True, sir, it is a Herculean labor; but let us make a beginning. If the Augean stables cannot be thoroughly cleansed, at least the filthy heap may be removed that blocks up the entrance.

Before Mr. ROBERTSON had finished his speech, (the whole of which is given above,) he gave way to a motion for adjournment.

And the House adjourned.