1833. They were distinctly told what would be the result. They were warned that bank capital would increase, and with it the circulation of paper money; but in the face of all argument and all warning, the experiment went on. The only existing check which had power to control the excessive issue of bank paper was put down. The deposites of the public money were transferred from where the laws had put them, and placed in deposite banks, arbitrarily selected at the will of the Executive. The authors of the present state of things are the very men who come here and propose to us this bill as a remedy. These two facts should be put together, and should be kept together, in the mind of every Senator who will form a right judgment in this matter. The removal of the deposites was the first step. We are now come to the second step in the process. The men who accomplished the first have already profited by it politically, and, if rumor speaks true, in other ways also. Does any man here entertain a doubt that high officers of Government have used those deposites as instruments of speculation in the public lands? Is not the fact notorious? I not one in the immediate neighborhood of the Executive among those the most deeply concerned? Will this be denicd? Is it not well known that several officers in the Departments purchased lands to sell on speculation, with the funds officially under their own control? How the same combination of persons profited politically by the same movement, I shall show hereafter. [FEB. 4, 1837. at this rate it must be twelve years before that stock can be disposed of; and if the stock is to be augmented by new and large purchases during the present year, the speculation must end in inevitable ruin. The thing is plain; it cannot be denied; it admits of no demonstration. What, then, is resorted to to prevent this disastrous catastrophe? The answer is found in the details of this bill. And I entirely concur with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. Davis] in pronouncing them most odious in their character. No American citizen is to be left free to purchase a portion of the public domain, the property of the whole people of the United States, without a license. Yet, before he can buy the land which his own Government has offered for sale, he must first take out a license. Odious as I hold all licenses upon the press or licenses upon trade, I hold this to be fully as obnoxious as either. A license to purchase the public lands! I cannot buy myself a farm, though I have the money in my pocket, till I pay a dollar and a quarter per acre for a license, and then I do not get a title until I have complied with the most onerous conditions; and if, after I have paid my money, I see reason to change my mind, I cannot leave the land without forfeiting all I have paid, if I find the situation to be sickly. I cannot remain there without risking the lives of my family; I cannot sell it to one more accustomed to the climate, without incur ring the pain of perjury as a speculator; nor can I remove without forfeiting the purchase money. But sup. posing the settler remains, he is required to consummate his title, not in a court of law or before a judicial officer, but before the register and receiver of the district. do not know how Senators from the new States may feel, but this I know, that nothing under heaven shall induce me to place Carolinians in such circumstances. gisters and receivers of a land office to be judges in mat ters of real estate! Why, sir, these persons, for the most part, are political partisans. They have obtained their offices as a reward for services rendered at the election. Has not the doctrine of the spoils been open I The re Assuming, then, what cannot be denied, that the excessive increase of the circulating medium produced by the experiment is the main cause of these speculations in the public land, and assuming, on the authority of universal rumor, that high functionaries of the Government have availed themselves of the state of things thus produced, I come now to what is my main proposition, namely, that this bill is calculated to consummate these plans of speculation, and that without this measure, or something equivalent to it, they must end in loss. [Here some explanation took place between Mr. CALly avowed on this floor' Has it not been unblushingly HOUN and Mr. WALKER, as to the statements made by the latter in reference to the probable effect of the rejection of the bill.] Well, sir, be it as the honorable chairman states. He says now that, if this bill shall not become a law, the purchases of the public land will continue to go on as they have done for the last year. Admit it, and what must be the consequence? Cannot all men perceive that in this, as in all other cases, over supply must operate to reduce the price? The honorable chairman tells us that the amount of land required for fair and honest settlement, by the progress of the country, is five millions of acres annually; and that the amount taken upon speculation last year was thirty millions. If so, then there is already in the hands of the speculators a six years' supply. Should all the land offices be closed to-morrow, the amount these speculators hold would not be absorbed by the regular demands of the country in less than six years. Now, the greater part of these large purchases have been made upon loans; the interest is running on; and unless the sales shall be in proportion, do not all men see that the accumulation of unproductive land upon their hands must infallibly ruin those who are engaged in such speculations? Under such circumstances, the help of legislation is the only thing that can relieve them. I repeat it. This bill, or something like it, is indispensable. It puts a finish to the work. The land offices being left open, and no obstructions thrown in the way of the purchase for settlement, we may suppose that one half of the five millions annually required will be purchased from the Government. There will then remain but two and a half millions to take off the thirty millions stock which the speculators already hold; and maintained that the party which obtains a political victory has, as a thing of course, a right to all the offices of the State, and to the public money into the bargain, so that they may control it entirely for their own benefit? I have a right, therefore, to assume that, as a gen eral thing, these registers and receivers will be political partisans. What, then, will be the condition of a large portion of our citizens? Allowing the consumption of public lands to be two and a half millions of acres a year, you will have about a hundred thousand voters, the title to whose earthly ali will be in the hands of these regis ters and receivers. Can any thing be conceived more odious? Would the license of the press itself be a meas ure more hateful or dangerous? Sir, we have spent too much time in considering so monstrous a proposition. I hope we shall not waste upon it another moment. But, putting the political effects of this bill out of veiw, let us inquire what will be its moral influence. The Senator from New York [Mr. WRIGHT] told us that he considered the price of public land as already too high, and that he was averse to placing it still higher. Sir, these were his words; but let us look at the face of the bill; its practical effect will be an enormous increase in the price to be paid for the public domain; I put to any man of sound common sense, whether he had not rather give two dollars an acre at once for his farm, and get a good title for his land without further difficulty? I would, most certainly. Consider the terms on which he must buy: the moment he enters his land under this bill, it becomes subject to State taxation; but if he buys from the speculators it will not be so. The entire mass of land purchased last year, and including some of the best parts of the public domain, is now held for sale free of taxation, while land purchased from the Government must immediately be taxed. What chance will the United States lands have against such a competition' None at all; the speculators will have the complete monopoly. This, then, is a question between the Government and the speculators. Our stock is one hundred and twenty millions, theirs is thirty millions; our land is at a dollar and a quarter, theirs is at not less than three dollars; and here is a fair competition. But this bill comes in, and throws the market into the hands of the speculators. In any other than these extraordinary times, one would suppose that these objections must be fatal to any bill. It is most obvious that unless you throw restrictions round the purchase of land from the United States, the object of the speculators must be defeated. But we are asked, what is to be done with all this speculation? I answer, let it alone, and it will run down of itself. The times will react-the present state of things is artificial-it cannot possibly continue. Speculation, after it has run its course, will run down, and that with far less injury than will result from any attempt to put it down by legislation. If, however, you do legislate, there are many expedients besides that proposed in this bill. In the first place, you may raise the price of the public lands. This, to be sure, will confer a great benefit on those who have already purchased; but it will check future speculation. I have, however, no idea that any such measure will be resorted to; it would be very unpopular; and the object which gentlemen have in view must be secured without the loss of personal popularity. Then, in the second place, you may shut the land offices. This expedient, however, would be liable to the same objections with the other; for you can hit upon none which will not either be inoperative altogether, or of great advantage to those who have already purchased. My opinion, in regard to the public lands, has undergone a great change during the course of this debate. I thought there was a majority in this Senate who would resolutely object to all rash changes in our land system. I hoped, most confidently, that New England at least would have stood fast. I have been disappointed. I hoped that the public lands would not be drawn into our political contests. But in this, too, I have been entirely disappointed. I see that the era has arrived when our large capitalists are in a fair way to scize upon the whole body of the public lands. This has compelled a great change to take place in my mind. I greatly fear that we have reached the time when the public domain is lost to the Government for all useful purposes. We may, indeed, receive some amount of revenue from it, but it will be accompanied with such agitations, and so much trouble and political corruption, that the gain will not compensate for the evil incurred. I have made up my mind, if a fair concession can be made, to concede the whole to the new States, on some fixed and well-considered condition. I am for transferring the whole, on the condition that they shall pay us a certain per cent. of the proceeds, and submit to the necessary limitations as to the mode of bringing the lands into the market. The present system of sale not to be disturbed for some years, and after that the principle of graduation to be prudently introduced. I have always felt the force of the argument that the new States are not now placed upon an equal footing with the other members of the confederacy. They are full of our land officers and of public officers under our control; and in regard to the soil within their limits, they sustain to us a relation which must ever be productive of discontent and agitation. Whether a thing of this kind can safely be done, I do not know; but of this I am fully persuaded, that such a measure would be infinitely better than the scheme proposed in this bill. The chairman of the Committee on the Public Lands has avowed his own carnest belief that VOL. XIII.-45 [SENATE. the evils of the existing state of things are such that even a bill like this should be resorted to as a preferable alternative. He considers a surplus in the Treasury as a great evil; (and so do I, too, if it is to be permanent.) And his dread of a surplus is so great that it has prevented him from regarding the details of this bill as I am persuaded he would have done, but for the bias thus produced. With these views, I conclude by expressing my hope that the bill will not be recommitted, but that we shall either reject it, or suffer it to sleep by laying it upon the table. The question was then taken on the recommitment of the bill, and decided in the affirmative: Yeas 23, nay's 20, as follows: YEAS--Messrs. Benton, Black, Cuthbert, Dana, Ewing of Blinois, Fulton, Grundy, Hendricks, Hubbard, King of Alabama, King of Georgia, Linn, Lyon, Moore, Nicholas, Niles, Norvell, Rives, Robinson, Ruggles, Sevier, Walker, Wright-23. NAYS-Messrs. Bayard, Brown, Buchanan, Calhoun, Clay, Clayton, Davis, Ewing of Ohio, Kent, Knight, Morris, Prentiss, Preston, Southard, Swift, Tipton, Tomlinson, Wall, Webster, White-20. On motion, the Senate adjourned. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6. ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. Mr. TIPTON said that he was requested to present to the Senate two memorials, signed by citizens of Carroll and White counties, in the State of Indiana, praying Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia. These petitions (said he) are printed papers, couched in language both decorous and respectful, and signed by citizens of great respectability. I acknowledge (said Mr. T.) the right of the people to petition Congress for a redress of their grievances, and I feel it to be my duty, as one of their representatives on the floor of the Senate, to present their petitions, and to ask for them a respectful consideration; but I feel it to be due to the petitioners, to the Senate, and to myself, to state, respectfully but firmly, that my reflections on this subject have brought me to to a conclusion very different from that which they seem to have arrived at. I am unable to perceive, sir, whence it is that Congress derives the power to interfere with slavery in the District of Columbia. Our forefathers, in framing the federal constitution, recognised the existence of slavery in a portion of the States of this confederacy, by permitting slaves to be enumerated in apportioning representatives on the floor of Congress. Every attempt made by citizens of the non-slaveholding States to disturb the rights of our neighbors to this species of property distracts the peace of the country and endangers the exist ence of the Union. It is contended that Congress has exclusive legislation over the District of Columbia. If that be granted, it is but a delegated and limited power, not original, derivative. Slavery existed in Virginia, Maryland, and other States, before the federal constitution was adopted; slavery then belonged exclusively to the several States, and there it still remains; their entering into the Union did not yield to the Federal Government any right to interfere with the question of slavery within the States or in this District. The States of Virginia and Maryland ceded to the Federal Government this ten miles square, called the District of Columbia, for a seat of Government, and granted to Congress exclusive legislative powers over it for that purpose. This power was given to Congress by the States for special purposes, and is limited, from the very nature of the grant. Congress cannot abolish the right of trial by jury, abridge the liberty of SENATE.] Abolition of Slavery. the press, nor establish a national church, in this District, any more than in any of the States; nor do I believe that Congress has a right to interfere with slavery in the District, while Virginia and Maryland continue to be slave States. Were it possible that the petitioners could effect their object, and abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, they would erect a receptable in the midst of two slaveholding States for fanatics, abolitionists, and runaway slaves, who would, from their stronghold here, spread dissatisfaction, death, and destruction, through the surrounding country. Could the States who ceded the District have anticipated such a result, they never would have ceded it to the United States. Mr. T. said he was happy in being able to state to the Senate that there were but thirty-three names signed to these petitions, and that he hoped and believed that there was but a small portion of his constituents in favor of the course that the petitioners recommended; that he thought it was best to meet this question fairly; and, taking the suggestion of an honorable Senator from Virginia, not now here, [Mr. Tyler,] he would move to refer these petitions to the Committee for the District of Columbia. Let that committee give us a report that will present a full and fair view of the subject. This, he thought, would quiet the public mind. This course was adopted some years ago, when Congress was overrun with peti tions for stopping the mail on Sunday. The memorials were referred to the appropriate committee, and one able report from the chairman of the committee had put that exciting subject to rest, as he hoped, forever. lle Mr. CALHOUN expressed the hope that a question would be made on the reception of the petitions. insisted that, if an objection should be made to the reception of a petition, it was the rule, and for forty years had been the practice of the Senate, to take the vote of reception, without a motion not to receive. He read the rule on this point, which stated that, if there was a cry of the House to receive, and no objection should be made, or if the House were silent, the reception would take place of course. Otherwise, a vote must be taken on its reception. Mr. C. said he had in vain insisted on this at the last session. He hoped the Chair would now sustain the rule, before Mr. C. would be compelled to move a non-reception. Mr. EWING, of Ohio, said he supposed the question before the Senate was, as a matter of course, whether the petition should be received. The CHAIR was understood to say that the practice which thus rendered a simple objection nugutory, and required a motion not to receive, was erroneous. Mr. EWING. Such is my opinion as to the rules of this body. But I rise to express my regret that any objection is made to the reception of these petitions. I last year expressed a most decided opinion against the passage of a law which should carry into effect the prayer of these petitioners; and my opinion is still unchanged. I am a citizen of a State in which slavery is not admitted, and all my habits, and feelings, and opinions, are averse to it, both in principle and practice; but I did not then think, and I do not now think, that our National Legislature ought to interfere with the subject. They ought not to interfere with it, for it would exacerbate sectional feelings, which ought to be assuaged rather than excited; and, in justice to the people of the District itself, it ought not, for they are in the midst of a slaveholding population, surrounded with it on all sides. They themselves have been bred up in the same habits. We cannot, therefore, as just legislators, act for these people in a most important matter, involving their social condition, according to the opinions and wishes of those who are entire strangers to them and their condition, and against their own feelings and will. [FEB. 6, 1837. We did not receive a cession of this territory from the States to which they belonged for any such purpose; nor would such a measure be an act of humanity toward the slave, but the reverse. It would not give liberty to one human being. If such a law were about to pass, all the slaves in the District would be hurried out of it, and sold to the rice and sugar planters in the South; so that the cause of humanity would not be subserved by it. I have therefore been, and am still, opposed to the prayer of these petitioners. Having expressed once more my views on this subject, I will further say that, in my opinion, great injustice has been done to these petitioners, here and elsewhere. They are not incendiaries, but an orderly, quiet, con scientious part of the community. The opinions which I expressed last year-the same which I now briefly repeat-went abroad to them, and were not, as I ever heard, objected to; they allow the same freedom of opinion which they demand, and which I claim for them; and let me add that they are much mistaken who expect to put down opinion by harshness or proscription. The refusal to receive these petitions is considered as a denial of a constitutional right, and the tendency of our course here is to blend the constitutional right of petition with the abolition of slavery in the District. The effect of this is easily foreseen. I hope, sir, that these petitions will be received, and referred in the ordinary way, and that a report containing reason and argument will be made by that commit. tee, and go ab oad to the people. It would have a better effect on the public mind than harshness either of action or expression here. Mr. TIPTON said, when he presented the memorials, he thought the usual course would be pursued; but he was satisfied with the decision of the Chair. Mr. MORRIS, in order to obviate any possible diffi culty, moved that the petition be received. Mr. SWIFT said he thought the same respect ought to be paid to petitioners on this as on any other subject. The kind of opposition which these petitions had met with on their presentation had very much increased the excitement, instead of putting it down; and he therefore regarded it as an improper course, if such were the object. In Mr. S's Sate, these petitioners were among the most respectable; and he therefore felt unwilling to have them branded here as fanatics and incendiaries. They might be mistaken; but they were as intelligent and honest as any other people. Mr. CALHOUN expressed his satisfaction at the decision of the Chair. He hoped the old mode, which had been uniformly practised till within five or six years, would now be pursued. The CHAIR was understood to say that an objection was alone sufficient to produce the question on recep. tion. Several petitions were then presented on the same subject- By Mr. MORRIS: A petition from 2,265 ladies of Ohio; a petition from 3,710 lectors of the State of Ohio; a petition from 780 electers of Cuyahoga county, Ohio; a petition from a number of the electors of Laporte, Indiana; also, two petitions from the State of Tennessee, one from 108 ladies and the other from 107 men; all praying for the abolition of slavery and the slave trade in the District of Columbia. Mr. GRUNDY asked the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. MORRIS] to file with the petitions the letter which enclosed to him the two from Tennessee. Mr. MORRIS sa'd that the Tennessee petitions were enclosed in a letter from the State of Tennessee, to a citizen of Ohio, by whom they were enclosed to him. Mr. WHITE ask ed for the name of the person in Tennessee who had enclosed the petitions to Ohio. Mr. MORRIS did not recollect the name, and had not brought the letter with him. He did not know the person who wrote the letter, but had noticed that it was post-marked in Tennessee. As to the citizen of Ohio who had enclosed the petitions to him, he had been a-sured by a member of the other House, who knew him, that he was a man of the highest respectability, and that his word might be perfectly relied on. Mr. BUCHANAN said he had five memorials to present, from two hundred and twenty-nine ladies of Bucks county, Pennsylvania, and two memorials from sixty-one of the inhabitants of the city and county of Philadelphia, asking Congress to abolish slavery and the slave trade within the District of Columbia. [SENATE. But as members of this Senate had been charged with the presentation of memorials, he could not but regret that the honorable Senator from South Carolina had interposed any objection to the reception of these memorials. He believed that the course pursued at the last session was the proper and correct course; and that he fully concurred in the views of the Legislature of New Hampshire in relation to this absorbing subject. When he rose to address the Senate, he supposed that he had in his drawer a paper containing a printed copy of a preamble and resolutions which had been adopted by a great majority of the Legislature of his native State. He intended to have called for their reading, as the preamble and resolutions very fully express his own sentiments and his own feelings, but he had not been able to put his hand upon the paper; and as not many days can elapse before he can be furnished with an official copy of the document to which he had referred, he would, on presenting them to the Senate, avail himself of the opportu nity to express his concurrence therewith. He had no doubt as to the course the Senate ought to pursue. His own views upon this subject he had very fully expressed at the last session of the Senate. He had reflected upon the opinions he then advanced, and he had seen no cause for regret at the grounds then taken by him. Whilst presenting these memorials, he would say that, in taking a retrospect of the course which he had pursued at the last session in relation to this subject, it now met his entire and cordial approbation. He believed that the discussion which then took place in this body had been of essential service in directing the public mind to this question. Its true nature was, he thought, now well understood in the State which he had, in part, the honor to represent. He was convinced that, at this time, true policy would forbid any further discussion of this question. We should now avoid excitement, and leave the question to the sober good sense of the people. He then believed, and he still believes, that no beneficial He would vote in favor of receiving these memorials, results would attend the action of Congress upon the suband, after they were received, he should move to lay ject of slavery in the District of Columbia. In his opinthem on the table. This motion would prec'ude discus-ion, an evil rather than a good, would be the effect of sion, and that was what he desired. If, however, a majority of the Senate should prefer again to reject the prayer of these memorials, and any Senator would make that motion, he should again cheerfully vote as he had done before. But such a motion might lead to a protracted debate, which he thought ought to be avoided. For himself, he had now said all be intended to say on this question during the present session. Mr. MORRIS said the course with which the Senator from Pennsylvania had just expressed himself satisfied had greatly increased the number of such petitioners in Ohio, and had caused the organization of abolition societies in almost every county in the State, all contending for the right of the petitioners to be heard, although many disagreed as to the object of the petitioners. Mr. M. urged that the best and only way to quiet agitation on the subject, and prevent the increase of abolitionists, was for a committee to make a full report, which might be distributed over the country. Mr. M. would vote to print any number of such a report. The people of the West, he maintained, were a reflecting, reading, thinking, judging, prudent people; and the great body of these petitioners, as far as he knew them, were professors of religion, who acted on conscientious principles; and it was impossible to turn aside their zeal, even if it was misdirected, by merely refusing to hear them and answer their requests. Mr. M. declared his belief that not one of the petitioners wished for the abolition of slavery by force or violence. On the contrary, citizens of the free States would be ready to aid in suppressing any such violence in their sister States. Still it was impossible to stop the progress of human inquiry on this as on every other subject; and the public mind ought, therefore, as far as possible, to be enlightened. any action on the part of Congress. He was so well satisfied with the disposition of the memorials presented at the last session, for the abolition of slavery in this District, that if the memorials now presented should be received, and his friend from Pennsylvania should not renew the motion which he then made, to reject the prayer of these petitions, he would himself present such a motion as a motion to lay the whole mass on the table. Mr. CALHOUN said he thought it very desirable that the Senate and the South should know in what manner these petitioners spoke of Southern people. For this purpose he had selected, from the numerous petitions on the table, two, indiscriminately, which he wished the Secretary to read. [These two petitions were read, and proved to be rather more moderate in their language than usual.] Such is the language (said Mr. C.) with which they characterize us and ours. That which was the basis of Southern institutions, and which could not be dispensed without blood and massacre, was denounced as sinful and outrageous on the rights of men. And all this was proclaimed, in the Senate of the United States, of States that were united together for the purpose of maintaining their institutions in a more perfect manner. Were Southern members to sit quietly and hear themselves denounced in this manner? And if they should speak at all under these circumstances, were they to be denounced as agitators? This institution existed when the constitution was formed; and yet Senators would not only sit and receive them, but were ready to throw blame on those who opposed them. Mr. C. said he did not belong to the school of those who believed that agitations of this sort could be quieted by concessions; on the contrary, he maintained all usurpations should be resisted in the beginning; and those Mr. HUBBARD remarked that he extremely regret- who would not do so were prepared to be slaves themted that this subject had been brought before the Senate selves. Mr. C. knew, and had predicted, that if the peat this late period of the session. It must be recollected titions were received, it would not avail in satisfying the that a very decisive vote had been given in this body, at petitioners; but they would then be prepared for the the last session, expressive of their determination not to next step, to compel action upon the petitions. Mr. C. act upon petitions of a character similar to those which would ask Southern gentlemen if they did not see the have just been presented; and he could not but feel a second step prepared to be taken, not only that the pedeep regret that this subject was now brought forward-titions should be received, but referred. a subject calculated to produce great excitement, here and elsewhere. Mr. C. had told Mr. BUCHANAN and his friends, last The year, that they were taking an impossible position; and | [FEB. 6, 1837. Mr. MORRIS presented a petition from abolitionists in Ohio, which he said he had received during the prece ding debate; and having moved that it be received, read, and referred, with instructions to the committee to report on various points which he specified, Mr. WHITE remarked that the two petitions from Tennessee, which Mr. MORRIS had before presented, did not originate in that State. In one of them, the word "Ohio" had been erased, and "Tennessee" substituted; and the place in the other was left blank, so that it might have come from any State in the Union. Mr. KING, of Georgia, said he barely wished to correct an impression of the Senator from South Carolina, [Mr. CALHOUN,] that there was a material difference between the action on the petitions at this session and the last. A great proportion of the petitions at the last session were laid on the table precisely in the same manner as Mr. C. said the decision of the Chair settled the ques- had just been done on motion of Mr. BAYARD. The question that the Senate had a right to refuse to receive the tion of reception at the last session was not, at first,, dispetitions; for, if they had a right to vote at all on the sub- cussed at all. But when the question on reception was ject, they had the right to vote in the negative; and taken, Mr. K. had voted in favor of receiving the peti to yield this point was to yield it for the benefit of tions, and he should still do so if the question should arise. the abolitionists, at the expense of the Senate. But it He thought the Senate ought to take a ground on which was in vain to argue on the subject. Mr. C. would they could stand with all parts of the country. Southwarn Southern members to take their stand on this point ern Senators, he said, had been accused of becoming recwithout concession. He had foreseen and predicted this reant to the rights of their constituents. But the restate of things three years ago, as a legitimate result of ception, he maintained, was a mere matter of form, to the force bill. All this body were now opposed to the satisfy the constitutional scruples of some of the Senators. object of these petitions. Mr. C. saw where all origi- Mr. CALHOUN said he, for one, was extremely nated--at the very bottom of society, among the lowest pleased with the decision of the Chair, (that a mere oband most ignorant, but it would go on, and rise higherjection required a vote on the reception of the petitions.) and higher, till it should ascend the pulpit and the schools, where it had, indeed, arrived already; thence it would mount up to this and the other House. The only way to resist was to close the doors; to open them was virtually to surrender the question. The spirit of the times (he said) was one of dollars and cents, the spirit of speculation, which had diffused itself from the North to the South. Nothing (he said) could resist the spirit of abolition but the united action of the South. The opinions of most people in the North and South were now sound on this subject; but the rising genera tion would be imbued by the spirit of fanaticism, and the North and South would become two people, with feel. ings diametrically opposite. The decided action of the South, within the limits of the constitution, was indispensable. Mr. TIPTON expressed his surprise at the remarks of the Senator. He thought there was nothing in the petitions which had been read to produce such feelings. He called for the yeas and nays on the question of reception; which were ordered. Mr. BAYARD moved to lay the question of reception on the table, after remarking that he believed this was the method which had been usually pursued. This motion was decided by yeas and nays, on the call of Mr. MORRIS, as follows: YEAS--Messrs. Bayard, Benton, Black, Brown, Buchanan, Calhoun, Clayton, Cuthbert, Ewing of Illinois, Fulton, Grundy, Hubbard, Kent, King of Alabama, King of Georgia, Linn, Lyon, Moore, Mouton, Nicholas, Norvell, Page, Preston, Rives, Robinson, Ruggles, Sevier, Strange, Walker, White, Wright-31. NAYS-Messrs. Davis, Ewing of Ohio, Hendricks, Knight, Morris, Niles, Prentiss, Robbins, Southard, Swift, Tipton, Tomlinson, Wall--13. Mr. DAVIS presented about forty petitions on the same subject, from Massachusetts, and one from Philadelphia, and moved their reference. The CHAIR stated the question to be on their recep tion. Mr. BAYARD moved to lay the question on the table; which was done accordingly. But he ought to go further, and put the question of reception, whether the petition were objected to or not. According to the rule, he said, the burden of making a motion to receive should fall on those presenting the peti tions. Mr. C. had formerly pressed the Chair twice on this point, but was then overruled. The question was, whether we were bound to receive the petitions by the constitution. That question the Chair had now yielded, and had admitted that it was in the power of the body itscif to say whether or not the petitions should be re ceived. Mr. C again argued that, if Congress were bound to receive petitions, they were equally bound to refer and act upon them. Mr. SOUTHARD, after adverting to the deep feeling which was always excited in his mind when this subject came up for discussion, observed that it was a great error on the part of Southern gentlemen not to separate in this matter things which should never have been united. Some of these petitions related to the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, while others prayed for the prevention of what they denominated the slave trade in that District. The two questions were entirely differ ent, and ought not to be blended together. Mr. S. then adverted to the practice of slave-dealers resorting to this District, and making it a mart for their traffic, in the conducting of which great abuses were perpetrated, both in the sale of slaves who had been stolen from their masters, and of others who never had been enslaved before. Mr. S. sought no interference with that relation of master and servant which was recognised by the laws of some of the States, and was protected by the constitu tion. But into the latter question he was willing to look, not as a Northern or as a Southern man, but in relation to the great principles of government and of the Federal Union. In this he was but following the lead of gentlemen from the South. It was from them that the proposition had first come; and the suppression of crimes of this kind, instead of aggravating those evils which the South most feared, would go far toward allaying the spirit which sought to interfere with slavery in the Southern States. The abuscs he adverted to would |