SENATE.]

Counting Electoral Votes.-South Carolina Protest.

important to have full information on this subject; a detailed statement was required of all the actual expenditures which had been made, of the items of which it consisted, as well as the whole amount, and of what would yet be required to cover the whole expenses of the expedition. The importance of the exploring expedition was nothing, in comparison with the question-(one of the most important that could be discussed)—of the power assumed by the Executive to transfer, at pleasure, appropriations made by law to certain objects, to another and distinct object, not having the sanction of Congress. How far Congress would subsequently sanction, and thereby legalize such a practice, was a very important question. We require, before making our appropriations for the naval service of the year, that the estimates shall be submitted to us, down to the smallest contingency: and yet these might always be diverted to other objects.

[FEB. 9, 10, 1829.

that he considered the plan of the expedition, as disclos-
ed in the letter of the Secretary of the Navy, as extreme-
ly objectionable. Here was a scientific corps created, by
the mere will of an Executive officer, already selected,
and only waiting for the passage of this bill to receive
their appointments. They were to receive salaries of
from 1,500 dollars to 2 or 3,000 dollars, and they were to
perform duties which would reduce the officers of the
navy connected with the expedition to insignificance.
The observations-commercial, astronomical, and scienti-
fic-were all to be made and reported to Government by
these gentlemen, and one of them was finally to write
and publish the history of the voyage. What, he would
ask, was to be left to the naval officers? They were
merely to command the sailors and to navigate the ships.
The Captain (as gallant and intelligent an officer as any
in the service) was to incur all the responsibility, with-
out sharing in the honor that might be acquired.
should be the opinion of the Senate that this bill ought to
pass, and that the expedition be now sent out, for the
credit of the Navy he should endeavor to have it put on
a better footing. The officers of the navy, as it was at
present organized, were to be mere navigators; this did
not meet his approbation; he would have them at the head
of the expedition, and the scientific corps should be their
mere agents and instruments. To the navy should belong
the glory of the enterprise, if any glory was to be ac-
quired in it.

If it

The resolution was then agreed to, and the Senate adjourned over to Monday.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1829.

COUNTING ELECTORAL VOTES.

Mr. TAZEWELL, from the Joint Committee appointed for the purpose, reported, in part, the following resolution:

With regard to this South Polar expedition, he repeated, there was no law to sanction it. Yet the whole country had been led to believe there was such a law, and the Department had transferred, at pleasure, appropriations made by law to other objects, to fitting out a magnificent expedition. He would call the attention of the Senate to another view of the subject. It was impossible the public should ever know how much this expedition would cost, without calling for this information. He would venture the assertion that, instead of 50,000 dollars, it would cost nearer half a million. He had a statement before him-it had been made hastily, and was only an estimate, he admitted-but he believed it was sufficiently accurate at least to serve the purposes of illustration, so as to put this matter in a proper light. First, the Peacock had been rebuilt at what cost he did not know-but most probably at an increased cost over an ordinary sloop of war. Take the Boston sloop, which was built at one of the cheapest yards in the country, as an example; she cost the Government 96,000 dollars-the Peacock might perhaps be put down at a hundred thousand, when fitted out and Resolved, That the two Houses shall assemble in the fully prepared for sea. A brig had been purchased at Chamber of the House of Representatives, on Wednes10,000 dollars, and would probably require 5,000 for repairs, and as much more to fit her properly for the expe- day, the 11th day of February, 1829, at twelve o'clock; that one person be appointed Teller on the part of the dition. The provision ship, probably 20,000 dollars. The Secretary of the Navy estimates her at 15,000 dol- Senate, and two persons be appointed Tellers on the part lars-making 135,000 dollars. The Agent, 1,000 dollars; and Vice President of the United States, as they shall be of the House, to make a list of the votes for President instruments, 2,000 dollars; contingencies, 10,000 dollars. Then come the provisions, and support of these vessels declared; that the result shall be delivered to the Presiat sea. Ordinary sloops of war required, he believed, about dent of the Senate, who shall announce to the two Houses, 40,000 dollars per annum; schooners, about 20,000 dol-assembled as aforesaid, the state of the vote, and the perlars; say, for the three vessels employed, 80,000 dol- hath been made agreeably to the constitution of the Unitson or persons elected, if it shall appear that a choice lars; contingencies, 10,000 dollars; making 100,000 dollars, in round numbers, per annum. It was probable the expedition would not be completed in less than three years (the Secretary estimates two years and a half), making 300,000 dollars. Add to this the wear and tear of the vessels, &c. and it would be seen that, before this expedition is completed, the whole expense would probably not fall much short of half a million of dollars. True, the bill appropriates but 50,000 dollars; but this is in addition to what has already been expended, and the sums to be hereafter expended, out of the navy appropriations. He would not pretend this statement was at all accurate, but it was quite sufficient to show that information was wanted from the Department, that we might form some correct idea of the cost to the country of this expedition, in order to determine if it was worth our while to prosecute it.

Mr. H. said that the committee were influenced by these views, in calling for the information required by this resolution. The merits of the expedition were not intended to be now discussed; but, however important it may be considered by some gentlemen, it was deemed more important not to sanction the measures that had been pursued in this business. For himself, he would say,

ed States; which communication shall be deemed a suffi

cient declaration of the person or persons elected, and, together with a list of the votes, shall be entered on the journals of the two Houses.

The report was read and agreed to, and Mr. TAZEWELL was elected Teller on the part of the Senate.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1829.

SOUTH CAROLINA PROTEST.

Mr. SMITH, of South Carolina, presented the following protest of the State of South Carolina, against the system of duties lately established by the Government of the United States:

"The Senate and House of Representatives of South Carolina, now met, and sitting in General Assembly— through the Honorable WILLIAM SMITH, and the Honorable ROBERT Y. HAYNE, their Representatives in the Senate of the United States-do, in the name and on behalf of the good people of the said Commonwealth, solemnly protest against the system of protecting duties lately adopted by the Federal Government, for the following reasons:

"1. Because the good people of this Commonwealth

believe that the powers of Congress were delegated to it in trust for the accomplishment of certain specified objects, which limit and control them, and that every exercise of them for any other purpose, is a violation of the constitution, as unwarrantable as the undisguised assumption of substantive independent powers, not granted or expressly withheld.

[SENATE.

her soil, the blessings by which Divine Providence seems to have designed to compensate for the great disadvantages under which she suffers in other respects, are among the very few that can be cultivated with any profit by slave labor; and if, by the loss of her foreign commerce, these products should be confined to an inadequate market, the fate of this fertile State would be poverty and utter "2. Because the power to lay duties on imports is, and, desolation; her citizens, in despair, would emigrate to in its very nature, can be, only a means of effecting the more fortunate regions, and the whole frame and conobjects specified by the constitution; since no free Gov-stitution of her civil polity be impaired and deranged, if ernment, and, least of all, a Government of enumerated not dissolved entirely. powers, can, of right, impose any tax (any more than a penalty) which is not at once justified by public necessity, and clearly within the scope and purview of the social compact; and since the right of confining appropriations of the public money to such legitimate and constitutional objects is as essential to the liberties of the People, as their unquestionable privilege to be taxed only by their

own consent.

"3. Because they believe that the Tariff Law, passed by Congress at its last session, and all other acts of which the principal object is the protection of manufactures, or any other branch of domestic injury-if they be considered as the exercise of a supposed power in Congress, to tax the people at its own good will and pleasure, and to apply the money raised to objects not specified by the constitution is a violation of these fundamental principles, a breach of a well defined trust, and a perversion of the high powers vested in the Federal Government for federal purposes only.

Deeply impressed with these considerations, the Representatives of the good people of this Commonwealth, anxiously desiring to live in peace with their fellow-citizens, and to do all that in them lies to preserve and perpetuate the Union of the States, and the liberties of which it is the surest pledge-but feeling it to be their bounden duty to expose and to resist all encroachments upon the true spirit of the constitution, lest an apparent acquiescence in the system of protecting duties should be drawn into precedent, do, in the name of the Commonwealth of South Carolina, claim to enter upon the Journals of the Senate, their protest against it, as unconstitutional, oppressive, and unjust. "HENRY DEAS,

President of the Senate. "BENJ. FANEUIL DANKIN, Speaker of the House of Representatives.

[L. S.] STEPHEN D. MILLER."

4. Because such acts, considered in the light of a re- Mr. SMITH said that, in presenting this protest, it was gulation of commerce, are equally liable to objection; not his purpose to go fully into the objections which since, although the power to regulate commerce, may, could be raised against the system, but it was his intention like other powers, be exercised so as to protect domestic to make a few remarks, suggested by the occasion. manufactures, yet it is clearly distinguished from a power South Carolina believed that when, as a sovereign State, to do so to nomine, both in the nature of the thing and in she surrendered a portion of her territory, it was for the common acceptation of the terms; and because the con- certain and specified objects; and that, when those obfounding of them would lead to the most extravagant re-jects were accomplished, the authority ceded sults; since the encouragement of domestic industry implies an absolute control over all the interests, resources, and pursuits, of a people; and is inconsistent with the idea of any other than a simple consolidated Government. "5. Because, from the contemporaneous expositions of the constitution, in the numbers of the Federalist (which is cited only because the Supreme Court has recognized its authority), it is clear that the power to regulate commerce was considered by the convention as only incidentally connected with the encouragement of agriculture and manufactures; and because the power of laying imposts, and duties on imports, was not understood to justify, in any case, a prohibition of foreign commodities, except as a means of extending commerce, by coercing foreign nations to a fair reciprocity in their intercourse with us, or for some other bona fide commercial purpose.

"6. Because, whilst the power to protect manufactures is no where expressly granted to Congress, nor can be considered as necessary and proper to carry into effect any specified power, it seems to be expressly reserved to the States, by the tenth section of the first article of the constitution.

"7. Because even admitting Congress have a constitutional right to protect manufactures by the imposition of duties, or by regulations of commerce, designed principally for that purpose, yet a tariff, of which the operation is grossly unequal and oppressive, is such an abuse of power as is incompatible with the principles of a free Government and the great ends of civil society, justice, and equality of rights and protection.

"8. Finally, because South Carolina, from her climate, situation, and peculiar institutions, is, and must ever continue to be, wholly dependent upon agriculture and commerce, not only for her prosperity, but for her very existence as a State-because the valuable products of

to the General Government was at an end; that any measures pursued beyond the objects at first contemplated, was a violation of the compact: It belonged to the States to resume the authority. South Carolina did not assent to the postulate, that the authority was ever delegated to the Government, which the Government had assumed, over individuals and property composing the State. South Carolina had a deep interest in the Government. She had been as patriotic as any State in the Revolutionary contest. In that struggle, she furnished her full proportion of resources; she spilt her due proportion of blood; and in point of privations, waste of property, and individual suffering, there she was without a compeer. She had been content to obey all the requisitions of the General Government, and she had done so, from the reflection that her sufferings were not for the benefit of one member only, but of the whole Union. She had surrendered what, upon the consideration of wealth, would have placed her among the most opulent States in the Union, had she retained it. And she had done it for no other compensation, with no other intention, with no other desire, than her expectation of the protection of the General Government. After that struggle was over, she was an independent sovereign; she owed no allegiance to the Government of the whole, except by the compact to pay her portion of the expenses of the war. She then surrendered to the General Government a part, the profits of which were second to few, if any, in the Union, and which, except for the present circumstances, would be second to but one in the country. All this South Carolina, perfectly informed of the objects to be attained, was willing to yield for the sake of union, and was willing to add her strength to that of the others, that she might have their strength to protect her rights. She surrendered almost every thing in re

sylvania laid the foundation of a civil war. Government notwithstanding passed the law-the excise was laid-the State took up arms-a war ensued, and the Government was obliged to send out a military force to suppress the rebellion.

He held that the public good was not concerned in this matter of protecting duties. The public good concerned in taking the portion of the labor and capital of one State, not for another State, but for individuals! The People had, through papers-through interested papers-been taught to believe that it was for the good of every man in the country. But he would go further with respect to the States.

The State of Maryland had not gone into any civil war; she had not endeavored to arrest the arm of the Government; but she had opposed the laws of the Government, which opposition had terminated only at the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States. She had but just got out of her contest with the Government, and now she offered her assistance to put down the rebels of South Carolina !

Ohio had had a contest with the Government; how far it went he did not know; but the State assumed a pretty high tone, and she had called the proceedings in South Carolina treasonable !

[SENATE.

State of Kentucky; she regretted the reason for it, and she regretted that there was reason for this remonstrance.

We were told, in the prints, and in conversation, that the new administration is to correct the evils, and to heal the wounds of the constitution. He would ask in what respect the constitution was wounded, to need this healing balm, if it was not in two particulars-the one the handmaid of the other-your Internal Improvements and your Tariff; two measures which will be the downfall of this Government. He spoke not in praise of the administration which was to come; he spoke not in derogation of the administration which was about to depart; for the measures did not commence with them. He believed this system originated in cupidity on the part of the manufacturers. He did not allude to any gentleman upon this floor; he would not say that there was a gentleman employed to watch the Senate through a whole session, to say when there was a majority in favor of the tariff, and a minority against it, and who, for his services, was rewarded by a seat in the other House. He did not know how the administration which was coming into power was to heal the constitution. Was it by hustling out of office every man who held one? That was not the way in his opinion. It would not heal the constitution to turn one man out and put another one in; he thought it better to let the old ones remain, to keep them in: for they were sated, but new ones would suck them to death. It must be that the constitution, which means any thing and every thing, which was a greater tyrant than ever lived in Christendom, which will bring your Government to a footstool, and make it lower than the arms of all the potentates in the world could do. It now remained to be seen whether the constitution would be healed; whether the eighth section would be restored to its proper and to a common sense meaning, and made to operate for the general welfare, for the benefit of the army and the navy, and not for the benefit and protection of your manufacturers.

He trusted he should be allowed to mention another State, that of Kentucky. He had before him a document containing the proceedings of a large assembly at a church. It is not a remonstrance or an argument against the pro-healing balm is to be applied to the eighth section of the ceedings of South Carolina, but consists entirely of attacks on the spirit and views of South Carolina. There is not an epithet descriptive of treason, sedition, rebellion, and all this, that has not been exhausted in it. And by whom? Not by drunken brawlers; it was not an effusion from an intoxicated crowd; but at the head of it was the name of a person well known-who had held a seat in this House, who was a high dignitary of that State. After using all the epithets, he not only tenders you the services of that State to put down the rebellion, but tells you that South Carolina, in her numerous seditious meetings, had Mr. S. continued his remarks by alluding to reports of run counter to every principle of Government-to the prin- the Secretary of War, by which it appeared that an armciple that the majority must rule. I, as a Senator fromed force was stationed in the Winnebago country, for the South Carolina, announce to you, that South Carolina can 'protection of lead hunters. The Secretary recommendnever consent to that doctrine, to that dangerous principle, ed stationing a force at two posts which had been given that a majority shall rule. If a majority is to rule, away up, and also the establishment of a new post. We had a with your constitution at once. All governments have line, something like fifteen hundred miles in extent, which fundamental principles; and so far as those of this Govern-it was necessary to protect with an armed force, to prement are correct, South Carolina agrees with them; but she protests against the principle that a majority shall rule. But he had not yet done with the States.

vent smuggling. He believed there was not a man in the country, not interested in manufactures, who would not be glad to see all the goods used in the country smuggled At the heels of a memorial, in very strong terms claim- into it. He believed there was not a virtuous man who ing all the lands within her boundaries, from the State of would inform. We had, heretofore, been celebrated as a Indiana, which has been presented this morning, comes moral people, but these were the effects of your tariff sysanother Legislative document, striking at our internal tem. Upon this line of fifteen hundred miles, when the peace, by recommending Congress to take under its pro- laws are too oppressive, there will be smuggling; the expe-. tection the Colonization Society. As they are enlarging rience of all Governments shows it; you may increase your this majority which is to rule, they are striking at every armed force; you may build a Chinese wall around your thing belonging to us. To return to the State of Ken- country; and you can't prevent it. Nay, what right have tucky: What he was about to mention was to her honor, you to expect that the people whom you have oppressed but it was also rebellious. When Kentucky was not so will submit to have your armies among them for that purflourishing as she is now, when she was a young State, pose? And if they do, your armies employed for merceshe had in her State Legislature, some of the most dis-nary purposes are, and always have been, subject to corruptinguished patriots of the Revolution, and some of the most tion and here to establish a system of corruption to guard distinguished of those who advocated and adopted the your revenue! constitution; but what was the language of Kentucky in 1798, soon after the adoption of the constitution? Kentucky remonstrated against a law of Congress. What was it? Did it trouble any body, or did it enfranchise any one? No, it did not. It was of no consequence to them; but, even with the courtesy of that day, they took upon themselves to denounce a law of Congress, because it affected foreigners; they not only denounced it, they declared that it was no law-that it was nullified. South Carolina was not unaware that there was such a precedent in the

He would say but a few words more, and then he would take his seat. The histories of all nations taught two facts. One was, that there never was a government which made a despotic assumption of power, that did not make it known abroad that it was for the public good, whenever it was expected it would be met and scrutinized by those feeling its oppression. Another fact, no less certain than the first, was, that, from the creation of the world to the present day, there has not been a republic that has endured-not one. Ours was now testing that fact; and as

far as it had gone, the signs were ominous indeed. One gentleman had preceded him that morning, with a memorial from a State, making a demand, as her rights, of all the land within her bounds. He knew of no new State which had asked for lands which had not received them, and he knew of no one that had been sparing in her demands. The Government had been bounteous in its gifts, but discontents were growing up every where, and the States now claimed all that remained. In all quarters, murmurs, more than ominous to this Government, were to be heard. South Carolina was sorry to join in these; but every man who looked with his eyes open, would acknowledge that, unless the present operation of the eighth section was changed, this Government was destined to but a short life. Was it in the power of a majority to silence these murmurs-these loud complaints? When ninetenths, nay, ninety-nine hundredths, and, he believed he might say, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousandths of the country were tributary to a few manufacturers, and in the nineteenth century, were people to submit to this? He ardently wished all these evils might be remedied. He now begged leave to present the protest of the State of South Carolina. It was prepared with all solemnity; it was engrossed upon permanent materials; and he hoped, ere half the document was demolished by time, this Government would be in a more flourishing condition. He wished the document might be read, and then printed for the use of the Senate.

Mr. HAYNE rose, and said, that the importance of the subject, and the intense interest it had excited among his constituents, must be his apology for adding a few words to what had fallen from his colleague. He knew that every thing which proceeded from so high a source as one of the sovereign and independent States of this confederacy, was entitled to receive, and, he trusted, always would receive, the most respectful consideration here. It was not so much, therefore, [said Mr. H.] to invite the earnest attention of the Senate to this protest, as to do justice to my own feelings, and to fulfil my obligations as one of the Representatives of South Carolina, that I now proceed to make a few remarks, suggested by the occasion.

[FEB. 10, 1829.

protest, yet, it may be well doubted (if we are to judge from what we hear and see around us) whether it is believed, north of the Potomac, that she really entertains them: for, in the face of the solemn declarations of her people, and their Representatives, denouncing the policy pursued by the Federal Government, as involving them in ruin, we still find the public ear abused, and the public mind deluded, by exaggerated statements of our uninterrupted prosperity and happiness. It has even been insinuated, here, at the very seat of Government, that the enlightened public opinion of the South is in favor of this policy, and that the excitement which prevails there is merely "artificial," if it has not been " got up for party purposes."

Sir, this state of things, let me assure gentlemen, must not be suffered to continue, or it will inevitably lead to the most unhappy consequences. It has become necessary, therefore-indispensably necessary-that the sentiments of our constituents should be expressed in the most deliberate and imposing form, in a manner no longer to be misunderstood or misrepresented. The Legislature of South Carolina, coming directly from the people, have, at their late session, with an unanimity without example, instructed their Senators to lay this their protest before you. In obedience to that command, my colleague and myself here, in our places, in the presence of the Representatives of the several States, and in the face of the whole American people, solemnly protest against the system of protecting duties, as "UNCONSTITUTIONAL, OPPRESSIVE, and UNJUST.” We desire that this record may bear witness for us to all future times, that we have earnestly remonstrated with our brethren against the extension of an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us; and with full experience of the ruinous effects of the system of protecting duties, have denounced it as utterly destructive of our interests. The people of South Carolina find themselves impelled, by their attachment to the principles of the constitution, and by a proud recollection of common dangers, and common triumphs, to endeavor to preserve for themselves and their posterity, those rights and privileges secured to them by the great Charter of our Liberties, and One of the most unhappy circumstances connected with consecrated by the blood of our fathers. It is (to use the the present condition of the Southern States was, the language of the protest) "because they anxiously desire great, he might, perhaps, say, the insuperable difficulty to live in peace with their brethren, to do all that in them of causing their sentiments and feelings to be made known, lies to preserve and perpetuate the Union of the States, so as to be understood and appreciated by their fellow- and the liberties of which it is the surest pledge," that citizens in other quarters of the Union. Viewing the they now protest against a system, which not only aims a United States as one country, the people of the South fatal blow at the prosperity of South Carolina (dependmight almost be considered as strangers in the land of ent as she must ever continue upon agriculture and comtheir fathers. The fruits of their industry had, from the merce), but which threatens her very existence as a State. policy pursued by the Federal Government, for many I know, Mr. President, that this is not a suitable occayears past, been flowing to the North, in a current as sion for the examination of the principles involved in this steady and undeviating as the waters of the great Gulf; protest. With regard more especially to the violation of and as the sources of our prosperity were drying up, that the fundamental principles of the constitution, by the reciprocal intercourse which had softened asperities, and system of protecting duties, the present system is pecubound the different parts of the country together, in the liarly unfavorable to profitable discussion. One of the bonds of common sympathy and affection, had, in a great fathers of the constitution has, most unfortunately for us, measure, ceased. That close and intimate communion, and unhappily for his country, if not for his own fame, necessary to a full knowledge of each other, no longer thrown the weight of his great name into the scale of existed, and in its place there was springing up, (it is use- power. If this, therefore, were a question to be decided less to disguise the truth) among the people in opposite by authority, we should be almost without hope. But the quarters of the Union, a spirit of jealousy and distrust, people of the South will never yield to the authority of founded on a settled conviction, on the one part, that names, however venerable, when the principles of liberty they are the victims of injustice, and on the other, that are at stake; when the question to be decided is, whethour complaints, if not groundless, may be safely disre- er this shall remain a Federal Government, with strictly garded The people of the South are well aware of the limited powers, or shall become a consolidated Governevils growing out of this unhappy state of things; and of ment, with all power centered here. And it does appear none are they more deeply sensible than that (from causes to us that the principles now contended for by Mr. Madito which I shall not now advert) the eyes of our brethren son lead directly to investing this Government with the have been closed to our true condition, and their hearts power (openly contended for in another quarter) of “ orshut against our just complaints. Although South Caro-ganizing the whole labor and capital of the country "-a lina, in common with several of her sister States, had, on former occasions, avowed the principles contained in the

power which at once reduces the States to mere petty corporations. We shall not, I trust, therefore, be accus