I cannot believe that it is necessary to assure an American jury, that riot, violence, and incendiarism are crimes; that liberty has never sø much reason to tremble as when licentiousness assumes her place, nor humanity to shudder as when the most cruel outrages assume a pretext of reason and justice; and the destruction to-day of an empty hall prompts to-morrow the firing the roof that shelters the fatherless. It is not necessary to say that acts like these, however they may be sanctioned by the prejudices of the mass at the moment, are revolutionary, and ominous of the most fearful and extended evils-that they tear down the barriers which shut out from society the raging ocean of human passion

that they light a conflagration which will consume alike the just and the unjust, and let forth a tiger-spirit, whose tooth, once fleshed, will not cease until it is gorged with the blood of helpless infirmity and unoffending innocence.

“Their creed amounts simply to this, that, in a country of laws, men must judge for themselves when they are wronged, and how they shall be revenged, and that prejudice and passion, madness and crime, are good republican laws. What fearful infatuation is this! Men who inconsiderately sanction such acts little dream that they are lighting the torch to fire their own homes-whetting the knife for the throats of their own kindred. When the law is made a wreck and left to float upon the sea of popular caprice, subject to every mind and menaced by every wave, there may be brief intervals of tranquillity, but who dares hope for permanent security or happiness?

"If there were no worse consequences to be apprehended from the violence of Lynch law-if its decrees were just, or its crimsoned hands stainless-if it did not give power to ignorance and guilt, and war alike upon the good and the bad, it would be a sufficient argument against it, that it corrupts and ruins those who are concerned in its excesses. The young and thoughtless, who thus taste the turbulent pleasures of lawless license, and learn that the laws may be violated without disgrace, cannot be stayed at that point. They have graduated in the high school of the rioter, and soon learn to regard the commission of affrays and violations of the peace as gallant accomplishments. The bar-room and bawdyhouse ring with their blasphemy and boasts of achievements against social order; and, advancing from stage to stage, the career which commenced in popular tumult is closed in crime, infamy, and wretchedness."

Judge Todd tells us that, unless the laws are vindicated, property, reputation, liberty, and life, are no longer secure. That the laws in that republic are not vindicated is shown more particularly by Judge Fox,

who tells us that the mob have deliberately, and, with a design well known, set at naught the laws; and that, too, in the presence of the whole people of the great city of Philadelphia, who did not raise an arm to vindicate the laws. "All barriers," he tells us, ca were broken down, and the power of the law prostrated by the connivance of all ages, ranks, and conditions." These judges speak very correctly and very truly on these matters; but if we were to examine into their conduct, that is, the judges generally, we should find that they favour, encourage, and even belong to the most daring and lawless band in the whole country: they are, in reality, opposed to these low mobs, from whom they apprehend the greatest of danger to themselves; and yet they are lynchers themselves, and trample over the barriers of the law whenever it suits their purpose to do so but when the injured make charges against them, according to law, they say, "The law that you seek redress under is virtually repealed-our unlawful deeds are acts of public necessity; and, to inflict the penalty on us would be productive of more evil to the community than a continuation of our plundering and unlawful acts."

When the defrauded people, who form these low" lynching" mobs, were asking for redress for their intolerable grievances, in having been systematically plundered by the lynching and lawless bankers; when for this they sought redress under Article 19 of their general law on banking (which says that the fact of a bank refusing to pay its notes having been proved before a judge, it shall be the duty of that judge to transmit that fact to the governor, and it shall be the governor's duty, immediately on the receipt of the same, to declare the charter of the said bank to be forfeited) ;—when this redress was claimed there was not a single judge in the whole country applied to that did not connive with these villains, and that did not shuffle out of this responsible and important duty. Is it to be wondered at, then, when you know of these things, that even "they, in the temple of justice," as Todd says, are mere tenants by sufferance?"

Well, now, let us examine a little into "self-taxation." I say that the taxes of the United States are greater than those of England-they are laid on in such a variety of juggling ways; some of which I have noticed in other letters, and will now only speak of direct taxation. One case of which, for instance, that I know of, wherein an English farmer of my acquaintance rents a farm near Philadelphia: that farm is from ninety to a hundred acres, and, at the time I speak of, six or eight years back, he paid for it 1000 dollars per year, out of which the landlord paid the taxes, and those taxes amounted annually to six hundred and twenty-five dollars!

The way

You will think this impossible, but it is nevertheless true. that it is done is this :-A gang of " shin-plaster" speculators take it, or

pretend to take it, into ke it, into

and that their heads, that this land, is well, adapted, for building lots, and that it will shortly become the centre of Philadelphia! They try to buy it; the owner does not want to sell, but sets what he considers an extravagant price upon it say 50,000 dollars; they think it too much, but surprise the the man by offering 40,000. In a few days Bit de man after they come again and say they will have it at the price asked, but the owner, seeing that it is wanted at any price, has altered his mind, and now asks 100,000; and thus they go and come until they actually bought that farm at 250,000 dollars. They paid a deposit, of, I believe, 10,000 dollars. The assessors are soon round to

is farm at its Found to rate this new value, the speculators finally forfeit the deposit, and the landlord is saddled with annual taxation to the above amount; and this is the case, little above amount; and

more or less, with all the property in that county.

The following Report is from "The Committee appointed to examine the Estimate submitted to the Philadelphia County Board by the County Commissioners, on Monday the 20th day of April, 1835. They say— That they have had the same under consideration, and that the im portance of raising by direct tax nearly 600,000 dollars from our citizens who are holders of real estate for county my purposes alone, for the To quote present year, has induced them to procure such data as was ca as was necessary to form a correct opinion as to what amount should be expended on the different items reported to the board by the county commissioners. They accordingly inquired of these gentlemen for the balance-sheet for the year 1816, or for any year from that time to 1826; the object of which But which was to ascertain what t amount of money had been raised, and on what objects disbursed, when the tax was 30 cents in the 100 dollars, when the tax was 34, and when the tax was 40 cents.

2

dizlemjɔ wad godt duide

regret to say, to those queries no satisfactory

But your Committee re answer could be obtained. It was said that Mr. Roderfield, who is the clerk, was sick; and, as it was high h time the rate of county tax should be fixed for the year 1835, they felt it to be their duty to proceed without delay; and, in accordance with this arrangement, they went into a minute examination of every item set forth, in order to ascertain whether a more economical expenditure could not be recommended: and to that end they will notice the estimate submitted in the order previous to which they cannot refrain from stating that the demand of not refracting the order there set down; one hundred cents in the hundred dollars is not only much larger than could have been anticipated, inasmuch as a loan of nearly half a million has recently been allowed and made for the purpose of paying the debts contracted by former commissioners; and when it is considered. that when the above-named sum is raised there will still be a deficit of upwards of 120,000 dollars for the current expenses of the present year your Committee are constrained to say, unless laws be passed, checking,

in great measure, the unrestrained waste and the extravagant expenditure of the public money, real estate will have to bear heavier burdens. Your Committee are not surprised that those who are watchful of their personal interest relinquish investments in real estate, which are subject to, and must, under existing laws, bear all the burdens of taxation for county purposes, and turn their attention to stock and other personal securities, which are free from those enormous exactions. While they acknowledge, with pain, this state of things, they would recommend that the question, as to the amount necessary to be raised and paid by the county commissioners, be met and fairly treated at once."

And then the committee goes on to examine 47 items of extravagance and peculation, such as no country under the heavens ever allowed before, one of which, by way of sample, is Item 43; and it reads as follows:

-

"Public roads (opening streets), 120,000 dollars. This they would recommend not to be allowed; and here your Committee must express their entire and unqualified disapprobation of opening and grading streets for the purpose of allowing private companies to make railroads at the expense of the county. This is another great abuse which the public should frown indignantly upon-an abuse which your Committee cannot enforce their objections to in terms sufficiently strong."

When taxation becomes so enormous as no longer to be endured, the very tarers will come forward, and, by way of pacifying the people, make a report like the above. Two-thirds, I will warrant, if not the whole, of that board, were men who had a hand in levying the taxes which they here complain of, and which they shared bountifully of themselves. But of this the people, as a body, know nothing, and are, for a time, quieted by being made to believe that there are those in authority who are guarding their public interests. The system of taxation that this board complained of gets worse every hour, and it has now so involved the county in debt that it is absolutely bankrupt. The city and different townships of that county have, since then, been obliged to resort to paying their debts and their labourers with notes as low as twopence each! In the year 1837 they put out millions of these notes, and, on the face of them, promised to redeem them that day twelvemonth, in gold or silver, with one per cent. interest. Everybody, however, knew, who knew anything of their affairs, that they did not intend to pay them-indeed they knew at the time that it would never be in their power; but still they passed, from one poor man to another till one-half of them became worn out, and, to the poor, a total loss. When the day of payment came for the rest there was great anxiety in the public mind to know what shift the villains would next resort to;

R

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and The Public Ledger, of October 22nd, 1838, gave hits the following information with regard to one of the townships, which botaked as a sample of the whole:Judo modi hun rooq adt tødt redaromax sw nodw

.66 REDEMPTION OF SOUTHWARK CERTIFICATES. The commissioners of the district are redeeming their small certificates of loan by issuing script of one hundred dollars and upwards, bearing interest at the rate of six per cent. per annum, payable half-yearly, and not redeemable until January, 1849."

I cannot go on to tell all the consequences and sufferings occasioned by these things, nor is there necessity for it, because a man who has heard thus much, and whose imagination cannot so far complete the picture as to satisfy himself that in democracy and republicanism there is no security against oppression-such a man is too ignorant to comprehend, however clear and full the facts might be exhibited. I have repeatedly shown this, in the course of my letters, from the highest authority in the Union. In this letter I quote more particularly from the documents of mechanics and working men-men in the same sphere of life as I presume a great many of you to be in. They have, however, as you suppose, great advantages over you they having had, for upwards of sixty years, all the things that your charter calls for; and I will venture to say that, if you knew their difficulties, you would not exchange situations with them. In the year 1835 there was scarcely a trade from one end of the country to the other that did not strike for wages and time," they having, by their own showing, been reduced to the utmost misery; and from one of their circulars, on that occasion, I take the following remarks:

.

Why is it that so large a portion of the population of our happy land are grovelling in ignorance, in the way to intemperance and crime? We answer, that, as a mass, we have fallen asleep-the few robbed us of our birthright, and now even deny us a mess of pottage as a remuneration: Something must be done to relieve us and our children from the thraldom of vice and ignorance into which their avarice has plunged us. In order that this most desirable object should be attained, we, the parents and guardians of the children, operatives of cotton and woollen mills in the town of Patterson, do most solemnly protest against working our children from twelve to fourteen hours per day. We have viewed with deep regret for years this abominable and unhatural system, which has confined them more like criminals than the children of a free people, excluding them from the free and wholesome air; no time allowed for recreation, which is so essentially neces sary to promote health; scarcely time allowed them to take their scanty meals; they retire to their beds at night worn down and exhausted with excessive labour hence they are deprived of any privilege except work