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in asking for a postponement till the next session of Congress.

Mr. CALHOUN observed that this system of fortifications was likely to be run down by extravagant appropriations. It added something like two millions to the usual appropriation bill, and, considering the present prices, at least a million beyond what the appropriations ought to be. As the bill now stood, he felt himself compelled to vote against it.

Mr. BENTON remarked that the reasons given by the Senator from Georgia, why he should vote against this bill, were very proper so far as they were his reasons; but when the Secretary of War was quoted as being opposed to it, he thought it proper to set gentlemen right. Just so often as the Secretary was quoted in opposition to this system of fortifications, so often would he quote his own language. He would read a few extracts from the Secretary's report, in order to show what his opinions really were. Mr. B. then read the following:

"It cannot be doubted but that fortifications at the following places, enumerated in this bill, will be necessary: At Penobscot bay, for the protection of Bangor, &c.; at Kennebec river, at Portland, at Portsmouth, at Salem, at New Bedford, at New London, upon Staten island, at Soller's flats, a redoubt on Federal point, for the Barrancas, for Fort St. Philip.

[MAY 26, 1836.

Mr. B.,) if this plan goes on, it will put an end to the institutions of the country; it was engaged in contending against the very objects for which this Government was formed-the defence of the country. While they had but a skeleton of an army, whose companies of only fifty men each were reduced to thirty-odd, and while the officers in Florida were continually calling for men to fill up their ranks, the bill for that object could not be touched; it must be set aside to make room for the banks of the District of Columbia. Yes, sir, (said Mr. B.,) the convenience of the banks of the District of Columbia must take precedence over the cries of the bleeding frontiers. He could not but regret that at the last month of the session there should be a further effort to put off appropriations for the defences of the country; that, after having spent the first two months in crimination and recrimination for the loss of the fortification bill of the last year, they should now, at the end of six months of the session, have to struggle hard to get a bill for the same object passed. He wished to call the attention of the Senate and the country to the consequences of this odious principle of distribution. It was going to reduce us to a condition more helpless than we were under the old confederation; for it would reduce us to a dependence not only on the voluntary contributions of the States, but to the leavings of the States after they had cut and carved all they wanted for themselves.

Mr. KING, of Georgia, said he had not voted for the distribution bill, and therefore the remarks of the Senator on that subject could not be made applicable to him.

"These proposed works all command the approach to places sufficiently important to justify their construction under any circumstances that will probably exist. I think, therefore, that the public interest would be promoted by the passage of the necessary appropriations [Mr. BENTON said they were not intended for Mr. K.] for them. As soon as these are made, such of the Mr. K. said neither could the remarks of the Senator, positions as may appear to require it can be examined, denouncing those who had delayed the bill in its progand the form and extent of the works adapted to exist-ress, unless he referred to a vote for an adjournment on ing circumstances, if any change be desirable. The construction of those not needing examination can commence immediately, and that of the others as soon as the plans are determined upon. By this proceeding, therefore, a season may be saved in the operations."

Now, he did not know (Mr. B. said) that it was in the power of language to be more explicit in favor of any object than that of the Secretary of War was of the bill on the table. He must object (Mr. B. said) to any arguments founded on detached expressions in this report, when that same report contained explicit declarations in favor of the bill.

It had been urged by some gentlemen that the season was so far advanced, that it was not worth while to make appropriations this year. How did this happen? It was because there had been a continued struggle to keep off appropriations for the defences of the country; because the Senate had, by yeas and nays, given the distribution bill a preference over such necessary objects; because there had been a continued contest between the defences of the country and the scheme of dividing money; and in that contest the defences of the country had gone to the wall. Gentlemen said that it was now too late in the season to apply these appropriations this year. Well, then, if it was too late, whose fault was it? When this plan of distribution was commenced, it was supported on the ground that it was impossible to use the surplus in the Treasury for the service of the country. Every gentleman in favor of the plan took this position; and yet, when the officers of Government had sent in report after report, showing that this money can be profitably employed for the defences of the country, their judgment was disputed, and disputed, too, on points in which they must necessarily be entitled to cre dit and respect. Here they were, (said Mr. B.,) while two States and one Territory were reeking with blood and resounding with cries, engaged in dividing surpluses, and dividing them, too, by creating them. Sir, (said

Saturday evening. He had voted to adjourn very late on Saturday evening, when he believed some of the friends of the bill wished to push it to a third reading. But he had done so only from the lateness of the hour, and thinness of the Senate. That he was justified in that course, had been since proved by the revocation, in a fuller Senate, of every vote taken on that evening. Mr. K. denied that he condemned the report of the Secretary of War, by voting against this bill under present circumstances. He intended ultimately, in the main, to conform to it. It was an able document. In it we saw the developments of a great mind, well stored with science, and, what was equally important, a practical talent to give that science a judicious and useful application. He again referred to the report, and insisted that the season at which this bill would be passed, if at all, and the attention required of the War Department to another part of our frontier, would reconcile his views with those of the Secretary. The Secretary sent his report the 8th of April; and, as the bill was then before the Senate, he thought most likely it would be speedily acted on. From the business before the House, it could not be finally acted on before July; and he did not think any advantage could be derived from the appropriation, if the examination and surveys should be made before the money was expended. At any rate, the alvantage would be too small to justify an appropriation so far in advance, and a departure from the valuable principle of having surveys and estimates before appropriations were made for any work of this description.

Mr. K. said it was true that the Secretary, in one part of his report, had recommended the appropriation under the circumstances stated, and had stated that the Department would have the examination and surveys made before any money should be spent. If we would take the whole report together, however, we could plainly see that the Secretary was yielding something to his friends. He was reporting against the recommendations

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MAY 26, 1836.]

OF DEBATES IN CONGRESS.

Fortification Bill.

of the engineer department, against the bill reported by the Military Committee of the Senate, and against the known wishes of many friends whose opinions he respected. This, he thought, would account for any triAling difference between the Secretary and himself.

The Secretary, he said, had been compelled to throw himself against some of the most extravagant schemes for increasing our military preparations that had ever threatened the country. The whole of them, if adopted, would require at least one hundred millions to begin with. One bureau recommended near thirty millions for providing munitions of war alone. The fortifications proposed by another bureau, and recommended by the Military Committee, would cost near forty millions more; and he had noticed that, in debate in the other House, twenty-two millions were spoken of to arm the militia. The standing army was to be expensively increased; and as to depots, armories, and arsenals, they were almost without number, as their cost was beyond computation. It would require some Hutton to give us the sum total. Sir, (said he,) to consider the past policy of the Govvernment, and look at the documents on your table, and the views given us from various quarters, one would think he had been dreaming. The wise policy of allowing our citizens to prosper in the enjoyment of the fruits of their labor was to be changed. Every thing seemed to look to vast military establishments. Now, (said Mr. K.,) what I wish understood is, that I protest against all these schemes of heavy expenditures for permanent establishments. They would not only absorb the surplus, but heap new burdens upon us, and curse posterity with tariffs and taxes. We had been reminded of the system of fortifications recommended by Washington, and asked why they could not increase now, in proportion to our wealth and population. This was strange argument. Should we increase the nurses of the infant as he approached the years of maturity? Should we quadruple them, after he had become entirely capable of taking care of himself? We were able now to meet on equal terms any Power on the face of the earth; and all the Powers of Christendom united could not send a sufficient force across the Atlantic to gain a dangerous footing upon our soil. And yet, in this period of strength, we had all at once become alarmed for our safety, and wished to wall the enemy out. Except for our large com. mercial cities, we wanted no walls but the wooden walls that floated under the command of our gallant navy. We wanted no ramparts behind which to defend our country, except a rampart of bayonets pointed by the steady arms of freemen.

Our main arm of defence was the free and sturdy yeomen, who, whenever any daring invader should set foot upon our soil, would always be ready to drop any petty or party disputes, and rally around the standard of their common country.

He said he must confess that, as a democrat, governed by the principles of the old school of democracy, he felt great jealousy and apprehension of the multiplication of these fortifications. If we went on with them as threatened, he feared they might, at no distant day, become the grave-yard of freedom, and the burying-ground of the constitution, instead of the citadels of liberty. Other gentlemen had made predictions, and he would venture one: that was, if these military projects went on as they seemed to have begun; if our coast of three thousand miles were to be frowning with fortifications, and clouded with cannon; if our hitherto peaceful country were to become a great military camp; if every State in the Union were to be hereafter bristling with bayonets, and covered with arsenals, armories, and depots, he predicted we might, in the course of a few years, take the parchment upon which our constitution was written, and cover a drum-head with that, for all the use we should have for it as an instrument to define the

[SENATE.

istered. Every thing would shortly be settled by the
principles upon which our Government is to be admin-
sword, the truncheon, and the bayonet. A corporal and
his guard would soon be more respected than the Chief
Justice and his associates. And, like another great na-
tion which had lately revolutionized in the name of lib-
of four hundred and ten thousand men, perpetrates every
erty, but, in its sacred name, with a peace establishment
the purifier of the press, whilst the bayonet settled our
species of tyranny; the prison would, with us also, become
civil disputes. He, therefore, gave notice that he should
vote against all these vast projects for changing our sys-
tem into an expensive military Government, as fast as
they might be brought forward. And as to the forts in
Maine in danger? He hoped she could sustain herself
question, why push them on us without estimates? Was
another season against the Brunswickers. John Bull seem-
ed good natured at present, and had even kindly interfer-
ed to settle a dispute for us with a belligerant neighbor.
But we were told we were refusing appropriations whilst
the Indians were cutting the throats of the people. In-
deed! And were fortifications in the East intended to
protect us against Indians in the West? No appropria-
tions for the West had been delayed a moment, when
another reason why we should direct our whole atten-
asked for: and the danger in the South and West was
tion there for the present, and not be dividing the atten
tion of the War Department with the seacoast, where
there was no danger pressing.

Mr. BENTON replied that his allusions to the Indian
cation bills, but to the bill for filling up the ranks of the
disturbances in the South had no relation to the fortifi-
tee months ago, and which was also recommended by
army, which had been reported by the Military Commit-
the Secretary of War; whose fate was so peculiar, that he
could not make a report without its being praised on all
hands, though the objects he recommended were stren-
filling up the ranks of the army, and a bill in pursuance of
uously opposed. Now the Secretary recommended the
that recommendation had been reported by the commit-
tee; yet it had been made to yield to this distribution
frontiers, from Indian hostilities, he did it in connexion
bill. When he referred to the sufferings of the southern
with this continually staving off the bill for filling up the
ranks of the army, though that army had been reduced
under a compact that it was to be filled up whenever
the defence of the country rendered it necessary that
they should do so; though the skeleton companies of
number; and though the general commanding in Florida
that army of fifty men each did not even contain that
had called upon them in the most earnest manner to fill
up their ranks. They could not (said Mr. B.) get that
the close of the session; and though he had attempted
bill considered, though in the midst of summer, and near
to bring it forward by a side movement as an amend
ment to the volunteer bill, he was still unsuccessful.
themselves, because neglected by the General Govern-
Sir, (said Mr. B.,) the States are engaged in defending
ment. The States of Alabama and Georgia are taking
care of themselves in the same manner as if the General
Government was expunged; and expunged it would be, if
The State of Mis-
this scheme of distribution went on.
souri would have to take care of herself, to raise her
own men, and expend her own money, to protect herself
the General Government, bountifully supplied with mo-
against the 50,000 Indians placed on her borders by
ney, with arms, and with horses, and amply prepared
When this wretched scheme
for offensive operations.

of distribution came to be surrendered, he supposed that the States would be reimbursed for what they should be compelled to expend for self-defence; but he much feared that, until then, they would have to take care of themselves.

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Mr. WALKER said he had participated in no portion of the debate on this bill, and had designed giving a silent vote in its favor; but that the observations of his friend, the Senator from Georgia, [Mr. KING,] rendered it necessary that he should explain the grounds upon which his vote was given. Mr. W. said he was not in favor of a large standing army in time of peace, or of fortifying the whole line of seaboard. He was for such an army only as was indispensably necessary to occupy important posts on the coast or frontier, or in exposed situations in the country: an army very little exceeding our present number would be sufficient. He was only for fortifying important positions, upon the principles recommended in the admirable report of the Secretary of War, and sanctioned by the President. He would not, as other Senators had done, commence by eulogizing that report, and conclude by opposing its important recommendations. Gentlemen had said that this bill would subvert the liberties of the country-that armies and military array would cover the whole Union. Mr. W. had seen none of those formidable armies, none of those bristling bayonets, that seemed to alarm so many Senators. The neigh of the war-horse, or the sound of the cannon, had not reached his ear, as one of the consequences of this measure. The defence of the country was a constitutional injunction: it was one of the main objects for which the constitution was formed: it is due to the States-it is due to the people. And when was this defence to be made? When war had commenced? No, (said Mr. W.) It was the maxim of Washington, in peace to prepare for war. And how prepare, unless by fortifying those important points on the coast, by which, if undefended, an enemy's fleet might sail into our harbors, and burn our cities, and destroy our people? Mr. W. could not perceive how we were destroying the country by defending it. And now we are asked to substitute distribution for defence; to abandon the defence of the country, in order to distribute money, and that money the proceeds of the sales of the lands of the West.

This fatal distribution bill was to surrender the coast undefended into the hands of a foreign enemy, and to deliver up the new States as the colonies of the old members of the confederacy. This distribution of the proceeds of the sales of the public lands originated in a report of a tariff committee of the House in 1829; and the same committee which first proposed this distribution distinctly stated that it was necessary to give the old States a direct interest in the income of the public lands, in order to prevent any further concessions to the new States, or reduction of price. [Here Mr. W. read an extract, proving this statement, from this report.] Here was the effect of this distribution scheme, distinctly conceded by its authors to be a project to render it the interest of every old State to oppress and ruin the new States; and it is for this scheme we are asked to abandon the defence of the country.

Sir, (said Mr. W.,) this distribution scheme is, in another way, an enemy to the defence of the country. Reduce the price of the public lands in favor of actual settlers, and enable the poor but honest laborer to obtain at a low price a farm, and a home of his own to defend and protect, and you strengthen his arm and nerve his heart in the hour of gloom and danger. Increase the number of farmers and cultivators of the soil, and you increase the truest and surest defenders of the country. But these men are to be sacrificed by this distribution bill. Yes, (said Mr. W.,)-the bill which refuses to reduce the price of your public lands is as hostile to the interest of the poor but industrious laborer of the old as of the new States. Open the lands of the West to purchase at a low price to poor settlers, and the laboring man of the North may defy the power of his wealthy

[MAY 26, 1836.

employers. He may say, Pay me better wages, or I will go and become a farmer in the West. This distribution bill, then, is a bill to bring down the wages of the working-men of the North, and to place the poor in the power of the wealthy. This (said Mr. W.) was one of the effects of this distribution scheme, which would be made known to the working-men of the North-a scheme to prevent their ever being enabled to become farmers and freeholders; to give them a home which would be indeed their own, instead of diminishing their wages, by forcing them to remain dependent for their daily bread upon such miserable pittance for their labor as their wealthy employers might choose to give them; a scheme to retard the settlement of the new States, and to pauperize the laboring men of the old States, for the benefit of wealthy capitalists and powerful chartered monopolies; a scheme to plunder the new States for the benefit of the old States, and to oppress the poor man in every quarter of the Union. Gentlemen say the militia is the best defence of the country. Be it so; but are they the friends of the militia, the friends of the people, who would expose them to defend every important point without fortifications, and without cannon? who would make freemen the sole breastwork against which hostile artillery is to be directed, and cause streams of American blood to flow, solely because important points and harbors had no fortifications? Sir, (said Mr. W.,) I consider the lives of American freemen as above all price; and to save and protect them I would, if necessary, pour out the last dollar in the Treasury. Sir, (said Mr. W.,) it is because I am opposed to large standing armies, that I am for this bill. Leave the coast undefended, and you invite foreign aggression; you increase the chances of war, and thus increase the probable necessity for standing armies. Mr. W. said he had been instructed by the Legislature of Mississippi to endeavor to obtain a military depot at the flourishing and beautiful town of Columbus, upon the Tombigbee.

Mr. W.

Mr. W. said he had laid these instructions before the Military Committee, which has reported a ''ll embracing the contemplated object; which bill will become a law, if we do not abandon defence for distribution. said he had also carried through the Senate a resolution requiring a survey of the coast of the State of Mississippi, and the islands in its vicinage, to ascertain if there were any proper judicious sites for fortifications. If such sites were found in that quarter, (Mr. W. said,) he would ask for forts to be erected there also, for the defence of Mississippi and her people, and commerce upon the Gulf. But he would vote for no unnecessary fortifications in any section of the Union. Whilst millions, in times that are past, have been expended for other States, Congress has, in fact, done little or nothing for Mississippi; and (Mr. W. said) he should, upon all proper occasions, press her claims upon the consideration of the Senate, with a deep conviction that she would yet receive justice at the hands of the General Government, by a reduction, in favor of actual settlers, of the price of the public lands.

Mr. KING, of Georgia, said the remarks of his friend from Mississippi compelled him to say a word further to reconcile his views with the general principles of the report. If he had any pride as a politician, (and he had not much,) it was the pride of consistency. That he might be perfectly understood, he would read a few words further from the report, which he had not read before. Mr. K. then read from the 21st page:

"But before any expenditure is incurred for new works, I think an examination should be made in every case, in order to apply these principles to the proposed plan of operations, and thus reduce the expense of construction, where this can properly be done, and, also,

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MAY 26, 1836.]

Fortification Bill.

the expense of garrisons required to defend works disproportioned to the objects sought to be attained."

This was the wise language of the Secretary, approved by the President, and in which he entirely concurred. He believed, however, that the season would be so far spent before this bill could pass, that this examination could not properly be made and acted on before the next session. We, therefore, had no inducement to tie up additional millions in the deposite banks so long before needed, and also depart from the principle of having surveys and estimates, when there was no emergency that justified such haste in the appropriation. So was he. His friend was for "reasonable defences." In the abstract, they agreed exactly. He feared only they would differ when they came to settle what was reasonable.

"The

The Senator had very candidly acknowledged that one of his reasons for voting for this bill at this session was, because he looked on it as "antagonistical" to the distribution bill. He would make a further appeal to the candor of his friend, and ask him if he were not sensible that this was the only reason he had for voting for the bill? [Mr. WALKER said no, he had other reasons.] He had no doubt the Senator imagined he had, Mr. K. could not think that or he would not say so. many of his democratic friends would ever have thought of the enormous appropriations at the present session, and this among them, but for that fatal surplus. surplus!" "the surplus!" ay, that was at the bottom of all our troubles. It was the root of all the evils that, he feared, might grow out of the proceedings of the present session. He acknowledged its possession gave us much embarrassment, and surrounded us with perils; but he He cared nothing hoped we would live through them. for the surplus. Would to God that fifty millions of the public treasure could be thrown into the crater of Vesuvius, or sunk in the ocean, unless we could devise some means to get rid of it, that would not fix a perinaHe cared nent and growing curse upon the country. but little for land bills, distribution bills, or graduation bills, which had been referred to: and as to the surplus, gentlemen might do just what they pleased with it, so they did not plant it in prodigality, that it might grow up and branch off into future expenditures that would ultimately overshadow and impoverish the land.

A useless expenditure, he said, was not only the loss of the amount thus expended, but was the fruitful seed of other and greater expenditures. It grew up and branched off like a polypus. Having once taken leave of the rules of necessary expenditure, we were soon governed by no rule at all. Waste begat corruption, and corruption begat more waste; and thus, by a recip. rocating influence, useless expenditure became both effect and cause, and ultimately led to that system which he was anxious to avoid; that was, the expenditure of money as an end, instead of a means.

If no safe distri

bution could be made then, he implored gentlemen, after making necessary expenditures, to let the surplus alone. But it was said the banks would break, and we should lose the money unless we got rid of it. Well, He should shed no tears over their let them break. misfortunes, nor mourn over the losses of the Government. Better that a thousand charters of private corpo. rations should be forfeited, and millions lost to the Government, than our constitutional charter should be Better submit to the forfeited, and our liberties lost. acknowledged evils of the surplus, than encounter greater evils by its improper expenditure. He only wished that we should adhere to the system under which we had grown and prospered beyond any example the The great se. history of the world had ever furnished. cret of this prosperity was the economical system heretofore pursued, of having the citizen lightly taxed, to VOL. XII.-100

[SENATE.

enjoy the fruits of his own labor, by which we had be-
come a nation of producers. He wished to continue this
system, and not, like other nations, by a large Govern-
ment patronage, sustain one third of the nation in splen-
did idleness and glittering vice, devouring the bread
earned by the honest industry of the remainder.
Mr. CRITTENDEN said when he remembered how
formidably the Senator from Missouri announced that he
and his friends constituted the majority of the Senate,
them, he considered his rebuke as intended for his
and that some responsibility would thereafter devolve on
friends, and not for those opposed to the administration.
Mr. C. said it was but in accordance with parliamentary
He preferred,
measure before the Senate for its action.
proceedings to interpose dilatory motions, to defeat any
himself, however, to meet this bill directly, and wished
it were in his power to take upon himself the whole re-
sponsibility of defeating it; and would then consider he
had done some service. If the Senator, in saying there
was no surplus, meant to say the capacity to squander,
indicated by these appropriations, transcended the capa-
city to accumulate, then he admitted there was no sur-
plus. In regard to Penobscot, they were told that the
appropriation was not equal to, but would require treble
the amount to complete it; and so it was said of other
fortifications, and all under the term of national defence;
to fall into this unbounded system of extravagance and
and were they, he asked, at the tap of the political drum,
wastefulness, and deprive the people, to whom this mo-
ney belonged, from a general participation in its advanta-
ges? But a plan was proposed to invest it in a train and
chain of fortifications, from Maine to Florida. He agreed
with the Senator from Georgia, that it was better to bury
it in the ocean, than to squander it in this way, and en-
tail upon us the train of evils that would follow.
In time of war, it
standing army would follow this system, as certainly as
the shadow followed the substance.
was said not to be patriotic to stop for estimates, and it
seemed that peace was not time to wait for them; so that
they were to be made belligerants from beginning to
end; and peace itself, it seemed, was made for war. When
they had constructed all these fortifications, a tax would
have to be raised to garrison them, for which six thou.
sand men would be necessary, who would require a
perpetual tax of two millions of dollars to support them.
They were, in fact, sowing these fortifications like drag-
ons' teeth, over the land, from which hosts of myrmidons
would spring up, to eat out the substance of the citizens.
Last year, in the prospect of a war, two millions was all
that was necessary; and now, in time of peace, that sum
bore but a small proportion to the amount proposed to
be expended for defence. He admitted there were some
points on the seacoast, where forts, &c. were necessary,
and he would go for them; but he was opposed to this
system of fortification as a means of general defence. It
was, among other reasons, too costly for a general sys-
lem. It was admitted by the Senator from Mississippi
that the militia was the main arm of our defence; but he
was for placing them behind these fortifications, which
Mr. C. thought would tend to destroy their spirit of
valor and patriotism; and when they became too good to
stand out in the danger, let them stay home, said he, and
sustain a mercenary army to fight for them, under cover
of these fortifications.

A

But what, he asked, did our militia do at Bunker's Hill, and what did they do at New Orleans? The very argument in favor of protecting our citizens behind walls, It was the honor, the right, and the privilege of the citirequired but one step further to create a standing army. zens to defend their country; and he would as soon see them surrender their right of suffrage as to yield to this.

If this bill passed, they would appropriate not less than six millions of dollars, and there would be a beating up

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for labor along the whole line of fortifications. Penobscot would beat up against Kennebec, and Kennebec against Penobscot, and the Government would be beating up against itself from Penobscot to New Orleans. By adding to expenditures in one part of the country, it was taking the amount expended from another part; and he asked what right they had to take the labor of laboring men from one portion of the country to another. If this bill was antagonistical to the land bill, it followed that, as that bill had passed the Senate, this must be defeated, especially as this was a scheme to prevent it from going into effect. He went against this bill for the reasons he had given, and would prefer leaving it in the banks, rather than appropriate the money in this way. While gentlemen looked upon the paltry distribution of the surplus at Kennebec, Portsmouth, &c., to use a figure of speech of the Senator from Connecticut, [Mr. NILES,] they wanted to stick their forks into the fleshpots of Egypt alone.

It seemed the people could not be trusted with an equal distribution of the surplus among them, on account of their susceptibility to corruption; while the Senate alone claimed the priority of calling on the aid of engineers and a host of officers to superintend its expenditure. He should hardly suppose the Secretary of the Treasury could get his natural rest in watching these various projects for disposing of the surplus, which were sometimes overcharged, and sometimes undercharged. The Senator from Missouri had sneeringly and contemptuously said, that while here engaged in the work of dividing the surplus, they had refused to take measures for the defence of the frontier against the Indians. He would like to know how the distribution bill had interfered with appropriations for that object.

[Mr.. BENTON said he would tell the gentleman. It had interfered in this way. They had reported a bill, under the recommendation of the Secretary of War, to fill up the skeletons of our regiments, and they could not get that bill considered.]

Mr. C. continued. The general commanding there had in command ten men for one opposing him; and if he had not succeeded in his expedition, it had not been for want of men. He intended to cast no reproach on the soldiers; but he thought perhaps fewer would have done better; and, accordingly, he did not know that any of them were accusable for that negligence.

[Mr. BENTON said the gentleman never read the report of the general commanding in Florida, or he would have known it.]

Mr. C. continued. They had not refused any appropriations for that object, but had hurried them through without estimates. He had a deep settled conviction that this system of fortifications was pregnant with mischievous consequences that ought to alarm the country. It was an extravagance and waste of the people's money, from which they would reap a poisonous harvest; and the time would come when we should have no surplus, and when we should be called on to raise by taxation some two or three millions of dollars per annum for the support of a standing army.

Mr. WALKER said he would detain the Senate but a few moments in reply to some of the strictures of the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. CRITTENDEN] Upon his remarks. That Senator said that to support the system of fortifications would destroy the martial spirit of the people, by placing them in forts where there was no peril in the conflict, no hazard of life, and none of that glory and excitement arising from their exposure to danger in the open field in defence of their country. Mr. W. said that, if exposing to danger the lives of our people upon a naked and defenceless coast was the best means of infusing into our citizens a martial spirit, it was one of those means that had escaped the sagacity of all writers

[MAY 26, 1836.

upon the art of war, and was against the experience of all the nations of the world. The musket and rifle were one means of defence, artillery a second, and forts a third; and upon the principle that should induce us to abandon the third, we should also abandon the second, in order to increase the loss upon our side, and augment the glory and danger of the combat, and thus infuse into our people a more martial spirit. But (said Mr. W.) will this danger and glory call back from the grave our slaughtered citizens? Will they check the widow's sigh, or dry the orphan's tear? Will they give back your cities from pillage and conflagration? Will they return to their homes and country that patriotic militia who were wantonly sacrificed, mowed down by thousands, because the Government had refused to erect the necessary fortifications to repel invasion? To me (said Mr. W.) there would be no glory in such a spectacle. Our true glory consists in saving an effusion of American blood; in sparing the lives of our citizens; in conquering with as little loss upon our side as possible. If any other man than the patriot Jackson had commanded at New Orleans, that city, and the whole commerce of the West, would have been sacrificed for the want of the necessary fortifications. The object is to defend the country with as little loss of life as practicable; and hence it was behind cotton-bale ramparts that the riflemen of the West obtained at New Orleans that great and glorious, because to us a bloodless, victory. And when the victory was gained, and many an ardent officer applied to their great commander for liberty to pursue and capture the army of the enemy, "No," said the veteran patriot, "my object is accomplished--the defence of New Orleans; and I would now rather pave with gold the way of the enemy beyond our limits, than sacrifice, in search of glory only, the life of one of my soldiery." Whilst some gentlemen (said Mr. W.) denounce the bill, because they say it will destroy the martial spirit, others oppose it because it will make us too belligerant. Indeed, the same Senators have used these irreconcilable and contradictory arguments. How the bill could at the same time destroy our martial spirit, and yet render us too belligerant, Mr. W. could not understand.

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Mr. W. said he had heard not one sound practical argument against this bill; it was all vague and general denunciation. Those opposed to the bill, eulogized the report of the Secretary of War, and conceded the propriety of defending important points; and (said Mr. W.) is not every point, the fortifying of which is proposed by this bill, an important point-a point within the express recommendation of the Secretary of War? These honorable Senators, then, upon their own principles, should support this bill. It is a bill to defend important points, and those only; and if we do not intend to abandon the whole system of fortifications, and leave the entire coast naked and defenceless, and open to the hostile navies of the world, to burn our cities, and destroy the lives and property of our people, we must support this bill. The opposition to this bill, with specific appropriations, is a singular commentary upon the course of those Senators who excused themselves for opposing the three million fortification bill, because its appropriations were not specific. We have just escaped (said Mr. W.) the horrors of a foreign war, with our coast and harbors entirely defenceless; and as Omniscience only can determine when the danger may recur, preparation against foreign aggression is the best means of avoiding it, and a solemn duty which we owe to the States and people of this Union. "Millions for defence, not a cent for tribute," is a principle, when properly applied, that should never cease to influence every American statesman, and which, he hoped, would operate upon the present occasion.

Mr. RIVES said he agreed with several of the gentlemen who had spoken against this bill, and particularly

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