Thirty Years' View (Vol. II of 2)

Having thus shown that bank circulation was now taxed in Great Britain, and had been for fifty years, he proceeded to show that it had also been taxed in the United States. This was in the year 1813. In the month of August of that year, a stamp-act was passed, applicable to banks and to bankers, and taxing them in the three great branches of their business, to wit: the circulation, the discounts, and the bills of exchange. On the circulation, the tax commenced at one cent on a one dollar note, and rose gradually to fifty dollars on notes exceeding one thousand dollars; with the privilege of compounding for a gross sum in lieu of the duty. On the discounts, the tax began at five cents on notes discounted for one hundred dollars, and rose gradually to five dollars on notes of eight thousand dollars and upwards. On bills of exchange, it began at five cents on bills of fifty dollars, and rose to five dollars on those of eight thousand dollars and upwards.

Such was the tax, continued Mr. B., which the moneyed interest, employed in banking, was required to pay in 1813, and which it continued to pay until 1817. In that year the banks were released from taxation, while taxes were continued upon all the comforts and necessaries of life. Taxes are now continued upon articles of prime necessity – upon salt even – and the question will now go before the Senate and country, whether the banking interest, which has now grown so rich and powerful – which monopolizes the money of the country – beards the government – makes distress or prosperity when it pleases – the question is now come whether this interest shall continue to be exempt from tax, while every thing else has to pay.

Mr. B. said he did not know how the banking interest of the present day would relish a proposition to make them contribute to the support of the government. He did not know how they would take it; but he did know how a banker of the old school – one who paid on sight, according to his promise, and never broke a promise to the holder of his notes – he did know how such a banker viewed the act of 1813; and he would exhibit his behavior to the Senate; he spoke of the late Stephen Girard of Philadelphia; and he would let him speak for himself by reading some passages from a petition which he presented to Congress the year after the tax on bank notes was laid.

Mr. B. read:

"That your memorialist has established a bank in the city of Philadelphia, upon the foundation of his own individual fortune and credit, and for his own exclusive emolument, and that he is willing most cheerfully to contribute, in common with his fellow-citizens throughout the United States, a full proportion of the taxes which have been imposed for the support of the national government, according to the profits of his occupation and the value of his estate; but a construction has been given to the acts of Congress laying duties on notes of banks, &c., from which great difficulties have occurred, and great inequalities daily produced to the disadvantage of his bank, that were not, it is confidently believed, within the contemplation of the legislature. And your memorialist having submitted these considerations to the wisdom of Congress, respectfully prays, that the act of Congress may be so amended as to permit the Secretary of the Treasury to enter into a composition for the stamp duty, in the case of private bankers, as well as in the case of corporations and companies, or so as to render the duty equal in its operations upon every denomination of bankers."

Mr. B. had read these passages from Mr. Girard's petition to Congress in 1814, first, for the purpose of showing the readiness with which a banker of the old school paid the taxes which the government imposed upon his business; and, next, to show the very considerable amount of that tax, which on the circulation alone amounted to ten thousand dollars on the million. All this, with the additional tax on the discounts, and on the bills of exchange, Mr. Girard was entirely willing to pay, provided all paid alike. All he asked was equality of taxation, and that he might have the benefit of the same composition which was allowed to incorporated banks. This was a reasonable request, and was immediately granted by Congress.

Mr. B. said revenue was one object of his bill: the regulation of the currency by the suppression of small notes and the consequent protection of the constitutional currency, was another: and for that purpose the tax was proposed to be heaviest on notes under twenty dollars, and to be augmented annually until it accomplished its object.

CHAPTER XLIX.

LIBERATION OF SLAVES BELONGING TO AMERICAN CITIZENS IN BRITISH COLONIAL PORTS

Up to this time, and within a period of ten years, three instances of this kind had occurred. First, that of the schooner Comet. This vessel sailed from the District of Columbia in the year 1830, destined for New Orleans, having, among other things, a number of slaves on board. Her papers were regular, and the voyage in all respects lawful. She was stranded on one of the false keys of the Bahama Islands, opposite to the coast of Florida, and almost in sight of our own shores. The persons on board, including the slaves, were taken by the wreckers, against the remonstrance of the captain and the owners of the slaves, into Nassau, New Providence – one of the Bahama Islands; where the slaves were forcibly seized and detained by the local authorities. The second was the case of the Encomium. She sailed from Charleston in 1834, destined to New Orleans, on a voyage lawful and regular, and was stranded near the same place, and with the same fate with the Comet. She was carried into Nassau, where the slaves were also seized and detained by the local authorities. The slaves belonged to the Messrs. Waddell of North Carolina, among the most respectable inhabitants of the State, and on their way to Louisiana with a view to a permanent settlement in that State. The third case was that of the Enterprize, sailing from the District of Columbia in 1835, destined for Charleston, South Carolina, on a lawful voyage, and with regular papers. She was forced unavoidably, by stress of weather, into Port Hamilton, Bermuda Island, where the slaves on board were forcibly seized and detained by the local authorities. The owners of the slaves, protesting in vain, at the time, and in every instance, against this seizure of their property, afterwards applied to their own government for redress; and after years of negotiation with Great Britain, redress was obtained in the two first cases – the full value of the slaves being delivered to the United States, to be paid to the owners. This was accomplished during Mr. Van Buren's administration, the negotiation having commenced under that of President Jackson. Compensation in the case of the Enterprize had been refused; and the reason given for the distinction in the cases, was, that the two first happened during the time that slavery existed in the British West India colonies – the latter after its abolition there. All these were coasting voyages between one port of the United States and another, and involved practical questions of great interest to all the slave States. Mr. Calhoun brought the question before the Senate in a set of resolutions which he drew up for the occasion; and which were in these words:

"Resolved, That a ship or a vessel on the high seas, in time of peace, engaged in a lawful voyage, is, according to the laws of nations, under the exclusive jurisdiction of the State to which her flag belongs; as much so as if constituting a part of its own domain.

"Resolved, That if such ship or vessel should be forced by stress of weather, or other unavoidable cause, into the port of a friendly power, she would, under the same laws, lose none of the rights appertaining to her on the high seas; but, on the contrary, she and her cargo and persons on board, with their property, and all the rights belonging to their personal relations, as established by the laws of the State to which they belong, would be placed under the protection which the laws of nations extend to the unfortunate under such circumstances.

"Resolved, That the brig Enterprize, which was forced unavoidably by stress of weather into Port Hamilton, Bermuda Island, while on a lawful voyage on the high seas from one port of the Union to another, comes within the principles embraced in the foregoing resolutions; and that the seizure and detention of the negroes on board by the local authority of the island, was an act in violation of the laws of nations, and highly unjust to our own citizens to whom they belong."

It was in this latter case that Mr. Calhoun wished to obtain the judgment of the Senate, and the point he had to argue was, whether a municipal regulation of Great Britain could alter the law of nations? Under that law she made indemnity for the slaves liberated in the two first cases: under her own municipal law she denied it in the latter case. The distinction taken by the British minister was, that in the first cases, slavery existing in this British colony and recognized by law, the persons coming in with their slaves had a property in them which had been divested: in the latter case that slavery being no longer recognized in this colony, there was no property in them after their arrival; and consequently no rights divested. Mr. Calhoun admitted that would be the case if the entrance had been voluntary; but denied it where the entrance was forced; as in this case. His argument was:

"I object not to the rule. If our citizens had no right to their slaves, at any time after they entered the British territory – that is, if the mere fact of entering extinguished all right to them (for that is the amount of the rule) – they could, of course, have no claim on the British government, for the plain reason that the local authority, in seizing and detaining the negroes, seized and detained what, by supposition, did not belong to them. That is clear enough; but let us see the application: it is given in a few words. He says: 'Now the owners of the slaves on board the Enterprize never were lawfully in possession of those slaves within the British territory;' assigning for reason, 'that before the Enterprize arrived at Bermuda, slavery had been abolished in the British empire' – an assertion which I shall show, in a subsequent part of my remarks, to be erroneous. From that, and that alone, he comes to the conclusion, 'that the negroes on board the Enterprize had, by entering within the British jurisdiction, acquired rights which the local courts were bound to protect.' Such certainly would have been the case if they had been brought in, or entered voluntarily. He who enters voluntarily the territory of another State, tacitly submits himself, with all his rights, to its laws, and is as much bound to submit to them as its citizens or subjects. No one denies that; but that is not the present case. They entered not voluntarily, but from necessity; and the very point at issue is, whether the British municipal laws could divest their owners of property in their slaves on entering British territory, in cases such as the Enterprize, when the vessel has been forced into their territory by necessity, through an act of Providence, to save the lives of those on board. We deny they can, and maintain the opposite ground: – that the law of nations in such cases interposes and protects the vessel and those on board, with their rights, against the municipal laws of the State, to which they have never submitted, and to which it would be cruel and inhuman, as well as unjust, to subject them. Such is clearly the point at issue between the two governments; and it is not less clear, that it is the very point assumed by the British negotiator in the controversy."

This is fair reasoning upon the law of the case, and certainly left the law of nations in full force in favor of the American owners. The equity of the case was also fully stated and the injury shown to be of a practical kind, which self-protection required the United States to prevent for the future. In this sense, Mr. Calhoun argued:

"To us this is not a mere abstract question, nor one simply relating to the free use of the high seas. It comes nearer home. It is one of free and safe passage from one port to another of our Union; as much so to us, as a question touching the free and safe use of the channels between England and Ireland on the one side, and the opposite coast of the continent on the other, would be to Great Britain. To understand its deep importance to us, it must be borne in mind, that the island of Bermuda lies but a short distance off our coast, and that the channel between the Bahama islands and Florida is not less than two hundred miles in length, and on an average not more than fifty wide; and that through this long, narrow and difficult channel, the immense trade between our ports on the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic coast must pass, which, at no distant period, will constitute more than half of the trade of the Union. The principle set up by the British government, if carried out to its full extent, would do much to close this all-important channel, by rendering it too hazardous for use. She has only to give an indefinite extension to the principle applied to the case of the Enterprize, and the work would be done; and why has she not as good a right to apply it to a cargo of sugar or cotton, as to the slaves who produced it."

The resolutions were referred to the committee on foreign relations, which reported them back with some slight alteration, not affecting or impairing their force; and in that form they were unanimously adopted by the Senate. Although there was no opposition to them, the importance of the occasion justified a record of the vote: and they were accordingly taken by yeas and nays – or rather, by yeas: for there were no nays. This was one of the occasions on which the mind loves to dwell, when, on a question purely sectional and Southern, and wholly in the interest of slave property, there was no division of sentiment in the American Senate.

CHAPTER L.

RESIGNATION OF SENATOR HUGH LAWSON WHITE OF TENNESSEE: HIS DEATH: SOME NOTICE OF HIS LIFE AND CHARACTER

This resignation took place under circumstances, not frequent, but sometimes occurring in the Senate – that of receiving instructions from the General Assembly of his State, which either operate as a censure upon a senator, or require him to do something which either his conscience, or his honor forbids. Mr. White at this time – the session of 1839-'40 – received instructions from the General Assembly of his State which affected him in both ways – condemning past conduct, and prescribing a future course which he could not follow. He had been democratic from his youth – came into the Senate – had grown aged – as such: but of late years had voted generally with the whigs on their leading measures, and classed politically with them in opposition to Mr. Van Buren. In these circumstances he received instructions to reverse his course of voting on these leading measures – naming them; and requiring him to support the administration of Mr. Van Buren. He consulted his self-respect, as well as obeyed a democratic principle; and sent in his resignation. It was the conclusion of a public life which disappointed its whole previous course. From his youth he had been a popular man, and that as the fair reward of conduct, without practising an art to obtain it, or even seeming to know that he was winning it. Bred a lawyer, and coming early to the bar, he was noted for a probity, modesty and gravity – with a learning, ability, assiduity and patience – which marked him for the judicial bench: and he was soon placed upon it – that of the Superior Court. Afterwards, when the judiciary of the State was remodelled, he was placed on the bench of the Supreme Court. It was considered a favor to the public to get him to take the place. That is well known to the writer of this View, then a member of the General Assembly of Tennessee, and the author of the new modelled judiciary. He applied to Judge White, who had at that time returned to the bar to know if he would take the place; and considered the new system accredited with the public on receiving his answer that he would. That was all that he had to do with getting the appointment: he was elected unanimously by the General Assembly, with whom the appointment rested. That is about the way in which he received all his appointments, either from his State, or from the federal government – merely agreeing to take the office if it was offered to him; but not always agreeing to accept: often refusing – as in the case of a cabinet appointment offered him by President Jackson, his political and personal friend of forty years' standing. It was long before he would enter a political career, but finally consented to become senator in the Congress of the United States: always discharging the duties of an office, when accepted, with the assiduity of a man who felt himself to be a machine in the hands of his duty; and with an integrity of purpose which left his name without spot or stain. It is beautiful to contemplate such a career; sad to see it set under a cloud in his advanced years. He became alienated from his old friends, both personally and politically – even from General Jackson; and eventually fell under the censure of his State, as above related – that State which, for more than forty years, had considered it a favor to itself that he should accept the highest offices in her gift. He resigned in January, and died in May – his death accelerated by the chagrin of his spirit; for he was a man of strong feelings, though of such measured and quiet deportment. His death was announced in the Senate by the senator who was his colleague at the time of his resignation – Mr. Alexander Anderson; and the motion for the usual honors to his memory was seconded by Senator Preston, who pronounced on the occasion a eulogium on the deceased as just as it was beautiful.

"I do not know, Mr. President, whether I am entitled to the honor I am about to assume in seconding the resolutions which have just been offered by the senator from Tennessee, in honor of his late distinguished colleague; and yet, sir, I am not aware that any one present is more entitled to this melancholy honor, if it belongs to long acquaintance, to sincere admiration, and to intimate intercourse. If these circumstances do not entitle me to speak, I am sure every senator will feel, in the emotions which swell his own bosom, an apology for my desire to relieve my own, by bearing testimony to the virtues and talents, the long services and great usefulness, of Judge White.

"My infancy and youth were spent in a region contiguous to the sphere of his earlier fame and usefulness. As long as I can remember any thing, I remember the deep confidence he had inspired as a wise and upright judge, in which station no man ever enjoyed a purer reputation, or established a more implicit reliance in his abilities and honesty. There was an antique sternness and justness in his character. By a general consent he was called Cato. Subsequently, at a period of our public affairs very analogous to the present, he occupied a position which placed him at the head of the financial institutions of East Tennessee. He sustained them by his individual character. The name of Hugh L. White was a guarantee that never failed to attract confidence. Institutions were sustained by the credit of an individual, and the only wealth of that individual was his character. From this more limited sphere of usefulness and reputation, he was first brought to this more conspicuous stage as a member of an important commission on the Spanish treaty, in which he was associated with Mr. Tazewell and Mr. King. His learning, his ability, his firmness, and industry, immediately extended the sphere of his reputation to the boundaries of the country. Upon the completion of that duty, he came into this Senate. Of his career here, I need not speak. His grave and venerable form is even now before us – that air of patient attention, of grave deliberation, of unrelaxed firmness. Here his position was of the highest – beloved, respected, honored; always in his place – always prepared for the business in hand – always bringing to it the treasured reflections of a sedate and vigorous understanding. Over one department of our deliberations he exercised a very peculiar control. In the management of our complex and difficult relations with the Indians we all deferred to him, and to this he addressed himself with unsparing labor, and with a wisdom, a patient benevolence, that justified and vindicated the confidence of the Senate.

"In private life he was amiable and ardent. The current of his feelings was warm and strong. His long familiarity with public affairs had not damped the natural ardor of his temperament. We all remember the deep feeling with which he so recently took leave of this body, and how profoundly that feeling was reciprocated. The good will, the love, the respect which we bestowed upon him then, now give depth and energy to the mournful feelings with which we offer a solemn tribute to his memory."

And here this notice would stop if it was the design of this work merely to write on the outside of history – merely to chronicle events; but that is not the design. Inside views are the main design: and this notice of Senator White's life and character would be very imperfect, and vitally deficient, if it did not tell how it happened that a man so favored by his State during a long life should have lost that favor in his last days – received censure from those who had always given praise – and gone to his grave under a cloud after having lived in sunshine. The reason is briefly told. In his advanced age he did the act which, with all old men, is an experiment; and, with most of them, an unlucky one. He married again: and this new wife having made an immense stride from the head of a boarding-house table to the head of a senator's table, could see no reason why she should not take one step more, and that comparatively short, and arrive at the head of the presidential table. This was before the presidential election of 1836. Mr. Van Buren was the generally accepted democratic candidate: he was foremost of all the candidates: and the man who is ahead of all the rest, on such occasions, is pretty sure to have a combination of all the rest against him. Mr. Van Buren was no exception to this rule. The whole whig party wished to defeat him: that was a fair wish. Mr. Calhoun's party wished to defeat him: that was invidious: for they could not elect Mr. Calhoun by it. Many professing democrats wished to defeat him, though for the benefit of a whig: and that was a movement towards the whig camp – where most of them eventually arrived. All these parties combined, and worked in concert; and their line of operations was through the vanity of the victim's wife. They excited her vain hopes. And this modest, unambitious man, who had spent all his life in resisting office pressed upon him by his real friends, lost his power of resistance in his old age, and became a victim to the combination against him – which all saw, and deplored, except himself. As soon as he was committed, and beyond extrication, one of the co-operators against him, a whig member of Congress from Kentucky – a witty, sagacious man of good tact – in the exultation of his feelings wrote the news to a friend in his district, who, in a still higher state of exultation, sent it to the newspapers – thus: "Judge White is on the track, running gayly, and won't come off; and if he would, his wife won't let him." This was the whole story, briefly and cheerily told – and truly. He ran the race! without prejudice to Mr. Van Buren – without benefit to the whig candidates – without support from some who had incited him to the trial: and with great political and social damage to himself.

Long an inhabitant of the same State with Judge White – indebted to him for my law license – moving in the same social and political circle – accustomed to respect and admire him – sincerely friendly to him, and anxious for his peace and honor, I saw with pain the progress of the movement against him, and witnessed with profound grief its calamitous consummation.

CHAPTER LI.

DEATH OF EX-SENATOR HAYNE OF SOUTH CAROLINA: NOTICE OF HIS LIFE AND CHARACTER

Nature had lavished upon him all the gifts which lead to eminence in public, and to happiness, in private life. Beginning with the person and manners – minor advantages, but never to be overlooked when possessed – he was entirely fortunate in these accessorial advantages. His person was of the middle size, slightly above it in height, well proportioned, flexible and graceful. His face was fine – the features manly, well formed, expressive, and bordering on the handsome: a countenance ordinarily thoughtful and serious, but readily lighting up, when accosted, with an expression of kindness, intelligence, cheerfulness, and an inviting amiability. His face was then the reflex of his head and his heart, and ready for the artist who could seize the moment to paint to the life. His manners were easy, cordial, unaffected, affable; and his address so winning, that the fascinated stranger was taken captive at the first salutation. These personal qualities were backed by those of the mind – all solid, brilliant, practical, and utilitarian: and always employed on useful objects, pursued from high motives, and by fair and open means. His judgment was good, and he exercised it in the serious consideration of whatever business he was engaged upon, with an honest desire to do what was right, and a laudable ambition to achieve an honorable fame. He had a copious and ready elocution, flowing at will in a strong and steady current, and rich in the material which constitutes argument. His talents were various, and shone in different walks of life, not often united: eminent as a lawyer, distinguished as a senator: a writer as well as a speaker: and good at the council table. All these advantages were enforced by exemplary morals; and improved by habits of study, moderation, temperance, self-control, and addiction to business. There was nothing holiday, or empty about him – no lying in to be delivered of a speech of phrases. Practical was the turn of his mind: industry an attribute of his nature: labor an inherent impulsion, and a habit: and during his ten years of senatorial service his name was incessantly connected with the business of the Senate. He was ready for all work – speaking, writing, consulting – in the committee-room as well as in the chamber – drawing bills and reports in private, as well as shining in the public debate, and ready for the social intercourse of the evening when the labors of the day were over. A desire to do service to the country, and to earn just fame for himself, by working at useful objects, brought all these high qualities into constant, active, and brilliant requisition. To do good, by fair means, was the labor of his senatorial life; and I can truly say that, in ten years of close association with him I never saw him actuated by a sinister motive, a selfish calculation, or an unbecoming aspiration.

Thus, having within himself so many qualities and requisites for insuring advancement in life, he also had extrinsic advantages, auxiliary to talent, and which contribute to success in a public career. He was well descended, and bore a name dear to the South – the synonym of honor, courage, and patriotism – memorable for that untimely and cruel death of one of its revolutionary wearers, which filled the country with pity for his fate, and horror for his British executioners. The name of Hayne, pronounced any where in the South, and especially in South Carolina, roused a feeling of love and respect, and stood for a passport to honor, until deeds should win distinction. Powerfully and extensively connected by blood and marriage, he had the generous support which family pride and policy extends to a promising scion of the connection. He had fortune, which gave him the advantage of education, and of social position, and left free to cultivate his talents, and to devote them to the public service. Resident in Charleston, still maintaining its colonial reputation for refined society, and high and various talent, he had every advantage of enlightened and elegant association. Twice happily married in congenial families (Pinckney and Alston), his domestic felicity was kept complete, his connections extended, and fortune augmented. To crown all, and to give effect to every gift with which nature and fortune had endowed him, he had that further advantage, which the Grecian Plutarch never fails to enumerate when the case permits it, and which he considered so auxiliary to the advancement of some of the eminent men whose lives he commemorated – the advantage of being born in a State where native talent was cherished, and where the community made it a policy to advance and sustain a promising young man, as the property of the State, and for the good of the State. Such was, and is, South Carolina; and the young Hayne had the full benefit of the generous sentiment. As fast as years permitted, he was advanced in the State government: as soon as age and the federal constitution permitted, he came direct to the Senate, without passing through the House of Representatives; and to such a Senate as the body then was – Rufus King, John Taylor of Caroline, Mr. Macon, John Gaillard, Edward Lloyd of Maryland, James Lloyd of Massachusetts, James Barbour of Virginia, General Jackson, Louis McLane of Delaware, Wm. Pinkney of Maryland, Littleton Waller Tazewell, Webster, Nathan Sandford, of New York, M. Van Buren, King of Alabama, Samuel Smith of Maryland, James Brown, and Henry Johnson of Louisiana; and many others, less known to fame, but honorable to the Senate from personal decorum, business talent, and dignity of character. Hayne arrived among them; and was considered by such men, and among such men, as an accession to the talent and character of the chamber. I know the estimate they put upon him, the consideration they had for him, and the future they pictured for him: for they were men to look around, and consider who were to carry on the government after they were gone. But the proceedings of the Senate soon gave the highest evidence of the degree of consideration in which he was held. In the very second year of his service, he was appointed to a high duty – such as would belong to age and long service, as well as to talent and elevated character. He was made chairman of the select committee – and select it was – which brought in the bill for the grants ($200,000 in money, and 24,000 acres of land), to Lafayette; and as such became the organ of the expositions, as delicate as they were responsible, which reconciled such grants to the words and spirit of our constitution, and adjusted them to the merit and modesty of the receiver: a high function, and which he fulfilled to the satisfaction of the chamber, and the country.

Six years afterwards he had the great debate with Mr. Webster – a contest of many days, sustained to the last without losing its interest – (which bespoke fertility of resource, as well as ability in both speakers), and in which his adversary had the advantage of a more ripened intellect, an established national reputation, ample preparation, the choice of attack, and the goodness of the cause. Mr. Webster came into that field upon choice and deliberation, well feeling the grandeur of the occasion; and profoundly studying his part. He had observed during the summer, the signs in South Carolina, and marked the proceedings of some public meetings unfriendly to the Union; and which he ran back to the incubation of Mr. Calhoun. He became the champion of the constitution and the Union, choosing his time and occasion, hanging his speech upon a disputed motion with which it had nothing to do, and which was immediately lost sight of in the blaze and expansion of a great national discussion: himself armed and equipped for the contest, glittering in the panoply of every species of parliamentary and forensic weapon – solid argument, playful wit, biting sarcasm, classic allusion; and striking at a new doctrine of South Carolina origin, in which Hayne was not implicated: but his friends were – and that made him their defender. The speech was at Mr. Calhoun, then presiding in the Senate, and without right to reply. Hayne became his sword and buckler, and had much use for the latter to cover his friend – hit by incessant blows – cut by many thrusts: but he understood too well the science of defence in wordy as well as military digladiation to confine himself to fending off. He returned, as well as received blows; but all conducted courteously; and stings when inflicted gently extracted on either side by delicate compliments. Each morning he returned re-invigorated to the contest, like Antæus refreshed, not from a fabulous contact with mother earth, but from a real communion with Mr. Calhoun! the actual subject of Mr. Webster's attack: and from the well-stored arsenal of his powerful and subtle mind, he nightly drew auxiliary supplies. Friends relieved the combatants occasionally; but it was only to relieve; and the two principal figures remained prominent to the last. To speak of the issue would be superfluous; but there was much in the arduous struggle to console the younger senator. To cope with Webster, was a distinction: not to be crushed by him, was almost a victory: to rival him in copious and graceful elocution, was to establish an equality at a point which strikes the masses: and Hayne often had the crowded galleries with him. But, equal argument! that was impossible. The cause forbid it, far more than disparity of force; and reversed positions would have reversed the issue.

I have said elsewhere (Vol. I. of this work), that I deem Mr. Hayne to have been entirely sincere in professing nullification at that time only in the sense of the Virginia resolutions of '98-'99, as expounded by their authors: three years afterwards he left his place in the Senate to become Governor of South Carolina, to enforce the nullification ordinance which the General Assembly of the State had passed, and against which President Jackson put forth his impressive proclamation. Up to this point, in writing this notice, the pen had run on with pride and pleasure – pride in portraying a shining American character: pleasure in recalling recollections of an eminent man, whom I esteemed – who did me the honor to call me friend; and with whom I was intimate. Of all the senators he seemed nearest to me – both young in the Senate, entering it nearly together; born in adjoining States; not wide apart in age; a similarity of political principle: and, I may add, some conformity of tastes and habits. Of all the young generation of statesmen coming on, I considered him the safest – the most like William Lowndes; and best entitled to a future eminent lead. He was democratic, not in the modern sense of the term, as never bolting a caucus nomination, and never thinking differently from the actual administration; but on principle, as founded in a strict, in contradistinction to a latitudinarian construction of the constitution; and as cherishing simplicity and economy in the administration of the federal government, in contradistinction to splendor and extravagance.

With his retiring from the Senate, Mr. Hayne's national history ceases. He does not appear afterwards upon the theatre of national affairs: but his practical utilitarian mind, and ardent industry, found ample and beneficent employment in some noble works of internal improvement. The railroad system of South Carolina, with its extended ramifications, must admit him for its founder, from the zeal he carried into it, and the impulsion he gave it. He died in the meridian of his life, and in the midst of his usefulness, and in the field of his labors – in western North Carolina, on the advancing line of the great iron railway, which is to connect the greatest part of the South Atlantic with the noblest part of the Valley of the Mississippi.

The nullification ordinance, which he became Governor of South Carolina to enforce, was wholly directed against the tariff system of the time – not merely against a protective tariff, but against its fruits – undue levy of revenue, extravagant expenditure; and expenditure in one quarter of the Union of what was levied upon the other. The levy and expenditure were then some twenty-five millions of dollars: they are now seventy-five millions: and the South, while deeply agitated for the safety of slave property – (now as safe, and more valuable than ever, as proved by the witness which makes no mistakes, the market price) – is quiet upon the evil which produced the nullification ordinance of 1832: quiet under it, although that evil is three times greater now than then: and without excuse, as the present vast expenditure is the mere effect of mad extravagance. Is this quietude a condemnation of that ordinance? or, is it of the nature of an imaginary danger which inflames the passions, that it should supersede the real evil which affects the pocket? If the Hayne of 1824, and 1832, was now alive, I think his practical and utilitarian mind would be seeking a proper remedy for the real grievance, now so much greater than ever; and that he would leave the fires of an imaginary danger to die out of themselves, for want of fuel.

CHAPTER LII.

ABOLITION OF SPECIFIC DUTIES BY THE COMPROMISE ACT OF 1833: ITS ERROR, AND LOSS TO THE REVENUE, SHOWN BY EXPERIENCE

The introduction of the universal ad valorem system in 1833 was opposed and deprecated by practical men at the time, as one of those refined subtleties which, aiming at an ideal perfection, overlooks the experience of ages, and disregards the warnings of reason. Specific duties had been the rule – ad valorems the exception – from the beginning of the collection of custom-house revenue. The specific duty was a question in the exact sciences, depending upon a mathematical solution by weight, count, or measure: the ad valorem presented a question to the fallible judgment of men, sure to be different at different places; and subject, in addition to the fallibility of judgment, to the chances of ignorance, indifference, negligence and corruption. All this was urged against the act at the time, but in vain. It was a piece of legislation arranged out of doors – christened a compromise, which was to save the Union – brought into the House to be passed without alteration: and was so passed, in defiance of all judgment and reason by the aid of the votes of those – always a considerable per centum in every public body – to whom the name of compromise is an irresistible attraction: amiable men, who would do no wrong of themselves, and without whom the designing could do but little wrong. Objections to this pernicious novelty (of universal ad valorems), were in vain urged then: experience, with her enlightened voice, now came forward to plead against them. The act had been in force seven years: it had had a long, and a fair trial: and that safest of all juries – Time and Experience – now came forward to deliver their verdict. At this session ('39-'40) a message was sent to the House of Representatives by the President, covering reports from the Secretary of the Treasury, and from the Comptroller of the Treasury, with opinions from the late Attorneys-general of the United States (Messrs. Benjamin F. Butler and Felix Grundy), and letters from the collectors of the customs in all the principal Atlantic ports, all relating to the practical operation of the ad valorem system, and showing it to be unequal, uncertain, unsafe – diverse in its construction – injurious to the revenue – open to unfair practices – and greatly expensive from the number of persons required to execute it. The whole document may be profitably studied by all who deprecate unwise and pernicious legislation; but a selection of a few of the cases of injurious operation which it presents will be sufficient to give an idea of the whole. Three classes of goods are selected – silks, linens, and worsted: all staple articles, and so well known as to be the least susceptible of diversity of judgment; and yet on which, in the period of four years, a fraction over five millions of dollars had been lost to the Treasury from diversity of construction between the Treasury officers and the judiciary – with the further prospective loss of one million and three-quarters in the ensuing three years if the act was not amended. The document, at page 44, states the annual ascertained loss during four years' operation of the act on these classes of goods, to be:

"Making in the four years $2,362,845; and the comptroller computes the annual prospective loss during the time the act may remain unaltered, at $800,000. So much for silks; now for linens. The same page, for the same four years, represents the annual loss on this article to be:

"Making the sum of $1,411,389 on this article for the four years; to which is to be added the estimated sum of $400,000, for the future annual losses, if the act remains unaltered.

"On worsted goods, for the same time, and on page 45, the report exhibits the losses thus:

"Making a total of ascertained loss on this head, in the brief space of four years, amount to the sum of $1,285,142; with a computation of a prospective loss of $500,000 per annum, while the compromise act remains as it is."

Such were the losses from diversity of construction alone on three classes of goods, in the short space of four years; and these classes staple goods, composed of a single material. When it came to articles of mixed material, the diversity became worse. Custom-house officers disagreed: comptrollers and treasurers disagreed: attorneys-general disagreed. Courts were referred to, and their decision overruled all. Many importers stood suits; and the courts and juries overruled all the officers appointed to collect the revenue. The government could only collect what they are allowed. Often, after paying the duty assessed, the party has brought his action and recovered a large part of it back. So that this ad valorem system, besides its great expense, its chance for diversity of opinions among the appraisers, and its openness to corruption, also gave rise to differences among the highest administrative and law officers of the government, with resort to courts of law, in nearly all which the United States was the loser.

CHAPTER LIII.

REFINED SUGAR AND RUM DRAWBACKS: THEIR ABUSE UNDER THE COMPROMISE ACT OF 1833: MR. BENTON'S SPEECH

Mr. Benton rose to make the motion for which he had given notice on Friday last, for leave to bring in a bill to reduce the drawbacks allowed on the exportation of rum and refined sugars; and the bounties and allowances to fishing vessels, in proportion to the reduction which had been made, and should be made, in the duties upon imported sugars, molasses and salt, upon which these bounties and allowances were respectively granted.

Mr. B. said that the bill, for the bringing in of which he was about to ask leave, proposed some material alteration in the act of 1833, for the modification of the tariff, commonly called the compromise act; and as that act was held by its friends to be sacred and inviolable, and entitled to run its course untouched and unaltered, it became his duty to justify his bill in advance; to give reasons for it before he ventured to submit the question of leave for its introduction; and to show, beforehand, that here was great and just cause for the measure he proposed.

Mr. B. said it would be recollected, by those who were contemporary with the event, and might be seen by all who should now look into our legislative history of that day, that he was thoroughly opposed to the passage of the act of 1833; that he preferred waiting the progress of Mr. Verplanck's bill; that he opposed the compromise act, from beginning to end; made speeches against it, which were not answered; uttered predictions of it, which were disregarded; proposed amendments to it, which were rejected; showed it to be an adjournment, not a settlement, of the tariff question; and voted against it, on its final passage, in a respectable minority of eighteen. It was not his intention at this time to recapitulate all the objections which he then made to the act; but to confine himself to two of those objections, and to those two of them, the truth and evils of which TIME had developed; and for which evils the public good demands an immediate remedy to be applied. He spoke of the drawbacks and allowances founded upon duties, which duties were to undergo periodical reductions, while the drawbacks and allowances remained undiminished; and of the vague and arbitrary tenor of the act, which rendered it incapable of any regular, uniform, or safe execution. He should confine himself to these two objections; and proceed to examine them in the order in which they were mentioned.

At page 208 of the Senate journal, session of 1832-33, is seen this motion: "Moved by Mr. Benton to add to the bill a section in the following words: 'That all drawbacks allowed on the exportation of articles manufactured in the United States from materials imported from foreign countries, and subject to duty, shall be reduced in proportion to the reduction of duties provided for in this act.'" The particular application of this clause, as explained and enforced at the time, was to sugar and molasses, and the refined sugar, and the rum manufactured from them.

As the laws then stood, and according to the principle of all drawbacks, the exporters of these refined sugars and rum were allowed to draw back from the Treasury precisely as much money as had been paid into the Treasury on the importation of the article out of which the exported article was manufactured. This was the principle, and this was the law; and so rigidly was this insisted upon by the manufacturing and exporting interest, that only four years before the compromise act, namely, in 1829, the drawback on refined sugars exported was raised from four to five cents a pound upon the motion of General Smith, a then senator from Maryland; and this upon an argument and a calculation made by him to show that the quantity of raw sugar contained in every pound of refined sugar, had, in reality, paid five instead of four cents duty. My motion appeared to me self-evidently just, as the new act, in abolishing all specific duties, and reducing every thing to an ad valorem duty of twenty per centum, would reduce the duties on sugar and molasses eventually to the one-third or the one-fourth of their then amount; and, unless the drawback should be proportionately reduced, the exporter of refined sugars and rum, instead of drawing back the exact amount he had paid into the Treasury, would in reality draw back three or four times as much as had been paid in. This would be unjust in itself; and, besides being unjust, would involve a breach of the constitution, for, so much of the drawback as was not founded upon the duty, would be a naked bounty paid for nothing out of the Treasury. I expected my motion to be adopted by a unanimous vote; on the contrary, it was rejected by a vote of 24 to 18;[2 - The following was the vote:Yeas – Messrs. Benton, Buckner, Calhoun, Dallas, Dickerson, Dudley, Forsyth, Johnston, Kane, King, Rives, Robinson, Seymour, Tomlinson, Webster, White, Wilkins, and Wright – 18.Nays – Messrs. Bell, Bibb, Black, Clay, Clayton, Ewing, Foot, Grundy, Hendricks, Holmes, Knight, Mangum, Miller, Moore, Naudain, Poindexter, Prentiss, Robbins, Silsbee, Smith, Sprague, Tipton, Troup, Tyler – 24.] and I had to leave it to Time, that slow, but sure witness, to develope the evils which my arguments had been unable to show, and to enforce the remedies which the vote of the Senate had rejected. That witness has come. Time, with his unerring testimony, has arrived. The act of 1833 has run the greater part of its course, without having reached its ultimate depression of duties, or developed its greatest mischiefs; but it has gone far enough to show that it has done immense injury to the Treasury, and must continue to do it if a remedy is not applied. Always indifferent to my rhetoric, and careful of my facts – always leaving oratory behind, and laboring to establish a battery of facts in front – I have applied at the fountain head of information – the Treasury Department – for all the statistics connected with the subject; and the successive reports which had been received from that department, on the salt duties and the fishing bounties and allowances, and on the sugar and molasses duties, and the drawbacks on exported rum and refined sugar, and which had been printed by the order of the Senate, had supplied the information which constituted the body of facts which must carry conviction to the mind of every hearer.

Mr. B. said he would take up the sugar duties first, and show what had been the operation of the act of 1833, in relation to the revenue from that article, and the drawbacks founded upon it. In document No. 275, laid upon our tables on Friday last, we find four tables in relation to this point, and a letter from the Register of the Treasury, Mr. T. L. Smith, describing their contents.