formed of, and conducted by, men who have acquired efficiency by dint of study, labour, and long training.

The second constitutional feature of difficulty of the author of the report of the select committee, as we have seen, is "the provision for educating such persons (cadets) gratuitously at the public expense." This is partly answered by our preceding remarks. If the cadets form a part of the army, as proved, it will be conceded that they are properly clothed and fed at the public expense. In reference then to education, is not the common recruit for the ranks taught his military duty at the public expense, in the same way as the recruit destined to wear the epaulette and to command? In time of peace, is not the whole army, whether of officers or privates, a school of instruction for military duty, maintained at the public expense? The difference in the kind of instruction does not alter the principle, because the private and the officer are educated with reference to their respective kind of service. The constitutional power of congress to "support" as well as to "raise armies," therefore, clearly extends to the case. Indeed, the author of this report actually concedes the whole of the argument in the following passage:

"The power and duty of instituting seminaries of learning, and of devising other means for the general improvement of the citizens for any particular and for every purpose, being thus reserved to the state governments exclusively, the national government cannot rightfully enter into any attempt of the kind; certainly not to embrace any persons excepting those actually in the public service and actually subject to the commands of government, and upon whom necessarily rests, for the time being, the execution of certain public duties. In this position there is no denial of power to the national government to instruct, in all things essential to a proper discharge of their official duties, all persons actually in the employ and administration of the government; although it may, at the same time, be suggested as a mark of bad policy and bad economy in any government to have in its employ, for officers, individuals who have yet to learn the theoretical and fundamental principles of their duties.p. 16.

The latter suggestion might be valuable if applicable to the subject. We would ask, where are the "theoretical and fundamental principles" of the art of war to be learned, except in a military academy? Have we any such private institutions? Have not all, which have been attempted, failed? And, as the policy and consequent pursuits of the people of the United States are likely to be pacific as the country grows older, is it probable that any such institutions will be established? How, then, is the government to obtain officers "learned in the theoretical and fundamental principles of their duties" for its armies? It is for the very reason that such officers cannot be obtained from other sources, that the military academy is established, and VOL. XXII.-No. 43.

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its pupils instructed at the public expense: it is for the very reason that the army cannot be supplied with officers of the requisite knowledge, that the academy is constitutionally maintainable under the express power" to raise and support armies" already referred to. But a most fatal and unkind answer to this point of the author of the report (because it comes from himself), is his own proposition so to modify the academy as to make it a school of practical instruction for officers of the army and students, and this to be maintained at the public expense. Is not the constitutional objection as forcible in the one instance as the other?

The third objection on the constitutional score, is to the "provision for thus educating such persons (cadets) independent of all obligation, on their part, to continue in the public service beyond the period of completing their education." There is a slight error in fact here, inasmuch as the cadet is enlisted for five, and the course of instruction occupies four years; and, during the fifth year, the obligation to remain in the service is in full force. But this is not very material as to the main principle involved. We are not disposed to deny that, in the abstract, this is the strongest, though, so far as results are considered, it is one of the weakest objections made. Under the present system, the cadet serves the whole five years, and is liable to be called into the field. The tendency of the education, by force of early habits, is to ensure to the government the services of the individuals thus taught. Thus of the nine hundred and forty graduates of the school up to May, 1837, three hundred and fifty-one resigned their posts in the army; a large proportion of the latter number having gone through different periods of service before resignation, some of them as long as sixteen years. The exact number of these three hundred and fifty-one who resigned their commissions as soon as they received them, in other words, who did not enter the army at all, we have not at hand. But we will take the years 1835 and 1836, and, from official documents, state their results in this particular. It is specially observable, that the resignations during these years were more numerous than usual, owing to the disputes among the senior officers in relation to the Indian campaigns, and to the great demand for civil engineers in the various states, and by corporations. Notwithstanding, out of about sixty graduates of each year, but eight, in 1836, and seven, in 1835, resigned their commissions the same year they received them; while in 1836 alone, there were forty-six graduates who resigned their commissions in the army after having served from six to sixteen years, while during the same year twenty resigned who were not graduates of the academy. The resignations in previous years fall far short of those for the years stated, so far as the graduates

are concerned. This statement is sufficient to show that the objection practically is but of the slightest importance. All means are constitutional which accomplish a constitutional purpose, if in respect to their manner they do not otherwise come in collision with a prohibitive principle. The purpose here, in relation to the common defence, through the medium of the army, we have described, and is in no wise defeated by the resignations of a few of the cadets out of the mass. There never was any great constitutional purpose attempted, but that some part of the machinery provided to carry it out was slightly defective, though the whole machine was not therefore to be condemned, nor was the purpose a whit the less lawful. We hardly think it will ever be found expedient to pass a law requiring that all cadets, upon entering the academy, shall be bound to render a compensation to the government for their military education, in the event of their resigning within two, three, or four years after graduation. Even this would be attended with difficulties; for a young officer, scarcely six months in the army, may render a service to his country, which will amply compensate for the money bestowed in his education. Again, the morale of the army must be preserved. The best officer is not one who is a bound slave as to the time of service, but he who is actuated by the ennobling sentiment of love of country and a desire for personal and professional honour and advancement. As their own voluntary act, men will be content to spend a whole life in military service; but if constrained, as a compensation for their education to the same pursuit, tardy zeal and careless duty will be the consequence. All officers in all armies have the liberty to resign. That privilege has always been extended to hired mercenaries; for even the Scotish archers of the despotic Louis XI. could lay down their employment at will. An incentive to the accomplishment of high deeds is always the strongest in the breast of the man who is conscious of a free agency, and we should be loth to see the day when an opposite principle is introduced into the American service. If conditions such as we deprecate were required for the entry of every individual into the army list, we should either have no officers, or such as would disgrace the service and the country. In conclusion of this branch of the subject, it deserves notice that the plan which the author of the report submits is liable likewise to this very objection, for he does not suggest that his pupils, the officers, shall, as a compensation for their tuition, obligate themselves to remain any definite time in the service. In short, it is impracticable on the score of expediency, and we think we have sufficiently answered the constitutional point raised in the report.

The fourth and last constitutional difficulty stated is, "that

the present system provides for educating persons at the public expense in numbers far exceeding and disproportioned to the wants of the public service." The fact is here assumed upon evidence which is entirely inconclusive. As to those who do not graduate from want of capacity or industry, or are dismissed for misconduct, they cannot be said to be educated in the school. Being found incompetent, they are discharged as unfit for the requisitions of the public service. It is to the graduates alone that this objection applies. Now the fact is assumed by the result that of nine hundred and forty graduates, three hundred and fifty-one have resigned, who, for the most part, entered the service and continued in it for a long time. We might, however, readily grant the fact that there have been particular periods, in which, respectively, there was an excess in the number of the graduates, over the vacancies in the army list. At the same time, it is equally true that there have been periods in which the army has suffered for want of officers. It is folly to suppose that the exigencies of the service can be made to depend upon any fixed rule. How many officers may die, resign, or be dismissed in any one year, is not given to the government to know. But the most conclusive view of the matter is, that whenever it has been the lot of the government to embark in a war, whether it has been with a foreign nation or an Indian tribe, there has been a woful lack of officers. Such was the case in the war of 1812, and also during the fierce Indian wars of the last few years. But even in the inactive times of peace, the assertion is not borne out by the proof. Major Eaton, the secretary of war in 1831, states, "the supply of the army by actual appointment during the preceding five years, from the corps of graduated cadets, had averaged about twenty-two annually, while the graduates were about forty, making in such year an excess of eighteen." But these eighteen received the supernumerary or brevet rank provided by law; and it was chiefly from them the details for special duty, such as for coast and river surveys, advance duty, engineer duty, &c., were made, required by the provisions multiplied by congress in reference to subjects for which the laws provided for no increase of personal means for their performance. These details were for "wants of the public service," in an equal degree with those which were made for actual duty in the field, and the importance of the discharge of these duties will be fully understood by every one who has taken the trouble to look at the voluminous and able reports of the war department, in reference to this special service. But the refutation of this objection assumes broader ground. The power to provide for the common defence clearly embraces the right to carry out the Washingtonian policy, of preparing for war in time of peace. Upon the supposition that peace is always to continue, no

standing army is ever necessary. Yet no one has doubted the constitutional power to maintain a standing army. And if the government were to wait in making provision for a stock of skilful officers, until the tocsin of war has sounded, we must feel the evils in the absence of means at hand to resist their approach. Had the gloomy forebodings lately entertained of a war with France been realised, and had that nation, with all its skill in the military art, landed an army on our shores, where then would have been our supply of officers for the public service? Volunteer patriotism would have done much, very much; but at what cost, peril, inconvenience, and possible comparative want of success? The very basis, then, on which the superstructure of the argument is raised, is weak and unsubstantial.

These are the views which we think satisfactorily vanquish all difficulties on constitutional grounds. If more aid is wanted than their own intrinsic merit to support them, the voice of authority has not been silent. Much declamation has been in vogue about the opinions of men "identified with republican principles." This is one of the "springes to catch woodcocks, so often set up by politicians to entrap the unreflecting and unwary. To say nothing of the testimony of Washington and others of his successors, what have been the opinions of Jefferson, Madison, and Jackson? The two former, at all events, can be considered in no other light than strict constructionists; indeed, they are the great apostles of the doctrine of state rights, in the estimation of the party claiming to be their disciples. In short, the whole subject presents too solemn a question to be trifled with elsewhere than in the mere personal political arena; and consequently every administration, as we have proved by the details, since the adoption of the federal constitution, has united in support of the present plan and organization of the military academy.

But we feel less satisfaction in noticing briefly and succinctly the points of expediency which are urged against the constitution of the present school by the author of the report of the select committee-not because they are less susceptible of the clearest refutation, but because, in this respect, the report-and we take up that as a summary of all that has been or can be said on that side of the question at other times and places-loses much of its semblance of fairness in many of its details of facts, and struggles, indiscriminately, to blacken all the features of the institution, some of which are of almost universally acknowledged worth. The author overshoots himself, and falls on the other side of the hobby he has desired to mount; and this we will now take occasion briefly to show.

One of the first grounds relied on, is that which relates to