bore reply under repeated slanders of this kind; and at the instance of the friends of the measure, and in consideration of the advanced period of the session, permitted the question to be finally taken, without reply.

The President, in taking the ground he did upon the Indian question, knew that he was incurring great responsibility; that he was shocking deeply wrought prejudices in various classes of the community; in many sections strong religious feelings; that he was exposing himself to the arts and misrepresentations of his political enemies, yet he dared to take the course he did, because he loved his country and its institutions; that country for which he had hazarded more than mere personal popularity upon repeated occasions for which he had offered to die. What had he gained by his course upon that question? The President had taken a strong interest in the success of the policy of removing the Indians, because he thought it calculated to preserve the harmony of the republic, and its reputation from a blot, which the inherent difficulties of our relations with the southern tribes, and the irritations likely to grow out of them might bring upon it. But, sir, when he had laid the proposition before Congress he felt his conscience free. He had done what duty prompted; the rest was to be decided. [Here Mr Vance called Mr Bell to order, as he was discussing a bill not before the House]. Sir, I refer to this measure because it has been brought into this discus

sion.

The administration has been charged with taking an improper interest in it; and it has been repeatedly referred to as an instance of the extravagance of this Congress. We have been told, in this debate, that while the President scruples to appropriate money to internal improvement, he has urged the adoption of another measure, and by his influence, carried it through the House, involving an expenditure of half a million of dollars, and that, too, to further a ruinous and disgraceful policy. I consider everything I have said, or shall say upon this subject, strictly in order. When this measure was directly the subject of discussion, I stated that the extravagance of an administration would never be decided merely by the amount expended that the intelligence of the country, in making up its verdict upon such a question, would look to the propriety of the expenditure-to the necessity which demanded the application of the public treasure; and that praise or censure would follow as the objects to be accomplished were for good or for evil. I also then stated that, the removal of the Indians would bring more money into the Treasury by removing the incumbrance of the Indian title from the public lands, than would be drawn from it; but enough of this now.

It has been said in the course of the debate, that the President has undertaken to decide against the will of the people, as expressed through their representatives in Congress, that appropriations shall not be made to objects

of internal improvement. The Constitution allows the veto of the President upon the will of a majority of Congress. By the course pursued in the present instance, the subject is recommitted to Congress, and an appeal will ultimately be carried before the people, who will, in their returns to the next Congress, pronounce upon the motives of the President, and approve or condemn his councils, as they shall think fit. Before that tribunal he will be arraigned, and if they shall not see the evils of the present system of appropriation in the light he does, he is willing to be prostrated in their esteem. But, sir, I do not understand the President to be opposed to internal improvement. It is the present unequal and distracting mode of appropriating the public treasure, which he has set his face against. A patriotic system of dispensing the general funds for the improvement of the country-a system which, while it professes to act for the general good, and to become a cement to the Union, shall be so, in fact; one which shall be secured against abuses by an amendment of the Constitution, is decidedly approved by the message. The expediency of proceeding in the system, as at present practised, is, it is true, as decidedly denied; but it is not proposed to dam up, forever, the stream from the Treasury for the beneficent purposes of internal improvement; this I do not believe the people will consent to; but it is proposed to check its flow in its present wild and unrestricted channel. It is believed

that the present burthens of the country may be greatly diminished; that manufactures may be duly encouraged, and still have a surplus in the Treasury, ample enough for the accomplishment of every desirable object of internal improvement.

The gentleman from Ohio, last up (Mr Vance), has spoken in an improper manner of the fading prospects of the west; and deprecated the idea of diminished expenditures for its benefit. I claim also to be a friend to the interests of the west that west to which I belong by birth, and I promise that gentleman to go along with him, side by side, in asserting its claim to be regarded in the distribution of the favors of this Government-its claim to a fair portion of whatever funds shall be appropriated to internal improvement; but I differ with him as to the mode of applying them. I contend that the half million, which it would require to extend the Zanesville road through Kentucky, and to make it permanent, applied under the direction of the Legislature of that State, to various roads of smaller extent, leading from her interior secluded and fertile districts, to the great outlets which nature has already provided for carrying off the productions of the whole west, would secure a greater actual amelioration of the condition and prospects of the people of that State, than two millions expended upon any free great road, extending quite through the State, and belonging to any great system of national improvement, executed under the waste

ful superintendence of the General Government. I affirm that the same increased proportion of actual advantage and amelioration would attend the application of a small amount to similar objects in Ohio, or in any other western State under the direction of the local authorities, over a large sum administered by the General Government.

Mr Sutherland said, he should vote in favor of the bill. He said Pennsylvania was the friend of internal improvements, and also the friend of General Jackson, and she would abide by both, waiting with confidence for the slow but certain process by which the system of improvements would universally prevail. The President had, in rejecting the bill, exercised only his constitutional power, and he (Mr Sutherland,) and his constituents, in supporting it, were only exercising the power which the Constitution granted to them. He represented a State which was friendly to both; for in fact, Pennsylvania was the first State which had given the present Chief Magistrate an undivided support, and which was also while it had lost no confidence in its first object, being the general good of his country, friendly to the great principle of internal improvement. That such would, sooner or later, be the universal sentiment of the nation, he had no doubt the course of time and the course of human affairs would render apparent.

Mr Isacks said, he was sincerely sorry to feel it a duty he owed to himself to say a few words on this subject. From

what had of late fallen from different members, and other indications, he scarcely knew whether even he was regarded as the friend or enemy of this administration. To such as might wish to monopolize the entire support of the administration he had but little to say. This he might say perhaps, without offence, that he was an older (not a better) soldier' than those who had on this day, so much to his satisfaction, pronounced their eulogies upon the President. He had been longer in the service of that cause which brought the present Executive into power than many who were now far ahead of him, at least, in their own estimation.

Mr Isacks said, when he came here some seven years ago, a colleague of the President's, if members of different Houses can be called so, the Tennessee delegation, with one exception, old George Kremer, and perhaps half a dozen others, were all the political friends that could then be numbered for him in Congress. Nothing could be more grateful to him than the multiplication since. He was now, and had been ever since, to this moment, no less the devoted, personal and political friend of the President than he was then and had been before. And in vindication of his honor, his honesty, patriotism and firmness of purpose, he would, on any proper occasion, go as far as he that goes farthest,' and he trusted that his acts, in and out of this House, during the two last struggles for the Presidency would be taken as a sufficient guarantee for that

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pledge. But on the present question he differed from the President, and what of that? We have, said Mr Isacks, differed before. During the Congress that we were representatives of Tennessee, we often differed; but there was then a class of subjects we did not differ upon. We voted together (I speak from memory, not records) on the survey bill, on the bill to subscribe stock to the Chesapeake and Delaware canal, on the bill for the construction of the road from Canton to Zanesville, in Ohio, and on the bill appropriating fifty thousand dollars to remove obstructions in the Mississippi river. I do not say, and must not be understood to mean that, by those votes, either he or I stand committed for this bill but for myself I will say that, under the influence of opinions formed during the period in which those bills were discussed, and which opinions have never since been changed or shaken, I did, upon mature reflection, vote for this bill when it was here before; my opinion, notwithstanding the arguments by which the President's objections are so powerfully urged, remain the same, and if I live, I will vote for it again. And do I expect by that to offend the President? Not SO. If it were to do it, it would prove that I am what I am, and he is not Andrew Jackson!!! I think I know the man who now fills the Executive chair well no ugh to be convinced that if ithout a change of opinion, I should feel so strongly the influence of the message as to change my vote on this bill, he would

think me a villain. I am certain he ought, under such circumstances, to despise me, as I should myself, and am sure he would. But suppose we had a Chief Magistrate capable of taking offence, and feeling resentment for honest consistency in others, I would say to him, I cannot help it; to you, Mr President, Iowe no responsibilities; to none but God and my constituents do I acknowledge responsibility, and these I will discharge as I may.

My colleague (Mr Bell) anticipates the final settlement of the great question of internal improvement when the people shall decide, and their will is represented. I heartily join him in that appeal to the people, and so far as I can, will cheerfully stake the fate of internal improvement, yes, and my own fate politically, upon that issue. Will my colleague do likewise?

Mr Kennon observed that, being perfectly satisfied in his own mind that all the arguments which could be adduced would not change a single vote upon the subject, he felt himself bound to move the previous question.

The motion was agreed to by a vote of yeas 105, nays 76. So the previous question was carried.

The main question, which was the passage of the bill, the objections of the President notwithstanding, was then put, when there appeared to be yeas 96, nays 92. Two thirds of the House not agreeing to pass the bill, it was rejected.

On the 29th of May the House

proceeded to take up several other bills, which originated in the Senate, authorizing internal improvements; and as if with the view of evincing its total disregard of the opinions of the President, the House passed the following bills:

1st. One authorizing a subscription to the Washington Turnpike Company. The previous question was demanded and the bill was ordered to a third reading-yeas 81, nays 47, and passed, 74 yeas, 39 nays.

3d. A bill authorizing a subscription to the stock of the Louisville and Portland Canal Company. Here an attempt was made to delay the proceedings by demanding a call of the House; but the call was refused, 43 yeas, 91 nays. The previous question was then demanded and the bill was ordered to a third reading, 83 yeas, 52 nays, and passed, 80 yeas, 37 nays.

The act making appropriations for light-houses, improving harbors and directing surveys, &c, which had been amended in the Senate, was also called for, and various efforts were ineffectually made by the friends of the President to prevent a vote on the bill by motions to adjourn and for a call of the House. These having failed, the previous question was ordered, yeas 95, nays 44, and the amendments proposed by the Senate were put separately and passed.

On the amendment relating to the improvement of the navigation of Back Creek, in Maryland, the vote stood, yeas 76, nays 60. The amendments having all pass

ed, the bill was sent, together with the two other bills, to the President for his approbation. The first bill being similar to the one already rejected, was returned to the Senate, where it originated, with a reference to the message rejecting the Maysville bill for his reasons. The Senate then proceeded to reconsider this bill, and on the question of its passage, notwithstanding the objections; the vote stood, yeas 21, nays 17, andthe bill was rejected.

The other bills, viz. that authorizing a subscription to the Louisville Canal, and the bill for building light-houses were retained for further consideration unti the next session of Congress. The manner in which they were finally disposed of must of course be reserved for a future volume. This determination of the Executive against the system of internal improvement gave great offence to many of his friends and entirely alienated some from his party.

Even in Congress such an increasing want of confidence was manifested that the decided majorities which the administration possessed in both Houses at the commencement of the session had dwindled before its close into feeble and inefficient minorities. Nor was this the only difficulty to which the President had exposed himself by his decision. In seeking to temporize and to lay down a rule satisfactory to both parties, he had assumed an unsafe position, more difficult to maintain than either of the opposite points, which he sought to