handled as the report of the Committee on Manufactures has been. To convince the Senator of this fact, I will read two passages from the first page of the report, and show what mistakes, committed by him, were left untouched and uncorrected through the indulgent forbearance of the Committee on Public Lands.

rect.

[JUNE 28, 1832

The Senator from Kentucky, among other amiable personalities, was polite enough to say that the report of the Committee on Public Lands would have been better if it had had less of my labor in it. And what would have been the report, of which that Senator was the writer, if it had had nothing in it but what was fresh from his own inven Mr. B. then read the first sentence in the report from tion? Every argument it contained was an old acquaintthe Committee on Manufactures, in which it was recited ance in this chamber--familiar to our own ears in all the that the committee had been instructed by the Senate to debates upon the graduation bill--speculators to buy up inquire into the expediency of reducing the price of the all the public lands--destruction of the present land sys public lands, and of ceding them to the several States in tem--splendid growth of the new States, and of Ohio in which they lie, on reasonable terms. This recital is cor- particular, under the influence of the present system-The instructions given to that committee by the injury to former purchasers of public lands--fall in the Senate are correctly stated. And what was the conduct value of all lands, public and private--emigration from of the committee? Did it obey the instruction? Did it the old States-the land revenue paid by the old States-conform to the sense of the Senate? Did it report a bill too rapid growth of the new States-comparative growth either for reducing the price of the lands, or ceding them of old and new States--cessation of all sales, under the exto the States? It did neither! It disregarded the instruc-pectation of reducing prices. These are the topics which tion. It set aside the command of the Senate. It substi- figure in the Senator's report; and all these topics had tuted its own will for the authority of the Senate; and already figured for six years in this chamber, before he brought in a bill, neither to reduce the price of the lands, entered it. The old opponents of the graduation bill had nor to cede them to the States, but to keep up the price, used them all up; yet the Committee on Public Lands and divide the proceeds of the sales among all the States. made no allusion to the antiquity of the gentleman's arguThe Committee on Public Lands made no remark on this ments. They received the resuscitated carcases of these disobedience. They passed it over in silence. They old arguments as if they had been something fresh and were sensible that the Senate itself had expressed its own new. They answered them gravely, and civilly, and disapprobation of that disobedience in doing what had without allusion to their former acquaintance; and no allu never been done before--in referring the bill of the Manu-sion would have been made to it now, had it not been for facturing Committee, without previous discussion, to the the Senator's polite disparagement of the report from the Committee on Public Lands to report upon the subject Committee on Public Lands, under the assumption that it conformably to the expressed sense of the Senate. contained too much of my composition.

Mr. B. then read the second paragraph of the report The Senator from Kentucky proclaimed his intention from the Committee on Manufactures, which, after citing to answer the report of the Land Committee; and how did the cessions of Virginia and Georgia, complimented other he comply with that proclamation? By avoiding every es States for their magnanimity and patriotism in giving up sential argument of the report, catching at detached extheir lands also. Was this correct? Was it historically pressions, and piddling at verbal criticism! He avoided true? The Connecticut claim in Ohio; was that given up? all notice of the objection to the principle of his bill, or, rather, was not a deed of conveyance exacted for it which makes the new States the private property of the from the Federal Government? The Massachusetts claim old ones. He paid no attention to the memorials of six in the then province of Maine; was that given up? Let States, praying for a reduction of the price of the public Massachusetts herself respond. Here is the protest of her lands. He shut his eyes upon the fact that the first choice Legislature, adopted a few months ago, reciting that she of new lands were now selling, in the State of Maine, at had then owned large tracts of vacant land in Maine, and a maximum of sixty cents per acre, and thence down to declaring all acts between the Federal Government and three and a half cents. He never once alluded to the of Great Britain to be null and void, by which she should be ficial reports from the registers and receivers of the deprived of any part of that land. Here, then, is the as- public lands, which described the quality of these refuse sertion of the Massachusetts Legislature in opposition to lands, and fixed their values at from five to fifty cents per the Manufacturing Committee's report. She declares that acre. He was blind to the marshal's returns, which exhi she now owns large bodies of vacant lands; lands which bited about one-third of the taxable inhabitants of the new she never did cede to the Federal Government; which she States as being non-freeholders. He omitted to notice will not now cede to it; nor permit any part of it to be the glaring injustice of putting Massachusetts and Conpared off in settling the boundary line with Great Britain. necticut on a level with Virginia and Georgia in their She nullifies the act of the Federal Government; and that interest in the public lands. He made no answer to the not a mere act of Congress, but a case of national law--allegation that the old States would raise the price of the the supreme law of the land--a treaty with a foreign lands, and send agents to bid against purchasers, and to Power, at the risk of war with that Power. This is nul- prosecute for trespasses, as soon as they could consider lification in earnest. It was doing the think like master them as their own. He paid no attention to the obvious workmen. The South Carolinians were nothing but ap- objection which displayed the injustice of making no disprentices. They were fumblers and bunglers at nullifi-tinction between the States which had, or had not, recation. They did nothing but talk and threaten: Massa-ceived donations in money, or land, for objects of internal chusetts economized words, and went to acts. She did improvement. He was deaf to the allegation that these the thing at once: a word and a blow, and the blow first; lands had been granted for revenue, and that it was due to and what effect that blow might have had upon the secret the donors, after taxing them upon other articles to raise redeliberations of the Senate on the boundary question, it venue, to give them the benefit of these lands in alleviatdid not become any one to say in open session. Let the ing the burden of future taxes for revenue. He was South Carolinians take a lesson from Massachusetts, or silent as the dead to the argument that these lands were surrender their pretensions to the character of nullifiers. granted to be disposed of, and not to be kept for three But this is an episode. I have referred to the Massachu-hundred years. He paid no attention to the argument setts protest to correct a great historical blunder in the that the new States were entitled to a reduction of the report of the Committee on Manufactures, and to esta- revenue on the articles chiefly used by themselves. He blish the claim of the author of the Public Land Commit-paid no attention to the fact that his report and bill were tee's report to the thanks of the writer for forbearing to at war with each other; that his report was for dividing the nett proceeds of the sales, and his bill for dividing the

expose it.

JUNE 28, 1832.]

Public Lands.

[SENATE.

gross proceeds; thereby making a difference of a million inland gulf stream, parallel to the tariff stream, the penof dollars in the sum to be divided. He fought shy upon sion stream, the internal improvement stream, and the the quotation from Burke; commented upon an immate- United States' Bank stream, which are now sweeping the rial part, and left unnoticed the whole stress and point of wealth of the South and West into the Northeastern cities. the quotation, which asserted that the true mode of de- The Senator from Kentucky carries his confidence in riving revenue from land was from its cultivation, and the money argument so far as to believe that the new not from its sale. He paid no attention to the versifica- States themselves will be captivated by it; that they will tion of this sentiment in the United States, where the sale fall in love with the fallacious dividends which he has held of the public lands has produced but thirty-eight millions out to them, and consent to sell themselves to the old of gross revenue, while the cultivation of the lands, through States for a small share of their own spoils. A large table the medium of custom-house revenue, had produced five of dividends is displayed before them; but it is all decephundred and fifty-six millions of nett revenue. He would tion and illusion. The dividends will be reduced to innot notice the example of England, and all other countries significance when the expenses of the land system are dewho are now making donations of land to their citizens, ducted from the gross receipts; and, even if it stood at the and, in many instances, giving them assistance in cultivat- sums carried out in his table, every new State would save ing it. He said nothing about the injustice of demanding more infinitely by a reduction of the price of the land the same price for all sorts of land-nothing about the than by receiving a share of her own money. The saving injustice of requiring one dollar and twenty-five cents per upon the sales of last year, to be effected by a reduction acre for land worth twenty-five or fifty cents. The Sena- of the price according to the plan recommended by tor from Kentucky omitted all these essential points, and, the Land Committee, would be, in Ohio, $214,000; in that omission, gave a fine exemplification of the rule of in Indiana, $347,000; in Illinois, $213,000; in Missouri, the rhetoricians, which recommends all those arguments $187,000; in Alabama, $447,000; in Mississippi, $103,000; to be passed over in silence, which cannot be met and and in Louisiana, $43,000. answered.

But it is not by tables, constructed beforehand, that The Senator from Kentucky, in skipping all the argu- the loss of the new States can be ascertained from such a ments of the Committee on Public Lands, has been equally bill as this. If it passes, their doom is sealed. They beaverse to the use of arguments on his own side. Song, come the private property of the old States. To make anecilote, metaphor; many exhibitions and flourishes to money out of them will be the only consideration. Every entertain the ladies and by-standers; but very few argu- art that ingenuity and avarice can invent, will be put in ments to enlighten the Senate. The cash argument was requisition to swell the amount for distribution. Instead the only one which he condescended to use. The table of being reduced, the price of the lands will probably be of dividends was the Alpha and Omega of his argument, raised again to the old minimum of two dollars. Instead and that table was constructed upon a principle of error, of preferences to settlers and occupants, they will have which exhibits to each State about four or five times more to bid for their own labor against the agents of the paraspoil than it would ever get. Instead of an average of a mount States who will be sent to superintend the sales, series of years, which would give a million and three-quar- and see that every tract is screwed up to the highest ters in place of three millions, for the gross receipts from point. The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. CLAY] thinks the public lands, instead of the nett proceeds, which would the price ought to be raised, but he will not move to raise require about a million to be deducted for expenses in ad-it. Can he go security for his coadjutors? Will they not ministering the public lands, buying them for Indians, do it? Those who are to divide the spoil are to make the paying the annuities incurred on account of them, and spoil. They can make it what they please, and certainly effecting the removal of the Indians; instead of the re- will please to make it as great as possible. Nor is it in mainder which these deductions would leave, and which the price only that the new States may be oppressed and in some years would be nothing, and in other years per- harassed. Innumerable arts may be resorted to in order haps half a million of dollars, the Senator from Kentucky to enhance the product derivable from the lands. Here is takes the gross proceeds of the last year, swelled, as it was, with payments due for lands sold before the year 1820, with military and forfeited land scrip, and constructs his table upon that fallacious sum, and then exhibits to the States these large and seductive dividends. But this argument will do upon paper alone. An amendment to "That it shall be the duty of the land agent to sell at confine the distribution to the nett proceeds will detect its public auction, or private sale, all grass growing on the fallacy, and leave those empty handed who supposed they public lands from year to year; to take suitable measures were become rich on the spoils of the new States. for the preservation of grass and timber standing and Still, this cash argument is the only one the Senator growing thereon; and to prosecute in behalf of the State from Kentucky has condescended to use; and let us see for all trespasses which have been, or may be, committed how he has used it. He assigns to the States north of the thereon; and to seize and to sell at public auction all kinds Potomac about one million two hundred and sixty thou- of timber and grass cut by trespassers. And the said sand dollars, and to the States south of the Potomac agent is hereby authorized to sell timber on the public about five hundred and fifty thousand dollars! Thus, the lands where the same is decaying, and in his opinion it is States which surrendered their lands to the Federal Go- for the public interest to do so!" This is now a law of vernment, are to receive about seven hundred thousand Maine; this is a law made by those who are now aiming dollars less than those who refused to surrender, and which at the ownership of all our lands. If they succeed, will would now involve the country in a foreign war before they be more generous to the people of the New States they would give up an acre to settle a disputed boundary. than to their own citizens? On the contrary, will they not Again: the Southern States send emigrants to the new be a thousand times harder? Rotten timber and prairie States; the Northern States send but few, and mean to grass will then be an object of revenue. All cattle and stop those few to work in their factories. The Southern horses will have to be confined on the owner's land, or States, then, through their emigration, and the new taken up and sold for the trespass if they stray on the States, are to furnish the whole sum which is thus to be public lands. Agents sent from the old States, and staso unequally divided. The whole is to come from the tioned in every township, would watch, not only the South and West, and twice the largest share is to pour farmers and their slaves, but their cattle, their horses, and into the Northeast; thus opening another current, another their hogs, to sue them for trespasses.

an act passed in the State of Maine, in the year 1828, for the sale of rotten timber and growing grass, and the prosecution of trespassers, which act can be, will soon be, applied to the new States if this scheme of distribution succeeds. Listen to it:

SENATE.]

Public Lands.

(JUNE 28, 1832.

This bill has been called a system for settling the busi- also is quoted by the Public Land Committee, and no noness of internal improvement; and under that assumption tice is taken of it by the Senator from Kentucky, nor by the bill for granting a township of land to the French col- the Senator from Ohio, [Mr. EwING.] Why do they out lege at St. Louis, and the bill to grant half a million of to notice that memorial? Because it is full and plain, exacres to the States of Missouri, Mississippi, and Louisiana, press and explicit, up to the mark, and direct and open in had been laid upon the table. They were laid by to await favor of preventing emigration to the West for the purthe establishment of this system, as it is called; but when pose of detaining the laboring population to work in the the internal improvement bills were up to expend a mil-factories. There is no room for dispute about it, and, lion or so in money, in the Northeast, no motion was therefore, the Senators who undertake to answer the remade to lay them down. The word system was not then port of the Land Committee, prudently pass by that mepronounced; this bill for adjusting the business of inter-morial, and the unanswerable argument founded upon it, nal improvement was not once alluded to. All passed although referred to in the body of the report, and quoted without hesitation or question. System, indeed! It is verbatim in the appendix. The fact is clear; the conclunone, and cannot be. It does not even profess to bind a sion irresistible; the character undeniable, that this land future Congress, and could not if it would. It does not bill is a tariff measure; and that the new States are to even profess to abstain from future appropriations, and be oppressed in the price of the public lands, for the could not prevent them if it tried. Future Congresses purpose of preventing emigration, and of supplying la will do as they please. Future majorities will do as they borers to the factories. please. Unequal appropriations will go on as freely as The bill is certainly adroitly drawn; it is calculated upon ever; the only difference will be, that the land revenue a wide-spread scheme, and universal design to attract all will be thrown to that object, in addition to all the expend- interests to engage in the oppression of the West. The itures which would otherwise have been made. In one proceeds of the sales of the public lands are to be divided respect only it may be considered as a system, and that a among all the States, and for all sorts of purposes--to pay most disastrous one; a system of setting aside the pro-old debts for roads and canals, or to make new roads and ceeds of particular branches of the revenue, to answer canals with ready money--to promote education--and to specific purposes, and thus getting clear of surplus reve-colonize free negroes on the coast of Africa. Certainly nue without reducing taxes! Land revenue is the branch these multiplied objects must enlist a great multitude now to be set aside; the revenue from woollens, cottons, against the new States, and excite their cupidity to the iron, salt, &c. &c., may follow next year. There is no highest degree to get hold of the public domain for their end to that system when once begun. It is now com- respective objects. One of these objects, from the efforts menced on the weakest part of the Union, because they which have been made to recommend it to public favor, are the weakest, and the least able to defend themselves. and the profound ignorance which pervades the public The South is to be tempted into it by a share of the West-mind with respect to its feasibility, demands a word of eluern spoils and next year the West is to be tempted into cidation; I speak of the colonization scheme; for the prothe continuation of the system, by getting a share of the secution of which this bill commits the federal domain, Southern spoils. Thus a revenue of any amount, twenty-and the political powers of this Federal Government. A five or thirty millions, may be kept up, by dexterously more visionary, a more chimerical, and a more impractiplaying off the South against the West, and the West cable project never entered the head of man, than this against the South, and making them alternately co-operate scheme, and this I will demonstrate by facts and reasons with the Northeast in plundering each other. which no candid man can permit himself to dispute.

that.

It is not a system for the settlement of the internal im- Two distinct views of the project demonstrate this improvement question. Its object is very different from possibility: first, the experience of Great Britain; secondIt is a tariff bill; it is an ultra tariff measure; the ly, the authentic reports of our own Colonization Society, strongest and the boldest which has been attempted at Each view is conclusive; either, taken separately, put an this session. Tariff is stamped upon its face; tariff is em- end to hope; both, taken together, condemn it irrevocablazoned upon its borders; tariff is proclaimed in all its bly. All the world knows something, but few know the features. In the first place, it is intended, by diverting real history of the British attempt at African colonization. the land revenue from the support of the Government, to The expense in money and in lives, and the total failure create a vacuum in the treasury, which must be filled up of the undertaking, are but slightly known. The moneyed by duties on imported goods. In the next place, it is in- expense has been prodigious. The chief justice of Sierra tended, by keeping up the price of the public lands, to Leone, Mr. Jeffcott, in a charge to a grand jury in the prevent the emigration of laboring people from the manu- capital of the colony, in June, 1830, stated the expense facturing States, and retain them where they were born, for the last ten years to amount to £7,000,000 sterling, to work in the factories. This is the true character of the (about 33 millions of dollars;) that the number of Africans bill; a tariff bill; a land tariff bill; conceived according to brought in during that period was between 18 and 19,000; the plan of Mr. Rush, in 1828, and the memorial of the and that the expense of each had been about £300 sterNew York Tariff Convention in November of the last year. ling, (near 1,500 dollars;) and that the total population of The Committee on Public Lands charged this design upon the colony was then but little upwards of 20,000 souls. this bill; they quoted Mr. Rush, and the memorial of the This gives an idea of the expense in money. But a more New York Tariff Convention, to prove that character upon dreadful account of expenditure is still to be opened. It it; and their charge has not been met. A feeble attempt at is the expense of human life! Every Governor sent to the the vindication of Mr. Rush has fixed the design more colony had perished under the climate, one only excepted, firmly upon him. The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. CLAY] and he had perished under the knives of the native neinforms the Senate that he suggested to Mr. Rush, before groes. The soldiers and sailors sent there were swept his report was communicated to Congress, that it might off in crowds. No seasoning in any other part of the be misunderstood, and that he had better omit what re- world could prepare them for the horrors of this African lated to the public lands and the manufactures. He sug- climate. Troops from the West Indies, from the Cape of gested to him that it might be misunderstood! Yes, mis- Good Hope, the East Indies, all shared the same fate. understood! and that very phrase proves that it was under- The only difference was, that the drunkards died the first stood! that the Senator from Kentucky understood it at the season, and the sober ones the second or third. This first blush precisely as every body else has understood it waste of life and money induced the British Parliament, But the memorial of the New York Conven- in 1826, to open a commission to examine into the state of tion, which has been printed and laid upon our tables, that the colony; the result was a determination to contraet their

ever since.

establishments, to withdraw most of their troops, and to surrender all hope of success.

[SENATE.

I must protest against the application of the public lands to this object. It is several years since things have been The last annual report of the American Colonization So- taking that turn. Mr. KING, of New York, the most conciety proves and establishes the inability of their efforts. spicuous author of the Missouri question, first proposed Look at their own statements. At page 41, it is stated, it in the Senate. His resolution was submitted in 1824, and correctly stated, that the annual increase of the black but led to no result. The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. population is from 75 to 80,000 souls, and that it will re- CLAY] now moves it in a more formal and determined quire this number to be annually carried off to check the manner. The managers of the Society have themselves growth of that population among us. At page 10, it is stat-looked to it, and have curiously mixed up a calculation of ed, and correctly stated, that the arrival of 1,000 emigrant wordly gain, a question of profit in a moneyed point of negroes in any one year would be the ruin of the colony! view, with this devotion of the public lands to their favorthat even that small number of new comers would make ite object. At page 23 of their last annual report, after a revolut on, and require an armed force to keep the claiming an appropriation of the public lands, they go on peace among them. Here, then, are two facts, which to add, that it should not be forgotten that, whatever apput an end to the illusions of this scheme. Seventy-five propriations should be made by the Government to this thousand per annum must go, before the increase of the object, the greater part would be expended in giving emblacks is checked at home--before we can feel any na-ployment to our shipping and to citizens of the United tional advantage from it; and the arrival of 1,000 would States. Thus philanthropy and wordly gain are to go destroy the colony, and put an end to the project! Can hand in hand; the shipping interest and those employed in argument, or commentary, add to the force of these two conducting the scheme are to get the greater part of whatfacts, presented by the managers of the Society themselves ever is expended. The public lands of the West are to in their last annual report?

fall into the current which is sweeping off every thing else. Farmers of the West are to be required to furnish annually millions--compelled to pay infinitely more for refuse land than citizens of Maine pay for first choices, to furnish money to enrich the shippers, as well as to buy lands to be given as a donation to the negroes carried to Africa; and all this in addition to furnishing as much as will defray the expenses of the State Governments in all the old States.

Individuals may give their money: benevolent persons may follow the impulse of their feelings in bestowing their charity upon this project. Their money is their own, and they may do what they please with it. But can legislators and statesmen follow the same impulsions, and act in the same manner, with respect to the revenues of the people? Can they commit this Government upon a scheme of African colonization, without counting the cost in life and money, and asking themselves if the success is to justify the Mr. B. concluded with showing that the question was expenditure? The total English expense in the fifty years of now between the plans of the two committees—the Comher experiment cannot have been less than eighty or ninety mittee on Manufactures, which was for keeping up the millions of dollars. The destruction of life has been appal-price of the lands; and the Committee on Public Lands, ling. The description of Edmund Burke has been real-who were for reducing the price to one dollar per acre ized, that it was a region where the gates of death stood for fresh lands, and fifty cents per acre for such as had open day and night for the reception of its victims. Go-been in market five years, with a right of preference to vernors and judges, soldiers and mariners, all go. Our actual settlers; and he called upon all the friends of the colony is on the same ground. It is not only within the West to stand forward and show their friendship on this chartered, but within the settled limits of the British co- occasion, by voting down the plan of the Manufacturing lony; the mortality must be the same when our establish- Committee, and sustaining that of the Public Land Comments equal theirs. If this scheme is followed up, and mittee. this Federal Government becomes committed to that scheme, a territorial government must be sent to Africa. A detachment of the army and of the navy must be sent there, and courts armed with strong criminal jurisdiction. If left to themselves, the colony will be in civil war before it reaches 20,000 souls. Violence prevails all over the world. The second man that was born killed the first. Murders, seditions, revolutions, go on every where. Can it be expected that this medley of negroes, part from America, part from Africa, some full blood, some half blood, will realize the visionary speculation of human perfectibility, and be kept in order by moral restraints, and the The proposition was opposed, on the ground that the mild punishment of interdiction from the use of fire and printing of the extra number of copies would be to circu water in Africa? For the Roman punishment by exile is late erroneous information, as the bill would probably be the highest now known in our colony. No! these re-amended in its progress through the Senate. straints will soon fail. They will fail as they did in the The motion was negatived, as also was a motion by Mr. British colony before it reached 20,000, and require all MARCY to print 300 extra copies.

FRIDAY, JUNE 29.
THE TARIFF.

The bill from the House, to alter and amend the several acts imposing duties on imports, was read twice, referred to the Committee on Manufactures, and ordered to be printed.

Mr. POINDEXTER moved to print an additional number of copies of the bill, for the purpose of extending information of its details through the country.

Mr. TYLER suggested that an estimate of the amount of revenue which would be cut off by the new bill be embraced in the statement.

the machinery of a strong Government to keep the ne- Mr. GRUNDY then offered a resolution requiring the groes in peace. Who is prepared to establish that Go-Secretary of the Senate to prepare a statement of the duverament in Africa? To spread our constitution across ties imposed by existing laws, and those imposed by the the Atlantic, and beneath the equator, and stretch it over bill which had now passed the House of Representatives. a race for which it was not made? Who is prepared to expend a hundred millions of money in this attempt, and to send the sons of our farmers--the soldiers and mariners of the republic-to perish on that pestilential coast? Those Mr. GRUNDY suggested that this information could who are not prepared for these things should stop at once, only be obtained from the Treasury Department. The and refuse to commit their Government upon a project information called for by his resolution would be neceswhich must involve all these consequences, and, after in- sary to enable the Senate to act on the bill. He presumvolving them, must end as the British attempt at coloniza-ed the Committee on Manufactures would be able to retion has ended, in demonstrating its total impracticability. port the bill on Monday or Tuesday.

As a Western man, as a citizen of one of the new States, Mr. CLAY moved to amend the resolution, by calling VOL. VIII.--73

SENATE.]

Death of Mr Mitchell.--Portrait of Washington.--Harbor Bill.--Public Lands.

[JUNE 30, 1832.

for a statement also of the rates of duties imposed by the The resolution was then ordered to be engrossed, and two bills reported by the Committee on Manufactures of read a third time. the Senate.

HARBOR BILL.

The amendment was accepted by Mr. GRUNDY as a modification of his resolution, and the resolution, as modi-made by the House to the harbor bill, disagreeing to an The Senate then proceeded to consider the amendment fied, was then agreed to.

DEATH OF Mr. MITCHELL.

A message was received from the House of Representatives, by Mr. Clarke, the Clerk of the House, announc ing the death of GEORGE E. MITCHELL, one of the Representatives from the State of Maryland, of that House, and that his funeral would take place at 5 o'clock P. M.

On motion of Mr. CHAMBERS, the Senate then came to the following resolution:

Resolved, That the Senate will attend the funeral of the Hon. G. E. MITCHELL, one of the Representatives from the State of Maryland, this day at 5 o'clock P. M., and, as a tribute of respect for the memory of the deceased, that the Senators will go into mourning, by wearing crape on the left arm for thirty days.

On motion of Mr. CHAMBERS,
The Senate then adjourned.

SATURDAY, JUNE 30.

PORTRAIT OF WASHINGTON.

On motion of Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN, the Senate took up the resolution for the purchase of the original portrait of George Washington, by Rembrandt Peale.

amendment of the Senate relative to the bridge over the Wabash river, at Terre Haute, (Indiana,) and the Senate receded from their amendment.

[Whilst this amendment was undecided, Mr. TIPTON, of Indiana, said, the House of Representatives having dis agreed to the amendment, he wished the Senate to recede from it. He said he should be very glad to see th ́s bridge constructed, provided this could be done without interrupting the navigation of the river. A portion of his constituents were anxious to have an appropriation for this bridge: another portion of them, and, he thought, a smaller one, were opposed to it, fearing that it would injure the navigation of the Wabash; but the provision of the bill which the House had stricken out, protected the naviga tion of this river. It was not his design to speak of the action of the House, nor of the motives of those who produced that action; nor would he give a history of this bridge in the Senate, and in the other House; he would, however, remark, that it had twice passed the Senate, first in a separate bill, containing an appropriation for the ent to the harbor bill, the one now before the Senate. Cumberland road, and latterly in the form of an amend He was opposed to endangering the passage of this bill at for continuing the Cumberland road in his State, and for this late period of the session. It contained a provision other important works of internal improvement, and he hoped that the Senate would recede for this time, and let the bill pass.]

PUBLIC LANDS.

Mr. F. moved to fill the blank with 2,000 dollars. He founded his motion, first, on the accuracy of the likeness, and, secondly, on the nature of the subject itself. He stated the opinions of Judge Marshall, Judge Washington, and other distinguished men, as to the accuracy of the re semblance. He considered this work as a conception of taste and genius, and the value of these efforts of genius, The Senate then resumed the consideration of the bill in dollars and cents, must depend upon the taste of those to appropriate, for a limited time, the proceeds of the pubwho purchase. He had no doubt that many painters could be found who would paint a portrait of Washington for 250 dollars; but this was the work which it would be most becoming the dignity and taste of the Senate to possess-the portrait of Peale. It was not the price of the canvas or the oil which was to be considered, but the value of the immortal mind which was portrayed by the painter.

Mr. SMITH stated that Stewart received only 1,000 dollars for his best portraits; and he would have no objection to give 1,000 dollars for this. Stewart had engaged to make him a copy for 600 dollars, but it could not be obtained from him.

lic lands.

The question pending being on the motion of Mr. MOORE indefinitely to postpone the bill,

Mr. BENTON resumed his remarks in continuation, against the general features of the measure, as unjust to the new States. He contended that, by the distribution proposed of the proceeds among the several States, Indana, though she paid as much as Ohio, would only receive half the amount as her share of the sales; in like manner, Ilino's, one-fourth; Missouri, one-fifth; and Alabama and Mississippi, in no proportion to the money paid by them severally. That it was also unjust to the old Mr. WEBSTER said that he had taken his idea of Wash- States, and to the people of the Union generally, as it ington from the portraits of Stewart. He admitted the would keep up the price of the public lands above their merits of his picture, and said that if it was to be regarded value; and that it was a plan much less beneficial than that as an original, which he supposed it was, the price ought recommended by the Committee on Public Lands, which not to be in the way. An original head of Washington, would make a reduction in the price of one-half. He adby Stewart, was lately sold for 1,500 dollars, and the pur-verted to the modes proposed by the bill under considerchaser would not listen to an offer of 5,000 for it. Ination, for the application of the proceeds by the States England, if its character were as high as it is here, it would to various purposes. That for the purpose of the African fetch a much higher price.

Mr. WHITE thought that if it were the intention of the Senate to own the portrait, they should not cavil about the price. No private gentleman would think of giving less. His acquaintance with the original of the likeness had been but slight, but it was his impression that it was vastly superior to any other he had ever seen.

colonization, lie contended, was visionary, chimerical, and totally impracticable; instancing the failure of an attempt by the British to establish a colony at Cape Coast Castle, Sierra Leone-its total failure, from the mortality of the climate, &c. Their plan of colonization at Liberia would in the end also result in failure from various causes, and in the interim could only serve to enrich the shipping inte Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN then moved to amend the re-rest, and to keep up the price of the public domain for solution, by adding a provision that the portrait be hung this and other purposes. In conclusion, he denounced it in a conspicuous part of the Senate chamber, under the as radically wrong and unjust. direction of the President of the Senate, and that the expenses thereof be paid out of the contingent fund; which was agreed to.

The words "of New York” were then stricken out, on motion of Mr. MARCY, who stated that Mr. Peale was not of New York.

Mr. MOORE said he would occupy a few minutes of the time of the Senate, in assigning the reasons which influenced him in submitting the proposition now pending, and which inclined him to the support of the bill reported by the Committee on Public Lands.

I consider, sir, said Mr. M., that this is a measure of the