The National Register. — London, England, 1808-01-04 00:00:00

JAN. 4. Nov. V.-Mr. J. Clay presented a Memorial from sun dry inhabitants and traders of the city of Philadelphia, praying that the Act prohibiting the importation of certain goods, wares, and merchandize, passed the 18th April, 1806, may be repealed. Mr, Clay moved, that the Memorial be referred to the Committee of Commerce and Manufactures. Mr. Rowan hoped the Petition would not be referred to any Committee, He thought it would be beneath the dig nity of the House to give it any consideration. Had he been in Congress at the time the law passed, he would have voted against it ; but as it had passed, and as we had re ceived a fresh insult from Great Britain in the attack on the Chesapeake, he would not vote for its repeal. Mr. Crowninshield said, that from the rumours which were afloat, and the disposition of Great Britain, he enter tained no hope that she would do America justice. She was making great preparations, endeavouring to decoy the Indians on our frontiers, and was arming her Militia in Canada and Nova Scotia. Mr. Randolph said, if the prayers of the petitioners was improper, would it not be better to expose their errors in a masterly Report from a Committee, than to slam the dour in their faces, and affecting all the airs of an Asiatic Sovereign, refuse to hear them ? We were, he believed, on the eve of a war with Great Britain; and we were treading in the very footsteps of the British Ministry on the eve cf an American War, and on the eve of the French War. The House, Mr. R. said, had now been in session five weeks; and, on the eve of a war, they were discussing whether we should import locks with brass nobs or locks with iron nobs ; they were sitting there looking at one another, read ing newspapers, writing letters, receiving back checks, and counting their money ; and the nation was precisely in the same situation as it was when the House first assembled. If we were to have a war with Great Britain, as he believed we were, it would become the House at the outset to con ciliate those by whom that war was to be carried on ; he meant by those, the great body of the American people, and not the rich merchant more than the landholders, but not less. After a long debate, the question was then taken for re ferring the Petition to a Committee of the whole House, and it was lost.—ayes 50—Noes 80. The petition was ordered to lie on the table. NEW YORK, Dm R.—The visit of General Moreau to the westward, and the expedition of his travelling., has ex cited a variety of conjecture in the political world. A friend of the General has handed us the following account of the motives of his journey, which will fully satisfy the curiosity, and allay the suspicions of those who are always watching the movements of great characters. " The General had some time ago, the misfortune of losing his only son. His Lady has also been under the necessity of returning to France, in order finally to settle some family con cerns. Such painful separation, added to the dreadful loss which he hid just experienced, have rendered his house so to tally disagreeable to him, that in order to divert his griefs, he has determined to undertake this excursion, and visit the Ohio and slissis4ippi, as far down as New Orleans. His intention is only to remain a few da i s at the latter place, as he wishes to be in Charleston next February, and in New York the follow ing month. " The season being so far advanced, made it necessary for him to travel with some rapidity, and it wa►; only a few das before he left New York, that he was informed a passage could be proi ured. E' This explanation was perhaps unnere.ssary, for no person of common sense will imagine, tti.et one of the greate,bt THE NATIONAL REGISTER. 7 of the age, should be willing to change his high fame for that of an adventurer," - - - The Senate of the United States have appointed a Corn. mittee to investigate the conduct of John Smith, Senator of the United States from the State of Ohio, as it relates to his connections with Aaron Burr. Mr. Smith is said to be at Washington. A Resolution has passed the house of Representatives of the State of Maryland, granting leave to bring in a Bill, entitled, an Act to abolish all such parts of the Constitu tion and form of Government, as relate to the time and manner of electing the Senate, and the mode of tilling up vacancies in that body.—Yeas 97, Nays 9. WLST INDIES. 7. 11 ! .t„\i, i *. SLAVE TRADF. Ja.m.tica..—The House of Assembly of Jamaica have made a report on the Act passed in the last Session of Parliament, for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. It is the object of this report to represent the stop put to the importation of Slaves, as ruinous to the Colonies. This has been always the argument of those who opposed that benevolent measures but it is obvious that if it were true, it cannot be proved by any effects which have yet resulted from the abolition, as sufficient time has not yet elapsed to sheer• either benefits or disadvantages of the Act. if, however, the wisdom of the Legislature had not adopted that measure, it is to be feared that the Colonists would have experienced the dreadful effects of an abolition, not brought about by the influence of law, but by violence. The constant and unlimited importation of Negroes from Africa would have finally reduced our West Ind►a Islands to the melancholy situation of St. Domingo. The following are the Resolutions of the Committee of the House : " Resolved, That the Act of the Imperial Parliament for abolishing the Slave Trade, is pregnant with evils to this bland, militating not only against its general welfare and interest, but threatening its total destruction as a British West India Colony. That depriving this extensive and yet unsettled Island of the means of a supply of labourers from Africa, to cultivate the soil, must be eventually ruinous to the Proprietors and others interested in it : many indui-trions and enterprising settlers, who have braved the difficulties and hardships always attendant Lit infant embellishments in the interior and mountainous situations. will, with their families, be reduced to poverty and wretched ness; and, when these settlements are abandoned by their pre sent inhabitants, they will become the haunts and fastnesses of disaffected and rebellious negroes. That properties in possession of mortgagees, receivers, guardians, and others, must shortly fall a sacrifice to this Parliamentary regulations : becau,e, from their peculiar circumstances, they cannot be supplied with la bourers, the result of w hick w ill be, to deprive a numerous de scription of persons, from the earliest state of infancy to the most advanced and helpless ages, of the common means of edit cation :Ind support." The Jamaica Papers received on Tuesday, contains a Memorial of the Committee of Planters, Merchants, and others, interested in the West ludia Colonies, which though presented so k►ug ago as last June, has not, till now, been published in any Paper in this country. In this Memorial the Planters complain, That where the relaxation of the navigation system would be beneficial to the British Planter, it is enforced; and, where the enforcement of it would be beneficial to him. it is unaccountably relaxed by the novel permission granted to the Neutral Power of cam ing the produce of his rivals to undersell him at the European market. •• That your Memorialists are unwilling to intrude their con cerns upon the important relations of the Mother Country with Neutral Powers ; but humbly conceive, that it cie;pwt reasuaa- ~ •. .~ i~ cl 4 it • • I . .44 --.....,......' i' t ~~~ .. ~ r d