Litchfield enquirer., 1830-02-11
MR.. WEBSTERsS SPEECH.

L
inq7siry into the ezpcdiency Of abolish
ing the office Of the Surveyors General,
and Of s~sPeHding the Surveys Of the p~b-
| Tic lands.
Mr.. WEBSTER said, although he might
be among those who saw no necessity for
the resolution, ye. he was not one who
saw any harm in it. II conferred no new
powers on the Committee on Public Lands.
But whatever he might think of the reso-
luton after what had fallen from a Sena-
tor from S. Carolina, (Mr. Haync,) he
could not avoid saying what impression it
had made upon his mind. IL he saw no ne
cessity for the first resolution, still less did
he see the necessity for tho amendment Of
the Senator from New Hampshire, (Mr.
Woodbury. fit was the fact that we had
SO much land IN the market, could it be
supposed that any law was necessary to
expedite the sale Of the Public Lands, or
to throw any more into the market2 He
thought the great evil, so far as thCre was
an evil, the increase Of population had not
kept up with the quantity Of lands thrown
into the market. What we need was not
( acres, but hands. There was land enough,
no selling them at prices nearly nominal,
no giving them away, could accelerate the
population beyond its present increase.
The Senator from S. Carolina seems
to think the policy of the U. States has
been that of hard step mother towards
the Western country. He had alluded to
the policy Of European powers in planting
colonies. Was there any analogy between
the cases ON which salesman could stand,
and make an argument ? Were the West
ern settlements colonies Had they fed
from the law Of the country? Far from
it-they had gone under the shadow of the
wing Of the parent country. Had not the
United States paid millions on millions for
extinguishing Indian titles, and for the de-
fence of the people? Was there any
comparison between that and European
policy?
Take the State Of Ohio.-When did
she begin to have respectable existence 7.
You know that down to the year '93 or "a,
the only settlements were a little village
on the Muskingum, and perhaps another
at Cincinnati. The first settlement might
be dated from the victory Of Wayne. in
'94. In IS years, here was State Of a
million and half of people, Was this
proof of happiness2 The State had run
away from the old thirteen States. 1t
would be perilous' for any man sO soy that
Ii.is CxP-TlsuvaIr had: uot succeedCd. He.
looked with wonder anu uSndgcusvs'. a.
wisdom which had governed the country,
and arranged tho subject of the Public
Lauds, aud given an impetus TO the popu-
lation, which had gone On increasing al
most until the present moment.
Our Public Lands wefe derived from
four principal sources. The cession by the
States at the close Of tho war then the
cession of Georgia; then the purchase Of
Louisiana then the purchase Of Florida.
Where was the power % give away these
lands2 Were not the lands pledged to
the public debt2 But this was not the o.
riginal mortgage. The FIRST pledge was 10
the whole States for the "public good"
and for Virginia among those States.-
When this cession was made, some Of tho
States were filed to their chartered limits,
while some of them contained vast quanti-
ties Of unsettled crown land. During the
Revolutionary war, the smaller States
complained /; the remonstrance was that
their ccssion Of the States Of portion Of
the crown lands, which by political neces-
sity would become the property Of the
States, would benefit the States, holding
them, as we'll as others.-In Congress, in
1880, the States were requested to make
cessions, and Congress resolved that the
lands thus acquired should be held for the
common benefit, and to be settled and dis
posed Of in such manner as Congress
should Understanding these lands under
those express stipnlatiOns, was it possible
that Congress could give this land away :
Gould they consider il in any other
way than as so much money iO the Tsoasu-
rys
It would be found that other States dis.
posed oflands on the same grounds as did
Virginia. Massachusetts, Connecticut,
and North Carolina, did the same. The
United States received them under stipu-
lations which good faith required them TO
observe. One Of them was that the Uni
ted States should not govern them long as
Tcrritories. Had the United States NOT
done this Had not the States been ad-
mi,ted as soon as there was any plausible
reason for Il Z States having twenty mem
beers in tho House, and two members here,
had given al their support 70 admit state
with equal power here, which wo.sld have
but one member in the House. This was
a vast disproportion Of political pswer.--.
| Rut he did not know that any persan had