Richmond enquirer. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1815-1867, 1841-07-06


REPORT on THE FINANCES.
SPEECH OF Ms. WOODBURY., OF \. HAMPSHIRE.
In Senate, Eednesday, June 10, loil.-On the mo-
ton Of Mr.. CLAY OF Kentucky 10 print l,''oo CO.
pies of the Report of the Secretary vi the Treasury
on the finances Concluded
BY the time Of the next meeting Of this body, we
shall be able 10 see whether the present additional pa
tent medicines now proposed for relief of all kinds are
successful or be followed by some new P"ticai
panaeea and the political millennium to come which Is
again and again postponed notwithstanding all the con-
fdent Wing prophecies 10 the contrary.
have done with the expenditures and receipts
with deficits and debts-and next Will advert 10 the
measures o relief proposed 10 get rid OF any deposits or
debts which the Secretary calculates TO exist IN sueh
inflated, exaggerated amounts
The General Government, the States, and the peo-
pe are all represented BY him and by the President to
be in most suffering condition.; and, not cnntenied TO
administer advice TO the patient placed in their charge
BIZ the Constitution, VIZ: the General Government,
they embraced in their benevolent plans all the disor-
ders of the State Governments, and all the ills which
flesh is heir TO among the people At large Some brlei
views their extended system OF leglslating Tor al
most every body and ,hngon the character and
propriety of these extraordinary of relief and
shall relieve the Senate from any further attention TO
this occasion, any poitt whatever connected
with this report.
The frs, prominen; feature in the relief proposed, is
TO magnify its extent and importance IN all possible
WAYS like many physicians, who attempt t.
the smallest scratch slightest fever, without seeking
10 persuade the patient and his friends that lock Jaws
choeras and all other horrors have been escaped BY
sorting to their skill and aid.
The next is, when the General Government is repre-
scented be embarrassed and overloaded With monstrous
debts and deficits 10 bt.iu and take from three mil
lions ofits present Not 10 take from It
plus-relieve it of ncumbrance but while debllita
ed they say, ng with exhaustion, TO bleed 1t
three millions
No, satisfied with this, the mex, wise proposition is
IL take from it million more, and to g We it
to those States who at tins moment indebted 10 il
twenty eight millions; and who so far from hav
ing any claim 10 this nine millions as debt due, are
bound in law and common honesty, and By their
plighted faith to pay US back in this exigency the
whole of that tweniyeight millions. THIS giving
away of twelve millions by US, when represented 10 be
much in debt, that should be paid-ihs ''new way of
paying old debts, is sagacious and profound,
to have occurred TO the editor Of the farce
under that title 1t is left to the present Admnstra
ton of its gorles, to have made the great dis
covery.
The next unique or peculiar feature in the measures
proposed is to grow rich by banking on borrowed ca
pita This is the sovereign remedy, and proposed
and elaborated in supplemental reports with much
gravity, notwithstanding the monuments of ruin now
standing before Us, from similar quack experiments
in Michigan, in Mississippi, and ii is TO be feared, in
several other States, and which identical kind of ef
fort to grow rich in way, has brought them
most OF the evils we are advised to help remove by
precisely the kind Of hazardous and runous ex
pertinent.
Another feature running through The whole Of these
rare schemes is that TO raise the Wind not
for one alone but for the whole of them at first BY
means ofthe boosted modern credit system-not by
any present surplus, for they pretend thcTe def
cency-not by retaining all our present revenues, for
many of those they propose to give away-not hy re-
ducing our expenditures for those they reconn'en nd 10
increase but BY overlooking this already embarrassed
Government, they call it, and this already ruined
people, they pretend, and all their posterity for
with an immense, permanent, national debt, in peri
cd of profound peace with all foreign nations.
Yes, one of the most striking elements in these re-
concentrations, not yet enlarged on, is, after denounc
ing the past Administration wasteu with expenses
only twenty three millions last year, and proposed TO
be no, over twenty this year, and yet Processes TO
tce retrenchment and reform, by increasing these ex
penses to twenty millions, and 20 relieve the public
suffering by adding to the debt millions millions for
the dangerous and reckless experiment in public
banking that has occurred since the Mississippi scheme
of John Law, more than century ago. III our new
plans this report reach Europe and there under
Standaue, think shall obtain the high reputation
of being very Soomons in wisdom as TO moneyed mat
ters and shall succeed, ought such bases, in
obtaining there liberal loans.
The whole, sir, IS wrong in fundamental principles
would call it, except for the high whence it
emana,ed system OF most wretched quackery in both
politics and finance. 1t Of the Bddle school
throughout.
We should begin well end in economy We
should resort to old fashioned iugalty in expenses
old fashioned thrift by industry We should begin as
we'll advance, by saving and abor-by holding to
our present resources-keeping what have already
got, and instead giving them away like the spend
thrift obtaining more, so far real wants require
and as be raised without proving too burthensome
10 the people.
As the Georgia memorial justly prays, should re-
duce rather than increase expenses; and the financial
committees could too call on the President and
Secretary for specific plans and items for reducton
as to bring down the aggregate to the thirteen fifteen
millions approved by that memorial and the Senator
from Kentucky. There is not single pointed
out in either retrenchment Let them practice what
they preach. Let not have economy merely in
speeches, but extravaganza in vo,cs-reform gene.
rails, but waste in all particulars Let us moi begin
at this session with proposal to increase judicial saa
res-as at the last session Of the Senate after the 4th
of March, with putting officers salaries with no du-
ties for months TO perform, and with advocating add.
tona allowances to others. Above ALL Sir let us not
resort the miserable shifts of desperate debtors by
kting and loans 10 postpone merely The evil day
bu, increase greatly, in the end, The debt and then
most compacently concnr with the Secretary in this
report, that such of his eariy and ttectua mea
to prerent The further augmentation OF the DEBT"
He Is also to "prevent this further augmentation of
the debt" by paying, as before remarked, three mil
lions of our from lands and nine millions
fourth instament, and supply the amount of them by
new loan increased debt TO the amount of twelve
million of dollars. He is to do this, too, when it is ap
parent the dome your Capitol tina, they have no
claim on Us for o dollar due ae debt bat really owe