Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1847-01-02
WAR TAXES.


Thursday night for the following copy of Letter
which, it appears by the date of it, was addressed
by the Secretary Of the Treasury, ten days ago, to
the Committee of Ways and Means Of the House
| of Representatives
TREASURY DEPARTMESr, DECEMBER 81, 1916.
Sin Permit most respectfully call your attention TO
the views submitted in my last annual report in regard
posing duties on tea and coffee.
These duties suggested in view Of the necessity of OBJ
tanning the loan therein proposed, and this Department feels
bound to communicate the opinion entertained by it, that in
the absence of these duties it will probably be wholly inn
practicable to negotiate the loan such would be
permitted by Congress.
Most respectfully your obedient servant,
r. J. WALKER,
Secretary of the Treasury.
/ Hon. JAMES ]. McKAr,
Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means.
! This frank and 1--WE must say honest Letter from
the Head of the Treasury Department, fully con-
firms, as the conviction of the Secretary, what we
viz that unless additional taxes are laid upon ar
ticles which will Immediately and certainly pro-
duce additional revenue it will probably be "wholly
impracticable " to negotiate further loan of money
for the Government upon any reasonable terms.
The Secretary of the Treasury might have added,
what he will yet be obliged to say to Congress pub
licly, or privately to the Members, that even with
the aid of the proposed new taxes, he can obtain
no loan upon any terms until the Subtreasury be
repealed, or in some way other rendered nope
ratiye. This is what Congress must come to, UNI
less they desire to see the War with Mexico brought
to an end by the absolute failure of ability to carry
1t on.
The organ of the Administration accompanies
this Letter with urgent exhortations to Congress to
carry the Secretary's recommendations into effect.
1t trusts $ that the recommendation of the Secre-
tary of the Treasury will meet at once the favor
able attention Of Congress- &c. If it be true that
there is, as the government paper says, but one
feeling among the Democracy on the subject of the
prosecution of the War;" why has not the recon-
mendation, made by the President in his Annual
Message and repeated by the Secretary of the Trea-
sury in his Annual Report, four weeks ago, receiv-
ed at an earlier day the sanction, in some form or
other of the Representatives of the Democracy in
both Houses of Congress In each House they
greatly outnumber the Wings and they are re-
sponsble to the country for getting us honorably
their choice has plunged US, and about the prosecu-
ton of which it seems there is, among that party
/" but one feeling" 1t is an odd sort of manifesto
ton Of that feeling, that, with the knowledge that
the War cannot be further prosecuted without the
provision of further means for carrying it on, an
entire month of the session has been suffered to
pass away without the first step having been taken
towards this object in the House of Representatives
to which House belongs exclusively the right OF
originating bills for raising revenue. Nay, not
only has step for that purpose been taken by the
/ House Of Representatives, with its overpowering
Democratic bias, but its Committee of Ways and
Means, consisting of three Wing members and six
other members selected for their supposed political
devotion TO the Administration, has to this day re-
fused or neglected to report any bill conformabe to
the joint recommendation of the President and the
Secretary of the Treasury at the opening of the
sessions this refusal neglect continuing also for
more than week after receiving the information
from the Secretary that the laying of these taxes
on Tea and Coffee are indispensable to the pro-
secution of the War.
Upon these facts one of three things is clearly
practicable: either that the government paper is
mistaken about the unanimity of opinion among the
Democracy in all parts Of the country upon the
subject of the War that the Secretary Of the Trea-
sury himself is entirely in error in supposing addi
tional revenue to be indispensably necessary to
carry on the Government that there is in the
Committee of Ways and Means, if not in the ma
jority of the House Of Representatives, manifest
indsposition to sustain the Administration in the
present emergency.
Without remarking more particularly upon this
state of things, having accomplished our present
purpose by directing the attention of our readers to
its existence, we leave what there is incompre-
hensbe about it to be explained by the light which
time will certainly throw upon it.
DEsERTIoNs FROM THE AMERICAN ARMY.-A cor
respondent of the New Orleans Tropic, writing
from Monterey on the 9th ultimo, says:
ARKANSAS CONGRESSIONAL ELEcTIoN.-The New
Orleans " Tropic' of the oath ultimo has the fol-
lowing:
"The election for member of Congress the State Of Ar
kansas took place Monday Of last week We yesterday
gave letter from correspondent Little Rock dated the
nth Instant in which the writer expressed the opinion that