The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1851-03-08

answer To tHia whole systasn Of internal inn
provemeuts than the numbers Of memorials on
our table, asking the general government TO
undo what they have done. say, sir, that even
II we had the p~per, il the Constitution con-
tanned elAuse directly authorizing Congress to
improve the rivers and harbors OF the country,
that Il would be better to yield up the power at
once. What do know Of the wants Of the
rivers in California, Oregon, or Maine! And
what do the representatives of distant States and
territories know about the wants of the people
of louisiana Why have the thirty members
from the States of New York or Pennsylvania
| right to invite commerce to their doors by
making these improvements at the expense OF
the general government! Ii should be left to
private competition There is not a single
power OF this government that could not be ex-
ercised cheaper and better if left to private conf
petition. We hear great deal about cheap
postage; Out il we had no government mails,
private expresses would bring letters and pack
ages to our doors cheaper and better than the
mails do. Look at the telegraph, the great i'm
provement Of the present century, and which
has conferred immortality on the INVENTOR
Why, sir, IL the government had undertaken to
supply the country with telegraphs, there would
not have been one-tenth of the telegraphic fa-
cties that there now are, The energy Of the
American people is such that wherever private
enterprise and competition are at work, they
will beat our government. ! am willing, how
ever, that the government should exercise every
power that has been granted to it by the Con-
stitution. | am willing, for instance, that it
should exercise power over the post office; for,
| although there is no doubt that in the older
States-in New York and New England-the
no,.H h. XIV, TO- fas
| yet in some of the new States, there might not
be population and means enough.
Mr.. Chairman, without the least fear Of con
tradiction invoke the authority of every repub-
lican or Democratic President, against this mon
strous system of internal improvements and it
| is no answer to say that occasionally they have
been impelled by stern necessity to sign some
isolated bill, for which, in most cases, they have
endeavored to. draw some distinction, and have
universally made such an act an exception; and
though they may be convicted Of inconsistency,
| it is not any argument in favor of this power
| If you can improve river already navigable,
and tax the people of the interior for the bene-
| fit of those residing on the borders of rivers
creeks and bayous, why will you not make the
canals and railroads to bring the produce of the
interior to the streams already navigable? 1t
would no doubt be for the general welfare, as
it would also be to build carriages, rail cars, and
all the necessary means of transporting freight
| to market
| The absolute impossibty of drawing any
real distinction was so clearly shown in Mr..
Folks unanswered and unanswerabe message,
that it would bea work of supererogation to re-
peat it.
When General Jackson put his veto to one of
| those internal Improvement bills, there were
IN ono hundrod u,ilInpa of dn1laro, north
of internal Improvement schemes lying upon
the Speakers table, and it requires no great
effort of the imagination to forseee that in few
years the country will be indebted many thou
sand millions of dollars.
But abandoning al the strong constitutional
objections to this magnificent system, ask gen.
tlemen how it tallies with their notions Of po-
litical economy, to open the door of the treasury
to the hungry expectauts of river and harbor
improvements, when we are obliged to borrow
money to pay the interest of our public debt?
I If there is not public virtue enough left with
the members of this body, to resist the offer of
hundred thousand dollars, to be expended in
their districts have only this consolation left,
that in a few years the debt for the internal i'm
provements of this country will run up to many
hundred millions of dollars and when the peo-
pie shall begin to feel the tax, they may hold
heir representatives to strict account and
whenever they put their veto upon it, the trea-
sury will be relieved from this most terrible
drain, and the recuperatve power of this coun-
try is such that she will soon recover from the
effects, and be once more the plain economical
government established by our fathers, and ad-
ministered within the receipts Of scale of du-
| ties which looks to the revenue, and not to the
protection of particular classes or interests,
when it iITposes tax upon its citizens.
| If the cure of this disease can be effected in
| this manner, a thousand millions would be
cheaply paid to bring the government back to
| the golden days Of Democracy, as understood
| by Jefferson, Madison and Jackson. am con-
! tent to rest the case upon the Argument as pre-
scented by those great men, which position un-
derstand to have been adopted by all the national
| Democratic conventions up to lS4S, which nom-
mated Generals Cass and Butler and by them
| fully concurred in, in their acceptance of that
nomination; and if those gentlemen are now,
| or have been in favor of internal improvements.
as contemplated by the provisions of this bill,
| | will only say that it will not be the first in
| stance in which gentlemen's principles and votes
cut at right angles.
There can be no better commentary offered
npon the whole system, than the fact that there
is in the bill, and that there are lying upon your
taOle hundreds OF peUuOns asking Congress to
undo what they have already done towards the
Improvement Of rivers and harbors
The object in the first place, was to obtain a
large sum of money to be expended at par
ticular point, without the least reference to the
improvement, and afterwards to obtain as much
more for removing what never was desired or
required. If Congress will, without surveys,
or any satisfactory information iujure or destroy
the navigation of streams of the country, there
is some show of reason in requiring that they
should place the place in statu quo and submit
whether it would not be well, after the end is
gained, (the expenditure of the money! to stip-
ulate that the government should be empowered
to cede all such Improvements when they shall
be found to be useless to the respective Statea
and thus avoid the double expenditure Of undo
ing what was uselossly and unadviscdly begun
in the first place.
shall not trespass more than a moment lon
ger on the attention Of the committee These
crude remarks have been thrown out because
as ] said before, | am opposed to the bill, and
tho raeolution oloeiny dahata con,nalla6 mo N