The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1858-07-29


was without authority Of law. But it rested in
the Secretary's discretion, the gentleman from
Virginia says. So Hulps surrender within
his official discretion and authority but the hero
OF that national disgrace was not spared from
inquiry and condemnation. | answer that if il
rested in the Secretary's discretion to determine
that Fort Smelling was useless, and then to pro-
ceed 70 make sale OF it, these general circumstan-
ces show that he had never applied that discre-
ton officially until long after he had made the
sale. l may add, that the alarmed and danger
Gus circumstances of the surrounding frontiers
prove that the sale was indiscreet and inoppor-
tune. The act was wholly lawless, and has en-
riched few private individuals, while the Gov
eminent has been Inundated into the condition
of gentleman's lessee
But, In this connection, the Secretary of War
! IS more obnoxious to censure. Let the facts be
briefly told. This large and valuable reservation
had been long time watched by Spectators wih
a quick prophetic sense of its future importance.
Application was made to the Secretary of War,
the Hon. Jefferson Davis, early in 1856, through
the agency of Mr.. Rice, then Delegate from the
Territory of Minnesota, to buy it at the rate of
fifteen dollars per acre. Secretary Davis referred
the subject to General Jesup, Quartermaster
General. On the Sd of May, 1856, he answered
that the fort, the wharf, and considerable guam
tity of land, ought to be retained for the public
use, +" not temporarily but in fee" He said, at
the same time, that higher bid than fifteen dol
lars per acre might be expected. Secretary Davis
! answered MIR. Rice at dash Of the pen and dis
posed of the matter. His letter of May 6, 1856,
is unusually short, clear and nervous
In reply, | have to say that the reservation is
still needed for military purposes; and Mr..
Steele's offer cannot therefore be entertained "
1t was not pressed again in this quarter, but
took the new form of an application to Congress.
At the close of the last session of the last Con-
gress the clause that has been referred to as the
amendatory act of 1867 was proposed in the SEN
ate to an appropriation bill, and passed and the
following conversation then took place in regard
to it, as reported in the Congressional Globe.
When this amendment was offered, Mr. Bright said:
81 should like to inquire if there is any provis-
ion for public sale
| "Mr. WELLER. Those sold under the act of 1919
{ were sold at auction but it has been decided
that that act was retrospective, and did not APP
{ ply to any military sites established after the
passage of the law. Since that time of course,
many military posts have become wholly useless
to the Government; and this amendment is to
sell them.
"Mr. BRIGHT. At public or private sale
| "Mr. WELLER At public sale.
"The amendment was agreed to."-COngres-
sional Globe, Uol. "a, p. lO46.
1t rested in this manner until, at the beginning
| of Mr.. Buchanan's Administration, Mr.. Davis was
succeeded by the present Secretary.
| The Fort Smelling reservation was not par
| tcularly named in the law of 1857, but the test-
mony of Mr.. Rice shows that it was meant. Thus
the official opinion of his immediate predecessor,
recently expressed, and of the superior army Off
Ger in charge of the subject of supplies, was
brought to the notice of Secretary Floyd. 1t was
part of recent report of General Jesup, that this
and two or three other reservations were of the
value of 81 900 900, and enough to provide posts
for the defence of the whole frontier. The neces-
sity of caution in making the sale had been par
ticularly noticed. These views had been enforced
by recent report of Secretary Davis, and unu-
sual caution urged in order to secure the Gov
| eminent against loss in making the sale, espe-
| cially in providing a minimum which should be
up to the value of the property In addition to
| this, the improvident and lawless sale of that
part of the reservation adjoining Minneapolis,
which had short time before been detached by
law from the same reservation, and brought to
market, admonished him of the Importance of
rare sagacity, caution, and judgment, in officers
| appointed to this duty.
Then followed the brief transaction. Early
in April, 1857, without advice, without seeking
| advice, from any persons connected with the
military service, Secretary Floyd sent Major
| Eastman to Minnesota, to survey and subdivide
| the Fort Smelling reservation, with view of
bringing it to sale. Eastmans instructions were
| limited TO making the survey, for the Secre-
tary of War told him that he would afterwards
send another person to make the sale. At the
same time, Mather and Schell, for some inscru-
| table reason, suddenly appeared at Washington.
They at once learned, what no one else knew, and
what could only have been known at the Depart
ment of War, that the Fort Smelling reservation
was about to be sold and entered into a mutual
| combination to buy the post and its thousands
OF adjoining acres-not to occupy, for Mather, a
citizen and Senator of New York, and, by the
statement of the Secretary of War, highly-re-
spectacle individual, only wanted an invest
ment; and Mr.. Schell, who is also citizen of
| New York, and Senator, with a larger public
spirit wished to buy it, as he afterwards ex-
pressed willingness to buy the Capitol, for the
profit of the thing How did these favored indi-
viduals know that Fort Smelling was to be sold,
| to induce them into such combination, when it
was unknown to everybody else Soon after in
the same month of April, DIR. Graham, of Lex
ington, Virginia, ambitious, though without
money, of an investment in Minnesota, stops at
Washington on his way, and asks his particular
friend, the Secretary of War, the modest question
| if he has anything out West to be done for his
Department, that will pay2 The Secretary an
swers, Nothing, unless you will sell some old
| forts" The gentleman from Virginia Mr.
LETCHER has expressed high sense of the
| ability and character of Mr.. Graham. His
| shrewdness is not doubted. The defence of a
| transaction that has plundered the Government
| of hundreds of thousands, and changed a princi-
| pal Northwestern defence into private ownership
is put only on Prescriptions of character. Ali
| the parties in connection with it have had their
advocates. DIR. Graham is defended by one
| gentleman from Virginia, Mr.. LETcHER,1 and
Mr.. Heiskell by another, Mr.. HOPKINS I while
the Secretary of War exats Mr.. Mather. Schell
dwells in the security of his own invulnerable
mail. The public has suffered in its tender
points of military defence and money; but these
gentlemen argue, that the public loss is mitiga-
ted, from having been occasioned by an assoca-
ton of very honest gentlemen. On the same
| evening, Graham is brought in conjunction by an
extraordinary chance, with Mather and SchelI.
None of them can explain the accident but sud-
| denly, these three persons are melted into the
same combination, and the valuable public prop
erty of Fort Smelling, more than a thousand miles
away, is the object. But there is a condition to
the admission of Dr. Graham. He is to unite
Franklin Steele in the transaction. Mr.. Steele
| has long been the army sutler at that post, and
| is now the only resident on that large reserva-
| ton; and the forthcoming instructions of the
Department of War will require that any settlers
on the reservation shall be provided for by the
commissioners that make the sale. Such an
instruction means Franklin Steele and nobody
else. How does this triumvirate, in advance of
"the rest of mankind" get the information that
the instructions of the Secretary of War will take
care of Mr.sFranklin Steele as q particular ward
of the Government, and make it important for
the success of their plans to unite him in the
combination DIR. Graham accepts the con-
dtion, and proceeds to Minnesota in search of
Mr.. Steele. Thus, Graham, Matber, Schell, and
| Steele, have the only knowledge that the reser-
walton is to be sold, and have already effected a
combination to buy; Graham investing his char
acter Mather and Schell the money, and Steele,