The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster Part 45

NOTE.

This speech is singular among the speeches of Mr. Webster, as it exhibits him as a "Strict-Constructionist," and as a master of that peculiar kind of deductive reasoning which is commonly considered the special distinction of his great antagonist, Mr. Calhoun. In subtilty and refinement of argument it is fully the match of most of Mr.

Calhoun's elaborate disquisitions. At the time of its delivery it excited the almost savage ire of John Quincy Adams, as will be seen by reference to the latter's "Diary." It was in connection with this speech that Mr. Adams speaks of "the rotten heart of Daniel Webster." How such a purely intellectual feat as this, one so entirely pa.s.sionless and impersonal, should be referred to rottenness of heart, is one of the unexplained mysteries of the operations of Mr. Adams's understanding, when that understanding was misled by personal antipathy.

[Footnote 1: Mr. Madison. See the discussion in Gales and Seaton's Debates in Congress, Vol. I. p. 473 _et seq._]

ON THE LOSS OF THE FORTIFICATION BILL IN 1835.

A SPEECH DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, ON THE 14TH OF JANUARY, 1836, ON MR. BENTON'S RESOLUTIONS FOR APPROPRIATING THE SURPLUS REVENUE TO NATIONAL DEFENCE.

It is not my purpose, Mr. President, to make any remark on the state of our affairs with France. The time for that discussion has not come, and I wait. We are in daily expectation of a communication from the President, which will give us light; and we are authorized to expect a recommendation by him of such measures as he thinks it may be necessary and proper for Congress to adopt. I do not antic.i.p.ate him. In this most important and delicate business, it is the proper duty of the executive to go forward, and I, for one, do not intend either to be drawn or driven into the lead. When official information shall be before us, and when measures shall be recommended upon the proper responsibility, I shall endeavor to form the best judgment I can, and shall act according to its dictates.

I rise, now, for another purpose. This resolution has drawn on a debate upon the general conduct of the Senate during the last session of Congress, and especially in regard to the proposed grant of the three millions to the President on the last night of the session. My main object is to tell the story of this transaction, and to exhibit the conduct of the Senate fairly to the public view. I owe this duty to the Senate. I owe it to the committee with which I am connected; and although whatever is personal to an individual is generally of too little importance to be made the subject of much remark, I hope I may be permitted to say a few words in defence of my own reputation, in reference to a matter which has been greatly misrepresented.

This vote for the three millions was proposed by the House of Representatives as an amendment to the fortification bill; and the loss of that bill, three millions and all, is the charge which has been made upon the Senate, sounded over all the land, and now again renewed. I propose to give the true history of this bill, its origin, its progress, and its loss.

Before attempting that, however, let me remark, for it is worthy to be remarked and remembered, that the business brought before the Senate last session, important and various as it was, and both public and private, was all gone through with most uncommon despatch and prompt.i.tude. No session has witnessed a more complete clearing off and finishing of the subjects before us. The communications from the other house, whether bills or whatever else, were especially attended to in a proper season, and with that ready respect which is due from one house to the other. I recollect nothing of any importance which came to us from the House of Representatives, which was neglected, overlooked, or disregarded by the Senate.

On the other hand, it was the misfortune of the Senate, and, as I think, the misfortune of the country, that, owing to the state of business in the House of Representatives towards the close of the session, several measures which had been matured in the Senate, and pa.s.sed into bills, did not receive attention, so as to be either agreed to or rejected, in the other branch of the legislature. They fell, of course, by the termination of the session.

Among these measures may be mentioned the following, viz.:--

THE POST-OFFICE REFORM BILL, which pa.s.sed the Senate _unanimously_, and of the necessity for which the whole country is certainly now most abundantly satisfied;

THE CUSTOM-HOUSE REGULATIONS BILL, which also pa.s.sed nearly unanimously, after a very laborious preparation by the Committee on Commerce, and a full discussion in the Senate;

THE JUDICIARY BILL, pa.s.sed here by a majority of thirty-one to five, and which has again already pa.s.sed the Senate at this session with only a single dissenting vote;

THE BILL INDEMNIFYING CLAIMANTS FOR FRENCH SPOLIATIONS BEFORE 1800;

THE BILL REGULATING THE DEPOSIT OF THE PUBLIC MONEY IN THE DEPOSIT BANKS;

THE BILL RESPECTING THE TENURE OF CERTAIN OFFICES, AND THE POWER OF REMOVAL FROM OFFICE; which has now again been pa.s.sed to be engrossed, in the Senate, by a decided majority.

All these important measures, matured and pa.s.sed in the Senate in the course of the session, and many others of less importance, were sent to the House of Representatives, and we never heard any thing more from them. They there found their graves.

It is worthy of being remarked, also, that the attendance of members of the Senate was remarkably full, particularly toward the end of the session. On the last day, every Senator was in his place till very near the hour of adjournment, as the journal will show. We had no breaking up for want of a quorum; no delay, no calls of the Senate; nothing which was made necessary by the negligence or inattention of the members of this body. On the vote of the three millions of dollars, which was taken at about eight o'clock in the evening, forty-eight votes were given, every member of the Senate being in his place and answering to his name.

This is an instance of punctuality, diligence, and labor, continued to the very end of an arduous session, wholly without example or parallel.

The Senate, then, Sir, must stand, in the judgment of every man, fully acquitted of all remissness, all negligence, all inattention, amidst the fatigue and exhaustion of the closing hours of Congress. Nothing pa.s.sed unheeded, nothing was overlooked, nothing forgotten, and nothing slighted.

And now, Sir, I would proceed immediately to give the history of the fortification bill, if it were not necessary, as introductory to that history, and as showing the circ.u.mstances under which the Senate was called on to transact the public business, first to refer to another bill which was before us, and to the proceedings which were had upon it.

It is well known, Sir, that the annual appropriation bills always originate in the House of Representatives. This is so much a matter of course, that no one ever looks to see such a bill first brought forward in the Senate. It is also well known, Sir, that it has been usual, heretofore, to make the annual appropriations for the Military Academy at West Point in the general bill which provides for the pay and support of the army. But last year the army bill did not contain any appropriation whatever for the support of West Point. I took notice of this singular omission when the bill was before the Senate, but presumed, and indeed understood, that the House would send us a separate bill for the Military Academy. The army bill, therefore, pa.s.sed; but no bill for the Academy at West Point appeared. We waited for it from day to day, and from week to week, but waited in vain. At length, the time for sending bills from one house to the other, according to the joint rules of the two houses, expired, and no bill had made its appearance for the support of the Military Academy. These joint rules, as is well known, are sometimes suspended on the application of one house to the other, in favor of particular bills, whose progress has been unexpectedly delayed, but which the public interest requires to be pa.s.sed. But the House of Representatives sent us no request to suspend the rules in favor of a bill for the support of the Military Academy, nor made any other proposition to save the inst.i.tution from immediate dissolution. Notwithstanding all the talk about a war, and the necessity of a vote for the three millions, the Military Academy, an inst.i.tution cherished so long, and at so much expense, was on the very point of being entirely broken up.

Now it so happened, Sir, that at this time there was another appropriation bill which had come from the House of Representatives, and was before the Committee on Finance here. This bill was ent.i.tled "An Act making appropriations for the civil and diplomatic expenses of the government for the year 1835."

In this state of things, several members of the House of Representatives applied to the committee, and besought us to save the Military Academy by annexing the necessary appropriations for its support to the bill for civil and diplomatic service. We spoke to them, in reply, of the unfitness, the irregularity, the incongruity, of this forced union of such dissimilar subjects; but they told us it was a case of absolute necessity, and that, without resorting to this mode, the appropriation could not get through. We acquiesced, Sir, in these suggestions. We went out of our way. We agreed to do an extraordinary and an irregular thing, in order to save the public business from miscarriage. By direction of the committee, I moved the Senate to add an appropriation for the Military Academy to the bill for defraying civil and diplomatic expenses. The bill was so amended; and in this form the appropriation was finally made.

But this was not all. This bill for the civil and diplomatic service, being thus amended by tacking the Military Academy to it, was sent back by us to the House of Representatives, where its length of tail was to be still much further increased. That house had before it several subjects for provision, and for appropriation, upon which it had not pa.s.sed any bill before the time for pa.s.sing bills to be sent to the Senate had elapsed. I was anxious that these things should, in some way, be provided for; and when the diplomatic bill came back, drawing the Military Academy after it, it was thought prudent to attach to it several of these other provisions. There were propositions to pave the streets in the city of Washington, to repair the Capitol, and various other things, which it was necessary to provide for; and they, therefore, were put into the same bill, by way of amendment to an amendment; that is to say, Mr. President, we had been prevailed on to amend their bill for defraying the salary of our ministers abroad, by adding an appropriation for the Military Academy, and they proposed to amend this our amendment by adding matter as germane to it as it was itself to the original bill. There was also the President's gardener.

His salary was unprovided for; and there was no way of remedying this important omission, but by giving him place in the diplomatic service bill, among _charges d'affaires_, envoys extraordinary, and ministers plenipotentiary. In and among these ranks, therefore, he was formally introduced by the amendment of the House, and there he now stands, as you will readily see by turning to the law.

Sir, I have not the pleasure to know this useful person; but should I see him, some morning, overlooking the workmen in the lawns, walks, copses, and parterres which adorn the grounds around the President's residence, considering the company into which we have introduced him, I should expect to see, at least, a small diplomatic b.u.t.ton on his working jacket.

When these amendments came from the House, and were read at our table, though they caused a smile, they were yet adopted, and the law pa.s.sed, almost with the rapidity of a comet, and with something like the same length of tail.

Now, Sir, not one of these irregularities or incongruities, no part of this jumbling together of distinct and different subjects, was in the slightest degree occasioned by any thing done, or omitted to be done, on the part of the Senate. Their proceedings were all regular; their decision was prompt, their despatch of the public business correct and reasonable. There was nothing of disorganization, nothing of procrastination, nothing evincive of a temper to embarra.s.s or obstruct the public business. If the history which I have now truly given shows that one thing was amended by another, which had no sort of connection with it; that unusual expedients were resorted to; and that the laws, instead of arrangement and symmetry, exhibit anomaly, confusion, and the most grotesque a.s.sociations, it is nevertheless true, that no part of all this was made necessary by us. We deviated from the accustomed modes of legislation only when we were supplicated to do so, in order to supply bald and glaring deficiencies in measures which were before us.

But now, Mr. President, let me come to the fortification bill, the lost bill, which not only now, but on a graver occasion, has been lamented like the lost Pleiad.

This bill, Sir, came from the House of Representatives to the Senate in the usual way, and was referred to the Committee on Finance. Its appropriations were not large. Indeed, they appeared to the committee to be quite too small. It struck a majority of the committee at once, that there were several fortifications on the coast, either not provided for at all, or not adequately provided for, by this bill. The whole amount of its appropriations was four hundred or four hundred and thirty thousand dollars. It contained no grant of three millions, and if the Senate had pa.s.sed it the very day it came from the House, not only would there have been no appropriation of the three millions, but, Sir, none of these other sums which the Senate did insert in the bill. Others besides ourselves saw the deficiencies of this bill. We had communications with and from the departments, and we inserted in the bill every thing which any department recommended to us. We took care to be sure that nothing else was coming. And we then reported the bill to the Senate with our proposed amendments. Among these amendments, there was a sum of $75,000 for Castle Island in Boston harbor, $100,000 for defences in Maryland, and so forth. These amendments were agreed to by the Senate, and one or two others added, on the motion of members; and the bill, as thus amended, was returned to the House.

And now, Sir, it becomes important to ask, When was this bill, thus amended, returned to the House of Representatives? Was it unduly detained here, so that the House was obliged afterwards to act upon it suddenly? This question is material to be asked, and material to be answered, too, and the journal does satisfactorily answer it; for it appears by the journal that the bill was returned to the House of Representatives on Tuesday, the 24th of February, _one whole week before the close of the session_. And from Tuesday, the 24th of February, to Tuesday, the 3d day of March, we heard not one word from this bill.

Tuesday, the 3d day of March, was, of course, the last day of the session. We a.s.sembled here at ten or eleven o'clock in the morning of that day, and sat until three in the afternoon, and still we were not informed whether the House had finally pa.s.sed the bill. As it was an important matter, and belonged to that part of the public business which usually receives particular attention from the Committee on Finance, I bore the subject in my mind, and felt some solicitude about it, seeing that the session was drawing so near to a close. I took it for granted, however, as I had not heard any thing to the contrary, that the amendments of the Senate would not be objected to, and that, when a convenient time should arrive for taking up the bill in the House, it would be pa.s.sed at once into a law, and we should hear no more about it.

Not the slightest intimation was given, either that the executive wished for any larger appropriation, or that it was intended in the House to insert such larger appropriation. Not a syllable escaped from anybody, and came to our knowledge, that any further alteration whatever was intended in the bill.

At three o'clock in the afternoon of the 3d of March, the Senate took its recess, as is usual in that period of the session, until five o'clock. At five o'clock we again a.s.sembled, and proceeded with the business of the Senate until eight o'clock in the evening; and at eight o'clock in the evening, and not before, the clerk of the House appeared at our door, and announced that the House of Representatives had _disagreed_ to one of the Senate's amendments, _agreed_ to others; and to two of those amendments, namely, the fourth and fifth, it had agreed, _with an amendment of its own_.

Now, Sir, these fourth and fifth amendments of ours were, one, a vote of $75,000 for Castle Island in Boston harbor, and the other, a vote of $100,000 for certain defences in Maryland. And what, Sir, was the addition which the House of Representatives proposed to make, by way of "_amendment_" to a vote of $75,000 for repairing the works in Boston harbor? Here, Sir, it is:--

"_And be it further enacted_, That the sum of three millions of dollars be, and the same is hereby, appropriated, out of any money in the treasury not otherwise appropriated, to be expended, in whole or in part, under the direction of the President of the United States, for the military and naval service, including fortifications and ordnance, and the increase of the navy: _Provided_, such expenditures shall be rendered necessary for the defence of the country prior to the next meeting of Congress."

This proposition, Sir, was thus unexpectedly and suddenly put to us, at eight o'clock in the evening of the last day of the session. Unusual, unprecedented, extraordinary, as it obviously is, on the face of it, the manner of presenting it was still more extraordinary. The President had asked for no such grant of money; no department had recommended it; no estimate had suggested it; no reason whatever was given for it. No emergency had happened, and nothing new had occurred; every thing known to the administration, at that hour, respecting our foreign relations, had certainly been known to it for days and weeks.

With what propriety, then, could the Senate be called on to sanction a proceeding so entirely irregular and anomalous? Sir, I recollect the occurrences of the moment very well, and I remember the impression which this vote of the House seemed to make all round the Senate. We had just come out of executive session; the doors were but just opened; and I hardly remember that there was a single spectator in the hall or the galleries. I had been at the clerk's table, and had not reached my seat, when the message was read. All the Senators were in the chamber. I heard the message, certainly with great surprise and astonishment; and I immediately moved the Senate to _disagree_ to this vote of the House. My relation to the subject, in consequence of my connection with the Committee on Finance, made it my duty to propose some course, and I had not a moment's doubt or hesitation what that course ought to be. I took upon myself, then, Sir, the responsibility of moving that the Senate should disagree to this vote, and I now acknowledge that responsibility.

It might be presumptuous to say that I took a leading part, but I certainly took an early part, a decided part, and an earnest part, in rejecting this broad grant of three millions of dollars, without limitation of purpose or specification of object, called for by no recommendation, founded on no estimate, made necessary by no state of things which was known to us. Certainly, Sir, I took a part in its rejection; and I stand here, in my place in the Senate, to-day, ready to defend the part so taken by me; or, rather, Sir, I disclaim all defence, and all occasion of defence, and I a.s.sert it as meritorious to have been among those who arrested, at the earliest moment, this extraordinary departure from all settled usage, and, as I think, from plain const.i.tutional injunction,--this indefinite voting of a vast sum of money to mere executive discretion, without limit a.s.signed, without object specified, without reason given, and without the least control.

Sir, I am told, that, in opposing this grant, I spoke with warmth, and I suppose I may have done so. If I did, it was a warmth springing from as honest a conviction of duty as ever influenced a public man. It was spontaneous, unaffected, sincere. There had been among us, Sir, no consultation, no concert. There could have been none. Between the reading of the message and my motion to disagree, there was not time enough for any two members of the Senate to exchange five words on the subject. The proposition was sudden and perfectly unexpected. I resisted it, as irregular, as dangerous in itself, and dangerous in its precedent; as wholly unnecessary, and as violating the plain intention, if not the express words, of the Const.i.tution. Before the Senate, then, I avowed, and before the country I now avow, my part in this opposition.

Whatsoever is to fall on those who sanctioned it, of that let me have my full share.

The Senate, Sir, rejected this grant by a vote of TWENTY-NINE against nineteen. Those twenty-nine names are on the journal; and whensoever the EXPUNGING process may commence, or how far soever it may be carried, I pray it, in mercy, not to erase mine from that record. I beseech it, in its sparing goodness, to leave me that proof of attachment to duty and to principle. It may draw around it, over it, or through it, black lines, or red lines, or any lines; it may mark it in any way which either the most prostrate and fantastical spirit of _man-worship_, or the most ingenious and elaborate study of self-degradation, may devise, if only it will leave it so that those who inherit my blood, or who may hereafter care for my reputation, shall be able to behold it where it now stands.

The House, Sir, insisted on this amendment. The Senate adhered to its disagreement; the House asked a conference, to which request the Senate immediately acceded. The committee of conference met, and in a very short time came to an agreement. They agreed to recommend to their respective houses, as a subst.i.tute for the vote proposed by the House, the following:--

"As an additional appropriation for arming the fortifications of the United States, three hundred thousand dollars."

"As an additional appropriation for the repairs and equipment of ships of war of the United States, five hundred thousand dollars."

I immediately reported this agreement of the committee of conference to the Senate; but, inasmuch as the bill was in the House of Representatives, the Senate could not act further on the matter until the House should first have considered the report of the committee, decided thereon, and sent us the bill. I did not myself take any note of the particular hour of this part of the transaction. The honorable member from Virginia[1] says he looked at his watch at the time, and he knows that I had come from the conference, and was in my seat, at a quarter past eleven. I have no reason to think that he is under any mistake on this particular. He says it so happened that he had occasion to take notice of the hour, and well remembers it. It could not well have been later than this, as any one will be satisfied who will look at our journals, public and executive, and see what a ma.s.s of business was despatched after I came from the committee, and before the adjournment of the Senate. Having made the report, Sir, I had no doubt that both houses would concur in the result of the conference, and looked every moment for the officer of the House bringing the bill. He did not come, however, and I pretty soon learned that there was doubt whether the committee on the part of the House would report to the House the agreement of the conferees. At first, I did not at all credit this; but was confirmed by one communication after another, until I was obliged to think it true. Seeing that the bill was thus in danger of being lost, and intending at any rate that no blame should justly attach to the Senate, I immediately moved the following resolution:--

"_Resolved_, That a message be sent to the honorable the House of Representatives, respectfully to remind the House of the report of the committee of conference appointed on the disagreeing votes of the two houses on the amendment of the House to the amendment of the Senate to the bill respecting the fortifications of the United States."

You recollect this resolution, Sir, having, as I well remember, taken some part on the occasion.[2]