35TH CONG....1ST SESS.

ment of the same strength; or an individual volunteer during the same period, $174 97 more than an individual regular soldier. It will be remembered, however, that these volunteers are mounted.*

Mr. BENJAMIN. In my statement as to the cost per man of the Army, I took from the estimates submitted by the War Department what the Secretary of War himself states as to the expenses of the Army proper. I find the estimates as follows: First, expenses of recruiting, transportation of recruits, &c., $110,000; next, pay, commutation of officers' subsistence, commutation of forage, payments to discharged soldiers for clothing not drawn, payments in lieu of clothing for officers' servants, subsistence in kind, clothing of the Army, supplies for the quartermaster's department, incidental expenses of that department, barracks, transportation of officers' baggage, transportation of troops and supplies, purchase of horses, contingencies of the Army, medical and hospital department, contingent expenses of the adjutant general's department, expenses of the commanding general's office,-the whole making, together, as the expenses of the Army proper, $14,776,619 49.

Now, if we take, according to the statement of the honorable Senator from Mississippi, the cost of raising a regiment, and count that only as added to the pay and rations, undoubtedly he may bring the expenses per man to four or five hundred dollars; but have we any assurance that all the other expenses and all those other branches of the Army service are not to increase proportionately to the Army, and consequently that the sum total of the appropriations will still remain about a thousand dollars per man? I do not profess to be acquainted with these details, but I take the report of the Secretary of War, and he says he wants $15,000,000 for the Army proper, which now averages about fifteen thousand men, making $1,000 per man.

Increase of the Army-Mr. Davis.

of the dangers of a standing army; and yet, ac-
cording to this process of calculation you would
bring forward a beautiful sheet of economy. You
would have lopped off the vast expenditures which
do not depend on numbers; you would have mul-
tiplied the lower grades where the smallest pay is
received, and, per capita, you would bring up a
sheet demonstrating a most economical adminis-
tration. Now, let us take the other case: suppose
that, following in the footsteps of our fathers, and
profiting by the experience of the time which has
intervened from their day to this, we think proper
to maintain, in time of peace, a large staff; we
think proper to go on with förtifications for the
contingencies of war; we think proper to go on
with the manufacturing of arms, so that the whole
militia may be supplied at any moment; we think
proper to cut down the companies to the small
number necessary for duty in time of peace; we
think proper to maintain a large number of regi-
ments in proportion to the whole number of the
rank and file; and then, per capita, you have the
greatest expenditure you could possibly show,
yet you have the wisest economy, according to
the theory of our military system, which could
be adopted.

Mr. BENJAMIN. In the list of expenditures
to which I have just referred, I carefully excluded
everything having reference to the manufacture
of arms, and to fortifications. That list has no
reference to them at all. They are excluded. If
we include these and other items, the expenses
would reach twenty millions.

SENATE.

he argued should be included in the expense per capita. That is an expense which is proportionately great as you reduce the number of men. The transportation increases from the want of ability to station the men wherever they are; and that is compensated for by taking the same man and using him at a number of places. Never, in the history of any nation, were such extensive marches and movements made, and over plains so desert and so totally destitute of all supplies by the way, as those made by our Army in the last two or three years.

This brings me to the argument of the Senator from Georgia, that on account of the improvements which have been made, an army of twentyfive thousand men is equal to what one hundred thousand would have been twenty-five years ago. Sir, twenty-five years ago we had none of these long marches to make which are reported by the Secretary of War. Twenty-five years ago our Indian frontier was within reach of supplies which could be sent on navigable water. It has been since that time that our Indian frontier has been pressed outward, the settlements advancing from navigable waters, throwing our military operations into a country where everything has to be transported at a vast expense, and where nothing is to be obtained, either on the road or at the place of destination. These are the elements of increasing expense, and the expense is not to be diminished by making speeches about what has been done in former times, and what might be done now. It requires the coöperation of the legislative Mr. DAVIS. But you include all the vastly and executive branches, to reduce the expenses expensive portions of the Army in your estimate. of the Army, or any other branch of the public You include the staff, which would not be in-service. Reforms have been asked, from year creased by adding to the number of men, and which, on our theory, is maintained in time of peace because it is essential in time of war; because it is a part of that arrangement by which you render effective, with the small nucleus preMr. DAVIS. I am obliged to the Senator from served in time of peace, a large army in the field. Louisiana for his explanation, and think it is easily Besides, it will be remembered that by special answered. It is a process of calculation which al- legislation you have sometimes increased the pay ways leads to error. There are some methods of of particular officers, general and staff; you have computation which will occasionally be right, and raised it to a magnitude which bears no relation sometimes wrong; but that is a process which is to that of the soldiers; and this is an argument adalways wrong, and cannot be right. I will put duced against the increase of companies, against the two cases that result from that process. I the increase of privates in the Army; but it has will suppose that fortifications cease; that the resulted from the pay which you have bestowed manufacture of arms ceases; that your staff is dis-with a liberal hand on some officers in the service. banded; that you swell the companies to the maximum limit; that you have additional regiments; that you raise an army to that magnitude which might even frighten the Senators who have spoken

It is to be observed, that the above sum of $293,784 39 is a full and minutely exact estimate of the whole amount required for the pay, clothing, subsistence, and personal equipment (exclusive only of arms) of a maximum infantry regiment, supposed to be full, at tlie beginning of the year, and to be kept full throughout the whole succeeding twelve

months.

It is moreover to be observed, that the estimates for clothing is for a first year's supply, which is considerably greater than that for either of the subsequent four years; the proportional cost of an infantry soldier's allowance for the five years, being, according to the last table published to the Army, in 1855, as follows: first year, $44 03; second year, $23 61; third year, $36 67; fourth year, $2361; fifth year, $31 52.

I say such a process of calculation leads to error,
and cannot lead to any other result. It never can
evolve the truth. It may vary the one side or the
other, just in proportion as the Administration
multiply the troops and diminish the size of the
staff, or the reverse; but it is false, work it out as
you may.

In the argument of Mr. Calhoun, in his report
of 1820, in answering then the very same objec-
tions which are made now, as to the expensive
character of our peace establishment, he pointed
out the unfairness of including the staff in such
an argument, and running a parallel between the
staff of our Army and others. A nation of Europe
keeping on her peace establishment an army equal
to her war purposes, and having it concentrated,
and with a staff exactly commensurate to the size
of that army, forms no standard of measure for a
country like ours and an army like ours, where
we preserve, in time of peace, a staff suited to the
vast augmentation of our force, by bringing the
militia into the field in time of war. The same argu-
ment which he made then is applicable now; but I
shall not detain the Senate longer on this point.

I am not arguing that the expense of our military establishment is not great, or more properly the expense of protecting our frontier; but arguing rather that the whole theory on which the opposition rests is wrong. They contend that, in proportion as you increase the number of men, you will increase the expenses of the Army. It is not so, because, if you use one regiment to perform the duty of five, you add to the expense of that cluded, is expected, besides, under ordinary circumstances, regiment the transportation to the places where

The allowance of camp and garrison equipage, herein in

to last throughout the whole tive years.

The estimated cost of raising a regiment is not to be counted in the same year with that above furnished for maintaining it; not only, because, as already stated, the latter completely covers the year, but for the reason that many items of expense included in the former, and which cannot easily be separated from it, are also included in the latter.

five would be stationed, and you increase the ex-
penses of that regiment just in proportion as you
move it over great distances. Then the expense
comes in, as this year, in the form of transporta-
tion. It comes in exactly as that deficiency which
was cited by the Senator from Maine, and which

year, to improve the administration of the Army, but they have not been granted. The last two Administrations, as well as this, have recommended to Congress changes in the organization which would be conducive to economy and efficiency. Congress has not heretofore responded. Whilst it does not so respond, it seems as idle, as it is easy, to make declamation against the expenses of the military establishment.

We are told by the Senator from Georgia that he takes the standard of Mr. Calhoun, and he made the argument-which I am willing to pass over-that Mr. Calhoun left ten companies to the regiment, and therefore he was retaining the theory of Mr. Calhoun, against the invasion of that theory by the proposed bill. Sir, the theory of Mr. Calhoun was not any certain number of officers to the regiment; it was not any certain number of men to the company; it was not even any certain number of officers to the Army. He says, in his report, that those were things which varied with different countries, and must vary in the same country, at different times. He presented what he believed to be a good organization of the staff. What I claim respect for in relation to Mr. Calhoun's theory of organization, is the great principle on which it rested; not the details, which were to vary with circumstances, but the mighty truth, which his mind, contracting all light like a moral lens, brought on the subject. It was the truth of this theory of a skeleton army, in time of peace, for purposes of instruction and organi zation, with a staff adequate to the vast number of militia which would be called into the field whenever we should be engaged in a foreign war.

That theory he presented; that theory he defended; that theory has been justified by practice and experience from that day to this. That theory is not violated by changing the number of men in a company, or the number of men in a regiment, or the number of companies in a regiment. The number of companies in a regiment varies from twelve to eight. It is not violated by increasing or reducing the Army. It would only be violated by establishing, as a rule, that we would on our peace establishment keep a certain number of companies required for frontier service, and swell them up to the war or maximum standard, and then, when we get into war, be compelled to meet its contingencies by raising new troops, or, as Mr. Calhoun said, introducing a new element, instead of expanding the old one.

The Senator from Texas says there is a want of respectability in the rank and file of the Army, and he draws that want of respectability from

さな

35TH CONG....1ST SESS.

their inability to obtain promotion. I answered
him on that point this morning, and showed him
that, at least, recent legislation had removed his
argument, had opened the door wider than ever
before, and the rank and file were in a better con-
dition now than they were at the time to which
he referred, so far as promotion was concerned.
I endeavored-I will not say successfully-to con-
trovert his idea that the present object was to di-
minish that opportunity, and sought to show, and
I believe did show, that the first section of this
bill was to increase the opportunities for the pro-
motion of the rank and file, both to commissioned
and non-commissioned officers.

But he repeated, this morning, something like
the argument he made the other day, when he aver-
red that there was an impassable barrier between
the rank and file and the commissioned officers,
and he ascribes it all to the Military Academy us
the root of the evil. He says these are politicalap-
pointments. He seems to have a very bad opinion
of a man because he has been instructed in a par-
ticular branch. He seems to reach the conclusion
that it follows, as a necessary consequence, that
if a man has been educated for a particular pro-
fession, he is utterly unfit for it. Therefore, the
lawyer, who gets a license, must be unfit to go
into court; the surgeon, who has walked the hos-
pitals, must be unable to perform an operation.
It seems to me that the test to which they are ap-
plied ought to bring anybody's mind to a different
conclusion.

I propose to notice that, in connection with his argument, that this is political favoritism. I claim that on the theory which at present exists, we have the most democratic basis which could be incorporated into the Army. How are your cadets appointed? It is true the law leaves to the Executive the power to appoint; but it is well known that the practice is, and for many years has been, for the member of the congressional district in which a vacancy occurs, to nominate whomsoever he pleases from that district, and the Secretary of War always appoints the person so nominated. Then these appointments are political only in the sense that they represent every shade of political opinion which is represented in the House of Representatives, and that every political party, which can have a voice in the House of Representatives, has a representative in the Military Academy. Is that objectionable? If so, how is it proposed to be cured?

Increase of the Army-Mr. Davis.

THURSDAY, February 11.

Mr. President, having already consumed the time of the Senate to a greater extent than I had anticipated, I shall endeavor to close my remarks very soon. Yesterday, in the progress of a review of the various objections made to the bill, I noticed those points that relate to efficiency and economy. I undertook to show, at that time, that it was better all the duties of our peace establishment, as it is called, should be performed by regular troops, than by the frequent calling out of the militia. I endeavored, also, to indicate at that time the sources of the increase in the expenditure of the Army, and to show that this was the result of the remote points at which the Army was serving; it was the result of the vast expense of transportation to those remote points; it was the result of the increased cost of everything which entered into the consumption and the active employment of the Army.

SENATE.

tingencies, the Senate would have done. He announces, after speaking of the wants, and delay the Senate had made in attending to them:

"Strange as this delay is, its causes are yet stranger. The increase recommended was by regiments. That recommendation came first from the Lieutenant General com manding the Army, indorsed by the Secretary of War, and finally approved by the President. It can scarcely be doubted, had the Military Committees, without delay, reported a bill in conformity with these suggestions, it would at this moment have been the law of the land, the regiments in a forward state of recruiting, and arrangements in progress for their carly march to their places of destination."

So far as that delay occurred in the committee, it occurred during the period the committee were collecting information and investigating the subject, to reach a result and bring that result to the Senate. Then, sir, as to what the Senate would have done, that is not a matter of speculation. The substitute presented by the Senator from California, Mr. GWIN,] the very proposition of the War Department, was voted upon, and it received but eight votes in the Senate; and of those eight votes, some Senators voted for it because they felt it was a proposition so easily killed that they had better substitute it for the bill of the committee, with no desire that it should pass, with no intent to sustain it, but simply adopting it as a means of readily disposing of the whole question.

This article proceeds to deal with military matters, and informs the Senate and the committee that all the knowledge on military affairs is at the other end of the avenue; and then the writer proceeds himself to launch out a little. Speaking of the Army organization, he says:

I do not recollect whether or not I stated another
very essential difference: being that, whilst at the
time the comparison of which I spoke was insti-
tuted, we had no mounted force except a small
amount of light artillery, we now have nearly one
third of the amount of the Army mounted; and
that portion of the Army almost constantly in
active service. Horses which at that time were
worth sixty or seventy dollars, cost last year $176;
forage has risen in the same proportion; and, as
the loss of horses in the service of the United States
has been referred to, I invite attention to the cases
which I cited yesterday, and others of a like kind,
where Indians had been pursued by troops for
hundreds of miles without cessation, passing over
sixty, and sometimes even eighty miles, almost,
scarcely without drawing the rein, in pursuit of an
enemy as wily, as brave, and, mounted on horses,
nearly as fleet as the Arabs of the desert, over a
country quite as inhospitable, and in which it is If he had happened to know a little about the
equally difficult to obtain water or food necessa- organization of the European armies, of which
ry to sustain a horse. Undergoing this severe he speaks so confidently, he would have under-
fatigue under excessive heat, is it matter of sur- stood that the artillery organization there is for
prise that horses, drawn immediately from the a wholly different purpose-a purpose for which
farms where they have been purchased, and forced ours should be-and conforms to the idea which
into such service as this, should sink under the I once presented to the Senate, when in the War
trial-should require to be renewed, and that the Department, to make our artillery organization
expenditure should be great, as they must be sup- for the use of large guns, and not as they are now
plied not only at the high rates of the market, but-infantry, merely wearing a different uniform.
at the accumulated value they have when trans- The article proceeds:
ported to these remote points?

The distribution, which is to be made of the gross
amount of expenditure according to the statement
read by the Senator from Louisiana, [Mr. BEN-
JAMIN,] is not a distribution upon the heads of the
soldiers. For a fair comparison, reference must
be had to the different character of troops; and it
will be readily seen that the simple division of a
gross sum to be applied to a variety of objects
cannot give a result which will express the cost
of the soldier truly. The sum he has stated is, I
believe, perhaps about that which a mounted sol-
dier costs in the Army. Taking the troops serv-
ing at these remote points, engaged in these ex-
peditions, and taking the cost of forage, and the
supplying of remount horses, I believe it will
amount to what he stated, $1,000 per capita; but
this surely is not to be taken as the average cost
of the Army, it being not the man only, but the
horse also, and the cost of both depending on the
locality of service. Equally delusive is the com-
parison made between the cost of this date and
that selected, there being no cavalry at the former
period, and the posts being then convenient to the
great markets of the country, and contiguous to
productive settlements.

Then, again, the large number appointed, say one hundred per annum, exceeds the number who are commissioned, say forty or fifty, more than two to one. Thus double, or more than double, the chances are given to the youth of the country to get into the Academy, that are offered to get places in the Army. I say you multiply the opportunities; and how is this brought to bear? From each congressional district a nomination may be made. The cadet so nominated enters the Academy, and there it depends on himself whether he shall go through and obtain a commission or Fot. When he attains that commission, he feels that he has something which he has won by his own effort; something he does not owe to the favor of any one, save so far as he may run back to the early favor he received from the member who nominated him to an office, which was so small that the member had probably forgotten it. If, then, I say, there is any mode by which you could leave the officer of the Army without any political bias of character; any mode by which you could leave him independently to feel that he might entertain whatever opinions he pleased, it is that which you have adopted, and which enables him to reach a commission by his own effort, in contact with the struggling many by whom he is to be sur

rounded.

If

I have never, I believe, either in my former or
present service in the Senate, referred to any criti-
cism in a newspaper, or to a newspaper article,
and I do not intend to do so now in that character;
but the Senator from New Hampshire, [Mr.
HALE, yesterday, introduced a newspaper arti-
cle, which, at that time, I had not read. Since it
has been introduced by a Senator to the Senate,
I will notice it; but otherwise I would not have

you were to increase that Academy twofold
in number, you would but render its principles
more democratic; you would but increase the
chances to youth to get position; you would but j
increase the struggle which would be required to
obtain a commission, and give him additionally done so.
to feel that whatever he attained he owed to his
country, and not to man; to himself, and not to
more political favoritism.

executive business, and then adjourned.
The Senate proceeded to the consideration of

"Indeed, on inquiry, we learn that two of each of the twelve artillery companies are intended for light field artillery, and are not integrals of the garrison organization, which conforms to the other regiments, is of long standing, is the basis of our system, State and Federal, and of the systems of the European arinies."

"In fact, but a hasty glance at the books shows but one
established system of regimental organization in all these
different arms, and we find the entire tactical system based
on battalion, squadron, regimental drill, and armny evolu-
tions, contemplating ten companies to each regiment."

The "glance" must have been "hasty" indeed
-hastier than a "plate of soup;" and it must have
been oblique as well as hasty; otherwise it cer-
tainly must have occurred to the writer of this
article, who, it is apparent, is not as ignorant as
he is inclined willfully to misrepresent, that so far
from this being a uniform organization, it is an
exception in every army of Europe; that so far
from ten companies being the universal organiza-
tion, so far from the tactics depending on the
number of companies, he will not find in any sys-
tem of tactics the word "regiment" used. All
our tactical organization is on the basis of the
battalion; and a battalion in the European armies
usually consists of some fraction of a regiment.
A regiment may consist of one, two, three, four,
or six battalions, and in some circumstances it
does. There are, in some services, regiments
running up from six to twenty-four companies.
The idea of ten companies being the basis recog-
nized all over the world as necessary for the tac-
ties, is an absurdity which a man who shows as
much knowledge of the affair of which he writes
as the writer of this article, cannot have com-
mitted with an honest purpose. Then he says:

"The mischief would not end in deranging the fixed
Army basis, but would result in fundamentally changing
the inilitia organizations in all the States of the Union, as
they have adopted the Army plan, and must always look to

it for its system of drill and instruction. Here would be in-
calculable mischief and confusion."

It is a flippant article contained in the Incalculable mischief and confusion by chang-
Union of yesterday, in which the writer under-ing the number of companies in a regiment!-a
takes to arraign the Committee on Military Affairs
of the Senate, and presumptuously, also, to ar-
raign the Senate, and, committing the most egre-

gious blunders, to state what, under certain con

change that has been frequently made in our own
history, and which, in its reference to the tactics,

is not found to bear any relation at all, the whole
being intended for a certain number of companies

But, sir, suppose a Chief Magistrate to be so wicked and so silly as this, how could he use the Army for such purpose? Refugees, to some extent, from other countries, who have come here to enjoy liberty, weary of the despotism of the land in which they were born, and natives of the United States, cradled by mothers who would, them-dowments, and graces, which have adorned this selves, have met a despot if he had come to the threshold of their houses, and with their own feminine arms have repulsed tyranny from the land of their birth-commanded by men who have been selected in their boyhood from the various conditions of the people and sections of our country, educated in the service of the Government, accustomed to look up to it as not only a temple beneath which they found shelter, but to uphold which, in all its beauty and its strength, was the great end and aim of all their earthly ambitiontrained to love, to respect, and to follow a flag emblematic of that Union which makes us a confederation of sovereignties, following from year to year, upon a poor pittance which barely sustains life, a profession to which they have been educated and to which they are attached, looking through it only to promotion and that reputation which is to be gained by the peril of their life, if an opportunity should offer, in the cause of their country-educated gentlemen, drawn from every section of the Union, from every condition of life, are suddenly, because they bear commissions and have sworn to sustain the Constitution and to serve their country against all enemies whatsover, to be converted into the mere instrument which a tyrant

35TH CONG....1ST SESS.

rendered the fit instrument of despotism? If it be said these were men drawn from the pursuits of civil life and only occasionally employed in the military service, what, then, shall be said of the great, the good, heroic Taylor? for a hero he was, hot in the mere vulgar sense of animal courage, but by the higher and nobler attributes of generosity and clemency. His was an eye that looked unquailing when the messengers of death were flying around him; but in the ward-room, over his wounded comrade, was dimmed by the tear of a soldier's love and compassion. His was a selfreliant, resolute heart, which rose under accumulated difficulties, and hardened by contact with danger; but that heart melted to a woman's softness at the wail of the helpless or the appeal of the vanquished. He was a hero, a moral hero. His heart was his country's, and his life had been his country's own through all its stages. Was he the fit instrument of a despot to be used for the overthrow of the liberties of the United States?

South shed upon the battle-fields of Mexico. All the wars in which this country has been engaged for the last twenty-five years have been on our southern frontier and in Mexico; and I beg gentlemen to remember that it costs, in times of peace, about twenty-five million dollars to support our Army, which is almost wholly occupied in their defense and protection.

Sir, from my carliest days I have learned to love this Union. I have learned that it was my first duty as an American and as a citizen, if need be, to lay down my life for the Union and our liberties, purchased at the cost of so much blood and treasure; and I had hoped that the ties which The Black Hawk war of 1832 was attended with bound us together, and which taught us the great but trifling cost. Since that period, the expense doctrine of brotherly love and fraternity, would of sustaining our Army has been about six hunnot so soon have been forgotten by Americans. I dred million dollars; and this enormous sum has believe, sir, that the union of these States is de- been expended almost exclusively for the protecmanded by every consideration of interest, patri- tion of our southern frontier. If gentlemen will otism, and historic renown; and if gentlemen, take the pains to examine into the subject, they who seem just now discontented with their posi- will find that since the purchase of Florida we tion in the Union, will consult our past history, have expended on the purchase of lands from forthey will find abundant examples of high patriot-eign Governments, from Indians by treaty, and ism and noble magnanimity in the conduct of the in various other modes of expense, over eight northern portion of the Confederacy. hundred million dollars-a sum which would purchase some of the States of this Union, with all the property within them, real and personal.

It is part of my purpose this morning to introShall I prove my proposition by going on and duce some few reasons here to satisfy those genmultiplying examples; or is it not apparent that tlemen that they ought to take back these unjust whatever may be true of the history of Rome, charges of "sectionalism and injustice." I shall whatever may be true of the condition of Europe, endeavor to show that the country which we posthe United States stands out its own founder and sess was purchased by the blood and treasure its own example? No other people like our own of the whole people, and should be distributed ever founded a State. No other people like our with reference to the wants, prosperity, and hapown have ever thus elevated a State to such great-piness of all. It is a cardinal doctrine of our Govness in so small a space of time. If there be evi- ernment, lying at its very foundation and constidence of decay, that decay is not to be found in tuting the soul of its vitality, that it shall be so the spirit of your little Army, but is to be hunted administered as to "promote the greatest good of for in the impurities of your politicians. It there- the greatest number." This, sir, is Democratic docfore does not become the politician to point to our trine. Yes, sir, it is Democratic doctrine as our little and gallant and devoted Army, as the incipi- fathers taught it. It is the doctrine for which our ent danger which is to overthrow the liberties of fathers fought, and it is the doctrine by which, this country. I hope, the Republic of America will ever stand.

Now, sir, let us look into this subject. We have
at the North a population of something over thir-
teen million, most of them white men; you have at
the South, gentlemen, but a little over six million
white men.
I do not take slaves into account,

If I have succeeded, Mr. President, in impressing upon Senators the principal truths I have endeavored to advance, I have succeeded in showing that the plan of increase which we propose is the most economical and efficient within our reach. If their judgment, however, shall decide other-because they have been denominated property. wise, I then have performed my duty. I have argued this question earnestly because I am thoroughly convinced of the advantages of the bill which is before us. If I am in error it is fortunate for me that the majority of the Senate will correct it. If I am right, the future will sustain my opinion, even though it be now overruled. I am, therefore, content with whatever fortune may befall the bill.

KANSAS AFFAIRS.

You have, in the fifteen slave States, eight hundred
and thirty-eight thousand square miles of land;
we have, in fifteen free States, four hundred and
forty-seven thousand nine hundred and ninety
square miles of land. We have got more than
double your population, but we have got less than
half the amount of land that you possess. I tell
gentlemen that this is not a sectional question. It
is simply a question whether we shall have homes
for our children; and I propose to address myself
to that view of it. You have in the South, or had
in 1850, a population of six million four hundred

SPEECH OF HON. S. M. BURROUGHS, and twelve thousand six hundred and five; we have

OF NEW YORK.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

February 23, 1859.

[WRITTEN OUT BY HIMSELF.*]

The House being in Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union

Mr. BURROUGHS said:

Mr. CHAIRMAN: It is with a good deal of diffidence and embarrassment that I rise now to address the committee, because I have seen a number of gentlemen on my side of the House attempting in vain, within the last twenty-five or thirty days, to obtain the floor-gentlemen who would have discussed the question which I propose to consider with much more ability than I can hope to bring to the subject. Still, I entertain the hope that some points pertinent to the question may be found in the suggestions which I have to make, and will proceed to the question.

Sir, I have felt myself exceedingly mortified, from time to time, in this House, at the remarks that have been made on the left side of the Hall, to the effect that the Republican party was a sectional party. We have not unfrequently been charged with the grossest selfishness. We have been repeatedly charged with having attempted to carry measures which were calculated to break the last ties which bind together the States of this Union.

in the North, or had in 1850, a population of thir-
teen million three hundred and forty-two thousand
and eighty-nine. I say nothing about the slaves.
You, gentlemen, have your negroes who till and
cultivate your soil; but we have our cattle upon a
thousand hills, and an industrious yeomanry. I
propose now to ask who paid for the land we
have, and how we came by it, and what would
be a fair, honest, and equitable division of it?
Why, sir, I recollect that that little strip of land
upon your southern coast, Florida, was bought
at an expense of something over three million
dollars, if not over five million. You recollect,
also, that we purchased Louisiana at a cost of
$15,000,000, besides what we have paid for the
extinction of Indian titles. The gentleman from
Alabama, [Mr. SHORTER,] who spoke the other
day, and who is one of those who made this
charge of sectionalism and injustice, lives in a
State upon which we have expended untold mil-
lions-yes, sir, and northern blood, too-in her
Indian wars. I hope the gentleman will be mag-
nanimous enough, when he looks into the facts,
to take back the charge of sectionalism and bad
faith. We profess to be friends of the Union,
and friends of every hunian being in the Union,
black as well as white; and we do not like to be
charged with bad faith and illiberality and injus-

tice.

But again: we got into a war about Texas. Do The gentleman from Mississippi, [Mr. LAMAR,] gentlemen know how we got into that difficulty? in his speech some days ago, gave utterance to We admitted Texas into the Union, and took this sentiment, and several other speeches from upon ourselves the war with Mexico; and in carhis side of the House have reiterated the senti-rying on that war we expended nearly two hundred million dollars, to say nothing of the precious blood which men of the North and men of the

*For the original report, see page 814 Cong. Globe.

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Now, sir, I propose, in a spirit of kindness, to ask gentlemen who make this charge of sectionalism against us, to tell us where this money -thiscight hundred millions-came from? Where did the money come from? I have facts and figures here to satisfy any gentleman where it came from. Look to the importing and tax-paying States of this Confederacy. In the State of New York we have a population of over three million, nearly half as much as the population of the whole southern States.

Sir, I have not time to-day to present the careful calculations by which I arrive at the fact that the northern fifteen States of this Confederacy have paid three fourths of the entire amount expended for the purchase of these lands, and in sustaining the Mexican, southern border, and Indian wars. Six hundred million dollars have been paid in the form of indirect taxes for these purposes. I make this now simply as a general statement; and tell gentlemen that if they doubt the correctness of the statement, I will, at a future time, present the facts and estimates in careful detail.

Well, sir, I now come here with the complaint that the northern States have not quite half the territory you of the southern States have; and I say further that our land is not as good as yours. I know it, for I have been upon your southern soil; I have been over most of the States of this Union, and gathered the means of forming a correct opinion, and believe that, with the exception of the mountain ranges of the South, you have much better lands than we possess. You have a genial climate-ten thousand fields of beauty, surpassing the valley of the Mediterranean in fruitfulness, richer than the fabled gardens of Hesperides or the Paradise of Sardis; and yet you would deny to us Kansas, and call us sectional and selfish and aggressive, if we do not yield to your demands. This we can never do. Our interest is against it. The voice of the rising generation against it demands our attention, and our honor forbids that we should suffer a country to be wrested from us, long since recognized as rightfully ours, and decreed as our inheritance forever by the most solemn compact which our fathers could make.

But I do not propose just to dwell upon Kansas, but will mention one other reason why we cannot surrender it to slavery, and drive away northern freemen from their own rightful country, We have paid for it, and we claim Kansas as our country upon high grounds of justice and equity -upon the ground that the North is entitled to a fair portion of the lands of the country, as the separate inheritance of freemen; and this because the white man must be paid for his labor, must be rewarded for his toil, and cannot live in the same community with the unpaid negro slave. I need not make an argument to prove that slave labor, being cheaper, crowds out the laborer who has social and domestic wants to supply, which cannot be attained at the cost of negro slave labor.

It is the rightful ambition of northern men to have homes of their own-good homes-and to be surrounded by all the institutions of religion, learning, and moral elevation, which are possessed at the North. A gentleman from Mississippi, not now in his seat, [Mr. LAMAR,] a few days ago,