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SENATE.]

Executive Patronage.

honor;' the President of the United States is the source
of patronage. He presides over the entire system of
federal appointments, jobs, and contracts. He has
'power' over the 'support' of the individuals who ad-
minister the system. He makes and unmakes them. He
chooses from the circle of his friends and supporters,
and may dismiss them, and upon all the principles of
human actions will dismiss them, as often as they disap-
point his expectations. His spirit will animate their
actions in all the elections to State and federal offices.
There may be exceptions; but the truth of a general rule
is proved by the exception. The intendeď check and
control of the Senate, without new constitutional or stat-
utory provisions, will cease to operate. Patronage will
penetrate this body, subdue its capacity of resistance,
chain it to the car of power, and enable the President
to rule as easily, and much more securely, with than
without the nominal check of the Senate. If the Pres-
ident was himself the officer of the people, elected by
them, and responsible to them, there would be less dan
ger from this concentration of all power in his hands;
but it is the business of statesmen to act upon things as
they are, not as they would wish them to be. We must
then look forward to the time when the public revenue
will be doubled; when the civil and military officers of
the federal Government will be quadrupled; when its
influence over individuals will be multiplied to an indefi-
nite extent; when the nomination by the President can
carry any man through the Senate, and his recommend-
ation can carry any measure through the two Houses
of Congress; when the principle of public action will
be open and avowed-the President wants my vote, and
I want his patronage; I will vote as he wishes, and he
will give me the office I wish for. What will this be,
but the government of one man? and what is the govern-
ment of one man but a monarchy? Names are nothing.
The nature of a thing is in its substance, and the name
soon accommodates itself to the substance. The first
Roman Emperor was styled Emperor of the Republic,
and the last French Emperor took the same title; and
their respective countries were just as essentially monar-
chical before as after the assumption of these titles.
It cannot be denied or dissembled, but that the federal
Government gravitates to the same point, and that the
election of the Executive by the Legislature quickens
the impulsion.

"Those who make the President must support him. Their political fate becomes identified, and they must stand or fall together. Right or wrong, they must support him; and if he is made contrary to the will of the people, he must be supported not only by votes and speeches, but by arms. A violent and forced state of things will ensue; individual combats will take place; and the combats of individuals will be the forerunner to general engagements. The array of man against man will be the prelude to the array of army against army, and of State against State. Such is the law of nature; and it is equally in vain for one set of men to claim an exemption from its operation, as it would for any other set to suppose that, under the same circumstances, they would not act in the same manner. The natural remedy for all this evil would be to place the election of President in the hands of the people of the United States. He would then have a power to support him which would be as able and as willing to aid him, when he was himself supporting the interest of the country, as they would be to put him down when he should neglect or oppose those interests. Your committee, looking at the present mode of electing the President as the principal source of all this evil, have commenced their labors at the beginning of this session, by recommending an amendment to the constitution in that essential and vital particular; but in this, as in many other things, they find the greatest difficul

[FEB. 13, 1835.

ty to be in the first step. The committee recommend the amendments, but the people cannot act upon it until Congress shall propose' it, and peradventure Congress will not propose' it to them at all.

"It is no longer true that the President, in dealing out offices to members of Congress, will be limited, as supposed in the Federalist, to the inconsiderable number of places which may become vacant by the ordinary casualties of deaths and resignations; on the contrary, he may now draw, for that purpose, upon the entire fund of the executive patronage. Construction and legisla tion have accomplished this change. In the very first year of the constitution, a construction was put upon that instrument which enabled the President to create as many vacancies as he pleased, and at any moment that he thought proper. This was effected by yielding to him the kingly prerogative of dismissing officers without the formality of a trial. The authors of the Federalist had not foreseen this construction; so far from it, they had asserted the contrary, and, arguing logically from the premises that the dismissing power was appurtenant to the appointing power,' they had maintained, in No. 77 of that standard work, that, as the consent of the Senate was necessary to the appointment of an officer, so the consent of the same body would be equally neces sary to his dismission from office. But this construction was overruled by the first Congress which was formed under the constitution; the power of dismission from office was abandoned to the President alone, and, with the acquisition of this prerogative alone, the power and patronage of the presidential office was instantly increas ed to an indefinite extent; and the argument of the Federalist against the capacity of the President to corrupt the members of Congress, founded upon the small number of places which he could use for that purpose, was totally overthrown. So much for construction. Now for the effects of legislation; and without going into an enumeration of statutes which unnecessarily increase the executive patronage, the four years' appointment law will alone be mentioned; for this single act, by vacating almost the entire civil list once in every period of a presidential term of service, places more offices at the command of the Pesident than were known to the constitution at the time of its adoption, and is, of itself, again sufficient to overthrow the whole of the argument which was used in the Federalist."

It is impossible, said Mr. C., to read this report, which denounces in such unqualified terms the excess and the abuses of patronage at that time, without being struck with the deplorable change which a few short years has wrought in the character of our country. Then we were sensitive in all that related to our liberty, and jealous of patronage and Governmental influence: so much so, that a few inconsiderable removals, three or four printers, roused the indignation of the whole country-events which would now pass unnoticed. We have grown insensible, become callous and stupid.

But let us turn to the question which I have asked. How has the plighted faith of the party been fulfilled' Have the abuses then denounced been corrected? Has the four years' law been repealed? Has the election of the President been given to the people? Has the exercise of the dismissing power by the President, which was then pronounced to be a dangerous violation of the constitution, been restored to Congress? All these pledges have been forgotten. Not one has been fulfilled. And what justification, I ask, is offered for so gross a violation of faith? None is even attempted; the delinquency is acknowledged; and the only effort which the Senator from Missouri has made to defend his own conduct and that of the administration, in adopting the practice which he then denounced, is the plea of retali ation. He says that he had been fourteen years a men

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ber of the Senate; and that, during the first seven, no friend of his had received the favor of the Government; and contends that it became necessary to dismiss those in office to make room for others who had been for so long a time beyond the circle of executive favor. What, Mr. C. asked, is the principle, when correctly understood, on which this defence rests? It assumes that retaliation is a principle in its nature so sacred, that it justifies the violation of the constitution, the breach of plighted faith, and the subversion of principles the observance of which had been declared to be essential to the liberty of the country. The avowal of such a principle may be justified at this time by interested partisans; but the time must arrive when a more impartial tribunal will regard it in a far different light, and pronounce that sentence which violated faith and broken pledges deserve. Mr. C. said the bill now before the Senate affords an opportunity to the dominant party to redeem its pledge, as late as it is, and to avert, at least in part, that just denunciation which an impartial posterity will otherwise most certainly pronounce on them. He hoped that they would embrace the opportunity, and thereby prove that, in expelling the former administration, they were not merely acting a part, and that the solemn pledges and promises then given were not electioneering tricks, devoid of sincerity and faith. I consider it, said Mr. C., as an evidence of that deep degeneracy which precedes the downfall of a republic, when those elevated to power forget the promises on which they were elevated; the certain effect of which is to make an impression on the public mind that all is juggling and trickery in politics, and to create an indifference to political struggles, highly favorable to the growth of despotic power.

Mr. BENTON replied at much length.

[SENATE.

port the man who would keep him in office. Pass the bill before the Senate, and the result will be far different. Each office-holder would be independent, and would look solely to a faithful discharge of his duty for his continuance in office. As the law now stood, it was made to operate on the whole band of officers of the Government, as well on the other officers as on the disbursing agents for whom it was originally intended. Each one not influenced by pure motives would say to the Executive, "Will you retain me in office if I support you?" This effect of that law which it was now proposed to repeal must be apparent to every Senator, and he thought, if they would follow it up, it would produce on their minds a deep conviction that the statute book ought to be relieved from it. It was the intention of those who framed that law to bring the officers of the Government before the Executive at the end of every four years, in order that they might be dismissed if found unworthy. But it certainly never was intended that an officer who had fairly disbursed the public money, and faithfully discharged the duties of his office, should be turned out in order to make room for a politi cal partisan. It was intended to secure a greater accountability in the disbursing agents, and, by bringing their conduct more frequently in review, to secure to the Government the services of the most trust-worthy individuals. But had this been the operation of the act? No. The period of four years had been selected as the period when the enemy was to be prostrated, and friends sustained. This mode of executing the act had defeated all the intentions of its framers. It had introduced a different system, with regard to the tenure of office, from that contemplated by those who passed the law. He was of opinion that it would be wise in Congress to dispense with those provisions which tended to make Mr. SOUTHARD said that the proposition then the whole band of office-holders servile suppliants of the before the Senate had relation entirely to the bill which Executive, destitute of that independence of character, had been proposed by the select committee as one of that manly feeling, which should characterize every the means by which executive power was to be restrain-public officer. Mr. S. here read from the bill the proed. When he said this, his object was to draw the attention of the Senate to the subject under consideration, not to meet any statements with regard to financial matters. The simple proposition was, was it proper that the bill should pass? The first section of the bill supplied two sections of the bill passed in 1820, and the second section provided that Congress shall be aware who are public defaulters, declaring that the commissions of such shall expire. The last provision required that the President should assign to the Senate his reasons, when he removes a public officer from office. He approved of the first provision of the bill, because he believed that the act of May, 1820, placed too much power in the hands of the President, and had accomplished none of the intentions for which it was framed. The act required that certain officers should be appointed for the term of four years, and the intention was to bring those officers (who were disbursing officers) before the Executive at the end of every four years, in order that, if their official conduct had not been correct, he might, by failing to renominate, get rid of them He valued that provision of the bill very much. He without the formality of a removal. The object certain- would not, at that time, enter into the subject of remoly was a good one, but it had tended to increase the vals from office. It had long been a subject of difference power of the Executive to an extent not anticipated at with politicians, and had occupied their attention at an the time of the passage of the law. The law went into early period of the Government. But this section did operation immediately preceding the presidential elec- not interfere with this power of removal. It required tion, and every four years afterwards the officers ap- simply that the President should state to the Senate, pointed under it were to go out of office if not reap. when he removed an officer, that he had removed him, pointed. Now, could any man not see that all these and why. Was there any thing that should make the officers would feel themselves dependent on the Execu- Executive reluctant to communicate such reasons to his tive, who had the power to leave them out or renomi- constitutional advisers? We are bound to presume (Mr. nate them. The law as it stood placed every man, who S. said) that he has acted under the best considerations. was not above being bribed by office, in the market, All that was asked of him was to state that he had refeeling and acting on the principle that he was to sup-moved a public officer, and his reasons for so doing, in

visions requiring the President to lay before Cougress the accounts of all district attorneys, marshals, and other disbursing officers, &c.

The object was to exhibit to the Senate the appointing power, the number of those who should fail to render their accounts, and to give to those who should be unfortunate time to repair the accident which deprived them of the ability to make a correct settlement of their accounts. If an officer, therefore, should be a defaulter in September, the account being made up to January, would leave him time to correct the evil, if the default should be the effect of unforeseen accident, and not of criminal conduct. This part of the bill was so plain that he would not detain the Senate longer in commenting on it. The third section of the bill provided, "That, in all nominations made by the President to the Senate, to fill vacancies occasioned by removal from office, the facts of the removal shall be stated to the Senate at the same time that the nomination is made, with a statement of the reasons for such removal."

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order that the Senate, the co-ordinate appointing power, (he said co-ordinate power, because no appointment could be made without the concurrence of the Senate,) might judge of the propriety of appointing another individual to the office thus vacated. The history of this power of removal was not common. In the early periods of our history it was almost unknown. It continued unknown until Mr. Jefferson's time, and had not been exercised at all by one of his predecessors. The Senate would understand him as referring to the administration of Mr. Adams. There was not one removal from office during the presidency of that gentleman.

[FEB. 13, 1835.

"The whole of this great power will centre in the President. The King of England is the fountain of honor;' the President of the United States is the source of patronage. He presides over the entire system of federal appointments, jobs, and contracts. He has power over the 'support' of the individuals who administer the system. He makes and unmakes them. He chooses from the circle of his friends and supporters, and may dismiss them, and upon the principles of human action will dismiss them, as often as they disappoint his expecta tions. His spirit will animate all their actions in all the elections to State and federal offices. There may be exceptions, but the truth of a general rule is proved by the exception. The intended check and control of the Senate, without new constitutional or statutory provisions, will cease to operate. Patronage will penetrate this body, subdue its capacity of resistance, chain it to the car of power, and enable the President to rule as easily, and much more securely, with than without the nominal check of the Senate. If the President was himself the officer of the people, elected by them, and responsible to them, there would be less danger from this concentration of all power in his hands; but it is the not as they would wish them to be. We must, then, look forward to the time when the public revenue will be doubled; when the civil and military officers of the federal Government will be quadrupled; when its influ ence over individuals will be multiplied to an indefinite extent; when the nomination of the President can carry any man through the Senate, and his recommendation can carry any measure through the two Houses of Congress; when the principle of public action will be open and avowed-the President wants my vote, and I want his patronage; I will vote as he wishes, and he will give me the office I wish for. What will this be but the government of one man? and what is the government of one man but a monarchy? Names are nothing. The nature of a thing is in its substance. The first Roman Emperor was styled Emperor of the Republic, and the last French Emperor took the same title; and their respective countries were as essentially monarchical before as after the assumption of these titles."

The Senator from Missouri [Mr. BENTON] had complained that this report, which emanated from the committee, presented a great variety of bills, which were there framed, to limit the executive prerogative, without being calculated to accomplish any other useful purpose. In looking at the report this morning, he did not see any grounds for making this complaint. There was one bill proposing an amendment to the constitution, which did not meet with the gentleman's concurrence. But because he disapproved of one measure of the committee, did it follow that no other was worthy of approbation? He apprehended that the gentleman from Mis--business of statesmen to act upon things as they are, and souri would not reject his own measures (for he was on the committee, and approved of every bill with the exception of the one just named) because more was not done. Of the other bills proposed by the committee, one was for the regulation of the newspapers in which the laws of the United States and the public advertisements shall be inserted. Did the gentleman see no practical good to result from this bill? Another was to regulate the appointment of postmasters. The provisions in this bill had just been passed by the Senate by a unanimous vote, in the bill to reorganize the Post Office Department; and it was not, therefore, necessary to pass such provisions as were contained in this second bill of the committee, after one had passed the Senate for that purpose. The next bill was for the regulation of the appointment of cadets and midshipmen. He could not answer for what was the practice of the Departments now, with regard to such appointments, but he well knew what was the practice some time ago; and it was to carry the provisions of this very bill into effect. In conclusion, he trusted, therefore, that these bills would find favor with those who had heretofore supported similar measures.

Mr. CALHOUN said that the whole course of the Senator from Missouri, on this occasion, was unbecoming a gentleman; and I appeal to the Senate to bear witness that, in repelling his charges, I have acted on the defensive. However offensive to him, I retract or explain nothing which I asserted when last up. On the contrary, I reaffirm that part of the report which the Senator considers so offensive, and the expression which he has thought proper to consider as casting a personal imputation. Yes, in spite of all he says, the practice of the administration, in dismissing faithful officers, on party grounds, and supplying their places with political partisans, has the tendency to produce all the results which I have attributed to it, and must ultimately convert the whole body of office-holders into corrupt sycophants and supple instruments of power, if persisted in. In making this assertion, which has given him such offence, I have his own authority. In his report, in 1824, he condemned the practice in language as strong, if not stronger, than that which is used in the present report, which he has seized upon to justify his abusive language. To refresh his memory, I will read an extract from that report, which will enable the Senator to judge with what propriety he, who then held such language, should now be so offended that it should be repeated by me.

[Here Mr. C. read as follows, from Mr. BENTON's report of 1824:]

Mr. C. proceeded. This is the language of the Sen ator himself. It is a prophecy. Have we not reached the state that was predicted? And we behold him, who foretold these disasters, now advocating the cause which produced them.

I understood (said Mr. C.) when I moved the resolation on the subject of patronage, the nature of the task in which I had engaged, and its consequences to me personally. I was not so ignorant of human nature, nor of the history of former periods, as not to know that he who undertakes to reform long standing abuses must expect to have his character and motives assailed by those who are profiting by such abuses. I had made up my mind, before I commenced the task, to meet this and every other resistance which I might encounter. Nothing shall drive me back.

Mr. C. proceeded, and said that, in spite of all the zeal which has been displayed to prove that there will be no surplus revenue, I reaffirm there will be a large surplus, provided the expenditure shall not exceed what, on a liberal allowance, it ought to be. Yes, on this supposition there will be an annual average surplus of nine millions for the next seven years, as stated in the report, provided there be no untoward event to prevent it; making, in the aggregate, upwards of sixty millions of dollars. However disguised, the real question is, to whom shall the surplus go? Shall it be left to the disposition of the administration, to be distributed among its partisans, or shall it be returned to the States by amendment to the constitution, as proposed by the com

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mittee? This is the question which has produced the extraordinary excitement which we behold. It is the question which explains the violence and extraordinary course of the Senator from Missouri in this debate.

He clearly sees that this fund is necessary to keep up the ascendency of the party now in power; and hence the efforts which he has made to prevent it from being restored to the States. I, who am opposed to the pres ent state of things, and who see, as I firmly believe, in its continuance, the loss of our liberty, am, for opposite reasons, desirous of returning it to the States. I am not in favor of this measure, because I am in favor of revolution, as the Senator has untruly intimated. There is no man more averse to revolution than myself, and it is because I am so that I feel such solicitude to adopt these peaceful and quiet means of reform which I have proposed, as the only mode of preventing a resort to violence and convulsion.

That our affairs are tending to that result, we daily see too many sad illustrations; and, among them, one which I consider not the least ominous is the almost total decay of all attachment to principle. Frequent and sudden revolutions in opinions of the longest standing, and those thought to be most firmly fixed we see abandoned on the command of power.

I consider (said Mr. C.) the Senator's attempt to devise some scheme to dispose of the surplus revenue, to be as unsuccessful as was his attempt to prove that there would be none. He proposed that it should be expended on the fortifications, and intimates that I have abandoned my former opinion upon that subject. I repel the charge. My opinions are now as they were formerly. I believe that all of the great commercial cities and the great estuaries ought to be defended, and for this purpose I have advocated, and still continue to advocate, a moderate annual appropriation to complete the system; and, so far from abandoning my former opinions, I have accordingly, in estimating what the expenditures ought to be, allowed for fortifications the same as was expended in 1823 on that object, with the addition of 20 per cent.

But the Senator is not satisfied with this large addition. He is for expending the whole surplus of nine millions on fortifications. Can he be serious? Does he believe that it is practicable, if it were desirable, to draw so large an appropriation for this object? Would the interior agree to it? Would the West assert that this immense surplus should be expended on fortifications? No one is more competent to answer these questions than the Senator himself; and yet, although he must know that the whole scheme is utterly impracticable, he gravely rises in his place and proposes it, with a view of defeating the distribution of the surplus. But, suppose it were practicable, how would he dispose of the whole of the fortifications, if the system were completed, with our little army? Or is he prepared to raise the army to thirty or forty thousand men, in order to man these fortifications? Is he ignorant that, in planning a complete and entire system for the defence of the coast, they were distributed into three classes; and that the first, with a few in the second, were intended to be commenced in the present state of the country?

[SENATE.

of twelve millions, there will be an annual surplus of nine, leaving two millions of the present surplus in the treasury to meet current and contingent expenses; and does not the Senator see that those two millions, on this supposition, will be a standing sum from year to year throughout the whole period? and that to add two other millions annually to that sum would increase the overplus at the rate of two millions per annum, and raise it to fourteen millions at the expiration of seven years? It seems to be the fortune of the Senator, when he undertakes to correct what he deems an error, instead of correcting, to fall into the grossest errors on his own part. The Senator has thought proper to introduce a correspondence between the Register of the Treasury and myself; and what a ridiculous parade he has made about a trifling incident scarce deserving notice. The note appended is correct. I did not receive from the Treasury the information I asked for-the amount of the United States' share of the bank dividend for the last year. I wanted the whole amount, and the Register gave me but that which was actually paid in, and what stands to the credit of the Treasury, and not that part which the bank has retained on account of its claims against the United States. Presuming, from the note of the Register, that he had no official statement of the amount of the last item, I applied to the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. SILSBEE] to know the dividend which the bank had declared; and learning from him that it was seven per cent., and ascertaining that, at that rate, the amount of the dividend of the last and preceding years was about the same, I took that of the year 1833, instead of that of the year 1834, and appended the note merely to give notice of the fact, without intending to give the slightest cause of offence to the Secretary, or any other officer of the Department, all of whom had been prompt in their endeavors to furnish the information desired."

I stated these facts to the Senator when he showed me the letter of the Secretary to which he has referred, and added that I would cheerfully make the explanation on the first suitable occasion: but the next morning I saw the correspondence in the Globe, and, of course, whether inserted by the Secretary or the Senator himself, selfrespect prevented me from giving any explanation in my place; for it had been inserted obviously for party purposes; but seeing the Register, and not believing that he had any thing to do with the publication, I stated the facts to him, and ascertained from him what I had supposed, that he had furnished me all that was in his office, and of course that I could not obtain from him the information desired. This is the whole amount of this ridiculous affair.

I must regret, said Mr. C., in conclusion, that the debate has taken the course which it has. The responsibility is not on me; I have acted throughout on the defensive; I have but repelled the unwarrantable assertions of the Senator from Missouri, and his groundless imputations. The Senate will bear me witness that there is no member of this body more disposed to discuss subjects on their abstract merits, without involving personalities, and that I never deviate from this course but when the remarks of others compel me to do so.

Mr. BENTON then rose and spoke for a considerable

and commented with great warmth and severity. He read the following: "It is to convert the entire body of those in office into corrupt and supple instruments of power, and to raise up a host of hungry, greedy, and subservient partisans, ready for every service, however base and corrupt."

The Senator, among many other instances of his accuracy and skill, has furnished us with a remarkable illus-time against the report, from which he quoted largely, tration of his proficiency in arithmetic. He contends that, to have a surplus of nine millions a year, with a standing overplus of two millions in the treasury, the annual surplus must be eleven instead of nine millions, as estimated by the committee; or, in other words, that there must be an overplus of two millions annually, to keep that sum in the treasury at the end of the year. Now, what (said Mr. C.) is the state of the case? The committee assumes that, with an average expenditure

Mr. B. remarked, "corrupt and supple instruments of power!" and the gentleman has done me the honor to identify me with them, as base and corrupt. Sir,

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the Senate prevents me from applying that epithet to him which he deserves, after connecting me with such odious and infamous epithets-of identifying me with those supple and corrupt instruments of power. It is not necessary that I should repel the accusation, for the whole people of the United States will drive it back upon him as a bold and direct attack upon truth!

Mr. POINDEXTER rose and called the gentleman to order. He wished to know whether a Senator on that floor had a right to say that any thing said on it was "a direct attack upon truth?"

Mr. CALHOUN hoped the gentleman from Mississippi would allow the Senator from Missouri to proceed. He cared nothing about the Senator's assertion that he (Mr. C.) was bold enough to make an attack upon truth. Nothing that fell from that gentleman deserved

his attention.

Mr. POINDEXTER. My object in calling the Senator from Missouri to order was, that the words which he ascribed to the gentleman from South Carolina, that it was a direct attack upon truth," might be taken down. I ask if it is in order to use such language?

[Here such was the confusion that prevailed in the Senate-several members speaking at the same timethat not one word of what was said by the VICE PRESIDENT reached the reporter's gallery. When, however, order was in some measure restored-]

Mr. POINDEXTER approached the Clerk's table, and the words were taken down by the Secretary.

Mr. BENTON exclaimed, "Take them down! take them down! I'll sign them!"

Mr. LINN said, would it not be as well to take down the exceptionable words contained in the report, and which the Senator from Missouri had read?

Mr. POINDEXTER. I wish to know whether the words were in order?

The VICE PRESIDENT said the Senator might deny the truth of the statement without intending to impute a wilful misrepresentation of the truth to the gentleman from South Carolina. If the Senator had said that the gentleman had not told the truth, he would have been out of order.

Mr. POINDEXTER asked whether the Senator from Missouri, in alleging that the Senator from South Carolina had made "a direct attack on truth," was not out of order?

The VICE PRESIDENT. The impression of the Chair is, that it was in order to deny the truth of a statement read on that floor, but not what is stated by an honorable Senator.

Mr. WEBSTER dissented from the opinion of the Chair. The word untruth implied an intentional misrepresentation, and the application of it to a member of that body was unparliamentary and out of order. A member may not, said Mr. W., get up and say that the words of another are untrue, because truth is synonymous with veracity. He might say that the words of another were founded in misconception; that he was mistaken, or had unintentionally made an erroneous statement, but he could not charge him with uttering an untruth. He remembered a case of the kind in the other House, when a gentleman of distinction from South Carolina presided there. A member applied certain epithets to the war then pending with Great Britain-he said it was a French war, and another member answered that it was untrue. The Chair decided that the charge implied want of veracity, and that the member making it was out of order.

Mr. W. then appealed to the Senate from the decision

of the Chair.

Mr. CUTHBERT said that, in a contest like this, it must be in the power of the presiding officer to show the meaning of the word "truth." There were several

[FEB. 13, 1835.

kinds of truths--political, mathematical, philosophical, moral, and many other. Now, it was entirely within the competence of the presiding officer to determine whether it was intended to impute, or not, moral crime to any member-such was the latitude of the case.

The VICE PRESIDENT said that, inasmuch as he did not understand the Senator from Missouri to intimate an intention of untruth on the part of the gentleman from South Carolina, he conceived the Senator was not out of order.

Mr. KING, of Alabama, regretted exceedingly the course the debate had taken, because he feared that it would lead to still greater excitement. He regretted it because he thought the gentleman from South Carolina himself had given utterance to expressions produced by the feelings of the moment. He did not, however, admit that the expressions, either of the gentleman from South Carolina or the gentleman from Missouri, were such as to justify the calling them to order. He had, on many occasions, heard in debate expressions such as had fallen from the Senator from Missouri, when no notice was taken of them. It was not unusual to hear the words "unfounded in fact" used in debate. A statement is made by a gentleman as not of his own knowledge, and another applies to it the words "unfounded in fact." This did not put the gentleman applying such language out of order. What the Senator from Missouri said in reference to the Senator from South Carolina did not impeach the personal veracity of that gentleman; and he did hope that the Senator from Missouri would say so at once, and, by putting an end to the question of order, permit the debate to go on. If he was compelled to record his vote, he should be obliged to say that the words of the Senator from Missouri did not impeach the personal veracity of the Senator from South Carolina, and consequently did not put him out of order. He hoped that his friend from Missouri would say that his language did not imply a want of veracity in the Senator from South Carolina, and at once put an end to the delicate question before the Senate.

Mr. LEIGH concurred in the remarks of the Senator from Massachusetts, and consequently should feel himself compelled to vote against the decision of the Chair.

Mr. BIBB said that before he recorded his name on this question, he wished to say that he should feel himself bound to sustain the decision of the Chair, lest the rules of this body, instead of regulating, might be used to restrain debate. He considered the expression "a direct attack on truth" not out of order; it was a mere inference, and was not intended to imply a wilful perversion of facts.

Mr. GOLDSBOROUGH said that it had been many years since he had the honor of a seat on this floor, and the rules for regulating debate might have become more relaxed than formerly, but he was persuaded that if, in the times to which he alluded, a member here had charged another with "a bold and direct attack on truth," not only would the presiding officer have called him to order, but the call would have resounded from all sides of the House. The preservation of decorum in debate is among the first objects of the rules of all deliberative bodies-it is an armor which is thrown around the members for their defence.

The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. BIBB] had been pleased to say that he should sustain the decision of the Chair; lest the rules of the Senate, instead of regulating, might be made to restrain debate. There is (said Mr. G.) another and a much more dangerous means by which the freedom of debate may become restricted; and that is, the overawing debate.

Picture to yourself, sir, said he, on this floor, (and I desire to be understood as making no particular allu

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