Kitabı oku: «Abridgement of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856 (4 of 16 vol.)», sayfa 82
Wednesday, November 6
James Lloyd, from the State of Massachusetts, took his seat in the Senate.
Friday, November 8
On motion, by Mr. Smith, of Maryland,
Resolved, That Mountjoy Bayly, Doorkeeper and Sergeant-at-Arms to the Senate, be, and he is hereby, authorized to employ one assistant and two horses, for the purpose of performing such services as are usually required by the Doorkeeper to the Senate, and that the sum of twenty-eight dollars be allowed him weekly for that purpose, to commence with, and remain during the session and for twenty days after.
Monday, November 11
James Turner, appointed a Senator by the Legislature of the State of North Carolina, for the term of six years, commencing on the 4th day of March last, produced his credentials; which were read, and the oath prescribed by law was administered to him, and he took his seat in the Senate.
Tuesday, November 12
Alexander Campbell, from the State of Ohio, took his seat in the Senate.
Thursday, November 14
Reparation for the attack on the frigate Chesapeake
The following Message was received from the President of the United States:
To the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States:
I communicate to Congress copies of a correspondence between the Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of Great Britain and the Secretary of State, relative to the aggressions committed by a British ship of war on the United States frigate Chesapeake, by which it will be seen that that subject of difference between the two countries is terminated by an offer of reparation, which has been acceded to.
JAMES MADISON.
Washington, Nov. 13, 1811.
The Message and papers therein referred to were read, and ordered to lie on the table.
Friday, November 22
Jonathan Robinson, from the State of Vermont, took his seat in the Senate.
Monday, November 25
William Hunter, appointed a Senator by the Legislature of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, in place of Christopher Grant Champlin, resigned, produced his credentials, was qualified, and took his seat in the Senate.
Friday, November 29
The oath prescribed by law was administered to Mr. Bayard, his credentials having been read and filed during the last session.
Thursday, December 19
Battle of Tippecanoe
The following Message was received from the President of the United States:
To the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States:
I lay before Congress two letters received from Governor Harrison, of the Indiana Territory, reporting the particulars and the issue of the expedition under his command, of which notice was taken in my communication of November 5th.
While it is deeply lamented that so many valuable lives have been lost in the action which took place on the 7th ultimo, Congress will see, with satisfaction, the dauntless spirit and fortitude victoriously displayed by every description of the troops engaged, as well as the collected firmness which distinguished their commander, on an occasion requiring the utmost exertions of valor and discipline.
It may reasonably be expected that the good effects of this critical defeat and dispersion of a combination of savages, which appears to have been spreading to a greater extent, will be experienced not only in a cessation of the murders and depredations committed on our frontier, but in the prevention of any hostile incursions otherwise to have been apprehended.
The families of those brave and patriotic citizens who have fallen in this severe conflict, will doubtless engage the favorable attention of Congress.
JAMES MADISON.
Washington, Dec. 18, 1811.
The Message and letters referred to were read, and ordered to lie on the table.
Friday, December 20
Mr. Gilman, from the committee, reported the bill to raise, for a limited time, an additional military force, correctly engrossed; and the bill was read the third time, and the blanks filled. On the question, Shall this bill pass? it was determined in the affirmative – yeas 26, nays 4, as follows:
Yeas. – Messrs. Anderson, Bibb, Bradley, Campbell of Ohio, Campbell of Tennessee, Condit, Crawford, Cutts, Franklin, Gaillard, German, Gilman, Gregg, Horsey, Howell, Leib, Lloyd, Pope, Reed, Robinson, Smith of New York, Tait, Taylor, Turner, Varnum, and Worthington.
Nays. – Messrs. Dana, Goodrich, Hunter, and Lambert.
Rangers for the Frontier
The Senate resumed, as in Committee of the Whole, the bill authorizing the President of the United States to raise certain companies of spies or rangers for the protection of the frontier of the United States; and the bill was amended; and the President reported it to the House accordingly.
On the question, Shall this bill be engrossed and read a third time as amended? it was determined in the affirmative.
Tuesday, December 24
Hudson River and Lake Ontario Canal
The following Message was received from the President of the United States:
To the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States:
I communicate to Congress copies of an act of the Legislature of New York, relating to a canal from the great Lakes to Hudson's River. In making the communication, I consult the respect due to that State in whose behalf the commissioners appointed by the act have placed it in my hands for the purpose.
The utility of canal navigation is universally admitted. It is not less certain, that scarcely any country offers more extensive opportunities for that branch of improvements than the United States; and none, perhaps, inducements equally persuasive to make the most of them. The particular undertaking contemplated by the State of New York, which marks an honorable spirit of enterprise, and comprises objects of national as well as more limited importance, will recall the attention of Congress to the signal advantages to be derived to the United States from a general system of internal communication and conveyance; and suggest to their consideration whatever steps may be proper, on their part, towards its introduction and accomplishment. As some of those advantages have an intimate connection with arrangements and exertions for the general security, it is at a period calling for these that the merits of such a system will be seen in the strongest lights.
JAMES MADISON.
Washington, December 23, 1811.
The Message and documents therein referred to were read; and referred to the committee last mentioned, to consider and report thereon.
Friday, December 27
The following Message was received from the President of the United States:
To the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States:
I lay before Congress copies of resolutions entered into by the Legislature of Pennsylvania, which have been transmitted to me, with that view, by the Governor of that State, in pursuance of one of the said resolutions.
JAMES MADISON.
Washington, December 27, 1811.
Oliver Evans' claim for different applications of Steam Power
Mr. Leib presented the memorial of Oliver Evans, stating that the memorialist verily believes himself to be the original proposer of steam-boats and steam-wagons in the United States, (Doctor Franklin only excepted;) and that he conceives his patent, dated February 14, 1804, secured to him the right to use his engine for boats, mills, and land carriages, and praying to be left in full possession of those rights, for reasons stated at large in the memorial; which was read, and ordered to lie on the table.
Monday, December 30
Burning of the Richmond, Va., Theatre
Mr. Bradley submitted the following motion for consideration:
Resolved, That the members of this House will wear crape on the left arm for one month, in testimony of the national respect and sorrow for the unfortunate persons who perished in the city of Richmond, in Virginia, on the night of the 26th of the present month.
Tuesday, December 31
Mr. Bradley called up the motion made yesterday on the subject; and, on his motion, it was amended and agreed to as follows:
Resolved, That the members of this House will wear crape on the left arm for one month, in testimony of the condolence and sorrow of the Senate for the calamitous event by which the Chief Magistrate of the State of Virginia, and so many of her citizens, perished by fire, in the city of Richmond, on the night of the 26th of the present month.
Thursday, January 16, 1812
Hostile policy of Great Britain
The following message was received from the President of the United States:
To the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States:
I communicate to Congress a letter from the Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of Great Britain to the Secretary of State, with the answer of the latter.
The continued evidence afforded in this correspondence, of the hostile policy of the British Government against our national rights, strengthens the considerations recommending and urging the preparation of adequate means for maintaining them.
JAMES MADISON.
Washington, January 16, 1812.
The Message and documents enclosed were read, and referred to the committee to whom was referred, on the 8th of November last, so much of the Message of the President of the United States as concerns the relations between the United States and France and Great Britain, to consider and report thereon; and five hundred copies thereof ordered to be printed for the use of the Senate.
Friday, January 17
Incorporation of a Mining Company in Upper Louisiana
Mr. Bradley, from the committee appointed on the petition of Moses Austin and John R. Jones, reported a bill to incorporate Moses Austin, John Rice Jones, Henry Austin, and others, into a company, by the name of the Louisiana Lead Company; and the bill was read, and passed to the second reading.
Wednesday, January 29
The bill establishing a land office was read the second time.
Additional Military Force
The Senate resumed, as in Committee of the Whole, the consideration of the bill, entitled "An act authorizing the President of the United States to accept and organize certain volunteer military corps," together with the amendments reported thereto by the select committee.
Mr. Giles rose and opposed at length the bill as it came from the House, reserving to himself the privilege of acting on the proposed amendment according to the result of further reflections. He believed the bill would be productive of no practical efficacy. It proposed a force which could not be raised; and if raised, from the short period of its service, in the event of serious hostilities, would be utterly incompetent to effect the objects of those hostilities. The bill would be inoperative, because, in the States of Massachusetts and Vermont, (and he presumed in other States,) no power or provision existed by which these volunteers could be commissioned, so as to perform the contemplated service; and if the Government were deprived of the volunteers in Massachusetts and Vermont, he did not know where they could obtain volunteers for the object which he believed all branches of the Government had in view. He presumed that the system of volunteers was the favorite system of the Government; and this he inferred from their having recommended to the other House the raising of ten thousand regulars only, and from the Message of the President, sent in after both Houses had passed the bill for raising twenty-five thousand regulars, and communicating the correspondence between Mr. Foster and Mr. Monroe, as a ground for urging Congress to persevere in the preparations they were engaged in making. The President must, therefore, have deemed a volunteer force essential for the contemplated service. And here he observed he thought, if his correspondence with the British Envoy, which afforded evidence of "continued hostility" towards us, furnished matter of sufficient importance to press upon Congress the utility of hastening their measures of preparation, that the other business of the Department of State might have been allowed to repose long enough for a reply to have been made to Mr. Foster, before nearly a month had elapsed after the date of his letter. He did not advert to this circumstance from any want of respect to this Government: he should always treat them with the highest respect. He should prefer the reduction of the number of the volunteers to twenty-five thousand, rather than the retention of the fifty thousand, because it would increase the momentum of actual force, and decrease the expenses, about which so much has been said. Surely, he said, he did not mean that it would not increase the momentum of force proposed by the other House, but that proposed by the Executive. The Executive had asked for ten thousand regulars, and fifty thousand volunteers – in all, sixty thousand men. The other House had agreed to give him eighty-five thousand. The proposed amendment would, therefore, bring the quantum of force down nearly to the Executive requisition. But the bill proposed a force which would be utterly inefficient, as all other volunteer bills had been. The returns under the thirty thousand volunteer law, passed two or three years ago, were so few, that the Secretary of War did not register them. He asked, how efficient could that species of force be, of which the Chief Magistrate did not think it worth while to have a record kept? It was only a formidable display of armies on paper – a tender of services – which only produced very handsome replies from the President. He did not censure the Secretary of War or the President; very far from it; the defect had been in the law. He begged gentlemen to look seriously at the subject. If a war should ensue, it must be a serious one. The responsibility attached to Congress of placing an adequate force in the hands of the President for the war. But if they passed a law which would give the President only a nominal force, totally incompetent to effect any desirable object, he, for one, should be unwilling to take any share of responsibility on himself.
Thursday, February 27
Increase of the Navy
The Senate resumed, as in Committee of the Whole, the consideration of the bill entitled "An act concerning the Naval Establishment," together with the amendments reported thereto by the select committee.
Mr. Lloyd. – Mr. President, the amendments proposed by the committee to whom this bill has been referred, having been gone through with, I now beg leave to offer a new one, by an additional section to the following effect:
"Be it further enacted, That the President of the United States be, and he hereby is, authorized to cause to be built as speedily as may be, on the most approved model, – frigates, not exceeding thirty-six guns each; and that a sum not exceeding – dollars be, and the same is hereby appropriated for building the said frigates, out of any moneys in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated."
It is my intention, sir, to move for twenty new frigates; but the number I have left blank in order, should the Senate be favorably disposed to an increase of the Navy, and disagree with me as to the degree of that increase, they might regulate the number at their pleasure.
Sir, I have been induced to offer this amendment from an impulse of duty towards my more immediate constituents, and also from a sense of the obligation imposed upon me, however feebly I may be able to respond to it, in the honorable station in which I am placed, to endeavor to the extent of my ability to support the dignity, protect the rights, and advance the best interests of the United States. Sir, I trust the amendment under consideration, if adopted, would have a relation, and a favorable relation, to all these objects.
If it be not the determination of the Government to engage in an open, actual, efficient war; to place the nation in such a complete state of preparation as to avert war, from our state of readiness to meet it; then the measures of the present session, those of filling up the existing Military Establishments, and thereby adding to it between six and seven thousand men, that of enlisting a standing army of twenty-five thousand men to serve for five years, unless sooner discharged – of providing for the employment of fifty thousand volunteers, and of holding in readiness one hundred thousand of the militia, would be not only inexcusable, but nearly treasonable; as they would in such case, without any adequate object, impose severe and heavy burdens upon the people of the United States, from which years of the highest degree of prosperity would not relieve them. But, sir, I am bound to believe, that unless redress be obtained, it is the determination of the Government of the United States to enter into an actual, vigorous, real war, or at any rate to put the nation into a perfect State of readiness to commence it, should it be necessary; and in either of these cases, an efficient naval force is as indispensable, nay much more indispensable, than a land force.
In the year 1793, when Great Britain depredated upon your commerce, you had a man at the head of your Government who fought no battles with paper resolutions, nor attempted to wage war with commercial restrictions, although they were then pressed upon him. He caused it to be distinctly and with firmness made known to Great Britain, that if she did not both cease to violate our rights, and make us reparation for the wrongs we had sustained – that young and feeble as we then were, just in the gristle, and stepping from the cradle of infancy, we would try the tug of war with her. What was the consequence? Her depredations were stopped – we made a treaty with her, under which we enjoyed a high degree of prosperity. Our claims were fairly heard, equitably adjudged, and the awards were honorably and punctually paid to the sufferers. In this instance you did something for commerce.
Next came the war with Tripoli – the Barbary States preyed upon our commerce – you determined to resist, and despatched a small squadron to the Mediterranean: this ought to have been considered as the germ of your future maritime greatness: the good conduct and bravery of that squadron, and the self-immolation of some of its officers, spread the renown of your naval prowess to all quarters of the civilized globe. What did you in this instance? At the moment when victory had perched upon your standard – when you might have exhibited the interesting spectacle of the infant Government of the United States holding in subjugation one of the Powers of Barbary, to whom all Europe had been subservient – at this moment when conquest was completely within your grasp – civil agency stepped in – the laurel was torn from the brow of as gallant a chieftain as ever graced the plains of Palestine, and we ignominiously consented to pay a tribute, where we might have imposed one.
After this you had the Berlin decree, the Orders in Council, the Milan decree, the Rambouillet decree, the depredations of Spain, the robberies even of the renegado black chief of St. Domingo, and the unprovoked and still continued plunder of Denmark, a nation of pirates from their origin. What cause of complaint has Denmark, or ever had Denmark, against us? Her most fond and speculative maritime pretensions we have willingly espoused, and yet she continues daily to capture and condemn our vessels and cargoes, and contemptuously tells us that the Government of the United States is too wise to go to war for a few merchant ships. And this we bear from a people as inferior to the United States in all the attributes of national power or greatness, as I am inferior to Hercules. Yes, sir, commerce has been abandoned, else why prohibit your merchants from bringing the property, to a large amount, which they have fairly purchased and paid for, into the ports of our country, else why, by this exclusion, perform the double operation of adding to the resources of the enemy you are going to war with and impoverishing your own citizens.
Yes, sir, commerce has been abandoned, "deserted in her utmost need by those her former bounty fed." Yes, sir, she has been abandoned. She has been left as a wreck upon a strand, or as a derelict upon the waters of the ocean, to be burnt, sunk, or plundered, by any great or puny assailant who could man an oar or load a swivel for her annoyance.
What was the leading object of the adoption of the Federal Constitution in the northern parts of the Union? Most emphatically, it was for the protection of commerce. What was the situation of some branches of our commerce then? And what is it now? Look at the statement which was laid upon our tables about a fortnight past, and taken from the returns of the Treasury. What effect has it had upon our fisheries, which were so nobly and successfully contended for by the American Commissioners who settled the Treaty of 1783; which for a time suspended that Treaty; and which, both the duplicity and intrigue of France and the interest of England strove to deprive us of – of our fisheries, which were then considered, and still ought to be considered, as a main sinew of our strength, and a nursery for our seamen?
