value of foreign coin; but that this cannot mean that it has the power to create such coin. Very true; but, then, it may make the steelyards, or the scales, (may it not?) as necessary instruments, to ascertain that value which is to be regulated. It may establish an assay on any scale it chooses.

We have just passed a bill authorizing the Treasury Department to make and issue Treasury notes; and we have done this under the power to borrow money; and certainly the honorable member himself did not doubt, in that case, that, in exercising a clear constitutional power, we had a right to make any thing, which became necessary, as an instrument, to its convenient execution.

The power of Congress, therefore, over the currency; its power to regulate all currency, metallic or paper; and its power, and its duty, to provide and maintain a sound and universal currency, belongs to it as an indispensable and inseparable part of its general authority to regulate commerce.

But, sir, I might safely go much farther than this. It could be shown, from a hundred instances, that the power to regulate commerce has been held to be broad enough to include an authority to do things, to make things, to create things, which are useful and beneficial to commerce; things which are not so much regulations of commerce, in a strict sense, as they are aids and assistances to commerce. The gentleman himself, I will undertake to say, has voted for laws, for such purposes, very often.

Mr. President, we have appropriated, I know not how much more, or how much less, than a million of dollars, for a breakwater in the mouth of the Delaware. The gentleman has concurred in these appropriations. Now, sir, we did not propose to regulate a breakwater; we proposed to make it, to create it. In order to regulate commerce, and to regulate it beneficially, Congress resolved to create a breakwater; and the honorable member never found any constitutional difficulty in the way, so far as I remember. And yet, sir, a breakwater is not essential and indispensable to commerce; it is only useful and beneficial. But a sound currency, of universal and equal credit, is essential to the enjoyment of the just advantages of the intercourse between the States.

The light-houses on the sea-coast, and on the lakes, and all the piers, buoys, and harbors, have been created, in like manner, simply by the power of Congress to regulate commerce.

Mr. President, the honorable member from Pennsylvania, growing warm in the progress of his speech, at length burst out into an exclamation. "What," said he, "would the framers of the Constitution say, could they be now present, and hear the doctrines for which the member from Massachusetts contends!"

Sir, I have already quoted the language of several of these good and great men. I rely on their opinions, fully and clearly expressed.

I have quoted Mr. Madison, among others; but, sir, to use the language of the forum, I am willing to call the witness again into court, and to examine him further. Mr. Madison, all will admit, is a competent witness. He had as much to do as any man in framing the Constitution, and as much to do as any man in administering it. Nobody, among the living or the dead, is more fit to be consulted, on a question growing out of it; and he is far from being considered as a latitudinarian, in his mode of construction. I will then, sir, question him further.

Be it remembered, sir, that my proposition simply is, that it is a part of the power and duty of Congress to maintain a general currency, suitable to the state of things existing among us, for the use of commerce and the people.

Now, sir, what says Mr. Madison? I read from his Message of December, 1816:

"Upon this general view of the subject, it is obvious that there is only wanting, to the fiscal prosperity of the Government, the restoration of a uniform medium of exchange. The resources and the faith of the nation, displayed in the system which Congress has established, insure respect and confidence both at home and abroad. The local accumulations of the revenue have already enabled the Treasury to meet the public engagements in the local currency of most of the States; and it is expected that the same cause will produce the same effect throughout the Union. But, for the interests of the community at large, as well as for the purposes of the Treasury, it is essential that the nation should possess a currency of equal value, credit, and use, wherever it may circulate. The Constitution has intrusted Congress, exclusively, with the power of creating and regulating a currency of that description; and the measures which were taken during the last session, in execution of the power, give every promise of success. The Bank of the United States has been organized under auspices the most favorable, and cannot fail to be an important auxiliary to those measures.”

And now, sir, I hand the witness over to the gentlemen for crossexamination.

But, sir, if the honorable member from Pennsylvania could overthrow my proposition, he would equally overthrow his friend from South Carolina; because that gentlemen admits, that there must be a paper currency of some kind, and that, a paper currency issued by the authority of Government. And if we both fall, we shall pull down along with us (which mercy forefend!) the Secretary of the Treasury, report and all; for it is one of the leading objects of that luminous paper to show how far Government issues might usefully become the medium of payment and the means of circulation. And, indeed, every vote given in Congress for the Treasury note bill the gentleman's own vote, if given, or so far as given, on the ground that Treasury notes shall pass from hand to hand as currency is a refutation of his argument.

Mr. President, this power over the currency, for which I am con

tending, is in the Constitution; the authority of Congress over commerce would be radically deficient without it; the power has been admitted, acknowledged, and exercised. To deny that this power is in the Constitution, is to rewrite the Constitution, to reconstruct it, to take it away, and give us a substitute. To deny that the power has been acknowledged, and exercised, is to contradict history, and to reverse facts.

VOL. III.

30

T*

REMARKS

IN SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, JANUARY 10, 1838,

ON THE FOLLOWING RESOLUTION, MOVED BY MR. CLAY, AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR THE FIFTH OF Mr. Calhoun's RESOLUTIONS, VIZ.

"Resolved, That the interference, by the citizens of any of the States, with the view to the abolition of slavery in this District, is endangering the rights and security of the people of the District; and that any act or measure of Congress, designed to abolish slavery in this District, would be a violation of the faith implied in the cessions by the States of Virginia and Maryland; a just cause of alarm to the people of the slave-holding States, and have a direct and inevitable tendency to disturb and endanger the Union."

MR. WEBSTER said he could not concur in this resolution. I do not know (said he) any matter of fact, or any ground of argument, on which this affirmation of plighted faith can be sustained. I see nothing by which Congress has tied up its hands, either directly or indirectly, so as to put its clear constitutional power beyond the exercise of its own discretion. I have carefully examined the acts of cession by the States, the act of Congress, the proceedings and history of the times, and I find nothing to lead me to doubt that it was the intention of all parties to leave this, like other subjects belonging to the legislation for the ceded territory, entirely to the discretion and wisdom of Congress. The words of the constitution are clear and plain. None could be clearer or plainer. Congress, by that instrument, has power to exercise exclusive jurisdiction over the ceded territory, in all cases whatsoever. The acts of cession contain no limitation, condition, or qualification whatever, except that, out of abundant caution, there is inserted a proviso that nothing in the acts contained should be construed to vest in the United States any right of property in the soil, so as to affect the rights of individuals therein, otherwise than as such individuals might themselves transfer their right of soil to the United States. The acts of cession declare, that the tract of country "is forever ceded and relinquished to Congress and to the Government of the United States, in full and absolute right and exclusive jurisdiction,

as well of soil as of persons residing or to reside therein, pursuant to the tenor and effect of the 8th section of the 1st article of the constitution of the United States.”

Now, that section to which reference is thus expressly made in these deeds of cession, declares, that Congress shall have power "to exercise exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, over such district, not exceeding ten miles square, as may, by cession of particular States and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of Government of the United States."

Nothing, therefore, as it seems to me, can be clearer than that the States making the cession expected Congress to exercise over the District precisely that power, and neither more nor less, which the constitution had conferred upon it. I do not know how the provision, or the intention, either of the constitution in granting the power, or of the States in making the cession, could be expressed in a manner more absolutely free from all doubt or ambiguity.

I see, therefore, nothing in the act of cession, and nothing in the constitution, and nothing in the history of this transaction, and nothing in any other transaction, implying any limitation upon the authority of Congress.

If the assertion contained in this resolution be true, a very strange result, as it seems to me, must follow. The resolution affirms that the faith of Congress is pledged, indefinitely. It makes no limitation of time or circumstance. If this be so, then, it is an obligation that binds us forever, as much as if it were one of the prohibitions of the constitution itself. And at all times hereafter, even when in the course of their history, availing themselves of events, or changing their views of policy, the States themselves should make provisions for the emancipation of their slaves, the existing state of things could not be changed, nevertheless, in this District. It does really seem to me, that if this resolution, in its terms, be true, though slavery in every other part of the world should be abol ished, yet in the metropolis of this great republic it is established in perpetuity. This appears to me the result of the doctrine of plighted faith, as stated in the resolution.

[In reply to Mr. BUCHANAN-]

Mr. WEBSTER said: The words of the resolution will speak for themselves. They require no comment. They express an unlimited plighted faith. The honorable member will so see, if he will look at those words. The gentleman asks whether those who made the cession could have expected that Congress would ever have exercised such a power. To this I answer, that I see no reason to doubt that the parties to the cession were as willing to leave this as to leave other powers to the discretion of Congress.