REMARKS

UPON THAT PART OF THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE WHICH RELATES TO THE REVENUE AND FINANCES, DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, DECEMBER 16 AND 17, 1840.

THE motion submitted by Mr. WRIGHT, on Monday, 14th inst., proposing to refer so much of the President's Message as relates to the Finances, to the Committee on Finance, coming up for consideration

MR. WEBSTER rose, and addressed the Senate nearly as follows:

MR. PRESIDENT: It has not been without great reluctance that I have risen to offer any remarks on the Message of the President, especially at this early period of the session. I have no wish to cause, or to witness, a prolonged, and angry, and exciting discussion on the topics it contains. The Message is, mainly, devoted to an elaborate and plausible defence of the course of the existing Administration; it dwells on the subjects which have been so long discussed among us-on banks and banking, on the excess of commerce and speculation, on the State debts, and the dangers arising from them, on the sub-Treasury, as it has been called, or the Independent Treasury, as others have denominated it. I propose now to deal with none of these points. So far as they may be supposed to affect the merits or character of the Administration, they have, as I understand it, been passed upon by the country; and I have no disposition to reargue any of them. Nor do I wish to enter upon an inquiry as to what, in relation to all these things, is supposed to have been approved or disapproved by the people of the United States, by their decision in the late election. It appears, however, thus far, to be the disposition of the nation to change the Administration of the Government. All I purpose at this time to do is, to present some remarks on the subject of the finances, speaking on the present state of things only, without recurring to the past, or speculating as to the future. Yet I suppose that some proper forecast, some disposition to provide for what is before us, naturally mixes itself up, in a greater or less degree, with all inquiries of this sort.

In this view, I shall submit a few thoughts upon the Message of the President; but I deem it necessary to preface what I shall say with some few preliminary remarks.

And, first, I will say a word or two on the question whether or not unfounded or erroneous impressions are communicated to the people by that document, in several respects. In this point of view I first notice what the President says in the eighth page. He there represents it as the great distinctive principle- the grand difference in the characters of our public men that of one class of them it has been the constant object to create and to maintain a public debt, and with another to prevent and to discharge it. This I consider as an unfounded imputation on those who have conducted the Government of this country. The President says "he has deemed this brief summary of our fiscal affairs necessary to the due performance of a duty specially enjoined upon him by the Constitution. It will serve also to illustrate more fully the principles by which he has been guided in reference to two contested points in our public policy, which were earliest in their development, and have been more important in their consequences than any that have arisen under our system of government: he alludes to a national debt and a National Bank." About a National Bank I have nothing at present to say; but here it is officially announced to us that it has been a great contested question in the country whether there shall or shall not be a national debt, as if there were public men who wished a national debt, to be created and perpetuated for its own sake! Now, I submit it to the Senate, whether there has ever existed in the country any party, at any time, which avowed itself in favor of a national debt, per se, as a thing desirable? Does the history of the past debts contracted by the Government lay the least foundation for any such assertion? The first national debt we have had was the loan negotiated in Holland, by John Adams. None, I presume, ever doubted the policy of such a loan, in the then existing circumstances of the country. Then there came the debt contracted for the pay of the Revolutionary army, by the Continental Congress, or rather by the country through that Congress. Next were the debts incurred during the war by the States, for the purpose of carrying on the war. Provision was made for discharging these debts as the cost of our Revolution: can any body object to a debt like this? Of the same character were the loans made by Government to carry on the late war with Great Britain. These are the principal national debts we have ever contracted, and I cannot but think it singularly unfortunate that what looks so much like an imputation on those who authorized these loans should come from the head of an Administration which, so far as I know, is the first that has ever commenced a national debt in a time of profound peace.

And now to proceed to the actual state of the finances.

The Message, though it does not call the obligations of the Government a national debt, but, on the contrary, speaks in the strongest terms against a national debt, yet admits that there are Treasury

notes outstanding, and bearing interest, to the amount of four and a half millions; and I see, connected with this, other important and leading truths, very necessary to be considered by those who would look out beforehand that they may provide for the future.

Of these, the first in importance is, that the expenditures of the Government during the term of the present Administration have greatly exceeded its income. I-shall not now argue the question whether these expenditures have been reasonable or unreasonable, necessary or unnecessary. I am looking at the facts in a financial view, purely and I say that during the last four years the public expenditure has exceeded the public income at the rate of SEVEN MILLIONS OF DOLLARS PER ANNUM. This is easily demonstrated.

At the commencement of the first year of this presidential term, in January, 1837, there was in the Treasury a balance of six millions of dollars, which was reserved from distribution by what has usually been called the Deposit Act. The intention of Congress was to reserve five millions only; but, in consequence of an uncertainty which attended the mode of effecting this result, the Secretary, in his calculations, wishing to be, at least, on the safe side, it turned out that the sum actually reserved was six millions. Here, then, was this amount in the Treasury on the first of January, 1837. Events occurred during that year which induced Congress to modify the deposit act, so as to bring back again into the Treasury the fourth instalment of the sum to be deposited with the States, which amounted to nine millions. I find, further, from the communications of the Secretary of the Treasury now submitted to the Senate, that, for the stock for the United States in the Bank of the United States for which bonds had been given to the Treasury by the Bank of the United States of Pennsylvania, which bonds are now paid, there have been received eight millions. Now, Sir, these are all items of a preexisting fund, no part of which has accrued since January, 1837.

To these I may add the outstanding Treasury notes running on interest, (four and a half millions;) and the whole forms an aggregate of twenty-seven and a half millions of dollars of surplus, in addition to the current revenue, which have been expended in three and a half or four years—excepting, of course, what may remain in the Treasury at the end of that term. Here, then, has the Government been expending money at the rate of nearly eight millions per annum beyond its income. What state of things is that? Suppose it should go on. Does not every man see that we have a vast debt immediately before us?

But is this all?is this all? I am inclined to think that, in one respect at least, it is not all. The Treasury, I think, has not duly distinguished, in reference to one important branch of its administra tion, between Treasury funds proper, and a trust fund, set apart by

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treaty stipulation, to be invested for the benefit of certain Indian tribes. I say the Treasury has taken, as belonging to the Government, that which properly belongs to a trust fund which the Government engaged to invest in permanent stocks for the benefit of certain Indian tribes. This makes it necessary to look a little into these trust funds. By our treaty with the Chickasaws, the proceeds of the sales of the lands ceded to the United States by that tribe, were to be invested in permanent stocks, for the use of the members of that tribe. At the date of the last communication which I find, from the Treasury, the amount received on these sales was $2,498,000 06. Bonds had been purchased to the amount of $1,994,141 03; but as some of these bonds were purchased at rates above par, the sums vested in them amounted to $2,028,678 54. This would leave a balance of $369,000 uninvested at that time; and the Secretary informs us that the portion of it which had been received from the land offices had been "mixed up in the general fund." Here, then, is one item of trust money- money not our own—which has been mixed up with our own money, and received as part of the available funds of the Treasury. The stocks purchased for the Chickasaws appear to be as follows:

As a matter of account and book-keeping, this might be thought correct, or it might not; but I think it would have been better to keep a separate account for funds thus held in trust, as every private individual does, who is made a trustee for the interests of others. If the facts are as I have gathered from the report submitted to Congress, here are three or four hundred thousand dollars of the trust fund not invested, and which remain yet to be invested for the benefit of these Indian tribes. As to the rates at which these bonds were purchased, I find it stated that one "lot" of Alabama bonds

was taken, March 31, 1836, at 4 per cent. premium; others, immediately after, at 4; others, in May, at 3; and others, in March, 1837, at 1 per cent. off. Tennessee bonds were purchased at par; Ohio bonds at 117 advance; part of the Maryland bonds at 3 per cent. off, part at 1 per cent. off, and part at 14 advance.

So much for the investment under the treaty with the Chickasaws. But we have other treaties presenting a more important case. We have treaties with eight tribes of Indians, by which treaties the United States stipulated to invest the amounts agreed to be paid for the lands ceded by them in State stocks. Take, for example, the stipulation in the treaty with the Sioux of the Mississippi. The article of the treaty is in these words: -

"Art. 2. In consideration of the cession contained in the preceding article, the United States agree to the following stipulations on their part: First, to invest the sum of $300,000 in such safe and profitable State stocks as the President may direct, and to pay to the chiefs and braves as aforesaid, annually, forever, an income of not less than five per cent. thereon.”

The stipulations in the other treaties are substantially the same. The whole amount thus agreed to be invested for the eight tribes, by treaties, mostly entered into in the years 1837 and 1838, is $2,580,100. This appears from the following statement, which I find in the documents:

Statement exhibiting the Amount of Interest appropriated by Congress to pay the following Tribes, in lieu of investing the Sums, provided by the Treaties,

in Stocks.

Now, Sir, not one dollar of all this has been invested. The very statement which I have quoted shows this. That statement declares that, instead of investing this large sum, according to contract, the United States pays interest upon it, as upon a debt.