USA > Washington DC > Washington DC > Centennial history of the city of Washington, D. C. With full outline of the natural advantages, accounts of the Indian tribes, selection of the site, founding of the city to the present time > Part 65
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On the 5th of January, 1836, Mr. Leigh, from the Judiciary Com- mittee, made a report to the Senate, informing that body of the fact of the bequest having been made, and also giving a succinet history of the proceedings so far taken, including the correspondence presented above.
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In the House of Representatives, on Jannary 14, Mr. Adams, from the House select committee, made a report in which he stated that Congress, in its representative capacity, was alone competent to accept the bequest, and added some interesting historical reflections. "The testator, James Smithson, a subject of Great Britain, declares himself, in the caption of the will, a descendant in blood from the Pereys and the Seymours, two of the most illustrious historical names in the British Isles. Nearly two centuries since, immediately after the restoration of the royal family of the Stnarts, in 1660, an ancestor of his own name, Hugh Smithson, received from Charles the Second, as a reward for his eminent services to that house during the civil wars, the dignity of a barony of England, a dignity still held by the Dukes of Northumberland, as descendants from the same Hugh Smithson. The father of the testator, by his marriage with the lady Elizabeth Sey. mour, who was descendant by a famous line from the ancient Percys, and by subsequent creation of George the Third, in 1766 became the first Duke of Northumberland. His son and successor, the brother of the testator, was known in the history of the Revolutionary War by the name of Lord Percy, was present as the British officer at. the sanguinary opening scene of our Revolutionary War at Lexington, and at the battle of Bunker Hill, and was the bearer to the British Government of the dispatches from the commander-in-chief of the royal forces announcing the event of said memorable day; and the present Duke of Northumberland, the testator's nephew, was the ambas- sador extraordinary of Great Britain, sent to assist in the coronation of the late King of France, Charles the Tenth, a few months only before the date of this bequest from his relative to the United States of America. . . . The father of the testator, npon forming his alliance with the heir of the Pereys, assumed, by an act of the British Parliament, that name, and under it became Duke of Northumber- land. But, renowned as is the name of Percy in the historical annals of England; resounding as it does from the summit of the Cheviot Hills to the cars of our generation in the ballad of Chevy Chase, with the classical commentary of Addison; freshened and renovated in our memory, as it has recently been, from the purest fountain of poetical inspiration, in the loftier strain of Alnwick Castle, by a bard of our own native land; doubly immortalized as it is in the deathless dramas of Shakespeare; "confident against the world in arms," as it must have been in long ages past, and may still be in the virtues of its present possessors by inheritance, let the trust of James Smithson to the United States of America be faithfully exeented by their
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Representatives in Congress; let the result accomplish his object; and a wreath of more unfading virtue shall entwine itself in the lapse of future ages around the name of Smithson, than the united hands of tradition, history, and poetry have braided round the name of Percy, through the long perspective of a thousand years," etc.
As a conelusion to the report, the committee submitted the fol- lowing bill:
"A BILL to Authorize the President of the United States to Assert and Prosecute with Effect the Right of the United States to the Bequest of James Smithson, late of London, Deceased, to Found at Washington, under the Name of the Smithsonian Institution, an Establishment for the Increase and Diffusion of Knowledge among Men:
"Be it enacted, etc., That the President of the United States be, and is hereby, authorized to constitute and appoint an agent or agents to assert and proseente, for and in behalf of the United States, and in their authority, as may be advisable, in the Court of Chancery or orther tribunal in England, the right of the United States to the legacy bequeathed to them by the last will and testament of James Smithson, late of London, deceased, for the purpose of founding at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an insti- tution for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men; and to empower such agent or agents to receive and grant acquittance for all such sums of money or other funds as may or shall be decreed or adjudged to the United States for or on account of said legacy.
"SEC. 2. That said agent or agents shall, before receiving any part of said legacy, give a bond or bonds in the penal sum of $500,- 000 to the Treasurer of the United States and his successors in office, with good and sufficient security to the Secretary, for the faith- ful performance of the duties of the said agency, and for the faithful remittance to the Treasurer of the United States of all and every snm or sums of money, or other funds, which he or they may receive in payment in whole or in part of said legacy, and the Treasurer of the United States is hereby authorized and required to keep safely all sums of money or other funds which may be received by him in virtue of the said bequest, and to account therefor separately from all other funds of his office, and subject to such further disposal thereof as may be hereafter provided by Congress.
"SEC. 3. That any and all sums of money or other funds which shall be received for and on account of said legacy, shall be applied in
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such manner as Congress may hereafter direct, to the purpose of founding and endowing at Washington, under the name of the Smith- sonian Institution, an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men, to which application of the said moneys and other funds the faith of the United States is hereby pledged.
"SEC. 4. To the end that the claim to the said bequest may be prosecuted with effect, and the necessary expenses of prosecuting the same be defrayed, the President of the United States be, and he is hereby, authorized to apply to that purpose any sum not exceeding $10,000 out of any money in the treasury not otherwise appropriated."
This act was approved by the President July 1, 1836. And under its authority the President appointed Richard Rush, of Pennsylvania, the agent to recover the funds in England; who, having arrived in England, notified Messrs. Clarke, Fynmore, & Fladgate of that fact September 14, 1836. The work was begun as soon as practicable, but had not progressed far when a complication arose with reference to the interest of Henry James Dickinson, named in the will. It then tran- spired that Henry James Dickinson was the son of Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Lewis Dickinson by a Mrs. Coates, who was still living, and was married to a Frenchman named De la Batut. During the lifetime of young Dickinson he had made his mother ample allowance for her support, but at his death this allowance ceased. Mr. Rush was satis- fied that under the will of Mr. Smithson she had no claim against the fund bequeathed to the United States, and stated that her claim was under the will of Henry Lewis Dickinson, made at Paris in 1819, by which he left all his property in trust to his brother, Mr. Smithson, for his (Dickinson's) son, Dickinson, or Henry James Hungerford. Half of the interest of it, however, was to go to Mrs. Coates while she lived, and it thus appeared to Mr. Rush that the fee of the French attorney, which had been presented for payment out of the Smithson bequest, could not be charged to this fund. During the progress of the suit, however, Mr. Rush consented to a certain amount being allowed to Madam De la Batut for the sake of preventing delay, and at length the Chancery Court decided to retain for her benefit a sum which should produce an annuity of £150 9s., which, together with arrears, as she had received nothing since 1834, amounted to £5,542. On May 9, 1838, after numerous and vexations delays, the court decreed that the Smithson bequest belonged to the United States. On the 5th of June, the attorneys, Clarke, Fynmore, & Fladgate, informed Mr. Rush that everything was completed, and the following sums had been trans-
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ferred to his name, and that they were entirely at his disposal, free from the control of the Court of Chancery. These sums were as fol- lows: £64,535 18s. 9d. consols; £12,000 reduced annuities; £16,100 bank stock. On the 9th of the month, Mr. Rush shipped to the United States by the ship Mediator, in gold, the net proceeds of this amount, which was £105,565 12s. 5d., the gross amount being £106,- 370 7s. 3d. Upon its arrival in the United States, it was, by the direction of the Secretary of the Treasury, deposited in the mint at Philadelphia, and amounted in dollars to $508,318.46.
In the meantime, on July 7, 1838, an act was passed by Congress to provide for the support of the military academy of the United States at West Point for the year 1838. The sixth section of this act was as follows:
"That all money arising from the bequest of the late James Smithson, of London, for the purpose of founding at Washington, in this District, an institution to be denominated the Smithsonian Insti- tution, which may be paid into the treasury, is hereby appropriated, and shall be invested by the Secretary, with the approval of the President of the United States, in stocks of States, bearing interest at not less than five per cent. per annum, which said stocks shall be held by the Secretary in trust for the uses specified in the last will and testament of said Smithson, until provision is made by law for carrying the purpose into effect; and that the annual interest aceruing on the stock aforesaid shall be in like manner invested for the benefit of said institution."
Under authority of this act, granted as will be seen before the money was received in the treasury, the Secretary of the Treasury, on the 4th of September,. 1838, invested $499,500 of the money in the purchase of five hundred $1,000 bonds of the State of Arkansas, bearing six per cent. interest, payable semiannually, on the 1st of January and July of each year after September 4, 1838; and the further sum of $8,270.67 in the purchase of eight bonds of the State of Michigan, bearing six per cent. interest, payable semiannually on the first Monday in January and July in each year after the 1st of May, 1838. The remainder of the money was left in the treasury. Thus the United States became pledged for the faithful application of the purpose of the testator-the increase and diffusion of knowl- edge among men.
On December 6, 1838, the President invited the attention of Con- gress to the obligation resting upon the United States to fulfill the object of the bequest, and on the next day transmitted to Congress
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reports from the Secretary of the State and of the Treasury in com- pliance with a resolution of the House of Representatives of the 9th of July preceding, requesting all such documents, communications, etc., as might be in the possession of the Executive, or which could be obtained, as should illustrate the origin, progress, and consummation of the process by which the Smithsonian bequest had been recovered, etc.
A variety of projects had been presented by individuals, which were referred to the committee for consideration; but as they all contemplated the establishment of a school, college, or university, the committee did not consider them suitable for carrying out the purposes of the testator. The committee agreed from the first that no part of the fund should be applied to the establishment of any such institution or ecclesiastical establishment, and they also agreed that they would recommend that the capital of the fund should be preserved entire and unimpaired, and so invested as to yield an income of six per cent. per annum, which income only should be annually applied by Congress, and that the capital itself should be increased, rather than diminished.
While the committee was deliberating upon the means of carrying into effect these objects by special enactments, the Senate, on January 12, 1839, adopted a joint resolution to the effect that a joint committee of seven members of the Senate, and as many members of the House as the House should think proper to appoint, should be appointed to consider the entire question of establishing an institution for the application of the legacy of James Smithson, of a charter for the institution, etc., and to consider the expediency of ways and means to be provided by Congress other than said legacy, but in addition thereto, and in aid of said benevolent intention, and to report by bill, or otherwise. Thus two widely divergent plans were suggested by the House and Senate respectively, and after considerable discos- sion it became apparent that further joint deliberation would offer no prospect of concurrence.
February 6, 1839, a series of resolutions was presented to the joint committee for consideration, which were to the effect that no part of the Smithsonian Fund ought to be applied to the education of children or youth of the United States, nor to any school, college, university, or institute of education. These resolutions were adopted on the 13th of that month. The report of the committee of the House, drawn up by a master mind, one fully alive to the value of the increase of knowledge,-that of no less a personage than the venerable John Quincy Adams,-strongly urged the establishment of an astronomical observatory at Washington, and gave in a most lucid and comprehen-
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sive manner the history of astronomy, and presented in the clearest language an estimate of the immense importance to the world, espec- ially to commerce and navigation, of the Royal Observatory of England and of France. In Europe, at that time, according to the able and interesting report, there were one hundred and twenty astronomical observatories, while in the United States there was not one. With such observations, the committee submitted the follow- ing bill:
"A BILL for the Disposal and Management of the Fund Bequeathed by James Smithson to the United States, for the Establishment of an Institution for the Increase and Diffusion of Knowledge among Men:
" Be it enacted, etc., That the Vice-President of the United States, the Chief Justice of the United States, the Secretary of State, of the Treasury, of War, of the Navy, the Attorney-General, and the Mayor of the city of Washington, all during the time for which they shall hold their respective offices, together with three members of the Senate and four members of the House, to be annually elected by their respee- tive Houses on the second Wednesday of December, and to continue in office until others are elected in their stead, shall be and hereby are constituted a body politie and corporate by the style and title of the . Trustees of the Smithsonian Institution for the Increase and Diffusion of Knowledge among Men,' with perpetual succession and the usual powers, duties, and liabilities incident to corporations.
Section 2 gave the corporation thus constituted power to appoint a secretary and treasurer, and to prescribe their duties. Section 3 provided that the sum of $508,318.46, placed in the treasury of the United States September 1, 1838, as the proceeds, in part, of the bequest of James Smithson to the United States, together with all the sums which had been or might be thereafter realized, should be placed to the credit of the fund to be denominated the Smithsou Fund in the treasury of the United States, and the faith of the United States was pledged for the preservation of said fund, undiminished and unimpaired, to bear interest at the rate of six per cent. a year, payable on the first days of January and July, to the treasurer of the board of trustees of the Smithson Fund, to be applied to the pur- poses of the fund, conformably to the laws, and subject to the rules and regulations of the board of trustees.
Section 4 provided that no part of the said Smithsonian Fund, principal or interest, should be applied to any school, college, univer-
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sity, institute of education, or ecclesiastical establishment. Section 5 provided that the appropriations made from time to time by Congress should be for the aceruing interest, and not for principal of the fund, etc. Section 6 provided that the sum of $30,000, part of the first year's interest, be applied toward the erection, at the city of Wash- ington, of an astronomical observatory, adapted to the most effective and continual observations of the phenomena of the heavens, etc. Section 7 provided that the site should be in the city of Washington, on land belonging to the United States, etc.
There were five other sections to the bill, the 12th setting apart from the second and third years' interest the sum of $60,000, which was to be invested, and the interest arising from such investment was to be applied to the payment of the salary of an astronomical observer, and to the incidental and contingent expenses and repairs upon the building.
February 25, 1839, the Senate having taken up the bill introduced by Mr. Robbins, of Rhode Island, providing for the appointment of nine commissioners annually -three by the Senate, three by the House, and three by the President, to take charge of the Smithson- ian Fund, to draw up an act of incorporation for the institution, and to constitute a portion of its board of trustees, when incorporated, Hon. John C. Calhoun then made the following remarkable speech :
" This is a bill making provision for the common benefit of man- kind; but we are restricted in our powers. The question whether we have the power to establish a university or not, was the subject of consideration at an early stage of our Government, and President Washington decided that Congress had the power; but the question was voted down, and never revived. And now what would we do? We accept a fund from a foreigner, and would do what we are not authorized to do by the Constitution. We would enlarge our grant of power direct from the States of the Union. Sir, can you show me a word that goes to invest us with such a power? I not only regard the measure proposed as unconstitutional, but to me it appears to involve a species of meanness which I cannot describe, a want of dignity wholly unworthy of this Government. Some years ago, we accepted a statue of Mr. Jefferson, which is no more like him than I am, and we made a tacit admission, by its acceptance, that we were too stingy to purchase one worthy of the man and the Nation; and now what would we do by this? We would accept a donation from a foreigner, to do with it what we have no right to do, and just as if we were not rich enough ourselves to do what it proposed, or too
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mean to do it if it were in our power. Sir, we are rich enough our- selves, and if we are not, this bequest cannot give us the power."
Hon. Thomas H. Benton spoke in a similar strain to this of Mr. Calhoun, that "it was a violation of the Constitution," as did also Mr. Niles, of Connecticut; while Robert J. Walker of Mississippi, Ambrose II. Sevier of Arkansas, Mr. Wright and Richard A. Bayard of Delaware, were strongly in favor of the resolution. The bill was laid on the table by a vote of 20 to 15.
March 16, 1840, the Secretary of the Treasury, in obedience to a resolution of Congress, submitted the following statement of the moneys of the United States invested in State stocks: In bonds of the State of Arkansas, $523,000; in bonds of the State of Michigan, 88,000; and in bonds of the State of Illinois, $26,000. September 8, 1841, the Senate passed a bill to amend so much of the sixth sec- tion of the act for the support of the military academy at West Point, of 1838, referred to above, as required the Secretary of the Treasury to invest the annual interest aceruing on the investment of the money arising from the bequest of James Smithson in the stocks of the States, and required him instead to invest the money or interest so accruing in any stock of the United States bearing interest not less than five per cent., and on the 10th of the month the House concurred in this amendment. On the 9th of September, a statement was sent to Congress by Hon. Thomas Ewing, Secretary of the Treasury, showing the following investments of the Smithsonian Fund. In bond of the State of Arkansas, $538,000; in Illinois bonds, $56,000; in Ohio bonds, $18,000, and in Michigan bonds, $8,000; total, $620,000.
In the debate upon the amendment to the sixth section of the act- to support the military academy, adopted as above narrated, Hon. Lewis F. Linn, of Missouri, in the Senate, called attention to the fact that the Democratic Party, during the Presidential campaign of 1840, had been slandered, vilified, and abused with the most unfounded charges of designs to diseredit the States of the Union. The Dem- veratic Party had been denounced from one end of the Union to the other, for having prostrated the whole credit system; yet now what spectacle do we behold? What but that to be expected from the Whig Party, which had so notoriously proved to the world that their professions out of power were one thing, while their per- formance in power were quite another thing? Now they have the first opportunity, they offer the most outrageous, treacherous, and fatal stab to the State stock credit system that was ever attempted by any of the representatives of the people or of the States, etc.
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Hon. Henry Clay, in his usual clear and intelligent manner, replied, that the relation between the Government of the United States and those of the separate States, of the latter being debtor to the former, ought always to be avoided; for what means could be used to coerce the States if they should refuse to pay the bonds? The Government had stocks of its own in which the trust fund conld be invested, and he preferred the adoption of this principle, that in all cases of trust funds an account should be kept with the United States. He regarded the Smithsonian Fund as a sacred trust, which the Government would be bound to restore if it should be lost. The Government had assumed the responsibility for the money, and it should remain in the treasury under the control of the Government so long as the Government was responsible.
Future events showed in the clearest possible manner that what Mr. Clay said might at least have been prompted by the commonest principles of business sagacity, as it was certainly the clearest of com- mon sense.
President Tyler, in his message to Congress, of the 6th of Decem- ber, 1841, made the following recommendation: "I suggest for your consideration the propriety of making, without further delay, some specific application of the funds derived under the will of Mr. Smith- son, of England, for the diffusion of knowledge, and which have heretofore been vested in public stocks until such time as Congress should think proper to give them a specific direction. Nor will you, I feel confident, permit any abatement of the principal of the legacy to be made, should it turn ont that the stocks in which the invest- ments have been made have undergone a depreciation."
The select committee of the House to carry into effect this recommendation of the President, was composed of Hon. John Quincy Adams; Hon. Richard W. Habersham, of Georgia; Hon. Truman Smith, of Connectient; Hon. Joseph R. Underwood, of Kentucky; Hon. Benjamin Randall, of Maine; Hon. Charles J. Ingersoll, of Pennsylvania; Hon. R. M. T. Hunter, of Virginia; Hon. George S. Houston, of Alabama; and Hon. Samuel S. Bowne, of New York.
December 10, 1841, Mr. Adams, from this committee, reported to the House that the $500,000 loaned to the State of Arkansas was not payable before the 26th of October, 1860, and the $38,000 subsequently loaned to that State was not payable before January 1, 1861. The bonds of the other States in which this fund had been invested did not mature until about the same time, and some of them were not redeemable until 1870, and many of them were payable only at the
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pleasure of the State! The account with the several States then stood as follows: Arkansas, $538,000; Michigan, $8,000; Illinois, $46,000; Ohio, $18,000; the United States, $1,291.86.
June 7, 1844, Mr. Adams, from the select committee of the House, submitted a report in which he showed from documents submitted likewise that the Government had invested in bonds of the State of Arkansas the sum of $538,000, upon which up to December 31, 1843, that State had paid $93,591.73 interest, and that there remained due at the same date the sum of $75,687.84, and that the interest was accumulating at the rate of $32,000 per year. Michigan owed at the same time $480 in interest; Illinois owed $3,360, and Ohio owed nothing. The interest due from the three States amounted to $79,- 527.84, which, added to the principal, $620,000, made a total sum of $699,527.84. And if the fund should continue to be invested in this manner, for which there was no remedy, the aggregate amount would be, by December 31, 1846, more than $800,000. None of the bonds were payable before 1850, and some of them not before 1870, and all payable at the pleasure of the States, and yet Congress, on July 1, 1836, in accepting the bequest, solemnly pledged the faith of the Government of the United States that all the sums of money and other funds received from and on account of this legacy should be applied to the humane and generous purpose of the testator. For the redemption of this pledge it was absolutely necessary that the funds then locked up in the bonds of the States, and the accruing interest on the same, should be made available for the disposal of Congress, in order that Congress might execute the trust which it had assumed. For this purpose the committee reported a bill for the appropriation of the sum of $800,000,. to be invested in certificates of stock of the United States bearing interest at the rate of six per cent., payable semiannually, and redeemable at the pleasure of Congress by the substitution of other funds of equal value, which sum of $800,000 was to be constituted permanent funds, as follows: To replace the $508,318.46 deposited in the mint at Philadelphia September 1, 1838, and invested as already narrated, and $300,000 to supply the place of the interest that would have accrued by December 31, 1846.
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