USA > Georgia > The bench and bar of Georgia: memoirs and sketches. With an appendix, containing a court roll from 1790-1857, etc., volume I > Part 34
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57
283
WILLIAM C. DAWSON.
States, thereby impairing the value of our own lands at home, and increasing the value of those in the new States,-all at our expense. And yet we are called upon to sustain these propositions. Gentlemen see it and understand it. But I will not comment upon or illustrate these positions. I hasten to a conclusion.
I drop every thing else, and come down to the last point upon which I shall speak. The great question which has been presented is, What dis- tribution shall be made of the public lands ? Are the States of the Union all equally entitled to participate in the advantages growing out of them ? Is there a Senator on this floor who dares, in violation of his own good sense, get up and announce that each State in this Union is not entitled to its share of the public lands? Is there one who dare do it? And yet they will waive that question, and adopt a course of policy by which they deny the principle in their action. They will not dare to avow it in their places in the Senate ; but they are pursuing a policy that will by degrees sap the whole of the public lands, take from them, time after time, the best land, granting two or three hundred miles at a time to particular neighborhoods, like the Des Moines, and then at another time making a grant of lands ten miles deep for an extent of six or seven hundred miles, -and all this for the benefit of individual States, and without any regard to an equal distribution.
If we, the members of the Senate of the United States, composed of sixty-two persons, were partners in this great land-fund, and owned it as the United States do, if two of us lived in every State of this Union, if we held the lands under the same compacts, under the same articles of agreement, under the same treaties, that the United States hold them, is there a man who would violate his honor and that faith which is due to integrity, by saying that he would dispose of these lands to the injury of his distant friends in other States, by giving the benefit of them only to individuals living in the State in which the lands lie ? And, if they were to do so, would not the Supreme Court of the United States instantly arrest this attempt to deprive one or more of the copartners of their just rights, and force them by the whole power of the Government to do jus- tice among one another ? Yet here we are, without any just cause, without any good reason for it, disposing of our public lands in just the same inequitable and improper manner.
Mr. President, let me suggest that this is the only question remaining between the two old parties of the country. The tariff is settled. The question of internal improvements is settled. Neither is now strictly a Whig or a Democratic question. Portions of both parties take different sides in regard to them. The disposition of the public lands is now the only question left unsettled ; and I wish now to present this idea :- Is it right, is it prudent, for Congress to legislate in such a way as to give dis- satisfaction to any portion of the country in relation to their rights? And is it not known that this partial mode of distributing the public lands has produced discontent? And this discontent will grow greater and greater as more and more acts are passed of this character and description. If this is the only question remaining, what ought we to do? Settle it ; adjust it. Do it amicably ; do it with justice ; and do it with unlimited liberality toward the new States. I am one of those who, in such a dis- tribution, would go as far as the farthest in being liberal toward the new States,-toward the younger members of the Confederacy, who have had to grow up in the wilderness and the forest. I will do for them as much
284
BENCHI AND BAR OF GEORGIA.
as any other man. But we all know what has been done for them. My worthy friend from Kentucky [Mr. Underwood] has told you of the advantages they have received; and I have, through his kindness, before me here a statement of what the three per cent. fund and the two per cent. fund granted to the new States have amounted to. And how much do you suppose has been paid out of the Treasury under these land-laws, in actual cash, to the new States? Four millions and some hundreds of thousands of dollars,-all gone to them already, besides the immense quantity of land they have received for educational purposes and for pur- poses of internal improvements. I do not mention this for the purpose of creating discontent or dissatisfaction ; nor does it spring from any feeling of unkindness toward the new States. What I say is, that we have showed liberality upon liberality ; and, if the representatives of the new States are willing to come to an equitable adjustment of this question, I want to know when they are going to begin. Was there ever a more modest, diffident, unassuming request made than that which is made by the amendment of my friend from Kentucky ? He asks 14,000,000 of acres for the old States. He says, Give it to us : we want it to educate our poor people ; we want it to increase our internal improvements. Look at what Illinois has got ; look at what Iowa has got ; look at what Indiana has got; look at all the new States : they are making railroads charm- ingly, successfully, and prosperously at our expense. Gentlemen of the new States, will you not do something to aid us? If you intend to do us justice, what time will be better than this to begin ? What evidence can you give of a returning sense of doing that justice to us which the compact and the articles of cession require should be done, than to allow this amendment to pass ? It is small and limited, to-be-sure,-scarcely enough to do much good. Still, if adopted, it would be the beginning of a system founded upon equity and justice, which might grow, and grow, until con- tent and satisfaction would reign throughout those States, founded upon the justness and propriety of your legislation. But if you stop now, and declare that this distribution shall never take place, my word for it, this public-land question will be the great question that will disturb the har- mony of parties and the aspirations of individuals. I am resolved, for one, that this injustice to the State which I in part represent shall never be perpetrated by any set of men with my approval. If they do me injustice in a case where I am clearly entitled to justice, I shall calculate that they would do me injustice on other grounds ; and I may make it a foundation upon which I would make a stand, even against a friend who would not do us justice when it is claimed and when he knows he ought to do it.
This public-land question should not only be made a question in politics, but it should be made a question in morals. By what right can we here combine together to take from one another's people that which justly should be devoted and appropriated to their use, contrary to the law of the land and the moral law ? Are we to forget every thing here and go into one common melee for the purpose of seeing who can get the most ? There is a want of morality in that which I cannot approve. I would prefer that a man should win my fortune, and then enjoy himself in splendor upon it, than to get it in such a way as this. There is a want of morals and a want of principle in this which should be looked into. I make no charges against anybody. We have forgotten what is due to each other. The section of the country in which I reside is willing that the proceeds of these lands should be paid into the Treasury and be
.
285
WILLIAM C. DAWSON.
appropriated for the payment of the general expenses of the Government. I have so voted. But the representatives of the new States will not per- mit it to be done hereafter. It is given away for every other purpose than that which would benefit the people of the old States. I have looked into this matter in every form and shape; and the more I have looked into it, the more I have become discontented with the manner in which the public lands have been appropriated. I have felt the necessity of a system founded upon equity and justice, by which the public lands may be disposed of. When will the period arrive when that may be done ? Never, unless we begin ; and there is no better time to begin than the present. Hence it is that I say, that if this proposition is rejected it will show that you never intend to adopt any proposition by which the old States of this Confederacy may be benefited by the public lands. If that is done, we will understand you.
I ask pardon for having detained the Senate so long; and I assure them that it was not my intention, when I arose, to have spoken more than thirty minutes.
Mr. UNDERWOOD. I hope the question will not be taken now. I think it would be better that it should not now be taken. The truth is, that if you force me to vote at this time I do not know but that I shall have to contradict myself. I stated the other day that if iny amendment was not acceptable to the Senate I should still vote for the bill. I told the worthy chairman of the Committee on Public Lands, this morning, that I doubted very much whether I ought to do so. And, under the feelings which have been inspired by the speech of my friend from Georgia, I really feel almost disposed to retract my former assertion that I intended to vote for the bill in any event. I feel a sense of the injustice which has been practised toward the old States to such an extent, that I do not know whether, if something like justice is not done to my own State, I can vote for the bill. I therefore hope that the question will not be pressed at this late period of the day, but that it may lie over, in order that we may all think about it, and that, as the speaking is pretty well over, when we meet again we may be prepared to take up the bill and vote upon it. There is no immediate necessity for acting on the bill now.
The further consideration of the bill was postponed.
For the second session of the Thirty-Second Congress, from first Monday in December, 1852, to 4th March, 1853, the author has no reported proceedings; and he is therefore unable to give a synopsis of the discussions in which Mr. Dawson engaged or the measures he introduced in that session.
In April, 1854, a bill was before the Senate, introduced by Mr. EVERETT, to recompense the discoverer of practical anaesthesia, which had been referred to the Committee on Military Affairs, and amended in committee by inserting the names of William T. G. Morton, Charles T. Jackson, and Horace Wells, as the probable discoverers, and by filling a blank in the bill relative to the amount to be paid with the sum of one hundred thousand dollars. The report * says that
* Cong. Globe, vol. xxviii. part 2, p. 943.
-----
286
BENCHI AND BAR OF GEORGIA.
The bill, as amended, recites that a discovery has been made, and is now in practice, whereby the human body can be rendered safely insen- sible to pain in dental, surgical, and obstetrical operations, by the use of what are commonly called anaesthetic agents, and the Government of the United States has been and is in the enjoyment of the discovery, in the military and naval service; and that it is believed that the discovery was made by some one of the following persons, -- William T. G. Morton, Charles T. Jackson, each of Boston, and Horace Wells, of Hartford, deceased ; but it does not appear to the satisfaction of Congress which of these parties was the original, true, and first discoverer thereof; and, as Congress is willing to provide a recompense for such discovery when ascertained, it proposes to appropriate $100,000, to be paid by the Secretary of the Treasury as a recompense for the discovery and the use and benefit thercof by the Government and people of the United States.
The following conversational remarks transpired in the Se- nate :-
Mr. DAWSON. I regret that I failed this morning to bring up some papers connected with this subject. I wish now to ask that the further consideration of the bill be postponed until to-morrow, in order that I may produce those papers. I have in my possession a letter from Dr. Jackson and one from Dr. Long, of Athens, in the State of Georgia, on this sub- ject. Dr. Long is a very young man ; but he commenced his practice as early, I think, as the year 1843, and has, therefore, been over ten years in the profession. The evidence which I have will, I think, establish the fact beyond controversy, that this young man applied this discovery in the same form in which it is said to have been applied by one of the three individuals mentioned. I have forgotten his given name, or I would pro- pose to insert it in the proper place.
Mr. EVERETT. It is provided for by the general provision allowing all persons to come in.
Mr. DAWSON. I know that ; but I wish Dr. Long to stand among the four named in the bill as one of the individuals who, in all probability, made the first discovery. Perhaps it would be sufficient to put in Dr. Long, of Athens, Georgia.
Mr. WALKER. I will state to the Senator from Georgia that I heard of this gentleman, and procured of Mr. HILLYER, of the House of Repre- sentatives, his name, and I thought I had it in my pocket ; but I have lost it. The terms of the bill, however, are broad enough to embrace him.
Mr. DAWSON. But I wish to have him distinctly mentioned in both sections. I move, therefore, to insert the name of " Dr. Long, of Athens, Georgia," in every place in the bill where the names of Dr. Jackson and Dr. Morton occur.
The amendment was agreed to.
On the 20th April, 1854, Mr. DAWSON addressed the Senate as follows :*-
MR. PRESIDENT :- During my recent absence from this city, resolutions were transmitted to me from the Legislature of the State of Georgia,
* See Congressional Globe, vol. xxviii. part 2, p. 955.
287
WILLIAM C. DAWSON.
through the Executive of that State, which I did not intend, nor think it necessary, to submit to the Senate; but, as I am instructed to do so, in consequence of the oft-repeated presentation of petitions on the subject of slavery, I beg leave to present them.
They set forth that the State of Georgia, in solemn convention, had firmly fixed herself upon the principles of the Compromise measures of 1850, relating to the subject of slavery in the Territories of the United States, as a final settlement of the agitation of that question, its with- drawal from the halls of Congress and the political arena, and its refer- ence to the people of the Territories interested therein, and distinctly recognises in those Compromise measures the doctrine that it is not com- petent for Congress to impose any restrictions as to the existence of slavery among them upon the citizens moving into or settling upon the Territories of the Union, acquired or to be hereafter acquired, but that the question whether slavery shall or shall not form a part of their do- mestic institutions is for them alone to determine for themselves. Her present Executive has reiterated and affirmed the same fixed policy in his inaugural address. They therefore resolve :-
That the Legislature of Georgia, as the representatives of the people, speaking their will and expressing their feelings, have had their confidence strengthened in the settled determination of the great body of the Northern people to carry out in good faith those principles, in the practical application of them to the bills re- ported by Mr. Douglas from the Committee on Territories in the United States Senate at the present session, proposing the organization of a territorial govern- ment for the Territory of Nebraska.
And be it further Resolved, That our Senators in Congress be, and they are hereby, instructed, and our Representatives requested, to vote for and support those prin- ciples, and to use all proper means in their power for carrying them out, either as applied to the government of the Territory of Nebraska, or in any other bill for territorial government which may come before them.
Resolved, further, That his Excellency the Governor be requested to transmit a copy of these resolutions to each of our Senators and Representatives in Congress.
I present these resolutions. I do not wish to make any further com- mentaries on them, but simply to say that they are the decision of the representatives of the people of Georgia, in Legislative Assembly con- vened. I move that they lic on the table.
Throughout the session he maintained his habitual activity and devotion to his public duties, and frequently submitted his views, as the following subjects on which he addressed the Senate will show :-
1. The mission of the Papal Nuncio to the United States.
2. Refunding to certain railroad-companies duties paid on rail- road-iron.
3. To enable the United States to make use of the solar com- pass in the public surveys.
4. The Nebraska and Kansas Bill.
5. To print additional copies of the Patent-Office Report.
6. For the publication of the Senate debates, and compensation therefor.
7. On the bill authorizing a large gold coinage.
288
BENCH AND BAR OF GEORGIA.
8. On the bill for the construction of a railroad from the Mis- sissippi Valley to the Pacific Ocean.
9. To authorize the extension of the Washington and Alexan- dria Railroad into the District of Columbia.
10. On the Homestead Bill.
11. Relating to the Lower California expedition against Mexico.
12. On the bill granting land to the State of Michigan for the construction of the Oakland and Ottawa Railroad.
13. On the bill granting land to the State of Louisiana for con- structing a railroad from Algiers, on the Mississippi River, to the Sabine, &c.
14. To repeal the Minnesota Land Bill.
While the Homestead Bill was before the Senate, on the 20th July, 1854, he proposed an amendment, the nature of which may be seen by the official report :*-
Mr. DAWSON. I then move to strike out the words "who may not be a landholder;" and my reason for doing so is this :-- As I stated before, the whole of these public lands belong as much to one citizen of the United States as to another ; and it is but equal and fair justice because A has been an industrious and thriving man, and has drawn around him the comforts of life, that he should be entitled to the same rights, at least, as the man who has been prodigal and lazy. The qualification placed in the amendment is to give to the landless ; and the landless may be as rich as any man in the Union, for a millionnaire in this country may not hold lands. Sir, when we are going to do justice, let us do it broadly, fairly, and honestly.
It is known to all that I am opposed to this giving away of the public lands at all ; but, if they are to go, I am just as much entitled to my share as any man in the Union, and any man in the Union is as much entitled as I am. How is it that we undertake to specially legislate for individuals instead of the masses, and to lay down a discrimination and say that the landless, from improvidence, shall be preferred to the indus- trious man, because the latter has drawn around him the comforts of a home? Do you believe, gentlemen of the Senate, that the industrious, hardy people of this country will submit to such a regulation ? Will any man feel that you are conferring a favor on him by the bill, when it induces the people to live in idleness, in carelessness, and indifference to industry? Shall we put men who are idle upon a more elevated foot- ing than the industrious and persevering? Sir, when these things are known, the public mind will stand astounded at this special legislation, which is so incompatible with the equal rights of the people of this country.
Now, sir, it is seen by every gentleman that the mechanics of the country cannot go and occupy such a homestead. They are driven by implication, and by making a distinction against their occupation, either to go on the lauds or not to receive the benefits of the bill. It says to
* Appendix to the Congressional Globe, vol. xxix. p. 1106.
289
WILLIAM C. DAWSON.
the industrious classes who have nothing, "Here is a proposition; but, if you do not go on the land, you shall have no interest in the land."
In a few days after making this speech on the Homestead Bill, Mr. Dawson addressed the Senate, giving his views on appropria- tions of the public money to improve rivers and harbors,-a subject on which there is a great diversity of opinion among statesmen. The House of Representatives had passed a bill designating large sums for different localities, with the following provisions :-
The Secretary of War, before expending any part of the money herein appropriated, shall, in such cases as he may think the public interests require it, cause a re-examination and re-survey of the public works hereby appropriated for; and he is hereby authorized to modify the pre- sent plan if, in his opinion, the public works will be materially benefited thereby.
The following is an extract from Mr. Dawson's speech :*-
When the bill came to the Senate I looked upon its passage almost as certain. I knew it had incorporated into it objectionable features; and I thought, sir, that conservative, constitutional inen in the Senate would meet it with boldness and with firmness, and limit the power of the Government in making appropriations for rivers and harbors by some just discretion, if there be none in the Constitution for it. But instead of that, sir, all the objectionable features which would bring down the veto of the President of the United States on the bill are sought to be covered over, and the President is sought to be deprived by indirection, by an ad captandum movement, of the right of veto, upon the idea that he is so weak and so wanting in firmness and independence as to act on mo- tives of expediency and leave the final decision to a future time. Sir, my confidence in the President of the United States is far above this. If his friends charge him with want of discretion, want of observation, want of capacity, by incorporating such a provision as this, I shall not do it. Why, sir, for the purpose of passing the bill through this body (which every one of them believes to be unconstitutional) they seek to divide the responsibility. And how do they do it? By first announcing to the people of this country that the Congress of the United States has not sufficient intelligence or information to act upon a subject of this kind. My friend from Michigan says that there is no other way in which they may know how to act; therefore he is for transferring the legislative discretion to an executive officer : and he says he will take the opinion of the Secretary of War in regard to the facts. We are to take the examination of the Secretary of War, and the Secretary of War is to regulate the power of Congress in the making of appropriations of money, for commercial purposes, for these rivers and harbors. We are to transfer that to the head of the War Department; so that Congress will be en- lightened when the Secretary of War, at the next Congress, shall com- municate to us his views upon the subject, with the facts he may have ascertained. Ilow is he to ascertain the facts? Will it not be had by
* Appendix to the Globe, vol. xxix. p. 1160.
VOL. I .- 19
290
BENCH AND BAR OF GEORGIA.
sending out engineers and officers to make surveys and estimates and lay them before him? and can we not act upon them just as well as the Secretary of War? Why, sir, it is an insult to this body and to the other branch of Congress to make such a proposition. For what do we have our engineers but for the purpose of ascertaining the facts? and if we stick to principle, sir, and vote for no proposition of this kind except upon proper estimates made upon the subject, there will be no necessity for this.
Now, sir, for a large proportion of this bill I am prepared to vote ; but do we not sce, have we not received from the President of the United States, honestly, as a man should act, an assurance that he would have sanctioned the Cape Fear River appropriation but for certain reasons expressed in his Message? In turning over and looking to this bill, we find in it an appropriation for the Appomattox River, which runs up to Petersburg, in Virginia, and which is not as wide as from my scat to the centre of the Senate-Chamber. The bill contains an appropriation of $500,000 for that object. Could there be any difference in putting that out of the bill, if there are in this body any constitutional views in accord- ance with those formerly sustained by the Democratic party ? Not a particle. And yet we are not to undertake to strike out such unconstitu- tional appropriations. But what do you undertake to do? Divide the responsibility-like a cuttle-fish in shallow water, who blackens it in order to escape-and try to throw it upon the Government. Why, do they not know that the President, in honor, would be bound to veto the bill ? You cannot change it. The people will understand it. There is not a Senator but knows it. Whether the President has been conversed with for the purpose of adopting this plan, I cannot tell. I do not believe he has. The object is to wind round and get over the constitutional prin- ciple. And how do you propose to do it? By throwing the question of the constitutionality of the appropriation upon the head of one of the De- partments, the Secretary of War.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.