SENATE.] Public Lands. [MAY 16, 1826. had intended to give. In this respect, the opinions of the Carolina had, virtually, instructed its Senators on this subgentlemen were entitled to great weight; but, Mr. C.ject, by authorizing a subscription to the stock. said, when they differed from the course he meant to pursue on abstract legislation, or constitutional grounds, for the decision of which every man in this body must consider himself bound to himself, the opinions of those gentlemen were not entitled to more weight than those of any other individuals. Mr. VAN BUREN regretted he was not so fortunate as to make himself understood. It was proposed that the United States should subscribe for a portion of the stock, and so place herself in the same relation as individual stockholders. His objection was, that this was bad stock, and a losing concern. If that was the case, and there were other reasons why the United States should benefit this company, it should be done by voting money directly. The gentleman from Maryland had said, there might be other advantages arising from this Canal; it was necessary for the support of the forts, and the general interests of the United States would be promoted by it. Then, Mr. V. B. said, his objection would apply; they should give money directly for these purposes, that their constituents might know, not only the purpose for which it was to be applied, but the extent also; and not go the round about way of promoting the public interest by becoming stockholders. As to the question being settled, he should protest against the admission of such a doctrine; and he should resist, to all intents and purposes, the idea that the acts of this Congress were to bind him, or his constituents, hereafter. Mr. BRANCH said gentlemen had misconceived the value of this Canal; it was now yielding a handsome income. The bill for removing obstructions in the river Savannah had passed, and the constitutional scruples were removed on that question. And when questions of a similar character were daily passing the Senate, by an almost unanimous vote, could he sit here and do justice to the People he represented, without admitting them to a participation in these advantages? In the cases which had been cited, it was a donation; here it was taking stock in a work which would yield a large revenue, and would besides give efficiency to the fortifications. Mr. HENDRICKS offered a few remarks in reply to Messrs. VAN BUREN and KANE, in which he reiterated the statements he had before advanced, urging the value and importance of the canal. Mr. TAZEWELL said he had but one further observation to make, and it should be in the shape of a query to the gentleman from Mississippi. How long was it since the powers of the Federal Government had been derived from the consent of two States? The question on ordering the bill to a third reading, TUESDAY, MAY 16, 1826. PUBLIC LANDS. On motion of Mr. BENTON, the Senate then took up the bill to graduate the price of the public lands. The bill having been read, Mr. BENTON rose, and addressed the Chair as follows: Mr. PRESIDENT: This is not a new bill, presented for the first time to the Senate, but one which I have annually brought in for three successive sessions. Circumstances have prevented me heretofore, from discussing its merits before you; but the vote which you have just taken, convinces me that the great majority of this body is willing to hear me, and I shall endeavor to acquit myself worthily of their indulgence, by the plain, brief, and common-sense manner in which I shall treat the subject. It is a subject of great moment to this Confederation, and worthy the most anxious deliberation of this Senate, whether we consider the value of the property to be disposed of, or the political consequences of permitting it to be held and wielded by the Federal Government. The bill which I have introduced, contains two very plain and distinct principles; the first presenting a proposition to sell off the best of the land for prices adapted to its value; and the second contemplating a plan for the gratuitous donation of the remainder. I think, Mr. PresiMr. REED, of Mississippi, said he did not, on this bill, dent, that these principles, under some modification, consider himself as called to act upon the general question. ought to be adopted; and I flatter myself that I can deIf the States, through whose territories the canal was to monstrate the propriety of adopting them, whether the pass, had given any proof that it was their wish that the lands are to be considered as a source of revenue, or as a General Government should exercise the power, which means of increasing the wealth and population of the he believed it possessed, he should not hesitate in assent-country. The first would be the view of a mere financier, ing to that power being exercised for purposes beneficial to these States. There was only one Senator present from Virginia, and he opposed the appropriation. The People of Virginia, Mr. R. said, had not sought, or wished, the aid of the General Government; they had resources enough of their own, and did not require the interposition of foreign aid to assist them. So it was with regard to the other State concerned in this matter. He could not say that this Government should exert its power against the will of the People of those States, and their Representatives on this floor. Mr. R. said his feelings and his vote would have been different on this subject, if the two The Public Lands were acquired from two sources; States, which were interested, had coincided in invoking the cessions of particular States, and purchases from the aid of the General Government. His opinion was, that France and Spain. The quantity thus acquired, and now the General Government had power to appropriate mo- lying within the limits of States and Territories, may be ney for the purposes of internal improvement. The power estimated at 240 millions of acres. The cessions from the to improve the country could not well be deemed uncon- States were made for the declared object of paying off the stitutional. It was, therefore, not on the general principle debt of the Revolution, and with a stipulation to erect the that he felt himself called on to act-be stated this distinct- ceded Territory into sovereign States, with all the rights ly, that the basis of his vote might not be misunderstood. and powers which belonged to the original members of Mr. BRANCH observed that the Legislature of North | the Confederation; and the purchases from France and the second would be that of a statesman; and, as I mean to support my bill in both characters, I shall proceed to consider it, in the first place, as a mere revenue measure. I then lay down the proposition fairly and boldly, that, as a mere scheme for raising money out of the Public Lands, the first principle of my bill ought to be adopted: and, in proceeding to maintain that proposition, I shall go back to the acquisition of these lands by the Federal Government, show the object for which they were acquired, and shall examine the manner in which that object has been pursued or neglected. MAY 16, 1826.] Public Lands. [SENATE. Spain were made under the stipulation, secured by the “if timely and judiciously applied, they may save the nefaith of treaties, of erecting the purchased Territory into "cessity of burthening our citizens with new taxes for the like sovereign, equal, and independent States. In both" extinguishment of the principal; and that, being free to cases the Federal Government was nothing but a trustee, | “discharge the principal, but in a limited proportion, no and bound by compacts and treaties to dispose of the "opportunity ought to be lost for availing the public of lands according to the terms of the trust. The cessions" its right." by the States were made at the close of the Revolutionary war; the purchase from France, about a quarter of a century ago; and that from Spain, in the year 1819. These two extracts show the policy of Washington, his policy to reduce the principal of the debt, and to make the public lands subservient to that object, by "timely" and "judicious” sales. The report of General Hamilton, his Secretary of the Treasury, made at the same time, may be considered as an amplification of the message, and the correct expositor of President Washington's idea of timely and judicious sales. This report recommends the immediate sale of the lands, at their then value, and fixes that value at an average of twenty cents per acre. The following extract conveys his sentiments in his own words: Report of 1791. After reciting that the public creditors are offered onethird of their debt in land, at twenty cents per acre, and an interest of six per cent. on the remaining two-thirds until paid, the report proceeds: 66 "The creditor is offered the advantage of making his interest principal, and he is asked to facilitate to the Government an effectual provision for his demands, by "accepting a third of them in land at a fair valuation. "The general price at which the Western lands have been heretofore sold, has been a dollar per acre, in public securities; but, at the time the principal purchases were made, these securities were worth, in the market, "less than three shillings in the pound. The nominaprice, therefore, would not be the proper standard, under present circumstances; nor would the precise specie value then given be a just rule; because, as the pay, The first acts of the Congress of the Confederation, with respect to these lands were faithfully directed to the object for which they were intended. The Ordinance of '85 fixed their price at one dollar per acre in certificates of the public debt; directed them to be divided, as fast as surveyed, into thirteen portions, according to the quotas of the States in the last requisitions; distributed by lot among the different States, and offered for sale at the Court-house of every county. This ordinance was a faithful exposition of the views of the States, in making the cessions, and a fair acknowledgment of the obligation incurred by the Federal Government in accepting them. The mode of selling the lands was also eminently just and wise; but the intention of the ordinance was defeated by the monopoly which had been effected of the certificates of the public debt. These certificates were no longer in the hands of the soldiers who had fought the battles of the country, or of the farmers who had furnished support to the armies. They were in the hands of speculators, who had purchased them up at an average of two shillings and sixpence in the pound, and wished to convert them into a public debt, at twenty shillings in the pound, drawing an annual interest of six per cent. These speculators resided chiefly in the great cities, and Congress, finding that no sales could be effected at the County Court-houses, directed them, by a subsequent ordinance, to be held at Philadelphia, New York, and Boston; but without betterments were to be made by instalments, and the securisuccess than before. The speculators would not take the lands, but relied upon their interest in Congress, in accomplishing their favorite object of funding their certificates at eight times as much as they had given for them. Thus passed off the time from '85 to '89; Congress endeavoring to pay the public debt with the public land, ¦ « and the holders of the debt endeavoring to have it funded. Here then is the plan of Washington and Hamilton, a The Federal Government, under the new Constitution, plan which contains the truc principle of action for every went into operation in the midst of the struggle, and the debtor, whether a nation, or an individual. They proposed Executive Government faithfully pursued the plan of the to pay the principal, instead of piddling at the annual inCongress of the Confederation. The first and second mes-terest, of the debt, and to sell the land at once, for what it sages of President Washington were directed to this object, and he strongly recommended a sale of the lands to pay off the principal of the debt. Doubtless it will be agreeable to the Senate to hear the words of that great man, and as I wish to avail myself of his authority in the support of my bill, I will here read the passages to which I have referred. Message of 1790. "ties were, at the times of the purchases, extremely low, "the probability of a moderate rise must be presumed to have been taken into the account. Twenty cents, therefore, seems to bear an equitable proportion to the two "considerations of value at the time, and likelihood of increase.' was worth, instead of holding it up for a future and indefinite rise. But the plan of these great men did not succeed. It met a vehement opposition, both in and out of Congress. The speculators in certificates, and the political enemies of General Hamilton, combined to attack it. They represented it as a prodigal waste of the public lands, to sell them at an average of twenty cents an acre, when, by holding them a few years, they would rise to a "Allow me, moreover, to hope that it will be a favorite nual interest of the debt, until this great rise should take great price. They urged the advantage of paying the an policy with you, not merely to secure a payment of the "interest of the debt funded, but as far and as fast, as the place. They set up load and piteous lamentations in favor growing resources of the country will permit, to ex-forever the tenants and vassals of the speculators who of the poor, whom they represented as destined to remain "onerate it of the principal itself. The appropriations you have made of the Western Lands, explain your dispositions on this subject; and, I am persuaded, that the "sooner that valuable fund can be made to contribute, along with other means, to the actual reduction of the public debt, the more salutary will be the measure to every public interest, as well as the more satisfactory 66 "to our constituents." Message of 1791. "A provision for the sale of the vacant lands of the United States is particularly urged, among other reasons, by the important considerations that they are "pledged as a fund for reimbursing the public debt; that, Var. I-17 would monopolize the lands at such low rate. They ex- SENATE.] Public Lands. (MAY 16, 1826. their certificates-certificates which had been got for a song from the People-to be converted into national debt, at twenty shillings in the pound, and six per cent. interest. Having done this, their next object was, to make the debt perpetual, by limiting the sales of lands to as much as would pay the annual interest. To accomplish this purpose, the price of land was raised to two dollars per acre, in gold and siver; the law which permitted evi-are remaining unsold at one dollar twenty-five cents! dences of the debt to be taken in payment of land, was repealed altogether; the nett proceeds of the lands were pledged, by themselves, to themselves; and the People were unblushingly told, that a national debt was a national blessing, because it would create a powerful moneyed interest, to support the Government. Such are the facts, Mr. President, relative to the origin of the present system of selling public lands. Such were the actors, such their motives, and such their merits, in the establishment of this system. Having displayed these, let us next look to the fruits of the system-let us see what the People of these States have gained by paying interest upon the debt, and waiting for the rise in the price of their lands. I hold those fruits in my hand, (showing a paper,) and I will present them to the Senate. Here Mr. BENTON presented the following table, which he informed the Senate, had been procured by him from the Register of the Treasury:] STATEMENT of the amount of money annually received from the sales of Public Lands from the year 1789, to 1825, and of the amount annually paid for interest on the Public Debt, during the same period. Such, Mr. President, are the fruits of this system! One hundred and thirty-six millions of dollars paid in interest! Twenty-six millions received from the sales of public land! The debt increased instead of diminished for it was seventy-six millions at the end of the Revolution, and it is eighty millions now! And the lands which were to rise in ten years to four and eight dollars an acre, But even the amount of interest paid, or the greater part of it, had to be collected from other sources. Look to the table. In no one year was more than half enough received from the sales of land to meet the interest of that year; seldom more than one-fourth; at present not onefifth; and the amount annually decreasing; and still we have advocates for the continuation of this ruinous policy; men who look forward to the rise, and want us to continue, I presume, for another half century, the experiment of a system under which we have already paid the amount of the principal twice over, in annual interest, without diminishing the principal one dollar; under which we see the best of the lands dribbled and piddled away without accomplishing the object for which they were ceded to the Federal Government, or being felt among the resources of the nation. I trust, Mr. President, that we shall not be guilty of this improvidence; I trust, that after fifty years' experience, and the loss of one hundred and tion to listen to the venerated voice of Washington, and thirty-six millions of dollars, we are brought to a condi to go to work in earnest at selling off the land for what it is now worth, and paying off the principal of the public debt instead of wasting that great fund in the payment of annual interest. It is, indeed, a great fund, and capable, under a judicious administration, in conjunction with the sinking fund, of extinguishing the public debt in eight in mathematics. Our debt is eighty millions of dollars, years. I say eight years! and prove it like a proposition and the sinking fund is ten millions. Now it is just as plain as that two and two make four, that the sinking fund would extinguish the debt in eight years, if its whole amount could be applied to the principal; but about one half is absorbed in the payment of interest. Let the interest, then, be raised from the lands, while the duties on imports furnish ten millions for the sinking fund. The lands amount to two hundred and forty millions of acres, and if so disposed of as to raise the interest of the debt for eight years, the sinking fund would extinguish the prin cipal in that time. The amount to be raised, supposing ten millions of the principal to be annually extinguished, would not exceed twenty millions, and surely the sales could be so managed as to raise that sum in that number of years. Here, then, is a paradox. I maintain that it is better economy to sell the lands, or the best of them, in eight years, for twenty millions, than to sell them in the progress of ages and centuries for three hundred millions. One would enable us to get rid of the debt; the other would not. The lands were ceded to the Federal Go vernment to pay the debt. In fifty years they have paid no part of it, not even the one-fifth part of the interest. In fifty years to come they can do no better if adminis tered in the same way; but in eight years they will extinguish a debt of eighty millions if the present ruinous system is abandoned, and a new and jutlicious one adopted. I propose, then, to accelerate the sales, and to raise twenty millions in eight years. How is this to be done By letting the land go for what it is worth--by selling for the present value-instead of waiting for a future, distant, and uncertain rise. There are several ways to accomplish this object. One of these would be to abolish the minimum price, and sell all the lands off hand for what they would bring. This mode is not recommended for reasons too obvious to need enumeration. Another would be, to class and appraise the lands, reserving the two first classes MAY 16, 1826.] Public Lands. [SENATE. for sale, and surrendering the third to the States. The and Territories, and see how slowly the system proceeds. third mode would consist in letting the lands class them-Take, as an example, the oldest and most populous disselves, as proposed by the bill now under consideration. tricts of the oldest and richest of the new States, and see DISTRICTS. This bill proposes successive annual reductions of twenty-five cents per acre, until the price is reduced to twenty-five cents, when the refuse would be subject to gratuitous donation. Its operation would be to quicken the sales, to infuse new life and animation into them, and to sell more in five years than would be sold, under the present system, in as many ages. A district would be sold out in five years. Each tract would find a bidder, as it fell from one price to another, until it got to its true value. The fear of losing it by the purchase of another person, and the idea of being given away as a donation, would Marietta, compel those who wanted a tract, to buy it as soon as it Zanesville, got to its real value. At present, people do not purchase Steubenville, the second and third rate lands, because it is absurd and Chillicothe, contradictory to give the same for that kind as for the first rate. No man will give one dollar twenty-five cents for a quarter section that has but one half, one quarter, or one tenth part of it fit for cultivation; or which is only desirable for the timber upon it, or for a spring, or a quarry, or a place for building, or which might be wanted for the mere purpose of keeping off too close a neighbor. People will not buy such inferior tracts at one dollar twenty-five cents; for that would bring the little good land which it contains, to eight or ten dollars an acre. They will not buy, because they know that nobody else will, and that they can buy it ten or twenty years hence, and, in the mean time, have the use of it without paying taxes. I say, have the use of it; and this refers to the timber it may bear: for it is notorious that the public timber is used as common property, and that no blame or censure attaches to the practice. Statutory enactments are unavailing when unsupported by the moral sense of the community for which they are intended. The Federal Government has its statutes upon this subject; but they are no protection to the land-they are nothing but instruments of revenge in the hands of neighbors, who fall out and quarrel with one another, and commence the "unprofitable contest of trying which can do the other the most harm." But, in general, there are none to inform, or to bear witness. Cincinnati, Piqua, What will be the fruit, Mr. President, of continuing this system? Sir, I will tell you what it will be. First, one third of what is received for the lands, will be sunk in the expenses of collection, and the most meritorious officers will be driven from the public service for want of adequate compensation. The public debt will continue to accumulate, and the lands intended to pay it will be dribbled away upon the interest, and dissipated upon a thousand unknown and unknowable objects. The public debt will be saddled upon us forever: for unless it is paid quickly, paid in this season of peace and prosperity, it will be fastened on us to eternity. I say the debt must be paid now, or never; and my meaning is, that, if it stands until another war intervenes, it will receive an increase which will put payment forever out of the question. This is the progress of all national debts. It has been the progress, especially, of the debt of that great nation from which we sprung, and whose institutions, whether good or bad, we copy from instinct and fatality. The British debt, like our own, grew out of their Revolution. Like our own, it was considered a trifle, which could be paid Whole neighbor-off at any time. Like ourselves, the British thought it better to pay the annual interest, and postpone the principal to a more convenient season. But wars came on to increase it. The balance of power in Europe added some hundred millions; the American war added an hundred more; the wars of the French Revolution put it up to a thousand millions of pounds sterling the annual interest is now near two hundred millions of dollars, a sum greater than the whole debt was when the fatal policy was adopted, of paying interest, and postponing the payment of the principal. Shall we act upon the same principles, until overwhelmed, like Great Britain, by the magnitude of our debt? And that we shall be so overwhelmed, is beyond all doubt, unless we pay it off in this season of peace and prosperity. Nothing is easier than to pay it within the eight or ten succeeding years, and nothing more honorable than to do so. The Congress which shall accomplish that object will be entitled to the glorious appellation of blessed. "The publ e debt is paid." What a subject for a circular letter! What a noble letter would that little sentence alone compose! A nation without a national debt would, indeed, be a rare and sublime spectacle; but, rare as it is, our nation must soon exhibit it, unless our affairs be grossly, and, I might say, criminally mismanaged. hoods are in the same predicament. By common consent they go and take timber from the public land, and let their own stand for a future occasion. In the level countries they often go five miles; and on the banks of the great rivers, immense numbers make a regular business of cutting large rafts, and floating them off to market, even to New Orleans, at a distance of five hundred or a thousand miles. Thus, those who please have the benefit of the land, without the payment of tax or purchase money. Thus the inducement to purchase is destroyed. Thus is accounted for the notorious fact, that the sales are declining; that we are receiving less and less every year, and that the Registers and Receivers, in most of the Districts, do not receive as much for their commissions as would compensate them for the loss of their time; and yet the system costs the Government upwards of 33 per cent. on the amount collected. The salaries, commissions, surveys, contingencies, &c. are upwards of $300,000 per annum; the receipts into the Treasury are only about nine hundred thousand; and thus is presented the anomalous fact, that, in the operation of the most enormously expensive system of revenue that ever was heard of, the principal officers who administer it cannot live upon their compensation. Look to the document which has been laid upon your tables. See Registers and Receivers, whose commissions are, in many instances, less than one hundred dollars per annum, and very few exceeding twice or thrice that sum. Look, also, to the table of lands sold, and remaining unsold, in the different States с : Thus far, Mr. President, I have considered the bill before you in a mere financial point of view. I have discussed it as a revenue measure, and, under that aspect, which is not the most favorable which it wears, I have demonstrated the advantage of adopting its principles. But I should be false to myself, and to the place in which I "What constitutes a State? [MAY 16, 1826. "Not high rais'd battlements, nor labored mound, "Thick wall, or moated gate; "Not cities proud, with spires and turrets crown'd, "Nor starr'd and spangled courts, "Where low-born baseness wafts perfume to pride : "But MEN! high-minded men, "Who their duties know, but know their RIGHTS, "And, knowing, dure maintain them." stand-I should be false to the character of Senator, with give, without price, to those who are not able to pay; and which I am clothed, and which should include the char- that which is so given, I consider as sold for the best of acter of statesman-if I should suffer the bill to go off un-prices; for a price above gold and silver; a price which der this limited and contracted point of view. Far from cannot be carried away by delinquent officers, nor lost in it. A wider horizon opens before me. Consequences failing banks, nor stolen by thieves, nor squandered by far superior to the accumulation of dollars in the Trea- an improvident and extravagant administration. It brings sury; consequences even superior to the honor and advan a price above rubies-a race of virtuous and independent tage of paying off the public debt, present themselves to farmers, the true supporters of their country, and the my vision. I see, in the adoption of this great measure, stock from which its best defenders must be drawn. consequences which connect themselves with the durabili ty and prosperity of this Republic-the number of tenants diminished; the class of freeholders increased; the mul tiplication of that class of population which is to pay taxes, bear arms, defend the country against foreign and domestic enemies, and to furnish the future statesmen and warriors of this Republic. These are the grand advantages which are to result from a distribution of the soil among the children of the country: and, happily, I speak to those who understand and anticipate me. I speak to statesmen, and not to compting clerks; to Senators, and What made these States? What constitutes their power? not to Quastors of provinces; to an assembly of legisla- What brought them to their present height of power and tors, and not to a keeper of the King's forests. I speak freedom? What made them, as they now are, the pride to Senators who know this to be a Republic, not a Mo- and admiration of the universe, and the sole depository of narchy; who know that the public lands belong to the human liberty? What produced these great results, but People, and not to the Federal Government; who know the operation of the system, which, with so much more that the lands are to be "disposed of" for the common zeal than ability, I now recommend to the Senate? A good of all, and not kept for the service of a few; and system of cheap and ready distribution of the soil among knowing that I speak to such enlightened men, I feel my the People, by the combined action of sales and donalabor abridged, and my task anticipated. The American tions; sales upon easy terms to those who are able to pay, Senate is not the place for the illustration of truisms. Se and gratuitous gifts to those who are not. These Atlantic nators who have passed their lives in the administration of States were donations from the British crown; and the the public affairs, whose minds are trained to the indue-great proprietors distributed out their possessions with a tion of truth, need no elaborate discussion of great princi- free and generous hand. A few shillings for an hundred ples. It is sufficient to state them, and the practical con-acres, a nominal quit rent, and gifts of an hundred, five sequences are forthwith comprehended. hundred, and a thousand acres, to actual settlers: Such I state a proposition, then, of received and universal were the terms on which they dealt out the soil which is truth, when I say that the power of a Republic is in its now covered by a nation of freemen. Provinces, which population; that the basis of population is agriculture; now form sovereign States, were sold from hand to hand, and that the agriculture which combines wealth and pop- for a less sum than the Federal Government now demands ulation, is that of the freeeholder. Quotations in support for an area of two miles square. I could name instances. of a truth so plain would be out of place in the Senate; I could name the State of Maine; a name, for more reabut there is one which I flatter myself they would be sons than one, familiar and agreeable to Missouri; and willing to hear, one to which it would listen with pleasure, which was sold by Sir Ferdinando Gorges to the propriewhether it be for the justness of the sentiments, the sim-tors of the Massachusetts Bay, for twelve hundred pounds, plicity and beauty of the language, or for the eminent provincial money. And well it was for Maine that she authority from which it comes. I speak of General Ham-was so sold; well it was for her that the modern policy ilton's report in favor of manufactures, and in the front of which he places the following just and noble encomium upon the agricultural interest: The Quotation. of waiting for the rise, and sticking at a minimum of $1.25, was not then in vogue; or else Maine would have been a desert now. Instead of a numerous, intelligent, and virtuous population, we should have had trees and wild "It ought readily to be conceded, that the cultivation beasts. My respectable friend, the Senator from that of the earth, as the primary and most certain source of State, (Gen. Chandler,) would not have been here to national supply-as the iminediate and chief source of watch so steadily the interest of the public, and to opsubsistence to man-as the principal source of those ma- pose the bills which I bring in for the relief of the land terials which constitute the nutriment of other kinds of claimants. And I mention this to have an opportunity to labor-as including a state most favorable to the freedom do justice to the integrity of his heart and to the soundand independence of the human nind-one, perhaps, ness of his understanding-qualities in which he is excelmost conducive to the multiplication of the human spe-led by no Senator-and to express my belief that we will cies-has, intrinsically, a strong claim to PRE-EMINENCE come together upon the final passage of this bill for the over every other kind of judustry." cardinal points in our policy are the same-economy in Tenantry is unfavorable to freedom. It lays the founda- the public expenditures, and the prompt extinction of the tion for separate orders in society, annihilates the love of public debt. I say, well it was for Maine that she was sold country, and weakens the spirit of independence. The for the Federal price of four sections of Alabama pine, tenant has, in fact, no country, no hearth, no domestic Louisiana swamp, or Missouri prairie. Well it was for altar, no household god. The freeholder, on the con-every State in this Union, that their soil was sold for a trary, is the natural supporter of a free government, and it should be the policy of republics to multiply their freeholders, as it is the policy of monarchies to multiply tenants. We are a republic, and we wish to continue so: then multiply the class of freeholders; pass the public lands cheaply and easily into the hands of the People; sell, for a reasonable price, to those who are able to pay; and give, without price, to those who are not. I say song, or given as a gift to whomsoever would take it. Happy for them, and for the liberty of the human race, that the Kings of England and the Lords Proprietors," did not conceive the luminous idea of waiting for the rise, and sticking to a minimum of $1.25 per acre. Happy for Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio, that they were settled under Stutes, and not under the Federal Government. To this happy exemption they owe their present greatness |