mencement in 1823. No honors were conferred at the close of the respective sessions upon individuals in the classes at Union College-as was the custom at the University of North Carolina-so as to mark distinctly the relative merit of the various members of the classes; but in the reports made by the faculty for the information of parents and guardians, Mr. Sims invariably received high commendation.

After the close of his collegiate course, he read law with General Dromgoole, in Brunswick county, Virginia, and was admitted to practice. For a year or two he attended the courts of Brunswick, Mecklenburg, and Greensville; but, finding his business inadequate to his necessities, and the bar in that part of Virginia crowded with able and experienced practitioners, he removed, in the year 1826, to South Carolina, and settled at Darlington Court-house. In the year following he took charge of the academy at that place, and continued to teach for several years. The school, under his management, was large and prosperous, and its patrons expressed much gratification with the conduct and the progress of the pupils. He was thought to possess great aptitude for imparting instruction, as well as eminent skill in school discipline.

He took advantage of this period of his life to extend his scientific and literary knowledge, and to make a thorough and complete review of his entire collegiate course; but he also continued his study of the law, and in December, 1829, was admitted to practice in the courts of South Carolina. In 1830 he commenced his professional career, and soon met with very reasonable encouragement. His business continued to improve, and both in the Circuit and in the Court of Appeals, the dockets attest his success. He was soon enabled to meet, from the profits of his profession, not only his current expenses, but also to discharge his debts in Virginia, which, at the time of his removal, he was unable to pay, and to lay up a competency for himself and family. At the time of entering into public life, he was among the leading lawyers on his circuit, and in full practice. In every branch of his profession, as advocate, solicitor, or attorney, he had his full share of business.

He is represented from early youth to have been fond of politics, and to have devoted himself much to that kind of reading and study adapted to the duties of a statesman. The necessity

which compelled him to attend to his private means, prevented him from entering very early into public life; but he was always a firm and decided politician, with fixed principles and a ready opinion. During the period of the Nullification strifes in South Carolina, he was active and decided, though not a candidate for any office. When General Jackson's "proclamation" reached the village of Darlington, Mr. Sims was at the post-office. He read it publicly to the assembled multitude, and, before he had completed the reading, he, together with thirty or forty others, had enrolled their names as volunteers, to be at the service of Governor Hayne at any moment, to assist in defending the state against " Federal aggression, and the threatened heresies of the President's proclamation." On the same evening he drafted resolutions, which were unanimously adopted by a large public meeting, readily assembled under the existing circumstances of the times. These are believed to have been the first resolutions in condemnation of that state paper which were ever adopted in the country. They are as follows:

"Whereas we believe the government of the United States is limited in its powers by the Constitution, and that the substitution of Federal discretion in the place of such constitutional limitations is subversive of all the reserved rights of the states:

"And whereas we believe the Federal Union was intended to link the states together in the bonds of peace and amity, by fraternal feelings and congenial sympathies, and not by force:

"And whereas we believe that in no emergency can the general government employ force to control or subdue the regularly constituted government of the states, but that the employ. ment of the military for such purposes would be in open conflict with the character and genius of our institutions, destructive of constitutional liberty, and inevitably subversive of the union of these states. Above all, because we believe the states are sovereign, and not corporations, or counties, in a vast consolidated empire, and, as such, not rightfully subject to be driven from their course by the simple edict of a tyrant, drunk with power and unmerited popularity, much less to be crushed in the exercise of their legitimate rights by the unholy power of a flattered usurper or imbecile despot. Therefore,

"Resolved, That we have received with mingled feelings of

regret, abhorrence, and detestation, the proclamation of the President of the United States touching the ordinance of the people of South Carolina, published in convention on the 24th day of November, 1832.

"Resolved, That we consider the views of the chief magistrate of the United States, as expressed in the aforesaid proclamation, as characterized by every mark that can define a tyrant.

"Resolved, That the intention expressed in the same to resort to force for the purpose of coercing the obedience of South Carolina, evinces a recklessness of the restraints imposed by the Constitution, and a disregard of the peace, harmony, and safety of the Union.

"Resolved, That we believe that the first drop of blood shed in this controversy will render reconciliation of the unhappy differences which exist between this government and that of the United States forever impracticable.

"Resolved, That, living in an age and a country where controversies in regard to the powers of government are settled by the arbitrament of an enlightened public opinion and a spirit. of mutual concession, not by brute force and lawless violence, we have confidence in the good sense and love of liberty, at all times, upon great occasions, manifested by the people of the United States, that they will repudiate and put down the unconstitutional and tyrannical doctrines promulgated in the proclamation of the President.

"Resolved, That we still approve of the high and magnanimous course of South Carolina, and of her talented and patriotic sons who are guiding her destinies."

It was not, however, until the year 1840 that Mr. Sims entered public life. In that year, by an overwhelming vote, he was returned a member to the General Assembly for Darlington, in which service he remained until elected to Congress in the fall of 1844. While in the Legislature he was an active and useful member, never absent from his committees, and ready at all times to take part in the public discussions of the House. He served on various important committees, and was the author of several useful measures which were adopted by the Legislature. Others, also, he introduced, which he regarded as highly important to the interests of the state, but which were not adopted. One measure, in particular, he urged more VOL. I.-A A

than once on the consideration of the House, and which he considered of great importance. In the State of South Carolina, lands are subject to levy, and sale, and execution, exactly as personal chattels. In a bill, the details of which he had taken great pains to mature, Mr. Sims proposed to exempt a part of the landed estate of every citizen with a family from sale under execution, so as to leave a homestead and small farm for the family. By this measure, he proposed not only to find a shelter for the women and children against the contingencies and misfortunes of life, but also to counteract the effect of the pre-emption system of the general government, and the low price of the public lands, in drawing off the population of the state. He urged the measure both by an able report and speeches, and though it failed, yet he made many proselytes to it. Governor Hammond, in his annual message to the Legislature of 1844, recommended the adoption of that, or some similar system.

Mr. Sims took his seat in the national Legislature as a member of the twenty-ninth Congress. Perhaps at no period of our history have our foreign relations been more complicated, or has a deeper anxiety been manifested in the public mind as to the course of policy which might be adopted, than at the first session of that Congress. We trust we shall have done something, before the close of our labors, to give a concise view of the difficulties of the times as then existing, and to place in an intelligible form before the country the results of the deliberations of its representatives. In the discussion of all the important topics of the day, as well as of other matters of a less prominent character, Mr. Sims took an active part. In politics he is a Democrat, and he claims never to have changed or wavered in his faith.

When the bill to provide for the establishment of the Smithsonian Institution for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men was under consideration in the House, he opposed it, and expressed the opinion that the money ought to be restored to the British Chancery. Much had been said in praise of the munificent and splendid liberality of James Smithson. It had been said that, animated by a spirit of benevolence to his race, he had made his will, constituting the government of the United States his trustee to carry out his intentions,

and that he had dedicated to the noble purpose of the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men an entire estate under its management. Disclaiming any intention to speak in terms of reproach of one who slept under the sod, Mr. Sims could only see in the will of Mr. Smithson what he had seen in the wills of many other men. After having griped, through their lives, every shilling that came into their hands, animated at last by some posthumous vanity, they sought to build up a name which should live after them; and such, rather than any feeling for humanity, so much lauded, was the motive that guided them. In the present case, he saw abundant evidence of this disposition in the appointment of the government of the United States as a trustee to carry out this splendid vanity. He thought that our government was not instituted for any such purpose as the administration of charities. He believed there was no grant of power in the Constitution admitting such an exercise. And as there was no such power, as this fund was still under our control, and as the trust had not been executed, he thought it became Congress to retrace the errors it had already committed. The fund might then be restored to England, and devoted there to purposes similar to those which had been contemplated in the City of Washington. The only difference would be in its locality.

Perhaps a brief notice of this eccentric gentleman may be acceptable to many of our readers.

"Smithson," says Professor Henry, "was born in England in the year 1768. He was educated at the University of Oxford, was a man of amiable disposition, and devoted to science. He was the best chemist in Oxford, and, after his graduation, became the rival of Wollaston in minute analysis, and possessed most extraordinary skill in manipulation. The following anecdote to the point was related on the authority of the late President of the Royal Society:

"On one occasion he observed a tear trickling down the face of a lady. He caught it on a piece of glass, lost one half, analyzed the other half, and discovered a microscopic salt. He resided most of the time abroad, and was an illegitimate son of the Duke of Northumberland, who recognized him, and left him a handsome property. He was the author of upward of twenty original memoirs on various subjects of science. He