party is opposed to internal improvements when it is not. If we are opposed to them let us say so, and stand by our declarations. If, as a party, we mean to give up our position, let us do it at once and be done with it. Of all parties in the world the Democratic party is the last that ought to practise humbuggery. It never has done it upon any question, and ought not to do it upon this. Let us have an open, plain, straightforward, honest course to pursue on the subject of internal improvements, as on all others. If we find that we do not agree-that it is not a sound principle, let us abandon it openly. My constituents are opposed to these appropriations on principle. They are opposed to them on interest. They have been taught to believe that they are wrong-that they lead to monstrous abuses, to enormous corruption, and to a prodigal waste of the public money. But, sir, if we are to make these appropriations-if they are to become a part of the permanent policy of the government, let us all understand it, and let us have a fair start. If there is to be a scramble for the public treasury of the country, I want to know it; I want my state, which contributed its proportion to the national treasury, to have a fair share in the division when it comes to be divided out. In the bill which the President vetoed two years ago I believe there was a small appropriation of $5000 to remove the bar at the mouth of the Pascagoula river. I suppose the sum was so small that my friend from Michigan, and the other members of the committee, overlooked it this year, and reported no bill for it. It is a matter of very little consequence. presented it here at a late hour one night, because I knew that it was infinitely more meritorious than a great many appropriations in the bill. I Sir, you may talk about your harbors, but the best harbor on your Atlantic and Gulf coast is in the state of Mississippi, where you have from seventeen and a half to nineteen feet of water-where there has never been a dredging machine placed--where there has never been one sixpence of money appropriated for the purposes of improvement. That is a harbor in which the whole British fleet in the war of 1812 and 1815 rode with safety during the winter preceding the battle of the 8th of January, 1815. We have asked for no money from the national treasury to improve it. We have been standing on the principle of opposition to these appropriations. We have failed to build up a city there; our commerce has languished; our agriculture to some extent has languished, simply because we opposed these measures on principle, even to our own disadvantage. If this opposition is to be abandoned, I desire to have the harbors in my state improved. We have rivers penetrating the state which are not improved. Our agriculture languishes in consequence. We have not asked for your bounty to improve them, because we understood that that party with which my state has always acted was opposed to it; but if you are going to depart from your principle, if you are going to abandon it, let us understand you, so that all of us may have an equal and a fair chance. I shall want an appropriation to improve the harbor at Cat Island and at Pascagoula. I shall want to improve the navigation of the magnificent Pearl, of the Yazoo, and of other rivers penetrating my state. I have asked for no such appropriations, because I have been standing on a principle. If, however, we are simply opposed to a general system of internal improvements, and can make any amount of them in detail, I shall bring in my part of the detail. If we can improve this harbor and that, this river and that, in other states, I shall expect you to vote appropriations to improve harbors and rivers in my state; but I desire to know where we stand? On the 30th of July, 1856, Mr. BROWN again spoke on the same subject as follows: Mr. President, I have taken very little part in the discussion of these bills, contenting myself, as regularly as they came up, with recording myself against them; but, since the discussion has taken the turn it has within the last few minutes, I feel not only justified, but to some extent called upon, to express my concurrence, to a very great extent, in the views so ably expressed by the honorable senator from Georgia. I do believe (and what I believe I am not afraid to say in the Senate or anywhere else) that these appropriations have a corrupting tendency on the politics of the country. I do not mean to say, nor did I understand the senator from Georgia as saying, that they corrupt individual senators; but upon what principle do all these appropriations proceed? If Michigan gets no more than she pays into the treasury, why does she seek these appropriations at all? If she pays in $300,000 and only gets $300,000 back, why does she ask for it? If no other state gets back any more than she contributes to the national treasury, if there were no inequality in these appropriations, I undertake to say they would not be sought for. Mr. PUGH. Does the senator from Mississippi pretend that the appropriation made to the state of Ohio equals her taxation? Does he pretend it? Mr. BROWN. I pretend to say that, in all the amounts which have been appropriated by these several bills, not one solitary sixpence has been appropriated for the great agricultural state of Mississippi. Why? Because, with our notions of our constitutional obligation, we could not ask for it, and the committee say they cannot give it to us. You tax us without our asking to be taxed. You levy duties and get the money into the treasury without our consent, and even against our protestations; but when you come to paying it out, you take it all to yourselves, and say you cannot give us any because we do not ask for it. If our will is to be consulted in appropriating the money, I beg gentlemen to consider our will when they come to raising the money. If you cannot make appropriations for us until we ask for them, do not lay tribute upon us until we ask it. Mr. President, if it were possible to distribute this money among the states, in the exact proportion in which it is paid into the treasury of the nation, not a solitary one of these bills would pass; there would cease to be an effort to pass them through Congress. They are urged upon us because more is obtained than is contributed-because it is a tribute levied upon the labor and wealth of one part of the country for the benefit of the other, and, I think, no more worthy parts of the country. Now, sir, we have harbors in our state; we have rivers in our state. For certain improvements upon the southern coast of the state which I have the honor to represent, items were inserted in the general bill which was vetoed by the President; and, when members of the com mittee were searching out the various items for the lake shores, it could not have escaped their attention that there were items there for the benefit of the shores of Mississippi-one item for the improvement of the mouth of the Pascagoula river-a river I dare say quite as important to the commerce of the country as many of those little points on the northern lakes; yet it was entirely overlooked. Then there was the proposition to purchase a pass lying between New Orleans and Mobile, which, in my opinion, was more constitutional than any other item in the bill; and why? The government pays annually $10,000 for the privilege of running its mail-boats through that pass. It is a pass belonging to a private person-his individual property; and the government has to use it; private commercial men have to use it; all the shipping that passes between those two important southern commercial points goes through that pass, or else outside the island, where vessels of a smaller class, especially steamers, are exceedingly insecure. For the privilege of going through them, I repeat again, the government pays $10,000 annually. As incidental to the post office power, I think the appropriation might be made. The committee seem not to have thought so. They have reported no item-no bill for it; but have overlooked the matter entirely. Why? The senator from Michigan [Mr. Stuart] says, and other members of the committee say, because the members from Mississippi did not ask for it. Too much respect, I beg leave to say, is given to our constitutional scruples when you come to appropriate money, and too little when you come to levy taxes. THE SLAVERY QUESTION. SPEECH DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, The Senate having under consideration the motion of Mr. RUSK to refer so much of the President's message as relates to foreign affairs to the Committee on Foreign Relations-Mr. BROWN said : MR. PRESIDENT: When the President's message came into the Senate, and was read by the secretary, the first proceeding that followed was the rising of the senator from New Hampshire [Mr. Hale] to make a violent attack on the President and on the sentiments of his message. He based that attack chiefly on the ground that the President had intimated a purpose in certain quarters to attack slavery in the states. This speech of the senator from New Hampshire was quickly followed by speeches of a similar character from the senator from New York [Mr. Seward], and others on that side of the chamber who sympathize with them. These assaults have fallen here as they will fall elsewhere-harmless shafts. They have inflicted no injury on the President, and they will inflict none on the great cause which he so manfully defended. While assailing the President in coarse and unseemly phrase, these gentlemen have not failed to cover their own positions. In all they have said, from the hour that the message was read to this, the most casual observer will not have failed to perceive that, on some account, their tactics have been changed. The bold and defiant air of the conquering hero has given place to the subdued manner of defeated soldiers. Senators now read us long speeches, indignantly denying what I had supposed, up to within the last few days, was an admitted proposition everywhere, to wit: that when the proper time came, slavery was to be assaulted in the states. There seems, however, to have been a falling back from this position; why, I certainly do not know, but I have a strong suspicion that gentlemen have found themselves, even at the north, in advance of public sentiment, and it has been found prudent at least to fall back on more tenable ground. While we have witnessed this exhibition in the Senate, elsewhere an exhibition not less remarkable has been going on. Politicians who certainly express no open sympathy with these gentlemen, seem to have been advancing from a position which they occupied heretofore, and taking one in closer proximity to the gentlemen on the other side of the chamber. My reading of these counter-movements, the falling back of the one party and the advancing of the other, is this: that they mean for the time being to camp in sight of each other, and during the next four years to make forays on joint account against the National Democracy; and when the presidential contest of 1860 comes on, they will go into battle under the same leader, and fight under banners so nearly alike that a soldier belonging under one being found fighting under the other, will subject himself to no charge of desertion. I was not prepared at first for the indignant denials which we have heard from the other side of the chamber, that there was a purpose to assail slavery in the states. I was not, because at first I did not understand this change of tactics; I had supposed that gentlemen were more than half inclined to have it known that such an attack was in contemplation, and that at the proper time their purposes would be made manifest. I knew very well it had been quite the custom at all times when these purposes were directly charged on gentlemen, for them to throw them aside with a sort of "Oh no-no we don't-no such thing." But the burning indignation which has been lately manifested has struck me with surprise. My surprise was manifested in the beginning of this debate. I ventured to quote from memory certain passages from the speeches of gentlemen, manifesting as I then thought, and still think, purposes altogether different from those avowed in this debate. I spoke from memory alone; but since then I have given more critical attention to the recorded speeches of gentlemen, and can now speak with more accuracy, and with greater confidence. I do not mean to say that senators deliberately disavow their real sentiments-that would violate the decorum of this body. But I will say that if they have never contemplated an attack on slavery in the states, they have been singularly unfortunate in the use of language. I intend to-day to call particular attention to certain expressions heretofore used by them in the discussion of this question. But before I do so, let me set not only myself right, but let me set those right for whom I speak. I recur very briefly to a speech delivered by myself on the 30th of January, 1850, and shall read two or three short sentences from that speech. The party with whom I acted at that day, like the party with whom I act now, had been accused of a direct and deliberate purpose to bring about such a state of public affairs as must necessarily result in a dissolution of the Union. Denying that charge, speaking for myself, speaking for those who acted with me, speaking, as I then believed, and as I now believe, for the great mass of the southern people, I used this language: "I repeat, we deprecate disunion. Devoted to the Constitution-reverencing the Union-holding in sacred remembrance the names, the deeds, and the glories of our common and illustrious ancestry-there is no ordinary ill to which we would not bow sooner than dissolve the political association of these states. If there was any point short of absolute ruin to ourselves and desolation to our country, at which these aggressive measures would certainly stop, we would say at once, go to that point and give us peace." So I say to-day, sir. Speaking for myself and for those in whose name I am authorized to speak, I declare before the Senate and the world, that this Union has nowhere more devoted friends than they and I. And when I have spoken for those for whom I am authorized by election to speak, I feel that I may safely go further and say that nineteen-twentieths of the whole people of the Southern States agree with us. Point out any spot short of absolute ruin to ourselves, and desolation to our section of the country, and give us the guarantee that when you have gone to that point, these aggressive and perplexing measures, legislative and others, shall certainly cease, and we will say to you at once, go to that point. But, sir, I went on that occasion, as I do now, a step further; I said :— "Does any man desire to know at what time, and for what cause, I would dissolve the Union? I will tell him. At the first moment after you consummate your first act of aggression upon slave property, I would declare the Union dissolved; and for this reason: such an act, perpetrated after the warning we have given you, would evince a settled purpose to interpose your authority in the management of our domestic affairs, thus degrading us from our rightful position as equals to a state of dependence and subordination. Do not mistake me; I do not say that such an act would, per se, justify disunion; I do not say that our exclusion from the territories would alone justify it; I do not say that the destruction of the slave trade in the District of Columbia, nor even its abolition here, nor yet the prohibition of the slave trade among the states, would justify it. It may be that not one, nor two, nor all of these combined, would justify disunion. These are but the initiative steps-they lead you on to the mastery over us, and you shall not take these steps." I meant then, Mr. President, to say what I say now, that no man in the South has ever taken the ground that the mere act of our exclusion from the territories would dissolve the Union, if that could be the end of agitation. No southern man has ever taken the ground, and no one takes it now, that the abolition of slavery in this district might not be submitted to, if that was to be the end. But we have looked, and are looking for the day, and have a right, in consequence of the declarations constantly emanating from high quarters, to anticipate the hour when the whole northern free-soil phalanx will be turned loose in one mighty assault upon slavery in the states. I have taught my people, as - I would teach them to-day, to prepare for this assault. Defend the out posts. Yield not an inch of ground. It is better to die defending the door-sill than admit the enemy and then see the hearth-stone bathed in blood. On the occasion to which I have referred, I drew a picture of what must be our condition if these schemes of emancipation should ever be carried out. Then, as now, gentlemen denied that there was any inten |