APRIL 9, 1832.] Revolutionary Pensions. [H. OF R. indigent, according to the gentleman's description of in- and, let us admit, sometimes their habits, were a little digence, he should be holden to prove it. We know, and shaken by the life they had been leading. War never leaves it is interesting to know, that some degree of very credit the individual who actively mingles in it, any more than it able pride often outlives within him the better days, and leaves the nation, exactly where it finds him. The idleness easier circumstances, and brighter hopes of his youth and of camp, and the excitements of camp, are alike unfavormanhood. He knows and feels that he "needs the aid able to morality and to industry. The chances were, that of his country for support," but then he loves to appear when they went back to their places in society, and the to be able to struggle on to the end of his long and weary land rested from the agitation with which it had so long march without it. You give him adequate and noble re-been heaving, they would all, if the expression may be lief, in amount, by your pension law; why not soothe the pardoned, have sunk at once to the bottom. The chances half extinguished feelings of old age, by permitting him were, that they would become the "cankers of a calm to receive it rather as compensation for service, and as world and a long peace." Many of them did so. Others "honor for valor," than as alms to mendicancy? How much struggled, and rose to something like competence and commore politic it would be--how much more grateful, and fort, but not above the necessity of partaking of this relief. how much more truly it would bless him who gives and I cannot refrain from reminding you, in this connexion, him who takes! Nobody willingly admits that he feels that the ten years which immediately followed the war of the pressure of the most respectable poverty. It often independence, that period in which these men were callhappens with such a one, that the concealed and season-ed to put off the garments of the camp, and, beating their able charities of a child favorably settled in life, or friends swords into ploughshares, to resume, as well as they could, whom the world knows not of, enable him to keep on that the habits and pursuits of civil life, were for a time the decent exterior of comfort and independence, in which we most unfavorable to morality, to industry, to the acquisition all love to appear. But all this the gentleman's amendment of property, and the formation of a stable and elevated rudely tears away. It requires him to spread upon record character, which this country ever saw. There was no conclusive evidence of his pauperism, under his own opening to enterprise for any body, and, least of all, for hand and oath, to be twice judged of by two distinct tri- the pennyless, disheartened, and war-worn soldier. Mabunals, the court and the department. I repeat it; this isnufactures, we had none; and under such a Government as a harsh and cold feature in such a pension law as yours. It the old confederation, admitting the unrestrained importáalways has been so considered. This sentiment is gaining tion of the foreign article, we should have never had any. ground, and the country will sustain any Congress that Commerce and the fisheries were annihilated; agriculture shall strike it out. Yes, sir, will trust the generous, was languishing to death. A great pressure of debt was direct, and manly sense of this people, that they will re- bearing upon the confederacy, the States, and the citizen.' gard it, on our parts, as an act of suitable and sincere de- There was no circulating medium in existence except a ference to meritorious old age and feeling, and not as a cun- depreciated, worthless paper, wholly unfit to develop ning contrivance to sustain what the gentleman from and vivify the industry of a community, but very fit and South Carolina is pleased to call the "high pressure or very likely to make us a nation of gamesters and jockeys. protective system.” Undoubtedly this was as severe a crisis as the sharpest agony of the war. Such was the world which the disbanded soldiers began life in; and stronger and more affecting proof, both of the truth of this description, and of the disastrous influence which that hard season shed on all their after fortunes, you need not seek, than is afforded by the fact that far the larger number of those who received their settlement certificates from the Government at the close of the war were obliged to sell them, in the course of the ten years following, at an average of two shillings and sixpence in the pound. I repeat, then, it is unnecessary in terms to confine the provisions of this bill to the indigent. Without any such expressed limitation, few others will partake of them; and, therefore, the limitation will do more harm than good. But gentlemen say that pensions are for the necessitous only, and that some such limitation as this proposed by the gentleman from Virginia is indispensable, to prevent their bestowment on persons rolling in wealth. They are very much concerned lest, in the language of Grattan, we should tax pedlars to pamper pensioners. Sir, there is some force in the suggestion; but the fair, practical answer to it is this: almost all those who will come within the provisions of this bill are, in point of fact, in comparatively humble pecuniary circumstances; and this limitation is not necessary in order to give the desired direc-i tion to this bounty. The limitation is in some respects a harsh one; it is not indispensable, and therefore I would not, if I could prevent it, have it in the bill. Gentlemen tell us of General Wade Hampton. He undoubtedly is There is another reason why the indigence of the party an extraordinary instance of one who served in the war of should not be expressed upon the face of the law, as the independence, and is now in the enjoyment of vast wealth. condition upon which he receives his pension. The genBut do gentlemen seriously mean to intimate an appre- tleman from Virginia makes light of it, and perhaps my hension that the provisions of this bill will generally be honored and estimable friend from Rhode Island [Mr. bestowed on such men as Wade Hampton? Surely the BURGES] stated it too strongly; but I still think the penfact is wholly and palpably otherwise. From my own ob- sions we now bestow, and which this bill proposes to beservation, from the testimony of other gentlemen given in stow, are to be regarded rather in the light of compensathis discussion, from the uniform concurrence of opinion tion for service, than as alms to the most meritorious expressed by all who, at any time heretofore, have advo-poverty. Perhaps they partake of a mixed character. cated in Congress the adoption or extension of the pension To some of those to whom we give them, they are given system, I am satisfied that, as a general fact, the survivors merely in charity; to others, and these the greater numof the war of the revolution are in reduced pecuniary circumstances, although often considerably above want; the precise condition of life which this charity pre-eminently blesses. Sir, we know why they are in such circumstances. They left the army at the average age of thirty-two or thirty-three. The prime of life was already nearly past. Before that age, the foundations of most men's fortunes are laid, and their destinies fixed. Many of them had families immediately dependent and expensive. The business which they followed before they went to the war, it was not perfectly easy at once to resume. Their health, VOL. VIII.--154 ber, they are nothing less than the long deferred and inadequate wages of such service as no money could ever compensate. This is the grand peculiarity which characterizes pensions for revolutionary military service, which makes it safe to give them, and which distinguishes them from any others which this country ever can give, or which foreign and older countries ever have given. Speaking within bounds, I suppose not one in fifty of all whom the bill embraces ever had the contract for wages which their country made with them fully performed. Fortynine in fifty, perhaps, in a refined and high equity, are H. of R.] Revolutionary Pensions. [APRIL 9, 1832 your creditors to-day; and I submit that the law which ought They are beyond your charity, and his sarcasm. Bu to adapt itself to the general state of the facts, ought for the living it does a good deal; and I care not how libe therefore to assume the form of a provision for the pay- rally, or how gracefully it is done. Sir, much has bee ment of a national debt, rather than that of a distribution said, and ably said, upon this topic; but it seems to me the of national alms. It humbles and rebukes one, the strong, plain, and narrow ground on which the claims of thought that we should compel our creditor to prove not the militia upon the pension fund are to be placed, and only his right to the money he asks for, but his need the bill defended, is this: that you have already, and leag of it. ago, established a pension system, the principle of which I studiously avoid details upon a subject so familiar to is broad enough to embrace, and does embrace, this spe you. But one brief general view I will hazard. You cies of force, and this kind of service. The bill does not may divide the soldiers of the revolution into two classes; seek to introduce a new and disputable principle; it only those who were paid off during the war, and those who were carries out and applies a received and settled principie paid off at its close. Those paid during the war received The general reasonings for and against the giving of penall which they ever received, in a depreciated and depre- sions, seem to be hardly relevant to this deliberation. ciating State or continental paper money; and they lost does not greatly illustrate the pending question to argue upon their contract in two ways. In the first place, it as the gentleman from South Carolina has done, that generally happened that they were obliged to take this pension system is unconstitutional; that it is impolitic; the paper for more than it was worth when they took it; and it distributes more public money in one portion of the then again it invariably happened that it fell still lower be- country than in another; and that its tendencies are to abuse fore they could by possibility force it away. Those paid and perversion. The system actually exists. To some at the close of the war, were paid, not in money of any extent it is of the recognised institutions, and a part of the denomination, but in certificates of settlement, (a sort of settled and ancient policy of the country. Every political governmental due bill,) which were funded ten years af- party, every administration, every Congress, every Pres terwards. In that long and gloomy interval of depression, dent, has contributed to rear and sustain it. Do gentle disorder, and want, the greater number who had received men contend for its abolition? Nobody is so hardy. Why, these certificates, were compelled to sell them on an then, will they not help to make it equal, impartial, an average of two shillings and sixpence in the pound. Those, just, by expanding it to the proper limits of the principle more fortunate or more sagacious, who retained and had it rests upon? I submit that the case of the milita and them funded, lost heavily upon them by the mode in which their associates, in the provisions of this bill, stands upo they were funded. They were entitled to receive the precisely the same grounds of right and merit with that of whole interest of ten years at that time in arrears; but, by the continental troops, and that you cannot continue to the mode of funding, two-thirds only of that arrear was ever give pensions to one class, and yet fairly and consistently paid them. They were entitled to interest from the time withhold them from the other. Is it not so? Is there an of funding, upon the whole principal then due and unpaid; pretence for this discrimination? Is there, let me ask. but one-third of that principal bore no interest for ten in the first place, any thing in the character or in the years. Thus, in various ways, and in various degrees, all amount and value of the service rendered by the milita suffered somewhat; some more than others, but most con- which unfavorably distinguishes their claim from that of siderably. Then the case stands thus: these persons held the soldiers of the line? The gentleman from South Care a contract of their country, by which she engaged to pay lina, partly by direct assertion, and partly by adroit insinu them a certain sum in money. When the time of per- ation, has sought on this point to make an impression, as formance came, she was unable to meet the engagement, regard it, palpably against the historical fact. He has and was reluctantly obliged to give, and they were reluc- sought to persuade you that the revolutionary services of tantly obliged to take, less than the whole in lieu of the this species of force were inconsiderable in amount, and whole. m a great change of relative circumstances, that they did not differ in character from those which the which we cannot without emotion contemplate, they ask entire male population of every invaded country necesse you to make up the deficiency. The gentleman from rily, and without merit, always do perform. He would Virginia is perfectly willing to do so; but insists that it confound the enlisted, marching, and fighting militia with shall be done in the form of a donation of charity, which "the three millions of whigs with arms in their hands"we are at liberty to withhold, and to which we may annex memorable words! by which Chatham intended to describe, any condition. I submit that it is more honorable, more not a literal army, but a determined people. These views honest, and much nearer to the historical fact, that it take of the gentleman demand, perhaps, some notice. the form of a payment of a debt which we may not with- Sir, I have heard it plausibly maintained that this country hold, and to which we may not annex an offensive condi- owes its independence to the militia. That, perhaps, is tion. Since the act is to be done, let us call it by its right too broad a proposition; at all events, it is needless to d Let us give it the name of the virtue it most re- cuss it. Our business to-day would rather seem to be, sembles. It comes nearer to justice than to generosity, to inquire whether the services of this portion of force though borrowing of both; therefore, let us call it justice, were indispensable--for who can pronounce on that not and fashion the bill accordingly. to compare them invidiously with those of their co-workers in that great labor of glory--but to inquire whether they were not real, considerable, national: and whether they ought not to be at length compensated by a place upon the national pension roll. name. I now solicit your attention to another topic. I approve the great objects of this bill, and I am in favor, therefore, of the amendment offered by the gentleman from Vermont, partly for the further reason that it renders the bill more liberal and more grateful than it would be without I abstain from details, but two or three general v it. I approve the whole bill, and chiefly that provision, may be suggested. I affirm, first, that there was not so eloquently assailed by the gentleman from South Caro- campaign or battle, from the beginning of the war to the lina, which it makes for a long disparaged and neglected end, in which the militia did not bear an important par portion of the army of the revolution--the militia, State along with the continentals. I do not say that they gene troops, and volunteers. Sir, it will not "raise the dead" of the war of independence, as the honorable gentleman repeatedly and somewhat unkindly forewarned you. "They are in their graves; Nor steel, nor poison, rally mustered in equal numbers, nor that they ever lear ed to stand fire quite as well in the open field. We know they did not. But I do say they served every where, and fought every where, under regular contracts of enlistme from which they could not break away, or under compu sory levy for a prescribed term, and that they contributed APRIL 9, 1832.] whom were militia. an important, and, as yet, an unappreciated and uncom- But in two or three memorable instances they saved the pensated share, to whatever of success crowned the Ame- army. One happened when Washington lay before Bosrican arms. I promised to avoid details, but I will remind ton, early in 1776, and another some time subsequently in you that the army which shut the British up in Boston, and the Jerseys. It was in the gloomy period of the short enfinally drove them from it, consisted, when the siege was listments, the old were expiring, the new were not yet nearly raised, of twenty thousand men, of whom six thousand filled, and a prompt and strong levy of yeomen and mewere militia. That siege began, you may say, in April or chanics alone enabled him to present to the enemy the May, 1775, and down to August, 1775, the entire besieging show of a considerable armed organization. But it is needforce was a mere militia. The continental line did not less to pursue this topic. There can be no doubt that this exist in name or in fact until August, 1775. That other force, whenever exerted, powerfully aided the cause of army, which captured Burgoyne, consisted of ten thou- the revolution. It prevented the enemy, to some extent, sand men, of whom thirty-eight hundred were militia; and from undertaking those predatory incursions upon the at Yorktown the American forces amounted to eleven coast and frontier, which were so distressing when underthousand, of which four thousand were militia. Besides taken. It protected to some extent the agricultural labor this, they shared in every triumph and every defeat which of the country, without which the war could not have successively illumined or darkened the long and changing been maintained two years. It kept down disaffected perscenes of that awful drama. The brilliant victory at Cow-sons. It sustained the spirit of the people and of the pens, to which the gentleman from New York [Mr. WARD] leaders of the people, by lightening in some degree the has alluded, and which, in its consequences, rescued two burden, and breaking off the horrors of civil war. States from the enemy, was won by an army, two-thirds of There is nothing, then, in the amount or character of the service rendered by this part of the army, which warrants It is interesting, too, to call to mind how many of what a discrimination in favor of the continental troops. It was may be termed the turning incidents of the war, how many directed against the common enemy--it aided the common of the more showy and startling achievements, which pro-cause--it was military service. duced a permanent and extended influence upon the tem- Can any other reason be assigned for this discrimination? per and feelings of the people and the enemy, and upon Will you say the militia and State troops were better paid the course and issue of the struggle; how many of these than the line? The reverse is the fact. The rate of their you owe to the single-handed daring of the militia. Gen wages may have been more or less, but more generally tlemen have reminded you of Lexington and Bunker Hill. they clothed and armed themselves. They were paid in Yes, sir, the children in the infant schools can tell that the the same kind of paper. The contract with them for men who fought there never heard the beat of an enemy's compensation was no better kept than that with the regudrum before in their lives. But how few of all the bat-lar army. It was not kept so well. Generally, the State tles of history have produced such results or drawn after paper depreciated earlier and faster than the continental them such consequences, and how little of all the blood paper. That of Massachusetts began to fall nearly twelve shed in war has been shed to such good purpose as this! months before that of the confederacy; and, therefore, in The capture of Burgoyne was an eventful incident of the the long run of the war, they suffered more from depreciawar. The most popular of our historians, in his peculiar tion than the other portion of the army. And, generally, expression, remarks that "this event was the hinge on is there any reason to doubt that the sufferings, privations, which the revolution turned." It secured to us the alli- and perils of the militiaman who served his nine months ance of France, and put the ultimate independence of the in the field, were as severe as those of the continental country beyond hazard. He says, with much more accu-soldier who served his? Gentlemen say that nine months' racy, I think that "the battle of Bennington was the first service in a seven years' war is below the regard of this link in the grand chain of causes which finally drew on the prosperous and grateful country. Why, nine months is a ruin of the royal army." All that glory, too, was gather long campaign, and a very short campaign has many times ed by the militia--by Stark's own." That high-spirited in modern war changed the face of the world. Besides, soldier sent the official account of the battle, not to the you have long ago settled the principle, that service for Continental Congress, but to the Legislature of Massachu-nine months alone in the line gives a title to a pension. setts, and the trophies of the victory are hanging up to-day All the peculiar hazards of that civil war, the soldiers of in her Senate house. both classes incurred together. They ran the same risk Will the gentleman allow me to remind him that the of falling in the field, of the prison ship, and the scaffold. Southern campaigns illustrate remarkably the nature and Nay, I take it that those who served in the earlier scenes value of the revolutionary services of this species of force? of the war, before it assumed the form of recognised and There is hardly recorded a series of more desperate, ro- national hostility, came much nearer to the pains and pemantic, and useful enterprises and conflicts, than they nalties of rebellion than those who entered later. In other were engaged in, day and night, seed time and harvest, respects, I have thought the lot of the militiamen the hardsummer and winter, for three years. Without them, the est of the two. Generally they were older; oftener they patriot cause would have been for the present wholly ruin- had families, and a business which required their attention. ed in at least two States. They fought in every battle, They could not have left home to attend court, as jurors, "shoulder to shoulder," with the troops of the line. But for a fortnight, without inconvenience; and yet they were beyond and better than that, they maintained under Sumpter, Pickens, Marion, cum multis aliis "the bravest of the brave," a desperate partisan guerilla warfare of less historical celebrity, but hardly less useful than the continental campaigns of Gates, Lincoln, or even Greene. often summoned without the preparation of a moment to a campaign of twelve months. They were called up at midnight to leave comfortable dwellings, happy but helpless families, and fields ripening to the harvest; and they knew that, if they survived to return, it might be to find I do not wonder that some students of this portion of those fields trampled down by an enemy's cavalry, and our history have exclaimed that we owe our independence those families without a house over their heads. This was to the militia. Remember, too, that it happened_more peculiarly the case with the Southern militia. I really than once during the war that a seasonable recruit of these suppose that they suffered more in health, feeling, and insoldiers saved, when nothing else, perhaps, could have terest, than the same number of troops of the line; and I saved, the army of Washington itself from disappearing think that this ought to be remembered, now that we are and dissolving away. Every week almost, requisitions finally making up the revolutionary pension roll. were made on them for direct co-operation with the continental troops to meet the various emergencies of the war. But it is urged that although pensions are equitably due to the militia and State troops and volunteers, the States, and not the General Government, ought to pay them. The gentleman from South Carolina holds apparently this opinion. They served, it is said, under the States, and often, if not generally, for the mere local defence of the States. Their contract was exclusively with the States. From them they received their wages and bounty; and from them also, it is said, some have actually received pensions. There is an appearance of plausibility in this suggestion, which is dispelled by a closer examination. [APRIL 9, 1832. ther authorized or unauthorized by the United States." The truth is, as the gentleman from New Hampshire [Mr. HUBBARD] remarked, the principle has long been settled, that pensions are properly payable by this Government to the militia, as well as to the troops of the line. From the adoption of the federal constitution, down to the year 1818, it was the invariable practice of this Government to bestow them, without any discrimination, upon both these descriptions of force alike. In 1818, for the, first time, a different rule was adopted. Before that year, our only pension system was an invalid pension system. The invalid pension act, passed in 1806, provides, in substance, that all persons wounded in the war of the revolu- he assailed Massachusetts or Georgia; whether he can tion, "in service against the common enemy," whether of the line, State troops, volunteers, or militia, shall receive pensions. You perceive that this act goes the whole length of the principle of this bill. It comprehends all these descriptions of force, and it makes service against the common enemy, and that only, wherever, and under what ever contract rendered, the title and basis of the grant. But the principle had been settled long before. In 1735, the old Congress recommended to the States to provide for the payment of pensions to persons disabled in the war of independence, whether of the line or the militia, and resolved to allow in account the sums thus paid. The States gave pensions accordingly, and, by the first Congress of the new constitution, a law was made, substantially reimbursing to the States their expenditures upon this object, and adopting their pensioners into the family of national pensioners. From that time down to 1818, the practice of the Government was settled and uniform. It gave pensions to invalids only, but it gave them to all alike, precisely as this bill gives them. learn that either of those States has ever given pensics to any persons except invalids. I know very well that, as troops from time to time were called for, the States, to induce them to enlist, engaged to pay them bounties, a also engaged to pay pensions to such as should be disabled in service, and to the widows and children of those who should fall. Further than this, I apprehend, they did n go. To the class of persons, then embraced in this b the States mentioned by the gentleman did not, I suspect, give pensions. This is not a bill for invalid pensioners All such are provided for by the act of 1806. To that law the objection might have been relevant, but perhaps t weighty. To this it has no application. I think, sir, more than enough has been said to show that the claims of the militia, State troops, and volunteers, rest on precisely the same grounds of right and merit with those of the continental troops. This is sufficient for the defence of the bill. But two or three other objections taken by the gentleman from South Carolina are entitled to notice. I understood the gentleman to say that three of the States (South Carolina, Virginia, and North Car lina) have long since given pensions to the same class of persons living within their respective limits, whom this provides for; and he argues that it is unjust to compel these States thus to contribute over again to the support the pensioners of other States. This objection, sir, I take And, sir, in a more general view, if pensions are equi-is not supported in point of fact. I shall be surprised to tably due to the militia at all from any Government, they would manifestly seem to be due from this Government, which pays the debt of the revolution. They form so much addition to the price of independence, and the whole of that price you pay. The National Government has actually assumed on itself the obligation to reimburse to the States the wages which they paid this force. How then can it be argued that pensions, which are only the arrears and incidents of wages, are due from the States, and not from you? In 1790, the act for settling the accounts of the revolution was passed. It allowed to the States all their expenditures during the war, whether in curred for particular or for common defence. This would comprehend these wages. I know that the act was less The gentleman says the time is unsuitable for the pas liberally executed by the commissioners. But its terms sage of such a law. Putting this suggestion into very are sufficiently broad to embrace this precise expenditure; plain English, what is it? The gentleman and his friends and that such was its intention, also becomes quite mani- are zealously engaged in an attempt to break down your fest by reference to Hamilton's celebrated report on pub- protective system, not gradually, but at a blow. It is part lic credit, of January 9, 1790, wherein the great princi- of their tactics to seize the occasion of the extinguishment ple on which the accounts of the revolution ought to be of the public debt, to abolish the duties which sustain that settled, is stated, and briefly and luminously vindicated. system. This bill, he argues, makes an appropriation It is certain that this act was passed for the purpose of money. It has some tendency to keep up the duties, and carrying into effect the views of that report, and one thus it opposes some obstacle to his favorite enterprise therefore may properly explain the other. I take leave therefore, he says the time is unsuitable, if there were no to refer you to a few passages of that performance, so other objection. worthy of the great and clear mind, and noble policy of him, sometimes called the most intellectual of our departed statesmen. "Let each State," he observes, "be credited for all moneys paid, and articles furnished, to the United States; and for all other expenditures during the war, either towards general or particular defence, whe The time is unsuitable! Sir, this is delicately and adroitly stated. It seems to imply that the claim is a good one, s that some fifteen or twenty years hence it may fitly acted on. The gentleman says a pension sy stem endure forever. One might suppose he thought these old sold en would live forever. Sir, the current which is bearing APRIL 9, 1832.] Revolutionary Pensions. [H. OF R. Sir, if you can hew and rear that statue of the departed commander in chief which we have just now voted to his sublime virtues and unapproachable fame, you can bestow the spare comforts of life upon those aged and wearied men who shared in his labors, and contributed to his glory. I hope the amendment offered by the gentleman from Vermont will be adopted, and that the bill, thus amended, may become a law. them and us away, will hardly pause in its course to the ought you not, to multiply and present to those who shall • shoreless and deep sea, to give you time to adjust the serve you in these great crises, inducements to serve you tariff controversy. To delay such a bill is to defeat it. well? You give them wages, bounties, promotion, swords, Why does not the gentleman say at once that this appro-and medals. May you not, and ought you not, to be able to priation bill helps the protective system, and therefore he point them also to the laurels which a grateful country has will now, and at all times, resist it? To the suggestion, wreathed around other brows, and to the glory which coin that form, I have only one word to say. I should hold vers the living and the dead of other fields? May you not it to be unprincipled legislation on my part, to vote for a secure future service by generously rewarding past serneedless or an unconstitutional application of the public vice? May you not honor the dead, and pension the aged, money for the purpose of sustaining the system of protec- that the living and the young may be stimulated to an tion, although I believed that system fraught with every equally salutary emulation? blessing which a good man could ask in prayer of God for his country. But I hold it to be just as unprincipled to refuse a necessary and proper application of money for the purpose of breaking that policy down. The true rule would seem to be this, try every demand made against your treasury upon its merits. If it is well founded, allow it; if it is ill founded, disallow it. But do not turn away a I have adverted, imperfectly, to the leading objections public creditor, because the mode of taxation which is to urged by the honorable gentleman to the bill. Shall I say raise the money will be more burdensome to one portion that it did not seem to be so much his object to insist on of the country than to another. You say you cannot bear these, as to present generally an exposition of the docthe tariff. Rid yourselves of it, then, in such manner as trines, claims, and determination of the South in relation your principles will permit; but do not, in this sense, or to what is called the existing crisis? I do not complain of in any sense, hang it about the necks of the old soldiers. him for availing himself of this occasion to effect this obThe gentleman says that the pensioners under the ex-ject. But I am satisfied that, as a friend of the bill, I ought isting law are almost all north of the Potomac, and appre- not to attempt a reply to this portion of his able speech. hends that it will be so under this bill. Well, sir, what I had designed to make the attempt, but I repress myself then? Where should they be? Where did the honorable by the reflection that it is the time of the old soldiers I am gentleman expect to find the white-haired and bending consuming, and that it is indiscreet, if not unjust, to conveteran, but there, where his fathers found the young and nect such a claim as theirs with the perplexed and excitthe brave in the day of their "own great extremity?" Is ing politics of the day. it strange that the States which furnished so large a part of the army should furnish an equal proportion of the survivors? Besides, does the residence of your creditor affect his standing in this high court? Consider, too, that the Mr. DEARBORN manifested much surprise at the fruits of the labors of these men, independence and union temper exhibited by the gentleman from South Carolina, -omnes omnium caritates complectentes-are on both sides | [Mr. DAVIS,] especially in reference to the residue of of the river, and on both sides of the mountain. many of the pensioners now upon the roll. The gentleThe gentleman doubts your constitutional power to give man was opposed to the whole system, because the result pensions for revolutionary military services. Sir, re-of it was to dispense money in the North; and he had conspectfully submit that this objection comes too late. If trasted the large number of pensioners in the Northern the constitution is a thing to be loved, enjoyed, and exe- and Eastern States, with the comparatively few who were cuted, and not a book of riddles and puzzles for ever- found south of the Potomac. Admitting the fact to be lasting disputation, the question is closed. This Govern- as he had stated, was there any thing astonishing or unment has given pensions from the day of its institution to accountable in it? Had not the first blow of the revoluthis hour. It has done so, whoever has administered it; tion been struck in Massachusetts? It was her troops that and it has been done with the approbation of the whole had been first called to the field. Boston had been bepeople of America. The constitution has received an leaguered by the enemy. Our army had been sent through interpretation which forms a part of the writing itself. the wilds of the Kennebeck to Quebec; another by the Let me say, however, that if it were an open question, it way of Lake Champlain to Montreal; and scarcely had the is a plain one. enemy been driven from her capital, when her troops, The honorable gentleman severely and eloquently ar- with those of New Hampshire and Rhode Island, were raigns the policy of instituting a military pension system. called to the South to defend New York, New Jersey, and I agree entirely with him, that great judgment, coolness, Pennsylvania. Again: when a haughty enemy poured his and measure, are requisite to the safe bestowment of pen- legions down the valleys of the Hudson, what troops were sions. I agree that the tendencies of the practice are to they who were assembled to confront and to arrest his abuse and perversion, and that, when thus abused, it may progress? It was the troops from the Northern States. produce the consequences so strikingly portrayed by him. Throughout the war, those troops were to be found every It is the ordination of God, that his choicest blessings and where, in the South as well as in the North. Nor could best gifts, in their perversion, become the greatest curses. it be otherwise. The population of the North was more Government may thus change into an intolerable tyranny, dense; they were therefore the more exposed to deand religion into a blind and bloody superstition. But what struction; and every where they were called to aid in then? Will you, therefore, pull down the fair and well rolling back the tide of invasion and ruin. It was histocompacted architecture of your constitution, or vote with rically true that more than one-fourth of the revolutionarevolutionary France, that there is no God in the universe? ry army had been raised within the State of Massachusetts; The eloquent warning voice of the gentleman may fitly and if New Hampshire and Rhode Island should be taken teach us with what caution we ought to give any the slight-into the account, it would be found that from those States est extension to our present system. But his warfare is came more than one-third of all the troops that were in the upon the system itself. I venture yet to say that that sys- field during the war. This was the true and simple extem, when consummated by this bill, may be defended as planation why the numbers on the pension roll were so resting on a wise, or at least a safe, policy, and a sound great in proportion to the census of those States. And reading of the constitution. You have the power of en-was this to be a matter of censure? Were such deeds to gaging in war, and of maintaining armies. May you not, be considered dishonorable? And were the muster rolls |