age of $650,000 per annum? The deposites of ment of General Shields's term, would have been gold, the produce of U. S. mines, at the four sufficient. He would vote to postpone if General mints, for coinage in 1848, were of the value of S. expected to produce further evidence. He (Mr. $241,544. The value of the U. S. coinage that Seward) had but little respect for the wisdom that year was $5,879,728. Since 1824 North Carolina prescribed the nine-year qualification-Mr. HALE, has furnished nearly four millions of gold ove-General SHIELDS asked Mr. Foote to withdraw on the contrary, respected that provision the most. for coinage. In eleven years, to 1849, our three his motion, and then tendered his resignation, by branch mints, at New Orleans, Charlotte, and letter, to the reading of which Mr. Webster objectDahlonega, received of U. S. gold, $5,649,873 as ed.-A motion to lay the resolution of the commitdeposites for coinage. In fifty-six years, to 1849, tee on the table was then lost, 15 to 34; and Mr. the U. States mint (including its three branch-FOOTE said he feared that it was intended to fix a es, during the last eleven years) coined of gold, born and cradled in the land where once flourished brand on the general's forehead, because, though silver, and copper, $151,017,714, or less than $2,a Grattan, a Curran, and an Emmet, he had pre700,000 a year. Count the cost of four mints, sumed to aspire to high station in a republic. Why and it will be found to be a heavy and useless declare the election and commission, ab initio, burthen on the public treasury. Election and Rejection of General Shields. void? Was it not enough to declare General S.'s seat vacant, by reason of his present incompetency to occupy it? Why make a victim to propitiate the accursed spirit of Native-Americanism? GenOn the 5th of March, 1849, at an extra session of tlemen who were for a 21-years' qualification to the Senate, Messrs. Pearce, Upham, Cooper, But- candidates for naturalization, might vote that the ler, Borland, Walker, Dodge, Seward, Morton, election and commission were void.-Mr. DOUGDawson, Norris, Whitcomb, Soulé, and Smith, sen- LASS. Shall we disfranchise Illinois for two years? ators elect, were qualified. When James Shields, of General S. has resigned-the seat is vacant. You Illinois, was named, Isaac P.Walker, of Wisconsin, have declared that a governor can not fill a vacancalled in question his eligibility, and moved to re- cy, as a vacancy, for a term not originally filled. for his credentials to the judiciary committee. It is proposed now to say that the seat of General Next day, Mr. Douglass moved that Gen'l Shields S. is vacant; but that as an unconstitutional elecbe sworn in, on which arose discussions which fill tion has been held, the governor can not fill the vasixty-six columns of the Congressional Globe. cancy: the legislature do not meet till 1851. To this Mr. Walker desired a previous inquiry, as it was he could not assent. Gen'l Shields will have been a better course than admitting and then expelling more than nine years a citizen when the first regu him: he wished the question of his (Shields's) elf-lar term of the Senate commences next December. gibility fully settled before he was sworn in. Mr. Why put Illinois to the expense of a special sesWebster, and a majority of the senators, decided sion of the legislature? Was it not enough to dethat General Shields could take his soat, which he clare the seat vacant?-Mr. HALE wished Gen'l S.'s did. On the 7th, Messrs. Benton, Feich, Mason, letter read, instead of retaining him in order to reWebster, and Pearce, were appointed to inquire ject him.-Mr. WEBSTER. If a man has no seat, how into his eligibility; and they reported on the 13th, can he resign it? If the election was void, there that Shields had been elected by the State of Illi- is a vacancy already.-Mr. DOUGLASS. If no one nois on the 13th of January, 1849; that he had ad- had objected, and General S. had sat for six years, mitted that he was by birth an alien-that he was who would have said that his votes were invalid? naturalized Oct. 21, 1840-and that his election was His acts here are valid, and his election, till the void, as he lacked several months of being a citi- Senate declare his seat vacant. Acts had been zen for nine years. Shields's oath, when natural- passed by the casting vote of a member of the H. ized, was, that he was born in Tyrone county, Ire- of R. whose seat was afterward vacated. They land, May 17. 1810; came to the U. S. when a mi- were valid. Would it have been so if his election nor; had resided in them since he was 18 years old, had been void, as if he had never sat there --Mr. or during the last 21 years. On the question being BERRIEN. We have decided that he was disqualistated, viz., whether the Senate would declare his fied to sit and vote; how then can he resign?-Mr. election void, General Shields remarked, that there DOUGLASS. He has taken his seat, and is its constiwas no competitor to contest his seat; no memo-tutional occupant till legally displaced, or till he rial complaining of the election. He believed resign.-Mr. BUTLER said that as General Shields there were not five men in Illinois who would on had no valid title on Mar. 4, he had no title at all. these grounds have come forward and contested A deed founded on a void consideration is no deed. it: the only objection had arisen in the Senate. He-Mr. UNDERWOOD. The vacancy is produced, not (S.) had resided 17 years in Illinois; been in the by the individual lacking the qualifications, but by Legislature, a Judge of the Supreme Court, Com- the judgment of the body which investigates the missioner of the Land-Office, Auditor of Public Ac-case; by the sentence. The constitution knows no counts, General in the U. S. Army, and even for difference between the acts of a de facto senator three days Governor of Oregon-offices requiring and one rightfully such. The title to the seat is naturalization. Mr. Walker, however, had a right valid till a vacancy is declared to exist. He wishto do what no one in Illinois would have done; ed the resignation to be allowed to take effect.and if his (Gen. S.'s) own State would now desert Mr. DAWSON said, that in case of a marriage in him, after he had tried to prove his fidelity to his country by every act of his life, it was his intention never agam to offer for any office. The resolution of the committee he would not oppose.Mr. MASON said that the committee were guided by The General'e letter was read, and Mr. HALE the action of the Senate in Mr. Gallatin's case. moved to accept his resignation, and inform Illinois Gallatin was born in Genova, 1761; emigrated to of the vacancy, rather than be guilty of the act of the U. S. 1780; took the oath of allegiance to Va. discourtesy proposed, of withholding that notifica1785; was elected to the Senate, from Pa.. 1793; tion.-Mr. BADGER did not believe that the resig his seat was contested 1794, and his election de- nation had produced the vacancy-the title proved elared void, 14 to 12, because he had not been nine to be no title at all: he had no right to sit and vote. years a citizen.-Mr. FooTE moved to postpone -Mr. Downs. Why should the Senate continue to further proceedings till December.-Mr. SEWARD discuss the merits of a claim that is withdrawn? said that nine years' citizenship, at the commence-If we go on, it is to hold on to and make a victim which there were causes pre-existing to render it unlawful, a divorce would be granted, the mar riage would be declared void from the first, and the children illegitimate. of General Shields. No one in Illinois had com-lask to test its correctness. The Treasurer's report planed; the Senate had inquired from mere impulse, as it were. General S. had retired from his position, and his admission or continuance were no longer questions. Mr. Hale's motion was tabled, 20 to 15. Mr. MASON said the committee's resolution was a copy of the one adopted in Gallatin's case. The election weg void-it could not have been made good. Genbral S. was incompetent to resign-he had no title to his seat. The Senate refused to table the reso-type. The interest paid on public debt and tem lution declaring the election.Yoid-18 to 32. is scientifically spread over 588 pages, and contains lists of warrants paid, and several reports of auditors. Congress printed a report of the contingencies of the House of Representatives, 332 pagesit would have been easily contained in 100. The wasteful expenditure in public printing-turning one page into four or five, to swell contract acpunts should be checked. The treasury contingencies, in detail, fill a volume of 116 pages, small porary loans exceeds $3,000,000 yearly. The expenditures in the quarter ending Sept. 30, 1848, were $17,866,105, and the receipts $19,735,115, the greater part of the latter being money borrowed. In this return the postoffice revenue and expenditure are not included. The public disbursements during the year to July 1, 1849, were $66,431,844, including the redemption of floating debt: the re ceipts were some $31,000,000 from lands and customs, and the proceeds of a sixteen million loan. The United States Register states the public debt negotiated or authorized Sept. 30, 1848, at $65,778,450, to which was to be added other $10,127,200 received from loans and treasury notes, and $26,000 Mexican indemnity, &c.; total. $75,931,650. The funded debt had increased $48,036,151 be tween Mar. 4, 1845, and Oct. 1, 1848. Six per cent. is the rate of interest payable on nearly all of it: loans in London about the same time were effected at from 3 to 4. The U. S. debt, as a whole, has been contracted nearly at par. Mr. Douglass was checked by Mr. Mangum when affirming that they were persecuting his colleague, and refusing him those decent courtesies that had never been refused to another. He went on, however, to say that the object was to fix a brand upon a brave man, and to insult a sovereign State. Mr. Shields had poured out his blood for the honor and fame of his country, and was he to be the first to be refused the right to resign?-Mr. FooTE said that General S., though born in Ireland, had never failed to sympathize with republican progress: he had been baptized with blood and fire into the American family on the battle-plains of Mexico, and his heroic deeds had become a part of the national history. Would they discredit a man before the world who had been faithful in peace and glorious in war, in the very Chamber where his deeds had been solemnly enrolled, and his clair to public gratitude stood confessed? If General S. resigns whatever title he had, be it good or bad, if he gives up all claim, what more can be desired? Shall he The national debt of Britain is the nominal prinbe declared an impostor and a usurper?-Mr. BUT- cipal of a perpetual annuity. Considering the sum LER did not say but that the general might have paid yearly to the public creditors, it is the equivaresigned at first [although Walker's resolution was lent of a debt of $2,066,666,000, yielding 6 per cent. before the Senate when he took his seat]; but not per annum, or nearly $124,000,000 of dividends. now when the matter had been brought up.-Mr. It has been reduced only three millions of interest DAWSON Condemned Mr. Foote's remarks as offen- per annum during twenty years of peace, and is sive. The constitution had prohibited General S.'s election-the election could therefore not qualify him-the Senate must say that his election was void he could not take the office-the legislature had failed to elect a qualified person. General CASS said that as Mr. Shields claimed no seat, the intended declaration that his seat was void was an illegal assumption of power. The Senate refused to strike out the word "void" and simply declare Shields not entitled to a seat, 28 to 15-refused to allow him to resign, 32 to 12-and passed the committee's resolution, amended by Mr. Calhoun, a copy of which was then sent to Illinois. The governor, believing he had no power, made no appointment, but called together the legislature, which again appointed General Shields a senator of the U. S., the nine years of probation having expired. UNITED STATES FINANCES. The receipts, from customs, public lands, loans, issues of treasury notes, &c. [see ex. doc. 11], during the year ending June 30, 1848, amounted to $90,071.755; the expenditures to $60,655,143. Apparent balance in the treasury, $29,416.612. The real balance, however, was but $1,314,967, for $28,101,645 of the above sum were the moneys lent to the 26 states twelve years since, which they have disposed of by loans or otherwise, and the money, therefore, is not in the treasury. In Mr. Walker's letter [ex. doc. 11, December 18, 1848]. he states the balance in treasury at $33,079,276; in his letter of the 11th [ex. doc. 7], he states it at $1,701,251; and that the balance on hand at the close 1848, was $153,535. These state made the pretext for continuing heavy duties on tea, coffee, and many other articles chiefly consumed by the humbler classes. A public debt of $450 per family, at 6 per cent., for every family in a nation, is certainly a very heavy one. There are also East India debts, Canada debts, Jamaica debts. We have our State debts, over $200,000,000, and the interest on loans paid to persons abroad far exceeds the moneys brought by immigrants. The immense sums due by small proprietors in France, and secured by mortgage, added to the taxation caused by the large public debt, impoverishes them greatly. In 1792, the taxation of the United Kingdom was only £16,000,000-now it is £60,000.000. In 1792, Burke said, "nations are wading deeper and deeper into an ocean of boundless debt. Public debts, which at first were a security to governments, by interesting many in the public tranquillity, are likely in the end to be the means of their subversion. If governments provide for these debts by heavy impositions, they perish by becoming odious to the people. If they do not provide for them, they will be undone by an extensive discontented moneyed interest, injured and not destroyed." Sixty years ago, France had a public debt of 42,000,000 livres, and 3,000.000 poor: in 1838. the debt was 4,590,526,111 francs: in 1845, it had increased to 5,640,000,000. Now it is still higher. But little has been done for the education of the millions, and therefore the eighth constitution may soon have to give place to a ninth. of the fiscal yeance. The expenses of the U. S. Lord Chancellor Cottenham; Marquises of Lans ments are at courts and judiciary were $600,000, beside fees received by district-attorneys. The annual account of receipts, payments, and balances, forms an 8vo volume of 366 pages, but so complicated is state machinery that it would be a very laborious BRITISH CABINET.-Lord John Russell, premier; Sir Charles Wood, chancellor of the exchequer downe and Clanricarde; Sir George Grey, home sec.; Viscount Palmerston, for. sec.; Earl Grey, col. sec.; Sir Francis Baring; Sir John C. Hob house; Lord Campbell; Henry Labouchere, board of trade; Earls of Minto, Grenville, and Carlisle, KNOWLEDGE OF THE LAW. EVERY person is bound to know the law, whether life, liberty, or property, is involved. He is bound to understand the nice and subtle distinctions of the common law, as well as its plainest rules, and to conform his actions to the letter and spirit of the statutes, whether the language in which they are written is plain or doubtful. In illustration, he quotes the law of 1818, which gives each district-attorney $250 a year and the usual fees of office." What are they? Some of our district-attorneys have made $28,000 a year by them. The act appointing a district-attorney in Oregon, gives him Wisconsin fees; the Wisconsin act refers to the fees in Michigan; the Michigan compensation-bill refers to Indiana Territory, and the act to create it bids us look for the fees to On the Ed of May, 1828, that eminent and truly the ordinance of 1787, at the time of passing which honest Whig lawyer, Sir James Mackintosh, ask-no fees were provided, because the office of dised Mr. Huskisson, in the House of Commons, if trict-attorney had not been created! By the act of he had never heard of "a system of law in which 1799, district-attorneys are to receive "such fees in jumble of obsolete usages was mixed up and each state, respectively, as are allowed in the suconfounded with modern subtleties, until the minds preme court thereof." Congress took no trouble of the most acute men of the age, or of the nation to regulate the fees, nor is it known whether the men who had passed, in a service of forty years, law applies to States not then in existence. Worse through every stage of its gradations, from the still, there are several States which have neither lowest to the highest-were compelled to declare supreme court nor fee-bill. We often see it prothat they felt totally unable to find their way throvided, that a law referred to shall not be underits labyrinths, and were compelled, by their doubts stood to mean what it says it means. Statutes freof what was law and what was not, to add in a quently repeal all laws inconsistent with them, and most ruinous degree to the expenses of the suitor? the laws thus intended to be repealed often conDid he never hear of a country where this system tain like clauses. What is it, then, that is repealis called COMMON LAW, the wisdom of our ances-ed? In 1844, the revenue laws were collected in tors, and various other venerable names ?" a volume of 1,000 pages; in 1849, scarce 200 pages In most of the States, our fellow-citizens are re-remained in force: 20 years since, the land laws quired to obey the constitutions, the statutes pass- were published in over 1,000 pages, not over 100 of ed by Congress, the state laws or statutes, the which were in operation in 1849: out of 290 acts common law, and what is called equity, or the relating to the judiciary, scarce 100 pages remain rules and orders of a court of chancery. In Ohio in force: what is law and what is not puzzles our there are no common-law crimes; a man can only best jurists: "the national laws are not, and can be held to answer in the courts for an offence de-not now be understood by those who are bound to fined and set forth in its statute-book. In New. York, in 1846, a convention, while amending the constitution, provided for the appointment of three commissioners as a board to codify or arrange in writing, in plain language, the whole body of the common law; and three other commissioners to revise, reform, simplify, and abridge, the rules and practice, pleadings, forms, and proceedings, of the Courts of record. Both commissions were appointed in 1847, but by a legislature not friendly to law-reform. At length, the practice commission got into able and willing hands, and the reforms they have introduced, so far as successive legislatures permitted them to take effect, have had a salutary tendency. Not so the commission appointed to arrange the body of the common law. Chancellor Walworth said he would not act; Alvah Worden had spoken and voted against codification in convention; John A. Collier was evidently indisposed to do any thing; and Anthony L. Robertson, who succeeded Walworth, merely drew his salary. John C. Spencer, who had expressed himself unfriendly to the principle of codification, in his remarks on De Tocqueville, &c., was appointed in 1849, and declined to act after the legislature had adjourned. Seth C. Hawley became a commissioner in 1848. Mr. Worden resigned in 1849. know and obey them at the hazard of life, liberty, and property." One really able lawyer, aided by clerks, &c., could arrange and reduce them into a small volume, easily understood, better than a board of fifty jurists; and a Congress, which costs millions for its expenses, might add a law fee-bill or provide a compensation, instead of leaving the public at the caprice of either attorneys or judges. For the New-York supreme court, it was supposed that the code of procedure had provided uniform rules, instead of which the old absurd system of the judges making the law is again resorted to, without a reference to the legislature. We trust that 470, constituting the judges code-manufacturers, as it was under the old system, which the revisors justly condemned, is only a temporary one. If the judges are to make rules of proceeding, why was a commission appointed? The reformed practice-code of New-York will, we trust, return to one-term pleadings; in which, whatever a man's action or defense may be, he states it, in writing, in as few words as possible, and in language easily understood; its very simplicity oft-times calling for the exercise of more legal knowledge and dis cernment than was requisite under the old system. The legislature of 1848 possessed a fair share of the law-reform spirit, and we hope that their sucDe Witt Clinton earnestly urged on the legisla-cessors, in 1850, will excel them. Law-reform once ture of 1825 the great work of codification, so that carried in New-York will go over the whole Union. the rules which men must abide by might be ren- A complete code of procedure, without mystery, ardered more clear and distinct. Two reports have been made, we know not by whom, nor upon what parts of the law, nor whether the vacancies in the commission have been supplied. There are doubts whether our legislators have been friendly to the reduction of "a jumble of obsolete usages, mixed up with modern subtleties" into a systematic treatise, remarkable for its plainness and perspicuity; yet it is evident that a rule for human action, if it is to be obeyed, must be comprehended, and within the reach of these who are controlled by it. Speaking of the statutes passed by Congress, Mr. Gillett, solicitor of the treasury, wrote Mr. Secretary Walker that the people had no opportunity to see them; that, if they did, they could not understand them; and that even a good lawyer would find it almost impossible to tell, by reference to the national statute-book, what is statute law. ranged in one volume, having a convenient mode of notation, and of reference from one part to another, and including all the "judge-made rules" necessary to the administration of the civil and criminal law, will be issued this year if the legis lature set about it in earnest. The placing in the hands of one set of judges all the modes of granting legal relief, whether called equity, common law, or statute, and giving the practice a uniform operation, will be one of the greatest achievements of mind in this or any other age:-20-year lawsuits, for the benefit of bad men, will, when judges become prompt and methodical, fall into desuetude. Lord Brougham, we perceive, proposes to follow Napoleon's method in the arrangement of the criminal code of England-one section of his system relating to offences and their punishment. the other regulating the mode of criminal procedure. ELECTION RETURNS. ELECTION RETURNS, BY STATES, CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS, AND COUNTIES. Prepared Expressly for the Whig Almanac. MAINE.-[Complete.] Coolidge over Needham, 2,951. Needham, Clark, GOVERNOR-1849. PRESIDENT-1848. and scattering, over Coolidge, 432. Van Buren and Cass over Taylor, 1,663. Vote for Congress in IIId District, to fill vacancy &c. Taylor. Cass. V.B. 1657 505....5316 4670 967 MASSACHUSETTS. Hamlin, Hub'd, Talbot, York NEW-HAMPSHIRE.-[Official.] Counties. Briggs, Bout Phil- Briggs, Phil- Cush' GOVERNOR. 1849. CONGRESS. Strafford.....2007 589....2531 2123 38 9 East Peas Stew- 359 2126 376....1038 1974 Carroll. 186 78 289....1894. 419 714 2196 1535....5178 2418 1973 58 154 Total... .54495 S2266 24853...61640 36011 26404 RHODE-ISLAND.-[Official] GOVERNOR-1849. PRESIDENT-1848. 1041.. Grafton......2070 3897 8 Bristol..... 332 J. Kit Hib- White, Kent....... 588 238 148 220 Total.......18764 30107 7162 29969 22068 3685) VERMONT.-[Official] Total.......5081 2964 Vote for Congress in Ist District-King, W., 2,005; 206. GOVERNOR-1849. PRESIDENT-1848. 2,822; and Thurston, Coalition, 2,197.. Counties. Whig. F. D. &c. Taylor. V. B. Cass. Bennington..1882 1668 119....1554 616 1150 2869 92....1398 1106 1693 Litchfield.. .3778 Total .26,443 23492 3383...23122 13337 10948 Total......... 536 562 Fairfield......4356 3512 201...5036 4064 462 3519 561...3918 3674 800 .....27800 25106 3520 30314 27046 5005 Trumbull over Seymour, 2,694; Seymour, Niles, Middle- John Long- and scattering (40), over Trumbull, 866; Cass, and Counties. Fuller, Gamble, swarth, Painter, ston, streth, Oficial Aggregate for State Officers. Secy-Rog. H. Mills, 28,059; Hiram Reed, 25,210. 3944 W. L. F. W. L. F. W I. F. $952 4065 855 1457 4983 2856 4955 930 Wash'gton 3576 Total.... 133151 144740 164294 166930 168523 168221 Controller-Abijah Catlin, 28,045; Rufus G. Pin-received the following vote:-Phila. city and coun- Aggregate Vote for Congress. 1 Chapman, W., 7327.. Waldo, L. F., 7444..Scat., 28 Middle- Gamble, L. F., over Fuller and Cleaver, 8,150; 1849-CANAL. COMMISS'R-'48. GOVERNOR-1848. I. MARYLAND.-[Qficial.] CONGRESS-1849. PRESIDENT-1848. L. F. Adams....1645 1256.. 2314 1785 6130 Armstrong 1648 1937.. 1864 2013 Beaver....2349 Bedford...2523 2579.. 2610 2736 2613 1806 414......... 431 335 380 769 908 .1057 771 1427 Prince George's...... 835 ..1051 733 756 Bucks.....4432 4657..5063 5204 5084 5245 T. J. Mc- W. T. Hamil- 756.. 746 1000 768 996 2093.. 1636 2540 1649 2544 Allegany.. 5101 5895 5140 Frederick. 1851.. 1134 2209 1255 2238 Washington 891.. 603 1105 630 1111 Clinton.... 670 1001.. 1004 Total George W. 7307 7425 7037 24 2482.. 2234 2932 16 7 7 มุง ดี .4456 6903 Greene....1084 2047.. 1297 2350 1354 2362 1230.. 2258 1568 237: 1568 Wards 1-15, Balt.....6326 7277.. 8240 8063 56 870.. 642 926 788 992 A. Evans, S. M. Magraw, 597.. 492 580 1297.. 1504 1444 2594.. 2521 2966 2550 Luzerne.. 2578 3149.. 2899 3683 2967 2996 Harford. .1461 Lycoming 1524 2130.. 1831 3785 Kent.. McKean.. 233 365.. 362 406 1769 Queen Anne's 639 1443.. 1521 1258 133 876 429 Total.. ..3457 |