Page images
PDF
EPUB

There being no election, the Senate proceeded to a fourth balloting, which resulted as follows:

W. D. Moseley,
I. D. Hart,

N. Long,
Blank,

7

4

1

1

The Senate proceeded to a fifth balloting, which resulted as fol lows:

W. D. Moseley,

I, D. Hart,

Blank,

7

4

2

Mr. Kelly moved that the Senate adjoun until Thursday, 11 o'clock. Which motion was lost.

The Senate proceeded to a sixth balloting which resulted as follows:

W. D. Moseley,

I. D. Hart,
G. W. Macrae,
W. W. J. Kelly,
Blank,

7

3

1

Mr. Putnam renewed the motion to adjourn. A division was called, which showed ayes 5, nays 7. So the motion was lost. The Senate proceeded to a seventh balloting which resulted as follows:

[blocks in formation]

Mr. Moseley having withdrawn from the chamber, Mr. Baltzell moved that inasmuch as Mr. Moseley having received a majority of the votes of the Senators present, he be considered duly elected President of the Senate.

The Chair decided the motion out of order.

The Senate proceeded to an eighth balloting, which resulted as follows:

[blocks in formation]

There being no choice, Mr. Hart renewed the motion to adjourn, A division being called, the motion was lost.

The Senate proceeded to a ninth balloting, which resulted as follows:

[blocks in formation]

The Senate proceeded to a tenth balloting, which resulted as follows:

[blocks in formation]

The Senate proceeded to an eleventh balloting, which resulted as follows:

G. W. Macrae,

W. D. Moseley,

7

6

The Senate proceeded to a twelfth balloting, which resulted as follows:

G. W. Macrae,
W. D. Moseley,

7

6

Mr. Hart again renewed the motion to adjourn; which was lost after some discussion.

The Senate proceeded to a thirteenth balloting, which resulted as follows:

G. W. Macrae,

W. D. Moseley,
Blank,

6

6

1

The Senate proceeded to a fourteenth balloting, which resulted as follows:

[blocks in formation]

The Senate proceeded to a fifteenth balloting, which resulted as follows:

G. W. Macrae,

W. D. Moseley,
W. Anderson,
Blank,

7

4

1

1

So there was no election of President of the Senate.

On motion of Mr. Anderson, the Senate then adjourned until Thursday morning, 11 o'clock."

THURSDAY, January 9, 1845.

The Senate met pursuant to adjournment, Mr. Macrae in the Chair. The Journals of the 6th and 7th were read and the Senate proceeded to business.

Mr. Baltzell moved that the Senate proceed to the election of President of the Senate, viva voce, and that the ayes and noes be taken on the motion, which motions were, upon questions thereon severally put, decided in the negative.

On motion of Mr. Hart the Senate then proceeded to the elec tion of President, which resulted as follows:

G. W. Macrae,
W. D. Moseley,
Blank,

7

5

1

The Chair declared that there was no election, whereupon Mr. Baltzell appealed from the decision of the Chair, and moved that G. W. Macrae, Esqr. be declared duly elected President of the Senate.

The Chair decided this motion to be out of order, on the ground that by the former decision of the Senate, a majority of their whole number was necessary.

The Senate then proceeded to a second balloting, which resulted as follows:

G. W. Macrae,

W. D. Moseley,
Blank,

12

1

1

Mr. Moseley was then called to the chair, when on motion of Mr. Baltzell, Mr. Macrae was unanimously declared duly elected President of the Senate.

On motion of Mr. Hart, a committee, consisting of Messrs. Hart and Long, were appointed to conduct the President to the chair. Which having been done, the President addressed the Senate in a neat and pertinent manner, in acknowledgment of the honor conferred upon him.

On motion of Mr. Moseley, the Senate proceeded to the election of its other officers.

Which, upon ballots severally and separately taken, resulted as follows:

Thomas F. King, Secretary.

R. E. Gibson, Assistant Secretary.

I. V. Garnie, Foreman.

J. A. Summerlin, Messenger.

Neil McPherson, Sergeant-at-Arms.

On motion of Mr. Moseley, a committee, consisting of Messrs. Moseley and Hart, were appointed to inform the House that the Senate was duly organized and ready to proceed to business.

On motion of Mr. Anderson, a committee consisting of Messrs. Anderson and Mosely, was appointed to wait jointly with a committee of the House of Representatives, on his Excellency the Governor, and inform him that the two Houses of the Legislative Council are duly organized, and ready to receive any communication hist Excellency may think proper to make.

On motion of Mr. Long, the Senate then adjourned until tomorrow, 10 o'clock, A. M.

FRIDAY, January 10, 1845. The Senate met pursuant to adjournment, and a quorum being. present, yesterday's proceedings were read.

Mr. Moseley moved that the rules of the last session of the Senate be in force until others were adopted.

Which motion prevailed.

On motion of Mr. Gilchrist, a committee was appointed by the President, consisting of Messrs. Gilchrist, Moseley and Hart, to draft rules for the government of the Senate at its present session. Mr. Hart offered the following resolution:

Resolved, That the Reverend Mr. Martin be invited to act as Chaplain, for the present session of the Senate.

Which was read the first time, and ordered for to-morrow.

A committee of the House of Representatives informed the Senate, through their chairman, Mr. Child, that they were appointed to act with a similar committee on the part of the Senate, to wait upon his Excellency the Governor, and inform him that both Houses of the Legislative Council are duly organized, and ready to receive any communication he may wish to make them.

Mr. Carter offered the following resolution:

Resolved, That the Sergeant-at-Arms be instructed to furnish fifteen extra chairs for the use of the Senate.

Which was adopted, the rule being waived.

Mr. Anderson from the committee appointed to wait on the Governor, reported, that they had performed that duty, and his Excellency the Governor would in a few minutes forward his message.

The annual message of his Excellency the Governor, transmitted through the hands of his private Secretary, W. H. Branch, was then received.

GOVERNOR'S MESSAGE.

Gentlemen of the Senate

and House of Representatives:

In discharging the responsible duty of recommending the most appropriate subjects for your legislative deliberations, I am deeply sensible of my insufficiency to the proper performance of such an office. In advance, therefore, I invoke the aid of that Omniscient Being, to whom, as a Nation, we have been so often and so signally indebted. Under His guidance, and in the confident belief that my imperfect ef forts will be generously aided by your prudent counsels and co-operation, I shall, without farther preliminary, proceed to the execution of the task-barely premising that all governments, controlled by an enlightened and honest public sentiment, are designed to promote the greatest good of the greatest number, and can only be carried into practical operation, in a spirit of mutual concession and compromise. Under the influence of these fundamental truths, my purpose will be to confer ingenuously and freely with you, and to unite cordially with every honest patriot in placing our adopted country in the best position to assert her rights, and redress her wrongs, with energy, dignity and unyielding firmness. For it must be admitted that Florida has rights to maintain, as well as wrongs to redress, of such a character as to demand our undivided energies. With these convictions, I should be wanting in a proper discharge of my duty, were I to shrink from the high responsibility of recommending them, not only to your favorable notice, but to your efficient action.

If ever there existed a community with well-founded claims on its government for indemnity, it is to be found in Florida-a country highly favored by Providence, but laid waste by a ferocious and implacable foe-provoked and goaded on, not only without a provident preparation for such an occurrence, but in the prosecution of a war, to say the least, of doubtful policy. It is painful, as it is unnecessary, for me to dwell on the manner in which it was conducted and protracted. It is enough to know, as our citizens but too sensibly feel, that by this ill-advised measure, Florida has become, through no agency of her own, an almost blood-stained wilderness; and that half a century will scarcely suffice to place her where she would have been but for the mismanagement of her Federal Trustee. Would that this were all-but not so! Through the same agency, an unwise and ruinous legislation has been inflicted on her, worse, if possible, than "war, pestilence and famine." I mean the blighting influence of a corrupt and corrupting paper system,

You

so utterly rotten, that I cannot undertake its dissection. will, however, see from the accompanying correspondence marked B, that I have assumed what some may deem a weighty respon sibility. May I not expect your energetic aid, in the effort I am making to rescue our good name from the reproach of faithlessness, in the discharge of honest liabilities? I say emphatically, honest liabilities, for none other would I recognize as an individual, and no other would I advise you to assume. One thing, however, is certain, that whether the loss on the loans negotiated by the Banks, upon the faith of the Territory, is to fall on the Territory, your Federal Trustee, or the capitalists, you are bound in honor to prevent, by every means in your power, the waste or misapplication of the property mortgaged, to any other purpose than their payment.

It is true that all parties now denounce the Banking system, as it has existed in Florida, as a Pandora's box, and cry aloud for the nuisance to be forthwith abated. In this I concur. But let us take care, that we do not involve the innocent with the guilty, in one indiscriminate wreck; for in critical operations in surgery, the utmost caution and skill are necessary.

In addition to all this, Florida has had indignities superadded to injuries. She has been charged with repudiating her just debts.— Nothing can be more libellous; and in her behalf, I feel it to be my duty to repel the charge. On the contrary, it is her anxiety to pay her honest debts, that induces her to scrutinize the spurious demands of speculators and bank-swindlers, generated and fostered by irresponsible Federal rulers. Under such circumstances, it is expecting too much to suppose that the unsuspecting citizens of Florida will suffer themselves to be crushed by so unholy an alliance; and this, too, without a murmur.

Under the Providence of God, Florida earnestly desires to carve out her own fortunes in her own way. She asks to be permitted to appoint her own officers, and to make and administer her own laws; and in thus asking, she feels that she seeks nothing but what she is justly entitled to, and what she would be recreant to her best interests and posterity, were she not to insist on. She demands the rights of a Sovereign State, so long withheld from her, though guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States, and the Treaty of Cession.— With a solitary Delegate in Congress, without even a vote to oppose aggressions on your rights, how can you expect successfully to contend for an equal participation in the benefits of this glorious confederacy? Allow me, then, to advise you to gird on the armor of State Sovereignty-to shake off the old boy, and put on the new man!

To those of our fellow-citizens, who believe that we are incapable of sustaining the expenses of a State Government, I would respectfully say, that if the estimates of our able and indefatigable Delegate are to be accredited—of which I cannot doubt-your fears are groundless. Instead of being a loss of a few dollars and cents, it will be a gain of thousands and tens of thousands. But, I would remark, that we ought not to be deterred from the pursuit of the great prize, by such considerations. The right of self-government is inestimable to freemen, and ought not to be abandoned for light and trivial causes.

« PreviousContinue »