must follow, and will follow with forgery and perjury in its train. It is the honor and character of your trading people which now protects you from smuggling. Break down this sentiment, habituate them to perjury, destroy the disgrace attached to this violation of your law, and you lose half the security and means you have in the collection of your revenue.

The complaint has been made, that while we find fault with the measures proposed, we refuse to point out the course we would have the administration to pursue. I have, sir, no hesitation on my part, to disclose my opinion, or to offer the humble assistance of my advice on the subject In a few words I will tell you what I would do: place England and France upon the same footing, by repealing the non-importation act, rescinding the proclamation, and repealing the embargo. Then ask for, and insist upon adequate reparation for the affair of the Chesapeake. Make a treaty with Great Britain, if as good terms could be obtained as those in either of the treaties which have been refused. Agree to resist the execution of the Berlin decree, and if she afterwards persisted in her orders in council, declare war against her. Such would be my course. War would be the last resort; and I believe, in my conscience, we should never be driven to it, if the course were pursued with a sincere disposition to preserve peace. Permit me, sir, to notice one remark of the honorable gentleman from Virginia, which had escaped me, and I am done. The gentleman told us, that the removal of the embargo was designed as a concession to our eastern brethren. I rejoiced to hear this sentiment of forbearance. Such sentiments give hopes that the union may still be preserved. We have been led to the brink of a tremendous precipice; another false step, and we shall be lost in the abyss. Our safety is in treading back our steps. We have lost our way. Some ignis fatuus has beguiled us. There is a path of safety and honor— the path the nation once trod. Let us endeavor to regain it, and invoke the spirit of Washington to lead us once more into it!

SPEECH OF LEVI WOODBURY,

ON A

BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF THE SURVIVING OFFICERS OF THE REVOLUTION,

DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, 1828.

MR. PRESIDENT,

IT has become my duty, sir, as Chairman of the Committee who reported this bill, to explain the origin and character of it. I regret that this duty has not devolved upon some abler representative of the interests of the petitioners; but I regret it the less as my colleagues on the committee, possess every quality of both the head and heart to advance those interests, and will no doubt, hereafter, be seconded by an indulgent attention on the part of the senate.

Who, then, sir, are the venerable men that knock at your door? and for what do they ask? They are not suppliants for mere favor or charity, though we all know that nothing but the proud spirit which helped to sustain them through the distresses of our revolution, has withheld most of them from reliance for daily bread on the alms provided by the present pension act. No, sir, they come as petitioners for their rights. They come as the remnant of that gallant band, who enlisted your continental army, who disciplined its ranks, who planned its enterprizes, and led the way to victory and independence. Confiding in the plighted faith of Congress, given in the form of a solemn compact, they adhered to your cause through evil report and good

report, till the great drama closed; and they now ask only that the faith so plighted may be redeemed. Amid the wrecks from time and disease, during almost half a century, short of two hundred and fifty now survive, out of two thousand four hundred and eighty, who existed at the close of the war. Even this small number is falling fast around us, as the leaves of autumn; and this very morning a gentleman before me has communicated the information, that another of the most faithful among them has just passed "that bourne whence no traveller returns." It behooves us, then, if we now conclude, in our prosperity and greatness, to extend relief, either from charity, gratitude, or justice, to do it quickly.

My great anxiety is, in the outset, to prevent any misapprehension of the true grounds on which the appropriation is founded. Throughout the whole inquiry, there is no disposition to censure the motives or policy of the old Congress. They adopted such measures as the exigencies and necessities of the times forced upon them; and now, when those exigencies have ceased, it is just, as well as generous, to give such relief as the nature of the case may demand.

A very great obstacle to the success of this measure heretofore, has been a prevalent opinion, that these petitioners are seeking compensation merely for losses sustained on the depreciation of continental money and certificates received for their monthly wages; whereas, from their first memorial in A. D. 1810, to the present session, they have invariably rested on the non-performance, by Congress, of a distinct and independent contract. All the losses on their monthly wages, they bore in common, and are willing to forego in common with many in the walks of civil life, and with the brave soldiers under their command. This is the plain and decisive reason why none but officers are embraced in the present bill. The contract on which they rely, was made with the officers alone; and gallant and unfortunate as were

the soldiers, the officers have endured, and will continue to endure, without repining, still severer sufferings from the worthless money and certificates received for their wages; because those losses were perhaps too large, and too general, in all departments of life, ever to warrant the expectation, or practicability of complete remuneration. I have said severer sufferings on this account by the officers; because the money received for wages before A. D. 1780, worth only one dollar in the hundred, was, to the officers, the only means to purchase camp equipage and clothing, that were furnished to the soldiers out of the public arsenals; and because the soldier often received besides liberal bounties both at home and from Congress.

Let it then be distinctly understood, that notwithstanding this disparity against the officers, no such losses or depreciations form any part of the foundation for this bill. A moment's attention to the history of that period, will show the true ground of the appropriation. After this unequal pressure had continued nearly three years after the officers had sustained their spirits during that trying period under such disadvantages, by the force of those principles that led them at first to join in the pledge to the cause, of their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor;" after their private resources had become nearly exhausted in supplying those wants their country was unable rather than unwilling to satisfy, there arose a state of things which led to certain proceedings by Congress in relation to half pay.

The prospect had nearly vanished, that any honorable accommodation could be effected with the parent country. The contest seemed likely to become more severe, and to be protracted for many years; and it was obvious that many of the officers, thus impoverished and disheartened, must actually resign in order to provide themselves with decent clothing, and to maintain their families, and secure any subsistence for advanced life, or that they must receive some as

surance of future indemnity, if they continued in service, and abandoned every thing else to sink or swim with the military destinies of their country.

It was then that the resolve of May 15th, 1778, granting half pay, for only seven years, to all who continued in service till the close of the war, was passed.

This short period of half pay was dictated, rather by the wants of Congress to provide a longer one, than from an impression that it was, in truth, sufficient, or in accordance with any similar system in the armies of Europe. Hence, a committee, May 24th, 1779, reported a resolution, allowing half pay for life to the same class of officers, and justly grounded it on the great risks they were called to encounter, on their great sufferings and sacrifices of youth, ease, health and fortune, in the cause of their country. But the want of resources in Congress, induced them to postpone this subject, and on the 17th of August, 1779, to urge upon the respective states the expediency of adopting such a resolution, and of pledging for its fulfilment their state resources. The power of the states over those resources, was much more effective than that of the confederation over the states. But such were the general gloom and despondency of the times, that not a single state, except Pennsylvania, complied with the recommendation. The currency continued to depreciate more and more, daily; the officers, in many instances, were utterly unable, by their whole pay, to procure decent apparel: treason had penetrated the camp in the person of Arnold: Charleston had been surrendered: Lincoln captured: Gates defeated at Camden: the Southern states overrun by Cornwallis: our soldiery had become discouraged; and the great military leader of the Revolution had become convinced, and had urged, with his usual energy upon Congress, that the adoption of this resolution was almost the only possible method of retaining the army together. Under such appalling circumstances, Con