Thirty Years' View (Vol. II of 2)

CHAPTER XCVI.

MILITARY DEPARTMENT: PROGRESS OF ITS EXPENSE

There is no part of the working of the government, at which that part of the citizens who live upon their own industry should look more closely, than into its expenditures. The progress of expense in every branch of the public service should be their constant care; and for that purpose retrospective views are necessary, and comparisons between different periods. A preceding chapter has given some view of this progress and comparison in the Navy Department: the present one will make the same retrospect with respect to the army, and on the same principles – that of taking the aggregate expense of the department, and then seeing the effective force produced, and the detailed cost of such force. Such comparative view was well brought up by Mr. Calhoun for a period of twenty years – 1822 to 1842 – in the debate on the naval appropriations; and it furnishes instructive data for this examination. He said:

"I shall now pass to the military, with which I am more familiar. I propose to confine my remarks almost entirely to the army proper, including the Military Academy, in reference to which the information is more full and minute. I exclude the expenses incident to the Florida war, and the expenditures for the ordnance, the engineer, the topographical, the Indian, and the pension bureaus. Instead of 1823, for which there is no official and exact statement of the expenses of the army, I shall take 1821, for which there is one made by myself, as Secretary of War, and for the minute correctness of which, I can vouch. It is contained in a report made under a call of the House of Representatives, and comprises a comparative statement of the expenses of the army proper, for the years 1818, '19, '20, and '21, respectively, and an estimate of the expense of 1823. It may be proper to add, which I can with confidence, that the comparative expense of 1823, if it could be ascertained, would be found to be not less favorable than 1821. It would probably be something more so.

"With these remarks, I shall begin with a comparison, in the first place, between 1821 and the estimate for the army proper for this year. The average aggregate strength of the army in the year 1821, including officers, professors, cadets, and soldiers, was 8,109, and the proportion of officers, including the professors of the Military Academy, to the soldiers, including cadets, was 1 to 12 18-100, and the expenditure $2,180,093 53, equal to $263 91 for each individual. The estimate for the army proper for 1842, including the Military Academy, is $4,453,370 16. The actual strength of the army, according to the return accompanying the message at the opening of the session, was 11,169. Assuming this to be the average strength for this year, and adding for the average number of the Academy, professors and cadets, 300, it will give within a very small fraction $390 for each individual, making a difference of $136 in favor of 1821. How far the increase of pay, and the additional expense of two regiments of dragoons, compared to other descriptions of troops, would justify this increase, I am not prepared to say. In other respects, I should suppose, there ought to be a decrease rather than an increase, as the prices of clothing, provisions, forage, and other articles of supply, as well as transportation, are, I presume, cheaper than in 1821. The proportion of officers to soldiers I would suppose to be less in 1842, than in 1821, and of course, as far as that has influence, the expense of the former ought to be less per man than the latter. With this brief and imperfect comparison between the expense of 1821 and the estimates for this year, I shall proceed to a more minute and full comparison between the former and the year 1837. I select that year, because the strength of the army, and the proportion of officers to men (a very material point as it relates to the expenditure) are almost exactly the same.

"On turning to document 165 (H. R., 2d sess., 26th Con.), a letter will be found from the then Secretary of War (Mr. Poinsett) giving a comparative statement, in detail, of the expense of the army proper, including the Military Academy, for the years 1837, '38, '39 and '40. The strength of the army for the first of these years, including officers, professors, cadets, and soldiers, was 8,107, being two less than in 1821. The proportion of officers and professors, to the cadets and soldiers, 11 46-100, being 72-100 more than 1821. The expenditure for 1837, $3,308,011, being $1,127,918 more than 1821. The cost per man, including officers, professors, cadets, and soldiers, was in 1837 $408 03, exceeding that of 1821 by $144 12 per man. It appears by the letter of the Secretary, that the expense per man rose in 1838 to $464 35; but it is due to the head of the department, at the time, to say, that it declined under his administration, the next year, to $381 65; and in the subsequent, to $380 63. There is no statement for the year 1841; but as there has been a falling off in prices, there ought to be a proportionate reduction in the cost, especially during the present year, when there is a prospect of so great a decline in almost every article which enters into the consumption of the army. Assuming that the average strength of the army will be kept equal to the return accompanying the President's message, and that the expenditure of the year should be reduced to the standard of 1821, the expense of the army would not exceed $2,895,686, making a difference, compared with the estimates, of $1,557,684; but that, from the increase of pay, and the greater expense of the dragoons, cannot be expected. Having no certain information how much the expenses are necessarily increased from those causes, I am not prepared to say what ought to be the actual reductions; but, unless the increase of pay, and the increased cost because of the dragoons are very great, it ought to be very considerable.

"I found the expense of the army in 1818, including the Military Academy, to be $3,702,495, at a cost of $451 57 per man, including officers, professors, cadets, and soldiers, and reduced it in 1821 to $2,180,098, at a cost of $263 91; and making a difference between the two years, in the aggregate expenses of the army, of $1,522,397, and $185 66 per man. There was, it is true, a great fall in prices in the interval; but allowing for that, by adding to the price of every article entering into the supplies of the army, a sum sufficient to raise it to the price of 1818, there was still a difference in the cost per man of $163 95. This great reduction was effected without stinting the service or diminishing the supplies, either in quantity or quality. They were, on the contrary, increased in both, especially the latter. It was effected through an efficient organization of the staff, and the co-operation of the able officers placed at the head of each of its divisions. The cause of the great expense at the former period, was found to be principally in the neglect of public property, and the application of it to uses not warranted by law. There is less scope, doubtless, for reformation in the army now. I cannot doubt, however, but that the universal extravagance which pervaded the country for so many years, and which increased so greatly the expenses both of government and individuals, has left much room for reform in this, as well as other branches of the service."

This is an instructive period at which to look. In the year 1821, when Mr. Calhoun was Secretary at War, the cost of each man in the military service (officers and cadets included) was, in round numbers, 264 dollars per man: in the year 1839, when Mr. Poinsett was Secretary, and the Florida war on hand, the cost per man was 380 dollars: in the year 1842, the second year of Mr. Tyler's administration, the Florida war still continuing, it was 390 dollars per man: now, in 1855, it is about 1,000 dollars a man. Thus, the cost of each man in the army has increased near three fold in the short space of about one dozen years. The same result will be shown by taking the view of these increased expenses in a different form – that of aggregates of men and of cost. Thus, the aggregate of the army in 1821 was 8,109 men, and the expense was $2,180,093: in 1839 the aggregate of the army was about 8,000 men – the cost $3,308,000: in 1842 the return of the army was 11,169 – the appropriation asked for, and obtained $4,453,370. Now, 1854, the aggregate of the army is 10,342 – the appropriations ten millions and three quarters! that is to say, with nearly one thousand men less than in 1842, the cost is upwards of six millions more. Such is the progress of waste and extravagance in the army – fully keeping up with that in the navy.

In a debate upon retrenchment at this session, Mr. Adams proposed to apply the pruning knife at the right place – the army and navy: he did not include the civil and diplomatic, which gave no sign at that time of attaining its present enormous proportions, and confined himself to the naval and military expenditure. After ridiculing the picayune attempts at retrenchment by piddling at stationery and tape, and messengers' pay, he pointed to the army and navy; and said:

"There you may retrench millions! in the expenses of Congress, you retrench picayunes. You never will retrench for the benefit of the people of this country, till you retrench the army and navy twenty millions. And yet he had heard of bringing down the expenditures of the government to twenty millions. Was this great retrenchment to be effected by cutting off the paper of members, by reducing the number of pages, and cutting down the salaries of the door-keepers? How much could be retrenched in that way? If there was to be any real retrenchment, it must be in the army and navy. A sincere and honest determination to reduce the expenses of the government, was the spirit of a very large portion of the two parties in the House; and that was a spirit in which the democracy had more merit than the other party. He came here as an humble follower of those who went for retrenchment; and, so help him God, so long as he kept his seat here, he would continue to urge retrenchment in the expenditures of the military and naval force. Well, what was the corresponding action of the Executive on this subject? It was a recommendation to increase the expenditures both for the army and navy. They had estimates from the War and Navy Departments of twenty millions. The additions proposed to the armed force, as he observed yesterday, fifteen millions would not provide for. Where was the spirit of retrenchment on the part of the Executive, which Congress had a right to expect? How had he met the spirit manifested by Congress for retrenchment of the expenditures of the government? By words – words – and nothing else but words."

A retrenchment, to be effectual, requires the President to take the lead, as Mr. Jefferson did at the commencement of his administration. A solitary member, or even several members acting together, could do but little: but they should not on that account forbear to "cry aloud and spare not." Their voice may wake up the people, and lead to the election of a President who will be on the side of republican economy, instead of royal extravagance. This writer is not certain that 20 millions, on these two heads, could have been retrenched at the time Mr. Adams spoke; but he is sure of it now.

CHAPTER XCVII.

PAPER MONEY PAYMENTS: ATTEMPTED BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: RESISTED: MR. BENTON'S SPEECH

The long continued struggle between paper money and gold was now verging to a crisis. The gold bill, rectifying the erroneous valuation of that metal, had passed in 1834: an influx of gold coin followed. In seven years the specie currency had gone up from twenty millions to one hundred. There was five times as much specie in the country as there was in 1832, when the currency was boasted to be solid under the regulation of the Bank of the United States. There was as much as the current business of the country and of the federal government could use: for these 100 millions, if allowed to circulate and to pass from hand to hand, in every ten hands that they passed through, would do the business of one thousand millions. Still the administration was persistent in its attempts to obtain a paper money currency: and the national bank having failed, and all the efforts to get up paper money machines (under the names of fiscal agent, fiscal corporation, and exchequer board) having proved abortive, recourse was had to treasury notes, with the quality of re-issuability attached to them. Previous issues had been upon the footing of any other promissory note: when once paid at the treasury, it was extinguished and cancelled. Now they were made re-issuable, like common bank notes; and a limited issue of five millions of dollars became unlimited from its faculty of successive emission. The new administration converted these notes into currency, to be offered to the creditors of the government in the proportion of two-thirds paper, and one-third specie; and, from the difficulty of making head against the government, the mass of the creditors were constrained to take their dues in this compound of paper and specie. Mr. Benton determined to resist it, and to make a case for the consideration and judgment of Congress and the country, with the view of exposing a forced unconstitutional tender, and inciting the country to a general resistance. For this purpose he had a check drawn for a few days' compensation as senator, and placed it in the hands of a messenger for collection, inscribed, "the hard, or a protest." The hard was not delivered: the protest followed: and Mr. Benton then brought the case before the Senate, and the people, in a way which appears thus in the register of the Congress debates (and which were sufficient for their objects as the forced tender of the paper money was immediately stopped):

Mr. Benton rose to offer a resolution, and to precede it with some remarks, bottomed upon a paper which he held in his hand, and which he would read. He then read as follows:

[COMPENSATION NO. 149.]Office of Secretary of the Senate of the U. S. AWashington, 31st January, 1842.

Cashier of the Bank of Washington,

Pay to Hon. Thomas H. Benton, or order one hundred and

forty-two dollars.

$142 (Signed)

Asbury Dickens,Secretary of the Senate.(Endorsed). ☞ "The hard, or a protest."Thomas H. Benton."

District of Columbia,

Washington County, Set:

Be it known, That on the thirty-first day of January, 1842, I, George Sweeny, Notary Public, by lawful authority duly commissioned and sworn, dwelling in the County and District aforesaid, at the request of the honorable Thomas H. Benton, presented at the bank of Washington, the original check whereof the above is a true copy, and demanded there payment of the sum of money in the said check specified, whereunto the cashier of said bank answered: "The whole amount cannot be paid in specie, as treasury notes alone have been deposited here to meet the Secretary of the Senate's checks; but I am ready to pay this check in one treasury note for one hundred dollars, bearing six per cent. interest, and the residue in specie."

Therefore I, the said notary, at the request aforesaid, have protested, and by these presents do solemnly protest, against the drawer and endorser of this said check, and all others whom it doth or may concern, for all costs, exchange, or re-exchange, charges, damages, and interests, suffered and to be suffered for want of payment thereof.

[SEAL]

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and affixed my Seal Notarial, this first day of February, 1842.

George Sweeny,Notary Public.

Protesting, $1 75.

Recorded in Protest Book, G. S. No. 4, page 315.

Mr. B. said this paper explained itself. It was a check and a protest. The check was headed "compensation," and was drawn by the Secretary of the Senate for so much pay due to him (Mr. B.) for his per diem attendance in Congress. It had been presented at the proper place for payment, and it would be seen by the protest that payment was refused, unless he (Mr. B.) would consent to receive two-thirds paper and about one-third specie. He objected to this, and endorsed upon the check, as an instruction to the messenger who carried it, these words: "The hard, or a protest." Under instructions the protest came, and with it notarial fees to the amount of $1,75, which were paid in the hard. Mr. B. said this was what had happened to himself, here at the seat of government; and he presumed the same thing was happening to others, and all over the Union. He presumed the time had arrived when paper money payments, and forced tenders of treasury notes, were to be universal, and when every citizen would have to decide for himself whether he would submit to the imposition upon his rights, and to the outrage upon the Constitution, which such a state of things involved. Some might not be in a situation to submit. Necessity, stronger than any law, might compel many to submit; but there were others who were in a situation to resist; and, though attended with some loss and inconvenience, it was their duty to do so. Tyranny must be resisted; oppression must be resisted; violation of the Constitution must be resisted; folly or wickedness must be resisted; otherwise there is an end of law, of liberty, and of right. The government becomes omnipotent, and rides and rules over a prostrate country, as it pleases. Resistance to the tyranny or folly of a government becomes a sacred duty, which somebody must perform, and the performance of which is always disagreeable, and sometimes expensive and hazardous. Mr. Hampden resisted the payment of ship money in England: and his resistance cost him money, time, labor, losses of every kind, and eventually the loss of his life. His share of the ship money was only twenty shillings, and a suggestion of self-interest would have required him to submit to the imposition, and put up with the injury. But a feeling of patriotism prompted him to resist for others, not for himself – to resist for the benefit of those who could not resist for themselves; and, above all, to resist for the sake of the Constitution of the country, trampled under foot by a weak king and a profligate minister. Mr. Hampden resisted the payment of ship money to save the people of England from oppression, and the constitution from violation. Some person must resist the payment of paper money here, to save the people from oppression, and the Constitution from violation; and if persons in station, and at the seat of government will not do it, who shall? Sir, resistance must be made; the safety of the country, and of the Constitution demands it. It must be made here: for here is the source and presence of the tyranny. It must be made by some one in station: for the voice of those in private life could not be heard. Some one must resist, and for want of a more suitable person, I find myself under the necessity of doing it – and I do it with the less reluctance because it is in my line, as a hard-money man; and because I do not deem it quite as dangerous to resist our paper money administration as Hampden found it to resist Charles the First and the Duke of Buckingham.

There is no dispute about the fact, and the case which I present is neither a first one, nor a solitary one. The whig administration, in the first year of its existence, is without money, and without credit, and with no other means of keeping up but by forced payments of paper money, which it strikes from day to day to force into the hands, and to stop the mouths of its importunate creditors. This is its condition; and it is the natural result of the folly which threw away the land revenue – which repealed the hard money clause of the independent treasury – which repealed the prohibition against the use of small notes by the federal government – which has made war upon gold, and protected paper – and which now demands the establishment of a national manufactory of paper money for the general and permanent use of the federal government. Its present condition is the natural result of these measures; and bad as it is, it must be far worse if the people do not soon compel a return to the hard money and economy of the democratic administrations. This administration came into power upon a promise to carry on the government upon thirteen millions per annum; the first year is not yet out; it has already had a revenue of twenty odd millions, a loan bill for twelve millions, a tax bill for eight or ten millions, a treasury note bill for five millions: and with all this, it declares a deficit, and shows its insolvency, by denying money to its creditors, and forcing them to receive paper, or to go without pay. In a season of profound peace, and in the first year of the whig administration, this is the condition of the country! a condition which must fill the bosom of every friend to our form of government with grief and shame.

Sir, a war upon the currency of the constitution has been going on for many years; and the heroes of that war are now in power. They have ridiculed gold, and persecuted it in every way, and exhausted their wits in sarcasms upon it and its friends. The humbug gold bill was their favorite phrase; and among other exhibitions in contempt of this bill and its authors, were a couple of public displays – one in May, 1837, the other in the autumn of 1840 – at Wheeling, in Virginia, by two gentlemen (Mr. Tyler and Mr. Webster), now high functionaries in this government, in which empty purses were held up to the contemplation of the crowd, in derision of the gold bill and its authors. Sir, that bill was passed in June, 1834; and from that day down to a few weeks ago, we were paid in gold. Every one of us had gold that chose it. Now the scene is reversed. Gold is gone; paper has come. Forced payments, and forced tenders of paper, is the law of the whig administration! and empty purses may now be held up with truth, and with sorrow, as the emblem both of the administration and its creditors.

The cause of this disgraceful state of things, Mr. B. said, he would not further investigate at present. The remedy was the point now to be attended to. The government creditor was suffering; the constitution was bleeding; the character of the country was sinking into disgrace; and it was the duty of Congress to apply a remedy to so many disasters. He, Mr. B. saw the remedy; but he had not the power to apply it. The power was in other hands; and to them he would wish to commit the inquiry which the present condition of things imperiously required of Congress to make.

Mr. B. said here was a forced payment of paper money – a forced tender of paper money – and forced loans from the citizens. The loan to be forced out of him was $100, at 6 per cent.; but he had not the money to lend, and should resist the loan. Those who have money will not lend it, and wisely refuse to lend it to an administration which throws away its rich pearl – the land revenue. The senator from North Carolina [Mr. Mangum] proposes a reduction of the pay of the members by way of relief to the Treasury, but Mr. B. had no notion of submitting to it: he had no notion of submitting to a deduction of his pay to enable an administration to riot in extravagance, and to expend in a single illegal commission in New York (the Poindexter custom house inquisition), more than the whole proposed saving from the members' pay would amount to. He had no notion of submitting to such curtailments, and would prefer the true remedy, that of restoring the land revenue to its proper destination; and also restoring economy, democracy, and hard money to power.

Mr. Benton then offered the following resolution, which was adopted:

"Resolved, That the Committee on Finance be instructed to inquire into the nature of the payments now made, or offered to be made, by the federal government to its creditors. Whether the same are made in hard money or in paper money? Whether the creditors have their option? Whether the government paper is at a discount? And what remedy, if any, is necessary to enable the government to keep its faith with its creditors, so as to save them from loss, the Constitution from violation, and the country from disgrace?"

CHAPTER XCVIII.

CASE OF THE AMERICAN BRIG CREOLE, WITH SLAVES FOR NEW ORLEANS, CARRIED BY MUTINY INTO NASSAU, AND THE SLAVES LIBERATED

At this time took place one of those liberations of slaves in voyages between our own ports, of which there had already been four instances; but no one under circumstances of such crime and outrage. Mutiny, piracy, and bloodshed accompanied this fifth instance of slaves liberated by British authorities while on the voyage from one American port to another. The brig Creole, of Richmond, Virginia, had sailed from Norfolk for New Orleans, among other cargo, having 135 slaves on board. When out a week, and near the Bahama Islands, a mutiny broke out among the slaves, or rather nineteen of them, in the night, manifesting itself instantly and unexpectedly upon the officers and crew of the brig, and the passengers. The mutineers, armed with knives and handspikes, rushed to the cabin, where the officers not on duty, the wife and children of the captain, and passengers were asleep. They were knocked down, stabbed and killed, except as they could save themselves in the dark. In a few minutes the mutineers were masters of the vessel, and proceeded to arrange things according to their mind. All the slaves except the 19 were confined in the hold, and great apprehensions entertained of them, as they had refused to join in the mutiny, many of them weeping and praying – some endeavoring to save their masters, and others hiding to save themselves. The living, among the officers, crew and passengers were hunted up, and their lives spared to work the ship. They first demanded that they should be carried to Liberia – a design which was relinquished upon representations that there was not water and provisions for a quarter of the voyage. They then demanded to go to a British island, and placing the muzzle of a musket against the breast of the severely wounded captain, menaced him with instant death if he did not comply with their demand. Of course he complied, and steered for Nassau, in the island of Providence. The lives of his wife and children were spared, and they, with other surviving whites, were ordered into the forward hold. Masters of the ship, the 19 mutineers took possession of the cabin – ate there – and had their consultations in that place. All the other slaves were rigorously confined in the hold, and fears expressed that they would rise on the mutineers. Not one joined them. The affidavits of the master and crew taken at Nassau, say: