Part 170

Mr. LAURANCE was of opinion that a recommitment would tend to a saving of time; the committee will not be obliged to go over the same ground again that has already been explored; all they will be obliged to do is, to investigate the new testimony which will be adduced. He hoped, therefore, that the motion would prevail.

Mr. GILES said, that the proceedings of the committee were public, and that the Secretaries could have attended all the time, had they seen proper. They attended but once, and then appeared extremely anxious to get away to attend to their offices. The committee would have been extremely glad to have had those gentlemen present oftener, and to receive all the information they could give, and supposed they had done it.

Mr. GERRY replied to Mr. MADISON. He said, if gentlemen would recur to the proceedings of the House on the contested election, they will find that the House expressly reserved to itself the right of substantiating the facts, which should appear from an examination of the depositions, taken in conformity to the resolutions of the House; and here he adverted to the mode pointed out by the House in taking those depositions. The adverse party was to be summoned to attend to the taking them; but in this report it appears that ex parte evidence has been admitted as the foundation on which some of the decisions have been made.

Mr. MURRAY supported the motion for a recommitment. He observed that the matter, in its present state, was so incomplete that he could not see how the House could proceed upon it. One part of the evidence only is finished, and the report is made on that evidence. Now, we are told new testimony is offered; let the whole be brought into view at once, and then the House will be in a situation to judge.

Mr. PAGE was in favor of a further commitment of the subject; but whether to the committee who made the report, or to a new committee, he should not take upon him to say. With respect to the admission of any head of a department to the bar of this House, except in case of an impeachment, he would never consent to it. It would be a precedent of a most dangerous nature, tending to a destruction of all freedom of inquiry by committees.

Mr. FINDLAY observed, that the committee wished that Mr. Hodgdon should have been present, but he did not make his appearance; the committee therefore proceeded on the testimony they had, and as there is now new evidence brought forward, he thought it was proper that the report should be recommitted. As one of the committee, he should have no objections to such alterations as might appear proper on further and more complete investigation of the matter.

Mr. STEELE called for the reading of a clause in the memorial of the Secretary of War, which states that the committee had drawn conclusions from ex parte evidence. This being read, Mr. STEELE remarked on the want of candor towards the committee, which had been shown by some of the members in the course of their observations. He then adverted to the above clause respecting ex parte evidence, and observed that, with respect to the Secretary of War, it was not true that the committee had proceeded on ex parte evidence; that officer, said he, was notified of the meetings of the committee; he attended those meetings; he furnished the committee with papers and documents, &c.; and further, he was requested to detain officers in town whose testimony was necessary in the matter, and that he complained of some of those officers being detained by the delays of the committee from the recruiting service. With respect to Mr. Hodgdon the same cannot be said, as he was not then in the country.

Mr. STEELE then concluded by some additional remarks on the indelicacy manifested by some gentlemen in their treatment of the committee, and observed that he did not apply it to himself personally, but as it respected the committee at large, he thought proper to express the contempt which he conceived it merited.

Mr. DAYTON replied to Mr. STEELE. He repeated the substance of his original remarks on the report, and added, that in the course of the discussion he should attempt to show that the deductions made in several parts of the report were false. Mr. D. added, that whatever the gentleman last speaking might say, as one of the committee who signed the report, he was certainly implicated in whatever censure it merited.

The question for a recommitment was then agreed to, 30 to 22. And it was accordingly

Resolved, That the Committee of the whole House, to whom was committed the report of the committee appointed to inquire into the causes of the failure of the expedition under Major General St. Clair, be discharged from the consideration thereof; and that the said report, together with the documents relating thereto, including the letter of the Secretary of War, and the memorial of Samuel Hodgdon, be recommitted to Mr. FITZSIMONS, Mr. GILES, Mr. STEELE, Mr. CLARK, and Mr. FINDLAY.

THURSDAY, November 15.

Another member, to wit, THEODORE SEDGWICK, from Massachusetts, appeared, and took his seat in the House.

MONDAY, November 19.

Another member, to wit: JOHN FRANCIS MERCER, from Maryland, appeared, and took his seat in the House.

Protection to American Commerce.

Mr. WILLIAMSON moved that a committee be appointed to prepare and bring in a bill or bills for promoting commerce, by the increase of American seamen. In moving the above, Mr. W. addressed the House as follows:

Measures have already been taken by Congress for increasing the number of our shipping; but no effectual and general measure has been adopted for increasing the number of native American seamen. Every gentleman in my hearing knows that there are always a considerable number of foreigners employed on board American vessels; but none of us could have expected, and some of us may not have heard of the injury and insults to which our commerce has been exposed, from having British seamen on board our ships.

A schooner called the David and George, belonging to Portsmouth, in Virginia, and commanded by Captain Goffigan, lately touched at Sierra Leone, on the coast of Africa; she was navigated by eleven persons. Three of that number who had been on shore, informed Captain Wickham who commanded an armed vessel, that they were British subjects. Captain Wickham went on board the American vessel and claimed the three seamen; he also claimed wages for them. Captain Goffigan refused to deliver the men, and declared with truth that nothing was due them. Captain Wickham took the men by force, and by the same regulation he went into the hold, and took as much of the cargo as he thought fit, under the cover of substitute for wages. Captain Goffigan complained of this violence and robbery to Mr. Clarkson, who is Governor of the Province. The Governor replied, that he should have done the same thing, and that he had orders from his superiors so to act in such cases.

The ship Illustrious President, belonging to Virginia, commanded by Captain Butler, touched some time ago at Madeira, on her passage to the East Indies. The British frigate Hyena, commanded by Captain Hargood, lay at that time in the road. Seven of Captain Butler's sailors being British subjects, Captain Hargood sent to take them by force from on board the American ship, and he would have done so, had not the Governor of the Island, remembering what he owed to the honor of his nation and to every ship under his protection, interrupted his authority.

The ship Fame belonging to Philadelphia, commanded by Walter Sims, on her way to the East Indies, lately touched at Table Bay, at the Cape of Good Hope. Captain Blith, who commanded a ship of twenty guns, then lay in the road. One of Captain Sims' sailors, a native of Scotland, offered his service to Captain Blith, calling himself a British subject. That very man in Philadelphia had taken the oath of allegiance to the United States; but the British claim was best, for Captain Blith's ship was strongest. He took the man, sent an officer on board the American ship, who took the liberty of opening the after hatch, searching the hold and looking out a chest and clothes. Captain Blith justified these acts of violence, by saying, that he had printed instructions to take all who called themselves British subjects.

These are a few out of the numberless cases in which our ships have been robbed of their seamen, and they are samples of the manner in which we shall be constantly treated, while we depend on foreigners to navigate our ships. If these cases had terminated in threats and abusive language, to which our flag is too much accustomed, it might have been questioned whether the nation of the offending party was to blame. When you are told by one officer and another, that he is instructed to distress our trade, we should, if possible, deprive them of the present excuse. Is it not our business to inquire into the cause of this strange conduct? By a vitiated passion for British goods, we are universally clothed in the manufactures of that nation. Our debts increase every year, and we labor to make her rich, while we are becoming poor. We pour our treasures into her lap more than any other nation under the sun. Observe the rewards! I say nothing about her measures on our Western Frontier; but our trading ships are boarded and plundered at discretion by her ships of war; and yet, Great Britain, whose commerce we cherish, is the only nation that treats us in this manner. Perhaps it is conjectured that Americans are of that species of animals whose favor is increased by rough treatment. Be this as it may, it is our duty to consider of the safest and surest mode of extending our commerce. After we have been told that an American vessel having sailors on board, who chance to have been born in the British dominion, is subject to be deprived of her hands, robbed of her property, and turned adrift without help, it can hardly be necessary to adduce other arguments in favor of native American seamen; but other strong and conclusive arguments in favor of the measure present themselves. The merchants' property in critical situations, or in distant or obscure parts of the world, is always most safe when a ship is navigated by men who uniformly strive to return to their native home, and whose hopes and happiness centre in that country to which their ship belongs. The crew of a French brig some weeks ago, murdered their captain and mate on our coast; that misfortune, in all probability, would not have happened, if the seamen had been natives of France. Two of them only were of that kingdom. Is it necessary to add, that a powerful body of seamen, at some future day, may save us from the vast expense and danger of a standing army? Upon this single argument of native seamen we might rest the question. It needs neither support nor illustration. I shall, therefore, presume, that it is our duty as soon as possible, to provide for the daily operations of pride or injustice, by furnishing the merchant with seamen, of whom he cannot be robbed, except by open declaration of war--with seamen in whom he can trust--with men, who, actuated by those passions which are inseparable from the human breast, the pride of nation and the love of country, may serve him in every part of the world,--to furnish the nation with a safe and strong bulwark against foreign tyranny and invasion.

I shall now take the liberty of moving that committees may be appointed to bring in bills for the purposes mentioned.

Mr. WILLIAMSON, Mr. LAURANCE, Mr. GOODHUE, Mr. BENJAMIN BOURNE, and Mr. BARNWELL, were appointed to prepare and bring in the same.

THURSDAY, November 22.

Another member, to wit, JOHN MILLEDGE, returned to serve in this House for the State of Georgia in the room of ANTHONY WAYNE, whose seat was declared vacant, appeared, produced his credentials, and took his seat in the House.

WEDNESDAY, November 28.

Warner Mifflin's Petition.