Part 107

Mr. FINDLAY observed, that in addition to the constitutional objections urged, he had others on the ground of expediency. The country colleges and seminaries whose funds were small, had seldom or never an opportunity of importing books; they were happy to receive them in the country as donations, or by cheap editions; they would therefore receive no corresponding accommodation, and yet they were more useful and their use more universally felt than those called higher institutions, which claim to be exempted from paying impost. There are only a few of the well-endowed academies that can afford to procure foreign books, and when they have them, their circulation is extremely confined; to say nothing more, these reasons would engage me to support the resolution.

Mr. R. GRISWOLD.--The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. RANDOLPH) must have misunderstood me when he supposed I objected to the report because the committee had assigned no reason for the resolution: I mentioned the circumstance merely to show that we ought not then to decide. With respect to the constitutional objection he has set up, I acknowledge it is new to me. Such an inquiry may be of great weight, but it does not appear so to me. The paragraph quoted from the eighth section of the first article, “that Congress shall have power to levy and collect taxes,” has never struck me in the way it has that gentleman. The words are, “levy and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises;” but it drops the word taxes, it being settled in another part of the constitution, and declares that duties, imposts, and excises shall be uniform. The one speaks of direct taxes, the other of indirect--meaning that if an indirect tax is laid, it shall be uniform. No one State is to have an excise laid upon its inhabitants unless it extends to the citizens of every other: one part is not to be excised and another excused. This has always been the construction of that section of the constitution till the present moment, and I think it the true one. It is now said that Congress can only promote science and literature in one way. Why, have not Congress made grants of lands to promote those objects in the Western country? They have. I believe the power of Congress adequate to promote literature in the way applied for; and it has been frequently the case that, even after duties have been paid into the Treasury upon the uniform system, yet individuals have had those duties returned. I do not want to detain the House; but I am well persuaded that the constitution forms no impediment, and the expediency must be apparent.

Mr. J. CLAY said he was one of the committee, and had agreed to the report. Since reasons had been called for, he would in a few words assign those which influenced him. The gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. DANA) mistakes in thinking that a denial to exempt books from impost is a tax on literary institutions, and therefore not uniform, as the constitution requires all imposts should be; but he did not make his stand on the ground of the constitution--he rested the question upon its expediency. Giving literary institutions the privilege of exemption from imposts would open a wide door for fraud: we should soon have them importing books for sale duty free, rivalling the booksellers, who are subjected to the payment of impost, and vending them in every street and avenue of the nation. But why privilege colleges and universities to accommodate the rich; for we may believe that the rich, and the children of the rich, are the only persons who have access to these collections? The poor have little leisure and less opportunity to improve the advantage which even neighborhood would give them to peruse works of the kind alluded to; and sure it would be thought unjust to tax their pittance of imported articles, in order to enable gentlemen to read the classic authors, or the sublime and beautiful of the modern writers.

Mr. FINDLAY spoke of colleges, not of universities. We have three in Pennsylvania--one of them, to be sure, has also the title of university--but two of them have not funds to import books on their own account. It is only rich institutions that have this advantage: the poorer class of seminaries buy of booksellers, and pay them the impost as well as their retail profit. Indeed, this remission of duties will rather tend to create disgust than give satisfaction; and those seminaries which have large collections of books would be induced to sell them at their present price in order to procure new ones cheaper, as they have had to pay the duty on the former, but would have none to pay upon those they should hereafter import.

The question being called for, it was put on agreeing to the report of the Committee of the Whole, that it is inexpedient to remit the duty on books, and carried in the affirmative--seventy-nine members voting in the affirmative.

The House then adjourned.

WEDNESDAY, November 28.

Potomac River.

The House resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole on the bill authorizing the corporation of Georgetown to make a dam or causeway from Mason’s Island to the western shore of the river Potomac.

Mr. MACON (Speaker) moved to strike out the first section of the bill, with a view of trying its merits.

Mr. J. RANDOLPH seconded the motion of his respectable friend, (the Speaker.) The river Potomac was the joint property of the States of Maryland and Virginia under compact between those States. This property, at least on the part of Virginia, had never been relinquished. Congress, in his conception, had no right to pass the law in question; but if they had, there was another objection. The corporation of Georgetown were empowered to lay a tax which would be unequal and oppressive, since the property on which it was to be levied would not be equally benefited by deepening the harbor, supposing that effect to be accomplished. He hoped a prompt rejection of the bill would serve as a general notice to the inhabitants of the District to desist from their daily and frivolous applications to Congress, to the great obstruction of the public business.

Mr. SMILIE understood there was a rival interest between the towns of Alexandria and Georgetown, and as this rivalry had been exhibited on many former occasions, he deemed it proper, before they passed any bill for the encouragement of either place, that the parties should be obliged to publish their intentions some weeks before the application, that if there were any objections to the measure contemplated, they might be before the House at the same time. He stated this merely as a ground of postponement, not saying whether he was in favor or against the measure.

Mr. GREGG thought the House bound to legislate for these people, until they relinquished the claim to the jurisdiction, either by authorizing them to legislate for themselves, or retroceding them to the States to which they originally belonged. He approved of the idea of publishing, as expressed by his colleague, (Mr. SMILIE,) which he considered absolutely necessary. If Alexandria were opposed to the bill, it is probable they would have sent in a memorial on the subject before this time; their not having done so inclined him to believe that they were satisfied that the measure should go into operation. He did not think the bill perfect, but nevertheless he should not oppose its progress.

Mr. LEWIS said the landholders of Georgetown had very generally signed the petition to Congress. And no person out of the walls of this House gave it opposition. The people of Alexandria were content, and the owner of the island and the west shore of the river was the person most likely to be affected, yet he had given it his hearty assent. He was well persuaded that no injury would be done to the navigation of the Eastern branch, or to the port of Alexandria; if, therefore, they could render a benefit to Georgetown, without injuring any other property, he trusted the House would agree to the bill.

Mr. SLOAN felt interested in the result of this measure. The people here have nobody to look to but Congress to make legislative provision for their well-being; he therefore considered it a duty to attend to their desires; but he wished the applicants to give notice of their intentions, in order that any person conceiving himself likely to be aggrieved should have an opportunity of being heard. This was the usual course pursued in the State where he resided.

Mr. CLAIBORNE was by no means satisfied that the removal of the mud bank would do no injury to the Eastern branch and to Alexandria.

Mr. NELSON said that on a question so important to the upper parts of Maryland and Virginia, he could not refrain from stating some reasons in favor of the measure, and against the motion of the Speaker, which was intended to destroy the bill. It had been urged that the sediment which now obstructed the navigation to Georgetown, if set afloat by increasing the current and volume of water across it, would impede the navigation of the Eastern branch or fill up the harbor of Alexandria. Those who would take a view of the Eastern branch would be convinced it could make no deposit there, it being intercepted or turned aside by the point which projected into the Potomac; and as the water of the Eastern branch was more rapid than the Potomac, the breadth of the latter being much wider than the former, there certainly was no danger to be apprehended in that quarter. As to Alexandria, it was not to be supposed that the solid mass of sediment was to be taken off the bar at once and lodged in that harbor; the probability was, it would remove gradually and deposit at the eddy on each side of the river, while the union of the Eastern branch with the Potomac would increase the celerity of the current and carry it far below Alexandria.

The compact mentioned by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. RANDOLPH) between the States of Maryland and Virginia, he acknowledged to exist; but as the measure contemplated the improvement of the navigation of the Potomac, instead of obstructing it, the right of each State to the free navigation thereof remained unimpaired. He imagined that the inhabitants of Alexandria and the citizens of Virginia wished success to the measure. He knew his constituents had it much at heart, knowing that a choice of markets is a great accommodation to farmers; and if defeated, it would be as much to their advantage to bring their produce to a shipping port at once by land, as to use the canal recently constructed at such prodigious expense, having afterwards to go with their produce to Alexandria by land.

Mr. SMILIE should not be against the bill, if upon full and fair inquiry it was found proper to pass it. But he could not agree to be hurried along without allowing time to acquire information. He therefore moved that the committee rise and report progress.

Mr. MACON (Speaker) opposed the rising of the committee, because it was leaving the business exactly where it stood, unless it was meant to recommit it to a select committee for modification. But as he was determined to vote against it in any and every shape, he was prepared to decide now. As to the mode he had taken to come at his object, he should only say it was a fair one, and such as had been the uniform practice of the House since he had a seat in it.

The gentlemen in favor of this dam or causeway, say it will do no harm; but where is the demonstration? On the other side, serious apprehensions are entertained of its injurious effects upon the United States navy yard in the Eastern branch, and its causing obstructions in the harbor of Alexandria. He would assure the committee he was ready to promote the welfare of any of the citizens; but it must in justice be done, without injuring any other portion whatever.

At the last session, an application was made for a permanent bridge across the Potomac, with a draw for the passage of vessels; the petitioner urged the general utility of the measure to all persons travelling North or South, but particularly the vast benefit accruing to the inhabitants of the district, by affording a solid and secure means of intercourse between its several parts. This measure was opposed by the present petitioners, on the ground of the compact between Maryland and Virginia securing the right of free navigation to the river, and also alleging that their navigation to Georgetown would be impeded. The argument which they applied then, now applies against them, and it ought, in the minds of the same legislators, to apply with equal success.

Mr. FINDLAY was rather in favor of the bill, believing the mode proposed would be successful in deepening the channel, which would certainly improve the navigation to and from Georgetown, and in that object the citizens of some of the western counties of Pennsylvania were materially interested; several of their boatable creeks nearly interlocking with those of the Potomac. He would, however, agree to the committee rising, with a view to postpone the bill, until gentlemen acquired the information they asked for.

Mr. GODDARD hoped the committee would rise, and the subject be postponed until sufficient light was obtained to guide their votes to a proper decision. He also hoped that no member might be considered as the friend or the foe of the present bill, until he became such by an examination into its merits or demerits. He narrated the course the business had taken since its introduction into this House, and inferred that the same deliberate mode ought to be pursued to the end. Whether the measure was good or evil could only be determined in that way, and gentlemen ought not to object to doing positive good, unless it was demonstrated that positive evil would result to counterbalance the good that was intended. He conceived the members ought to inquire for themselves on this point, and legislate accordingly. He would on all occasions endeavor to promote the interests of the district; and as it had no immediate representative on the floor, he considered every representative bound to serve them, while the seat of Government remained among them.

Mr. G. W. CAMPBELL would not declare whether he should vote for the final passage of the bill or not. But he was disposed to take notice of the applications made from time to time by the inhabitants of the district; whether to redress grievances, or procure benefits. But he by no means approved of the principles of legislation without representation. He regretted that they were placed in this unfortunate situation; but he should decide on the present question according to its merits; and if it was found to be of great consequence to the petitioners, and not likely to work an injury to others, he presumed the bill would finally pass. But he wished the committee to rise, in order to give further time to obtain information. It had been alleged that the friends of the measure ought to demonstrate that the erection of a causeway would do no injury to any one. This was not a fair position; it was requiring them to prove a negative. The burden of proof should lie on those who oppose the bill, and it was for them to demonstrate that injury would result. The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. J. RANDOLPH) has stated that the boats from the western country have a choice of passing by the western or eastern channel to the market below Georgetown, and this, it is presumed, he means they should be still entitled to under the compact between Maryland and Virginia. Let us hear from those persons also, and then ascertain whether they have any objection to the project on that account. This was also an argument in favor of the rising of the committee, and perhaps it may be added, that a little delay will enable the House so to modify the bill as to render it less exceptionable than at present.

Mr. SOUTHARD had not considered this subject of much consequence in the outset, but he found that its importance increased as it toiled along. He thought this morning it would have occupied but a short portion of their time; in that he found himself deceived; and he believed he was not singular in these opinions. He suspected many other members were in the same predicament. He therefore would vote for the committee’s rising. That navigable waters are considered as highways, is a matter of great notoriety; but he did not know that to deepen a channel, by contracting its surface, was considered as obstructing the free navigation of a river, nor could he conceive that the body of sediment meant to be removed, would descend en masse and deposit itself at the confluence of the next stream it met. On the contrary, he imagined it would be separated by the force of the current giving it action into millions of particles, some of which would settle promiscuously on either side, while a part would ultimately be deposited in the ocean.

The committee hereupon rose and reported progress, and asked leave to sit again. On the question, Shall the committee have leave to sit again?

Mr. J. RANDOLPH requested that the act of cession by Virginia might be read, by which it would clearly appear that she had not ceded, or intended to cede to the United States any right acquired under her compact with Maryland. [The act was read.]