want of papers, which have now been laid upon the table from the Treasury Department. At the close of the last session, a resolution was passed through the Senate, upon my motion, asking for a large body of information on this subject, through the Treasury Department. That has come in this morning, and a bill will, therefore, be reported at an early day. But, still, I do not propose to throw any obstacle in the way of the object and the wishes of my friend from Arkansas. I am willing his bill should take its course; but if that bill which the committee will report passes, this bill will be superseded. Mr. BORLAND. I ask that the bill may be passed over informally. The bill was accordingly passed over informally. THE UNITED STATES BRIG WASHINGTON. The bill for the relief of the widows and rela tives of certain officers and seamen of the United States brig Washington, who were lost overboard in a hurricane, was considered as in Committee of the Whole, and having been amended verbally, it was reported to the Senate, and ordered to be engrossed for a third reading. BINDING CONGRESSIONAL DOCUMENTS. The joint resolution providing for the binding of certain documents, was next considered as in Committee of the Whole. It provides that all the executive documents of which additional copies have been ordered to be printed, which shall not contain less than two hundred and fifty pages, shall be bound, under the direction of the Joint Committee on Printing, provided that the cost thereof shall not exceed twelve and a half cents per volume. Mr. BORLAND. As chairman of the Committee on Printing, I will state that this is a joint resolution which came from the House of Representatives, and was referred to the Committee on Printing of the Senate, and was favorably reported upon. When this resolution was before the Senate on a former occasion, I made some remarks in opposition to its adoption, and I shall not, therefore, now go at length into the reasons why I am opposed to it. I will simply state, that as I opposed the measure then, so I shall vote against it now, because I think it is adding to the list of opportunities occasioning invitations to commit impositions on the Government. The binding of our documents for the last session has satisfied me with the system; and although in some respects there may be an advantage in it, I think it is, upon the whole, a great evil. I think that, instead of the documents being benefited by the binding, they have in a large number of instances been materially injured. So far at least as some of them which went to my State would go to prove this position, I am satisfied. I examined some of those which went there, and found that when they had reached their destination the binding was not worth anything. Nay, that it was worse than useless, for it had put these documents in a condition which prevented them from being bound again. I am opposed to this plan of binding, as I am opposed to everything in the way of either printing or binding being done on contract. My opinion is, that everything which we undertake to do under that system will be badly done--that it will result in much more expense and much less advantage to the country than by almost any other system. I have expressed these sentiments on a former occasion, and I have now no more to say. Mr. BRADBURY. I did not hear the resolution read, but I think that whatever is deserving of being placed in the library is deserving of being bound. I think the great fault is, that we print too large numbers of documents which are not of sufficient general interest to compensate for the outlay. It certainly is convenient when we have documents to use, to have them in a position in which we can use them. As the expense of binding is not great, I am under the impression that what we print in considerable numbers should be bound. Mr. BORLAND. We now print fourteen hundred copies of all documents that are ordered to be printed, for the Library and for the use of the SenBut the proposition in this joint resolution is to bind the extra copies which go out into the country. Now, if the Senator from Maine will look into this question of binding public documents, and will view it with regard to the economical course which he usually pursues, I think ate. he will be inclined to favor my side of the question. Does any Senator know what was the cost of binding documents last session? Mr. HALE. No. Mr. BORLAND. Why, sir, it cannot have fallen short of a hundred thousand dollars. The binding of the Patent Office reports alone cost fifty thousand dollars; and for the binding of the documents of this Congress, if we adopt this resolution, my opinion is we will have to pay a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. A SENATOR. No, no; not so much as that. Mr. HALE. My observation leads me to differ with the Senator from Arkansas in regard to this resolution. I think that if there be any value in these documents at all, at least to the people to whom they are sent in the country, it is in the binding. Now, if it is worth while to print these documents to send to our friends, it is certainly worth while to put upon them this ninepenny binding; for instead of tearing them up, as they would inevitably do if they were not bound, they allow them a place on the shelves of their libraries, there to remain, sir, like many of our documents here, never to be opened and read again. I am quite of opinion, therefore, Mr. President, that if these public documents have any value at all at least many of them-it is in the binding; and if we are to dispense with anything here, I would rather that we dispensed with the printing and kept the binding. [A laugh.] Mr. BRADBURY. 1 would like to inquire of the chairman of the Committee on Printing whether the order for printing the documents of the present session has already been so far executed as to render it impossible to reduce the number? The abuse seems to be in the manufacturing of so large a number of books. Formerly the Patent Office report was but a small volume; but recently, by the incorporation of much useless matter, it has swelled to two volumes; and I think that, in the first place, the abuse is in incorporating what is not of value; and in the second place, in printing so large a number of copies. I quite agree with the Senator from New Hampshire, [Mr. HALE,] that one thing, at least, which gives value to these documents is their being bound, and thus be put in a position in which they can be used and referred to. And the same reasons which would induce me to bind them for ourselves, would induce me to bind those which are intended for distribution elsewhere. Otherwise, they become as mere waste paper, and might as well not be circulated at all. Mr. HAMLIN. I was one of the Committee on Printing who agreed to this report, and therefore it becomes me, perhaps, to say a word. 1 have very little, indeed I have no feeling on this subject whatever. I am perfectly indifferent. Still, upon the investigation of the subject, I came to the conclusion that if our documents were worth preserving and sending abroad, they were worth a cheap binding. I will add, also, that I am satisfied that for twelve and a half cents per copy, the price we paid last year, binding may be had in muslin, which is a very respectable binding indeed, and makes a very respectable vol ume. If Senators will turn their attention or their recollection to the Debates on the California Convention, the Statistics of Commerce and Navigation, or still later works, the Surveys of New Mexico and Texas, all bound in muslin, they will have a fair sample of what can be done in the way of binding in muslin for twelve and a half cents per copy; and for that sum these documents can be placed in a situation in which they can be preserved. I must say that I think some of these documents are of a little more value than the Senator from New Hampshire seems to suppose. I think the agricultural report of the Patent Office is worth preserving, and in this cheap binding it will be preserved. The binding of these documents at twelve and a half cents per copy will not amount to half the sum named by the Senator from Arkansas, and it will fully accomplish the the object which is desired. Besides, I am told that if we do not pass the resolution, the House of Representatives will recommend the passage of a resolution of a similar character, and have the expense defrayed out of their own contingent fund. I think, therefore, it will be a matter of economy to have these documents containing three hundred pages bound in muslin; which can be done so cheaply and so neatly. | Mr. BRADBURY. I observe there is a limitation of the size of the volume. Last year it was ordered to bind such volumes as contained not less than three hundred pages. The bill before us limits the number of pages to two hundred and fifty. I move to strike out the words "two hundred and fifty," and insert the words "three hundred." Mr. HALE. I object. Mr. CLARKE. I hope not. Mr. BADGER. I hope that amendment will not prevail. I would much rather see the fifty struck out and leave the words "two hundred." I cannot understand why a document of two hundred pages should not be bound. I think anything beyond the size of a pamphlet should be bound. I hope the amendment will not prevail. The amendment was not adopted. The joint resolution was then reported to the Senate, and read a third time, and passed. SELECTION OF LANDS BY ILLINOIS. The Senate then proceeded, as in Committee of the Whole, to the consideration of a "Bill to authorize the State of Illinois to select the residue of the lands to which she is entitled under the act of 2d March, 1827, granting land to aid that State in opening a canal to connect the waters of the Illinois river with those of Lake Michigan." Mr. HUNTER. I would like to have that bill passed over. Mr. DOUGLAS. Would the Senator from Virginia like an explanation of the bill? Mr. HUNTER. I should be glad to have it explained. Mr. DOUGLAS. In 1827, the Congress of the United States passed an act granting to the State of Illinois a certain amount of alternate sections of land, for the purpose of constructing a canal to connect the waters of the Illinois river and those of Lake Michigan. The grant was made, under supposition that the land would be sufficient to construct the canal. A corps of engineers, walking over it, decided that it would require the sum of six hundred thousand dollars to make the canal. We accepted the grant with the idea of making the canal out of these lands. We commenced the work on that supposition, and went on and expended a large sum of money. The next estimate was, that a million and a half dollars would be required; but before we got through there was another estimate of three millions, and at last we made out the whole expenditure to be nine millions, and the canal is now finished. selecting the lands there was an omission to select a small quantity, which was therefore left, and has been sold by the Government. The Department acknowledges that we are entitled to some twenty thousand acres more. It is a small amount, and this is simply to authorize the State to select what we were entitled to under the original grant. The State does not ask any more on account of the greater expense than the original amount estimated. On Mr. HUNTER. I would inquire if the bill allows the selection to be made in any part of the State, or whether it is to be confined to the vicinity of the canal? Mr. DOUGLAS. The lands were originally upon the borders of the canal, but the Government of the United States has sold a portion of the land to which we were entitled along the line of the canal. It must now be selected elsewhere, so much as is necessary to make up the small deficiency that I have stated. Mr. DAWSON. I would ask if the lands were not sold prior to the grant made to the State? Mr. DOUGLAS. Not at all. Every acre has been sold since, and we now do not wish to disturb the title which has been made erroneously out of the grant made to us. It is on this account that we ask the privilege of selecting elsewhere. The bill was then reported to the Senate without amendment, and ordered to be engrossed for a third reading. RAILROADS IN IOWA. The Senate next proceeded, as in Committee of the Whole, to consider the bill granting the right of way and making a grant of land to the State of Iowa, in aid of the construction of certain railroads in said State. The bill was reported with an amendment. The amendment proposed to strike out all after the enacting clause, and insert a number of pro visions which have been prepared as a model bill in relation to all grants of land for the construcLion of railways. Mr. HUNTER. I would like to know from the Senator who introduced this bill, how much land it proposes to appropriate for the construction of these roads. Mr. DODGE, of Iowa. I will state, for the satisfaction of the Senator from Virginia, that, according to the estimate last year, the principal road and the branch which it is proposed to make will require fifteen hundred thousand acres as a minimum, and eighteen hundred thousand as a maximum. This amount is some three or four or five hundred thousand acres less than were granted to the State of Illinois by a like bill. The Committee on Public Lands have sought to make this bill a model bill, and have shaped all the others which are to follow it for grants of land for like purposes in other States after this model, which I trust the Senate will pass. It was carefully examined and revised by the Senator from Kentucky, [Mr. UNDERWOOD.] Several amendments were introduced into it by him, and it comes now to the Senate under the unanimous sanction of the Committee on Public Lands. I will state to my friend from Virginia, as I know that he sits heavily upon the public chest and dislikes to part with its dollars, that there is a provision in this bill enacting that the alternate sections of land which are not used for the construction of the rail- || road shall not be sold at a less price than two dollars and fifty cents per acre; so that when you take out this fifteen or eighteen hundred thousand acres, you will impose a tax upon our people who may purchase and settle on the land of double its present value. The bill therefore, in reality, grants very little to the State; and I hope it may be passed without opposition from my friend from Virginia. Mr. HUNTER. I do not think that we ought | to tax the constituents of the Senator from lowa, so as to make them pay $2.50 per acre for lands for which they ought not to pay more than $1 25; and if the bill is to operate in that way, I think it would be much better to lay it over for the present. It seems that there are to be many other applications of a like nature; and, before we know it, we shall probably grant away all that portion of the public lands in detail from which we are likely to derive any revenue. I believe that if this thing is to come up, it should come up as a system, so that we may see what we are doing. I hope that the bill may be postponed till another day. Mr. JONES, of Iowa. I hope the Senate will not determine to postpone this bill. It is exactly the same which passed last session, and one precisely similar has been passed this session, making a grant of land to the State of Mississippi. The title of the bill is wrong. The bill, in reality, makes no grant to the State as a gratuity. It authorizes the State to select alternate sections of six miles on each side of the road, but as the price of the remaining land is double, it is, in point of fact, no donation to the State, because the road will by that much enhance the value of the land. The only grant given to the State, is the right of way through the public land. If this bill, and others of the same kind, are put off, the lands through which these roads are to be located will be taken up by those who hold bounty land warrants. Most of the lands in the range of these railroads are already taken up, and it is therefore necessary, if any real benefit is to be derived from the passage of these bills, that they should be passed as speedily as possible. If these lands should be taken up by land warrants, the Government of the United States will not realize for them more than seventy-five cents per acre. the other hand, if they are granted for the construction of railroads, the Government will receive the full price for all the lands. But, sir, in addition to all this, the lands adjacent to these roads, not only for fifteen miles, but even for thirty or forty miles, will thus be brought into market, and will be sold many years sooner than they would otherwise be were it not for the building of these roads. I again say, that I trust the gentleman from Virginia will not insist upon this postponement, inasmuch as this identical bill has been before the Senate for the last eighteen months. The session before last it was introduced by myself, and it has now been upon our table for one or two On years. The amendments which are proposed are merely verbal, and do not materially affect the provisions of the bill. The bill is exactly the same as those granting lands to the States of Illinois and Mississippi. Mr. ATCHISON. There is another odious condition attached to this bill. The General Government, as the Senator from Iowa [Mr. JONES] shows, grants nothing-it gives nothing. But,|| sir, this bill provides-and I suppose it is to be a model bill, whose provisions are to be extended to several other cases-that upon these railroads the Government stores and the Government troops shall be transported free of charge. Mr. BRODHEAD. Will that be onerous? Mr. ATCHISON. Yes, it will be peculiarly onerous to the State of Missouri and the State of Iowa. From the Mississippi to the Missouri river across the State of Iowa, perhaps one third of all the Government stores en route to California and New Mexico will be transported upon this road and upon the Missouri road exclusively. Now, sir, I intend to test the Senate upon this question. I shall move to strike out that section. I do not consider it any great favor. It is nothing more, so far as pecuniary considerations are involved, than a grant of the right of way to construct these railroads through the public lands. This is about all that there is of it. The alternate sections we get thus: No. 1 is free; and for No. 2 is charged $2.50 per acre, instead of $1 25 as now. But there is another consideration. We have passed a bill making land warrants assignable. I do not recollect now the amount of public lands that will necessarily be taken up by these land warrants. Will the chairman of the Committee on Public Lands tell me the quantity of the public lands that will satisfy these land warrants? I think they cannot fall much short of thirty-five or fifty millions of acres. And who obtains these public lands? Why, sir, almost exclusively, or in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, they will go to the citizens of the old States of this Union, under that law. Now, when we ask in reality nothing but the right of way through the public lands, the Senator from Virginia, the chairman of the Commitee on Finance, whose duty it is to take charge of the public treasure-and I admit that I suppose it is in the discharge of that duty-opposes this bill. But I hope he will not be able to obstruct the passage of this the first bill. It is but slightly altered from the bills which have passed time after time through this body. If I am not mistaken, this bill passed here at the last session. Then why deliberate? Why move to postpone it? It has been discussed for the last ten years. I understand that the Senator from Virginia made the motion to postpone the further consideration of this bill, with a view to have an opportunity to look into it, and examine the principles involved in it. There is nothing new in it. This very bill, or a bill involving most of its principles, if not all of them, has been discussed time and again. I trust the Senate will act upon this bill, and promptly too. It is a matter of importance, if you make this grant of land, or this donation, as some gentlemen call it, that you should make it speedily; because, as the Senator from Iowa [Mr. JONES] suggested, these land warrants will fall into the hands of speculators, and they will, as a matter of course, search out the public lands which will be most valuable, upon which the greatest profits can be made, and there they will go and locate their warrants upon all the proposed railroad routes in the State of Missouri. Such has been the fact. We have two routes, one from St. Louis to the western boundary of the State, on the south side of the Missouri river; and another from the town of Hannibal to the town of St. Joseph, on the north side of the Missouri river. During the last year, $100,000 was received in the different land offices on the north side of the Missouri river, mainly upon the line of this northern railroad. Now, sir, these land warrants being made assignable, hundreds of thousands of them, or thousands at least, will fall into the hands of speculators, and the first lands that will be selected under these land warrants, will be the lands upon the borders of the railroads in the State. Then it is important that these bills should be promptly passed, that these alternate sections should be granted to the railroads, and thus taken out of the clutches of the speculators. I have ex amined, and I learn from the Commissioner of the General Land Office, that a hundred thousand dollars more money was received from the offices on the north side of the Missouri river last year, than for any one year during the last ten years. I trust, if the Senate intend to pass these bills at all, they will do it promptly. Mr. DAVIS. I understand the Senator from Iowa [Mr. DODGE] to say that this was a model bill, and the Senator from Missouri [Mr. AтCHIsoN] to repeat it. Mr. ATCHISON. I so understood it. Mr. DAVIS. It is a bill, then, which is to be our guide in all these matters. That is one good reason why it should be made right. I rise for the purpose of putting the inquiry to some gentleman who is able to inform me, whether I am right in understanding, that in laying out the road the State is authorized to lay one hundred feet on each side of the track-making the road two hundred feet wide. Mr. JONES, of Iowa. That is so. Mr. DAVIS. The Senator from lowa answers that it is so. Then let us look a little at the effect of it, and see what may come out of it. Two hundred feet, all experience shows, is quite unnecessary for a track. I believe that a width of eighty feet is all that is esteemed necessary for a railroad, unless where there is some cut, or embankment, or something of that sort, in which case more land is required. For all the purposes of a track-even for a double one-as far as our experience goes, eighty feet is deemed ample. Then, according to the bill, in front of the lands granted to the State, and in front of the lands owned by the United States, there will be a tract of land in the private ownership of this road. If the State makes the road, it will own it, and will have a strip of land included within the track in front of the land of the United States, disposable for other purposes. If the State disposes of the right to make the road, as I believe Illinois has done, to certain companies, the companies will own the land. If they have a right to locate two hundred feet, they will own land in front of the lands of the State and in front of the lands of the United States. Will not that be the result of the bill? It seems to me that the grant should be limited to at least so much land as is necessary for the road. It should not go beyond that, unless you mean to lead yourselve into the difficulty I have pointed out. tract of two hundred feet is not necessary. There may be places where it will be necessary, but they will only occur occasionally. I think the passage of the bill will lead to some embarrassment. I throw out these remarks for the consideration of Α gentlemen, if we are to pass a bill which is to be our guide hereafter. Mr. SMITH. The Senator from Massachusetts mistakes the provision of the bill. It does not grant the land, two hundred feet wide, to the State of Iowa, throughout the entire length of the road, but merely grants the right of way. The title to the land is not vested in the State, it is the mere right of way-the incorporeal right of way. It does not grant the right to the land itself; but it gives the State the privilege of making the road over this breadth of land-two hundred feet-for the whole length of the road, so that the road might be shifted, as might be necessary, within this range of two hundred feet. The right of way enjoyed will be the mere breadth of the track and so much of the adjoining land as may be necessary to occupy for an embankment, or excavation, or anything of that sort. In this particular, I believe the bill conforms to the bill passed in favor of the State of Illinois, and to other bills which we have passed. We passed several, I do not know how many, at the last session of Congress. I was then a member of the Committee on Public Lands, and concurred with the majority of the committeewhich I think was unanimous on this subject-in reporting all these bills to the Senate. I apprehend, therefore, that there is no difficulty in regard to this matter. It is a mere grant of the right of way-an incorporeal right invested in the State. After what has been the decision of the Senate on this subject for several years past, certainly at both sessions of the last Congress, and I believe at preceding sessions-after there had been a most emphatic and distinct expression of opinion by a very large majority of this body in favor of this policy, I did not suppose that I would have occasion to address the Senate on the subject. But I say now, as I have said before, that both as a member of the House of Representatives and as a member of this body, I have never given any votes with more satisfaction than those which I have given to accord to the new States of this Union that sort of coöperation and assistance which is comprised in bills of this character, by which we do not surrender one dollar from the public Treasury, for we obtain an equivalent by these concessions in the enhanced price of the reserved lands. When I give such votes, I believe that I am not only advancing the prosperity of the new States of the Union, but that I am contributing to the prosperity of the whole country. Every appropriation of this character which is made, conduces not only to build up the West and the East, the Atlantic States and the middle States, but moreover to enhance the resources of the Government itself; for my honorable friend from Virginia [Mr. HUNTER] knows very well that the resources of the Government do not depend upon the amount we actually collect into the Treasury, upon the dollars and cents we bring to the public coffers, but upon the ability of the people of the country to submit to taxation. Now we have the hour of prosperity. Now the taxes laid on the people are light. But the hour may come when we shall be involved in war, when the condition of the country will be such that we shall have to call upon the people to go to the full extent of their ability in supporting taxation to meet the exigencies of the country and of the Government. Sir, in opening these railroads, we not only provide for facilitating the transportation of the mail, and of troops and munitions of war, but we enhance the wealth of the country, and we increase its population and its tax paying capacity, and therefore place ourselves in a condition to meet any exigencies in which the country and the Government may be involved, particularly on the occasion of war, which I trust is very remote. and appropriated to objects of this character, it I did not intend to address the Senate on this to the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, and on which question the gen tleman from Indiana [Mr. FITCH] is entitled to the floor. Mr. FITCH. I have been requested to yield the floor for the purpose of going into Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union, to take up the Mexican indemnity bill. But after the character of the debate of yesterday, no benefit would result from my doing so; though, if I supposed debate would be closed upon that bill, and it could be disposed of to-day, I should yield willingly. Mr. DAVIS. I do not rise for the purpose of entering into any discussion of the merits of this bill. I understood this to be a bill intended to Mr. Speaker, upon the bill now under considerserve as a guide hereafter, and to be followed in ation, which was reported by my colleague, [Mr. other cases; it therefore seemed me that it DUNHAM,] I desire to say but a few words. Inshould be properly considered, and that its pro-deed, the objections which I entertain to that bill visions should be such as should be satisfactory. have been so ably urged by others as to preclude In answer to my objection that two hundred feet the necessity of saying much more. The bill is an unnecessary quantity, and may prove an purports to be an act amendatory of an act grantembarrassment, the Senator from Connecticut ing bounty lands to certain officers and soldiers says, it is an incorporeal right-that the grant is engaged in the military service of the United really nothing but a grant of the right of way-of States, and for other purposes. the right of having a track. Now, let me ask the gentleman, whether the easement granted does not extend to one portion of the two hundred feet as much as to another? and if the coterminous proprietors of lands are not precluded from the enjoyment of any part of these two hundred feet? If, for example, the land of a gentleman is one hundred feet from this road, is he not required to erect all his buildings and improvements at that distance, although his lands come within one hundred feet of the track? Let me say to the Senator, that this will be found to be very inconvenient, both to the proprietors of the lands and to the proprietors of the road. My own impression is, that it embarrasses all parties; and that is the precise thing which I wish gentlemen most interested in the bill to consider. I wish them to look at it and see whether, instead of this being a useful provision, it does not embarrass everybody. So far as my observations have extended, people who have lands coterminous with a railroad, are desirous of bringing their places of business as near to the track as they can. They desire to enjoy the road with as little expense and inconvenience as possible. If a man was about to build a place of business, the last idea that would enter his head would be to place it one hundred feet from the track of the road, if he wished to avail himself of its advantages. I think the provision is attended with inconvenience everywhere; but it is manifest that the easement goes to the whole two hundred feet. As it extends to the whole two hundred feet, it precludes persons having lands adjoining the road from enjoying the benefit of the road without great inconvenience. I confess, sir, that I am astonished upon reading this bill that it should have emanated from the source from whence it came, for I believe that of all the members upon this floor the chairman of the committee [Mr. DUNHAM] who reported it is usually the last gentleman who could be charged with inaccuracies in the business which falls under his charge. He is, perhaps, ordinarily,. as correct in legislative matters as any other gentleman here. This bill, however, notwithstanding his general accuracy, is a very crude and imperfect one, a fact of which my colleague [Mr. DUNHAM] is doubtless as well satisfied now as any one else. The proof of this crudeness and imperfection may be found in the bill itself, and in the remarks of the chairman when he introduced it. After hearing the debate of Thursday, and in view of the diversity of opinion developed by that debate in the committee from which the bill came, it is a matter of surprise that any bill could be reported from it: and if any, certainly we could expect none other than one of the mongrel character of this. I will not dwell on this subject. I shall vote with cheerfulness for this bill. The only doubt I have in regard to this entire matter is, as to whether the country is not running too fast in constructing railroads, whether there is not some danger of our embarking more capital in this sort of enterprise than the country can afford, and whether there is not some danger of involving ourselves in a railroad convulsion similar to that which occurred in England a few years since. If I have any hesitation whatever in regard to these appropriations, it is based on this consideration. I should much have preferred that my friends from Iowa should have consented to take the appropriation for one of these railroads at the present session and postpone that for the other railroad until a future day. But there is a great deal of propriety in the remark of my friend, that so far as one of the railroads is concerned, that from Keokuck to Dubuque, there is danger that the lands will be exhausted and taken up by the bill which we have passed making land warrants assignable, to which, by the way, was utterly opposed. With regard to the other railroad, extending entirely across the State to Council Bluffs, it is very well known that it passes over a very large portion of the State not now in course of settlement. I should have preferred it, then, if my honorable friends had consented to take an appropriation for one railroad, as I apprehend that the finances and business of the country may be exposed to some danger of a revulsion by reason of over-action and over-expenditure in this business of building railroads. But I am for the general policy, and shall vote cheerfully for this bill, and for all other bills of this character, unless I am restrained by the single consideration to which I have referred. I am opposed to the miserable practice of giving away the public lands. I am for holding them in our hands, and dispensing them for great and beneficent objects of national importance. With them I am for building rail-by the Chaplain, Rev. Mr. MORGAN. roads and canals, and for endowing seminaries; but I am not for dissipating them in the deplorable manner we did when we passed the bill giving bounty lands to I know not how many, perhaps to one half of the country. By that act there were a great many millions of dollars in a very great degree thrown away, and yet after you have given them the recipients come here and tell you that the gift is not worth accepting unless they can have the privilege of taking the warrants into the market and selling them for a mere song. If that immense amount in the aggregate could have been reserved I hope gentlemen do not suppose that I have risen for the purpose of interposing any captious objection to this measure, or for the purpose of embarrassing it in any way. I think that that portion of the bill to which I have drawn attention should be examined, in order that it may be ascertained whether it will or will not be attended with inconvenience. Besides, I do not understand that there is any provision in the bill, limiting the time within which this road is to be commenced. Mr. JONES, of Iowa. Yes, sir; it is limited to ten years. Mr. DAVIS. In order that we may have an opportunity of looking into the details of this bill, as it is to be made a model bill, I move that the Senate adjourn. The motion was agreed to, and the Senate adjourned. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. ASSIGNABILITY OF LAND WARRANTS. The SPEAKER. The first business in order is the consideration of the joint resolution No. 1, heretofore reported from the select committee, to which the same was referred, with an amendment explanatory of the act of 1850 granting to certain officers and soldiers bounty land, &c.; the pending question being on the motion submitted by the gentleman from Indiana, [Mr. DUNHAM,] to commit the said joint resolution and pending amendments The first section of the bill, as it stands, is highly objectionable. These objections may be obviated in part by the amendment which the chairman himself proposes-an amendment which he so singularly explained on Thursday, by assailing other members of the committee. But whether that section be so modified as to obviate its objectionable features or not, I consider its passage totally unnecessary. We have already passed, in this House, a bill making these warrants assignable. That bill is probably before this time engrossed, with amendments, in the other end of the Capitol, and will soon become a law. The chairman of the committee, [Mr. DUNHAM,] when he introduced the bill, advocated this first section as it is. But when he introduced the amendment, he, by implication, opposed it in its present shape, by advocating that amendment. Mr. DUNHAM. The gentleman is mistaken. I did not advocate that section when I introduced it. I only explained it. Mr. FITCH. Does the gentleman desire that Mr. FITCH. Perhaps my colleague's advocacy of that section was that of a lawyer in court, who feels it his duty to make the best of the case for his client; entertaining certain mental reservations, however-private opinions as to the moral character and guilt of that client, which he does not see proper to express to the jury. The gentleman says he opposed that section when he introduced the bill., In this he is mis taken. He did oppose it when he introduced the amendment, and thus eat his own words-his own previous argument. I shall therefore pay no further attention to his argument in favor of this section. I will leave that Janus-faced argument to neutralize itself. The second section of the bill provides for compensating registers and receivers of land offices for the location of bounty land warrants. This is, in my opinion, the most important section in the bill, considering the fact that we have already passed a bill making land warrants assignable.. It recognizes the justice and necessity of paying those officers, in some manner, for the labor and trouble of locating these warrants. So far it is right and proper, but is a mere mockery, in the manner and extent to which it proposes to compensate them. I must here briefly call the attention of my colleague [Mr. DUNHAM] to a portion of his own remarks in relation to this section of the bill, and upon which I shall take the liberty to comment as I proceed. "It may be possible," he says, "that in some of the offices, labor has been done for which their fees and salaries have not been an adequate compensation." Not only is that possible, Mr. Speaker, but, as my colleague well knows, it is an absolute certainty, because the records of the returns of those officers, found in the office of the Commissioner of the General Land Office, prove to a demonstration that the money which many of these officers have received is not sufficient to afford any compensation whatsoever for the trouble necessarily attendant upon these locations. It amounts to very little above their salary; and that salary, as we all know, will not feed and maintain themselves, independent of the support of their families. He says, "If their case is meritorious, undoubtedly the Congress of the United States will be disposed to grant relief. And further, that "they are left in the same situation as private claims." He thus would leave these officers, in each in part will receive a coloring from his own peculiar My friend [Mr. DUNHAM] proceeds to remark, one. This may be true; yet fifty cents is no compensation for locating in either case, when the average amount of trouble and extra duty at many of the offices in making the locations is taken into consideration. The labor in fact is quadruple that of the ordinary cash sales of land; and the per cent. which such sales would give is certainly small enough compensation for that trouble-small || enough to suit even the professed rigid economy of the gentleman himself. I may as well anticipate an argument which the gentleman will doubtless use. He will allege that all the labor and trouble in these cases are confined to the register, and that the receiver is not legitimately entitled to any compensation. The But this is very far from being the case. dividual case, to present an application to this receiver's signature will be found attached three House for relief in the premises; an application times to the papers in each case. This, of which, of course, like all other applications for course, presupposes an examination of the papers similar purposes, must be referred to the Commit- to which his signature is affixed. He is comtee of Claims; and it is well known what is gener-pelled, moreover, to sign the monthly abstract ally the fate of these applications. It is such, that no gentleman can desire to multiply them. They remain here generation after generation; in some instances without any report being made upon them, and in others with favorable reports, which are not acted upon. He proceeds, at the same time, to state that "they have, in many instances, received almost the maximum which the law allows them to receive, without any payment whatever for the location of land warrants." But, in truth, they have not received near that amount. I do not know from what source the chairman derived the information with which he thus edified the House; but certain it is, that during the five years from 1847 to 1851, both inclusive, if the percentage of all the different offices had been equally divided, it would not have given these officers, including their salary, over $1,000 per annum. But bear in mind, this percentage was very unequally divided. Perhaps two or three offices in the State of Indiana approached nearer the maximum than any others. In fact, it is altogether probable, one (Fort Wayne) attained that maximum. But it was owing to peculiar local and temporary causes. Much of the land within these office districts was not subject to entry until about the commencement of the period I have mentioned. These lands previously belonged to the Miami Indians, and were purchased by the United States at so high a price, that in selling them the minimum price was ixed at $2 per acre. They were, moreover, not subject to entry with land warrants, unless the warrants were in the hands of the original holders; and then only on payment of the difference between the special minimum price and the general minimum of other lands. These lands were very soon nearly all disposed of; and the cash sales of these offices, and of course the percentage from such sales, have very much diminished; so that they have not since equaled, by a very considerable amount, the average of the cash sales of the offices in other States. The highest yearly amount of sales, within the five years mentioned, was in 1850; and the offices in Illinois sold more than those of any other State; yet the highest percentage there, even in that year, was but about $600. I make these brief remarks in relation to the pay of these officers more for the purpose of eliciting full information, for that information is in the House, in the possession of one of my colleagues, than with the hope or expectation of myself imparting anything not already known to the House in relation to the matter. Mr. DUNHAM. I will furnish the House that information, if the gentleman desires. Mr. FITCH. The gentleman tells me that he will furnish this information to the House. I fear if he makes the attempt that anything he may im and certify to its correctness, and how can he do The application of these officers for that com- remarks. The application being for that justly due them, pay should not be withheld, for we have no right to impose labor upon our officers, duties as onerous as these, or any other duties, without a just compensation. Look, if you please, Mr. Speaker, for a moment at the operation upon these officers of the law providing for the distribution of bounty land warrants, and their location. It imposes duties upon the officers which necessarily compel them to clerk hire a clerk hire sufficient to absorb their pitiful salary of five hundred dollars per annum; leaving them entirely without any perquisites from their office, and depriving them, in fact, of that very pay to which they would be entitled had there been no sales whatever; swallowing up the pittance which it is supposed each obtains, whether there be or be not entries in his particular office. The chairman of this committee very pertinently, as he fancies, asks this House if they know what amount will be required to compensate these officers, and give them the per cent. which they ask. After having admitted in this section that they were entitled to compensation, it should never be asked what amount is to be paid, if that question is designed to operate against the payment. The only question which should be asked, he has himself answered, which question is this, Is the demand just? He has answered that in the affirmativehe has acknowledged the debt-and the amount, whatever it may be, should not deter him or this House from its payment. He charges that one member of the committee, the gentleman from Illinois, [Mr. BISSELL,] was governed in his opposition to the bill by motives independent of any opinion entertained by him relative to the assignability of warrants. He charged that the opposition of that gentleman grew out of the fact that this second section was not sufficiently comprehensive and liberal in its provisions. Well, I grant you, perhaps the charge is correct; and if so, if that was the sole reason actuating the gentleman from Illinois in his opposition to the bill, that reason was good and sufficient. For this section, as I have already remarked, is the most important one in the bill, and if not properly framed to accomplish the object it professes to have in view, his opposition to the entire bill for that sole reason is justifiable. Section four contains another and one of the worst defects in the bill, and one to which I desire to call the attention of the chairman; for if I convince no other member of this House, I shall have proved to him that his own hand-work is imperfect, scarce decently rough-hewed. Let me call his attention for a moment to this section, and to a certain feature in the bill, of which this professes to be amendatory. I have here the bill providing for the donation of bounty land warrants, approved September 30, 1850, and the bill amendatory thereto, introduced by my colleague, [Mr. DUNHAM.] In the bill of September 30, 1850, is found the following proviso: "Provided, That whenever any officer or soldier was honorably discharged, in consequence of disability in the service, before the expiration of his period of service, he shall receive the amount to which he would have been entitled if he had served the full period for which he was engaged to serve." that the wounded, who have enlisted or volunThe object of this proviso is manifest. It is, teered for a given period, but have been discharged before the termination thereof, in consequence of wounds, shall be entitled to receive the same bounty lands to which they would have been entitled under the bill if they had served out their entire period. Compare that provision, for a moment, with the fourth section of the bill reported by my colleague, which I will read. Section four of this bill provides: "That in computing the term of service of the officers and soldiers of militia, volunteers and rangers, for the purposes of this act, or of the act of which this act is explanatory, such term shall be computed from the time they were mustered into the service of, and paid by the United States, to the time they were discharged therefrom." Thus cutting off many of the most meritorious class of those for whose benefit the law of 1850 was designed from any bounty whatever; because there are many instances where citizens volunteered or enlisted for a specified time, and were wounded within the first thirty days of the term of their enlistment, and discharged in consequence of those wounds. But this amendatory act would deprive all of this class of the bounty to which, of all men, they are most entitled. This feature of the bill I look upon as the most crude and imper fect but the result rather of carelessness than design; for I cannot believe that my colleague, or any her member of the committee, would be willing to do injustice to that class embraced in the proviso, of those for whose benefit the original act was intended. The sixth section also contains a defective feature, and one to which, if I am not mistaken, the attention of my colleague was early called. It is found in the latter part of the section, and provides that the warrants "may be located upon any lands of the United States subject to private entry at the time of such location." I am not sure but there is a pending amendment to this section. Mr. DUNHAM. There is an amendment, by adding thereto the words, "at $1 25 per acre, or to that effect. Mr. FITCH. Then this section, if the amendment is adopted, is free from any objection of the character which I was about to urge. My objection to the section as first reported, had no reference to the permission given to locate warrants on any Government land, wherever situated, if the same permission had been extended to all warrants; but to the fact, that it would create a distinction in favor of these warrants, and against those issued for the benefit of those who served in the Mexican war; whereas they should be placed upon the same footing. There are other objections, which I designed to urge when the bill first came up, but which, as I have already remarked, have been ably stated by other members, and I certainly shall not go over the same ground. There are still others, by no one yet mentioned, part of which may be misprints; for we cannot presume that this committee would report a bill, professing to be amendatory of another act, and insert references to provisions in that act, and clauses of the act, which have no existence. The last section contains a reference to a proviso in the second section of the original act, which section has no proviso whatever. This I say may be a misprint, and I submit to my colleague that he had better declare the whole bill a misprint, in view of the defects with which it abounds, and procure its reference to the Committee of the Whole, where alone it can be corrected. Or, better still, as we shall soon have a bill from the Senate meeting the purpose for which this bill was designed, that he lay this upon the table. I shall not, of course, make this motion, as there may be other gentleman entertaining opinions, and desiring to express them in reference to it, different from those which I have urged. But my declining to make the motion is not from entertaining any doubt that such would be the most appropriate disposition of the bill, for it is certainly one which in its present shape, is not fit to become a law. Mr. CLARK. The grounds of my desire to present a few reflections upon the bill which is now before the House, will be found in the fact that the provisions of this bill intimately interest my constituents. Perhaps the people of no State will be more seriously affected by the provisions of this bill than those of the State which I have the honor to represent here; and this remark, Mr. Speaker, applies generally, not only to those who are now citizens of that State, but to all who expect to become citizens hereafter. And not only so, but there are those there who are personally interested in this bill; and it is upon this account that I propose briefly to consider some of the provisions both of the original bill and of the substitute. It will not be my object to travel over the whole ground, and consider all the sections and all the provisions which arise upon these two bills. I was glad, Mr. Speaker, to learn that the chairman of the special committee which reported the substitute, sent up an amendment the other day to the first section of the bill, in reference to the mode by which the warrants shall be assigned. I think that it would unquestionably create great confusion if there should be thirty-one different modes of assigning land warrants, in accordance with the laws of each of the thirty-one States of the Union. Now, the very fact that you propose to make warrants assignable, presupposes another fact, that you mean to give them a marketable value; that you mean an advantage shall accrue to the warrantee as well as to those who shall purchase them. Now, sir, if they shall be attended with such clogs as will prejudice their value in the market, why then your original purpose is to that extent contravened and defeated. How would these warrants pass from hand to hand, except at a diminished price, unless they shall pass freely without any restriction, and under such circumstances that those who propose to purchase them shall know that their assignments are according to law? Where do these warrants go for a market, and where do they find purchasers? In the first place they find them in the cities of the East, and in the next place in the neighborhoods of the land offices in the various districts of the West. And there it is, as well as here, that they are purchased by those who expect to use and locate them upon the public domain. Will these purchasers, sir, give as much for these land warrants when it cannot be known, or if known, yet with great difficulty and uncertainty, whether they have been assigned according to law? And how shall they know unless they have the means of referring to the statutes of the different States, whether they have been assigned in the manner in which deeds are required to be signed and authenticated in the several States in which such assignment shall be made? It is impossible that the purchaser can know with that certainty, upon which reliance may be placed; and whenever a warrant is offered to him, his natural answer would be, "that inasmuch as I have something to risk in reference to this matter, I cannot, and will not, give as much for it as though there was that certainty upon which I can rely." This will be his natural reply. But, if the mode prescribing the transfer of these warrants is made by the Secretary of the Interior, it will be uniform; and within, perhaps, less than twenty days after the mode is prescribed, it will be known in all the distant parts of the United States. There will be none ignorant of it. I think, then, decidedly, that the amendment offered by the chairman of the select committee, [Mr. DUNHAM,] in regard to the mode of assignment, is one in itself wise and expedient, and that it ought to be adopted. The next provision in the substitute which has been offered, to which I shall call the attention of the House for a few moments, is that in reference to the compensation of those who have heretofore performed service in the location of land location of land warrants from the time of the passage of the original act granting bounty lands to those who served in the Mexican war, which was in February, 1847, up to June of that year. For all that was done between these periods no involved. I believe it is an admitted fact, that compensation has been received. I believe there warrants without pay. The gentleman from Indiana, [Mr. EITCH,] who last spoke, has so fully investigated the facts of this case, that I shall not stop to consider them, but merely the principle those who have rendered services in your land offices, in the location of land warrants, have not received that compensation to which their services are entitled; and now I ask, upon what principle it is that those who have heretofore performed services for this Government, shall be left without compensation? I ask the chairman who reported this substitute, why it is that those who have already performed services are left to leanness and injustice, when those who are hereafter to perform like services are to be paid for their labor? Can the gentleman tell us what is the distinguishing principle between those who have rendered services, and those who are to render service, in reference to compensation? Is there any? I wish to call the gentleman's attention to that point-I wish to fasten his mind upon it; and I wish him to satisfy the House what distinguishing principle there is between those officers who have performed a service, and those who are hereafter to render the same service. If there is any, it is in favor of those who have already performed the service. Why, have they not performed them in view of the honor, the justice, and the good faith of this Government? Whenever you have invited individuals to labor for you, and have provided no specific compensation, is it to be tolerated as a precedent, or as a matter of principle, that they shall go unrewarded? I hear gentlemen say that they were under no obligation to have retained their office, and have performed the service which was required of them. Are they to be disposed of in this summary way-I might say in this inequitable way? Whenever you absolve yourself from your good faith-whenever you tread your good faith under foot, and do not perform that which you are reasonably expected to perform towards your citizens, that moment you do an injury to the citizens, which will recoil upon you, and which you will be made to feel. You hold out no inducement to faithfulness and devotion on the part of those upon whom you call for labor. Why, it seems to me, if there is anything in a declaration of this kind, that it applies only to those who are to hold office hereafter. When you have refused to grant them compensation, they will then know what course to pursue; they will know that you do not mean to reward them, and they will protect themselves. But, such is not the fact with reference to those who have already performed the services. I will read a brief extract from a letter to me by one of the officers of the land office in my district. He says, in addition to the above, referring to his memorial"We beg leave to add, that of the new warrants 'for which there is no compensation allowed, 'there have been located at this office, during the 'last two weeks, nearly one thousand; the labor attending which would employ three competent 'clerks." I can vouch for the truthfulness of this man. Mr. DUNHAM. I should like to know from the gentleman at what place that officer resides. Mr. CLARK. Dubuque, Iowa. Now, let gentlemen bear in mind, there is a limit fixed by law beyond which the compensation of your officers cannot go. I have no objection to a modification-to a scaling of their compensation, if the House think proper to do so; but I contend for the principle, the main principle, that they shall be paid as much as they reasonably deserve. Another fact, that may not be known to gentlemen here who are not intimately conversant with affairs of this kind, is, that the land officers are allowed nothing for rent and nothing for clerk hire, nothing for fuel or stationery. They have to provide themselves with all of these things, and their salary is but $500, and the other remnant of their compensation is made up of percentage upon moneys received. Now, you have set afloat a large amount of land scrip, with which your public domain is to be entered upon, and, as a natural consequence, you have curtailed, in a great measure, the purchase of lands with cash. Therefore there is no percentage, and the compensation of your land officers is reduced to a mere pittance. As it is now, it is hardly equal to the crumbs that fall from their master's table. These land officers have performed service in the || was an act passed in June of that year by which they were allowed a certain compensation upon warrants thereafter to be located. Again, the act of 1850, which has thrown wide-cast the greatest amount of warrants, provides for no compensation to them for their location. At any rate it provides for no compensation, and this is the kind of warrants to which the author of the communication from which I have read alludes. Now, I ask whether it is not hard enough that a man should earn his bread under the curse, to wit, by the sweat of his brow, and get his bread when he has earned it? I ask if gentlemen sitting here as a grand inquest in a matter of this kind, to do justice to our fellow-citizens, are to turn them away with such great injustice as cannot fail to awaken jealousy and rankling of heart? I am sure that it would be a violation of the plainest principles of justice-it would not be Jew-it would not be Christian. I do not believe it would be Mohammedan. I am sure it is not law. Why, sir, the Jewish law would not suffer the mouth of the ox to be muzzled that treadeth out the corn, and the Christian precept is, that the laborer is worthy of his hire. I do not know exactly what the Koran says upon the subject, but the law says that a man who has served his fellow-man shall receive as much as he reasonably deserves to have. The principle is not altered when the case is between an individual and the Government. Because you are sovereign or law-makers, do you lift yourselves above law and the principles of law? Because you cannot be reached in the execution of the law, therefore do you tread the principles of law under foot? I will believe it when I see it, and never before. I believe this Government has heretofore observed good faith in reference to those who have performed services for it, and I do not believe that it is yet ready to cut loose from that principle, and to say that they will have no more of it. I shall not dwell upon that section of the substitute, which provides for the issuing of a new batch of bounty land warrants. I will content myself simply with saying, that as at present advised, I am against that provision. I am glad that there is one section of this bill which I can approve, and that is the 6th: "That the warrants which have been or may hereafter be issued in 'pursuance of said act may be located upon any lands of the United States subject to private entry ' at the time of such location." This is as it should be, and this is the most important part of this bill. There is no portion of it which is so material to the new States, and I may say to all the States-at any rate, to all those in the old States who expect to emigrate and become settlers in the new. Here I shall feel it my duty, in a cursory manner, to recur to the argument made by the gentleman from New Hampshire, [Mr. Tuck,] and also to the argument made the other day by the gentleman from Illinois, [Mr. BISSELL.] The gentleman from New Hampshire [Mr. TUCK] seems to plant himself upon what he perhaps would denominate a principle in antagonism to speculators. It seems that speculators are a prominent class of men in the mind of the gentleman from New Hampshire. He would pursue a policy which would cut short the speculators from obtaining the public lands. He says, that if you suffer land warrants to be located upon the public domain to an extent as wide as they are surveyed and offered in market, the lands will fall into the hands of speculators. I can assure the gentleman from New Hampshire, that all his reasoning upon this point is based upon false facts, and therefore the force of his reasoning is neutralized and destroyed. The gentleman resides in the midst of the granite hills of New Hampshire. I reside in the midst of the great prairies of the West, where there are large tracts of public lands. I think I know the operations of this thing. I think I can with safety say, that speculations in lands have ceased long ago, except as here and there an indi vidual may have entered a small amount upon speculation. Why, they have found it a losing business years ago. It has been perhaps ten to |