settled than it is, until it shall pass under judicial consideration; but I do think that no man who is clear on this question of expediency need feel his conscience much pricked upon this.

Mr. Chairman, the President seems to think that enough may be done in the way of improvements, by means of tunnage duties, under State authority, with the consent of the General Government. Now, I suppose this matter of tunnage duties is well enough in its own sphere. I suppose it may be efficient, and perhaps sufficient, to make slight improvements and repairs in harbors already in use, and not much out of repair. But if I have any correct general idea of it, it must be wholly inefficient for any general beneficient purposes of improvement. I know very little, or rather nothing at all, of the practical matter of levying and collecting tunnage duties; but I suppose one of its principles must be, to lay a duty, for the improvement of any particular harbor, upon the tunnage coming into that harbor. To do otherwise-to collect money in one harbor to be expended on improvements in anotherwould be an extremely aggravated form of that inequality which the President so much deprecates. If I be right in this, how could we make any entirely new improvements by means of tunnage duties? How make a road, a canal, or clear a greatly obstructed river? The idea that we could, involves the same absurdity of the Irish bull about the new boots: "I shall niver git 'em on," says Patrick, "till I wear 'em a day or two, and stretch 'em a little." We shall never make a canal by tunnage duties, until it shall already have been made awhile, so the tunnage can get into it.

After all, the President concludes that possibly there may be some great objects of improvements which can not be effected by tunnage duties, and which, therefore, may be expedient for the General Government to take in hand. Accordingly, he suggests, in case any such be discovered, the propriety of amending the Constitution. Amend it for what? If, like Mr. Jefferson, the President thought improvements expedient, but not constitutional, it would be natural enough for him to recommend such an amendment; but hear what he says in this very message:

In view of these portentous consequences, I can not but think that this course of legislation should be arrested, even were there nothing to forbid it in the fundamental laws of our Union."

For what, then, would he have the Constitution amended? With him it is a proposition to remove one impediment, merely to be met by others, which, in his opinion, can not be

removed-to enable Congress to do what, in his opinion, they ought not to do if they could.

[Here Mr. Meade, of Virginia, inquired if Mr. L. understood the President to be opposed, on grounds of expediency, to any and every improvement?]

To which Mr. Lincoln answered: In the very part of his message of which I am now speaking, I understand him as giving some vague expressions in favor of some possible objects of improvements; but, in doing so, I understand him. to be directly in the teeth of his own arguments in other parts of it. Neither the President, nor any one, can possibly specify an improvement, which shall not be clearly liable to one or another of the objections he has urged on the score of expediency. I have shown, and might show again, that no workno object-can be so general, as to dispense its benefits with precise equality; and this inequality is chief among the "portentous consequences "for which he declares that improvements should be arrested. No, sir; when the President intimates that something in the way of improvements may properly be done by the General Government, he is shrinking from the conclusions to which his own arguments would force him. He feels that the improvements of this broad and goodly land are a mighty interest; and he is unwilling to confess to the people, or perhaps to himself, that he has built an argument which, when pressed to its conclusion, entirely annihilates this interest.

I have already said that no one who is satisfied of the expediency of making improvements need be much uneasy in his conscience about its constitutionality. I wish now to submit a few remarks on the general proposition of amending the Constitution. As a general rule, I think we would do much better to let it alone. No slight occasion should tempt us to touch it. Better not take the first step, which may lead to a habit of altering it. Better rather habituate ourselves to think of it as unalterable. It can scarcely be made better than it is. New provisions would introduce new difficulties, and thus create and increase appetite for further change. No, sir; let it stand as it is. New hands have never touched it. The men who made it have done their work, and have passed away. Who shall improve on what they did?

Mr. Chairman, for the purpose of reviewing this message in the least possible time, as well as for the sake of distinctness, I have analyzed its arguments as well as I could, and reduced them to the propositions I have stated. I have now examined them in detail. I wish to detain the committee only a little while longer, with some general remarks on the subject of

improvements. That the subject is a difficult one, can not be denied. Still, it is no more difficult in Congress than in the State Legislatures, in the counties, or in the smallest municipal districts which everywhere exist. All can recur to instances of this difficulty in the case of county roads, bridges, and the like. One man is offended because a road passes over his land; and another is offended because it does not pass over his; one is dissatisfied because the bridge, for which he is taxed, crosses the river on a different road from that which leads from his house to town; another can not bear that the county should get in debt for these same roads and bridges; while not a few struggle hard to have roads located over their lands, and then stoutly refuse to let them be opened, until they are first paid the damages. Even between the different wards and streets of towns and cities, we find this same wrangling and difficulty. Now, these are no other than the very difficulties against which, and out of which, the President constructs his objections of "inequality," "speculation," and "crushing the Treasury." There is but a single alternative about them— they are sufficient, or they are not. If sufficient, they are sufficient out of Congress as well as in it, and there is the end. We must reject them as insufficient, or lie down and do nothing by any authority. Then, difficulty though there be, let us meet and overcome it.

"Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt;

Nothing so hard, but search will find it out."

Determine that the thing can and shall be done, and then we shall find the way. The tendency to undue expansion is unquestionably the chief difficulty. How to do something, and still not to do too much, is the desideratum. Let each contribute his mite in the way of suggestion. The late Silas Wright, in a letter to the Chicago Convention, contributed his, which was worth something; and I now contribute mine, which may be worth nothing. At all events, it will mislead nobody, and therefore will do no harm. I would not borrow money. I am against an overwhelming, crushing system. Suppose that at each session, Congress shall first determino how much money can, for that year, be spared for improvements; then apportion that sum to the most important objects. So far, all is easy; but how shall we determine which are the most important? On this question comes the collision of interests. I shall be slow to acknowledge that your harbor or your river is more important than mine, and vice versa. clear this difficulty, let us have that same statistical information which the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Vinton] suggested

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at the beginning of this session. In that information we shall have a stern, unbending basis of facts-a basis in nowise subject to whim, caprice, or local interest. The pre-limited amount of means will save us from doing too much, and the statistics will save us from doing what we do, in wrong places. Adopt and adhere to this course, and, it seems to me, the difficulty is cleared.

One of the gentlemen from South Carolina (Mr. Rhett) very much deprecates these statistics. He particularly objects, as I understand him, to counting all the pigs and chickens in the land. I do not perceive much force in the objection. It is true, that if everything be enumerated, a portion of such statistics may not be very useful to this object. Such products of the country as are to be consumed where they are produced, need no roads and rivers, no means of transportation, and have no very proper connection with this subject. The surplus, that which is produced in one place to be consumed in another; the capacity of each locality for producing a greater surplus; the natural means of transportation, and their susceptibility of improvement; the hindrances, delays, and losses of life and property during transportation, and the causes of each would be among the most valuable statistics in this connection. From these it would readily appear where a given amount of expenditure would do the most good. These statistics might be equally accessible, as they would be equally useful, to both the nation and the States. In this way, and by these means, let the nation take hold of the larger works, and the States the smaller ones; and thus, working in a meeting direction, discreetly, but steadily and firmly, what is made unequal in one place, may be equalized in another, extravagance avoided, and the whole country put on that career of prosperity which shall correspond with its extent of territory, its natural resources, and the intelligence and enterprise of its people.

The first session of the Thirtieth Congress was prolonged far beyond the date of the Presidential nominations of 1848, and the canvass was actively carried on by members on the floor of the House. Mr. Lincoln warmly sustained the nomination of Gen. Taylor, and before the adjournment of Congress, he made, in accordance with precedent and general practice, one of his characteristic campaign speeches. He showed himself a man of decided partisan feelings, and entered into this contest with zeal, not only repelling the violent attacks upon the Whig candidate, but showing that there were blows

to be given as well as taken. He said some things in a vein of sarcastic humor, which could only have been mistaken for actual bitterness, by those who did not know the really genial character of the man. Argument, ridicule and illustrative anecdotes were brought into requisition, with great ability and unsparing boldness, in setting the real issues of the canvass, political and personal, in what he deemed a proper light before the people.

This

Although containing so many things of mere temporary interest, this speech will be read with avidity at the present time, and particularly on account of several passages which have especial significance from the position Mr. Lincoln himself afterward occupied—what had then probably never seriously entered his thoughts as among the events of the future. effort will perhaps give occasional offense to the purist in style, but its manly earnestness and force, and its adaptedness to popular effect as a campaign document, will not be called in question. It is obvious that there was some change in Mr. Lincoln's manner of speaking subsequently to those days, yet his first appearance in the national arena of politics exhibited that rugged strength and that earnest directness of expression which have given him permanent power with popular auditories.

MR. LINCOLN'S SPEECH ON THE PRESIDENCY AND GENERAL POLITICS. (Delivered in the House, July 27, 1848).

GENERAL TAYLOR AND THE VETO POWER.

Mr. Lincoln said

Mr. SPEAKER:-Our Democratic friends seem to be in great distress because they think our candidate for the Presidency don't suit us. Most of them can not find out that Gen. Taylor has any principles at all; some, however, have discovered that he has one, but that that one is entirely wrong. This one principle is his position on the veto power. The gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Stanton) who has just taken his seat, indeed, has said there is very little if any difference on this question between Gen. Taylor and all the Presidents; and he seems to think it sufficient detraction from Gen. Taylor's position on it, that it has nothing new in it. But all others, whom I have heard speak, assail it furiously. A new member from Ken