Volume 1 — SPEECHES, &c. (continued 11)

Is the annual expenditure of a sum no larger than one hundred and twenty thousand dollars, and the annual employment of seven thousand five hundred tons of shipping, too much for reasonable exertion, considering the magnitude of the object in view? Are they not, on the contrary, within the compass of moderate efforts?

Here is the whole scheme of the society—a project which has been pronounced visionary by those who have never given themselves the trouble to examine it, but to which I believe most unbiassed men will yield their cordial assent, after they have investigated it.

Limited as the project is, by the society, to a colony to be formed by the free and unconstrained consent of free persons of color, it is no objection, but on the contrary a great recommendation, of the plan, that it admits of being taken up and applied on a scale of much more comprehensive utility. The society knows, and it affords just cause of felicitation, that all or any one of the states which tolerate slavery, may carry the scheme of colonization into effect, in regard to the slaves within their respective limits, and thus ultimately rid themselves of a universally acknowledged curse. A reference to the results of the several enumerations of the population of the United States will incontestably prove the practicability of its application on the more extensive scale. The slave population of the United States amounted, in 1790, to six hundred and ninety-seven thousand, six hundred and ninety-seven; in 1800, to eight hundred and ninety-six thousand, eight hundred and forty-nine; in 1810, to eleven hundred and ninety-one thousand, three hundred and sixty-four; and in 1820, to fifteen hundred and thirty-eight thousand, one hundred and twenty-eight. The rate of annual increase, (rejecting fractions and taking the integer to which they make the nearest approach,) during the first term of ten years, was not quite three per centum per annum, during the second, a little more than three per centum per annum; and during the third, a little less than three per centum. The mean ratio of increase for the whole period of thirty years, was very little more than three per centum per annum. During the first two periods, the native stock was augmented by importations from Africa in those states which continued to tolerate them, and by the acquisition of Louisiana. Virginia, to her eternal honor, abolished the abominable traffic among the earliest acts of her self-government. The last term alone presents the natural increase of the capital unaffected by any extraneous causes. That authorizes, as a safe assumption, that the future increase will not exceed three per centum per annum. As our population increases, the value of slave labor will diminish, in consequence of the superior advantages in the employment of free labor. And when the value of slave labor shall be materially lessened, either by the multiplication of the supply of slaves beyond the demand, or by the competition between slave and free labor, the annual increase of slaves will be reduced, in consequence of the abatement of the motives to provide for and rear the offspring.

Assuming the future increase to be at the rate of three per centum per annum, the annual addition to the number of slaves in the United States, calculated upon the return of the last census, (one million five hundred and thirty-eight thousand, one hundred and twenty-eight) is forty-six thousand. Applying the data which have been already stated and explained, in relation to the colonization of free persons of color from the United States to Africa, to the aggregate annual increase, both bond and free, of the African race, and the result will be found most encouraging. The total number of the annual increase of both descriptions is fifty-two thousand. The total expense of transporting that number to Africa, (supposing no reduction of present prices) would be one million and forty thousand dollars, and the requisite amount of tonnage would be only one hundred and thirty thousand tons of shipping—about one ninth part of the mercantile marine of the United States. Upon the supposition of a vessel’s making two voyages in the year, it would be reduced to one half, sixty-five thousand. And this quantity would be still further reduced, by embracing opportunities of incidental employment of vessels belonging both to the mercantile and military marines.

But, is the annual application of one million and forty thousand dollars and the employment of sixty-five or even one hundred and thirty thousand tons of shipping, considering the magnitude of the object, beyond the ability of this country? Is there a patriot, looking forward to its domestic quiet, its happiness, and its glory, that would not cheerfully contribute his proportion of the burden, to accomplish a purpose so great and so humane? During the general continuance of the African slave trade, hundreds of thousands of slaves have been, in a single year, imported into the several countries whose laws authorized their admission. Notwithstanding the vigilance of the powers now engaged to suppress the slave trade, I have received information, that in a single year, in the single island of Cuba, slaves equal in amount to one half of the above number of fifty-two thousand, have been illicitly introduced. Is it possible that those who are concerned in an infamous traffic can effect more than the states of this union, if they were seriously to engage in the good work? Is it credible, is it not a libel upon human nature to suppose, that the triumphs of fraud, and violence, and iniquity, can surpass those of virtue, and benevolence, and humanity?

The population of the United States being, at this time, estimated at about ten millions of the European race, and two of the African, on the supposition of the annual colonization of a number of the latter, equal to the annual increase, of both of its classes, during the whole period necessary to the process of duplication of our numbers, they would, at the end of that period, relatively stand twenty millions for the white and two for the black portion. But an annual exportation of a number equal to the annual increase, at the beginning of the term, and persevered in to the end of it, would accomplish more than to keep the parent stock stationary. The colonists would comprehend more than an equal proportion of those of the prolific ages. Few of those who had passed that age would migrate. So that the annual increase of those left behind, would continue gradually, but at first insensibly, to diminish; and by the expiration of the period of duplication, it would be found to have materially abated. But it is not merely the greater relative safety and happiness which would, at the termination of that period, be the condition of the whites. Their ability to give further stimulus to the cause of colonization will have been doubled, whilst the subjects on which it would have to operate, will have decreased or remained stationary. If the business of colonization should be regularly continued, during two periods of duplication, at the end of the second, the whites would stand to the blacks, as forty millions to not more than two, whilst the same ability will have been quadrupled. Even if colonization should then altogether cease, the proportion of the African to the European race will be so small, that the most timid may then, for ever, dismiss all ideas of danger from within or without, on account of that incongruous and perilous element in our population.

Further; by the annual withdrawal of fifty-two thousand persons of color, there would be annual space created for an equal number of the white race. The period, therefore, of the duplication of the whites, by the laws which govern population, would be accelerated.

Such, Mr. Vice-president, is the project of the society; and such is the extension and use which may be made of the principle of colonization, in application to our slave population, by those states which are alone competent to undertake and execute it. All, or any one, of the states which tolerate slavery, may adopt and execute it, by coöperation or separate exertion. It I could be instrumental in eradicating this deepest stain upon the character of our country, and removing all cause of reproach on account of it, by foreign nations; if I could only be instrumental in ridding of this foul blot that revered state that gave me birth, or that not less beloved state which kindly adopted me as her son; I would not exchange the proud satisfaction which I should enjoy, for the honor of all the triumphs ever decreed to the most successful conqueror.

Having, I hope, shown that the plan of the society is not visionary, but rational and practicable; that a colony does in fact exist, planted under its auspices; that free people are willing and anxious to go; and that the right of soil as well as of sovereignty, may be acquired in vast tracts of country in Africa, abundantly sufficient for all the purposes of the most ample colony, and at prices almost only nominal, the task which remains to me of showing the beneficial consequences which would attend the execution of the scheme, is comparatively easy.

Of the utility of a total separation of the two incongruous portions of our population, supposing it to be practicable, none have ever doubted. The mode of accomplishing that most desirable object, has alone divided public opinion. Colonization in Hayti, for a time, had its partisans. Without throwing any impediments in the way of executing that scheme, the American Colonization Society has steadily adhered to its own. The Haytien project has passed away. Colonization beyond the Stony mountains has sometimes been proposed; but it would be attended with an expense and difficulties far surpassing the African project, whilst it would not unite the same animating motives. There is a moral fitness in the idea of returning to Africa her children, whose ancestors have been torn from her by the ruthless hand of fraud and violence. Transplanted in a foreign land, they will carry back to their native soil the rich fruits of religion, civilization, law, and liberty. May it not be one of the great designs of the Ruler of the universe, (whose ways are often inscrutable by short-sighted mortals,) thus to transform an original crime into a signal blessing, to that most unfortunate portion of the globe. Of all classes of our population, the most vicious is that of the free colored. It is the inevitable result of their moral, political, and civil degradation. Contaminated themselves, they extend their vices to all around them, to the slaves and to the whites. If the principle of colonization should be confined to them; if a colony can be firmly established and successfully continued in Africa which should draw off annually an amount of that portion of our population equal to its annual increase, much good will be done. If the principle be adopted and applied by the states, whose laws sanction the existence of slavery, to an extent equal to the annual increase of slaves, still greater good will be done. This good will be felt by the Africans who go, by the Africans who remain, by the white population of our country, by Africa, and by America. It is a project which recommends itself to favor in all the aspects in which it can be contemplated. It will do good in every and any extent in which it may be executed. It is a circle of philanthropy, every segment of which tells and testifies to the beneficence of the whole.

Every emigrant to Africa is a missionary carrying with him credentials in the holy cause of civilization, religion, and free institutions. Why is it that the degree of success of missionary exertions is so limited, and so discouraging to those whose piety and benevolence prompt them? Is it not because the missionary is generally an alien and a stranger, perhaps of a different color, and from a different tribe? There is a sort of instinctive feeling of jealousy and distrust towards foreigners which repels and rejects them in all countries; and this feeling is in proportion to the degree of ignorance and barbarism which prevail. But the African colonists, whom we send to convert the heathen, are of the same color, the same family, the same physical constitution. When the purposes of the colony shall be fully understood, they will be received as long lost brethren restored to the embraces of their friends and their kindred by the dispensations of a wise providence.

The society is reproached for agitating this question. It should be recollected that the existence of free people of color is not limited to the states only which tolerate slavery. The evil extends itself to all the states, and some of those which do not allow of slavery, (their cities especially,) experience the evil in an extent even greater than it exists in the slave states. A common evil confers a right to consider and apply a common remedy. Nor is it a valid objection that this remedy is partial in its operation or distant in its efficacy. A patient, writhing under the tortures of excruciating disease, asks of his physician to cure him if he can, and, if he cannot, to mitigate his sufferings. But the remedy proposed, if generally adopted and perseveringly applied, for a sufficient length of time, should it not entirely eradicate the disease, will enable the body politic to bear it without danger and without suffering.

We are reproached with doing mischief by the agitation of this question. The society goes into no household to disturb its domestic tranquillity; it addresses itself to no slaves to weaken their obligations of obedience. It seeks to affect no man’s property. It neither has the power nor the will to affect the property of any one contrary to his consent. The execution of its scheme would augment instead of diminishing the value of the property left behind. The society, composed of free men, concerns itself only with the free. Collateral consequences we are not responsible for. It is not this society which has produced the great moral revolution which the age exhibits. What would they, who thus reproach us, have done? If they would repress all tendencies towards liberty and ultimate emancipation, they must do more than put down the benevolent efforts of this society. They must go back to the era of our liberty and independence, and muzzle the cannon which thunders its annual joyous return. They must revive the slave trade, with all its train of atrocities. They must suppress the workings of British philanthropy, seeking to meliorate the condition of the unfortunate West Indian slaves. They must arrest the career of South American deliverance from thraldom. They must blow out the moral lights around us, and extinguish that greatest torch of all which America presents to a benighted world, pointing the way to their rights, their liberties, and their happiness. And when they have achieved all these purposes, their work will be yet incomplete. They must penetrate the human soul, and eradicate the light of reason and the love of liberty. Then, and not till then, when universal darkness and despair prevail, can you perpetuate slavery, and repress all sympathies, and all humane and benevolent efforts among freemen, in behalf of the unhappy portion of our race doomed to bondage.

Our friends, who are cursed with this greatest of human evils, deserve the kindest attention and consideration. Their property and their safety are both involved. But the liberal and candid among them will not, cannot, expect that every project to deliver our country from it is to be crushed because of a possible and ideal danger. Animated by the encouragement of the past, let us proceed under the cheering prospects which lie before us. Let us continue to appeal to the pious, the liberal, and the wise. Let us bear in mind the condition of our forefathers, when, collected on the beach in England, they embarked, amidst the scoffings and the false predictions of the assembled multitude, for this distant land; and here, in spite of all the perils of forest and ocean, which they encountered, successfully laid the foundations of this glorious republic. Undismayed by the prophecies of the presumptuous, let us supplicate the aid of the American representatives of the people, and redoubling our labors, and invoking the blessings of an all-wise Providence, I boldly and confidently anticipate success. I hope the resolution which I offer will be unanimously adopted.

EXTRACTS

FROM THE REPORT OF THE BOARD OF MANAGERS OF THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY, PRESENTED AT ITS ANNUAL MEETING, JANUARY THIRTEENTH, 1827, READ BY MR. CLAY IN THE COURSE OF THE DELIVERY OF THE PRECEDING SPEECH.

The system of government established with the full consent of the colonists, in the autumn of 1824, and which the managers had the happiness to represent in their last report, as having thus far fulfilled all the purposes of its institution, has continued its operations during the year without the least irregularity, and with undiminished success. The republican principle is introduced as far as is consistent with the youthful and unformed character of the settlement, and in the election of their officers the colonists have evinced such integrity and judgment as afford promise of early preparation for all the duties of self-government. ‘The civil prerogatives and government of the colony and the body of the laws by which they are sustained,’ says the colonial agent, ‘are the pride of all. I am happy in the persuasion I have, that I hold the balance of the laws in the midst of a people, with whom the first perceptible inclination of the sacred scale determines authoritatively their sentiments and their conduct. There are individual exceptions, but these remarks extend to the body of the settlers.’

The moral and religious character of the colony exerts a powerful influence on its social and civil condition. That piety which had guided most of the early emigrants to Liberia, even before they left this country, to respectability and usefulness among their associates, prepared them, in laying the foundations of a colony, to act with a degree of wisdom and energy which no earthly motives could inspire. Humble, and for the most part unlettered men; born and bred in circumstances the most unfavorable to mental culture; unsustained by the hope of renown, and unfamiliar with the history of great achievements and heroic virtues, theirs was nevertheless a spirit unmoved by dangers or by sufferings, which misfortunes could not darken, nor death dismay. They left America, and felt that it was forever; they landed in Africa, possibly to find a home, but certainly a grave. Strange would it have been had the religion of every individual of these early settlers proved genuine; but immensely changed as have been their circumstances and severely tried their faith, most have preserved untarnished the honors of their profession, and to the purity of their morals and the consistency of their conduct, is in a great measure to be attributed the social order and general prosperity of the colony of Liberia. Their example has proved most salutary, and while subsequent emigrants have found themselves awed and restrained, by their regularity, seriousness, and devotion, the poor natives have given their confidence and acknowledged the excellence of practical christianity. ‘It deserves record,’ says Mr. Ashmun, ‘that religion has been the principal agent employed in laying and confirming the foundations of the settlement. To this sentiment, ruling, restraining, and actuating the minds of a large proportion of the colonists, must be referred the whole strength of our civil government.’ Examples of intemperance, profaneness, or licentiousness, are extremely rare, and vice, wherever it exists, is obliged to seek concealment from the public eye. The sabbath is universally respected; sunday schools, both for the children of the colony and for the natives, are established; all classes attend regularly upon the worship of God; some charitable associations have been formed for the benefit of the heathen; and though it must not be concealed, that the deep concern on the subject of religion which resulted, towards the conclusion of the year 1825, in the public profession of christianity by about fifty colonists, has in a measure subsided, and some few cases of delinquency since occurred; and though there are faults growing out of the early condition and habits of the settlers which require amendment; yet the managers have reason to believe, that there is a vast and increasing preponderance on the side of correct principle and virtuous practice.

The agriculture of the colony has received less attention than its importance demands. This is to be attributed to the fact, that the labor of the settlers has been applied to objects conducing more immediately to their subsistence and comfort.

It will not, the board trust, be concluded that, because more might have been done for the agricultural interests of the colony, what has been effected is inconsiderable. Two hundred and twenty-four plantations, of from five to ten acres each, were, in June last, occupied by the settlers, and most of them are believed to be at present under cultivation. One hundred and fourteen of these are on cape Montserado, thirty-three on Stockton creek, (denominated the half-way farms, because nearly equidistant from Monrovia and Caldwell, the St. Paul’s settlement) and seventy-seven at the confluence of Stockton creek with the St. Paul’s.

The St. Paul’s territory includes the half-way farms, and is represented as a beautiful tract of country, comparatively open, well watered and fertile, and still further recommended as having been for ages selected by the natives, on account of its productiveness for their rice and cassada plantations. The agricultural habits of the present occupants of this tract, concur with the advantages of their situation, in affording promise of success to their exertions. ‘Nothing,’ says the colonial agent, ‘but circumstances of the most extraordinary nature, can prevent them from making their way directly to respectability and abundance.’

Oxen were trained to labor in the colony in 1825, and it was then expected that the plough would be introduced in the course of another year. Although commerce has thus far taken the lead of agriculture, yet the excellence of the soil, the small amount of labor required for its cultivation, and the value and abundance of its products, cannot fail, finally, to render the latter the more cherished, as it is, certainly, the more important interest of the colony.

The trade of Liberia has increased with a rapidity almost unexampled, and while it has supplied the colonists not only with the necessaries, but with the conveniences and comforts of life, the good faith with which it has been conducted, has conciliated the friendship of the natives, and acquired the confidence of foreigners.

The regulations of the colony allowing no credits, except by a written permission, and requiring the barter to be carried on through factories established for the purpose, has increased the profits of the traffic, and prevented numerous evils which must have attended upon a more unrestricted license.

Between the first of January and the fifteenth of July, 1826, no less than fifteen vessels touched at Monrovia, and purchased the produce of the country, to the amount, according to the best probable estimate, of forty-three thousand nine hundred and eighty dollars, African value. The exporters of this produce realize, on the sale of the goods given in barter for it, a profit of twenty-one thousand nine hundred and ninety dollars, and on the freight, of eight thousand seven hundred and eighty-six dollars, making a total profit of thirty thousand seven hundred and eighty-six dollars.

A gentleman in Portland has commenced a regular trade with the colony; and for his last cargo landed in Liberia, amounting to eight thousand dollars, he received payment in the course of ten days. The advantages of this trade to the colony, are manifest from the high price of labor, (that of mechanics being two dollars per day, and that of common laborers from seventy-five cents to one dollar and twenty-five cents,) and from the easy and comfortable circumstances of the settlers. ‘An industrious family, twelve months in Africa, destitute of the means of furnishing an abundant table, is not known; and an individual, of whatever age or sex, without ample provision of decent apparel, cannot, it is believed, be found.’ ‘Every family,’ says Mr. Ashmun, ‘and nearly every single adult person in the colony, has the means of employing from one to four native laborers, at an expense of from four to six dollars the month; and several of the settlers, when called upon in consequence of sudden emergences of the public service, have made repeated advances of merchantable produce, to the amount of three hundred to six hundred dollars each.’

The managers are happy to state, that the efforts of the colonial agent to enlarge the territory of Liberia, and particularly to bring under the government of the colony a more extended line of coast, have been judicious and energetic, and in nearly every instance resulted in complete success. From cape Mount to Tradetown, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles, the colonial government has acquired partial jurisdiction. FOUR of the most important STATIONS on this tract, including Montserado, belong to the society, either by actual purchase, or by a deed of perpetual lease; and such negotiations have been entered upon with the chiefs of the country, as amount to a preclusion of all Europeans from any possessions within these limits. The fine territory of the St. Paul’s, now occupied by settlers, was described in the last annual report of the society.

The territory of Young Sesters, recently ceded to the society, is ninety miles south of Montserado, in the midst of a very productive rice country, affording also large quantities of palm oil, camwood, and ivory. The tract granted to the colony, includes the bed of the Sester’s river, and all the land on each side, to the distance of half a league, and extending longitudinally from the river’s mouth to its source. In compliance with the terms of the contract, the chief of the country has constructed a commodious storehouse, and put a number of laborers sufficient for the cultivation of a rice plantation of forty acres, under the direction of a respectable colonist, who takes charge of the establishment.

The right of use and occupancy have also been obtained to a region of country on the south branch of the St. John’s river, north nine miles from Young Sesters, and the trading factory established there, under the superintendence of a family from Monrovia, has already provided a valuable source of income to the colony. Rice is also here to be cultivated, and the chief who cedes the territory, agrees to furnish the labor.

The upright and exemplary conduct of the individual at the head of this establishment, has powerfully impressed the natives with the importance of inviting them to settle in their country; and consequently, the offer made by the colonial agent for the purchase of Factory island, has been accepted by its proprietor. This island is in the river St. John’s, four miles from its mouth, from five to six miles in length, and one third of a mile in breadth, and is among the most beautiful and fertile spots in Africa. A few families are about to take up their residence upon it, and prepare for founding a settlement, ‘which cannot fail,’ says Mr. Ashmun, ‘in a few years, to be second to no other in the colony, except Monrovia.’

Negotiations are also in progress with the chiefs of cape Mount, which, if successful, will secure to the colony the whole trade of that station, estimated at fifty thousand dollars per annum, and may ultimately lead to its annexation to the territories of Liberia. ‘The whole country between cape Mount and Tradetown,’ observes Mr. Ashmun, ‘is rich in soil and other natural advantages, and capable of sustaining a numerous and civilized population beyond almost any other country on earth. Leaving the seaboard, the traveller, every where, at the distance of a very few miles, enters upon a uniform upland country, of moderate elevation, intersected by innumerable rivulets, abounding in springs of unfailing water, and covered with a verdure which knows no other changes except those which refresh and renew its beauties. The country directly on the sea, although verdant and fruitful to a high degree, is found every where to yield, in both respects, to the interior.’

Much progress has been made the last year in the construction of public buildings and works of defence, though with adequate supplies of lumber, more might doubtless have been accomplished. Two handsome churches, erected solely by the colonists, now adorn the village of Monrovia. Fort Stockton has been rebuilt in a style of strength and beauty. A receptacle capable of accommodating one hundred and fifty emigrants, is completed. The new agency-house, market-house, Lancasterian school, and town-house, in Monrovia, were some months since far advanced, and the finishing strokes were about to be given to the government-house on the St. Paul’s. The wing of the old agency-house has been ‘handsomely fitted up for the colonial library, which now consists of twelve hundred volumes systematically arranged in glazed cases with appropriate hangings. All the books are substantially covered, and accurately labelled; and files of more than ten newspapers, more or less complete, are preserved. The library is fitted up so as to answer the purpose of a reading-room, and it is intended to make it a museum of all the natural curiosities of Africa, which can be procured.’

No efforts have been spared to place the colony in a state of adequate defence, and while it is regarded as perfectly secure from the native forces, it is hoped and believed, that it may sustain itself against any piratical assaults. ‘The establishment has fifteen large carriage guns and three small pivot guns, all fit for service.’ Fort Stockton overlooks the whole town of Monrovia, and a strong battery is now building on the height of Thompson-town, near the extremity of the cape, which it is thought will afford protection to vessels anchoring in the roadstead. The militia of the colony consists of two corps appropriately uniformed, one of artillery of about fifty men, the other of infantry of forty men, and on various occasions have they proved themselves deficient neither in discipline nor courage.

EXTRACTS FROM THE REV. J. ASHMUN’S REPORT OF THE COLONY.

The money expended on these various objects has necessarily been considerable; but, in comparison with the expense which similar objects in this country cost European governments, it will be found not merely moderate, but trifling. Less than has been effected towards the extension of our limits, I could not attempt: and I am certain that where the direction of every other establishment on the coast, except the Portuguese, would regard itself not only authorized, but obliged, to pay away thousands, I have in countless instances spent not a dollar. But that species of economy which sacrifices to itself any object essential to the success of this undertaking, I am as little able to practice as the board is to approve.

The natives of the country, but particularly of the interior, notwithstanding their habitual indolence, produce, after supplying their own wants, a considerable surplus of the great staple of this part of Western Africa, rice. The moderate rate at which this grain is purchased by such as deal directly with the growers, and the various uses of which it is susceptible in the domestic economy, easily place the means of supplying the first necessities of nature in the reach of every one. Rice, moreover, always commands a ready sale with transient trading vessels or coasters; and forms a useful object of exchange for other provisions and necessaries, between individuals of the colony.

To this succeeds, as next in importance, the camwood of the country, of which several hundred tons every year pass through the hands of the settlers, and serve to introduce, in return, the provisions and groceries of America; and the dry goods and wares, both of Europe and America, which, from the necessary dependence of the members of every society on each other, come soon to be distributed, for the common advantage of all.

The ivory of Liberia is less abundant, and less valuable, than that of other districts of Western Africa. It, however, forms a valuable article of barter and export, to the settlement; and the amount annually bought and sold, falls between five and eight thousand dollars.

No less than FIVE schools for different descriptions of learners, exclusive of the Sunday schools, have been supported during the year, and still continue in operation. The youths and children of the colony discover, for their age, unequivocal proofs of a good degree of mental accomplishment. The contrast between children several years in the enjoyment of the advantages of the colony, and most others of the same age, arriving from the United States, is striking, and would leave an entire stranger at no loss to distinguish the one from the other. Should emigration, but for a very few months, cease to throw the little ignorants into the colony, from abroad, the phenomenon of a child of five years, unable to read, it is believed, would not exist among us.

The first successful essay in the construction of small vessels, has been made the past year. I have built, and put upon the rice trade, between our factories to the leeward, and cape Montserado, a schooner of ten tons burthen, adapted to the passage of the bars of all the navigable rivers of the coast. The sailing qualities of this vessel are so superior, that before the wind, it is believed, few, or none of the numerous pirates of the coast, can overtake her. She makes a trip, freighted both ways, in ten days; and commonly carries and brings merchandise and produce, to the amount of from four to eight hundred dollars each trip. Another craft of equal tonnage, but of very indifferent materials, has been built by one of the colonists. The model of the St. Paul’s (the public boat) was furnished by myself; but she was constructed under the superintendence of J. Blake, who has thus entitled himself to the character of a useful and ingenious mechanic.

One of the most obvious effects of this colony, has already been to check, in this part of Africa, the prevalence of the slave-trade. The promptness and severity with which our arms have, in every instance, avenged the insults and injuries offered by slave ships and factories to the colony, have, I may confidently say, banished it for ever from this district of the coast. Our influence with the natives of this section of the coast, is known to be so great as to expose to certain miscarriage, any transaction entered into with them for slaves. But there is a moral feeling at work in the minds of most of our neighbors, contracted, doubtless, by means of their intercourse with the colony, which represents to them the dark business in a new aspect of repulsiveness and absurdity. Most are convinced that it is indeed a bad business, and are apparently sincere in their determination to drop it for ever, unless compelled by their wants to adventure a few occasional speculations.

In the punishment of offences, the most lenient maxims of modern jurisprudence have been observed, by way of experiment on human nature, in that particular modification of it exhibited by the population of this colony. The result has been, so far, favorable to the policy pursued. The passion to which corporeal and other ignominious punishments address their arguments, is certainly one of the least ingenuous of the human constitution.

EXTRACTS FROM A MEMORIAL FROM THE FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR TO THE CITIZENS OF BALTIMORE.

We have hitherto beheld, in silence, but with the intensest interest, the efforts of the wise and philanthropic in our behalf. If it became us to be silent, it became us also to feel the liveliest anxiety and gratitude.

The time has now arrived, as we believe, in which your work and our happiness may be promoted by the expression of our opinions. We have therefore assembled for that purpose, from every quarter of the city, and every denomination, to offer you this respectful address, with all the weight and influence which our number, character, and cause, can lend it.

We reside among you, and yet are strangers; natives, and yet not citizens; surrounded by the freest people and most republican institutions in the world, and yet enjoying none of the immunities of freedom.

It is not to be imputed to you that we are here. Your ancestors remonstrated against the introduction of the first of our race, who were brought amongst you; and it was the mother country that insisted on their admission, that her colonies and she might profit, as she thought, by their compulsory labor. But the gift was a curse to them, without being an advantage to herself. The colonies, grown to womanhood, burst from her dominion; and if they have an angry recollection of their union and rupture, it must be at the sight of the baneful institution which she has entailed upon them.

How much you regret its existence among you, is shown by the severe laws you have enacted against the slave-trade, and by your employment of a naval force for its suppression. You have gone still further. Not content with checking the increase of the already too growing evil, you have deliberated how you might best exterminate the evil itself. This delicate and important subject has produced a great variety of opinions; but we find, even in that diversity, a consolatory proof of the interest with which you regard the subject, and of your readiness to adopt that scheme which may appear to be the best.

Leaving out all considerations of generosity, humanity, and benevolence, you have the strongest reasons to favor and facilitate the withdrawal from among you of such as wish to remove. It ill consists, in the first place, with your republican principles, and with the health and moral sense of the body politic, that there should be, in the midst of you, an extraneous mass of men, united to you only by soil and climate, and irrevocably excluded from your institutions. Nor is it less for your advantage in another point of view. Our places might, in our opinion, be better occupied by men of your own color, who would increase the strength of your country. In the pursuit of livelihood, and the exercise of industrious habits, we necessarily exclude from employment many of the whites, your fellow-citizens, who would find it easier, in proportion as we depart, to provide for themselves and their families.

But if you have every reason to wish for our removal, how much greater are our inducements to remove! Though we are not slaves, we are not free. We do not, and never shall, participate in the enviable privileges which we continually witness. Beyond a mere subsistence, and the impulse of religion, there is nothing to arouse us to the exercise of our faculties, or excite us to the attainment of eminence.

Of the many schemes that have been proposed, we most approve of that of African colonization. If we were able, and at liberty to go whithersoever we would, the greater number, willing to leave this community, would prefer LIBERIA, on the coast of Africa. Others, no doubt, would turn them towards some other regions; the world is wide. Already established there, in the settlement of the American colonization society, are many of our brethren, the pioneers of African restoration, who encourage us to join them. Several were formerly residents of this city, and highly considered by the people of their own class and color. They have been planted at cape Montserado, the most eligible, and one of the most elevated sites on the western coast of Africa, selected in 1821; and their number has augmented to five hundred. Able, as we are informed, to provide for their own defence and support, and capable of self-increase, they are now enjoying all the necessaries and comforts, and many of the luxuries of larger and older communities. In Africa we shall be freemen indeed, and republicans, after the model of this republic. We shall carry your language, your customs, your opinions and christianity to that now desolate shore, and thence they will gradually spread, with our growth, far into the continent. The slave-trade, both external and internal, can be abolished only by settlements on the coast. Africa, if destined to be ever civilized and converted, can be civilized and converted by that means only.

We foresee that difficulties and dangers await those who emigrate, such as every infant establishment must encounter and endure; such as your fathers suffered, when first they landed on this now happy shore.

The portion of comforts which they may lose, they will cheerfully abandon. Human happiness does not consist in meat and drink, nor in costly raiment, nor in stately habitations; to contribute to it even, they must be joined with equal rights, and respectability, and it often exists in a high degree without them.

That you may facilitate the withdrawal from among you of such as wish to remove, is what we now solicit. It can best be done, we think, by augmenting the means at the command of the American Colonization Society, that the colony of Liberia may be strengthened and improved for their gradual reception. The greater the number of persons sent thither, from any part of this nation whatsoever, so much the more capable it becomes of receiving a still greater. Every encouragement to it, therefore, though it may not seem to have any particular portion of emigrants directly in view, will produce a favorable effect upon all. The emigrants may readily be enabled to remove, in considerable numbers every fall, by a concerted system of individual contributions, and still more efficiently by the enactment of laws to promote their emigration, under the patronage of the state. The expense would not be nearly so great as it might appear at first sight; for, when once the current shall have set towards Liberia, and intercourse grown frequent, the cost will, of course, diminish rapidly, and many will be able to defray it for themselves. Thousands and tens of thousands poorer than we, annually emigrate from Europe to your country, and soon have it in their power to hasten the arrival of those they left behind. Every intelligent and industrious colored man would continually look forward to the day, when he or his children might go to their veritable home, and would accumulate all his little earnings for that purpose.

We have ventured these remarks, because we know that you take a kind concern in the subject to which they relate, and because we think they may assist you in the prosecution of your designs. If we were doubtful of your good will and benevolent intentions, we would remind you of the time when you were in a situation similar to ours, and when your forefathers were driven, by religious persecution, to a distant and inhospitable shore. We are not so persecuted; but we, too, leave our homes, and seek a distant and inhospitable shore: an empire may be the result of our emigration, as of their’s. The protection, kindness, and assistance which you would have desired for yourselves under such circumstances, now extend to us: so may you be rewarded by the riddance of the stain and evil of slavery, the extension of civilization and the gospel, and the blessings of our common Creator!

WILLIAM CORNISH,

Chairman of the meeting in Bethel church.

ROBERT COWLEY,

Secretary of the meeting in Bethel church.

JAMES DEAVER,

Chairman of the meeting in the African church, Sharp street.

REMUS HARVEY.

Secretary of the meeting in the African church, Sharp street.

ON THE CHARGE OF CORRUPTION.

AT LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY, JULY 12, 1827.

[IN June, 1827, Mr. Carter Beverley, of Virginia, published in the United States Telegraph, printed at Washington, a letter from general Jackson, charging Mr. Clay with corrupt motives in having voted for his competitor, Mr. Adams, for president of the United States, in the election by congress, in 1825. Mr. Clay being on a visit to Kentucky during the same summer, attended various meetings of his former constituents and friends, who were desirous of testifying their continued regard for him. At a public dinner given him at Lexington, the following toast was given, in the course of his answer to which, Mr. Clay takes the opportunity to refute the charges of general Jackson against him, as will be seen in the subjoined remarks.]

‘Our distinguished guest, HENRY CLAY. The furnace of persecution may be heated seven times hotter, and seventy times more he will come out unscathed by the fire of malignity, brighter to all and dearer to his friends: while his enemies shall sink with the dross of their own vile materials.’

MR. PRESIDENT, FRIENDS, AND FELLOW-CITIZENS,

I beg permission to offer my hearty thanks, and to make my respectful acknowledgments, for the affectionate reception which has been given me during my present visit to my old congressional district, and for this hospitable and honorable testimony of your esteem and confidence. And I thank you especially for the friendly sentiments and feelings expressed in the toast which you have just done me the honor to drink. I always had the happiness of knowing that I enjoyed, in a high degree, the attachment of that portion of my fellow-citizens whom I formerly represented; but I should never have been sensible of the strength and ardor of their affection, except for the extraordinary character of the times. For near two years and a half I have been assailed with a rancor and bitterness which have few examples. I have found myself the particular object of concerted and concentrated abuse; and others, thrusting themselves between you and me, have dared to arraign me for treachery to your interests. But my former constituents, unaffected by the calumnies which have been so perseveringly circulated to my prejudice, have stood by me with a generous confidence and a noble magnanimity. The measure of their regard and confidence has risen with, and even surpassed, that of the malevolence, great as it is, of my personal and political foes. I thank you, gentlemen, who are a large portion of my late constituents. I thank you, and every one of them, with all my heart, for the manly support which I have uniformly received. It has cheered and consoled me, amidst all my severe trials; and may I not add, that it is honorable to the generous hearts and enlightened heads who have resolved to protect the character of an old friend and faithful servant.

The numerous manifestations of your confidence and attachment will be among the latest and most treasured recollections of my life. They impose upon me obligations which can never be weakened or cancelled. One of these obligations is, that I should embrace every fair opportunity to vindicate that character which you have so generously sustained, and to evince to you and to the world, that you have not yielded to the impulses of a blind and enthusiastic sentiment. I feel that I am, on all fit occasions, especially bound to vindicate myself to my former constituents. It was as their representative, it was in fulfilment of a high trust which they confided to me, that I have been accused of violating the most sacred of duties—of treating their wishes with contempt, and their interests with treachery. Nor is this obligation, in my conception of its import, at all weakened by the dissolution of the relations which heretofore existed between us. I would instantly resign the place I hold in the councils of the nation, and directly appeal to the suffrages of my late constituents, as a candidate for reëlection, if I did not know that my foes are of that class whom one rising from the dead cannot convince, whom nothing can silence, and who wage a war of extermination. On the issue of such an appeal they would redouble their abuse of you and of me, for their hatred is common to us both.

They have compelled me so often to be the theme of my addresses to the people, that I should have willingly abstained, on this festive occasion, from any allusion to this subject, but for a new and imposing form which the calumny against me has recently assumed. I am again put on my defence, not of any new charge, nor by any new adversary; but of the old charges, clad in a new dress, and exhibited by an open and undisguised enemy. The fictitious names have been stricken from the foot of the indictment, and that of a known and substantial prosecutor has been voluntarily offered. Undaunted by the formidable name of that prosecutor, I will avail myself, with your indulgence, of this fit opportunity of free and unreserved intercourse with you, as a large number of my late constituents, to make some observations on the past and present state of the question. When evidence shall be produced, as I have now a clear right to demand, in support of the accusation, it will be the proper time for me to take such notice of it as its nature shall require.

In February, 1825, it was my duty, as the representative of this district, to vote for some one of the three candidates for the presidency, who were returned to the house of representatives. It has been established, and can be further proved, that, before I left this state the preceding fall, I communicated to several gentlemen of the highest respectability, my fixed determination not to vote for general Jackson. The friends of Mr. Crawford asserted to the last, that the condition of his health was such as to enable him to administer the duties of the office. I thought otherwise, after I reached Washington city, and visited him to satisfy myself; and thought that physical impediment, if there were no other objections, ought to prevent his election. Although the delegations from four states voted for him, and his pretensions were zealously pressed to the very last moment, it has been of late asserted, and I believe by some of the very persons who then warmly espoused his cause, that his incompetency was so palpable as clearly to limit the choice to two of the three returned candidates. In my view of my duty, there was no alternative but that which I embraced. That I had some objections to Mr. Adams, I am ready freely to admit; but these did not weigh a feather in comparison with the greater and insurmountable objections, long and deliberately entertained against his competitor. I take this occasion, with great satisfaction, to state, that my objections to Mr. Adams arose chiefly from apprehensions which have not been realized. I have found him at the head of the government able, enlightened, patient of investigation, and ever ready to receive with respect, and, when approved by his judgment, to act upon, the counsels of his official advisers. I add, with unmixed pleasure, that, from the commencement of the government, with the exception of Mr. Jefferson’s administration, no chief magistrate has found the members of his cabinet so united on all public measures, and so cordial and friendly in all their intercourse, private and official, as these are of the present president.

Had I voted for general Jackson, in opposition to the well-known opinions which I entertained of him, one tenth part of the ingenuity and zeal which have been employed to excite prejudices against me, would have held me up to universal contempt; and what would have been worse, I should have felt that I really deserved it.

Before the election, an attempt was made by an abusive letter, published in the Columbian Observer, at Philadelphia, a paper which, as has since transpired, was sustained by Mr. senator Eaton, the colleague, the friend, and the biographer of general Jackson, to assail my motives, and to deter me in the exercise of my duty. This letter being avowed by Mr. George Kremer, I instantly demanded from the house of representatives an investigation. A committee was accordingly, on the fifth day of February, 1825, appointed in the rare mode of balloting by the house, instead of by selection of the speaker. It was composed of some of the leading members of that body, not one of whom was my political friend in the preceding presidential canvass. Although Mr. Kremer, in addressing the house, had declared his willingness to bring forward his proofs, and his readiness to abide the issue of the inquiry, his fears, or other counsels than his own, prevailed upon him to take refuge in a miserable subterfuge. Of all possible periods, that was the most fitting to substantiate the charge, if it were true. Every circumstance was then fresh; the witnesses all living and present; the election not yet complete; and therefore the imputed corrupt bargain not fulfilled. All these powerful considerations had no weight with the conspirators and their accessories, and they meanly shrunk from even an attempt to prove their charge, for the best of all possible reasons—because, being false and fabricated, they could adduce no proof which was not false and fabricated.

During two years and a half, which have now intervened, a portion of the press devoted to the cause of general Jackson has been teeming with the vilest calumnies against me, and the charge, under every chameleon form, has been a thousand times repeated. Up to this time, I have in vain invited investigation, and demanded evidence. None, not a particle, has been adduced.

The extraordinary ground has been taken, that the accusers were not bound to establish by proof the guilt of their designated victim. In a civilized, christian, and free community, the monstrous principle has been assumed, that accusation and conviction are synonymous; and that the persons who deliberately bring forward an atrocious charge are exempted from all obligations to substantiate it! And the pretext is, that the crime, being of a political nature, is shrouded in darkness, and incapable of being substantiated. But is there any real difference, in this respect, between political and other offences? Do not all the perpetrators of crime endeavor to conceal their guilt and to elude detection? If the accuser of a political offence is absolved from the duty of supporting his accusation, every other accuser of offence stands equally absolved. Such a principle, practically carried into society, would subvert all harmony, peace, and tranquillity. None—no age, nor sex, nor profession, nor calling—would be safe against its baleful and overwhelming influence. It would amount to a universal license to universal calumny!

No one has ever contended that the proof should be exclusively that of eye-witnesses, testifying from their senses positively and directly to the fact. Political, like other offences, may be established by circumstantial as well as positive evidence. But I do contend, that some evidence, be it what it may, ought to be exhibited. If there be none, how do the accusers know that an offence has been perpetrated? If they do know it, let us have the fact on which their conviction is based. I will not even assert, that, in public affairs, a citizen has not a right freely to express his opinions of public men, and to speculate upon the motives of their conduct. But if he chooses to promulgate opinions, let them be given as opinions. The public will correctly judge of their value and their grounds. No one has a right to put forth a positive assertion, that a political offence has been committed, unless he stands prepared to sustain, by satisfactory proof of some kind, its actual existence.

If he who exhibits a charge of political crime is, from its very nature, disabled to establish it, how much more difficult is the condition of the accused? How can he exhibit negative proof of his innocence, if no affirmative proof of his guilt is or can be adduced?

It must have been a conviction that the justice of the public required a definite charge, by a responsible accuser, that has at last extorted from general Jackson his letter of the sixth of June, lately published. I approach that letter with great reluctance, not on my own account, for on that I do most heartily and sincerely rejoice that it has made its appearance. But it is reluctance, excited by the feelings of respect which I would anxiously have cultivated towards its author. He has, however, by that letter, created such relations between us, that, in any language which I may employ, in examining its contents, I feel myself bound by no other obligations than those which belong to truth, to public decorum, and to myself.

The first consideration which must, on the perusal of the letter, force itself upon every reflecting mind, is that which arises out of the delicate posture in which general Jackson stands before the American public. He is a candidate for the presidency, avowed and proclaimed. He has no competitor at present, and there is no probability of his having any, but one. The charges which he has allowed himself to be the organ of communicating to the very public who is to decide the question of the presidency, though directly aimed at me, necessarily implicate his only competitor. Mr. Adams and myself are both guilty, or we are both innocent of the imputed arrangement between us. His innocence is absolutely irreconcilable with my guilt. If general Jackson, therefore, can establish my guilt, and, by inference or by insinuation, that of his sole rival, he will have removed a great obstacle to the consummation of the object of his ambition. And if he can, at the same time, make out his own purity of conduct, and impress the American people with the belief, that his purity and integrity alone prevented his success before the house of representatives, his claims will become absolutely irresistible. Were there ever more powerful motives to propagate, was there ever greater interest, at all hazards, to prove the truth of charges?

I state the case, I hope, fairly; I mean to state it fairly and fearlessly. If the position be one which exposes general Jackson to unfavorable suspicions, it must be borne in mind that he has voluntarily taken it, and he must abide the consequences. I am acting on the defensive, and it is he who assails me, and who has called forth, by the eternal laws of self-protection, the right to use all legitimate means of self-defence.

General Jackson has shown in his letter, that he is not exempt from the influence of that bias towards one’s own interest, which is unfortunately the too common lot of human nature. It is his interest to make out that he is a person of spotless innocence, and of unsullied integrity; and to establish by direct charge, or by necessary inference, the want of those qualities in his rival. Accordingly, we find, throughout the letter, a labored attempt to set forth his own immaculate purity in striking contrast with the corruption which is attributed to others. We would imagine from his letter, that he very seldom touches a newspaper. The Telegraph is mailed regularly for him at Washington, but it arrives at the Hermitage very irregularly. He would have the public to infer, that the postmaster at Nashville, whose appointment happened not to be upon his recommendation, obstructed his reception of it. In consequence of his not receiving the Telegraph, he had not on the sixth of June, 1827, seen Carter Beverley’s famous Fayetteville letter, dated the eighth of the preceding March, published in numerous gazettes, and published, I have very little doubt, although I have not the means of ascertaining the fact, in the gazettes of Nashville. I will not say, contrary to general Jackson’s assertion, that he had never read that letter, when he wrote that of the sixth of June, but I must think that it is very strange that he should not have seen it; and I doubt whether there is another man of any political eminence in the United States who has not read it. There is a remarkable coincidence between general Jackson and certain editors who espouse his interest, in relation to Mr. Beverley’s letter. They very early took the ground, in respect to it, that I ought, under my own signature, to come out and deny the statements. And general Jackson now says, in his letter of the sixth of June, that he ‘always intended, should Mr. Clay come out over his own signature, and deny having any knowledge of the communication made by his friends to my friends and to me, that I would give him the name of the gentleman through whom that communication came.’

The distinguished member of congress who bore the alleged overture, according to general Jackson, presented himself with diplomatic circumspection, lest he should wound the very great sensibility of the general. He avers that the communication was intended with the most friendly motives, ‘that he came as a friend,’ and that he hoped, however it might be received, there would be no alteration in the friendly feelings between them. The general graciously condescends to receive the communication, and, in consideration of the high standing of the distinguished member, and of his having always been a professed friend, he is promised impunity, and assured that there shall be no change of amicable ties. After all these necessary preliminaries are arranged between the high negotiating powers, the envoy proceeds: ‘he had been informed by the friends of Mr. Clay, that the friends of Mr. Adams had made overtures to them, saying if Mr. Clay and his friends would unite in aid of the election of Mr. Adams, Mr. Clay should be secretary of state; that the friends of Mr. Adams were urging, as a reason to induce the friends of Mr. Clay to accede to their proposition, that if I was elected president, Mr. Adams would be continued secretary of state, (inuendo, there would be no room for Kentucky.)’ [Is this general Jackson’s inuendo, or that of the distinguished member of congress?] ‘That the friends of Mr. Clay stated the west does not want to separate from the west, and if I would say, or permit any of my confidential friends to say that, in case I was elected president, Mr. Adams should not be continued secretary of state, by a complete union of Mr. Clay and his friends, they would put an end to the presidential contest in one hour; and he was of opinion it was right to fight such intriguers with their own weapons.’ To which the general states himself to have replied in substance, ‘that in politics, as in every thing else, my guide was principle, and contrary to the expressed and unbiased will of the people or their constituted agents, I never would step into the presidential chair; and requested him to say to Mr. Clay and his friends, (for I did suppose he had come from Mr. Clay, although he used the terms Mr. Clay’s friends,) that before I would reach the presidential chair by such means of bargain and corruption, I would see the earth open and swallow both Mr. Clay and his friends and myself with them.’ Now all these professions are very fine, and display admirable purity. But its sublimity would be somewhat more impressive, if some person other than general Jackson had proclaimed it. He would go into the presidential chair, but never, no! never, contrary to ‘the expressed and unbiased will of the people, or their constituted agents:’ two modes of arriving at it the more reasonable, as there happens to be no other constituted way. He would see ‘the earth open and swallow both Mr. Clay and his friends and myself,’ before he would reach the presidential chair by ‘such means of bargain and corruption.’ I hope general Jackson did not intend that the whole human race should be also swallowed up, on the contingency he has stated, or that they were to guaranty that he has an absolute repugnance to the employment of any exceptionable means to secure his elevation to the presidency. If he had rendered the distinguished member of congress a little more distinguished, by instantly ordering him from his presence, and by forthwith denouncing him and the infamous propositions which he bore, to the American public, we should be a little better prepared to admit the claims to untarnished integrity, which the general so modestly puts forward. But, according to his own account, a corrupt and scandalous proposal is made to him; the person who conveyed it, advises him to accept it, and yet that person still retains the friendship of general Jackson, who is so tender of his character that his name is carefully concealed and reserved to be hereafter brought forward as a witness! A man, who, if he be a member of the house of representatives, is doubly infamous—infamous for the advice which he gave, and infamous for his willingness to connive at the corruption of the body of which he is a sworn member—is the credible witness by whom general Jackson stands ready to establish the corruption of men, whose characters are never questioned!

Of all the properties which belong to honorable men, not one is so highly prized as that of character. General Jackson cannot be insensible to its value, for he appears to be the most anxious to set forth the loftiness and purity of his own. How has he treated mine? During the dispensation of the hospitalities of the hermitage, in the midst of a mixed company of individuals from various states, he permits himself to make certain statements respecting my friends and me, which, if true, would forever dishonor and degrade us. The words are hardly passed from his mouth, before they are committed to paper, by one of his guests, and transmitted in the form of a letter to another state, when they are published in a newspaper, and thence circulated throughout the union. And now he pretends that these statements were made ‘without any calculation that they were to be thrown into the public journals.’ Does he reprove the indiscretion of this guest who had violated the sanctity of a conversation at the hospitable board? Far from it. The public is incredulous. It cannot be, general Jackson would be so wanting in delicacy and decorum. The guest appeals to him for the confirmation of the published statements; and the general promptly addresses a letter to him, in which ‘he unequivocally confirms (says Mr. Carter Beverley,) all I have said regarding the overture made to him pending the last presidential election before congress; and he asserts a great deal more than he ever told me.’ I should be glad to know if all the versions of the tale have now made their appearance, and whether general Jackson will allege, that he did not ‘calculate’ upon the publication of his letter of the sixth of June.

The general states that the unknown envoy used the terms, ‘Mr. Clay’s friends,’ to the exclusion, therefore, of myself, but he nevertheless inferred that he had come from me. Now, why did he draw this inference contrary to the import of the statement which he received? Does not this disposition to deduce conclusions unfavorable to me, manifest the spirit which actuates him? And does not general Jackson exhibit throughout his letter a desire to give a coloring to the statements of his friend, the distinguished member of congress, higher than they would justify? No one should ever resort to implication but from necessity. Why did he not ascertain from the envoy if he had come from me? Was any thing more natural than that general Jackson should ascertain the persons who had deputed the envoy? If his slacked sensibility and indignant virtue and patriotism would not allow him to inquire into particulars, ought he to have hazarded the assertion, that I was privy to the proposal, without assuring himself of the fact; could he not, after rejecting the proposal, continuing, as he did, on friendly terms with the organ of it, have satisfied himself if I were conusant of it? If he had not time then, might he not have ascertained the fact from his friend or from me, during the intervening two and a half years? The compunctions of his own conscience appear for a moment to have visited him towards the conclusion of his letter, for he there does say, ‘that in the supposition stated, I may have done injustice to Mr. Clay; if so, the gentleman informing me can explain.’ No good or honorable man will do another voluntarily any injustice. It was not necessary that general Jackson should have done me any. And he cannot acquit himself of the rashness and iniquity of his conduct towards me, by referring at this late day to a person whose name is withheld from the public. This compendious mode of administering justice, by first hanging and then trying a man, however justifiable it may be, according to the precepts of the Jackson code, is sanctioned by no respectable system of jurisprudence.

It is stated in the letter of the sixth of June, that the overture was made early in January; and that the second day after the communication, it ‘was announced in the newspapers, that Mr. Clay had come out openly and avowedly in favor of Mr. Adams.’ The object of this statement is obvious. It is to insinuate that the proposal which was rejected with disdain by general Jackson, was accepted with promptitude by Mr. Adams. This renders the fact as to the time of the alleged annunciation very important. It is to be regretted that general Jackson had not been a little more precise. It was early in January that the overture was made, and the second day after, the annunciation of my intention took place. Now, I will not assert that there may not have been some speculations in the newspapers about that time, (although I do not believe there were any speculations so early,) as to the probable vote which I should give; but I should be glad to see any newspaper which the second day after early in January, asserted in its columns, that I had come out ‘openly and avowedly in favor of Mr. Adams.’ I challenge the production of such a paper. I do not believe my intention so to vote for Mr. Adams was announced in the newspapers openly and avowedly during the whole month of January, or at any rate until late in that month. The only avowal of my intention to vote for him, which was publicly made in the newspapers, prior to the election, is contained in my letter to Judge Brooke, which is dated the twenty-eighth of January. It was first published in the Enquirer at Richmond, some time in the ensuing month. I go further; I do not believe any newspaper at Washington can be produced, announcing, before the latter part of January, the fact, whether upon my avowal or not, of my intention to vote for Mr. Adams. General Jackson’s memory must deceive him. He must have confounded events and circumstances. His friend, Mr. George Kremer, in his letter to the Columbian Observer bearing date the twenty-fifth of January, has, according to my recollection of the public prints, a claim to the merit of being the first, or among the first, to announce to the public my intended vote. That letter was first published at Philadelphia, and returned in the Columbian Observer to Washington city, on the thirty-first of January. How long before its date that letter was written to Mr. Kremer, does not appear. Whether there be any connection made by the distinguished member of congress, and that letter, perhaps general Jackson can explain.

At the end of more than two years after a corrupt overture has been made to general Jackson, he now, for the first time, openly proclaims it. It is true, as I have ascertained since the publication of Mr. Beverley’s Fayetteville letter, the general has been for a long time secretly circulating the charge. Immediately on the appearance at Washington of that letter in the public prints, the editor of the Telegraph asserted, in his paper, that general Jackson had communicated the overture to him about the period of the election, not as he now states, but according to Mr. Beverley’s version of the tale. Since I left Washington on the tenth of last month, I have understood that general Jackson has made a similar communication to several other persons at different and distant points. Why has the overture been thus clandestinely circulated? Was it that through the medium of the Telegraph, the leading paper supporting the interest of general Jackson, and through his other depositories, the belief of the charge should be duly and gradually infused into the public mind, and thus contribute to the support of his cause? The zeal and industry with which it has been propagated, the daily columns of certain newspapers can testify. Finding the public still unconvinced, has the general found it to be necessary to come out in proper person, through the thin veil of Mr. Carter Beverley’s agency?

When the alleged overture was made, the election remained undecided. Why did not general Jackson then hold up to universal scorn and indignation the infamous bearer of the proposal, and those who dared to insult his honor, and tamper with his integrity? If he had at that time denounced all the infamous parties concerned, demanded an inquiry in the house of representatives, and established by satisfactory proof the truth of his accusation, there might and probably would have been a different result to the election. Why, when at my instance, a committee was on the fifth day of February, 1825, (only four days before the election,) appointed to investigate the charges of Mr. Kremer, did not general Jackson present himself and establish their truth? Why, on the seventh of that month, two days before the election, when the committee reported that Mr. Kremer declined to come forward, and that ‘if they knew of any reason for such investigation, they would have asked to be clothed with the proper power, but not having themselves any such knowledge, they have felt it to be their duty only to lay before the house the communication which they have received;’ why did not general Jackson authorize a motion to recommit the report, and manfully come forward with all his information? The congress of the nation is in session. An important election has devolved on it. All eyes are turned towards Washington. The result is awaited with intense anxiety and breathless expectation. A corrupt proposition, affecting the election, is made to one of the candidates. He receives it, is advised to accept it, deliberates, decides upon it. A committee is in session to investigate the very charge. The candidate, notwithstanding, remains profoundly silent, and, after the lapse of more than two years, when the period of another election is rapidly approaching, in which he is the only competitor for the office, for the first time, announces it to the American republic! They must have more than an ordinary share of credulity who do not believe that general Jackson labors under some extraordinary delusion.

It is possible that he may urge by way of excuse, for what must be deemed his culpable concealment of meditated corruption, that he did not like to volunteer as a witness before the committee, or to transmit to it the name of his friend, the distinguished member of the house of representatives, although it is not very easy to discern any just reason for his volunteering now, which would not have applied with more force at that time. But what apology can be made for his failure to discharge his sacred duty as an American senator? More than two months after the alleged overture, my nomination to the office which I now hold, was made to the senate of the United States, of which general Jackson was then a sworn member. On that nomination he had to deliberate and to act in the most solemn manner. If I were privy to a corrupt proposal to general Jackson, touching the recent election; if I had entered into a corrupt bargain with Mr. Adams to secure his elevation, I was unworthy of the office to which I was nominated; and it was the duty of general Jackson, if he really possessed the information which he now puts forward, to have moved the senate to appoint a committee of inquiry, and by establishing my guilt, to have preserved the national councils from an abominable contamination. As the conspiracy of George Kremer & Co. had a short time before meanly shrunk from appearing before the committee of the house of representatives, to make good their charges, I requested a senator of the United States, when my nomination should be taken up, to ask of the senate the appointment of a committee of inquiry, unless it should appear to him to be altogether unnecessary. One of our senators was compelled, by the urgency of his private business, to leave Washington before my nomination was disposed of; and as I had but little confidence in the fidelity and professed friendship of the other, I was constrained to present my application to a senator from another state. I was afterwards informed that when it was acted upon, general Jackson, and every other senator present, was silent as to the imputation now made; no one presuming to question my honor or integrity. How can general Jackson justify to his conscience or to his country, this palpable breach of his public duty? It is in vain to say that he gave a silent negative vote. He was in possession of information which, if true, must have occasioned the rejection of my nomination. It does not appear that any other senator possessed the same information. Investigation was alike due to the purity of the national councils, to me, and, as an act of strict justice, to all the other parties implicated. It is impossible for him to escape from the dilemma that he has been faithless as a senator of the United States, or has lent himself to the circulation of an atrocious calumny.

After the election, general Jackson was among the first who eagerly pressed his congratulations upon his successful rival. If Mr. Adams had been guilty of the employment of impure means to effect his election, general Jackson ought to have disdained to sully his own hands by touching those of his corrupt competitor.

On the tenth of February, 1825, the very next day after the election, general Jackson was invited to a public dinner at Washington, by some of his friends. He expressed to them his wish that he might be excused from accepting the invitation, because, alluding to the recent election, he said, ‘any evidence of kindness and regard, such as you propose, might, by many, be viewed as conveying with it EXCEPTION, murmurings, and feelings of complaint, which I sincerely hope belong to none of my friends.’ More than one month after the corrupt proposal is pretended to have been received, and after, according to the insinuation of general Jackson, a corrupt arrangement had been made between Mr. Adams and me: after the actual termination of an election, the issue of which was brought about, according to general Jackson, by the basest means, he was unwilling to accept the honors of a public dinner, lest it should imply even an exception against the result of the election.

General Jackson professes in his letter of the sixth of June—I quote again his words—‘to have always intended, should Mr. Clay come out over his own signature, and deny having any knowledge of the communication made by his friends to my friends, and to me, that I would give him the name of the gentleman through whom that communication came.’ He pretends never to have seen the Fayetteville letter; and yet the pretext of a denial under my signature is precisely that which had been urged by the principal editors who sustain his cause. If this be an unconcerted, it is nevertheless a most wonderful coincidence. The general never communicated to me his professed intention, but left me in entire ignorance of his generous purpose; like the overture itself, it was profoundly concealed from me. There was an authorized denial from me, which went to the circle of the public prints, immediately after the arrival at Washington of the Fayetteville letter. In that denial my words are given. They were contained in a letter dated at Washington city on the eighteenth day of April last, and are correctly stated to have been ‘that the statement that his (my) friends had made such a proposition as the latter describes to the friends of general Jackson was, as far as he knew or believed, utterly destitute of foundation; that he was unwilling to believe that general Jackson had made any such statement; but that no matter with whom it had originated, he was fully persuaded it was a gross fabrication of the same calumnious character with the Kremer story, put forth for the double purpose of injuring his public character, and propping the cause of general Jackson; and then for himself and for his friends he defied the substantiation of the charge before any fair tribunal whatever.’ Such were my own words, transmitted in the form of a letter from a friend to a known person. Whereas the charge which they repelled was contained in a letter written by a person then unknown to some person also unknown. Did I not deny the charge under my own signature, in my card of the thirty-first of January, 1825, published in the National Intelligencer? Was not there a substantial denial of it in my letter to Judge Brooke, dated the twenty-eighth of the same month? In my circular to my constituents? In my Lewisburg speech? And may I not add, in the whole tenor of my public life and conduct? If general Jackson had offered to furnish me the name of a member of congress, who was capable of advising his acceptance of a base and corrupt proposition, ought I to have resorted to his infamous and discredited witness?

It has been a thousand times asserted and repeated, that I violated instructions which I ought to have obeyed. I deny the charge; and I am happy to have this opportunity of denying it in the presence of my assembled constituents. The general assembly requested the Kentucky delegation to vote in a particular way. A majority of that delegation, including myself, voted in opposition to that request. The legislature did not intend to give an imperative instruction. The distinction between a request and an instruction was familiar to the legislature, and their rolls attest that the former is always addressed to the members of the house of representatives, and the latter only to the senators of the United States.

But I do not rely exclusively on this recognised distinction. I dispute at once the right of the legislature to issue a mandatory instruction to the representatives of the people. Such a right has no foundation in the constitution, in the reason or nature of things, nor in usage of the Kentucky legislature. Its exercise would be a manifest usurpation. The general assembly has the incontrovertible right to express its opinions and to proclaim its wishes on any political subject whatever; and to such an expression great deference and respect are due; but it is not obligatory. The people, when, in August, 1824, they elected members to the general assembly, did not invest them with any power to regulate or control the exercise of the discretion of the Kentucky delegation in the congress of the United States. I put it to the candor of every elector present, if he intended to part with his own right, or anticipated the exertion of any such power, by the legislature, when he gave his vote in August, 1824?

The only instruction which I received from a legitimate source, emanated from a respectable portion of my immediate constituents; and that directed me to exercise my own discretion, regardless of the will of the legislature. You subsequently ratified my vote by unequivocal demonstrations, repeatedly given, of your affectionate attachment and your unshaken confidence. You ratified it two years ago, by the election of my personal and political friend, (judge Clarke) to succeed me in the house of representatives, who had himself subscribed the only legitimate instruction which I received. You ratify it by the presence and the approbation, of this vast and respectable assemblage.

I rejoice again and again, that the contest has at last assumed its present practical form. Heretofore, malignant whispers and dark surmises have been clandestinely circulated, or openly or unblushingly uttered by irresponsible agents. They were borne upon the winds, and like them were invisible and intangible. No responsible man stood forward to sustain them, with his acknowledged authority. They have at last a local habitation and a name. General Jackson has now thrown off the mask and comes confessedly forth from behind his concealed batteries, publicly to accuse and convict me. We stand confronted before the American people. Pronouncing the charges, as I again do, destitute of all foundation, and gross aspersions, whether clandestinely or openly issued from the halls of the capitol, the saloons of the hermitage, or by press, by pen, or by tongue, and safely resting on my conscious integrity, I demanded the witness, and await the event with fearless confidence.

The issue is fairly joined. The imputed offence does not comprehend a single friend, but the collective body of my friends in congress; and it accuses them of offering, and me with sanctioning, corrupt propositions, derogating from honor, and in violation of the most sacred of duties. The charge has been made after two years deliberation. General Jackson has voluntarily taken his position, and without provocation. In voting against him as president of the United States, I gave him no just cause of offence. I exercised no more than my indisputable privilege, as, on a subsequent occasion, of which I have never complained, he exercised his in voting against me as secretary of state. Had I voted for him, I must have gone counter to every fixed principle of my public life. I believed him incompetent, and his election fraught with danger. At this early period of the republic, keeping steadily in view the dangers which had overturned every other free state, I believed it to be essential to the lasting preservation of our liberties, that a man, devoid of civil talents, and offering no recommendation but one founded on military service, should not be selected to administer the government. I believe so yet; and I shall consider the days of the commonwealth numbered, when an opposite principle is established. I believed, and still believe, that now, when our institutions are in comparative infancy, is the time to establish the great principle, that military qualification alone is not a sufficient title to the presidency. If we start right, we may run a long race of liberty, happiness, and glory. If we stumble in setting out, we shall fall as others have fallen before us, and fall without even a claim to the regrets or sympathies of mankind.

I have never done general Jackson, knowingly, any injustice. I have taken pleasure, on every proper occasion, to bestow on him merited praise, for the glorious issue of the battle of New Orleans. No American citizen enjoyed higher satisfaction than I did with the event. I heard it for the first time on the boulevards of Paris; and I eagerly perused the details of the actions, with the anxious hope that I should find that the gallant militia of my own state had avenged, on the banks of the Mississippi, the blood which they had so freely spilt on the disastrous field of Raisin. That hope was not then gratified; and although I had the mortification to read in the official statement, that they ingloriously fled, I was nevertheless thankful for the success of the arms of my country, and felt grateful to him who had most contributed to the ever memorable victory. This concession is not now made for the purpose of conciliating the favor or mitigating the wrath of general Jackson. He has erected an impassable barrier between us, and I would scorn to accept any favor at his hands. I thank my God that He has endowed me with a soul incapable of apprehensions from the anger of any being but himself.

ON HEEDLESS ENTHUSIASM FOR MERE MILITARY RENOWN.

DELIVERED AT BALTIMORE, MAY 13, 1828.

[MR. CLAY having visited Philadelphia in the spring of 1828, for the purpose of consulting a medical gentleman, on the state of his health, which at that period was exceedingly delicate, was invited by a committee, in behalf of his friends in Baltimore, to remain in that city a short time, on his return. He arrived there on Monday afternoon, the twelfth of May, of the above year, and was greeted with even more than usual enthusiasm. The next day, Mr. Clay received the visits and congratulations of his fellow-citizens of Baltimore, who thronged in vast numbers, to press the right hand so often raised in their eloquent defence. Having declined a public dinner, he partook of one in company with the committee who attended upon him, and the chairmen of the various ward committees of the city, on which occasion the following, among other toasts, were drank:—

1. The president of the United States.

2. A great statesman has said, ‘What is a public man worth, who will not suffer for his country?’ We have seen a public man sacrifice much for his country, and rise resplendently triumphant over the calumnies of his enemies.]

MR. CLAY then rose, (evidently laboring under debility from indisposition, probably increased by the ceremonies of the day,) and said, ‘Although I have been required, by the advice of my physicians, to abstain from all social entertainments, with their consequent excitements, I cannot leave Baltimore, without saying a few words, by way of public acknowledgment, for the cordial congratulations with which I have been received during my present visit. I am not so vain, indeed, as to imagine that any personal considerations have prompted the enthusiastic demonstrations by which my approach to this city, and my short sojourn, have been so highly distinguished. Their honored object, has, it is true, some claims upon the justice, if not the sympathy, of a generous, intelligent, and high-minded people. Singled out for proscription and destruction, he has sustained all the fury of the most ferocious attacks. Calumnious charges, directed against the honor of his public character, dearer than life itself, sanctioned and republished by one who should have scorned to lend himself to such a vile purpose, have been echoed by a thousand profligate or deluded tongues and presses. Supported by the consciousness of having faithfully discharged his duty, and defended by the virtue and intelligence of an enlightened people, he has stood firm and erect amidst all the bellowings of the political storm. What is a public man, what is any man worth, who is not prepared to sacrifice himself, if necessary, for the good of his country?

‘But,’ continued Mr. Clay, ‘the demonstrations which I have here witnessed, have a higher and a nobler source, than homage to an individual; they originate from that cause with which I am an humble associate—the cause of the country—the cause of the constitution—the cause of free institutions. They would otherwise be unworthy of freemen, and less gratifying to me. I am not, I hope, so uncharitable as to accuse all the opponents of that cause with designs unfriendly to human liberty. I know that they make, many of them sincerely, other professions. They talk, indeed, of republicanism, and some of them impudently claim to be the exclusive republican party! Yes! we find men who, but yesterday, were the foremost in other ranks, upon whose revolting ears the grating sound of republicanism ever fell, and upon whose lips the exotic word still awkwardly hangs, now exclaiming, or acquiescing in the cry, that they are the republican party! I had thought, if any one, more than all other principles, characterized the term republican party, it was their ardent devotion to liberty, to its safety, to all its guarantees. I had supposed, that the doctrines of that school taught us to guard against the danger of standing armies, to profit by the lessons which all history inculcates, and never to forget that liberty, and the predominance of the military principle, were utterly incompatible. The republican party! In this modern, new-fangled, and heterogeneous party, Cromwell and Cæsar have recently found apologists. The judgment of centuries is reversed; long-established maxims are overturned; the Ethiopian is washed white; and the only genuine lovers of liberty were the Philips, the Cæsars, the Cromwells, the Mariuses, and the Syllas, of former ages.

‘It is time for slumbering patriotism to awake, when such doctrines as these are put forth from the capitol, and from popular assemblies. It is time that the real republican party, (I speak not of former divisions, springing from causes no longer existing, and which are sought to be kept up by some men in particular places, only for sinister purposes,)—that party, under whatever flag its members may have heretofore acted, that party which loves freedom, for freedom’s sake—justly to estimate the impending perils, and to proceed with an energy, and union, called for by the existing crisis in the republic. Regardless of all imputations, and proud of the opportunity of free and unrestrained intercourse with all my fellow-citizens, if it were physically possible, and compatible with my official duties, I would visit every state, go to every town and hamlet, address every man in the union, and entreat them, by their love of country, by their love of liberty, for the sake of themselves and their posterity—in the name of their venerated ancestors, in the name of the human family, deeply interested in the fulfilment of the trust committed to their hands—by all the past glory which we have won—by all that awaits us as a nation—if we are true and faithful in gratitude to Him who has hitherto so signally blessed us—to pause—solemnly pause—and contemplate the precipice which yawns before us! If, indeed, we have incurred the divine displeasure, and it be necessary to chastise this people with the rod of his vengeance, I would humbly prostrate myself before Him, and implore his mercy, to visit our favored land with war, with pestilence, with famine, with any scourge other than military rule, or a blind and heedless enthusiasm for mere military renown.

‘Gentlemen, I wish I had strength to expatiate on this interesting subject; but I am admonished by the state of my health, to desist. I pray you to accept my thanks for the sentiment with which you have honored me, and your permission to offer one which I hope will be approved by you.