NO FINAL ADJOURNMENT OF CONGRESS WITHOUT INCREASED TAXATION.
Speech in the Senate, on the Resolution of Final Adjournment, July 2, 1864.
July 2d, late in the evening, this day being Saturday, it was proposed that the session of Congress should finally close on Monday, July 4th, at noon. Mr. Sumner earnestly opposed this adjournment.
MR. PRESIDENT,—In determining when to adjourn we may be guided by the experience of the past. If earlier Congresses, having less to do, infinitely less, than the present Congress, have found it necessary to continue their sessions through the summer, it is not improper to ask if we should be less industrious and less persevering.
I have in my hand a memorandum of the adjournments of Congress at the long session during the last twenty years. It is most suggestive, at least, even if not commanding to us.
The first session of the Twenty-Ninth Congress closed August 10, 1846. The war with Mexico had just begun. The first session of the Thirtieth Congress ended August 14, 1848. The main discussion of this year was on the Wilmot Proviso. The first session of the Thirty-First Congress lasted till September 30, 1850. This was the session of Compromise. The Fugitive Slave Act bears date September 18th of this year. The first session of the Thirty-Second Congress did not close till August 31, 1852. During this period the Compromise measures were much discussed, also the Presidential question, and the platforms of the two great parties. It was as late as August 26th that I had the honor of moving the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Act, being one of the Slavery compromises adopted by the previous Congress. The first session of the Thirty-Third Congress adjourned August 7, 1854. This was early for those times. The first session of the Thirty-Fourth Congress adjourned August 30, 1856, Kansas being the constant order of the day. Down to this period there was no adjournment before August, and one Congress sat as late as September 30th. But a change took place.
In 1856 the old per diem of eight dollars, as compensation of Senators and Representatives, was transmuted into the present system of compensation by an annual salary of three thousand dollars, be the session long or short. See now what ensued. The first session of the Thirty-Fifth Congress, immediately after the change of pay, closed June 14, 1858; and yet the questions of Kansas and the Lecompton Constitution were uppermost. The first session of the Thirty-Sixth Congress closed June 28, 1860, on the eve of the Presidential election, having been much occupied by the crisis of that historic conflict. Then came the long session of the Thirty-Seventh Congress, which did not adjourn till July 17, 1862, being a remarkable session, which has stored the statute-book with monuments of its industry and patriotism. Such is the record of the past; and now it is proposed to adjourn on the 4th of July.