Mr. Livermore thought the bill very imperfect, and that the committee ought to rise, and recommend it to be referred to a select committee; observing, that it was extremely difficult for fifty or sixty persons to arrange and make a system of a variety of motions and observations that had been brought forward.
On the question being put, the committee rose and reported, and the bill was recommitted to a committee of ten.[33]
Monday, February 8.
Public Credit.
The House then resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union. The report of the Secretary of the Treasury relative to a provision for the support of public credit was before them. Mr. Baldwin in the chair.
After a silence of some minutes,
Mr. Livermore asked, what part of the report it was expected that gentlemen should speak to? He wished some gentleman would select such parts as he conceived to be of importance, and submit them to the committee.
Mr. Smith (of South Carolina) was of opinion, that the committee had better consider the object of the report, in separate points of view, by which means they would be able to go through the investigation with a greater degree of accuracy than if they were left to range at large in the extensive field before them. The report contains objects so various, that it is possible gentlemen may agree, with respect to one or two, and yet differ on a third: from this consideration, he was induced to suggest the idea of single and independent resolutions, and had prepared the following: if the manner met the approbation of the committee, he would lay them on the table for consideration. They were to the following effect:
Resolved, That Congress ought not adjourn, until they have adopted such measures as will make an adequate provision for the public debt.
Resolved, That in making such provision, no discrimination shall be made between the original holders of the evidences and the assignees thereof.