Monday, February 23.
Mr. Pinckney, a Senator for the State of South Carolina, attended.
Thursday, February 26.
The bill to prohibit the Secretary of the Navy from carrying on any business of trade, commerce, or navigation, was read the second time, and referred to Messrs. Langdon, Nicholas, and Dayton, to consider and report thereon.
Saturday, February 28.
Retiring of the Vice President.
The Vice President addressed the Senate as follows:
Gentlemen of the Senate:
To give the usual opportunity of appointing a President, pro tempore, I now propose to retire from the chair of the Senate; and, as the time is near at hand when the relations will cease which have for some time subsisted between this honorable House and myself, I beg leave, before I withdraw, to return them my grateful thanks for all the instances of attention and respect with which they have been pleased to honor me. In the discharge of my functions here, it has been my conscientious endeavor to observe impartial justice, without regard to persons or subjects; and if I have failed of impressing this on the mind of the Senate, it will be to me a circumstance of the deepest regret. I may have erred at times—no doubt I have erred—this is the law of human nature. For honest errors, however, indulgence may be hoped.
I owe to truth and justice, at the same time, to declare, that the habits of order and decorum, which so strongly characterize the proceedings of the Senate, have rendered the umpirage of their President an office of little difficulty; that, in times and on questions which have severely tried the sensibilities of the House, calm and temperate discussion has rarely been disturbed by departures from order.