The resolution having been read, Mr. B. said: As it is extremely possible, Mr. Speaker, that it is designed that this resolution shall share the same fate with that which the resolution of the gentleman from New York experienced this morning, I shall be allowed at least by publicly stating, to justify to the world, the motive which induced me to bring it forward. [Mr. B. alluded to a resolution offered by Mr. T. Morris, the object of which was, to direct the Secretary of the Treasury to state to the House the amount of stamp duties collected in each State, distinguishing what part was paid by the commercial cities. When the resolution was taken up there was a call for the question. Nothing was said against the propriety of it. It being merely a call for information, and considered so much a matter of course to agree to such resolutions when no opposition was made to them, it was not supposed necessary to say any thing on the propriety and reasonableness of the resolution. Yet, to the astonishment of its friends, when the question was put, there were for it 34, against it 54.]
Gentlemen are infinitely deceived, said Mr. B., if they think our object is, by any particular mode of proceeding, to gain an unfair advantage of public opinion. If such a suspicion be entertained, our conduct has been viewed with a jaundiced eye. It is a motive which never has, and I hope never will direct our measures. If popularity is to be gained only by a prostitution of principle to ignorant and unthinking prejudice, we are content to forego it. I am far from being indifferent to public opinion; the approbation of our fellow-citizens is the only reward we can expect for our services; but it is a reward no honest man will seek, if it is to be acquired only by artifice and deception.
I have avowed and avowed sincerely, that I am disposed to go hand and hand with gentlemen in the reduction of public burdens. When it was necessary I assisted in imposing them—now that circumstances permit I more cheerfully co-operate in taking them off. My true object is to make the most of our situation; not to be deluded by empty theories, or speculative systems, but, by an enlarged view of the various interests of the country, to discover by the reduction of what taxes the society would be the most substantially benefited.
The reduction of the Military Establishment creates considerable savings; other retrenchments are contemplated in the Navy and civil administration. These savings enable us to dispense with certain taxes; but is it not wise to examine diligently the operation of the several taxes which exist, and, after being informed by the various views which belong to the subject, to exonerate the community from those which, with the least benefit, are the most burdensome?
One great objection to the internal taxes is the expense of collection. I wish to know the particulars of this expense in order to see whether it may not be curtailed. I wish also to be informed of the expenses attending each branch of the revenue, for the purpose of judging whether it may not be expedient to retain some branches, while it may be wise to part with others. These are my objects; do they not entitle us to the information asked?
We know in one instance, that the expense in collecting the stamp duty is less than five per cent. This appears by the report of the Secretary of the Treasury; but we are not informed of the particular expenses belonging to the other branches of the revenue.
Sir, said Mr. B., I must rely that the resolution will be agreed to; there is not a precedent in our annals or opposition to such a resolution; if, however, one is now to be introduced, I think it proper that the names of those gentlemen should hereafter appear by whom it was resisted, and by whom it was established. He therefore hoped the question would be taken by yeas and nays.
The Clerk, at the request of Mr. Randolph, read an extract from the report of the Secretary of the Treasury, as follows:
"It will appear by the same statement, [M,] that while the expenses of collection on merchandise and tonnage, which are defrayed out of the revenue, do not exceed four per cent., those on permanent internal duties amount to almost twenty per cent. This, however, is an inconvenience which, on account of the great number of the individuals on whom the duties are raised, and of their dispersed situation throughout the whole extent of the United States, must, more or less, attach to the system of internal taxation so long as the wants of Government shall not require any considerable extension, and the total amount of revenue shall remain inconsiderable."
Mr. T. Morris.—If the honorable gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Randolph) thinks that the extract of the report of the Secretary of the Treasury, the reading of which he has called for, furnishes the information demanded by my honorable friend from Delaware, he is mistaken. The Secretary's report gives you a general estimate of the expense of collecting the aggregate of the internal taxes, but does not specify the charge falling on each separate tax. From the statement exhibited by the Secretary, it appears that it costs twenty per cent. to collect the whole of the internal taxes; but if the detailed statement asked for by the gentleman from Delaware is furnished, it will appear that the collection of some of those taxes does not cost more than five or six per cent. To show how unfair it is to connect together the expense attending the collection of all the internal taxes, I need only refer gentlemen to an authority which I believe they will not dispute. If my memory, sir, is not very incorrect, it will appear by a publication of the present Secretary of the Treasury, written in the year 1796, that the tax on country distilleries cost in its collection near thirty per cent.; that on city distilleries about nineteen. These, sir, and other reasons, may evince the propriety of repealing the tax on country distilleries; but because this tax is expensive in its collection, because it may be liable to objections, does it follow that other taxes, such as the tax on carriages, on refined sugars, &c., which fall on the rich, and which are not expensive in the collection, does it follow, I say, that because it may be proper to repeal the first, that these are to fall too? It is, sir, in order to be enabled to make proper discrimination, to be enabled to know which of these taxes ought to be repealed, and which retained, that the gentleman from Delaware has moved his resolution. And here, sir, let me be permitted to express a hope, that the resolution now before you may not meet with the silent negative which was the fate of one intended also to procure information, and which I had the honor of laying on your table. I did and do still believe, sir, that the majority of this House could not have been actuated by proper motives in refusing that information. [Here Mr. Randolph called Mr. Morris to order, saying that he had no right to impeach the motives of members. Mr. M. observed that for his part he was at a loss to know what was considered disorderly in that House, but that he would submit to the correction of the Chair. The Speaker determined him to be in order, and Mr. M. proceeded.] With regard, sir, to the course of proceeding which gentlemen have lately adopted, persevering in an inflexible silence, rejecting every proposition made by a member in the minority, without deigning to show its fallacy, refusing public documents for our information and that of our fellow-citizens, without showing, or even pretending to show, that they are unnecessary, I can only say that it militates against all my ideas of propriety. I have always hitherto supposed that every Representative on this floor had a right to be heard; that he had a right to call on the majority for their reasons both when they supported and opposed public measures. Gentlemen may, if they please, meet in what they have denominated caucuses when power was in other hands; they may then confer together about the measures in which they may think proper to unite; but, sir, if their debates are to take place there, and there alone, if we are not to be furnished here by them with the reasons which induce them to adopt public measures, they ought at least to open their doors to the minority, in order that, if they cannot hear their arguments in the proper place, they may not close them altogether. I trust, sir, that gentlemen themselves will see the impropriety of persevering in this line of conduct, and that they will consent to pay, if not to gentlemen in the minority, at least to their propositions, the attention and respect which they may deserve.