[22] This equilibrium was soon destroyed. The merchants soon got rid of the stamp tax; but the farmers still bear a salt tax.
[23] This extra session having been called on account of expected hostilities with the French Republic, the labors of Congress were consequently limited to the two objects of defence and revenue—preparation for defence, and providing the additional revenue which the defence required. Both objects were accomplished. The three frigates—Constitution, Constellation and United States, which afterwards earned themselves a place in history—were finished and manned. A detachment of 80,000 militia was authorized. A stamp duty was imposed—a loan authorized—and the salt tax increased: the latter as a temporary measure, and with an express clause against continuance, without which it could not have passed, and in contravention of which it was continued. Defence was the great object of the session: invasion the danger: and its repulse by sea and land the remedy. Preparation against invasion was, at that time, a proper policy: the progress of science, and of the arts of peace, has superseded such policy in our day. The electric telegraph, and the steam car, have opened a new era in defensive war. Accumulated masses of volunteers, summoned by electricity and transported by steam, rushed upon the invaded point and giving incessant attacks with fresh arrivals, would exterminate any invading force; and give the cheap, effective and extemporaneous defence which the exigency required.
[24] An illustrious mission, nationally composed of the most eminent citizens, three in number, and taken from different parts of the Union, and from both political parties: Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, from South Carolina; John Marshall, from Virginia; Elbridge Gerry, from Massachusetts—the two first federal; Mr. Gerry, republican.
[25] Mr. Gallatin is not accurately reported. The exception extended to all the officers of the Federal Government, and for as long a time as their duties required them to remain in the States, and to all others for the period of six months.
[26] In a subsequent part of this same debate, Mr. Macon retracted this censure upon the Quakers, as being too general.
[27] Acts of limitation have been found necessary in all countries, and in all sorts of claims, to quiet demands, bring things to settlement, and to protect the fair dealer from stale demands, after time and accidents have deprived him of the means of invalidating them. Necessary in the transactions of individuals, they become still more so in the transactions of the Government. Its officers are constantly changing, and the knowledge of transactions continually being lost, and the representatives of the Government without the personal interest which stimulates inquiry and invigorates defence. The Government becomes helpless against claims, even the most unjustifiable, after the lapse of some years; and, without the protection of a statute of limitations, is subject to continual impositions. This was well known to the conductors of our Revolution, and the founders of our Federal Government; and they took care, as they believed, to provide against a danger which they knew to be imminent. Equally solicitous to pay every valid claim, and to avoid the payment of unjust ones, they began even during the war to call upon all claimants to present their demands—to furnish abstracts when the case was not ready to be proved up. These calls were redoubled at the conclusion of peace, were repeated during the existence of the confederation, and reiterated at the formation of the new Government under the constitution. They took the form of law, and barred the claims which were not presented within limited times. The final bar was seven years after the new Government went into operation. The committee, of which Mr. Gallatin was chairman, made an enumeration of these different statutes, and reported in favor of their observance—a report in which the House concurred, and to which Congress then conformed its action. These statutes, and the reasons in which they were founded, seem to have been since forgotten; and stale claims let in upon the Treasury without restraint, and proved without difficulty, which no call could bring forth at the time they were supposed to have originated. It is instructive to look over the list of these statutes, and see the reasons in which they were founded, and the efforts made to call in all valid claims, and the attention paid to them fifty years ago, and the disregard since.
[28] Upon the request of General Washington the Count de Grasse remained in the Chesapeake beyond the time which his instructions allowed, risking all the penalties of insubordination, and by so doing did what was indispensable to the capture of Lord Cornwallis.
[29] This was the first debate on the prohibition of Slavery in a Territory which took place under the Federal Constitution, and it is to be observed that the constitutional power of Congress to make the prohibition, was not questioned by any speaker. Expedient objections only were urged.
[30] The speaker here alludes to the paper called "the second treaty of Pilnitz," which he declares to be a forgery. The first treaty of Pilnitz was a mere conditional agreement between the Emperor and the King of Prussia, that if either of them should be attacked by France, they would unite to repel the attack. This treaty they avowed; and when, on the acceptance of the new Constitution by the King of France, better prospects of a peaceable conduct on the part of that nation were entertained, they suspended this treaty by a formal declaration.
[31] Thus, by a close vote, the Naval Department was created; and, as the proceedings show, by a party vote—the Republicans of that day being against a Navy.