who had the job of surveying them.

Mr Polk stated, that eighty thousand dollars of the sum proposed was for surveying the lands of the Choctaws. By the treaty of cession, numerous reservations had been promised to certain individuals of that tribe; but these reservations were to be laid out immediately adjacent to ranges and townships, so that their location could not be ascertained until the Choctaw country was surveyed and so sacredly did the President consider himself bound by that treaty, that should no more than 80,000 dollars be appropriated (as had been proposed by Mr Vinton,) he would apply the whole of it to the Choctaw survey. Of course all other surveys must stop.

The question was then put upon filling the blank with 160,000 dollars, and carried yeas 73, yeas 73, nays 48.

A debate also arose upon the following item: For salary of the dragoman to the legation of the United States to Turkey, $2,500.'

Mr Archer moved to strike out 2,500, and to insert and for contingencies $37,500.' He said he was instructed to make this motion, by the unanimous vote of the committee on foreign affairs, which committee contained gentlemen of opposite political sentiments.

Mr Adams and Mr McDuffie both strongly objected to voting an appropriation on that ground. If there was any state secret in the matter, the House might receive it with closed doors.

Mr Archer declining to make any farther explanation, the amendment was negatived.

The bill was then reported to the House and laid upon the table, until the 15th of March, when it was again taken up in the committee of the whole, and Mr Irvin moved as an amendment, an appropriation of $25,000 for extra clerks in the land office, to be employed in the issuing of land scrip, instead of $4,000 as reported in the bill. He pressed his motion with great earnestness.

On motion of Mr Shepperd, of North Carolina, the appropriation was increased to $6,600.

The item for the salary of a minister to Colombia having been read, Mr Davis, of South Carolina, moved that it be stricken out. In supporting this motion, he observed, that a call on the department of state for information why why a minister of higher grade than a chargé was needed at Bogota, had elicited no response from that department. The House, in the mean time, were in possession of the fact, that the republic of Colombia had been dissolved, and the country divided into three governments. But did the republic still exist, our connection with it, in a commercial point of view, was of too small importance to justify the expense of keeping up that mission. Our whole import from ('olombiain 1827, was but $333,000, and last year it had decreased to $180,000. The salary of the minister alone amounted to sixteen per cent, upon the whole of our commerce with the republic.

Mr Archer considered the gentleman from South Carolina had misapprehended the facts of the case. He thought the Executive should not be called upon always to yield to the intervention of the House, in that which did not appropriately belong to its jurisdiction.

Admitting the republic to have been subdivided into three governments, was not their importance such as well to deserve a full mission from this country? Had we not sent such missions to South American States of less importance? Mr Archer had understood from General Santander, a gentleman who had filled the very highest office in Colombia, that it was supposed there that the foreign relations of the country, as they had existed before the change, were still to be maintained at Bogota.

The question being finally taken on the motion to strike out the appropriation for the mission to Colombia, it was negatived by a large majority.

Mr Stanberry inquired of the chairman of the committee of ways and means, whether the appropriation last year, made for a mission to Russia, had been expended. If it had not, and he was bound to presume it had not, inasmuch as the friends of the late minister to that court, (John Randolph) had expressly and repeatedly assured the House that he would not accept the money, then there could be no necessity for a new appropriation.

Mr McDuffie replied, that the minister had received every cent of the appropriation.

Mr Carson observed, that if the gentleman alluded to him, he was mistaken; he had never said, that the minister would not receive the money. He should have considered him very foolish if he had refused it.

Mr Stanberry replied, that some of the gentleman's friends had so declared, and among others the chairman of the committee on foreign relations, (Mr Archer.)

Mr Archer said, that he had not been among the number, but, had he been called upon, he should, without hesitation, have expressed a confident expectation that the minister would not receive it.

Mr Wilde moved the addition of 18,000 dollars, for a mission to France; which was agreed to, yeas 101.

Mr Wilde further moved, for the salary of a charge to Naples, 4,500 dollars, and for his outfit, 4,500 dollars; which was carried.

Mr Archer moved an item for a dragoman to the mission at Constantinople, and contingent expenses, 37,500 dollars. The motion was negatived.

The bill was then reported to the House, and on the 16th of March, when it was taken up, the amendments made in the committee were in general agreed to, without opposition.

Mr Wilde then moved to strike out the appropriation of $3,000 for the salary of the commissioner of the general land office, on which motion, a very animated debate arose. The ground of Mr Wilde's motion was un

derstood to be, the neglect or incompetency of the officer referred to. His cause was pleaded with much warmth, by Mr Irvin, Mr Leavitt, Mr Clay, of Alabama, and Mr Polk, who referred to his previous high standing in Ohio, his known character for industry and application, and the satisfactory manner in which he had discharged the duty of a judge in that State.

It was strenuously denied, that he had neglected the duties of his office here, although bad health might have sometimes detained him from it, and confined him to his bed; and it was insisted that if he had been guilty of corruption or malfeasance in office, or was incompetent to the discharge of his public duties, the proper course to be pursued was, either an impeachment or a committee of inquiry, or a direct application to the Executive for his removal.

Mr Wickliffe referred to some statements, in reference to the neglect of this officer, formerly made by Mr Sevier on the floor of the House, and declared it to be his purpose, on a future occasion, to move for an inquiry into certain parts of the commissioner's official conduct in reference to himself.

Mr Wilde, after vindicating the motion he had made, as intended to rouse the House, the Executive, and the nation, to a subject which he thought needed looking into, and, fortifying himself by precedents from the British parliament, said that, as the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr Wick

liffe) had pledged himself to an inquiry, he would withdraw his motion.

Mr Stanberry, of Ohio, moved to strike out the appropriation for the salary of the second auditor.

This motion gave rise to another debate of equal animation with the last. The motion was advocated by the mover, on the ground of the serious charges which had been preferred in that House against the officer in question, in relation to a certain tract of the public lands. Until the individual was cleared of these charges, it was improper that he should hold an important office under the government.

The motion was opposed by Messrs Arnold, Everett, Wickliffe, Mercer, Barringer, Beardsley, McDuffie, and Letcher, on the ground that, as the charges were now under a course of investigation by one of the committees of the House, it would be unjust to anticipate the decision by legislating the individual out of office. It was also highly inexpedient to set a precedent, which might be seized upon by the spirit of party to embarrass the service of the country, and destroy meritorious individuals. The individual was, at all events, entitled to his salary up to the present time, but the amendment would cut off the whole.

The motion was advocated by Mr Branch, who insisted that the office of second auditor might advantageously be dispensed with. Its necessity had grown out of the accounts occasioned by the

last war; but as long ago as Mr Mouroe's time, it had been officially recommended to abolish it. The same thing had been reported by the committee on retrench

ment.

Mr Stanberry eventually consented to withdraw his motion.

Mr Verplanck proposed that the item of 160,000 dollars for the survey of the public lands, should be subdivided: 80,000 dollars being appropriated specifically to the survey of the Choctaw lands, under the late treaty; which was agreed to.

On motion of Mr Davis, an item of 4,000 dollars was inserted for the purchase of the bust of Thomas Jefferson, by Caracci, yeas 81, nays 63.

Mr Archer now renewed the motion he had made in committee, to appropriate 37,500 dollars for contingencies, and the salary of a dragoman in the mission to Turkey, on which motion a debate of much interest arose.

In explaining and supporting this amendment, Mr Archer observed, that the House would recollect that he had, on a former occasion, submitted a similar motion, when the bill was under consideration in committee of the whole. He had at that time stated, that the cominittee of foreign affairs had instructed him to submit the amendment, without going into any further explanation than to state, that its adoption was unanimously recommended by all the members of that committee. He had accordingly done so. It happened, as he had anticipated, that several members

of the House had declared themselves unable to yield their assent to the amendment, until they should have heard the grounds on which it was deemed advisable. Proper and reasonable as these objections were, he had nevertheless, in compliance with the instructions under which he acted, declined giving the explanation, in consequence of which the amendment had been negatived. It was due to the committee of foreign affairs to assign the reason for the instructions they had given, as well as the reason why those instructions were now departed from. The papers, on which the amendment was grounded, had been communicated in confidence to the committee by the department of State; and they could not permit the desired explanation to be given, till they received authority to that effect from the department, from whom they had received the papers under the seal of confidence. That seal had now been removed, and he was permitted fully to explain the object of the amendment.

The trade which would be opened to the United States by the ratification of our treaty with Turkey, had constituted, in ancient times, one of the richest portions of the world. The value of this commerce made it an object sought for with avidity by all the European powers. They had all made strenuous efforts to obtain a share of it. But those efforts had all been unsuccessful. The Black Sea continued to be excluded from all but the Rus

sians. It was a praise due to our own government, that its attention had been early directed to that subject, with a view to extend the commercial relations of this country. It had been represented in that House, and very generally believed throughout the country, that the credit of this attempt was due exclusively to the existing administration. But Mr Archer said, that he owed it to candor to declare, (and it was with great pleasure that he did so) that the preceding administration had shown the same assiduity to possess the country of this commerce, and had been as zealous and as judicious in its efforts for that end, as the administration now in power. It had happened, however, that complete success had been reserved to the era marked by the accession of the present chief magistrate. A treaty had been made, but had not been ratified. It was perfectly well known to all persons acquainted with the manners and habits, which prevailed in Oriental countries, that there was no such thing as making a treaty with the Ottoman Porte, except on a condition, the necessity of which was as well recognised and as little disputed as the necessity of signing or sealing the treaty itself; namely, the making of presents to all the chief officers of the Turkish government. The United States' commissioners, by whom the late treaty had been negotiated, being fully aware of this fact sent home to the Executive, as it was their duty to do, an estimate of the presents

which would be necessary to the consummation of the treaty. In this, Mr Rhind and Mr Offley had done no more than was done by others, and had graduated their estimate according to the presents made by other powers. The amount of their estimate was 75,000 dollars.

It had been usual with all foreign powers, who maintained diplomatic relations with the Ottoman Porte, to depute to that Porte ministers of high grade — nor would any other be well received by a government so eminently jealous of its own dignity, as to take offence at the sending of any one of so low a rank as a chargé des affaires. Our own government, aware of this state of things, had sent to the Senate a nomination for a minister plenipotentiary. The members of the committee all knew that the Senate, in the exercise of an unquestioned power, (though he greatly doubted if it had in this instance been judiciously exercised,) thought fit to cut down the appointment to that of a chargé. It did not belong to him, to question the propriety of this decision before a co-ordinate branch of the government. As the mission had been cut down, it had been conceived necessary, that all the expenses attending it should be reduced also. The Executive government had some sort of a scale, by which they might proportion the expenses proper for a full mission, for this had been supplied by the estimate of the commissioners. But when the mission had been cut down to