six sub-agencies might be discontinued. But the committee was induced to recommend the usual appropriation in the estimate for their establishment as now existing.

The amendments were then concurred in, and the bill ordered to a third reading.

The bill was then passed, and sent to the Senate for concurrence. In that body, it was amended by adding $5000 for the relief of the Seminole Indians; and a motion was made by Mr Tipton, to strike out the provision prohibiting the practice of rewarding Indians for settling disputes among themselves; but it was negatived, yeas 7, nays 34.

The amendment of the Senate was agreed to in the House, and the bill as amended became a law. By this act the following appropriations were made for the service of the Indian department for 1832, viz.

For the expenses of the Indian
agencies,

For presents to the Indians,
For expenses of Indian inter-

course,

For blacksmith's shops, &c, For contingencies,

$79,525 20,000

27,594

23,766 20,000

By the other acts making the appropriations for the Indian service during the year 1832, there were appropriated,

For Indian annuities,
For education and civilization

$349,239

27,500

64,455

11,520

12,000

282,613

above bills, viz: the bill making appropriations in conformity with the stipulation of certain treaties with the Creeks, Shawnees, Ottowas, Senecas, Wyandots, Cherokees and Choctaws,

Mr Bates, of Massachusetts, inquired if any information had been furnished by the secretary of war, in pursuance of a certain resolution agreed to by the House on the 15th of March, 1832, in relation to the payments made or to be made, by virtue of treaties, to the several Indian tribes.

Mr Verplanck replied, that no answer had been given as yet. That the delay had been occasioned by the voluminous character of the documents. The object sought for could not bear on the bill, whatever grounds they might furnish for future leg-. islation.

Mr Bates could not consent to vote for these appropriations, until the information sought for was furnished to the House. He objected to the manner, in which the annuities had been paid. He was informed, that some of these while, in other cases, payments. tribes had not been paid at all; individuals, instead of to the nahad been made but partially to tions or tribes respectively. But 500 dollars of the annuities, of the Cherokees which was $6, 000, had been paid. He contended, that such proceedings were not in fulfilment of the contracts with those tribes, respectively, and protested against the practice altogether, which would lead to numerous private claims, that would prove troublesome and vexatious to Congress, hereafter.

Mr Wickliffe inquired, if the fund of $500,000 voted by Congress towards the removal of the Indians west of the Mississippi, was not applicable to these purposes?

Mr Verplanck replied, that he did not see how any part of the fund alluded to could be applied for any of these objects.

Mr Davis inquired, how much of the appropriation of $500,000 was unexpended.

Mr Bell replied, he believed the unexpended balance to be about $193,000.

On motion of Mr McDuffie, the bill was amended, so as to prevent any payment being made for improvements on their lands, except to Indians removing from Georgia, in pursuance of the treaof 1828.

ty

The subject was again renewed in the House on the 23d of May, when Mr Bates of Mass. moved and obtained the re-consideration of the bill making provision for the payment of Indian annuities, and thereupon offered an amendment restoring the mode of paying these annuities to that practised previous to the 4th of March, 1829, unless in cases where the Indians themselves should prefer it otherwise. Mr Bates went at length into an exposition of his views on this subject, protesting against the changes in the mode of payment, which had been made by order of the late Secretary of War, on the ground chiefly, that payments to individuals were not payments to the tribes in their national capaci

and did not discharge the debt of the United States to the tribe

as such. He objected to the multiplication of vouchers, and the complication of accounts, occasioned by the new arrangement; and insisted, that Congress had no evidence, that the annuities had been paid over to the Indians at all.

Mr Bell replied at length to these objections, and though he did not consider the question as of vital interest at all, thought the amendment involved an imputation on the conduct of the government, from which it was necessary to vindicate it. He waived the question as to the independent national character of the Indian tribes; explained a reply of Mr Jefferson's to the Upper Creeks, which had been commented on by Mr Bates; and insisted, that Mr Jefferson's view of Indian policy was to govern the tribes by intercourse, and by regulating their commerce. He insisted, that the manner in which we withheld the annuities as an offset, when depredations had been committed, (the amount of which depredations was liquidated by this government alone,) was a proof of the dependent light, in which the tribes had always been viewed and treated; and that the legislation of this country, with respect to the Indians, had always been governed by a policy, which regarded the interests of the United States. The evidence, he said, was in the Department in regular annual returns, which showed how far the annuities had been paid. The two modes of payment were equal as to expense.

Mr Verplanck then went into an explanation of the manner in

which the 360,000 of annuities were paid to the eighty different tribes of Indians who received them, and showed, that the alteration complained of by Mr Bates was not a general, but a particular regulation, having reference to the Cherokees alone. The mode of payment was different in different tribes. The amendment, though founded on the condition of the Cherokees, would, if adopted, apply to every tribe alike, and thereby involve in some cases an express violation of treaty. Fearing that the amendment would lead to gross abuses, Mr Verplanck was opposed to its adoption.

With the view of avoiding the decision of the question involved in this amendment, Mr Root moved the previous question, which cut off the amendment, and the call was sustained by the House, yeas 86, nays 69. The bill then passed, and became a law without further opposition.

That class of appropriations, which provoked more of a party opposition than any other, fell under the head of internal improvements. The members from the south, and the supporters of the administration from the eastern States, and from New York, were decidedly opposed to appropriations of this character, and a systematic effort was generally made by them, to defeat the bill, and failing in that, to reduce the appropriations to the lowest point.

This was in conformity with the views of the Executive, as

expressed in his action upon several bills of this nature.

The works which had been already commenced, required further appropriations in order to complete them; and the constitutional objection, which was considered conclusive, against the commencement of works of the same kind, was not deemed to extend to appropriations for those in a state of forwardness! A bill was therefore reported by the committee of ways and means, making appropriations for these works for 1832.

This bill was taken up in the committee of the whole House, March 31, and having been read, Mr Verplanck, the chairman, protem, of the committee of ways and means, proposed an amendment appropriating $5,868, for repairs done to the Cumberland road in 1831, by a mail contractor.

Mr Verplanck said, the sum was for repairs made to the road, which were absolutely necessary to make it passable. They had been made by the contractor, no! for his own individual benefit, but for the public interest, which would otherwise have been seriously injured by the delay in the transmission of the public mail. The Post Master General and the late Secretary of War had borne testimony to the necessity of the expenditure, and it was but just, that the person who had made the outlay should be reimbursed.

Mr Crawford objected to the appropriation. Last session of Congress, he observed, the House had refused to grant

$100,000, for the repairs of the road, and yet they were now called on to sanction an expenditure made by the authority of the Postmaster General and the Secretary of War, for repairs of this very road. He asked the House, if they were prepared to allow the executive officers to expend money, not only without the consent of Congress, but where one branch of Congress, as in the case of the Cumberland road, had actually refused to make an appropriation? He hoped the amendment would be rejected, and rejected it would be, except gentlemen were for establishing the most dangerous of all precedents, by taking out of that House the controlling power which it possessed, and of right ought to exercise over the public expenditure.

Mr Wickliffe said, that in fact, the road had been impassable, and the United States' mail had been obliged to be carried part of the way by another course, causing much delay in its transmission. The $4,000, or $5,000, expended by the contractors, had, he understood, been applied more to the improvement of the road than the $100,000, voted by Congress for that purpose five or six years ago. He put it to the gentleman from Pennsylvania, whether it would be just that Mr Stockton, the contractor, who had, in so public spirited a manner, repaired the road from his own private funds, should be permitted to lose his money, wher the public derived such essential advantages from its advance ?

Mr Irvin said, $900 had been

voted in 1830 for repairs of the road, of a similar character to the vote asked for on the present occasion. Not a voice was heard from the west, he observed, in opposition to the great improvements on the sea board; and he asked, why there should be any objection to this trifling sum for the repairs of the great channel of communication between the Atlantic States and the whole western country?

Mr Crawford said he considered that the immense sums of money, so improperly expended on that road, had done more than any other thing to prejudice the great cause of internal improvement, of which he, (Mr Crawford), was as ardent a friend as any gentleman in that House. In answer to the appeal of Mr Wickliffe, he said he would have the gentleman to lose the money; he had expended it without proper authority; for he knew of no mode of applying the public money, to any purpose, without the vote of Congress.

The amendment was finally agreed to, as was one appropriating $270,000, for the Delaware breakwater.

Mr Bullard moved an appropriation of $20,000, for improving the navigation of Red River.

Mr Bullard explained, in what manner the appropriation of last year had been expended in the improvement of the navigation of that river, under the appropriation made in 1828. About fifty miles had been opened of an obstruction, extending in all, 60 or 70 miles; so that a steamboat had passed, though not without some

difficulty. Mr Bullard referred to a report from the war department, containing the detailed statement of the progress, which had been made in this improvement, accompanied with a recommendation from the department of the appropriation which he had moved. He dwelt upon the benefit which must result to the commerce of all the southern part of Arkansas from removing the obstructions in this river, through which a navigation of 1000 miles from the Mississippi, would be opened through one of the most fertile countries in the world. The work was now on the eve of completion. It wanted but one short cut more to admit the passage of boats; and another for the floating off of drift. wood. But if the work should now stop, all that had been done would be lost. The opening which had been made would soon close, the drift wood accumulate, and the obstruction of the river become permanent and incurable. Messrs Foster and Davis, of South Carolina, now made an attempt to postpone the bill, on the ground of the absence of Mr McDuffie, the chairman of the committee of ways and means, but the motion was negatived by a very large majority; and the question being put upon Mr Bullard's amendment, it was agreed to.

Mr Verplanck said, he had had an amendment printed two months ago, going to reinstate in the bill all the objects, which had been recommended by the depart ment. The grounds on which the appropriations were recommended, were to be found at large

in the report of the engineers, which had accompanied the President's message, and had been printed for the use of the House. He then moved appropriations for public works at the following places :

For the Kennebeck river, Deer island, Boston; Hyannis, Nantucket, Oswego, Sodus Bay, Genessee river, Buffalo, Black Rock, Dunkirk, Presque isle, New Castle, Ocracoke inlet, Cape Fear river, Ohio and Mississippi rivers, Conesut creek, Ashtebula creek, Cayahoga creek, Grand river, Cleaveland, Black river, Huron La Plaisance Bay, for examinations and surveys, for the road to Chicago, to Fort Gratiot, and from Detroit to Sagana.

Mr Carson addressed the committee at length in opposition to these amendments. Nothing had ever appeared more extraordinary to him, than the course taken by the gentleman from New York, (Mr Verplanck), in proposing them. By adverting to the laws passed by the last Congress respecting internal improvements, it would be perceived, that the manner in which these amendments had been worded was calculated to deceive, and to impose on the House and the nation. As an example, he quoted the appropriation of the year before last, for completing the repairs in Dunkirk harbor, $1,342.' The year following there was another appropriation, for completing' the same 'repairs,' of $6,400. And the present amendment was in the very same words, ' for completing the repairs in Dunkirk harbor, $10,200.' Thus the appropria