be a protection to wealth against the agrarian and plundering enterprizes of a majority of the people. "That," wrote Jefferson to Adams," is your opinion; while I think that the American constitution provides a better remedy by leaving the free separation and election of the natural aristocracy from the mass, who will, in general, choose the good and the wise. Wealth will take care of itself. Cabals in the Senate of the United States furnish many proofs that to give an elevated class power to prevent mischief is to arm them for it." Macon's equality and radicalism went beyond Jefferson's. But he was an inactive reformer and merely by the force of example, as the American republic acts on the rest of the world. A planter, of moderate fortune, coveting no more, disliking the labour-gained wealth of professional life, and the chances of trade, he disregarded the vexatious vanities of riches or office, except that of serving the people as one of many law-makers, among whom, too, his rule was to do as little as possible. After serving a quarter of a century in the House of Representatives, what most would consider promotion to the Senate, was, perhaps, departure from his principles. Did he deem it rotation in office? a principle of republican government, of which Macon's twelve re-elections to the same seat in Congress, proved that he did not consider it applicable to elective places. Men grow insolent, said Tacitus, in a single year's public trust. Doubtless they should, by frequent recurrence of popular election, be continually subjected to that ordeal. But when incumbents of elective posts, like Macon, are faithful, they are not often supplanted without detriment to the constituency. When one party vanquishes another, it is but just that the principal places should be filled by the victorious. But abuse of this unquestionable principle as to others demoralizes communities by pampering morbid thirst, and insatiable yearning for emolument, substitutes avarice for ambition. Does not Macon's success demonstrate that no American statesman can be successfully both ambitious and avaricious? That he can no more prefer himself to the people, than serve mammon before God? To be of the aristocracy of the democracy is common ambition; but Macon's desire was to be of the democracy of the aristocracy.

Whatever, says Burke, writing of the French National Assembly, the distinguished few may have been, men of known rank

or shining talents, it is the substance or mass of the body which constitutes its character, and must finally determine its direction. In all bodies, those who will lead must also, in a considerable degree, follow. Macon was a leading follower, not a summit, but part of the mass of Congress; not a commanding actor or writer, no demagogue, hardly communing with his constituents but by the monosyllables of votes, always before them in print, but taking no undue means for soliciting their good will. Yet his popularity never failed, his success was transcendent, and the influence of his example is still enduring and increasing. The centralism of Hamilton has almost disappeared. The federalism of Washington and the constitutionalism of Madison have been, in a measure, superseded by the republicanism of Jefferson, which may be swallowed up in the radicalism of Macon. Will that be declining or advancing?

The most frequent disparagement cast by Europeans on American republicanism, is its alleged tendency to degenerate, a downward tendency, which is to swallow up learning, wealth, liberty, and refinement, and establish a despotism of mere vulgarity; that public life is less sought by respectability than elsewhere or formerly, and that talents avoid it. Whether this be

so in America, is it more so than elsewhere? Great talents are the creations of great conjunctures; and the tranquillity of the United States has been almost stagnant under the present forms of government. In such circumstances commercial, professional, and other lucrative pursuits, are more attractive than politics; and with the growth of luxury, which has been prodigious since the introduction of paper money, there will always be a large class preferring fashionable idleness to political notoriety. Mme. de Staël says, in her considerations on the French Revolution, that many of the old nobility of Europe despised the Emperor Alexander as an upstart, not to be received into good society. Social and ancestral distinction, a strong desire, more prevalent in Europe, is not without acknowledgment in America. Descendants of celebrated Americans are often chosen into political life for that reason. Congress and the state legislatures abound with members boasting some family merit, such as kindred with soldiers of the Revolution; and it is common to meet with Americans who preserve their ancestors' certificates of service in the revolutionary army, as if they were

patents of nobility. Besides the merits of personal pedigree, Burke eloquently vindicates those of honourable national lineage. Yet the country attorneys, village lawyers, notaries, brokers, traders, and clowns whom he enumerates as the majority of the third estate of the French National Assembly, inferior, in his judgment, to the noblemen and gentry he extols as hereditary legislators, enacted laws which reformed the crumbling basis of society, and reconstructed France so as to render that declining kingdom not only freer, but incomparably happier, richer, and greater than it was before the days of what Burke calls its downfall. If De Tocqueville's idea be true, that American democracy is irresistibly swallowing up everything else American, and such be the decline which Europe imputes to this country, at all events Great Britain, France, and all the freer kingdoms of Europe, are passing down the same declivity with more violence and precipitation than this country, one of whose consolations is Jefferson's maxim, that government, at best, is but relative good, and that, with all the faults of which it is accused, democracy is at least a less injurious and more durable state than royalty, since one of the unquestionable consequences of the American Revolution is that revolutionary movements, with equality and liberty, have begun throughout the Old World. Be that as it may as to public bodies and national stability, Macon found public life not more precarious or unprofitable, and less toilsome or irksome than private pursuits; and if American legislatures had more of such men, faithfully representing a sovereign people, public life would be reasonable support, and the most honourable occupation. For state legislatures and Congress, in most instances, are the mere chrysalis between worm and butterfly; where insect members perish after a short flight. But such is not legitimate rotation in office, nor the public service Macon performed. With him a place in Congress was the ultimate, not penultimate or intermediate stage; the goal, not the stepping stone, to some more profitable place or speculation, but that to which he dedicated all the faculties of all his life.

If there is romance of politics, or fancy in this sketch of an American political apostle, at least the experiment of both may not be unworthy of general consideration. We must endeavour to divest ourselves of the influences of Europe, and stand on American independence, in order to appreciate such an experiment.

Let it be borne in mind that in estimating what may be thought relapse to vulgar barbarism, or advance to true wisdom, according to the judgment or the prejudice of the reader, while Macon lived, such was the change, whether retrograde or progressive, that representative government, open legislation, religious toleration, and political equality, were first introduced among mankind. The wisest, therefore, may misjudge, the wildest be too tame in theory. At all events, Macon's passive example has had powerful influences. The book of John Taylor, of Carolina, proves it even in literature. Doing nothing, saying little, what a space Macon fills! Constructive and aristocratic excesses, as he calmly denounced them, banks, tariffs, taxes, rapid improvements, much government, armies, great expenditures, paper money, high pay, resisted by him, with a very few adherents, are now rejected by large portions of the American people. An executive Macon could hardly be; a Congress filled with them, especially in time of war, might not be practicable. Yet large infusion of his doctrine already affects all our institutions, and may act still more thoroughly on American government, should America become a world by itself, entirely independent of European pupilage. Already have chief magistrates of the United States proclaimed much of Macon's principles as standards for their administration; at least one of them, Mr. Van Buren, visited his peculiar homestead as a shrine to worship at; and others may follow in his footsteps of peace, moderation, severe economy and radical democracy. The experiment has not yet been made how far liberty may be carried. Not only in the United States, but in England, too, the tendency is to go farther. What has not the free principle done for Great Britain, in spite of feudal fetters. upon all her institutions! What has not equality done for France, almost without liberty? Are not Russia, Turkey, Egypt, India, South America much freer than before Macon lived? The laws and intercourse of nations, the laws of commerce and trade of different parts of the same nation, the laws of religious worship, the modern philosophy of all politics, own that the world has been governed too much, and that a great trial is to be made of cheap self-government.

VOL. 1.-19

CHAPTER VIII.

TAXES.-DIRECT TAX.-TAX ON REFINED SUGAR.-SALES AT AUCTION. -RETAILERS' LICENSES.—STAMPS.-CARRIAGES.-STILLS.-PRODUCE OF TAXES UNDER WASHINGTON'S, ADAMS', AND MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION.-SELECTION OF COLLECTORS.-COST OF COLLECTION.— REDUCTION OF TAXES AFTER WAR.-DALLAS'S SYSTEM.-MONROE'S ADMINISTRATION.-TAXES REPEALED.-CRAWFORD, SECRETARY OF TREASURY.-TABULAR STATEMENTS OF TAXATION.-DEBATE AND VOTES ON REPEAL OF SYSTEM OF INTERNAL REVENUE.-EFFECT ON IMPOST.-TARIFF OF DUTIES.-WAR LOANS.-PAPER MONEY.AMERICAN AND ENGLISH NATIONAL DEBT AND CREDIT.-SUSPENSION OF SPECIE PAYMENTS BY BANKS.-EVILS OF IRRESPONSIBLE BANKING.-EFFECTS OF WAR ON RESOURCES OF UNITED STATES.COMMISSIONER OF REVENUE.-SAMUEL HARRISON SMITH.-PRESI

DENT MADISON.

THE great need of the country, and business of Congress in 1813, were to provide money for war declared in a state of total unpreparedness. The only fiscal measures of the twelfth Congress were a loan of eleven millions of dollars, doubling the duties on importations, and authorizing five millions of treasury notes. War was declared the 18th of June, 1812, by that Congress; and it was not till the 22d of July, 1813, that the thirteenth Congress passed the act for the assessment and collection of direct taxes and internal duties; soon followed by acts imposing duties on refined sugar, sales at auction, retailers' licenses, stamps, carriages for conveyance of persons, licenses to distillers of spirituous liquors, and a direct tax of three millions of dollars a year. On the 24th July, the office of Commissioner of the Revenue was established. By these laws, sugar refined within the United States, was to pay four cents per pound, subject to drawback on importation; sales at auction, one per cent. on goods, and one quarter per cent. on ships or vessels, payable by the auctioneer on obtaining a license, subject to deduction of one per cent. on the amount of duties, for his trouble; licenses to retailers of wines, spirituous liquors, and foreign merchandize for one year, as follows: viz. retailers of merchandize, including wines and