Alexandria Daily Advertiser

CONGRESS.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

Saturday, February 20.

DEBATE

On the bill supplementary to the act laying an embargo, &c.

CONTINUED

MR. D. R. WILLIAMS. I do not renew the motion; and I hope there is yet sobriety enough for the house, not to suffer themselves to be driven into an improper measure by any intemperance which any member may have displayed. Mr. W. then gave some reasons why the bill should be recommitted; it had been so repeatedly and variously amended that it could not be understood. As a further reason for commitment, he said that the chairman of the committee himself had offered a proviso, and upon a reconsideration of it had found it had not the operation he intended.

MR. DANA said altho' not partial to the measure of laying an embargo he should endeavor to legislate effectually, to propose amendments or object to them to any bill whatever which should be necessary to carry into effect the general object. Since an embargo had been laid he was willing to render it effectual and equalize its operation. He then gave some reasons why the bill should be recommitted.

MR. RHEA (Tenn.) moved to adjourn.

Negatived. 55 to 25.

MR. LIVERMORE said he had seconded the motion for recommittal because he thought the bill required revision. There had been exceptions taken to several parts of it, were gentlemen ready to go into a discussion of it at this late hour and at this late day in the week? He tho't no, and for this reason wished them to be examined by the committee.

MR. J. MONTGOMERY. Now, at this late hour charges of a very serious nature against this house have been made on this floor by a gentleman from N. York. Not on this day are they made for the first time; they have been sent abroad in the public prints. It is important to know how those charges originated. At this late hour they cannot be repelled. Let us pursue this course in this awful business; let the question be carried over; let the house now adjourn. At our next meeting let us take up, and if those charges can be proved, if we are indeed so abandoned, so profligate, so destitute of patriotism, so dead to every thing which concerns the interest of our country, let us be stamped with infamy and sent home to our constituents. The crisis is serious and calls for the attentive deliberation of the house. Let the gentleman from New York establish his charges; if he does so, I for one will say those persons under this secret influence must be immediately expelled the house, if he does not some other course may be taken with relation to that gentleman.

Monday, February 22:

The house having resumed the consideration of the bill amendatory of the embargo law, and the motion for recommittal being yet before the house.

MR. JOHNSON observed that it had been late in the day on Saturday when a gentleman from New York, in giving some of his reasons why this bill should be committed, had made use of observations which he had at that time wished to repel. That he hoped he should be excused a few moments this morning in expressing to the house his sentiments of the course of that discussion, and what should always be his conduct so long as he held a seat in the councils of his country.

I presume, said he, that the rules which govern this house are reciprocal; and tho' I cannot feel myself justified in making an attack on any member without reasons by which to substantiate charges which I may make against them, yet I will abandon my seat at that moment in which I am not permitted to repel any attacks made on the house in which I am in common with the rest included. I represent a portion of the citizens of the United States. Before they sent me here they knew my sentiments: I had not concealed them. I have since I have been here on all occasions voted from a sense of duty, and upon evidence derived from sources accessible to all. I am a friend to liberal discussion and freedom of debate; but I am an enemy to insinuations unfounded and attacks unprovoked. I know that in the ardor of debate expressions may have escaped the lips of myself or any gentleman I may have been betrayed into an hurried expression, in which perhaps upon retrospection I might not feel myself justified but from the ardor of debate. But a direct charge against any members on this floor, tending to put them in a degraded and infamous view, is contrary to honorable conduct and cannot be excused, much less can it be justified. I have differed in opinion with gentlemen on this floor; and notwithstanding this difference I respect them individually, so far as I am acquainted with them, and so far as they have treated me with that politeness due from one gentleman to another. I should consider myself as derogating from the dignity of a representative, were I to level a reflection against any member because he differed from me in political sentiment. But what expressions have we heard on a subject on which they were not applicable, when every one of all parties seemed to join to render the embargo as effectual as a national measure should be. To this house and to those who vote for the measure, have been applied the observations, that an invisible hand guided us that we were told what was wanting and that the council of five hundred voted it; that we are governed by foreign influence; that our steps are marked by folly and madness; that we are forging chains to bind us to the triumphal car of the French emperor; that we are mere automatons, that we wait for the word of command and we obey. Expressions of this kind I never expected to hear on this floor. Such expressions I never expected to hear from the representative of a free people; and I pronounce them derogatory to the republican character and highly reprehensible. If by such expressions the gentleman means to charge me, or if any man shall say that I am governed by any other impulse than duty, or influenced by any other motives than my own, I say that I consider it a base and unprincipled calumny. And what I have said I am glad that I did not say till this morning, because it is now deliberately done. A member may say what he pleases with respect to himself; that he is governed by such or such influence. But when a charge is made that I am governed by any other impulse than that of an American, and that I am a tool to the will of others I pronounce it a slander. Under this impression I make this reply. And I would be understood that if any one considers himself injured or the resentment of any gentleman is awakened by any thing which I have said, that I do not consider myself as shielded by the splendid walls which surround me nor by the privileges of a member. What I have said I shall not retract.

[Debate to be continued]