of it. Then shall the young and the aspiring, wards that birth-day morning, what a succession in every region of our land, and through all of benefits, blessings, glories, seem to have been coming generations, whether of humble or ele-lighted up by that auspicious sun! Our Indevated origin, read the history of the great and pendence, institutions, government, with all the good; here they shall see by what monu- their concomitant excellences, we behold; and mental honors his country has consecrated his in all, the mighty agency of Washington! He name; and thus, he who lived the most perfect seems to stand on earth among us, in the midst man of one age, shall become the great and of his achievements, to receive our gratitude, enduring model for all future time. and to witness his own fame. If we carry in Let ine, then, in behalf of our common coun- procession these mouldering remains, it will try, implore Virginia, and the distinguished help to bring us back to a perception of our sons of Virginia now in this Hall, to look to a common allotment, and teach us to realize his consummation of the arrangement of 1799. I and our own mortality. In the midst of our do entreat them now to recollect and regard gratulations, that such a man was born, we the unanimity of a no less distinguished delega- shall have before our eyes the memorial, that tion then, as worthy of all imitation. Let such a man has died; and the joys of the CenVirginia, "the fruitful mother of heroes and tennial Birth-Day shall be chastened by those statesmen," not disregard the memory of her teachings of wisdom which remind us that no most illustrious matron, who, at the call of her human life, no sublunary good, can endure for country, surrendered her own individual and ever. peculiar affection, to the promptings of a glorious patriotism.

At first, I confess it did appear to me that there might be something, in the removal of these remains, inappropriate to a birth-day celebration. It is not so. These two days, that of his birth, and that of this celebration, are separated by the whole duration of an hundred years. Between these two points, what a tide of events has rolled over the world! When the eye of recollection looks back to

Let us then be permitted to hope that this nation may now, at last, discharge its high obligation to that venerated family, by doing appropriate honors to the remains of this most illustrious man; so that, hereafter, the filial piety of no son or daughter of America may be agitated with the anxious fear, that some felonious hand may violate the sanctuary of his tomb, and give to a foreign land the glory of being the Mausoleum of WASHINGTON.

WILLIAM HUNTER.

WILLIAM HUNTER was born in Newport, Rhode Island, in the year 1776. His father, of the same name, was a Scotch physician, a graduate of the University of Edinburgh. Having joined the Pretender, in his professional capacity, he found it necessary to embark for America, soon after the battle of Culloden. Settling in Newport, he entered successfully upon the practice of his profession, and is said to have been the first lecturer on anatomy in the United States. He married a daughter of Godfrey Malbone, an eminent shipping merchant of Newport, and one of the most opulent and influential citizens in the then Colonies. He died soon after the birth of his son William, who was his youngest child.

About the year 1785, Mrs. Hunter, accompanied by her three daughters, visited England, to consult an oculist about the eyes of the eldest, whose sight had become impaired through excessive study. William was left at Newport, where he attended the famous Latin school of Robert Rogers, at which, among others, Washington Alston was his schoolmate. From this institution, he proceeded to Brown University, at Providence, where the late Jonathan Russell* was his classmate, and whence he graduated, in 1791, with great distinction, receiving the salutatory, and Russell the valedictory oration. At his mother's request, shortly after graduating, he went to England, and entered himself as a student with the celebrated surgeon, John Hunter, who was a first cousin of his father. Anatomy, however, and especially dissections, proved to be so distasteful to him, that he soon abandoned the profession of medicine, and entered himself as a student of law in the Temple at London. For some time he was under Tid, and had Chitty as a fellow-student. Afterwards, he was under the learned Arthur Murphy, who he materially assisted in his admirable translation of Tacitus. When Murphy took to Burke his dedication of that work, Hunter accompanied him. They found Burke playing at jackstraws with his son. Mr. Hunter was a frequent attendant on the debates in Parliament, and at the argument of cases in the courts of law. As this time was at a period when Pitt, Fox, and Erskine were in the maturity of their powers, a young man, ambitious to become an orator, could not fail to derive advantage from listening to them.

In 1793, Mr. Hunter returned to Newport, where he was admitted to the bar, and soon rose to the head of his profession in Rhode Island. In 1799, he was elected to represent his native town in the General Assembly, and was subsequently re-elected at different periods from that time until the year 1811. He was then chosen a Senator of the United States, in which station he remained ten years. In politics he was a Federalist. At the period of his senatorship,

*Jonathan Russell was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1771. His early life was devoted to studying the best models of English and the classical writers, and after graduating, he was prepared for the profession of law, but subsequently relinquished it for that of commerce. His tastes, however, directed him to politics, and he was called upon to fill several positions of high diplomatic trust. For many years he was Minister Plenipotentiary from his native country at Stockholm, and in 1814, was one of the five commissioners who negotiated the treaty of Ghent. On his return to the United States, he was elected a representative in the lower House of Congress, from Massachusetts. In 1817, he received the degree of Doctor of Laws, from Brown University. Mr. Russell "had no skill as a forensic or parliamentary speaker; but he was a versatile, forcible, elegant and facile writer, and when the subject permitted, handled his pen with a caustic severity which is seldom passed." Few of his literary productions have been preserved.

speeches were not so frequently made in Congress as at the present time, and there were no regular reporters, so that those senators, especially of the minority, who wished to have their speeches printed, were obliged to write them out themselves. To these circumstances, the absence of Mr. Hunter's name from the debates reported in the Annals of Congress, may, it is presumed, be ascribed.

On the proposition for seizing and occupying the province of East Florida, in 1813, during the war between the United States and Great Britain, Mr. Hunter made a speech in secret session of the Senate, which he afterwards dictated to an amanuensis, and caused to be printed at Newport. This production will be found in the subsequent pages of this volume. It shows comprehensive views of the subject, expressed in a style unusually dignified and elevated, and contains passages of a high order of eloquence.

Mr. Hunter questioned the constitutionality of the Missouri restriction; voted accordingly, and failing to obtain a re-election to the Senate, he resumed his practice at the bar, and continued it until 1834, when he was appointed, by President Jackson, Chargé d'Affaires to Brazil. At Rio de Janeiro, he acquired the respect of the diplomatic body, and of the Brazilian government; and at the special request of the young emperor, was elevated to the position of Minister Plenipotentiary. During his residence in Brazil, he accumulated, from the various libraries of that country, and from every quarter to which he could gain access, vast stores of learning and research, which he would probably have published, had his life been spared.

In 1845, he returned to the United States, and on the tenth of December, 1849, died at Newport, in the seventy-sixth year of his age.

As a lawyer Mr. Hunter was distinguished for the extent and variety of his learning, while his diverse accomplishments gave him power as an advocate. In person he was tall, commanding and comely. In gesture graceful, natural and appropriate. His voice had a rare depth and melody, and his elocution was distinct and dignified. His language was rich and flowing, and his fancy quite poetical. His literary attainments were of a high order. He was quite familiar with the Latin classics, and apt in his quotations from them. In the French and Italian languages he was also well versed, and he spoke the former with as much ease and correctness as could be expected from one who had learned it in his childhood, from the French officers who were quartered in his father's house at Newport, and who had not many opportunities for prac tising it after their departure.

Mr. Hunter excelled in convivial talent, and was sure at a dinner-table to command at least as much attention as any one present whenever he thought proper to speak. His wit was keen and classical. Many of his good sayings are treasured up and repeated by his contemporaries in Congress. A man important as a politician in Pennsylvania, but otherwise quite insignificant, was a candidate for the office of Secretary of the Senate. Aspiring senators were eager in canvassing for him, so much so that the surprise of a newly elected senator was excited, and he asked Mr. Hunter why it was that such eminent men should take so lively an interest in the success of the candidates. Mr. Hunter replied, "Perhaps, my friend, you have not yet been long enough in Washington to be aware that Pennsylvania avenue leads to the President's house."

On another occasion, Mr. Little, of Maryland, was indulging in remarks of a personal character upon Mr. Law, of North Carolina, in the House of Representatives. Mr. Hunter happened to be among the auditors, and a gentleman near him asked if he thought Law would answer Little in the same strain. "No, indeed," said Mr. Hunter, "de minimis non curat lex."

ON SEIZING EAST FLORIDA.

This speech, on the proposition for seizing and occupying the Province of East Florida by the troops of the United States, was delivered by Mr. Hunter, in secret session of the Senate of the United States, on the second of February, 1813:

*

| peculiarity of its construction-the duration of its members in office, and the very mode of would be, and the design that it ought to be, their appointment, indicate the hope that it distinguished for the consistency of its conduct? Do not all the speculations upon the theoretic perfection of our constitution, contemplate this, as the body that, resisting temporary impulses, and opposing its own firmness to a fluctuating and imbecile policy, would give something like system and stability to our national councils?

Sir, I doubt not our power at all times-and upon great and extraordinary occasions I doubt not the right, the expediency and propriety of reversing our decisions. No body of men can be infallible, and therefore its decisions ought not to be irreversible. All I contend for is, that a case clear and strong indeed ought to be made out, to induce the Senate to forfeit, or even to hazard its character for stability and consistency. I do not say that our deliberate

proof of its absolute perfection, of its entire impeccability, as that it operates as an estoppel upon all subsequent inquiry, and necessarily precludes all debate; but grounding myself upon a well-known distinction, I do say, it is most persuasive, convincing and satisfactory evidence of the correctness of that decision, and that according to all the principles of parliamentary usage, deducible either from the rules of a sound logic, or from judicial analogies, it imposes on the honorable mover of this proposition and all its advocates, the necessity of substantiating, by new and further evidence, by arguments not before adduced, and by con

MR. PRESIDENT: It is, sir, with the utmost reluctance, that I make the attempt to suggest some remarks on the present subject. For although the question now under consideration is confessed on all sides to be one of the deepest interest and importance, involving in its decision no less a consequence than that of a change of our relations with a friendly power from a state of peace to that of war, yet we have been informed by the honorable gentleman from Maryland (whose judgment on all occasions, from his experience and standing here, is entitled to peculiar respect) that every exertion will be unavailing, and that it is the pre-deter-decisions, a few months since, is such conclusive mination of a majority of this Senate to adopt the present bill. If that gentleman desponds after his own able and ample discussion of the present bill, and his own vigorous efforts to prevent his own prediction, it would be presumption in me to hope. Whoever, too, moves in the discussion of this question must go on depressed, if not alarmed, by the denunciation of the honorable gentleman from Georgia, who in the overflowing of an allowable zeal and anxiety (connected as he deems the success of this bill to be with the peculiar interest and advantage of his own State) has declared it not less than infatuation, that pretends to foresee any evil consequences resulting from its adop-siderations of policy, arising out of a new juncture of our affairs-the wisdom, propriety In spite, however, of the forlorn hope to and necessity of the present proceeding. which I am condemned by the honorable gen- This too, sir, ought to be done with a cleartleman from Maryland, and the certainty of in-ness and copiousness of proof, sufficient to repel curring the penalty of the denunciation of the the warrantable, and inevitable suspicion, which honorable gentleman from Georgia (to whose always attaches to a renewed effort for a repersonal good opinion I am far from being in- jected measure; to an application for a new different), I feel myself impelled by obligations trial, upon a suggestion of new and further eviof duty, by a fair interpretation of the instruc-dence. What is the actual case? have we new tions of my constituents in reference to another occasion, and the clearest convictions of my understanding, to record my vote against the present proposition; and from the pressure of the same motives, I find myself induced, hopeless and unpropitious as is the occasion, to assign my reasons for that vote.

tion.

And in the first place, is it nothing, is it a consideration worthy of no regard, that this House has but lately, after a protracted and solemn discussion, rejected the very proposition contained in the bill before us? Is a character for consistency in its measures of no importance to this branch of the legislature? Does not the

* General Samuel Smith.
VOL. II.-22

proofs? even new statements? have we had any thing but arguments before refuted? Is the relation of our country different? Has any new event taken place? No, sir, it is not even pretended. I do therefore, on the ground of our former decision, on the ground that we were then right, and on the absence of all new inducement from proof, statement or argument, to do away that presumption, call upon gentlemen, as they respect themselves individuallyupon the Senate, whose character for consistency and dignity (most important and essential attributes of that character) will be compromitted and hazarded with the nation, to resist this overthrow of their best resolves-to stand to their former opinions, and to permit no con

tradictory record to be produced against them | tude to encounter? At second-hand with our -to the degradation of their established politi-intermediate decision to break off the storm of cal character and consequence.

public censure, they may be willing to adopt it. Sir, on this point of consistency and adher- But let us leave to them the honor and the peril ence to our former resolves, we ought to be of this at least contingent measure. If it will the more tenacious, because we have excited be so productive of good as some gentlemen hopes and expectations among our constituents, predict, it will be an act of condescension and and especially the commercial class, that we liberality for us to relinquish our pretensions ought not to disappoint. Next to an English, in their favor; but if it be an act pregnant with a Spanish war is the most disastrous in which innumerable evils, let the responsibility rest this country can be engaged. It affects, most upon the broad shoulders of the immediate deeply, the little commercial enterprise that is representatives of the people. They have a suffered to exist in the country. Upon the sug-power to which we cannot pretend, that of gestion that you were playing at this deep game originating money-bills-of devising the syslast session, a hundred commercial enterprises tems of taxation. The present war has exconnected with shipments to Spanish countries ceeded, in expense, all previous calculation; and colonies were suspended. Upon your wise has transcended every estimate:-and the exand virtuous rejection of this measure, hundreds pense of the next year will be at least double of shipments of enterprises grounded on your that of the last. A new war must inevitably consistency, upon your permanency of system, lead to a farther enormous increase of the pubhave commenced, and are now proceeding. lic burdens. Shall we originate measures, and leave to them the laborious, and I am afraid odious task of exacting from the pockets of the people the means of executing them? Or shall we heedlessly precipitate the country into a new war, ignorant whether the means will ever be provided to carry it on? Let us at least wait to see what is the system of taxation which their wisdom and patriotism will present to us. It may be too intolerable to be adopted ;-then this measure must fail; and we shall as a Senate have lavished our precious stock of public favor in a legislative effort at once premature and impotent.

Sir, it will be a gross breach of faith towards the commercial world; they will be ruined by this secret declaration of war. It will burst upon them, from this conclave, like a hurricane from the cave of olus, sweeping into the power of your new enemy as large an amount of property as that for which we pretend we are solicitous to seek indemnification. Where is our property? our commerce? at Cadiz-at Havana-at Lisbon. Do you suppose that the Spaniards, and the Portuguese, their allies, are dullards and fools? and that they will omit the fair and honest exercise of the rights of reprisal and retaliation? Will they not preach our doctrines against ourselves; practice our own arts, and repel aggression by aggression?

It is not on the mere ground of obstinate, unenlightened, indiscriminating adherence to your former measures, that I appeal to your sense of honor, magnanimity and consistency; but in relation to the prospect of loss, of disastrous consequences, of wide-spread distress. The merchants are now pursuing a lucrative honest trade with a friendly nation, upon the ground of their special and unsuspecting confidence in this Senate. Will you disappoint that confidence, and expose them to inevitable ruin; yourselves to inevitable censure?

Sir, why should we, as a Senate, at this time introduce this proposition? Is it by way of penitence for our former sin? a means of obtaining pardon for our past offences? a reparation for wrongs we have done? Or is it that some terrible necessity exists, that the Senate should entitle itself to forgiveness, and propitiate selfish and senseless clamor, by an act of submission and a surrender of its former opinions? Sir, I know we have the right to originate this measure; but is it proper, expedient, decorous in us to do it? It was, at first, the measure of the House of Representatives: let them at least re-produce it. Why this attempt to oblige us to adopt a bantling they have abandoned? Why court a perilous responsibility, which it seems they have no longer the forti

Sir, I wish to husband our peculiar reputation. Prudence, caution, and circumspection, but above all, independence; a firm, severe, and erect independence, ought to be the distinguishing qualities of this grave and dignified assembly. It is not for us to court popularity—but I am not unwilling to augment and corroborate our claims upon the public gratitude. We have already this session done much. We originated and carried through with uncommon despatch and unanimity, the bill for the augmentation of the navy. We conducted, with like dispatch and unanimity, our proceedings in regard to the Merchants' Bonds. We have unbound from the rack the victims of financial extortion, and preserved an useful and unoffending class of citizens from ruin, and the nation from disgrace. Let us not surrender these strong holds upon the public confidence. Let us at least not invoke public execration, by a rash declaration of an additional, unjust, and unnecessary war. If the car of the state is to be driven Jehu-like to destruction, let us refuse to be the charioteers.

I admit, that these objections are entirely preliminary; and relate not so much to the specific merits of the question now under consideration, as to the point whether we ought to consider it at all. Whether (if I may so express myself) we ought to assume of it any cognizance whatever. But in my humble conception, these objections are not less valid and important, for being preliminary considerations such as natu