latitude in which it is sometimes laid down, that "public debts are public benefits," a position inviting to prodigality, and liable to dangerous abuse, that he ardently wishes to see it incorporated, as a fundamentul maxim in the system of public credit of the United States, that the creation of debt should be always accompanied with the means of extinguishment. This he regards as the true secret for rendering public credit immortal. And he presumes that it is difficult to conceive a situation in which there may not be an adherence to the maxim. At least he feels an unfeigned solicitude that this may be attempted by the United States, and that they may commence their measures for the establishment of credit with the observance of it."

Extract from a report of the Secretary of the Treasury on manufactures, presented the 5th December, 1791.

After using several arguments to illustrate the operation of a funded debt as capital, the Secretary concludes thus. "There are respectable individuals, who from a just aversion to an accumulation of public debt, are unwilling to concede to it any kind of utility, who can discover no good to alleviate the ill with which they suppose it pregnant, who cannot be persuaded that it ought in any sense to be viewed as an increase of capital, lest it should. be inferred that the more debt the more capital, the greater the burthens the greater the blessings of the community."

"But it interests the public councils to estimate every object as it truly is; to appreciate how far the good in any measure is compensated by the ill, or the ill by the good; either of them is seldom unmixed." "Neither will it follow, that an accumulation of debt is desirable, because a certain degree of it operates as capital. There may be a plethora in the political, as in the natural body; there may be a state of things in which any such artificial capita is unnecessary. The debt too may be swelled to such a size as that the greatest part of it may cease to be useful as a capital, serving only to pamper the dissipation of idle and dissolute individuals; as that the sums required to pay the interest upon it may become oppressive, and beyond the means which a government can employ, consistently with its tranquillity, to raise them; as that the resources of taxation, to face the debt,

may have been strained too far to admit of extensions adequate to exigencies, which regard the public safety."

"Where this critical point is, cannot be pronounced; but it is impossible to believe that there is not such a point.”

"And as the vicissitudes of nations beget a perpetual tendency to the accumulation of debt, there ought to be in every government a perpetual, anxious, and unceasing effort to reduce that which at any time exists, as fast as shall be practicable, consistently with integrity and good faith."

Extract from a report of the Secretary of the Treasury relative to additional supplies for carrying on the Indian War, presented the 16th of March, 1792.

"The result of mature reflection is, in the mind of the Secretary, a strong conviction that the last of the three expedients which have been mentioned (that was the raising of the sum required, by taxes) is to be preferred to either of the other two."

"Nothing can more interest the national credit and prosperity, than a constant and systematic attention to husband all the means previously possessed for extinguishing the present debt, and to avoid, as much as possible, the incurring any new debt."

"Necessity alone, therefore, can justify the application of any of the public property, other than the annual revenues, to the current service, or to the temporary and casual exigencies of the country-or the contracting of an additional debt, by loans, to provide for those exigencies."

"Great emergencies might exist in which loans would be indispensable. But the occasions which will justify them, must be truly of that description." "The present is not of such a nature. The sum to be provided is not of magnitude enough to furnish the plea of necessity." "Taxes are never welcome to a community. They seldom fail to excite uneasy sensations more or less extensive; hence a too strong propensity in the government of nations to anticipate and mortgage the resources of posterity, rather than encounter the inconveniences of a present increase of taxes."

"But this policy, when not dictated by very peculiar circumstances, is of the worst kind. Its obvious tendency is, by enhancing the

permanent burthens of the people, to produce lasting distress, and its natural issue is in national bankruptcy."

"It will be happy if the councils of this country, sanctioned by the voice of an enlightened community, shall be able to pursue a different course."

Here is example added to precept. In pursuit of a doctrine, the opposite of that which is charged upon him, the Secretary did not scruple to hazard the popularity of his administration with a class of citizens, who, as a class, have been among the firmest friends of the government, and the warmest approvers of the measures which have restored public credit. The circumstance indeed has been a weapon dexterously wielded against him by his enemies; who, in consequence of the increase of duties proposed, have represented him as the oppressor of trade. A certain description of men are for getting out of debt, yet are against all taxes for raising money to pay it off; they are among the foremost for carrying on war, and yet will have neither loans. nor taxes. They are alike opposed to what creates debt, and to what avoids it.

In the first case their meaning is not difficult to be divined; in the last, it would puzzle any man, not endowed with the gift of second sight, to find it out, unless it be to quarrel with and pull down every man who will not consent to walk in their leading strings; or to throw all things into confusion.

AMICUS.

FACT.

September 11th, 1792.

A writer in the Gazette of Saturday last, after several obser vations with regard to certain charges which have been lately brought forward against the Secretary of State, proceeds to make or insinuate several charges against another political character.

As to the observations which are designed to exculpate the

Secretary of State, I shall do nothing more than refer to the discussions which have taken place, and appear to be in a train to be pursued in the Gazette of the United States.

As to the charges which have been brought against the other public character alluded to, I shall assert, generally, from a long intimate and confidential acquaintance with him, added to some other means of information, that the matters charged, as far as they are intelligible, are either grossly misrepresented, or palpably untrue.

A part of them is of a nature to speak for itself without comment, the malignity and turpitude of the accuser denoting clearly the personal enemy in the garb of the political oppo

nent.

The subject and the situation of the parties naturally impose silence, but this is not the first attempt of the kind that has been made fruitlessly hitherto, and I doubt not, equally fruitlessly in time to come. An opinion on the experience of 15 years, the greatest part of the time under circumstances affording the best opportunity for an accurate estimate of character, cannot be shaken by slanderous surmises. The charge of which I shall take more particular notice, is contained in the following passage:

"Let him explain the public character, who, if uncontradicted fame is to be regarded, opposed the Constitution in the grand convention, because it was too republican, and advocated the British monarchy as the perfect standard to be approached as nearly as the people could be made to bear." This, I affirm to be a gross misrepresentation. To prove it is so, it were sufficient to appeal to a single fact, namely, that the gentleman alluded to, was the only member from the State to which he belonged, who signed the Constitution, and it is notorious against the prevailing weight of the official influence of the State, and against what would probably be the opinion of a large majority of his fellow-citizens, till better information should correct their first impressions.

How, then, can he be believed to have opposed a thing which he actually agreed to, and that in so unsupported a situation, and under circumstances of such peculiar responsibility? To this I shall add two more facts-one, that the member in question,

never made a single proposition to the Convention which was not conformable to the republican theory—the other, that the highest toned of any of the propositions made by him was actually voted for by the representation of several States, including some of the principal ones; and including individuals, who, in the estimation of those, who deem themselves the only republicans, are preeminent for republican character more than this I am not at liberty to say.

It is a matter generally understood, that the deliberations of the Convention, which were carried on in private, were to remain undisturbed. And every prudent man must be convinced of the propriety both of the one and the other. Had the deliberations been open while going on, the clamors of faction would have prevented any satisfactory result; had they been afterwards disclosed, much food would have been afforded to inflammatory declamation. Propositions made without due reflection, and perhaps abandoned by the proposers themselves, on more mature reflection, would have been handles for a profusion of ill-natured

accusation.

Every infallible declaimer, taking his own ideas as the perfect standard, would have railed without measure or mercy at every member of the Convention, who had gone a single line beyond his standard.

The present is a period fruitful in accusation-much anonymous slander has and will be vented-no man's reputation can be safe, if charges in this form are to be lightly listened to. There are but two kinds of anonymous charges that can merit attention-where the evidence goes along with the charge-and where reference is made to specific facts, the evidence of the truth or falsehood of which is in the power or possession of the party accused, and he at liberty to make a free use of it. None of the charges brought forward in this instance, fall within either of these rules.

AMICUS.

G

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