of the House to take notice of it by war or negotiation. In the
establishment of land offices for the sale of the western lands he
brought to bear upon legislation his practical experience. He urged that
the tracts for sale be divided, and distinctions be made between large
purchasers and actual settlers--proposing that the large tracts be
sold at the seat of government, and the small on the territory itself.
He instanced the fact that in 1792 all the land west of the Ohio was
disposed of at 1_s_. 6_d_. the acre, and a week afterwards was resold at
$1.50, so that the money which should have gone into the treasury went
to the pockets of speculators. He also suggested that the proceeds of
the sales should be a fund to pay the public debt, and that the public
stock should always be received at its value in payment for land; a plan
by which the land would be brought directly to the payment of the debt,
as foreigners would gladly exchange the money obligations of the
government for land. On the question of taxation he declared himself in
favor of direct taxes, and held that a tax on houses and lands could be
levied without difficulty. He would satisfy the people that it was to
pay off the public debt, which he held to be a public curse. He
supported the excise duty on stills under regulations which would avoid
the watching of persons and houses and inspection by officers, and
proposed that licenses be granted for the time applied for.

The military establishment he opposed in every way, attacked the
principle on which it was based, and fought every appropriation in
detail, from the pay of a major-general to the cost of uniforms for the
private soldiers. He was not afraid of the army, he said, but did not
think that it was necessary for the support of the government or
dangerous to the liberties of the people; moreover, it cost six hundred
thousand dollars a year, which was a sum of consequence in the condition
of the finances.

The navy found no more favor in his eyes. He denied that fleets were
necessary to protect commerce. He challenged its friends to show, from
the history of any nation in Europe as from our own, that commerce and
the navy had gone hand in hand. There was no nation except Great
Britain, he said, whose navy had any connection with commerce. Navies
were instruments of power more calculated to annoy the trade of other
nations than to protect that of the nations to which they belonged. The
price England h