potentates, were not the most pernicious prodigality! The proceedings in Congress, during the two last winters, were, in this point of view, portentous. The reduction of the direct tax, from six to three millions of dollars, and the limitation of those three millions to only one year, are fearful omens of the entire extinction of that tax. Nay, in the month of February last, a proposition was made to abolish all the internal taxes; a scheme, say its advocates, that failed only because it was introduced too late in the session; and which may be carried into a law, by a triumphant majority, at the next meeting of the national legislature.

The reduction of the regular army probably would follow, as a matter of course, on the repeal of the internal taxes. Indeed, it was proposed in the Senate last spring, on the ground that ten thousand soldiers are dangerous to the liberties of the American people; and, therefore, should be diminished to five thousand. Britain has an army of one hundred and fifty thousand men, stationed at home, in France, and in colonial garrisons; besides her militia, amounting to two hundred thousand, and her Sepoy troops in the East-Indies, rated at a hundred and fifty thousand. And yet, no man in his sober senses believes that the liberties of the British people are endangered by this standing army. The liberties of England are not about to expire under the pressure of her military, or the encroachments of her government; if they are to perish, they will perish under the daggers of her democracy: if she is to be blotted out from the list of independent and powerful nations, she will be erased from that high scroll by the paricidal hand of her own rabble, led on to their own and their country's perdition by anarchial reformers, who are alike bankrupt in fortune, reputation, character, and principle. But we have no occasion to entertain such fears at present; for, while the sovereign governs under the benignant influence of the laws; while the people are free; while religion, morals, intelligence, learning, science, industry, enterprise, and valour, continue to make England their favoured abode,

the sun of her national glory can never set, but will burn with brighter and still brighter light, until all the ages of time shall be lost in the profound of eternity. The standing army of Britain may be too numerous and too expensive for the present dilapidated state of her finances; but, in regard to the liberties of her people, it is utterly harmless and innocent.

How much more a fortiori then must the liberties of the American people be secure, under the presence of ten thousand men, mostly native citizens, and commanded by officers, whose courage, loyalty, and talents have been displayed on the battle-field, and have received the reward of their country's gratitude! This little army is divided and stationed in garrisons along the Atlantic coast, from the District of Maine to St. Mary's, in Georgia, a distance of nearly two thousand miles, and on the west, from the lakes to New-Orleans, a distance still greater. The American citizens are intelligent, well educated, and awake to the preservation of their liberties; every where armed, and trained to the use of arms, and comprising a militia of nearly a million of free men. Are such a country, and such a people, in jeopardy, as to their freedom, from the existence of a standing army of ten thousand men?

Upon what ground of political forecast and wisdom is it, that so many members of the Congress, and so large a portion of the people out of the national legislature, seem bent upon lessening the defences of the country; and that, too, precisely at the moment when the United States, by their rapid augmentation in greatness, and by the peculiar condition of the world, which has thrown all Europe into the hands of three or four powerful sovereigns, and which forbids the very existence of any weak or nerveless government, are more than ever exposed to disturbance in their foreign relations? Against all saving of mere money, at the expense of national dignity and strength, it behoves the American government to contend with all its influence, power, and vigilance. And, unless the government gradually train its people to bear the weight of due taxation, how

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ean it expect their adequate support in a fierce and protracted struggle for national superiority, or sovereignty, or existence? Are the people of the United States prepared, now, for such a conflict, as the British people have, with so much courage, and wisdom, and perseverance, endured for five and twenty years, and finally conducted to so triumphant an issue? A conflict which, at the expense of seven hundred millions of pounds sterling, and of three hundred thousand lives, has broken down the power of revolutionary France, and rescued Europe, America herself, and the whole world, from impending bondage?

If not, how are they to acquire such habits of enduring patriotism and loyalty? When the danger comes, it will be too late; it will then be in vain to appeal to the fears and hopes of the people, to talk of forced loans, and of conscriptions, of requisitions of men and money. The government alone can inspire such high and heroic habits into the people, by a wisely adjusted system of internal taxation, which, increasing with the augmenting wealth and population of the Union, will enable government to call out, either on a sudden, or for a continuance, all the resources of the country, whether for the purpose of defence or offence, whenever the interests of the nation may require. Not a moment ought to be lost in laying the foundation of such a system; to frame which may well employ the deepest reflection of our ablest legislators and financiers; that the taxes shall be so laid as not to obstruct the progress of productive labour, nor divert capital from its legitimate objects, but leave all individual effort free to find the advantages of unrestrained competition in every allowable pursuit.

The banking capital of the United States exceeds a hundred millions of dollars. In most of the States there are several chartered banks for the purposes of discount and deposit. The United States Bank has a capital of thirty-five millions of dollars, of which the general government is a stockholder to the amount of seven millions, and appoints five out of twenty-five

directors, twenty being chosen annually by the stockholders at large. The influence which government has over this bank will greatly facilitate all its monied operations in future, both in war and in peace. The intrinsic benefits which banking institutions afford to every commercial community are too well known to require any minute elucidation. The youthful student will find those benefits fully displayed in Sir James Stuart's Work on political economy; Dr. Smith's "Wealth of Nations," and in Mr. Thornton's admirable Treatise on Paper Credit.

The national debt of the United States at present does not amount to one hundred and twenty millions of dollars. The expense of the revolutionary war, which gave independence and sovereignty to America, was upwards of one hundred and thirty-five millions of dollars. About one-half of this expense was paid by taxes, levied and collected during the war, and the residue remained a debt due from the United and the separate States on the return of peace, in 1783. The advances made from the American Treasury were principally in paper, called Continental Money, which, ultimately, depreciated so much that one thousand dollars would not buy more than one dollar in silver; but the specie value of the debt, independently of the paper depreciation, amounted in April, 1783, to 842,000,375, and the annual interest to $2,415,956. The interest, however, was not paid under the old confederation; and in 1790, the debt amounted to $54,124,464; and the State debts, including interest, were estimated at $25,000,000. Mr. Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury, after the establishment of the Federal Constitution, advised the general government to assume the whole of this debt, both state and continental, amounting to 879,000,000, and bearing an annual interest of 84,587,444, but Congress assumed only 821,500,000, of the debts of the several States, which were appropriated to each State. On the 31st day of December, 1794, the sum total of the unredeemed debt was $76,096,468.

Provision was made by law, first for paying the interest, and then for the redemption of the capital of the debt. For the payment of the interest, the permanent duties on imported articles, the tonnage duties, and duties on spirits distilled within the United States, and on stills, after reserving $600,000 for the support of the general government and the national defence, were appropriated and pledged. The Sinking Fund, for the redemption of the debt, was placed under the management of the President of the Senate, the Chief Justice of the United States, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, and the Attorney General, for the time being, as Commissioners of the Sinking Fund, which consisted of the surplus of the duties on imports and tonnage to the end of the year 1770; the proceeds of loans, not exceeding $2,000,000; the interest on the public debt, purchased, redeemed, or paid into the Treasury, together with the surpluses of monies appropriated for interest; and, lastly, the avails of the public lands. The amount of debt purchased by the Commissioners of the Sinking Fund, up to the 31st of December, 1794, was $2,265,022. In March, 1795, Congress made considerable additions to the income of the Sinking Fund, and appropriated and vested them in the Commissioners, in trust, till the whole debt should be redeemed.

On the 1st of January, 1800, the total debt, funded and temporary, of the United States, amounted to 879,433,820; the debts contracted by the general government from the year 1790 to 1800, being

10,786,100, and the debts discharged during that time being 88,164,232. The causes of the augmentation of the debt were the extraordinary expenses incurred in the wars with the Indians; $1,250,000 expended in suppressing two insurrections in Pennsylvania, on account of the tax on whiskey; more than $1,500,000 spent in the transactions of the United States with Algiers and the other Barbary powers, and the still greater expenses occasioned by the disputes with revolutionary France, in 1798 and 1799. On a