The part proposed to be struck out is that which requires all debts to government to be paid in specie.  It makes a good provision for government, and for public men, through all classes.  The Secretary of the Treasury, in his letter at the last session, was still more watchful of the interests of the holders of office.  He assured us, that, bad as the times were, and notwithstanding the floods of bad paper which deluged the country, members of Congress should get gold and silver.  In my opinion, Sir, this is beginning the use of good money in payments at the wrong end of the list.  If there be bad money in the country, I think that Secretaries and other executive officers, and especially members of Congress, should be the last to receive any good money; because they have the power, if they will do their duty, and exercise it, of making the money of the country good for all.  I think, Sir, it was a leading feature in Mr. Burke’s famous bill for economical reform, that he provided, first of all, for those who are least able to secure themselves.  Everybody else was to be well paid all they were entitled to, before the ministers of the crown, and other political characters, should have any thing.  This seems to me very right.  But we have a precedent, Sir, in our own country, more directly to the purpose; and as that which we now hope to strike out is the part of the bill furnished or proposed originally by the honorable member from South Carolina, it will naturally devolve on him to supply its place.  I wish, therefore, to draw his particular attention to this precedent, which I am now about to produce.

Most members of the Senate will remember, that before the establishment of this government, and before or about the time that the territory which now constitutes the State of Tennessee was ceded to Congress, the inhabitants of the eastern part of that territory established a government for themselves, and called it the State of Franklin.  They adopted a very good constitution, providing for the usual branches of legislative, executive, and judicial power.  They laid and collected taxes, and performed other usual acts of legislation.  They had, for the present, it is true, no maritime possessions, yet they followed the common forms in constituting high officers; and their governor was not only captain-general and commander-in-chief, but admiral also, so that the navy might have a commander when there should be a navy.

Well, Sir, the currency in this State of Franklin became very much deranged.  Specie was scarce, and equally scarce were the notes of specie-paying banks.  But the legislature did not propose any divorce of government and people; they did not seek to establish two currencies, one for men in office, and one for the rest of the community.  They were content with neighbor’s fare.  It became necessary to pass what we should call now-a-days the civil-list appropriation bill.  They passed such a bill; and when we shall have made a void in the bill now before us by striking out specie payments for government, I recommend to its friends to fill the gap, by inserting, if not the same provisions as were in the law of the State of Franklin, at least something in the same spirit.