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538 forging a nation Speech before the U.S. Senate daniel webster January 20, 1830 Speech before the U.S. Senate robert y. hayne January 27, 1830 The following two speeches are taken from what has become known as the Webster-Hayne Debate. This series of speeches took place in January of 1830 between Robert Y. Hayne, senator from South Carolina, and Daniel Webster, senator from Massachusetts . It began on January 19, when Hayne made a speech on the Senate floor. That speech concerned a proposal to limit the sale of federally owned lands to those that were already on the market. In it, Hayne sided with Sen. Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri, who characterized the land proposal as a scheme by northeastern states to restrain westward migration. The goal, in Benton’s view, was to keep the population in eastern states concentrated and poor, forcing the people to take difficult, low-paying manufacturing jobs. Hayne seized on this argument and added his own view that the national tariff, discouraging imports by artificially increasing their price, was another means by which northeastern interests were using their power at the federal level to serve their own interests at the expense of other sections of the nation. Webster responded on January 20 by painting the Northeastern states as the true friends of the West, but the major issues of the debate concerned Webster’s and Hayne’s differing conceptions of the nature and purpose of the union. Whereas Hayne sought to defend Southern interests by supporting policies that favored agriculture and states’ rights, Webster sought to defend northeastern interests through “The American System” —a high tariff and stronger national government aiming to promote manufacturing. Speech of Mr. Webster, of Massachusetts The following resolution, moved by Mr. Foot, of Connecticut, being under consideration: “Resolved, That the Committee on Public Lands be instructed to inquire and report the quantity of the public lands remaining unsold within each State and Territory, and whether it be expedient to limit, for a certain period, the sales of the public lands to such lands only as have heretofore been offered for sale, and are now subject to entry at the minimum price. And, also, whether the office of Surveyor General, and some of the Land Offices, may not be abolished without detriment to the public interest; or whether it be expedient to adopt measures to hasten the sales, and extend more rapidly the surveys of the public lands.” Mr. Webster said, on rising, that nothing had been further from his intention than to take any part in the discussion of this resolution. It proposed only an inquiry, on a subject of much importance, and one in regard to which it might strike the mind of the mover, and of other gentlemen, that inquiry and investigation would be useful. Although [said Mr. W.] I am one of those who do not perceive any particular utility in instituting the inquiry, I have, nevertheless , not seen that harm would be likely to result from adopting the resolution. Indeed, it gives no new powers, and hardly imposes any new duty on the Committee. All that the resolution proposes should be done, the Committee is quite competent, without the resolution, to do, by Webster Senate Speech 539 virtue of its ordinary powers. But, sir, although I have felt quite indifferent about the passing of the resolution, yet opinions were expressed yesterday on the general subject of the public lands, and on some other subjects, by the gentleman from South Carolina, so widely different from my own, that I am not willing to let the occasion pass without some reply. If I deemed the resolution, as originally proposed, hardly necessary, still less do I think it either necessary or expedient to adopt it, since a second branch has been added to it to-day. By this second branch, the Committee is to be instructed to inquire whether it be expedient to adopt measures to hasten the sales, and extend more rapidly the surveys of the public lands. Now, it appears that, in forty years, we have sold no more than about twenty millions of acres of public lands. The annual sales do not now exceed, and never have exceeded, one million of acres. A million a year is, according to our experience, as much as the increase of population can bring into settlement . And it appears also, that we have, at this moment, sir, surveyed and in the market, ready...

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