JB_111_156.xml

Title: [nd [wm 1816] Things as they are]

Description: nd [wm 1816]

Things as they are

§.8. Splendor

4

That this splendor is conducive to the reconciling men to this waste and this corruption, and thence to the continuing their support to so pernicious a form of government - that to a deplorable and shameful degree such has hitherto been the effect seems but too clearly out of /above/ dispute.

1. In the existence of Government a man beholds a security and the only effectual /adequate/ security for every thing which is dear to him /has a value in his eyes/. Government can not have place in any country but by the existence and exercise of political power: political power can not have existence but by means of some hands in which it is lodged. But in so far as they have had the power that persons in whose hands the powers really necessary for the maintenance of government and thence of public security have been lodged have never failed to obtain possess and employ for their own particular use as large a mass of the instruments in question, the instruments of personal enjoyment in every degree as they have been able: in particular in a monarchy, as large a quantity of that matter, the property of which is to give encrease to the splendour, the lustre, of the crown - of that sort of covering for the head, which, however common at one time, has for many centuries never been worn by any head but that of the Monarch, nor by that head but on great occasions. Such then being the state of things, that, without these accidental appendages of sumptuous houses sumptuous furniture, fine carriages, fine horses fine fourlegged attendants, fine two legged attendants of all /so many/ ranks and classes the man by whose hands the Monarchical power has been seen exercised has never offered himself to their eyes, between the idea of the power and that of the fancy[?] an intimate association has formed itself in their /men’s/ minds: an association so intimate that to many a mind the possibility of any separation between objects between which the conjunction has been thus constant may never have presented itself.

JB_129_627.xml

Title: [[129b-627] nd [wm 1816] 2 o]

Description: [129b-627]

nd [wm 1816]

2 o

Introd

§.9. Freedom of suffrage

IX. General Result

4

At any rate, if it be true that the population of the House is as to the great majority of it composed of impostors – let them be impostors as beneficent as King Numa with his Minister the Nymph Egeria is related to have been it is a mere abuse of words to speak of the government of this country by the name and in the character of a mixt monarchy the supreme authority of it being[?] in /divided into/ three distinct branches – the Monarchical the Aristocratical and the democratical branch the latter composed of representatives chosen by the people. It /On this supposition, it/ is in fact and truth a Monarchy now limited, now absolute, containing immediately under it an Aristocracy, disguised under the forms of mixt Monarchy having for its sole real support and dependence a vast and so long as it continues faithful to its liberticide trust /determined if indeed it be determined to act as an enemy to the people/ – an irresistible standing army the forms of civil i.e. non military government preserved so long as present convenience prescribes, the forms of military command ready at any time and at all times in any place and in all places to be substituted, at any times at any times, at all times and for ever substituted.

JB_129_632.xml

Title: [[129b-632] [Copyist’s hand]]

Description: [129b-632]

[Copyist’s hand]

nd [wm 1813]

Collectanea

2. Funded Public Debt contracted since the war, 73,096,414 dollars 33 cents

3 Floating Public Debt outstanding 9283,794 dollars –

Total 123,630,692 dollars, 23 cents –

The aggregate amount of the Public Debt, as estimated on 12 th Feb y 1816: being the sum of 123,630,692 dollars, 93 cents –

The aggregate reduction since that period, amounts to the sum of 3,471,210 dollars 33 Cents

In execution of the act of 30 th April 1816, relative to the Custom House Establishment, the Secretary states,

That the purchase of a Custom House as Boston cost 29,000 dollars –

That a purchase had been authorized at New York at a price not exceeding 53,000 dollars –

That a purchase has been authorized at Philadelphia, at the price for the site and buildings to be erected, which will probably amount to 65,000 dollars. Total 149,000 dollars –

That a negotiation has taken place with the Trustees for building an Exchange, at Baltimore, who offer to erect and convey to the Government a suitable establishment, being part of the Exchange, for 70,000 dollars –

And that a site and building may be purchased at Charleston for the sum of 50,000 dollars – Total 269,000.

But that the appropriation only amounts to 250,000 dollars, leaving a deficit of 19,000 –

Upon this statement, it is proposed to suspend the purchase at Baltimore, until an additional appropriation can be obtained, but to complete the other establishments