Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v4.djvu/507

1826.] mesne or final process; by others, personal property may be held in defiance of creditors; while, by others, real estate cannot be touched. In some instances, executions are suspended; in others, the courts of justice are closed, or, which is the same thing, delays are sanctioned which amount to a denial of justice. In some states, a few creditors in the immediate neighborhood are suffered, by attachment, or other legal proceedings, (often the result of collusion with the debtor,) to secure to themselves the whole estate of an insolvent. In several states, persons arrested for debt are permitted to "swear out," as it is called, after a notice of a few days; while in other states, they are required to lie in jail for three or four months. In some instances, the relief extended is confined to the discharge of the debtor from arrest in the particular suit; in others, from arrest in all suits; and in some few cases, the attempt has been made to release him from all future liability on existing contracts. These various systems, unequal and inconsistent as they must be admitted to be, are rendered still more objectionable by being perpetually fluctuating. It was the opinion of one of the ablest judges that ever sat on the English bench, or any other bench, that it was better for the community "that a rule should be certain than that it should be just;" for the obvious reason, that we can shape our conduct, or our contracts, in reference to any known and settled rule, so as to avoid its injurious effects; but when the rule is uncertain, we cannot avoid falling under its operation.

We are told that it was felt as a grievance by the Roman people, that the tyrant should write his laws "in a small character, and hang them up on high pillars," so that it was difficult to read them; but that grievance would have been rendered still more intolerable, if the inscriptions had been varied with the rising and setting of the sun.

Not a year, hardly a month passes by, which does not witness numerous, and, in many instances, radical changes in the insolvent systems of the several states. It is found utterly impracticable to conform to them or to guard against them. It defies the wisdom of the bench, or the learning of the bar, to give certainty or consistency to a system of laws, upon which twenty-four different legislatures are constantly acting, and almost daily innovating—a system which changes with a rapidity that deceives the mental vision, and leaves us in the grossest ignorance.

It is manifest, Mr. President, that the states are now reduced to the necessity of entering into a competition with each other, in restricting the rights of creditors, and impairing the liabilities of debtors; and this, too, in a matter in which, as it is impossible to mark the exact line of equality there must be great danger of their advancing, step by step, until every thing is unsettled. I am persuaded that nothing but the constitutional prohibition on the states, against "impairing the obligation of contracts," and the general—I might almost say the universal—belief that they have no right to pass an efficient bankrupt law, have hitherto prevented such an interference between debtor and creditor, as would have given a fatal blow to commercial credit and enterprise.

Sir, this whole country is filled with unfortunate debtors, who owe their failure to such causes. I have no hesitation in declaring it to be my firm belief, and settled conviction, founded on some personal knowledge, and information derived from those well acquainted with the subject, and worthy of entire confidence, that, from these causes, there is a mass of talent, industry—ay, sir, and virtue too—in our country, idle and useless; and that their number is daily and rapidly increasing. Thousands of