Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/193

Rh Though not acting with Macon as to West Point, Houston followed Macon in opposing an outlay of $26,000 on the Presidential mansion.

The question of the tariff, opened during the session of 1823-4, was pursued in the session of 1824-5. Mr. Webster's cast of mind, as well as the interests of his Boston constituency, enabled him to present facts and figures which were all-controlling, especially as they were based on commercial and common, rather than on manufacturing or local interests. In December, 1824, from the South Carolina Legislature were introduced resolutions on the tariff, and on internal improvements to this effect: that it was unconstitutional to tax one State for improvements in another State; or to levy duties other than for revenue on foreign imports; or to levy a tax for the support of domestic manufactures. Thus was opened the issue which culminated eight years later, at a period when the influence of Mr. Webster went counter to the last proposition of South Carolina; though the distinct position of antagonism was not taken during the four years that Houston, in common with Webster, was in the House. In the final action, testing the merits of the bill, two of the Tennessee Representatives, one of whom was Houston, voted for, while seven voted against the measure; a vote which tested the intelligent and independent judgment which ruled Houston as a young member.

The honors paid to Lafayette brought out the peculiar cast of different leading minds, both in the Senate and the House. Two propositions were brought forward: the former to give Lafayette a formal reception in the halls of Congress, the latter to give him a grant of lands in the territory formerly belonging to France. Macon, the veteran North Carolina Senator, opposed both as a departure, the one from the simplicity, the other from the unselfishness which should characterize Republican leaders. In the House the vote for giving the public reception was carried by 166 to 26, Houston voting with the majority. The resolution to make the grant of lands also was passed by overwhelming majorities on these grounds: that the lands donated in 1803 to Lafayette in the Territory of Louisiana, directly after its purchase from France, whose value was regarded only a fair equivalent for actual money expenditures made by Lafayette in his long service rendered to the United States, had subsequently been claimed by a French resident as his property, and that Lafayette had relinquished the grant as a matter of individual justice. In addition to this grant Congress voted to refund to Lafayette his travelling expenses incurred on his visit as the guest of the nation. It was at St. Louis, the ancient center of the line of French settlements which