388
WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1853
upon that earnest give them interest, and, if you please, be liberal, but let Texas have the credit of doing justice to her creditors, and let not the United States intervene to save her soiled honor, as it is called. She will take care of that article herself, ~nd she will take care of her money, too, I trust, ·and make a useful application of it in paying all just demands, but not the demands of Shylocks. Sir, I have done. 1 Congressionctl Globe, Apvendi.-c, 2d Sess., 32d Cong., pp. 153-156; Crane, Life and Select Litera111 Remains of Sam Houston, 393-402; The State Ga.zette, April 24, 1853; The Leon Pionee1·, April 12, 1853. 2 This was the Continental currency. About $80,000,000 remained un- canceled in 1790 and Congress proposed to redeem it for $2,000,000. REMARKS ON THE DEFICIENCY APPROPRIATION BILL, FEBRUARY 16, 1853L Mr. President, I am very reluctant to rise in the Senate when there is so much anxiety about the promotion of different meas- ures in this body, and if I did not think it was my duty, in my plain way, to support the amendment proposed by the honorable Senator from Wisconsin, I should make no remark. But, sir, I do not think it the poli~y of the Government to increase the salaries disproportionate to the duties to be performed by the officer, and particularly when that officer has no claims to con- sideration which entitle him to a just and favorable consideration of this body. I do not think, on the present occasion, that the gentleman at the head of the Census Bureau has, even by his mission to Europe, commended himself and the mission to the favorable notice of this body. Sir, I find in the history of this transaction little to commend, and if I were disposed to be a little rigid, I should say I find much more to censure than to commend. It appears that prior to the great World's Fair in London, it was projected by the Census Board that the Department of the Interior, I suppose, should, for the first time, be represented in Europe. Mr. Kennedy was selected as the delegate for that purpose. The Board recom- mended it, but there was no law appropriating the money that would be necessary to carry out that purpose. Mr. Kennedy made application to the First Comptroller of the Treasury for a warrant for $2,500 to pay his expenses; but that officer peremptorily refused, and the gentleman disappeared, although he said he had the authority of the Secretar1 v of the Interior, but not in writing. Yes, sir, he disappeared, and was not again
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