WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1842
208
was not regarded. Authority to hypothecate the Cherokee lands, or to make sale of them, or any portion thereof was omitted to be given. The collection of the direct tax was also postponed for six months after the usual period for its collection, and the Exchequer bills of necessity referred for redemption to imposts and licenses alone. The excitements in the country have pre- vented importations and persons owing their license tax have refused to pay. The process of collection is so tedious that unless some prompt remedy is devised by Congress it is useless to regard such a tax as a source of public revenue. The Exchequer bills being thus left dependent upon impost duties for their redemp- tion-no other demand existing for them-depreciated; and at one time were worth in market but twenty five cents on the dollar, though the whole amount issued up to this time is only about one hundred and twenty five thousand dollars; and the amount now in circulation cannot by possibility exceed thirty thousand. Had the requisite authority been given for the hypothe- cation of the Cherokee country for the redemption of these bills, and had the time for the collection of the direct tax not been postponed and the license tax been collectable, and the ware hous- ing system been abolished, it is believed a sum more than double the amount of two hundred thousand dollars could have been already brought into the Treasury. At the extra session in June last a law was passed, authorizing the Executive to have surveyed and brought into market four hundred thousand acres of the Cherokee lands, but under such restrictions that they amounted to a prohibition. Competent surveyors, after contracting for the execution of the work, de- clined its prosecution, having been assured that such hindrances would be interposed as would render their efforts, if not abortive, at least unpleasant. For the purpose of placing this subject at rest in the future, and that the country may not be prejudiced any longer in its just interests, there will be laid before the Hon- orable Congress at an early day, an opinion of the Attorney General, which for ability, clearness and conclusion, must place the question of right in the government forever at rest, and en- able the Congress to adopt such measures as will convert some of the most valuable resources of the nation into means, and have a tendency with other measures to ·sustain further issues if need- ful under the Exchequer law, to an extent double that now au- thorised to be issued.
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