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WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1858
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exonerate these partners from all accountability to the Govern- ment, but, in good faith, to hold the officers of the Government, to whom it has confided important trusts, responsible. When they have failed in the duty confided to them, and the revenues are betrayed or defrauded, let not the injury fall on innocent individuals when it is caused by the acts of the Government, who were responsible for the protection of citizens through the public functionaries of the Government. Mr. Houston. I do not wish to detain the Senate, but it does seem to me that it is a most extraordinary course which gentle- men have taken. I have great respect for the kindness, good temper, and justice of my excellent friend from New York [Mr. King], but it does seem to me he has not carried his suspicions quite far enough. He thinks these partners might have kept this man for the purpose of imposing on the custom-house. Now we learn from the facts stated today-I have never looked into the case before-that he was recommended to them as a business man, confidential and intelligent, and not for the special purpose, I believe, of transacting business at the custom-house as suggested. He was recommended by his former employers as a most reliable man, and he was made a partner to sustain and encourage him, and requite him for his fidelity. They gave him every encourage- ment necessary; and, being recommended by former business men who had him in their employment, it was natural that they should confide to him important trusts. That is, I believe, about the circumstances of his being employed by them; but it is just as probable that he had partners in the custom-house, who were sleeping or dormant partners, as to suppose that he had partners out of it. It does seem to me that four years' delinquency and perpetration of crime on his part is conclusive evidence that there must have been collusion in the custom-house, and that the col- lector of the customs is responsible for the deeds, and not this• firm in New Orleans, of which a partner was involved in com- plicity. I think the securities of the collector at New Orleans were answerable for these injuries to the Government; and if it was defrauded out of customs, it was his business to prevent it; and if the Government lost, owing to any neglect of his, his securities are responsible, for their obligation was to vindicate his honesty as a public officer; to see that he performed his duties as a public officer. A man might be honest, and yet utterly neglectful in the discharge of his duties, and involve the country in ruinous consequences to its revenues; and in that event, the
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