and were understood to have achieved a victory. We looked upon them as
conquerors. They had driven back the enemy with discomfiture, a thing,
by the way, Sir, which is not always performed when it is promised. A
gentleman to whom I have already referred in this debate had come into
Congress, during my absence from it, from South Carolina, and had
brought with him a high reputation for ability. He came from a school
with which we had been acquainted, _et noscitur a sociis_. I hold in my
hand, Sir, a printed speech of this distinguished gentleman,[4] "ON
INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS," delivered about the period to which I now refer,
and printed with a few introductory remarks upon _consolidation_; in
which, Sir, I think he quite consolidated the arguments of his
opponents, the Radicals, if to _crush_ be to consolidate. I give you a
short but significant quotation from these remarks. He is speaking of a
pamphlet, then recently published, entitled "Consolidation"; and, having
alluded to the question of renewing the charter of the former Bank of
the United States, he says:--

"Moreover, in the early history of parties, and when Mr. Crawford
advocated a renewal of the old charter, it was considered a Federal
measure; which internal improvement _never was_, as this author
erroneously states. This latter measure originated in the
administration of Mr. Jefferson, with the appropriation for the
Cumberland Road; and was first proposed, _as a system_, by Mr.
Calhoun, and carried through the House of Representatives by a
large majority of the Republicans, including almost every one of
the leading men who carried us through the late war."

So, then, internal improvement is not one of the Federal heresies. One
paragraph more, Sir:--

"The author in question, not content with denouncing as
Federalists, General Jackson, Mr. Adams, Mr. Calhoun, and the
majority of the South Carolina delegation in Congress, modestly
extends the denunciation to Mr. Monroe and the whole Republican
party. Here are his words: 'During the administration of Mr. Monroe
much has passed which the Republican party would be glad to approve
if they could!! But the principal feature, and that which has
chiefly elicited these observations, is the renewal of the SYSTEM
OF INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS.' Now this measure was adopted by a vote
of 115 to 86 of a Republican Congress, and san