Report upon a Bankrupt Law. The following Report, from the Committee on the Judiciary, accompanied the Bill reported by Mr. Bernard in the House of Representatives on Wednesday last, for establishing a uniform system of Bankruptcy : This Committee on the Judiciary, to whom have been referred the petitions and memorials presented to the House on the subject of a Bankrupt Law, respectfully report: In the opinion of the committee, a Bankrupt Law ought to be passed by Congress without unnecessary delay; and they present a bill for the consideration of the House. This bill is essentially the same that was matured in the Senate in the first session of the last Congress, after great deliberation, and which finally passed that body. It was not then considered in the House for want of time. The policy of laws designed to afford remedy and relief as between creditors and their debtors who are hopelessly insolvent, has the sanction of usage, in the past and the present, among nearly all highly civilized and business communities. The leading idea upon which these laws have proceeded has certainly not always been the same; it has varied with the general state of the law, and with the progress of society. In a country where the creditor was, by law, the undisputed arbiter of liberty and life to his insolvent debtor, the immediate motive for interposition must have been different from that which has promoted legislative interference where the relation of debtor and creditor has been differently understood. In England, bankrupt laws had their origin apparently in the idea that debtors who did not pay were merely unwilling, and not unable to pay. The first bankrupt law passed in the time of Henry 8th was levelled against those "who craftily obtained the goods of other men, and fled; or kept their houses, not minding to pay their debts." It came in aid of the law, proceeding on the same idea of ability and unwillingness, which authorized imprisonment for debt-a thing unknown to the common law. If a debt was not paid, the credit itself was supposed to have been craftily obtained; the ability to pay was presumed; the debtor was arrested and imprisoned till he should be made willing; or, if he had fled or kept house, so that arrest was impossible, his estate passed into the custody of the law for the liquidation of the debt. So long as this idea of ability and unwillingness prevailed, and no other was admitted, the whole evil, so far as creditors were considered, was supposed to be adequately met by the punishment of imprisonment or confiscation. When, however, it was found, as industry and production came to be increased by the use of capital and credit, that the mass of debtors who did not pay were, not only unable but unwilling, it became necessary to turn round, and, without disarming the creditor, throw a shield over the defenceless head of his honest and innocent debtor. The law in England on this subject, often variously modified in matters of detail, now is, and has long been, in sub dation. And second, that where creditors invoke the punishment of confiscation on their debtor, which can only be done where the debtor belongs to one or another of certain specified classes, the creditors shall take the full benefit of the proceeding by the application of the property towards the payment of their debts: provided the debtor, being honest and willing but unable to pay in full, shall, on certain terms and conditions, be for ever discharged from all legal obligation to pay the rest and residue of his debts. Thus the law of interposition and relief, in England, as between creditors on the one hand, and debtors who cannot pay their debts on the other, stands, and is administered, in two distinct branches, and under two distinct systems. In the one system the debtors are denominated in 'solvent'; in the other they are called bankrupt. In a report VOL. V.-8 made to the Queen in July, 1840, and signed by eight out of nine commissioners appointed to investigate this subject, it was strongly recommended to reduce these two branches of the law and systems of administration to one consistent system, and make the whole law of the case more comformable to reason and to right. The principal improvements in the law relating to insolvency proposed by the commissioners are these: To extend the benefits of the discharge from debts, in case of bankruptcy, beyond the mercantile and other specified classes, to which they are now chiefly confined, so as to embrace" all persons engaged in business requiring a capital and credit." To allow and encourage a voluntary cession of property, on the part of insolvents, "at such period of their difficulties as will best ensure equal justice to all their creditors." To make the granting of a certificate of discharge a judicial act, which may be opposed by creditors for cause, but to which their consent shall not be necessary. The suggestion of these improvements is sufficient to indicate the great change which public sentiment has undergone, or is undergoing, in England in regard to the proper basis on which those laws ought to rest that interpose their special authority between creditors and their insolvent debtors. At this day and in this country, if a system of laws relating to bankruptcies is to be established, it is believed that it is not difficult to perceive and state the grounds on which it ought to stand. Credits, or demands, are property, in which, not unfrequently, the bulk of large individual estates consists. As property, they are under the protection of the law, as much as any other kind of property. All the rights of property attach to them-the right of protection and defence against all encroachment and injury, and the right of recovery when wrongfully taken away, or withheld. They are private property, and private property is sacred. It must be respected. And the law must be vigilant and efficient in its guardianship of it. Failure in this is failure in the highest duty of civil society, and tends directly to dissolution. But the nature of credit, or demands, is such as to con stitute them a peculiar species of property; and, before we can undertake to pronounce with certainty on the whole duty of society and the law in regard to them, we must consider attentively their nature and peculiarities. They are held by a peculiar tenure-a tenure which implies and includes a contingency. The foundation of loan is trust, wherever securities are not taken; it is confidence; it is credit-all terms which imply risk, and the possibility of failure. The risk relates to the question of solvency or insolvency when the period comes for demanding payment. This kind of property is held subject to this contingency, and the lender himself takes the risk; he is his own insuIf his debtor fails, he loses; if not, he has his own.rer. He charges, too, for this risk, in the shape of interest, premium, or commission. He parts with the immediate possession of his property, expecting it to come back to him, in proper time, with increase; he puts it afloat, and takes the hazards of the voyage, for a consideration. If whelmed in the turbulent sea, he expects to sustain the loss. He is con-tent to hold his property subject to this contingency. While his debtor remains solvent, which is always to be, presumed until the contrary appear, the duty of society and the law towards him and this property of his is plain enough. If he invoke the law in the case, it will come efficiently to his aid. If his debtor attempt to elude his demand by flight or fraud, it will arrest him and restrain him of his liberty: and, otherwise, it will seize the unwilling debtor's estate and make the debt out of it for the creditor. When the law by these means has aided the creditor in the recovery of his property, it has done all its duty as against his solvent debtor. But suppose, before such recovery is had, the debtor is found to have fallen into a state of hopeless insolvency in other words, that contingency has arisen subject to which the demand has been holden from its inception? In this case a new duty has arisen on the part of the law, The fact of insolvency being ascertained, the fact of utter and hopeless inability to pay all his debts, the debtor stands to each creditor, if not in a new relation, at least in a relation materially modified. His creditors, taken together, now form a class, looking for a common relief to a common fund, which is insufficient to satisfy them all; and every principle of equity and justice requires that the law should interpose to give to each his distributive share, according to the relative amount of his demand, at the same time casting on each an amount of loss proportioned to the risk and insurance undertaken by him. When this is done, the inquiry arises, what more remains for the law to do? What further aid can the creditors demand? They cannot have the body of their debtor cut up and divided between them, as was said might have been done under the law of the Twelve Tables, or sell him with his wife and children into slavery, trans. Tyberim.They cannot at this day and in this country load him with chains, inflict stripes upon him, or throw him into a perpetual prison. With us, in this country, it may be considered as wholly settled, by a wise and humane public sentiment and policy, that the law will pursue, and will permit creditors to pursue, an honest but unfortunate and hopelessly insolvent debtor no further, after what remains of his wrecked fortune has been equitably divided amongst those to whom he is indebted. it may be included in the power expressly given to establish Beyond this the law sees and wisely adjudges that there is an end of all reasonable hope of further advantage to cre-ed up to be cancelled. It leaves to the creditor the evidence ditors. A form of indebtedness still remains, but the substance is gone. Nothing is left to the debtor with which to recover himself but his hands. He may labor in employments more or less profitable, according to his skill or his habits, but in no regular employment will or can the wages of labor afford more than a current support to the laborer and those dependent on him, so long as he is not permitted to turn one dollar of his surplus earrings into capital, or obtain one dollar of capital upon credit with which to aid him in enhancing the profits of his business - a thing utterly forbidden and rendered impossible to the bankrupt debtor. To hold the debtor or allow his creditors to hold him in this hopeless position is unjust, unnecessary and cruel. It is to bind him hand and foot and lay him down at the feet of his creditors, a victim and a sacrifice, as much lost to himself, to his family, and to society, if not as much degraded, as if, like the debtor in Rome, he might be led through the public streets by his creditor, with a halter round his body, and he made the unresisting subject of blows and personal chastisement. are insolvents. And if they so declare themselves, they are deemed bankrupts. These are voluntary bankrupts. On the general principles which have now been stated, the main provisions of this bill rest. No distinction is here It is at this point then that society has an eminent duty attempted to be set up between an insolvent system and a to perform towards the debtor and towards itself. That con- bankrupt system. All persons, whatever may be their occutingency has now happened, the hazard of which the credi-pation who are unable to meet their debts and engagements, tor was content to run, for such consideration as was satis factory to himself; his debtor has fallen into hopeless insolvency, and his demand, or some part of it, has sunk with him. He has nothing to complain of. By the very act of lending the debtor his property, without exacting security, he consented to take his share with other creditors in the risk of loss and sacrifice to which the debtor's business necessarily exposed their property in his hands, and he took or stipulated beforehand for his pay for that very risk. The enterprise has turned out an unlucky one, and he must bear his loss. The law has stepped in, as he knew it would, or as he knew it might and ought, by the terms of the Constitution of the country, to make an equitable adjustment of profit and loss between him and his partners in the enterprise, the other creditors; and having done this, it has done all that the nature of the case admitted of for his aid and benefit. And now comes the case of the debtor, and the interest which society has in his restoration. It is undoubtedly true, that to interfere in the slightest degree to impair the obligation of contracts between individuals is an exercise of high transcendental power on the part ofvernment. This Government does, when it undertakes to release a party from the performance of any part of his contract. This power is expressly prohibited to the States by the Constitution; and it is believed that it belongs as little to this Government as to the States, except so far as It is in regard to the mercantile classes only, or those whose business renders them directly liable to the peculiar hazards which attend mercantile operations; it is in regard to debtors in these classes only, and where their indebtedness amounts to a certain sum, that the right is given to creditors, under limi'ations, and on the happening of certain events, to cause such debtors to be declared bankrupt, and have their estates seized for their behoof. These are then involuntary bankrupts. And this is the only distinction made in the bill in regard to the various classes of insolvent debtors in the community, to whom such a bill is deemed at all applicable. The bill proceeds upon the principle that every person in the community, of whatever calling, who, in the employment of capital and credit, applied by his skill and industry, in production, has fallen into hopeless insolvency, so that all further effort to restore and redeem himself has become evidently useless, is entitled to the relief which this bill is intended to afford; and that in all cases the debtor may, if he choose, take the initiative. With respect, however, to the particular classes just referred to, it has been thought advisable and proper, on account of the great importance and necessity of promptness and punctuality in meeting all their engagements, that it should be put in the power of their creditors to move against them in certain circumstances, without waiting for them to stir the subject of their insolvency. In the principles already stated, will be found the reasons for making the provisions of this bill apply as well to existing cases and contracts as to those which arise after the passage of the act. All the legitimate power of civil society would be exerted in vain to coerce a full compliance with the contracts of insolvents, who have first lost the means of payment which they had in possession, and then are stript by existing laws of all the ordinary and indispensable means and instruments of accumulation and recovery. There are supposed to be not less than 500,000 such persons now in the United States; men who, though now bankrupt and ruined themselves, have by their industry and skill in business, and the use of capital and credit, added millions upon millions to the aggregate wealth of the nation-a wealth that still subsists, though no part of it is theirs; and who need only to be relieved from the bondage of oppressive debt to enter again, with renewed but chastened energy, on the field of enterprise, and add again new millions to the wealth of the community. Society, any more than their own families, cannot afford to lose the services of such men. It is believed, too, to be the highest interest of creditors themselves that the condition of their insolvent debtors, either voluntary or at their instance should be disclosed before their affairs once on the decline, become desperate, leaving nothing available for the payment of their debts. No doubt whatever is entertained that under a judicious bankrupt system, more will be realized to creditors, on the whole, from their insolvent debtors, that would be if they should be left to follow up the usual remedies without it. Among other advantages which creditors will have under this bill is that of being relieved from those unjust preferences by which it too often happens that the whole estate of a failing debtor is applied to satisfy a favorite creditor in full, while all the rest are left to bear the loss of their entire demands. That creditors themselves now feel a deep interest in the passage of a bankrupt law, whether viewed as a question of property or a question of policy and humanity, is abundantly evinced by the numerous petitions which have come to us from every quarter of the country, and especially from the great commercial cities. The number of those who still cling to ancient opinions in this matter, and who remonstrate against the escape of their insolvent debtors out of their hands on any terms, is comparatively very small, and is believed to be diminishing almost daily. As we have said, more will be saved out of insolvents' estates under a judicious bankrupt law than could be without it; while to all persons engaged in prosperous business, and to the community at large, the gain which must be realized by restoring so many valuable customers and co-operators in productive employment to active and profitable life and business cannot fail to be im mense. or authority on the part of the Federal Government is neecssary to give all the relief which the case requires or is susceptible of. State authority and State power is sufficient for this purpose. The proposition which has sometimes been made to include incorporated banks in a bankrupt bill, proceeds evidently on the notion of the necessity of restraining them in the exercise of their power of creating currency. It is a question of currency; and if the power of arresting State banks in their business of creating currency, or upon their abuse of that business, belongs to this Government at all, it is believed that it is not appropriately derived from the clause in the Constitution concerning bankruptcies, but from some authority which it possesses over the subject of currency. The committee have not deemed it their duty to go into an inquiry concerning the constitutional power of Congress to legislate over State banks in the mode and with the view proposed; which is understood to be that of arresting their proceedings, by the legal interposition of this Government, whenever they shall suspend payments in specie. Whether such a power exists, and, if it does exist, whether it is expedient to exercise it, seems to have no immediate connexion with the subject now under consideration. We are clearly of opinion that such an enactment could not find a proper, if it could a constitutional place, in a bankrupt law framed on the principles and with the objects of this bill. Annual Consumption of Country Produce in the City of New York. The following is an approximate estimate of the annual ........ $1,470,000 365,000 335,000 600,000 in 13 66 12 68 in 13 in 12 00 in 13 64 12 The Boston Transcript says a year has just expired since their Liverpool steamers began to run. They have made This bill does not include corporations among the debtors nineteen trips, on an average of fourteen days and ten hours, on whom it operates. A recurrence to the principles stated every thing considered, exhibiting wonderful punctuality.in this report will show that a bill, framed on such a basis The Transcript gives the following table of trips, not deductat this, could not, without serious discrepancy, embrace cor- ing their detention at Halifax. porations. Corporations aggregate cannot be imprisoned; Britannia arrived July 18, 1840, in 14 days 8 hours. 06 in 12 66 12 46 Aug. 17, nor, where the corporate body is alone liable for debts, could Acadia Sept. 17, the corporators be imprisoned or held personally responsible Britannia Oct. 2, in any way. As a general, if not an invariable rule, these Caledonia Oct. 17, corporations end their existence on falling into insolvency. Acadia Their effects are distributed among their creditors, and the Britannia Nov. 3, 66 in 14 22 Nov. 19, corporation ceases. Every thing is done, in this respect, in Caledonia Dec. 21, 64 in 16 "6 22 the case of a corporation, under its own charter, which is Acadia " 15 86 proposed to be done, under this bill, in the case of individu- Columbia als; while such corporations, being dissolved after their effects Britannia are distributed, could not require and could not receive a Caledonia discharge from their debts as bankrupts. They would be Acadia discharged already. The law of their organization is or Columbia should be bankrupt law enough for them. The remedy, Britannia moreover, in case of insolvency of a corporation, is complete, Caledonia or may be, in the State where the corporation exists. The Acadia corporation is a creature of the State law, having a local ex- Columbia istence, which, from its very nature, lasts no longer than its Britannia solvency; and if the corporation falls into insolvency, no aid | Caledonia Public Land Bill and the Tariff. Mr. Clifford, of Maine, made a very sensible speech on these subjects, as connected with each other, in the United States House of Representatives, June 29. He opposed the distribution of the proceeds of the public lands among the States, for this special reason, that, after laying a tax of 20 per cent. upon all luxuries, it would still leave a deficient revenue for the support of Government. He said, [N. Y. Journal of Commerce. "A very slight examination of the documents of commerce and navigation would satisfy every reasonable man that the whole amount of free importations which could properly be called luxuries, constantly with the opinions and habits of the whole people of the country, having reference to every class in society, whether rich or poor, does not exceed twentyfive millions of dollars. A duty of twenty per cent. ad val. on this amount would yield to the Treasury five millions of dollars-provided the enhanced cost to the consumer, the necessary effect of all increased rate of duty, should not reduce the amount of consumption, and consequently the amount of importations. The importation of luxuries is more likely to be reduced by augmenting the rate of duties than necessaries, for the obvious reason that the people can better forego the use of the former when the price is high than of the latter, which are indispensably requisite to a comfortable subsistence, and must therefore be purchased, whether light for the argument on the other side, and I am sure that at a high or low price. Put the case in the most favorable no one who will take the trouble to examine this table from the Treasury Department, will undertake to affirm that any be raised from the list of articles therein enumerated; and I greater amount of revenue than five millions of dollars can will again call upon the other side to specify any other article now free of duty, and of importance to the argument, that they would have included in the list to be effected by the new imposition; if none is named, it will be assumed that none can be. No one will name any article, and yet it is possible there may be some difference of opinion as to the articles properly denominated necessaries, in contradistinction to luxuries. I would like to be informed whether in speaking of luxuries, gentlemen include tea, coffee, sugar and molasses? Amongst my constituents these articles, if ever they were regarded as luxuries, they have ceased to be so. They are consumed in every family, by the poor as much as by the rich; and the habits and customs of the people in this respect cannot be changed by the force of arbitrary and oppressive laws, without producing serious complaint, and they ought not to be so changed under any pretence whatever. Statement exhibiting the value of certain articles imported in 1838, 1839 and 1840, free of duty, and the amount of duty which would have accrued at twenty per cent. ad valorem. $25,068,322 $5,013,664 40 $47,820,853 $9,564,170 60 $25,267,475 $5,053,495 00 TREASURY DEPARTMENT, Register's Office, June 28, 1841. Physicians' Fees in Old Times. T. L. SMITH, Register. upon the river, within this jurisdiction, both for setting of By the following extract from the State records, our read-bones and otherwise, as at all times occasions and necessities ers will perceive that the salary and fees of the physicians in this State were formerly, in some cases at least, fixed by law at a rate that would hardly be satisfactory to the pro'fession at the present day. In addition to the following scale of fees for medical gentlemen, adopted in 1652, the prices for all the produce of the farmer and the wages of day laborers were at the same time fixed by law. General Court, 1652. Thomas Lord having engaged to this Court, to continue his abode in Hartford for the next ensuing year, and to improve his best skill amongst the inhabitants of the towns be paid by the country, the sum of fifteen pounds for the may or shall require. This Court doth grant, that he shall said ensuing year-and they do declare, that for every visit or journey that he shall take or make being sent for to any house in Hartford, twelve pence as reasonable; to any house in Windsor, five shillings; to any house in Wethersfield, three shillings; to any house in Farmington, six shillings; to any house in Mattabeseck, eight shillings-(he having promised that he will require no more,) and that he shall be freed for the time aforesaid from watching, warding and training, but not from finding arms according to law." Votes in Boston for Presidential Electors in 1840. Mr. Editor,-Having recently had occasion to count the names of voters on the several Ward Lists in Boston, at the Municipal election on the 14th of December, 1840, I find the whole number to be 15,299. It was stated in the Mercantile Journal on the 5th of November last, that the whole number on the lists on the 4th of the same month, 5 days before the choice of Presidential Electors, was 15,212, only 87 less than they were on the 14th of December. It is presumed that, in these 5 days, 87 names were added,-and that few or no names were added or erased during the interval between the two elections; so that, without material error, we may assume 15,299 as the number of voters on the Lists on the 9th of November, 1840, at the election of Presidential Electors; and accordingly I have constructed the following Table, which contains in the 1st column the Wards; in the 2d, the number of voters on each Ward list; in the 3d, the number of votes in each Ward for Presidential Electors, November 9, 1840; in the 4th, the ratio per cent. of votes to voters; in the 5th, the number of voters absent from the polls at the Presidential Election; in the 6th, the number of inhabitants in each ward, according to the United States Census of June, 1840; and in the 7th, the ratio per cent. of votes to the population. tion. 11.37 per cent., and Louisiana, with 12.26 per cent., return- 25 States, being 20.87 per cent. of the whole population, [Boston Atlas. A visit to Miss White, at Flymouth. Pilgrim Father, William White.-She received us reclining A visit to Miss White, at Plymouth, a descendant of the on her bed, but neatly dressed, as for ten years past she has had but a partial use of her limbs for walking. Her face, however, was remarkably free from wrinkles that usually accompany so great an age, her features were so pleasing as Ratio of to indicate the possession of great beauty when young, and votes to she had not a gray hair on her head. Her hair was as brown popula- though not quite so full as that of a woman of 25; and her cheerful smile, firm voice, and intelligent conversation, made it difficult to believe in what was, however, beyond all doubt, 13.37 that she was really 91 years of age. She described her sight 4.20 as perfectly good; and her constant occupation of knitting, 16.17 sewing or reading, had never yet relaxed, or become painful. 16.76 The room in which she lived, was in a house more than two 16.13 hundred years old, and one of the earliest of those built in 13.30 the colony. It was of wood but constructed with great 16.22 strength, and the exact pattern of an English house of the 9.96 same period-a central door, low but wide, with a large 13.69 handle shaped brass knocker, (of which we saw more in Ply11.70 mouth than in any other town) with a broad entrance hall, 14.69 and rooms on each side. The house was two stories in height 12.37 but the ceilings were very low; and across those of the larger rooms, extended a thick and heavy beam of wood, laid flat, and not end wise as in modern buildings. Miss White's room was called "The Cabin of the Mayflower," and it was certainly the most perfect cabinet of antiquities we had yet 12.43 seen. flower, made of old English oak, with a staple for lashing The chair used by Governor Carver, on board the Mayit to the ship's deck in stormy weather, was a prominent article in the furniture: the other chairs were of the old high From which it appears, that, notwithstanding the efforts which were made to induce all the voters to go to the polls, only 75.86 per cent. of those whose names were on the lists, carried in their votes for Presidential Electors, November 9, 1840, while 3691 voters were absent from the polls. This fact may surprise some who have not looked into the sub-backed English fashion, the seats stuffed with hair, the wood jeet. The population of Boston, according to the United States Census of 1840, was 95,383, of which 11,608, the whole number of votes, was only 12.43 per cent.; while the proportion in other parts of the State of Massachusetts was 17.90 per cent, and in the whole State 17.20 per cent. In all the States except South Carolina, where the electors are appointed by the Legislature, and leaving out of the account the colored population, who are excluded from the ballotbox, and some others, the proportion of votes to the free population was 17.35 per cent. Had all whose names were on the lists, voted, the proportion of votes to the population in Boston, would have been only 16.38 per cent. It seems that the comparative number of voters, and especially that of votes, was very small in Boston. Very few of the States returned so small a proportion,--only Rhode Island, where the elective franchise is very much limited, with but 7.85 per cent.; Virginia, with In the State census in May, 1840, the population of 2d ward was 6817, and the proportion of voters would be 9.41 per cent.; but in the United States census, 8465 more persons were included. In the other wards there are small variations, but not enough to make any material differences in the proportions. of dark mahogany, the covering of striped black stuff.The old chest of drawers, with fanciful brass handles; the the little lion pawed mahogany pier-table, the perpendicular oak framed horizontal paned glass over the chimney-piece, and narrow oak framed pier-glass between the front window, with the dark green watered moreen curtains, and the family arms of the Whites and the Howlands, both Pilgrim Fathers, hanging over the mantel-piece, framed and glazed, as issued from the Herald's College in London, carried one back so completely to the English country mansions of past centuries, that it was difficult to feel one's self in the New World, and among a yet infant people. [Buckingham's America. Arrival Extra. dium, loaded with lumber and oars, and manned by three The schooner Experiment, says the New Haven Pallamen, arrived in our harbor yesterday from Presque Isle, on Lake Erie, about 70 miles above Buffalo, which place she left on the 2d inst. She is above 60 feet in length, although heavily loaded, draws but two feet and a half of water. The captain, as one might know, is a true Yankee, and is bound to Providence his native place, and has taken this method to make his visit a profitable one. |