be, in the discretion of Congress, a sufficient power to limit and
restrain this expansive tendency within reasonable and proper bounds. The
President himself values the evidence of the past. He tells us that at a
certain point of our history more than two hundred millions of dollars
had been applied for to make improvements; and this he does to prove that
the treasury would be overwhelmed by such a system. Why did he not tell
us how much was granted? Would not that have been better evidence? Let us
turn to it, and see what it proves. In the message the President tells us
that "during the four succeeding years embraced by the administration of
President Adams, the power not only to appropriate money, but to apply
it, under the direction and authority of the General Government, as well
to the construction of roads as to the improvement of harbors and rivers,
was fully asserted and exercised." This, then, was the period of greatest
enormity. These, if any, must have been the days of the two hundred
millions. And how much do you suppose was really expended for
improvements during that four years? Two hundred millions? One hundred?
Fifty? Ten? Five? No, sir; less than two millions. As shown by authentic
documents, the expenditures on improvements during 1825, 1826, 1827, and
1828 amounted to one million eight hundred and seventy-nine thousand six
hundred and twenty-seven dollars and one cent. These four years were the
period of Mr. Adams's administration, nearly and substantially. This fact
shows that when the power to make improvements "was fully asserted and
exercised," the Congress did keep within reasonable limits; and what has
been done, it seems to me, can be done again.

Now for the second portion of the message--namely, that the burdens of
improvements would be general, while their benefits would be local and
partial, involving an obnoxious inequality. That there is some degree of
truth in this position, I shall not deny. No commercial object of
government patronage can be so exclusively general as to not be of some