Chapter II: Section I: Internal Improvements

One of the most important constitutional questions that has arisen in the United States is one, regarding Internal Improvements, which has grown out of a failure of foresight in the makers of the constitution. No set of men could be expected to foresee every great question which must arise during the advancement of a young country; and there is no evidence of its having occurred to any one, in the early days of the republic, to inquire whether the general government should have power to institute and carry on public works, all over the States; and under what limitations. Many inconsistent and contradictory proceedings have taken place in Congress, since the question was first raised; and it remains unsettled.

For some years after the Revolution, the treasury had enough to do to pay the debts of the war, and defray the expenses attendant upon the organisation of the new system. As soon as a surplus was found to be in hand, suggestions were heard about improving the country. In 1796, Mr. Madison proposed a resolution to cause a survey to be made for a road from north to south, through all the Atlantic States. No appropriation was made for the purpose: but no objection was offered on the ground of the general government not having power to make such appropriation. The difficulty of access to the great western wilderness was represented to Congress under Mr. Jefferson's administration, in 1802; and a law was passed, making appropriations for opening roads in the north-west territory. This was the first appropriation made by Congress for purposes of internal improvement. Many similar acts followed; and road-making and surveying the coast went on expeditiously, and to a great extent. In 1807, Mr. Gallatin prepared the celebrated Report to the Senate, which contains a systematic plan for the improvement of the whole country. In 1812, during Mr. Madison's administration, a survey was authorised of the main post road from Maine to Georgia. Improvement under the sanction of Congress went on with increased activity into the administration of Mr. Monroe, by whom the first check was given. Mr. Monroe vetoed the bill authorising the collection of tolls for the repair of the Cumberland road. The reason assigned for the veto was, that it was one thing to make appropriations for public works, and another thing to assume jurisdiction and sovereignty over the soil on which such works were erected; and President Monroe did not believe that Congress could assume power to levy toll.[2] By his adoption of a subsequent act, involving the same principles, however, it seemed that he had changed his opinion, or resolved to yield the question.

Mr. J. Q. Adams's advocacy of internal improvements removed some lingering difficulties; and, while he was President, the public works were carried on with great activity. The southern members of Congress, however, were generally opposed to the exercise of this power by the general government: and it has ever since been a strongly-debated question.

President Jackson's course on the subject has not been very consistent. Before his election, he always voted for internal improvements, going so far as to advocate subscriptions by government to the stock of private canal companies, and the formation of roads beginning and ending within the limits of particular States. In his message at the opening of the first Congress after his accession, he proposed the division of the surplus revenue among the States, as a substitute for the promotion of internal improvements by the general government. He attempted a limitation and distinction too difficult and important to be settled and acted upon on the judgment and knowledge of one man;--a distinction between general and local objects. It is manifestly impossible to draw the line with any precision. The whole Union is benefited by the Erie canal, though it lies wholly within the limits of the State of New York; and a thousand positions of circumstances may be imagined by which local advantages may become general, and general local, so as to confound the limitation altogether. At any rate, the judgment and knowledge of any individual, or any cabinet, are obviously unequal to the maintenance of such a distinction.

In 1829 and 1830, the President advocated such an amendment of the constitution as would authorise Congress to apply the surplus revenue to certain specified objects, involving the general good; and he strongly objected to the general government exercising a power, considered by him unconstitutional, merely because there was a quantity of money in the treasury which must be disposed of. He has since changed his opinion, and believes that less evil would be incurred by even suddenly reducing the revenue to the amount of the wants of the government, than by conferring on the general government immense means of patronage, and opportunity for corrupt and wasteful expenditure.

These changes of opinion in President Jackson prove nothing so clearly as the great difficulty of the subject. It is, however, so pressing and so important that, notwithstanding its difficulty, it must be settled before long.

The opposing arguments seem to me to be these.

The advocates of a concession to Congress of the power of conducting internal improvements plead, with regard to the constitutionality of the power, that it is conferred by the clauses which authorise Congress to make post-roads: to regulate commerce between the States: to make and carry on war; (and therefore to have roads by which to transport troops;) to lay taxes, to pay the debts, and provide for the general welfare of the United States: and to pass all laws necessary to carry into effect its constitutional powers.

The answer is, that to derive from these clauses any countenance of the practice of spending without limit the public funds, for objects which any present government may declare to be for the general welfare, is an obvious straining of the instrument: that, by such methods, the constitution may be made to authorise the spending of any amount whatever, for any purpose whatever: that it is the characteristic of the constitution to specify the powers given to Congress with a nicety which is wholly inconsistent with such a boundless conveyance of power as is here presumed: and that, accordingly, the permission to lay taxes, to pay the debts, and provide for the general welfare of the United States, is limited as to its objects by the preceding specifications: and that, finally, the powers allotted to the State governments exclude the supposition that Congress is authorised to assume such territorial jurisdiction as it has been allowed to practise within the limits of the several States.

This last set of opinions appears to disinterested observers so obviously reasonable, that the wonder is how so weak a stand on the provisions of the constitution can have been maintained for any length of time. The reason is, that the pleas of expediency are so strong as to counterbalance the weakness of the constitutional argument. But, this being the case, the truly honest and patriotic mode of proceeding would be to add to the constitution by the means therein provided; instead of straining the instrument to accomplish an object which was not present to the minds of its framers.

The pleas of the advocates of Internal Improvements are these: that very extensive public works, designed for the benefit of the whole Union, and carried through vast portions of its area, must be accomplished: that an object so essential ought not to be left at the mercy of such an accident as the cordial agreement of the requisite number of States, to carry such works forward to their completion; that the surplus funds accruing from the whole nation cannot be so well employed as in promoting works by which the whole nation will be benefited: and that, as the interests of the majority have hitherto upheld Congress in the use of this power, it may be assumed to be the will of the majority that Congress should continue to exercise it.

The answer is, that it is inexpedient to put a vast and increasing patronage into the hands of the general government: that only a very superficial knowledge can be looked for in members of Congress as to the necessity or value of works proposed to be instituted in any parts of the States but those in which they are respectively interested: that endless jealousies would arise between the various States,[3] from the impossibility or undesirableness of equalising the amount of appropriation made to each: that useless works would be proposed from the spirit of competition, or individual interest:[4] and that corruption, co-extensive with the increase of power, would deprave the functions of the general government.

There is much truth on both sides here. In the first set of pleas there is so much force that they have ceased to be, what they were once supposed, the distinctive doctrines of the federal party. Mr. Webster is still considered the head of the Internal Improvements party; and Mr. Calhoun was for some time the leader of its opponents. Jefferson's latest opinions were strong against the power claimed and exercised by Congress. Yet large numbers of the democratic party are as strenuous for internal improvements as Adams and Webster themselves; the interests of the majority being clearly on that side.

To an impartial observer it appears that Congress has no constitutional right to devote the public funds to internal improvements, at its own unrestricted will and pleasure: that the permitted usurpation of the power for so long a time indicates that some degree of such power in the hands of the general government is desirable and necessary: that such power should be granted through an amendment of the constitution, by the methods therein provided: that, in the mean time, it is perilous that the instrument should be strained for the support of any function, however desirable its exercise may be.

In case of the proposed addition being made to the constitution, arrangements will, of course, be entered into for determining the principles by which general are to be distinguished from local objects, or whether such distinction can, on any principle, be fixed; for testing the utility of proposed objects; for checking extravagant expenditure, jobbing, and corrupt patronage: in short, the powers of Congress will be specified, here, as in other matters, by express permission and prohibition. These details, difficult or unmanageable amidst the questionable exercise of a great power, will, doubtless, be arranged so as to work with precision, when the will of the majority is brought to bear directly upon them.

It is time that this great question should be settled. Congress goes on making appropriations for a road here, a canal there, a harbour or a light-house somewhere else. All these may or may not be necessary. Meantime, those who have law on their side, exclaim against extravagance, jobbing, and encroachment on popular rights. Those who have expediency on their side plead necessity, the popular will, and the increasing surplus revenue.

If the constitution provides means by which law, expediency, and the prevention of abuse, can be reconciled to the satisfaction of all, surely the sooner it is done the better. Thus the matter appears to a passing stranger.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] "The income of the public works of the State" (South Carolina) "is very small, not exceeding 15,000 dollars per annum, over the cost of management, although the State has incurred a debt of 2,000,000 in constructing them. In many parts of the State, canals have been constructed, which do not yield sufficient to pay their current expenses; and, with the exception of the State road, and the Columbia canal, there is hardly a public work in the State, which, put up at public auction, would find a purchaser."

1833. _American Annual Register_, p. 285.

[2] President Jackson is of opinion that no toll should be levied on ways provided by the public revenue. It should be a complete and final outlay, and none of the people compelled to pay for works effected by the people's money. This seems clearly right.

[3] South Carolina was in favour of Internal Improvements, till it was found how much larger a share of the benefit would be appropriated by the active and prosperous northern States than by those which are depressed by slavery. Since that discovery, South Carolina's sectional jealousy has been unbounded, and her opposition to the exercise of the power very fierce. In her periodical publications, as well as through other channels, she has declared herself neglected, or likely to be neglected, on account of her being southern. The enterprise of the North and depression of the South are, as usual, looked upon as favour and neglect, shown by the general government.

[4] When I was ascending the Mississippi, I observed a light-house perched on a bluff, in a ridiculous situation. On asking the meaning of the phenomenon, I was told that a senator from the State of Mississippi, wishing to make a flourish about his zeal for the improvement of his State, had obtained an appropriation from Congress to build this light-house, which is of no earthly use.