Register of Debates in Congress, Comprising the Leading Debates and Incidents of the Second Session of the Eighteenth Congress Page: 107
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iO?
GALES &? SEA.TON'8 RE GIST EH
108
H.of R.]
Niagara Sufferers. '
[Deo. 30, 1824.
destruction ? Certainly not. Vet was not the building
destroyed solely on account of the warlike character oc-
casioned by the occupancy ? Assuredly. And was not
the Government as much bound to pay for the building
as if the occupation had continued ? It would be easy
to multiply examples. The true principle, then, was
this: that, if the occupation by Government j?ave a pub-
lic character, and at any time during the continuance oj
that character, the property was destroyed, the Govern-
ment is bound to indemnify the owner. The quo animo
■with which the enemy destroys, must be presumed from
the change of character in the thing destroyed. If you
will not admit this, your law is illusive : it promises to
pay if the quo animo is proved, but it refuses to receive
the only proof the case admits of.
Mr. BUCK, of Vermont, said, that he did not rise to
,*iebate the general principle of the bill, but to correct
a material error in point of fact. The error was so im-
portant, that, when it was shewn, it would appear that
the advocates of the bill had been going wholly on an
assumed state of the facts, which in reality Imd no exist-
ence. The gentleman who introduced the bill went so
far as to say, that he rested the cause of the claimants on
this one point, viz.- that the reason of the destruction of
property hr.d been its occupation by the Government;
and, having established the fact of such occupation, he
seemed to conceive that the claim was made out. Hut,
Mr. B. said, he had in his hand a document to show con-
clusively that the ravages of our frontier were not caus-
ed by the occupancy by our army, but were inflicted
entirely on a principle of retaliation, in consequence of
the burning of Newark. This document was the pro-
clamation of Gen. Prevost, the officer who commanded
the British forces at the time, and who, he believed, di-
rected, and in person superintended, the work of des
truction. [Here Mr. Buck quoted the proclamation, in
strong terms denouncing the conduct of this Govern
ment, and justifying the devastation of the Niagara fron-
tier.] Thus it appears that we are not driven to pre-
sume the motive of the enemy ; we have it in express
terms, declared by himself. lie should not attempt to
discuss the subject at large—he thought such a repre-
sentation of facts as was contained in the testimony,
coming almost wholly from parties interested, was not
to be put in competition with a public document such
as that he had just quoted. This changed the state of
the question. It was not now to be settled, whether
this Government was bound, because its acts had chang-
ed the character of the property—but whether it was
bound to remunerate the sufferers for injuries inflicted
by the enemv on a principle of retaliation. On this dis-
cussion, Mr. B. said, he should not enter, but only ob-
serve, that, if we admit that payment is to be made on
the principle of retaliation, we, having been the begin-
ners, by burning Newark, are of course bound to pay.
Mr. STOKKS, of New York, rose to call the attention
of the House to what were really the facts of the case
now before it, however perverted by the document
which had just been quoted. It was true, he said, that,
in that proclamation, the pretext for the devastation of
the Niagara frontier was the destruction of Newark, but,
ill his judgment, it never was the real cause of it. Who-
ever looks to the situation of that frontier, and the his-
tory of the War with Great Britain to that period, must
be satisfied that that document deserves no other char-
acter than that of mere hyperbole. It was not issued
until after the burning of the Niagara frontier, when it
had become necessary to give to the civilized world
some plausible pretext for such an act as burning that
frontier. Mr. S. reviewed the facts which attended the
destruction of Newark. &c. We had considered the
Niagara frontier generally as a point from which the Ca-
nadian frontier could be most easily invaded. We had
made the experiment, not without the loss of blood.
The enemv had similar objects on the North Western
frontier. Our advances on the Niagara country were in
some instances intended to create a diversion—to distract
the attention of the enemy, and turn him from the inva-
sion of the frontier of Oliio, to the protection of his own
territory. One great object of the invasion by us of the
Niagara frontier, he had always understood, was to pro-
tect the frontiers of Ohio, and of the states west of it;
and he had himself no doubt that one great object of the
devastation of the Niagara frontier by the enemy, was to
prevent its occupation as a military station, from which
Canada might be invaded. When Newark was burnt,
the British commander, who sought for a pretext for the
destruction, thought he had found it in the burning of
Newark; by availing himself of which, he could throw
the odium of his conduct on the United States, whilst
his real motive was very different from his avowed one.
That, said Mr. S. was the real history of the proclama-
tion, which was relied upon as an argument against the
claimants now before the House. Their object was to
secure themselves from our incursions. They accom-
plished it: they did, by the devastation of the Niagara
frontier, secure themselves, until a larger and better ap-
pointed force penetrated their frontier, &c.
I did not rise to discuss the question now before the
House, said Mr. S. but, since I am up, I may as well say
a few words UDon it. I think that the principle of the
bill is carried too far; and had I been one of the commit-
tee who reported it, I would not have given my assent
to it. But, if we vote to strike out the first section of
the bill, being willing to legislate at all on the subjeet,
we shall lose the opportunity of shaping it to our wishes.
The question involved in this bill, Mr. S. remarked, had
been call- ! a question of perfect or imperfect obliga-
tion. That, he said, was not the question. The pro-
perty of a citizen appears, by the usages of nations, to be
exempted from destruction by an enemy, unless, by giv-
ing up his property to public use, lie has converted it
from a private to a public character. Now, when a citi-
zen has given up his house for the public use, and it is
destroyed by reason of such conversion, an obligation is
created upon the Government to indemnify him for the
loss—Mr. S. spoke not of the obligation of a bond, but
of the moral obligation, arising from natural justice,
which constitutes an obligation in the meaning of the
law of nations. What is the obligation of the Govern-
ment to the citizen who has given up his property for
its use? It is this: you have converted his dwelling-
house into a public building—you have changed its char-
acter—to accommodate the public, you have destroyed
its sanctity as a private building- you have rendered it
liable to destruction—you have divested it of the char-
acter which, by the law of nations, would have protect-
ed it. What then is the Government bound to do ? To
say to the individual so circumstanced, As you have ren-
dered up your property for our use, we are your insur-
ers: After you have placed yourself out of the protec-
tion of the law of nations, you shall not suffer by having
done so. This, said Mr. S. is what I call a perfect obli-
gation—a perfect moral obligation. The question for
indemnity for losses sustained under such circumstances,
is a question, not of charity, but of absolute right: the
whole of it turning on the principle that the party has,
for your use, exposed his property to destruction law-
fully by the enemy. It is unjust, morally, that one who
has thus surrendered up, and exposed to destruction,
his property, on account of the public, should himself
suffer that loss thereby A'hich the public ought to bear.
When you take the property of a citizen for public use,
during war, you become the insurer of it against every
act of the enemy, lawful or unla-vful, and for this reason:
that, when he has once surrendered his house into your
possession, it is no longer his dwelling house; the pro-
perty then belongs to the public, and not to him. Now,
said Mr. S. if there be any definition of perfect obligation,
which does not include this, it is beyond my conception-
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Gales, Joseph, 1761-1841. Register of Debates in Congress, Comprising the Leading Debates and Incidents of the Second Session of the Eighteenth Congress, book, 1825; Washington D.C.. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc30752/m1/58/: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.