JAMES SMITHSON AND HIS BEQUEST. 189 



and would necessarily be partial in its operations and benefits. He was 

 inclined to favor tlie library plan, although there were great objections 

 to it. But "there was one recommendation it possessed that strongly 

 influenced him. That was, that though it might not effect the greatest 

 amount of benefit that could be produced by the fund, it was not liable 

 to the abuses to which all the other plans would probably give rise. It 

 would create no large body of office-holders, no patronage, no favorit- 

 ism, no partially sectional advantages." 



Mr. Owen replied to Mr. Adams, and showed that the position of the 

 latter as to the condition of the fund was entirely inconsistent with the 

 reports and bills he had so often presented. He was not specially wed- 

 ded to the feature of normal schools, although he believed it was the 

 most important one in the bill. As to the disgrace of educating our 

 children with foreign aid, there was no proposition in this bill to educate 

 children, but the teachers of children. And as to disgrace, it might be 

 said with equal propriety that it was disgraceful to receive foreign aid 

 for founding a library. 



Mr. Andrew Johnson renewed his attack on the bill : 



" There was something a little farcical and amusing [to him] in this 

 system of normal instruction, which was to provide the" country with 

 school teachers. He would like to see a young man, educated at the 

 [Smithsonian Institution and brought up in all the extravagance, folly, 

 aristocracy, and corruption of Washington, go out into the country to 

 leach the little boys and girls to read and write! Those young men, so 

 educated, would steal, or play the little pettifogger, sooner than become 

 teachers. Ninety-nine out of a hundred of those who received the ben- 

 eiit of this institution would hang about a law-office, get a license, become 

 a pack of drones instead of schoolmasters. Washington City was not 

 a place for such an institution. He believed that it would result in an 

 injury to the country instead of a benefit." 



Mr. John Bell, of Tennessee, held that the United States was respon- 

 sible for the fund and ought to appropriate it for its object. He hoped 

 that Arkansas would one day pay the money, but he feared it would be 

 a distant day. It was necessary to act now. He did not wholly approve 

 of the bill reported, but ho would take it rather than do nothing. 



Mr. Hannibal Hamlin, of Maine, regarded this fund as one which had 

 been received by the Government to carry out the intentions of Mr. 

 Smithson, and to which, by their acceptance, they had solemnly bound 

 themselves. He alluded to the difficulty — nay, the impossibility — of any 

 select committee agreeing upon a plan whioh, in all its details, should 

 be in accordance with the views of all. Notwithstanding this, he trusted 

 we should not let this opportunity go by to make a commencement in 

 this matter. He had not the slightest doubt of the full and unqualified 

 power of this Government to take charge of this money and give it the 

 direction required by the will of Mr. Smithson. 



While there were features in the bill with which he was not entirely 



