THIRTIETH CONGRESS, 1847-1849. 453 



tion to a higher point in public estimation than any which it has ever 

 yet attained. 



Mr. II. W. HiLLiARD rose, as a member of the Board of Regents in 

 this House, to make no opposition to the amendment of the gentle- 

 man from Tennessee, if it should be the deliberate opinion of the 

 House that such a committee should be appointed. But he wished 

 the House to mark the spirit in which the motion was made. When 

 the report was brought forward bj^ him (Mr. Hilliard) from the Board 

 of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution, at the last session of Con- 

 gress, and a motion was made to print it, the gentleman from Ten- 

 nessee was the very one who interposed his objection to the printing. 

 They had been reproached with not being willing to exhibit their 

 doings to the country. It had been said that there had been improper 

 expenditures of money, an indiscreet distribution of funds authorized 

 by them. Here was an ample report setting forth all the facts, mak- 

 ing everything plain, and when he had moved the printing of the 

 report, for the information of the country, to his amazement that 

 very gentleman objected to the printing on the simple ground of 

 expense. But now the gentleman came forward with a proposition 

 to form a standing committee whose business it should be to super- 

 vise the action of the three members of this House and the three mem- 

 bers of the Senate who were already charged with directing the affairs 

 of this Institution. He should offer no objections to the proposition; 

 he left it to the taste and judgment of the House. For one, he gave 

 way, and yielded any objections which he had hitherto offered to the 

 proposition. 



Mr. Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee, said the gentleman from Ala- 

 bama seemed to have stepped off upon the wrong track when he said 

 that the simple objection which he (Mr. Johnson) had had to the 

 printing at the last session of Congress was that it would involve an 

 expenditure of money. 



Mr. Hilliard (in his seat) said he had so understood it. 



Mr. Johnson continued. The gentleman from Alabama had wholly 

 misconceived his opposition to the printing of this report at the last 

 session of Congress. It would be remembered by the gentleman from 

 Alabama and by the whole House that he (Mr. Johnson) was striving 

 the whole session, that he had made effort after effort, to procure the 

 appointment of a committee before this report should be printed, that 

 they might ascertain whether this was the report which should be 

 printed or not. This was the objection he had to the printing of the 

 report. He wanted it referred to a committee, with instructions to 

 inquire into the expediency of printing this report, and also of print- 

 ing a work which they desired to have printed upon architecture — a 

 kind of mongrel report prepared by some of the Regents. He wanted 

 a conmiittee appointed to inquire into all the facts about the Institu- 



