THIRTY-EIGHTH CONGRESS, 1863-1865. 649 



annuities from time to time; every year we pay so much. It seems 

 to me there is a distinction between the two. Wherever we stipulate 

 to pay these annuities in coin, we pay them in coin. There is a differ- 

 ence between the payment of an annuity and the payment of interest 

 on the public debt; and that diflerence has always been recognized 

 since the foundation of the Government. But even if we did injustice 

 to the Indians, we make it good by the payment of large bounties; 

 we more than make it good by our annual appropriations for the 

 expenses of the Indian department. Since the recent condition of 

 aifairs, since we have been involved in war, we have appropriated 

 very large sums, this j^ear amounting to more than $1,000,000, for 

 the benefit of the Indians not included in Indian treaties. We have 

 indeed made good to them the appropriations in gold, or nearly so. 

 If, therefore, there is any injustice done to the Indians, it certainl}^ is 

 not a peculiar hardship. 



In this case the proposition was so plain that the committee had no 

 hesitation about awarding the payment in gold from this time for- 

 ward. I am told that this question has never been acted upon in the 

 Treasury Department, but that if these parties had demanded their 

 interest in gold, precisely as other creditors have done, and as the}^ 

 had a right to do, they would have been paid in coin at any time since 

 the beginning of this war. There has been no distinction in the 

 Treasury Department between this debt and any other funded debt of 

 the United States the interest of which is pa3^able in coin. 



Mr. John P. Hale. If I do not entirel}^ misunderstand the nature 

 of this case, it seems to me there is no force in the suggestions which 

 have been made in regard to any obligations of the Government, for 

 this reason: This Mr. Smithson gave this fund, some $500,000 or more, 

 to the United States; the}^ are the beneficiaries of this donation; it 

 was the propertv of the United States, and the Smithsonian Institution, 

 whether it was a wise or an unwise creation of Congress, was simply a 

 machinery instituted by the United States for the purpose of carrying on 

 and carrying out the bequest of Mr. Smithson. To speak of this Insti- 

 tution as an institution apart from the Government of the United States, 

 to my humble comprehension, is perfectly absurd. It is the United 

 States that own this Institution. It was for the benefit of the United 

 States that the fund was given to them, and Congress, because it was 

 not convenient to take it and manage it, as they did the other interests 

 of the Government, created these agents, created this Institution, as a 

 mere matter of convenience l)}^ which the Government might manage 

 the fund that was intrusted to them for the purposes specified in Mr. 

 Smithson'swill. They have no claim, no interest, in this matter. The 

 only question was. How shall the Government, if they accept the trust, 

 carry it on ? They concluded to carry it on by this machinery. It is 

 not an institution adverse to the United States Government. It is not 



