654 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



use it, is as direct a breach of faith as it would be on the part of this 

 Congress to pass a law that it would pay no debt whatever that it had 

 created. It Avould be the worst species of repudiation — worse than 

 borrowing money and refusing to pay it under ordinary circumstances. 

 The Government has accepted it; it has committed itself to- it, and this 

 Institution had as perfect a right to call for the payment of the interest 

 as it fell due, in coin, as had any other creditor of the Government. 



The Senator from Iowa wants to know why a distinction is to be 

 made l)etween the debt due the Smithsonian Institution and a debt due 

 any other person. No distinction is to be made. It is the very thing 

 we do not want to do. The Government of the United States in 1861, 

 when this rebellion broke out, owed some $^0,000,000; and does not 

 the Senator from Iowa know that we paid the interest to every one of 

 the holders of that indebtedness in gold? 



Mr. J. W. Grimes, I know we did not do it to the Indians. 



Mr. Trumbull. You have done it to the Indians in many instances; 

 but because you have wronged the Indian who can not assert his rights; 

 because you have violated your treaties with him, and by act of Con- 

 gress are changing treaties every day and driving him from the lands 

 that you set apart to him and said you would never disturb him in the 

 possession of; because you impose upon the Indian, do you propose 

 now to violate all your contracts? You are bound to pay the Indian 

 in gold if you have agreed so to pay him. Sir, this argument by 

 which you talk about not paying the poor soldier in coin smacks a 

 little of a speech upon the stump. The Senator from Iowa votes here 

 to pay the foreign bondholder in coin. 



In my opinion this amendment does not go far enough. The reason, 

 probably, for the introduction of the amendment at this time is in con- 

 sequence of a calamit}^ the destruction of a part of the Smithsonian 

 building within a few days by fire, involving a very large expenditure 

 to repair the building; but instead of calling upon Congress for an 

 appropriation for that purpose it was thought on the part of the 

 managers of the Institution they would be enabled to get along if they 

 received the interest due the Institution in coin. They were entitled 

 to receive it, and they would have received it in coin had they insisted 

 upon it heretofore. The only reason that it has not been insisted upon, 

 as I understand, is that in this great emergency of the country, as the 

 Institution was able to get along, the matter was not pressed upon the 

 Secretary of the Treasury, who never denied the obligation of the 

 Government to pay in coin as much upon this debt as any other debt 

 which the Government owed. I am informed by the Senator from 

 Maine [Mr, Farwell] that they received the currency of the country with- 

 out making a special demand for the coin under the particular condition 

 of things in the country at the time. The Institution will be able, as I 

 understand, to repair the building, provided they receive what the3' are 



