522 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



Mr. President. I shall not go over the ground so lucidly occupied by 

 the very able gentleman who preceded me, with whom I have been 

 associated in this trust. It is a pure, a high, and honorable trust, one 

 conceived by a noble mind the late James Smithson. He pursued 

 science as the great mistress of his affections; he pursued it to his 

 grave; and he left behind him this legacy. To whom ( He had the 

 world to choose from. He was an Englishman. He had never been 

 upon this continent. He possessed a large fortune. The high benev- 

 olence of his nature determined him, when he left the world, to devote 

 that fortune, in the hands of others, to the pursuit of science, when 

 the world closed upon him. As I have said, he had the world to choose 

 from, and he signalized this country and its institutions by his choice. 

 He left his fortune to the United States, in trust for the establishment 

 of an institution at Washington, "for the increase and diffusion of 

 knowledge." Where? In Washington? In the United States ? Upon 

 this continent, broad as it is? No; "amongst men" is the language of 

 the trust. 



If I am capable of reading the signs of the times, there are those, of 

 whom we have plenty, heaven knows, around us everywhere, who 

 look upon a public fund, no matter to what object it has been devoted 

 or how small the trust, as a thing to be scrambled for and appropri- 

 ated by the first needy or lucky adventurer. For the last twelve 

 months the newspapers have been full of intimations, coming gener- 

 ally from the northern and eastern sections of the country, throwing 

 suspicion and doubt upon the management of this trust, intimating 

 that it has been perverted from its original purpose; in substance, that 

 it was in improper hands, and should be taken from them; invoking, 

 in some insidious manner, the action of Congress upon the subject; 

 and all for what? To get hold of the fund. What use was to be made 

 of it after it was thus obtained those best know who join in the pur- 

 suit. Let me be understood. I ascribe no such motive to the very 

 learned and distinguished writer of the letter before us. I have the 

 honor only of a very formal acquaintance with him; but I know his 

 history and his character, and that assures me he can never lend him- 

 self to any un worth} 7 purpose; but yet I have strong reason to believe 

 that, if the objects which he seems to have in view could be obtained, 

 this pure and simple trust, which has been accepted by the American 

 people, would be debased into a mere pecuniary job. 



Sir, the letter of Mr. Choate unfortunately brings back into the 

 halls of Congress the great controversy which attended this fund when 

 it was first brought into the country. There was a great struggle for 

 it among the men of science, in the mechanic arts, and in other of the 

 useful and honorable pursuits of life. The parliamentary history to 

 which the writer has referred in the letter shows it. There were those 

 who believed that this fund should be devoted exclusively to a library, 



