FALLACIES OF LEGISLATION.

ILLUSTRATED BY THE NAVAL APPROPRIATION ACT OF MARCH 3, 1851.

Ir has been said and admitted, that knowledge is power. Ignorance and poverty are the props of tyranny and oppression. Ignorant men are generally credulous, and are readily influenced by positive assertions when uttered by men of property and position in the world. It often happens, that the intellects of poor ignorant men is confused and blunted through the mere presence of those whom they regard to be great and good. Hence they are often the victims of well-tutored knaves, who have won enough of popular approbation to hold some office. They become the playthings and support of demagogues, who, while pretending to devote their time and labor for the common advantage of those who constituted them, are only attentive to their own selfish interests. The difference of mental efficiency between a child and a man, depend more upon the inexperience and want of knowledge of the former than upon the greater age of the latter: those who are inferior in experience and information are children, no matter about their age; in conflict with the highly cultivated minds of educated men, they must always be beaten, especially where they are also opposed by selfish, dishonest pretensions.

The depressed or low condition of sailors, compared with other classes of citizens, is attributable to a want of knowledge beyond their very simple vocation. As a class, sailors have been scourged and maltreated in various ways, and it is only within a few years that any efficient attention has been paid to their condition. Among the most prominent efforts to ameliorate it, are those of Watson G. Haynes. He stumped the country, and kept up agitation of the subject until the use of the lash has been abolished. But this was effected in a hasty manner, and no modes of punishment have been substituted in its place to coerce the vicious to proper action. Though hastily performed, still the act itself is a good one; but more by chance than judicious proceeding on the part of Congress. The members of the national legislature are so much occupied in electioneering for office, in making buncombe speeches, that legislation, the great object of their meeting, is left till the last hours of the session, when laws are enacted in haste and confusion. The last Congress is not free from this imputation. In proof of it, the naval appropriation bill may be cited as an instance of imperfect, hasty legislation.

It is a duty and a privilege of every American citizen to express his views on all points affecting the common good or interests of classes. While he is bound to bow in obedience to all laws in existence, the American may attempt to point out their errors, that they may be corrected. Even when his opinions are wrong, they may be expressed advantageously to himself, because discussion will elucidate and bring out the truth, and render it manifest to all, or at any rate to the majority.

It may be said in defence of Congress, however, that it is the custom to rely on the reports of committees, and the heads of bureaus in the executive departments, especially upon technical points. If the heads of bureaus be feeble, prejudiced, antiquated men, destitute of the spirit of progress which

is characteristic of our age and country, or men who are capable only of imitation and of following the precedents of other nations, or men so conservative that they naturally oppose all change and improvement, it is to be anticipated that Congress and the Executive himself will be often led astray, in spite of the best intentions. It is time that the capabilities and qualifications of heads of bureaus should be scrutinized, and where they are found incompetent, even in a moderate degree, more efficient men should be substituted. Those offices may be occupied now, by the best and most efficient men at command of the administration; if so, examination will not harm them or the administration. Yet it is surmised that examination would lead to change in some cases.

The law making appropriations to support the navy for the fiscal year, 1851-2, provides, 1st, "That no commutation of rations shall be allowed except to officers and their attendants, and for the spirit part of their rations; and no person not actually attached to, and doing duty on board of a sea-going or receiving vessel, and the petty officers, seamen and ordinary seamen attached to the ordinary of the navy-yards, shall be allowed a ration."

2d. "That no rations stopped for the sick on board vessels, shall be credited to the hospital fund, but shall remain and be accounted for as part of the provisions of the vessel; and that the rations of officers and others of the navy, sent to hospitals on shore, shall be credited to the hospital fund at the cost only thereof; and the chief of the bureau of provisions and clothing, with the approbation of the Secretary of the Navy, shall prescribe all such regulations in relation to stopping such rations as will ensure a faithful accountability for the rations stopped for the sick on board vessels, and to ensure due credit to the hospital fund for the rations at cost of those sent to the hospitals on shore; the said regulations to go into effect on the first day of the succeeding month after their official receipt at yards, stations, and on board vessels."

The above legal enactments are based upon injustice, and will operate cruelly and fraudulently upon the common sailors, employed in the naval service.

An endeavor to demonstrate the truth of this proposition is here made, in the hope that some benevolent legislator may take up the subject, and procure the repeal of this unjust law, at the next session of Congress.

The first provision relates to the commutation of rations; or, in other words, to taking a sum of money in lieu of the articles constituting the ration. The law limits this commutation "to officers and their attendants;" and there is also provided commutation "for the spirit part of their ration," but it is not very clear whose rations; whether it is the spirit part of the rations assigned to the officers alone, or the spirit ration to which the attendants upon officers are entitled, or the spirit ration of both officers and their attendants. At any rate, the interpretation of the words of the law above quoted is, that hereafter seamen cannot commute their grog ration for money, but must drink their grog or throw it away; while officers and their attendants may receive money in lieu of grog, if they please.

The law of

The question may be asked, who are officers' attendants? March 3, 1835, regulating the pay of naval officers, declares that no officer shall be "allowed servants, or pay for servants, or clothing or rations for them, or pay for the same." Whether this act of 1851, repeals that of

1835, is not absolutely clear; but it is clear that the provisions of the two laws are in conflict as to this point, unless it can be shown that the word "attendants" is not used to designate "servants."

Prior to March 3, 1835, the compensation of all who were in the navy was composed of monthly pay and daily rations. No commission officer received less than two, and many received sixteen rations daily. The commutation price of the ration was then twenty-five cents; two rations a day were equal to $182 50, and sixteen daily rations were equal to $1,460 per annum. The law of 1835 changed this mode of paying officers to an annual salary, with one ration only when afloat, and annulled all allowances and perquisites of every description; but the compensation of sailors continued to be made in a monthly pay and a daily ration. About this time the commutation price of a ration was reduced to twenty cents, which makes it worth $73 per annum.

Now, why should "officers and their attendants" be permitted to commute their rations, while sailors are cut off from the same privilege? It is presumed that officers prefer other articles of food than those provided in the naval ration; and as the attendants on their messes will partake of whatever the officers procure for themselves, it is for the advantage of both that their rations should be commuted.

But is the privilege of commutation of no advantage to the sailor? A ration supplies more food than is absolutely necessary for one, but not enough for two; perhaps twenty-five rations would, with care, feed a man during thirty days. Experience has taught that a mess of twelve sailors can subsist on ten rations. This knowledge has been made to increase the comfort of men on board ship, and contribute towards the preservation of their health. It has been a common practice for each mess of twelve or fifteen to commute two rations, which brings to the mess a cash revenue of twelve dollars monthly. When in port, this money is expended in fruits, vegetables, milk, or such little table luxuries as do not enter into the composition of the ship's ration. Or, if not expended for common mess stock, the sum is equally divided among the members of the mess, to spend or hoard, as each may deem best.

These being the facts, it is very clear that the commutation of rations, at an established price, is of quite as much advantage to the sailor as to the officer. The ration is as much a part of the sailor's compensation, as it is of that of the officer. To make the compensation of the sailor less valuable and less available to him than the same kind of compensation to the officer, is unequal, illiberal, and unjust. It is true, a mess may save its surplus from the rations, and, in most ports, barter it with bom-boatmen for fruit, &c.; but, if this alternative be cast upon the sailor, why should the officer be released from it?

Commutation is an advantage to the interests of the government. The materials of a lawful ration cost in most foreign ports, from twenty to fifty per cent. more than in the United States. When a ship is on a foreign station, after the original outfit of provisions is exhausted, she must be supplied by purchase in a foreign market, or from depôts furnished from the United States. The cost of provisions. &c., kept in depôt on foreign stations, is increased beyond the original contract price, by the amount of freight, transportation, store rent, &c., and by the amount lost from leakage, breakage, and decay. For reasons of this nature, it is desirable to lessen the demand or consumption of ration materials; and this

is effected at the rate of at least fifteen per cent. by the practice of commutation, which the law in question has annulled.

It is conjectured that this law will increase the consumption of ration materials from ten to fifteen per cent., to say nothing of the annoyance and discontent it is likely to produce among the crews of ships abroad. No class of people are more punctilious than sailors as to the stipulated quality and quantity of their food; on this point, their prejudices are remarkable. They have been known to demand their "regular rations," even when green turtle and poultry had been furnished ad libitum as substitutes for salted beef and pork.

The second part of the law under consideration, relates to the Navy Hospital Fund, and is directly opposed to the provisions of "an act establishing Navy Hospitals," approved Feb. 26, 1811, according to the construction heretofore given to it. That act has not been repealed.

The Navy Hospital Fund had its origin in a law of March 2, 1799, in virtue of which twenty cents are retained from the monthly pay of all persons employed in the navy, to provide for their temporary relief when sick and disabled. By the law of Feb., 1811, this tax of twenty cents on the monthly pay, was made the Navy Hospital Fund, from which source navy hospitals and a naval asylum were to be established and supported. The fifth section of this law provides, "That when any navy officer, seaman, or marine, shall be admitted into a navy hospital, the institution [the Navy Hospital Fund] shall be allowed one ration per day during his continuance therein, to be deducted from the account of the United States with such officer, seaman, or marine;" and it requires, likewise, that the pensions of inmates of hospitals shall be paid to the fund, while they are entertained at its expense.

The revenue of the Navy Hospital Fund is derived, 1, from the deduction of twenty cents monthly from the pay of all persons paid by pursers in the navy; 2. "all fines imposed on navy officers, scamen and marines, shall be paid to the commissioners of navy hospitals ;" and, 3, from the commuted value of rations stopped on account of the sick. But the first and third are in fact the only sources of revenue. Fines are rarely imposed in name, and stopped pensions are not accounted for to the Commissioner of the Navy Hospital Fund. It may be a question, when an officer is sentenced by court-martial to suspension without pay, whether it is not to be regarded virtually as a fine to which the Navy Hospital Fund is legally entitled.

It must be clear that this fund belongs virtually to the sailors and others of the navy, and is held and managed in trust for them by the Secretary of the navy, who is by law the Commissioner of the Navy Hospital Fund. It receives from the pay of the navy, in the monthly tax, not less than $22,000 annually, and about $25,000 on account of stopped rations; or, in other words, the hospital fund has heretofore received from the property of officers, seamen, and marines, deducted from their pay and subsistence, about $45,000 annually. The current expenses of all navy hospitals and naval asylums, are borne by the fund.

When a sailor is ill, and unable to eat his ration on board ship, or when he is lodged and fed in a hospital, the practice has been to credit its arbitrary value to the navy hospital fund, on the ground that the ration was the property of the man and not of the government, and therefore it should be regarded as an equivalent for the medicines and sick-diet fur

nished at the cost of this trust fund, to the benefits of which he is entitled, because he is a (forced?) contributor. This law is based on a different view. It assumes that the ration of a sailor on board ship does not become his property until he has eaten it, or at least drawn it, and if left undrawn on account of sickness, the ration reverts to the treasury, and he loses all right and claim to it, direct or indirect.

Medicines and sick-diet are furnished on board ships of the navy by annual appropriations at the expense of the treasury, without charge to those who require them; but this bounty does not lessen their claim and right to a daily ration; life-buoys are always in readiness to be cast into the sea to save those who accidentally fall overboard, but no one contends that a man rescued from a watery grave by such a humane contrivance loses any right to pay or to rations for the use of the machine, which, by the way, it may be observed, is prepared with the economical object of saving and securing an individual's life, not so much for the use and advantage of the owner, as the benefit of the government, which has rented it for a limited term at a stipulated rate, to be paid in money and subsistence.

The effect of this law will be to deprive the Navy Hospital Fund of about one-fourth of its whole revenue, without any advantage to the treasury; and at the cost of doing a moral wrong to those entitled to its benefits. It assumes that rations are not a part of the compensation of sailors, and takes away one of their means of contributing to a fund created for the common benefit of their class. It will not probably enable the chief of the bureau of provisions to show that the navy is fed at less expense than under the administration of his predecessors in office; but it may compel the chief of the bureau of medicine to ask appropriations for the current expenses of naval hospitals; and had he been alive to the interests of sailors and to his own reputation for finance, he would have protested against such a law in time to prevent its enactment. The gentleman must have been somnolent.

It is questionable whether any rations will be stopped on account of the sick afloat under this law. If not, there can be nothing saved to the trea

sury in the expense of provisions for the navy.

It may be urged that twenty cents is more than the original cost of a ration, because the law proposes to ascertain the actual value of rations stopped on account of sick in hospitals, and to credit the hospital fund accordingly. Then the commutation value of a stopped ration for the hospital fund will fluctuate with the contract price of provisions; while the commutation of rations of officers and their attendants will remain at twenty cents. This fluctuation in the value of a ration for the purpose of commutation, is contrary to the spirit of the act of August 29, 1842, "to establish and regulate the navy rations." The fourth section of that act gives to commanding officers a right to diminish the daily allowance of provisions in case of necessity, but provides that "payment shall be made to the persons whose allowance shall be thus diminished, according to the scale of prices which is or may be established for the same." The fifth section of the same act provides for the commutation of the spirit part of a ration according to the "established" price of the same.

It has always been the practice to have an established price for each article composing the ration, in order to facilitate commutation, which frequently becomes absolutely necessary. When one article of the ration cannot be procured, it is a custom to substitute another for it, but not at a