SECTION II. SECTION II. 
There is less to be said on this head than would be possiblein any other country. When it is known that the United States aretroubled with the large surplus revenue accruing from the sale ofthe public lands, the whole story is told. The stranger will hearmuch lamentation in the Senate about the increase of the publicexpenses, and will see Hon. Members looking as solemn as if thenation were sinking into a gulf of debt: but the fear andcomplaint are, not of the expenditure of money, but of theincrease of executive patronage.
The Customs are the chief source of the revenue of the generalgovernment. They are in course of reduction, year by year. Thenext great resource is the sale of the public lands. Thismay he called inexhaustible; so large is the area yet unoccupied,and so increasing the influx of settlers.
This happy country is free from the infliction of an excisesystem; an exemption which goes far towards making it the mostdesirable of all places of residence for manufacturers who valuepractical freedom in the management of their private concerns,and honesty among their work-people. The brewer andglass-manufacturer see the tax gatherer's face no oftener thanother men. The Post-Office establishment in America is for theadvantage of the people, and not for purposes of taxation; andevery one is satisfied if it pays its own expenses. A small sumis yielded by patent fees; and also by the mint. Lighthouse tollsconstitute another item. But all these united are trifling incomparison with the revenue yielded from the two great sources,Customs and the Public Lands.*
The expenditures of the general government are for salaries,pensions, (three or four hundred pounds,) territorialgovernments, the mint, surveys, and improvements, the census andother public documents, and the military and navalestablishments.
The largest item in the civil list is the payment to Membersof Congress, who receive eight dollars per day, for the session,and their travelling expenses. The President's salary is 25,000dollars. The Vice-president's 5,000. Each of the Secretaries ofState, and the Postmaster-general's, 6,000. TheAttorney-general's, 4,000.
The seven Judges of the Supreme Court are salaried with thesame moderation as other members of the federal government. TheChief Justice has 5,000 dollars; the six Associate Judges 4,500each.
The Commissioned Officers of the United States army were, in1835, 674. Non-commissioned Officers and Privates, 7,547. Totalof the United States army, 8,221.
In the navy, there were, in 1835, 37 Captains and 40Masters-commandant. The navy consisted of 12 ships of the line;14 first-class frigates; 3 second-class; 15 sloops of war; 8schooners and other small vessels of war.
The revenue and expenditure of most of the States are so smallas to make the annual financial statement resemble theaccount-books of a private family. The land tax, the proportionof which varies in every State, is the chief source of revenue.Licenses, fines, and tolls, yield other sums. In South Carolina,there is a tax on free people of colour!
The highest salary that I find paid to the government of aState is 4,000 dollars, (New York and Pennsylvania;) the lowest,400 dollars, (Rhode Island.) The other expenses, besides those ofgovernment, are for the defence of the State, (in Pennsylvania,about forty pounds!) for education, (two thousand pounds, inPennsylvania, the same year,) prisons, pensions, and stateimprovements.**
Such is the financial condition of a people of whom few areindividually very wealthy or very poor; who all work; and whogovern themselves, appointing one another to manage their commonaffairs. They have had every advantage that nature andcircumstances could give them; and nothing to combat but theirown necessary inexperience. As long as the State expenditure fordefence bears the proportion to educatioll of 40l. to2,000l., and on to 80,000l., (the amount of theschool-tax, now, in Massachusetts,) all is safe and promising.There is great virtue in figures, dull as they are to all but thefew who love statistics for the sake of what they indicate. Thosewhich are cited above disclose a condition and a prospect in thepresence of which all fears for the peace and virtue of theStates are shamed. Men who govern themselves and each other withsuch moderate means, and for such unimpeachable objects, are nomore likely to lapse into disorder than to submit to despotism.
* See Appendix B.
** See Appendix B.
From Harriet Martineau, Society in America, VolumeII, Part II, Chapter IV, Section II - "Revenue andExpenditure." London: Saunders and Otley, 1837, pp. 288-292.
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