Oct 13, 2022 - Sale 2617

Sale 2617 - Lot 55

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[Economics] Webster, Daniel (1782-1852) & Others.
Twenty Speeches, 1830-1840.


Collection of octavo-format pamphlet speeches owned and assembled by Vermont attorney Charles Marsh (1765-1849); including some presented to him by the authors:

1) Webster's Speech on the Subject of the Public Lands, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1830;

2) Speech of Mr. Hayne of South Carolina in the Senate, January 21, 1830 on Mr. Foot's Resolution;

3) Webster's Speech in Reply to Hayne on the Resolution of Foot, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1830;

4) McDuffie's Report from the Committee of Ways and Means to the House delivered on April 13, 1830, with two folding typographical tables;

5) Hayne's Speech on the Reduction of the Tariff delivered January 9, 1832, Washington: Jonathan Elliot, [1832];

6) Webster's Speeches upon the Question of Renewing the Charter of the Bank of the United States, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1832;

7) Webster's Speech in Reply to Calhoun's Speech on the Bill, "Further to Provide for the Collection of Duties on Imports", Washington, 1833, author's presentation copy, last few pages torn with damage to blank margin;

8) John Quincy Adams's Speech [Suppressed by the Previous Question] on the Removal of the Public Deposites, printed as a supplement to the Daily Advertiser & Patriot;

9) Clay's Speech on the Subject of the Removal of Deposites, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1834;

10) Huntington's Speech on the Subject of the Removal of the Deposites, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1834;

11) Calhoun's Remarks on the Subject of the Removal of the Deposites, [Washington]: Duff Green, 1834;

12) Webster's Remarks on the Removal of the Deposites, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1834;

13) Webster's Speech on Moving for Leave to Introduce a Bill to Continue the Bank of the United States, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1834;

14) Calhoun's Remarks on the President's Protest, Washington: [no printer], 1834;

15) Webster's Second Speech on the Sub-Treasury Bill, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1838;

16) Webster's Speech in Answer to Mr. Calhoun, March 22, 1838;

17) Clay's Speech Establishing a Deliberate Design [...] to Break Down the Whole Banking System, Washington: at the office of the National Register, 1838;

18) John Davis's Reply to Mr. Buchanan on the Reduction of Wages, Washington: Gales & Seaton, 1840;

19) Thomas Dew's The Great Question of the Day, on the Subject of the Financial Policy of the Administration, and the Laws of Credit & Trade, Washington: Thomas Allen, 1840;

20) Hugh White's Letter to the Legislature of Tennessee, on Declining to Obey Certain of their Resolutions of Instruction and Resigning the Office of Senator of the United States, Washington: at the Madisonian Office, 1840; all bound together in modern half leather with marbled paper boards, generally good, sizes vary, 8 3/4 x 5 1/4 in.

This series of pamphlets begins with speeches in the famous Webster-Hayne debate, which erupted in the Senate between Webster of Massachusetts and Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina between January 19th and 27th, 1830. Ostensibly beginning with a spirited discussion of the pros and cons of protectionist tariffs, the speeches delivered in the course of this imbroglio were spontaneously conceived and orated by both. The debate itself was originally inspired by Samuel A. Foot of Connecticut's call for a temporary suspension of land surveying in a move to stop the government selling new plots of land.

Webster's Second Reply to Hayne, the third work in the present collection, is regarded as the most eloquent speech ever delivered in Congress. In it, he writes: "It is the People's Constitution, the People's Government; made for the People, made by the People, and answerable to the People," (see page 61) a phrase lightly retooled by Lincoln in the Gettysburg Address. Webster ends with this: "the sentiment, dear to every true American heart [is] --Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!" (see page 85). His stirring words are the source of North Dakota's state motto.

Former owner of these pamphlets, Charles Marsh, served as United States Attorney for the District of Vermont from 1797 until 1801, and was nominated to that office by George Washington. He was also a member of Congress from 1815 to 1817, where he served as Vermont's at-large representative in the House. The building that served as his law office in 1797 Woodstock, Vermont still stands today, the oldest detached law office in Vermont.