the Western and Atlantic Railroad, of $300,000, be deducted in your estimates, you should then make provision for one million and a half, in round numbers, and consequently reduce your sinking fund to $60,000 per annum.
This amount, at least, should be provided by law as a permanent annual sinking fund; and in addition it is recommended, that authority be given to apply to the same object any surplus that may be in the Treasury at the close of each fiscal year.
By the adoption of the policy suggested, the public debt can be fully discharged at or before the respective periods, at which our bonds fall due, by a process certain to sustain the par value of our securities, and by imposing upon the people a burden so light as to produce no derangement in business transactions or discontent in the public mind.
In the foregoing statement, no estimate is made for the ultimate liability of the State on account of the Central Bank—which, though not yet ascertained, it is believed will not fall short of $200,000—and for the payment of this amount, when it becomes due, provision should now be made.
Among the interesting subjects that will claim your attention during the present session, is the adoption of a system of finance, equal in its burdens upon all interests, and, at the same time, adequate to the wants of the State. I entertain the opinion that the true policy of the State in raising revenue from its citizens, is never to demand more than its necessities require, on the one hand, or fail in exacting an adequate sum for that purpose, on the other. It has long been a source of regret and surprise that a system of finance accomplishing this object has never been adopted. In reviewing our legislation on the subject, it will not fail to occur to you that interesting as it is, and involving as it does, the es- sential principles of good faith in every monetary transaction by the Government, as well as the most delicate of all relations between the representative and constituent, it has shared most sparingly of the care and deliberation of those to whom has been heretofore committed. Since the year 1804, but little has been done in the way of improvement to the system then adopted. Did this proceed from the conviction resting on the public mind that the system then adopted was just and equal, or that it was reliable for its certainty inbringing an adequate supply to the Treasury? Or did it originate from the want of moral firmness, or industry to investigate, expose, and reform a system wrong in itself, because of some imaginary dread of the constituent? If the latter, be assured that the representative has nothing to fear from his constituents, if his measures are just and equal to all. The People are honest; they are just, and expect of you the adoption of measures in strict unison with those
