Mr. FESSENDEN. I shall vote for this postponement, and I am free to say that if it is not postponed in the present attitude of the bill, I shall vote against.the bill itself, although I stand precisely in the category referred to by the honorable Senfrom Michigan not that I should inevitably be opposed to constructing this canal. At a proper time and underproper circumstances I am inclined to think that I might favor it. That is my present impression in relation to the matter, a though I have not examined the subject sutIiciently to be preared to give a denite answer on that point; but there is nothing in my mind in reference to it that would necessarily prevent my doing so, and I am favorable to the object. My difficulty is of another descrition. I did not vote for the Pacific railroad hi I. I did not vote at all on that measure. I believe there were only 5 votes 0. inst it. If my vote would have defeated tobill as it stood, I probably should have voted against it, notthat Twas opposed to the construction of the pay cific railroad, but I have been from the beginning oppOSed, even for the purpose of obtaining a very considerable goo, to violating what I supposed to be a constitutional provision, or at any rate of transcending the limits of the power which we had under the Constitution. lfiIy view with regard to the Pacific railroad was that we could only construct it under what is called the war power, connecting the country together for the common defense. I supposed to that end that it was not necessary for us to go any further than to construct the road thron h the Territories of the U.S., from.‘tate to State; and the mode in which I thought it ought to be done was that it should be properly surveyed. We had already had genera surveys; but as it was a national work, the proriety of the thing required that the national) Government should ascertain where the road ought to be built, lay it out, decide upon the line, fix it, and then build it for national purposes. I have been opposed always to putting national works into t a power of corporations; and since the vote was taken‘on that subject my objection has been growing stronger and stronger every day for it is get ting to be the case under the legislation of Congress, in m judgment, that the country is to be controlle by great corporations and our legislation isto be controlled by them, so that we are no longer really to have any powerleft in relation to such subjects. Now, sir, look at this proposition. It is put on 2 grounds by some gentlemen. I believe my friendfrom Massachusetts [Mr. Sunni 2n] puts it on the commercial power. Well, sir, I am in some degree a strict, perhaps it may be saida narrow. constructionist; but, as has been observed before, it is only very recently that it has been found out that under the power to “regulate commerce” the Government had the power to make a communication through States; that is to say, to make a channel of commerce where none before existed, either in the way of railroads or canals, or an thin of that descrition. It is a very moern doctrine. It use to be held, especially by the Democracy, very strongly and very thoroughly, (and I fell into their views upon that subject) that in relation to commerce, where we found that it existed by nature, where there were channels of commerce made for us, we had the power to improve them under the power to regulate; but the idea that we could make new channels in the shape of railroads or canals, or anything of that sort, for the sake ofincreasing the coin mercial convenience of the country was a doctrine that, if carried out, led to a most unlimited expenditure of mouey, and was assuming, under apower to regulate, the power to create, which did not, in myjudgment, exist. Perhapsl may be wrong upon this subject; but Imention it simply to show to my friendfrom Massachusetts that the question is not. so clear to me as in his remarks the other day he supposed it ought to be to everybody, so that there could not be any dispute about it. It has failed to approve itself to my mind. I stand as yet by the old landmarks. I do not know but that I may be convinced by and by; but at present I am not convinced that they ought to be removed. Then comes the question of the war power, whether we can do it under the provision giving power to Congress to provide for the general defense. I think we can, and I think we are the proper tribunal to decide on that subject. nt I have yet to be convinced that, under the power to provide for the general defense, we may construct a public work and then pass that work over into the hands of a corporation and cease to own and control it. If a public work is necessary for the general defense of the country, that work must necessarily, when made, belong to the country, and be under the control of the country. This idea of constructing important public works, which ought not to be constructed at all unless they are important to the defense of the country in the 1st place, and which may be of the last importance in case of war, and then parting with the power over those works. either in peace or war or at any time, has always struck me as ver curious. a Entertaining those ideas, I come to the same conclusion in reference to this work that I did with reference to the Pacific railroad, that if constructed at all it should only be after a careful examination by the Government of the U.S.; that it should be a Government work; that it should remain under the control of the Government; else it has not the character and cannot be subject to the necessity upon which it is supposed to be founded. Those are the ideas, in short I have neither strength nor inclination to make a speech on the matter upon which I have proceeded hitherto and to which I have adhered; and believing that the doctrines are sound I cannot vote foi this bill which proposes to put into the hands of a corporation the power to make a public work to suit itself, on its own surveys, without reference to any judgment by the Government of the U.S. upon the character of the Hub itself in reality, and to be left in their hairdowith power to go into a single State, “MkMingymicommunication from one State to (1make a new channel of cemme'rce Minsk purposes or to undertake to for the general defense which a when constructed will not be a work of the Government itself, belong to it, appertain to'it, be under its control, or subject to its authority. For these reasons I shall vote to postpone this bill, in the hope that at another session the friends of the measure may bring in a bill which I can vote for, which is not subject to the objections I have stated; but if this bill is not postponed, but is pressed at the present sessxon, I shall, for the reasons I have given, fee] under the necessity of voting against it.