Mr. FOSTER. I am quite unable to see the analogy which the honorable Senfrom Ne vada undertakes to trace between a lien created by a creditor attaching property prior to final judgment and an exemption law of a State giving a man a homestead of unlimited value free from all claims of creditors. In the case of an attachment, the lien may become perfect by pursuing the claim to final judgment, taking out execution, and levying it upon the property. The amount of the lien is then ascertained, and it can be discharged by applying the property to the payment of the debt if the property be sufficient. But the case the honorable senator puts is that of an exemption of a creditor's. as against all debts. Where is the analogy? Is there any lien in that case which is to be perfected by showing the amount which may rest on the property? None whatever the amount can neither be ascertained nor discharged. The Senator talks about creating a lien for the benefit of the family. Suppose it were provided that property of the debtor, a homestead of unlimited amount, should be exempt from sale, attachment, or execution at the suit of creditors, for the benefit of the family; what then Would that aid the matter? Could the family show the amount of their lien on the property? Is there any mode of ascertaining what the value of that lien is and discharging it, and then having the residue of the property applied to the payment of honest debts? Not at all. Nor is it necessary that what the senator calls a lien should be for anybody's benefit but that of the debtor himself. He unay have no family, no wife, no children, and still if a State passes a law that every individual may hold a house and land of unlimited value exempt from attachment or execution in favor of his creditors, the lien must be equally effective where there are no wife and children, as where there are both. But it is no lien at all. What we mean by lien is a legal claim on property held for the satisfaction of a debt, which can be ascertained, and when ascertained, may be paid, and the property so held as security for the debt is then relieved. There is nothing of that sort in this case. There is no analogy whatever not the remotest. This is no lien in any sense in which the law recognizes the titersmo. “lien.” It is an abuse of terms to call