Mr. Dana’s speech against the military Academy.—Objections—it is an aristocratic institution.—1st in its selection of candidates—2nd in its monopoly of military commissions.—Its expenses are enormous and wholly disproportioned to any advantages to be derived from it.—Its positive evils, as it operates on the officers and on the private soldiers.—Mr. Dana might have added, that if this republic is in danger from any quarter, its danger lies in this institution.

Immediately after the funeral obsequies, Congress took up, on the 6th of March, the bill making appropriations for the Military Academy at West Point. Mr. Hale of New Hampshire, one of the best debaters in the House, moved to strike out the appropriation from the bill. On this occasion, Mr. Dana of New York delivered a powerful speech in favor of the motion. The intrinsic value of this speech entitles it to a place in our book, so that its home truths may be duly considered by all who read books or public documents. The institution itself should be given away to the regents of the University of New York, or to some literary institution, and no longer be connected with the general government. But we proceed to lay before the reader extracts from this elegant speech.

Mr. Dana said: My first objection to the academy is, that it is an aristocratic institution. It is aristocratic in its nature and character. It gives to a few individuals privileges which it denies to the many. Out of a population of eighteen or twenty millions, about one hundred individuals are annually selected as the exclusive recipients of the national bounty, and are paid and educated at the public expense, without making the least return for the benefits they receive. All other persons who draw pay or salaries from the government, perform services of some kind—often perhaps very inadequate but the cadets do nothing for the public; make no return whatever. Their pay and education are mere gratuities. Is it just, or right, or republican, thus to pamper a few at the expense of the community?

The institution is aristocratic in the manner of selecting the cadets. They are nominated and virtually appointed by members of Congress. The privilege of appointing a cadet has become an appendage of a seat in this House. A member is thus enabled, at the public expense, to provide for a relative, dependant, or favorite, by quartering him for life upon the treasury. He thus enjoys a patronage almost equal to his pay. Why should he have this extra privilege? Are not members sufficiently compensated for their services? If not, increase their pay; but do not suffer them to quarter their dependants upon the public. Such a privilege will be abused; it cannot exist without abuse. It is not only unjust to the community, but it is injurious to this House. Congress is called upon to legislate continually in relation to the academy; and will not such a patronage tend unconsciously to bias the judgment of members, however pure their intentions? It is not in the nature of man to be entirely impartial and indifferent when his own interests are involved. But even if he succeeds in divesting himself of every improper influence, and acts with the strictest justice and propriety, his country’s good his only object, he will be likely to gain little credit by it; he will still be suspected. Men incapable of acting with the like nobleness themselves will be slow to believe it of others. I do not doubt that every member will act on this subject from the purest motives; but if we would stand well with the country—if we would have full credit for disinterestedness with the people, we ought to divest ourselves of this patronage.

Again, sir, if this power be confined without check or control to members of Congress, will there not be danger of the institution being aristocratic in the persons selected as cadets? Whom will a member be most likely to nominate? Will it not be a son or relative, or some one dependent for support upon the member?—or, if there happens to be none such, the son or friend of some wealthy or influential constituent whose influence the member desires to secure? I would rejoice to find it otherwise. But when we examine the roll of cadets, and compare it with the lists of members of Congress, we find such a coincidence of names as I cannot attribute wholly to accident; there must have been some relationship between them to produce such a striking family likeness.

[Mr. Giddings. I wish to state a fact for the information of the gentleman. Some years ago, being applied to to nominate a cadet for my district, and having at that time a son of the proper age to enter the academy, I wrote to many of the prominent men of my district to send me the name of a candidate, and could not procure one.]

Mr. Dana. The district of the gentleman from Ohio appears to a be very peculiar one in many respects. Unless I am greatly mistaken, relatives and connexions of many men of wealth and high stations have been educated at the public expense at West Point, and the privilege has been highly coveted and eagerly sought by them generally, the single instance of the constituents of the gentleman from Ohio to the contrary notwithstanding. I am entirely opposed to the whole system of educating any person, or class of persons, at the public expense; but if some must be so educated, let them be selected for their merits—for their talents and virtues; give the preference to the poor and to the orphan—they are the most needy and deserving—instead of bestowing the national bounty on the rich and influential, who have other means of education. I admit there have been many instances in which members, waiving all selfish considerations, (and I honor them for it,) have selected the most meritorious candidate; but as a general rule, in this contest for patronage between wealth and power on the one side, and poverty on the other, it needs not the gift of prophesy to determine which will triumph. If this Academy shall be continued, I hope that, at least, its organization will be so changed as to secure to the poor a fair participation in its benefits.

The institution is aristocratic in the monopoly of military commissions which it secures to the cadets after they have received their education. It is not sufficient to educate them at the public expense, but they must also be provided for in the same way ever after, and that too in the most objectionable form of a monopoly. No man, whatever may be his talents or qualifications, or his thirst for military fame, can get into the army unless he enter through the gate of the West Point Academy, the only portal open to ambition. Thus every person who has passed the age of 21, without obtaining an appointment in the academy, and every person under 21 who does not graduate there, is disfranchised, and rendered incapable of holding a commission. He may have spent his days in toil, and his nights in study, to qualify himself for his country’s service; he may have mastered all military science; the fire of genius may burn bright in his soul; he may be impelled by the purest patriotism, and be the “bravest of the brave;” but he comes not through the door of privilege—he has never graduated at West Point—he is rejected! Is this the equality of your boasted institutions? If “all men are created equal,” that equality is soon lost by congressional legislation. It is said that military science is necessary in the army, and that there is no institution except at West Point where it is taught. How can it be taught elsewhere? The science acquired any where but at West Point is of no value to the possessor. Abolish the monopoly of military commissions, throw them open for competition to merit and science, wherever acquired, and there will be places enough for instruction in the art, without burdening the treasury, and a much wider range for the selection of officers will be afforded to you. West Point is a beautiful and healthy place, and a strong military position; but there is nothing in its air or climate, however salubrious, that in itself creates a soldier. It has the monopoly of commissions—not of qualifications—the same instruction at another location would have equal effect in qualifying an officer to command. I object to the institution, because it is aristocratic, also, in the habits and feelings which it inculcates. Petted as the cadets are, it would be surprising if they did not become proud and vain. It is not their fault—your laws make them so. They are placed in such a position as to render the adoption of such feelings almost inevitable. They alone have a public education at the expense of the nation. They are instructed in things which no other individuals have any motives for learning—they only are deemed legally competent for officers of the army; and they naturally reason: “If our services were not indispensable, we should not be educated at the public expense. If persons not educated at West Point were capable of performing the duties of military commanders, we would not be allowed to monopolize military commissions. If the knowledge we have obtained could be had elsewhere, the United States would not, at great expense, erect and maintain the military academy. If our country could dispense with us, we should not be commissioned and retained for years under pay without employment. We alone have been educated for officers. All the military science of the nation centres in us; no others are qualified to command. We are a caste by ourselves—a military nobility, on whom the fortunes of the country depend.” Censure not these young men for their opinions. They are the legitimate fruits of your legislation—fair and just inferences from your enactments. But they are not, therefore, the less to be regretted. Such enactments are calculated to draw a wide line of separation between the cadets and their fellow citizens; to foster a spirit of pride and arrogance, and self-sufficiency, on the part of the former, mixed with scorn and contempt of the multitude, to be returned by the latter with feelings of envy and detestation. Have not these consequences resulted? Does not, even now, an ill feeling exist between West Point and the country?

My next objection to the academy is, that the expenses are exorbitant, and greatly disproportioned to the benefits.

A report made by the Secretary of War at the present session of Congress, states the expenditures to have been upwards of four million of dollars. Over seven hundred thousand dollars of that sum is the cost of the grounds, buildings and fixtures, in the nature of capital, which cannot be considered as entirely wasted, though they are of little value in any other respect than as connected with this institution. The residue amounting to 3,291,500 dollars, is stated as the current expenses of the institution—the cost of educating the cadets. This would amount to an annual expenditure of about 130,000 dollars. The number of cadets who have graduated, including those who are expected to graduate on the 30th of June next, amounts only to 1,231; each graduate, therefore, has occasioned an expense to the nation of three thousand two hundred and fifty dollars; or, if we take only the current expenses, deducting what may be considered as an investment of capital, the cost of each amounts to 2,673 dollars. But the amount thus reported by the Secretary of War, I understand, includes only the direct and immediate expenditures for the institution, and omits many expenses which the academy has indirectly occasioned. A friend who has carefully investigated the matter, and whose general accuracy I cannot doubt, makes the cost of each cadet who graduates this year amount to five thousand dollars. All of the expenditures direct and indirect, by reason of the military academy, I have no doubt, exceed five millions of dollars, which is the cost of educating 1,231 persons in military science sufficiently to qualify them for subaltern officers in the army. A part of them have taken their commissions, and are employed in the public service. Some have declined to accept, others have resigned soon after their acceptance, while many have received commissions, and been placed on the roll of supernumeraries—officers without men to command, or military duties to perform. Those who have graduated are by no means all who have entered the academy. Since 1815 the whole number of students has been 2,942. Deducting the 1,231 who have graduated, and are expected to graduate at the close of the present year, and there will remain 1,711 who have not graduated. Less than 200 remain at the academy, and between 1,500 and 1,600 must have left it without completing their education, or rendering any equivalent to the nation for the expense incurred for them. Perhaps, however, it is not a subject of regret that so many of the cadets have left the institution, or been dismissed from it without completing their education, and claiming their privilege of military commissions, as many more yet remain than we have the means of employing. The number of cadets at the academy usually amounts to about 250—the number annually admitted to about 100, of whom about 40 graduate. The army absorbs 22, and the remaining 18 are supernumeraries, holding brevet commissions, without active duties. It is rather a subject of congratulation, therefore, than of regret, that 60 out of a hundred of the students do not so persevere unto the end as to entitle themselves to commissions, and become quartered for life upon the treasury; but it is not on this account less objectionable in principle thus to educate them at the public expense, without an equivalent, in service or otherwise. A law providing, in terms, that 100 students should be admitted annually into the academy, and educated at the public expense—that 40 of them should be retained as officers of the army, and the remainder be discharged from all claims for the instruction they receive, and the expense they occasion, would be denounced as unjust and unconstitutional; but a law effecting indirectly precisely the same objects, receives not only the sanction, but the eulogies of the most strict constructionists. What cannot constitutionally be done directly, may be accomplished indirectly, without trenching upon the constitution. Be it so. I shall not raise a constitutional question here. My observation has taught me that the constitution is formed of materials very like India-rubber. It will stretch on the one side so as to admit anything a man desires to introduce, and close so tight on the other as to shut out everything he wishes to exclude.

But to return to the question. I hold it to be a less evil to give the supernumerary cadets a gratuitous education, if the nation can be thereafter discharged from their support, than to retain them as officers of the army, when their services are not wanted. Already the supernumeraries, at the lowest estimate, amount to seventy, whose support and pay cost the nation nearly 70,000 dollars a year; and the number will be largely increased at the next examination, which occurs in June. Prior to the Florida war, the number of unemployed officers was much greater; but, at its commencement, resignations were “plenty as blackberries.” It is but justice, however, to those who retained their commissions, to say, that they fought gallantly and well in the most unpromising and disagreeable contest.

Not only is the military academy an aristocratic and expensive institution, but it is also the parent of some positive evils. The first that I shall notice is the jealousies and controversies which it occasions between the officers of the army. Some of the officers have been educated at West Point, others have not. Most of the superior officers have not enjoyed the advantages of that institution: nearly all of the inferior officers have. Thus they are divided into two classes—the regular and the irregular. The cadets, having enjoyed greater advantages than their superiors—served a regular apprenticeship to their business, and entered the service by the only door the law now recognises—can hardly fail to look upon their superiors as unlearned, as mere intruders, the creatures of accident, as usurper of stations of right belonging to themselves. Is it possible for such feelings to remain smothered for years in the bosom, like the hidden fire of a volcano, without occasional eruptions? Will not such sentiments be very apt to break out in overt acts of disrespect and contempt? And will not the older officers, annoyed and disgusted by what they deem the vanity and presumption of the juniors, be likely to meet this spirit by a haughty and imperious bearing, calculated and intended to mortify their pride, and check their assumptions? Have not the many quarrels and controversies, often ending in courts of inquiry and courts-martial, which have been so frequent in, and so disgraceful to the army, originated principally in these conflicting sentiments? Sir, I apprehend the difficulties have been so produced, and under the same circumstances they will continue to occur, while human nature remains unchanged. Harmony can no more be expected to exist between two distinct classes of officers, so differently taught and appointed, than between different sets of children in the same family, whom all experience has shown to be irreconcilable.

The second positive evil I shall notice, is the effect produced upon the soldiery. By means of the Military Academy, the door to promotion is effectually closed against the men; the cadets having the exclusive right to preferment, and there being already seventy supernumerary officers and the number annually increasing. The soldier, thus excluded from promotion, has no incentive to bravery or good conduct; all he has to desire is to shirk danger and hardship as much as he can, without incurring the risk of punishment. Does not this state of things necessarily degrade and demoralize the army? Who would enlist into such a service? None but the desperate and the vicious. Having no hopes, they can be influenced only by their fears—the ties which should unite them to their leaders are all broken, and their obedience, instead of the submission of respect or affection, becomes the base servility of apprehension, and a desire to escape bodily suffering. The officers can regard such men as little better than brutes, to be controlled by fear and force, while the men look upon their officers as tyrants, to whom they are compelled to yield an unwilling obedience. What motive or feeling in the soldier can be appealed to as incentive to good conduct? Ambition, hope, pride? All are crushed and blighted. Conscience? Its voice is powerless with such men. Fear alone remains—the fear of personal suffering; and to this the officers appeal. Hence, despite your laws, corporal punishment has been, and continues to be, and, I fear, will continue to be, inflicted. True, it is prohibited; but has the prohibition banished it from the army? No; nor can it, until you so change the organization that the soldier will have other motives of action besides a fear of punishment. A late court-martial has exemplified the operation of these feelings in the army. A soldier who had been committed to the guard-house for some misconduct, was brought out by an officer and severely beaten with a sword. The officer was arraigned before a court-martial for unofficer-like conduct in thus beating the soldier in violation of law and of the rules and articles of war; and the court-martial, although they found that the act was committed as charged, decided that no criminality was attached thereto, and honorably acquitted the accused. When the proceedings were reported to the commanding general, he disapproved of the decision, and ordered the court-martial to reassemble to consider the case, and demanded of the court by what law or order a soldier could be taken from the guard-house and beaten with a sword; and if there was none, that then the accused should be punished according to law. The court reassembled, and reaffirmed its decision; and, the proceedings being reported to the War Department, were again sent back for recommendation and reconsideration, and the decision shown to be entirely erroneous. But the court-martial refused to change its decision, and I regret to be obliged to say that the department tamely submitted. Now, it may be considered as an established principle, decided by a court-martial and acquiesced in by the government, that an officer may take an unprotected and imprisoned soldier, beat him with an implement not more dangerous or cruel than a sword, without being guilty of “unofficer-like conduct,” although it be in direct violation of law, and of the rules and articles of war; and if the officer be arraigned for misconduct, he is entitled to an “honorable acquittal.” Perhaps it is necessary, as an act of justice to other officers, to add that the accused, and most of the members of the court were graduates of West Point. Is this the submission to the laws which is there inculcated?—the respect for the rights of inferiors taught at that “democratic institution?” After all, sir, the fault is as much in the system as in the men. By excluding every non-commissioned officer and private from promotion, you so degrade the army, and destroy its moral power, that is difficult to govern it without the infliction of corporal punishment. Abolish the West Point monopoly—open the way to merit for promotion from the ranks—and a new and far better class of soldiers will enlist in your service, a new spirit will pervade the army, obedience will be prompt and willing, emulation and hope will lead to acts of daring bravery, and you will gain in efficiency far more than you lose in science.

The last evil I shall notice is the want of confidence, respect and attachment between the army and the people. The main reliance of this country for defence is, and ever must be, the militia. Anything, therefore, which tends to prejudice the militia, or the mass of the people, against the army, should be cautiously avoided, as it is essential to have them act in concert and harmony. Whether merited or unmerited, it cannot be denied that the people, and especially that portion of them which compose the militia, look upon West Point, and West Point officers, with great disfavor; they are specially unpopular. If war should occur, and the army and militia be brought in contact, the most disastrous consequences might ensue from their dissensions. It would be difficult, perhaps impossible, to induce the militia to volunteer their services when they would be placed under the command of the cadets. In the objections I have made, and the views I have taken of West Point, I believe I have expressed the general sentiment of the militia of my district, and of the majority of the State I have the honor in part to represent. Located, as the academy is, in the State of New York, its character and influences must be as well known and appreciated there as in any part of the Union; yet it has been repeatedly denounced by military conventions, composed of the most distinguished and enlightened men of that State. Believing it to be an expensive, extravagant, and anti-democratic institution of little use, the occasion of many controversies between the officers, and of discontent and degradation to the soldiers, I cannot give my vote for its continuance.