Now, Sir, would any one say that a tax on the business of the mariner was a capitation tax? Would any one say that a tax on the business of merchants, of whom we have one hundred thousand, was a capitation tax? Would any one say that a tax on the business of the planter was a capitation tax? that a tax on the business of the wheelwright was a capitation tax? that a tax on the business of teachers was a capitation tax? that a tax on the business of tailors was a capitation tax? that a tax on the business of overseers of plantations, who apply the lash, of whom there are eighteen thousand, was a capitation tax? that a tax on lawyers, already voted by the Senator from Illinois, was a capitation tax? that a tax on farmers, if you will, of whom, happily, we have two million three hundred and sixty-three thousand, was a capitation tax? And will any one say that a tax on slave-masters, of whom, unhappily, we have three hundred and forty-seven thousand, is a capitation tax? Senators may imagine it a capitation tax, Senators may call it a capitation tax, but no imagination and no energy of assertion can make it so. It is not a capitation tax. It is a tax on the claim of the slave-master in the bones and muscles, the labor and service of his fellow-man, and, so far as the tax can have any influence, it must discredit and discourage such claim. Therefore, Sir, I say confidently that the tax is in every respect constitutional, and it is also a tax well worthy of adoption, because, at a moment when Slavery stands revealed as the very pest of our land, it will operate to discredit and discourage it. In no other way can you obtain so much revenue so easily and so beneficently. But if you refuse to impose this tax, you concede a special immunity to a most offensive pretension, and leave those who profit by it to gather their profits without any of that burden so freely imposed upon the honest industry of the country, and upon so many classes of our citizens. The motion to reconsider was carried,--Yeas 22, Nays 18. The question then recurred on the amendment, and it was lost,--Yeas 17, Nays 23. * * * * * This narrative shows how the effort to tax Slavery finally failed, not on its merits, but from tenderness to slave-masters of the Border States. PROPER DESPATCH OF BUSINESS. REMARKS IN THE SENATE, ON THE ORDER OF BUSINESS, MAY 30, 1862. In the pressure of business before the Senate, it was proposed to sit into the night on the Internal Tax Bill. Mr. Sumner spoke against this proposition. MR. PRESIDENT,--If I recollect aright, the Tax Bill was considered in the House of Representatives more than three weeks, and it is well known that there are rules for the limit of debate in that body which do not prevail in the Senate. MR. HALE. But which ought to prevail here.