Neither would a direct tax be adviseable. The experience of the world had proved, that a tax on consumption was less oppressive, and more productive, than a tax on either property or income. Without discussing the principles on which the fact was founded, the fact itself was incontestable, that, by insensible means, much larger sums might be drawn from any class of men, than could be extracted from them by open and direct taxes. To the latter system there were still other objections. The difficulty of carrying it into operation, no census having yet been taken, would not be inconsiderable; and the expense of collection through a country thinly settled, would be enormous. Add to this, that public opinion was believed to be more decidedly and unequivocally opposed to it, than to a duty on ardent spirits. North Carolina had expressed her hostility to the one as well as to the other, and several other states were known to disapprove of direct taxes. From the real objections which existed against them, and for other reasons suggested in the report of the secretary, they ought, it was said, to remain untouched, as a resource when some great emergency should require an exertion of all the faculties of the United States. Against the substitution of a duty on internal negotiations, it was said, that revenue to any considerable extent could be collected from them only by means of a stamp act, which was not less obnoxious to popular resentment than an excise, would be less certainly productive than the proposed duties, and was, in every respect, less eligible. The honour, the justice, and the faith of the United States were pledged, it was said, to that class of creditors for whose claims the bill under consideration was intended to provide. No means of making the provision had been suggested, which, on examination, would be found equally eligible with a duty on ardent spirits. Much of the public prejudice which appeared in certain parts of the United States against the measure, was to be ascribed to their hostility to the term "excise," a term which had been inaccurately applied to the duty in question. When the law should be carried into operation, it would be found not to possess those odious qualities which had excited resentment against a system of excise. In those states where the collection of a duty on spirits distilled within the country had become familiar to the people, the same prejudices did not exist. On the good sense and virtue of the nation they could confidently rely for acquiescence in a measure which the public exigencies rendered necessary, which tended to equalize the public burdens, and which in its execution would not be oppressive. A motion made by Mr. Jackson, to strike out that section which imposed a duty on domestic distilled spirits, was negatived by thirty-six to sixteen; and the bill was carried by thirty-five to twenty-one.