"Mr. Carroll said he had only withdrawn it that the motion to refer to the Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union

might be put.

"The question was stated on agreeing to the motion to refer the bill to the Committee of Ways and Means, and, being put, it was decided in the affirmative.

"So the said bill was referred to the Committee of Ways and Means."

On the following day Mr. Carroll moved that the rules be suspended, to enable him to offer a resolution instructing the Committee of Ways and Means to report the bill back to the House forthwith. This motion was ruled out of order.

The next day-the last of the session-Mr. Winthrop submitted a motion, which is thus recorded in the "Congressional Globe:"

"Mr. Winthrop said that, having in vain endeavored to get any action on the bill in the Committee of Ways and Means, he would move a suspension of the rules for the purpose of enabling him to move a resolution instructing the Committee of Ways and Means to report the bill for the relief of Ireland, which motion was decided in the negative, yeas 57, nays 102.

"Mr. Carroll inquired of the chairman of the committee (Mr. M'Kay) whether the Committee of Ways and Means had acted on the bill for the relief of the sufferers in Ireland and Scotland."

No answer to this inquiry is recorded. The bill never again saw the light of day. Nevertheless, some of the good people of the Emerald Isle, with a facility of mistake which is said to be characteristic, seized hold of the idea that the teeming aid poured forth in one continuous stream from the generous hearts of our people, was the fruit of the very bill thus suddenly deprived of vitality. The tokens of admiration and gratitude with which they hailed the "Half Million Bill" have been neither few nor cold.

Mr. Hunt was elected President of the Whig State Convention of New York which assembled at Syracuse in October last, to nominate officers to serve under the new State Constitution. Having been conducted to the chair by Messrs. Patterson and Crawford, he addressed the Convention as fol lows:

"GENTLEMEN,—I am deeply sensible of the distinguished

honor you have conferred upon me by electing me to preside over your deliberations. In return for this proof of your confi dence, I must ask you to accept my sincere and grateful acknowledgments. I can promise no more than an honest endeavor to discharge the duties of the chair, relying less upon my own ability than upon your kind indulgence and support.

"We are convened, gentlemen, on an occasion of striking novelty and interest. The people are about to exercise a great power for the first time, and whether it shall be exercised wisely for the public weal must, in a large degree, depend on the result of your action. The last year has been an eventful and memorable period in the political history of our state.

"This great commonwealth, in the exercise of that sovereign power which resides in the body of the people, has established for itself a new constitution of government. The evils and abuses which experience had disclosed in our former system have been discarded and done away; the popular basis upon which our institutions rest has been made broader and deeper, and our public agents have been reduced to a more direct de pendence upon the people. These great changes have been produced without violence, anarchy, or confusion, but by the deliberate action of the public will, expressed through peaceful and constitutional modes. Perhaps no spectacle presents a higher degree of moral grandeur than that of a community of freemen framing for themselves and their posterity a system of government, defining by a written code the limits of delegated authority, and protecting by fixed barriers the landmarks of civil and religious liberty. Nothing can afford a more admirable illustration of the character of our institutions and the enlightened patriotism of our people.

"There is no feature in our new Constitution which created more serious apprehensions in intelligent minds than the plan of an elective judiciary. But those apprehensions, so honestly entertained by many, seem to have been gradually dispelled It is believed that the people have shown themselves competent to the safe exercise of this delicate responsibility. We have seen our old courts displaced by new tribunals by a process so easy as to be scarcely perceptible, without the slightest shock to established interests, leaving all our rights of person and property in full and undisturbed security. It may be affirmed

that our new judiciary possesses the confidence and respect of the community in as full a degree as the system which it superseded.

"It now remains for us to lend our aid in carrying out that other prominent feature of our new Constitution, which restores to the people the choice of that large class of administrative officers who have heretofore been appointed through the intermediate agency of the executive or legislative department. In this, as in most human affairs, the success of the system may depend on the first step. Our responsibility is much enhanced by the moral certainty that the nominations to be made by this Convention will receive the ratification of the people. Let it be our aim to select 'new men' of tried capacity and fidelity— men in whose hands the public will be willing to intrust the administration of the important provisions of our new Constitution.

"The duties devolved upon us relate exclusively to state interests. Yet, in the present condition of our country, it is impossible for Whigs, assembled together as we are, to forget the obligations which rest upon them as members of that great national party in which are centered all our hopes for the peace, prosperity, and deliverance of the nation. In the unfortunate struggle of 1844, we feared the most serious calamities would result in the overthrow of the Whig cause. It may be doubted, however, if any one conceived the full weight and extent of the evils which were to be visited upon the country. At this moment our country is pouring out the blood of its bravest sons in a war commenced by the executive without the sanction of Congress a war for conquest and slavery.

"Our government has established a financial system hostile to the business interests, and a commercial system fatal to many branches of the industry of the country, inflicting upon the people the worst burdens of misgovernment, without affording that protection and support which was the first object of our glori ous Constitution. If there were no other incentive, a sense of these evils, which press so heavily upon us, should be sufficient to arouse the Whig party to new vigor and more efficient action. More than this: we find a higher incentive in the bright prospect now presented for the triumphant establishment of Whig principles and policy in our national councils.

SIMS, ALEXANDER DROMGOOLE.

THIS gentleman represents the fourth Congressional District of South Carolina, commonly known as the Darlington District, which comprises the judicial districts of Chesterfield, Marlbor ough, Darlington, Marion, Horry, Georgetown, and Williamsburg. He was born on the 12th of June, 1803, in the county of Brunswick, Virginia. His father, Doctor Richard Sims, was a native of Granville county, North Carolina, though descended from a family which settled more than a century ago in Hanover county, Virginia. His mother, whose maiden name was Rebecca Dromgoole, daughter of the late Reverend Edward Dromgoole, and eldest sister of the late representative in Congress, George C. Dromgoole, was a native of Brunswick county, Virginia. Her father came from Ireland; her mother, whose maiden name was Walton, descended from George Walton and Rebecca Roe, who settled at or near Williamsburg, Virginia, more than one hundred and fifty years ago.

Mr. Sims has four sisters and one brother living. A younger brother, the Reverend Edward D. Sims, an accomplished scholar and divine, and at the time of his decease Professor of English Literature in the University of Alabama, died in the spring of 1845.

Though the parents of Mr. Sims were in moderate circumstances, they were enabled, by economy and prudence, to afford him every opportunity for a thorough education. After the necessary preparation, at the age of sixteen he joined the freshman class in the University of North Carolina, at Chapel Hill, where he continued the assiduous prosecution of his studies until near the close of the first session in his junior year, standing among the first in his class. At this time he left the University and entered Union College, New York-attracted there, perhaps, as much by the high character of Doctor Nott as any other consideration-where he took his first degree at Com

The House received the rhythm in good temper, nothing disconcerted by the pains and penalties it provided.

In private life, no man has warmer or more devoted friends. Their attachments are founded on a knowledge of the manly attributes of his character, his integrity, and the uniform exhi bitions of a kindly temper and a generous heart. Those who know him best, esteem him most.