THE REPORT AND RESOLUTIONS OF THE COMMITTEE OF FIFTY
(New York, 1829)

Your committee, therefore, feel that all human society, our own as well as every other, is constructed radically wrong; that in the first foundation of government in this state the division of the soil should have been equal, at least, among families; and that provision should have been made (if property must descend in a family line) that it should descend in an equal manner, instead of having been placed at the disposal of the caprice of testators. They even go farther, and say, as their opinion, that inasmuch as the people resident on the soil, at the first formation of our government, had equal right thereto, as individuals, not as members of families, so also had their immediate successors the same right. But this has never been accorded to them; nay, even the families themselves of the first settlers, as we have seen, had nothing of equality existing between them; and, as a certain and natural result, we see thousands of our people of the present day in deep distress and poverty, dependent for their daily subsistence upon a few among us whom the unnatural operation of our own free and republican institutions, as we are pleased to call them, has thus arbitrarily and barbarously made enormously rich.

But though, as your committee believe, it is to this unnatural and unequal organization of society that we are to look for the prime source of all our oppressions; of that which places over us task masters, with power to require unreasonable toil; with power to withhold an adequate recompense; with power to deny employment altogether; and thus inflict upon us untold suffering; still your committee are sensible that this fountain of your distresses is not to be dried up but by a revolution; a civil revolution, it is true, since three hundred thousand freemen in this state have the power, through their votes at the ballot boxes, to bring it about, without resorting, as most other countries must do, to the use of the bayonet.

But although your committee are sensible that, until a revolution take place, such as shall leave behind it no trace of that government which has denied to every human being an equal amount of property on arriving at the age of maturity, and previous thereto, equal food, clothing, and instruction at the public expense, nothing can save the great mass of the community from the evils under which they now suffer; still they are also sensible, approaching as we are the eve of one of our annual elections, that there is an opportunity offered us of abating, of assuaging, of preventing the aggravation of our calamities, by resorting to the polls, .and there electing, if we can, men who, from their own sufferings, know how to feel for ours, and who, from consanguinity of feeling, will be disposed to do all they can to afford a remedy.

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RESOLVED, that it has become the duty of the people to enquire into the causes of their distresses, and to express their opinions in relation thereto.

RESOLVED, in the opinion of this meeting, that the first and unequal appropriation of the soil of the state to private and exclusive possession, was eminently and barbarously unjust.

RESOLVED, that it was substantially feudal in its character, inasmuch as those who received enormous, because they were unequal, possessions, were lords, and those who received little or nothing, were vassals.

RESOLVED, that hereditary transmission of wealth on the one hand, and poverty on the other, has brought down to the present generation all the evils of the feudal system, and that this, in our opinion, is the prime source of all our calamities.

RESOLVED, that these calamities have been greatly aggravated and increased by a legislation which has employed all its energy to create and sustain exclusive privileges; and that among the objects of such privileges, banking institutions stand most conspicuous.

RESOLVED, that these institutions, as it regards our own state, stand constantly indebted to the public, according to the best of our information, in the sum of thirty or thirty-five millions of dollars.

RESOLVED, if they are to be suffered to remain among us, that they ought no less to pay interest on the debt they owe to the community, than that the community itself should pay interest on any debt it may owe them.

RESOLVED, as banking is now conducted, the owners of the banks receive annually, of the people of this state, not less than two millions of dollars, as interest on their paper money, (and it might as well be pewter money,) for which there is and can be nothing provided for its redemption on demand.

RESOLVED, in this view of the matter, that the greatest knaves, imposters, and paupers of the age, are our bankers; who swear they have promised to pay to their debtors thirty or thirty-five millions of dollars on demand, at the same time that they have, as they also swear, only three, four, or five millions to do it with.

RESOLVED, that more than one hundred broken banks, within a few years past, admonish the community to destroy banks altogether.

RESOLVED, that more than a thousand kinds of counterfeit bank notes, from five hundred dollars down to a single dollar, give double force to the admonition.

RESOLVED, that the Constitution of the United States declares, among other things, that no state shall emit bills of credit; and that, in the opinion of this meeting, all our banking institutions are palpable infractions of that instrument; since if the state, of itself, have not power to emit such bills, it cannot have the power to authorize others to do it.

RESOLVED, according to information derived from official sources, that one auctioneer in this city, puts into his pocket for his year's services, over and above all expenses, more than one hundred and fifty thousand dollars! a sum six times as great as the salary of the President of the United States.

RESOLVED, that the average salary of twelve of these auctioneers exceeds, in the same manner, fifty thousand dollars a year each!

RESOLVED, that the exactions of our banking institutions, and of our auctioneer and other monopolists, are a rapacious and cruel plunder of the people.

RESOLVED, that until these auction and other monopolies can be suppressed, the persons having interest in them, (as well as in the case of the banks,) ought to be compelled by law to pay over to the state, all the monies they make beyond their expenses, except so much as may be a reasonable reward for their personal services, or a just and moderate return for investments.

RESOLVED, that exemption is privilege, and as such, the exemption from taxation of churches and church property, and the property of priests, to an amount not exceeding fifteen hundred dollars, is a direct and positive robbery of the people.

RESOLVED, that, so far as it goes, it is a connection of church with state; since the principle which would remit to a priest the taxes on his property, thus making a gift to him from the public treasury of that amount, might with equal propriety be extended to the payment of his annual salary.

RESOLVED, in the opinion of this meeting, that not less than three or four hundred thousand dollars, are annually plundered from the useful and industrious classes of our citizens, for the want of a lien law on buildings; and that this is a full and sufficient reason why it ought to be granted.

RESOLVED, as an insurmountable reason in favor of a lien law, if there were no other, that it ought to be passed; as with it, the poor and industrious mechanic and laborer can have no power to injure the rich; but without it, the rich may, as they do, plunder the poor of their earnings without restraint.

RESOLVED, that past experience teaches, that we have nothing to hope from the aristocratic orders of society; and that our only course to pursue is, to send men of our own description, if we can, to the legislature at Albany.

RES0LVED, that we will make the attempt at the ensuing election; and that as a proper step there to, we invite all those of our fellow citizens who live by their own labor, and none other, to meet us at Military Hall, Wooster street, on Friday, the 23d day of October instant, at half past 7 o'clock, then and there to nominate suitable persons for candidates for members of the senate and assembly.

RESOLVED, that we consider such invitation and nomination in this open and public manner, to be respectful to the community, regular and republican.

ISAAC ODELL, Ch'n—

WM. G. TILLOU, R. D. OWEN, Sec'ries.