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A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents. Volume 4, part 2: John Tyler

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Title: A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents. Volume 4, part 2: John Tyler

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A COMPILATION OF THE MESSAGES AND PAPERS OF THE PRESIDENTS. VOLUME 4, PART 2: JOHN TYLER ***

A COMPILATION OF THE MESSAGES AND PAPERS OF THE PRESIDENTS

BY JAMES D. RICHARDSON


John Tyler

April 4, 1841, to March 4, 1845




John Tyler

JOHN TYLER, second son of Judge John Tyler, governor of Virginia from
1808 to 1811, and Mary Armistead, was born at Greenway, Charles City
County, Va., March 29, 1790. He was graduated at William and Mary
College in 1807. At college he showed a strong interest in ancient
history; was also fond of poetry and music, and was a skillful performer
on the violin. In 1809 he was admitted to the bar, and had already begun
to obtain a good practice when he was elected to the legislature. Took
his seat in that body in December, 1811. Was here a firm supporter of
Mr. Madison's Administration; and the war with Great Britain, which
soon followed, afforded him an opportunity to become conspicuous as
a forcible and persuasive orator. March 29, 1813, he married Letitia,
daughter of Robert Christian, and a few weeks afterwards was called
into the field at the head of a company of militia to take part in the
defense of Richmond, threatened by the British. This military service
lasted but a month. He was reelected to the legislature annually until,
in November, 1816, he was chosen to fill a vacancy in the United States
House of Representatives. Was reelected to the Fifteenth and Sixteenth
Congresses. In 1821, his health being seriously impaired, he declined
a reelection and retired to private life. In 1823 he was again elected
to the Virginia legislature. Here he was a friend to the candidacy of
William H. Crawford for the Presidency. In 1824 he was a candidate to
fill a vacancy in the United States Senate, but was defeated. He opposed
in 1825 the attempt to remove William and Mary College to Richmond, and
was afterwards made successively rector and chancellor of the college,
which prospered signally under his management. In December, 1825, he was
chosen by the legislature to the governorship of Virginia, and in the
following year was reelected by a unanimous vote. In December, 1826, the
friends of Clay and Adams combined with the Democrats opposed to John
Randolph and elected Mr. Tyler to the United States Senate. In February,
1830, after taking part in the Virginia convention for revising the
State constitution, he returned to his seat in the Senate, and found
himself first drawn toward Jackson by the veto message (May 27) upon the
Maysville turnpike bill; supported Jackson in the Presidential election
of 1832, but broke with the Administration on the question of the
removal of the deposits from the United States Bank, and voted for Mr.
Clay's resolution to censure the President. He was nominated by the
State-rights Whigs for Vice-President in 1835, and at the election on
November 8, 1836, received 47 electoral votes; but no candidate having
a majority of electoral votes, the Senate elected Richard M. Johnson,
of Kentucky. The legislature of Virginia having instructed the Senators
from that State to vote for expunging the resolutions of censure upon
President Jackson, Mr. Tyler refused to obey the instructions, resigned
his seat, and returned home February 29, 1836. On January 10, 1838,
he was chosen president of the Virginia Colonization Society. In the
spring of 1838 he was returned to the Virginia legislature. In January,
1839, he was a candidate for reelection to the United States Senate;
the result was a deadlock, and the question was indefinitely postponed
before any choice had been made. December 4, 1839, the Whig national
convention, at Harrisburg, Pa., nominated him for Vice-President on the
ticket with William Henry Harrison, and at the election on November 10,
1840, he was elected, receiving 234 electoral votes to 48 for Richard M.
Johnson, of Kentucky. By the death of President Harrison April 4, 1841,
Mr. Tyler became President of the United States. He took the oath of
office on April 6. Among the more important events of his Administration
were the "Ashburton treaty" with Great Britain, the termination of
the Indian war in Florida, the passage of the resolutions by Congress
providing for the annexation of Texas, and the treaty with China. On May
27, 1844, he was nominated for President at a convention in Baltimore,
but although at first he accepted the nomination, he subsequently
withdrew his name. On June 26, 1844, Mr. Tyler married Miss Julia
Gardiner, of New York, his first wife having died September 9, 1842.
After leaving the White House he took up his residence on his estate,
Sherwood Forest, near Greenway, Va., on the bank of the James River. Was
president of the Peace Convention held at Washington February 4, 1861.
Afterwards, as a delegate to the Virginia State convention, he advocated
the passage of an ordinance of secession. In May, 1861, he was
unanimously elected a member of the provisional congress of the
Confederate States. In the following autumn he was elected to the
permanent congress, but died at Richmond January 18, 1862, before
taking his seat, and was buried in Hollywood Cemetery, in that city.

       *       *       *       *       *




INAUGURAL ADDRESS.


WASHINGTON, _April 9, 1841_.

_To the People of the United States_.

FELLOW-CITIZENS: Before my arrival at the seat of Government the painful
communication was made to you by the officers presiding over the several
Departments of the deeply regretted death of William Henry Harrison,
late President of the United States. Upon him you had conferred your
suffrages for the first office in your gift, and had selected him as
your chosen instrument to correct and reform all such errors and abuses
as had manifested themselves from time to time in the practical
operation of the Government. While standing at the threshold of this
great work he has by the dispensation of an all-wise Providence been
removed from amongst us, and by the provisions of the Constitution the
efforts to be directed to the accomplishing of this vitally important
task have devolved upon myself. This same occurrence has subjected the
wisdom and sufficiency of our institutions to a new test. For the first
time in our history the person elected to the Vice-Presidency of the
United States, by the happening of a contingency provided for in the
Constitution, has had devolved upon him the Presidential office.
The spirit of faction, which is directly opposed to the spirit of
a lofty patriotism, may find in this occasion for assaults upon my
Administration; and in succeeding, under circumstances so sudden
and unexpected and to responsibilities so greatly augmented, to the
administration of public affairs I shall place in the intelligence and
patriotism of the people my only sure reliance. My earnest prayer shall
be constantly addressed to the all-wise and all-powerful Being who
made me, and by whose dispensation I am called to the high office
of President of this Confederacy, understandingly to carry out the
principles of that Constitution which I have sworn "to protect,
preserve, and defend."

The usual opportunity which is afforded to a Chief Magistrate upon his
induction to office of presenting to his countrymen an exposition of the
policy which would guide his Administration, in the form of an inaugural
address, not having, under the peculiar circumstances which have brought
me to the discharge of the high duties of President of the United
States, been afforded to me, a brief exposition of the principles which
will govern me in the general course of my administration of public
affairs would seem to be due as well to myself as to you.

In regard to foreign nations, the groundwork of my policy will be
justice on our part to all, submitting to injustice from none. While
I shall sedulously cultivate the relations of peace and amity with one
and all, it will be my most imperative duty to see that the honor of the
country shall sustain no blemish. With a view to this, the condition of
our military defenses will become a matter of anxious solicitude. The
Army, which has in other days covered itself with renown, and the Navy,
not inappropriately termed the right arm of the public defense, which
has spread a light of glory over the American standard in all the waters
of the earth, should be rendered replete with efficiency.

In view of the fact, well avouched by history, that the tendency of all
human institutions is to concentrate power in the hands of a single man,
and that their ultimate downfall has proceeded from this cause, I deem
it of the most essential importance that a complete separation should
take place between the sword and the purse. No matter where or how the
public moneys shall be deposited, so long as the President can exert the
power of appointing and removing at his pleasure the agents selected for
their custody the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy is in fact the
treasurer. A permanent and radical change should therefore be decreed.
The patronage incident to the Presidential office, already great, is
constantly increasing. Such increase is destined to keep pace with the
growth of our population, until, without a figure of speech, an army
of officeholders may be spread over the land. The unrestrained power
exerted by a selfishly ambitious man in order either to perpetuate his
authority or to hand it over to some favorite as his successor may lead
to the employment of all the means within his control to accomplish his
object. The right to remove from office, while subjected to no just
restraint, is inevitably destined to produce a spirit of crouching
servility with the official corps, which, in order to uphold the hand
which feeds them, would lead to direct and active interference in the
elections, both State and Federal, thereby subjecting the course of
State legislation to the dictation of the chief executive officer and
making the will of that officer absolute and supreme. I will at a proper
time invoke the action of Congress upon this subject, and shall readily
acquiesce in the adoption of all proper measures which are calculated to
arrest these evils, so full of danger in their tendency. I will remove
no incumbent from office who has faithfully and honestly acquitted
himself of the duties of his office, except in such cases where
such officer has been guilty of an active partisanship or by secret
means--the less manly, and therefore the more objectionable--has given
his official influence to the purposes of party, thereby bringing the
patronage of the Government in conflict with the freedom of elections.
Numerous removals may become necessary under this rule. These will
be made by me through no acerbity of feeling--I have had no cause to
cherish or indulge unkind feelings toward any--but my conduct will be
regulated by a profound sense of what is due to the country and its
institutions; nor shall I neglect to apply the same unbending rule
to those of my own appointment. Freedom of opinion will be tolerated,
the full enjoyment of the right of suffrage will be maintained as the
birthright of every American citizen; but I say emphatically to the
official corps, "Thus far and no farther." I have dwelt the longer upon
this subject because removals from office are likely often to arise,
and I would have my countrymen to understand the principle of the
Executive action.

In all public expenditures the most rigid economy should be resorted to,
and, as one of its results, a public debt in time of peace be sedulously
avoided. A wise and patriotic constituency will never object to the
imposition of necessary burdens for useful ends, and true wisdom
dictates the resort to such means in order to supply deficiencies in the
revenue, rather than to those doubtful expedients which, ultimating in
a public debt, serve to embarrass the resources of the country and to
lessen its ability to meet any great emergency which may arise. All
sinecures should be abolished. The appropriations should be direct
and explicit, so as to leave as limited a share of discretion to the
disbursing agents as may be found compatible with the public service.
A strict responsibility on the part of all the agents of the Government
should be maintained and peculation or defalcation visited with
immediate expulsion from office and the most condign punishment.

The public interest also demands that if any war has existed between
the Government and the currency it shall cease. Measures of a financial
character now having the sanction of legal enactment shall be faithfully
enforced until repealed by the legislative authority. But I owe it to
myself to declare that I regard existing enactments as unwise and
impolitic and in a high degree oppressive. I shall promptly give my
sanction to any constitutional measure which, originating in Congress,
shall have for its object the restoration of a sound circulating medium,
so essentially necessary to give confidence in all the transactions
of life, to secure to industry its just and adequate rewards, and to
reestablish the public prosperity. In deciding upon the adaptation of
any such measure to the end proposed, as well as its conformity to the
Constitution, I shall resort to the fathers of the great republican
school for advice and instruction, to be drawn from their sage views of
our system of government and the light of their ever-glorious example.

The institutions under which we live, my countrymen, secure each person
in the perfect enjoyment of all his rights. The spectacle is exhibited
to the world of a government deriving its powers from the consent of the
governed and having imparted to it only so much power as is necessary
for its successful operation. Those who are charged with its
administration should carefully abstain from all attempts to enlarge
the range of powers thus granted to the several departments of the
Government other than by an appeal to the people for additional grants,
lest by so doing they disturb that balance which the patriots and
statesmen who framed the Constitution designed to establish between the
Federal Government and the States composing the Union. The observance
of these rules is enjoined upon us by that feeling of reverence and
affection which finds a place in the heart of every patriot for the
preservation of union and the blessings of union--for the good of our
children and our children's children through countless generations.
An opposite course could not fail to generate factions intent upon
the gratification of their selfish ends, to give birth to local and
sectional jealousies, and to ultimate either in breaking asunder the
bonds of union or in building up a central system which would inevitably
end in a bloody scepter and an iron crown.

In conclusion I beg you to be assured that I shall exert myself to carry
the foregoing principles into practice during my administration of the
Government, and, confiding in the protecting care of an everwatchful and
overruling Providence, it shall be my first and highest duty to preserve
unimpaired the free institutions under which we live and transmit them
to those who shall succeed me in their full force and vigor.

JOHN TYLER.


[For proclamation of President Tyler recommending, in consequence of the
death of President Harrison, a day of fasting and prayer, see p. 32.]




SPECIAL SESSION MESSAGE.


WASHINGTON, _June 1, 1841_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_.

FELLOW CITIZENS: You have been assembled in your respective halls of
legislation under a proclamation bearing the signature of the
illustrious citizen who was so lately called by the direct suffrages of
the people to the discharge of the important functions of their chief
executive office. Upon the expiration of a single month from the day of
his installation he has paid the great debt of nature, leaving behind
him a name associated with the recollection of numerous benefits
conferred upon the country during a long life of patriotic devotion.
With this public bereavement are connected other considerations which
will not escape the attention of Congress. The preparations necessary
for his removal to the seat of Government in view of a residence of four
years must have devolved upon the late President heavy expenditures,
which, if permitted to burthen the limited resources of his private
fortune, may tend seriously to the embarrassment of his surviving
family; and it is therefore respectfully submitted to Congress whether
the ordinary principles of justice would not dictate the propriety of
its legislative interposition. By the provisions of the fundamental law
the powers and duties of the high station to which he was elected have
devolved upon me, and in the dispositions of the representatives of the
States and of the people will be found, to a great extent, a solution of
the problem to which our institutions are for the first time subjected.

In entering upon the duties of this office I did not feel that it would
be becoming in me to disturb what had been ordered by my lamented
predecessor. Whatever, therefore, may have been my opinion originally as
to the propriety of convening Congress at so early a day from that of
its late adjournment, I found a new and controlling inducement not to
interfere with the patriotic desires of the late President in the
novelty of the situation in which I was so unexpectedly placed. My first
wish under such circumstances would necessarily have been to have called
to my aid in the administration of public affairs the combined wisdom of
the two Houses of Congress, in order to take their counsel and advice as
to the best mode of extricating the Government and the country from the
embarrassments weighing heavily on both. I am, then, most happy in
finding myself so soon after my accession to the Presidency surrounded
by the immediate representatives of the States and people.

No important changes having taken place in our foreign relations since
the last session of Congress, it is not deemed necessary on this
occasion to go into a detailed statement in regard to them. I am happy
to say that I see nothing to destroy the hope of being able to preserve
peace, The ratification of the treaty with Portugal has been duly
exchanged between the two Governments. This Government has not been
inattentive to the interests of those of our citizens who have claims on
the Government of Spain founded on express treaty stipulations, and a
hope is indulged that the representations which have been made to that
Government on this subject may lead ere long to beneficial results.

A correspondence has taken place between the Secretary of State and the
minister of Her Britannic Majesty accredited to this Government on the
subject of Alexander McLeod's indictment and imprisonment, copies of
which are herewith communicated to Congress.

In addition to what appears from these papers, it may be proper to state
that Alexander McLeod has been heard by the supreme court of the State
of New York on his motion to be discharged from imprisonment, and that
the decision of that court has not as yet been pronounced.

The Secretary of State has addressed to me a paper upon two subjects
interesting to the commerce of the country, which will receive my
consideration, and which I have the honor to communicate to Congress.

So far as it depends on the course of this Government, our relations of
good will and friendship will be sedulously cultivated with all nations.
The true American policy will be found to consist in the exercise of
a spirit of justice, to be manifested in the discharge of all our
international obligations to the weakest of the family of nations as
well as to the most powerful. Occasional conflicts of opinion may arise,
but when the discussions incident to them are conducted in the language
of truth and with a strict regard to justice the scourge of war will for
the most part be avoided. The time ought to be regarded as having gone
by when a resort to arms is to be esteemed as the only proper arbiter
of national differences.

The census recently taken shows a regularly progressive increase in
our population. Upon the breaking out of the War of the Revolution
our numbers scarcely equaled 3,000,000 souls; they already exceed
17,000,000, and will continue to progress in a ratio which duplicates in
a period of about twenty-three years. The old States contain a territory
sufficient in itself to maintain a population of additional millions,
and the most populous of the new States may even yet be regarded as but
partially settled, while of the new lands on this side of the Rocky
Mountains, to say nothing of the immense region which stretches from
the base of those mountains to the mouth of the Columbia River, about
770,000,000 acres, ceded and unceded, still remain to be brought into
market. We hold out to the people of other countries an invitation to
come and settle among us as members of our rapidly growing family, and
for the blessings which we offer them we require of them to look upon
our country as their country and to unite with us in the great task of
preserving our institutions and thereby perpetuating our liberties. No
motive exists for foreign conquest; we desire but to reclaim our almost
illimitable wildernesses and to introduce into their depths the lights
of civilization. While we shall at all times be prepared to vindicate
the national honor, our most earnest desire will be to maintain an
unbroken peace.

In presenting the foregoing views I can not withhold the expression of
the opinion that there exists nothing in the extension of our Empire
over our acknowledged possessions to excite the alarm of the patriot for
the safety of our institutions. The federative system, leaving to each
State the care of its domestic concerns and devolving on the Federal
Government those of general import, admits in safety of the greatest
expansion; but at the same time I deem it proper to add that there will
be found to exist at all times an imperious necessity for restraining
all the functionaries of this Government within the range of their
respective powers, thereby preserving a just balance between the powers
granted to this Government and those reserved to the States and to the
people.

From the report of the Secretary of the Treasury you will perceive that
the fiscal means, present and accruing, are insufficient to supply the
wants of the Government for the current year. The balance in the
Treasury on the 4th day of March last not covered by outstanding drafts,
and exclusive of trust funds, is estimated at $860,000. This includes
the sum of $215,000 deposited in the Mint and its branches to procure
metal for coining and in process of coinage, and which could not be
withdrawn without inconvenience, thus leaving subject to draft in the
various depositories the sum of $645,000. By virtue of two several acts
of Congress the Secretary of the Treasury was authorized to issue on and
after the 4th day of March last Treasury notes to the amount of
$5,413,000, making an aggregate available fund of $6,058,000 on hand.

But this fund was chargeable, with outstanding Treasury notes redeemable
in the current year and interest thereon, to the estimated amount of
$5,280,000. There is also thrown upon the Treasury the payment of a
large amount of demands accrued in whole or in part in former years,
which will exhaust the available means of the Treasury and leave the
accruing revenue, reduced as it is in amount, burthened with debt and
charged with the current expenses of the Government.

The aggregate amount of outstanding appropriations on the 4th day of
March last was $33,429,616.50, of which $24,210,000 will be required
during the current year; and there will also be required for the
use of the War Department additional appropriations to the amount of
$2,511,132.98, the special objects of which will be seen by reference
to the report of the Secretary of War. The anticipated means of the
Treasury are greatly inadequate to this demand. The receipts from
customs for the last three quarters of the last year and first quarter
of the present year amounted to $12,100,000; the receipts for lands
for the same time to $2,742,450, shewing an average revenue from both
sources of $1,236,870 per month.

A gradual expansion of trade, growing out of a restoration of
confidence, together with a reduction in the expenses of collecting and
punctuality on the part of collecting officers, may cause an addition
to the monthly receipts from the customs. They are estimated for the
residue of the year from the 4th of March at $12,000,000. The receipts
from the public lands for the same time are estimated at $2,500,000, and
from miscellaneous sources at $170,000, making an aggregate of available
fund within the year of $15,315,000, which will leave a probable deficit
of $11,406,132.98. To meet this some temporary provision is necessary
until the amount can be absorbed by the excess of revenues which are
anticipated to accrue at no distant day.

There will fall due within the next three months Treasury notes of
the issues of 1840, including interest, about $2,850,000. There is
chargeable in the same period for arrearages for taking the Sixth Census
$294,000, and the estimated expenditures for the current service are
about $8,100,000, making the aggregate demand upon the Treasury prior
to the 1st of September next about $11,340,000.

The ways and means in the Treasury and estimated to accrue within the
above-named period consist of about $694,000 of funds available on the
28th ultimo, an unissued balance of Treasury notes authorized by the act
of 1841 amounting to $1,955,000, and estimated receipts from all sources
of $3,800,000, making an aggregate of about $6,450,000, and leaving a
probable deficit on the 1st of September next of $4,845,000.

In order to supply the wants of the Government, an intelligent
constituency, in view of their best interests, will without hesitation
submit to all necessary burthens. But it is nevertheless important so to
impose them as to avoid defeating the just expectations of the country
growing out of preexisting laws. The act of the 2d of March, 1833,
commonly called the "compromise act," should not be altered except under
urgent necessities, which are not believed at this time to exist. One
year only remains to complete the series of reductions provided for by
that law, at which time provisions made by the same law, and which then
will be brought actively in aid of the manufacturing interests of the
Union, will not fail to produce the most beneficial results. Under a
system of discriminating duties imposed for purposes of revenue, in
unison with the provisions of existing laws, it is to be hoped that our
policy will in the future be fixed and permanent, so as to avoid those
constant fluctuations which defeat the very objects they have in view.
We shall thus best maintain a position which, while it will enable us
the more readily to meet the advances of other countries calculated to
promote our trade and commerce, will at the same time leave in our own
hands the means of retaliating with greater effect unjust regulations.

In intimate connection with the question of revenue is that which makes
provision for a suitable fiscal agent, capable of adding increased
facilities in the collection and disbursement of the public revenues,
rendering more secure their custody, and consulting a true economy
in the great, multiplied, and delicate operations of the Treasury
Department. Upon such an agent depends in an eminent degree the
establishment of a currency of uniform value, which is of so great
importance to all the essential interests of society, and on the wisdom
to be manifested in its creation much depends. So intimately interwoven
are its operations, not only with the interests of individuals, but of
States, that it may be regarded to a great degree as controlling both.
If paper be used as the chief medium of circulation, and the power be
vested in the Government of issuing it at pleasure, either in the form
of Treasury drafts or any other, or if banks be used as the public
depositories, with liberty to regard all surpluses from day to day as
so much added to their active capital, prices are exposed to constant
fluctuations and industry to severe suffering. In the one case political
considerations directed to party purposes may control, while excessive
cupidity may prevail in the other. The public is thus constantly liable
to imposition. Expansions and contractions may follow each other in
rapid succession--the one engendering a reckless spirit of adventure and
speculation, which embraces States as well as individuals, the other
causing a fall in prices and accomplishing an entire change in the
aspect of affairs. Stocks of all sorts rapidly decline, individuals
are ruined, and States embarrassed even in their efforts to meet with
punctuality the interest on their debts. Such, unhappily, is the
condition of things now existing in the United States. These effects may
readily be traced to the causes above referred to. The public revenues,
being removed from the then Bank of the United States, under an order of
a late President, were placed in selected State banks, which, actuated
by the double motive of conciliating the Government and augmenting their
profits to the greatest possible extent, enlarged extravagantly their
discounts, thus enabling all other existing banks to do the same; large
dividends were declared, which, stimulating the cupidity of capitalists,
caused a rush to be made to the legislatures of the respective States
for similar acts of incorporation, which by many of the States, under a
temporary infatuation, were readily granted, and thus the augmentation
of the circulating medium, consisting almost exclusively of paper,
produced a most fatal delusion. An illustration derived from the land
sales of the period alluded to will serve best to show the effect of the
whole system. The average sales of the public lands for a period of ten
years prior to 1834 had not much exceeded $2,000,000 per annum. In 1834
they attained in round numbers to the amount of $6,000,000; in the
succeeding year of 1835 they reached $16,000,000, and the next year of
1836 they amounted to the enormous sum of $25,000,000, thus crowding
into the short space of three years upward of twenty-three years'
purchase of the public domain. So apparent had become the necessity of
arresting this course of things that the executive department assumed
the highly questionable power of discriminating in the funds to be used
in payment by different classes of public debtors--a discrimination
which was doubtless designed to correct this most ruinous state of
things by the exaction of specie in all payments for the public lands,
but which could not at once arrest the tide which had so strongly set
in. Hence the demands for specie became unceasing, and corresponding
prostration rapidly ensued under the necessities created with the banks
to curtail their discounts and thereby to reduce their circulation.
I recur to these things with no disposition to censure preexisting
Administrations of the Government, but simply in exemplification of the
truth of the position which I have assumed. If, then, any fiscal agent
which may be created shall be placed, without due restrictions, either
in the hands of the administrators of the Government or those of private
individuals, the temptation to abuse will prove to be resistless.
Objects of political aggrandizement may seduce the first, and the
promptings of a boundless cupidity will assail the last. Aided by the
experience of the past, it will be the pleasure of Congress so to guard
and fortify the public interests in the creation of any new agent as to
place them, so far as human wisdom can accomplish it, on a footing of
perfect security. Within a few years past three different schemes have
been before the country. The charter of the Bank of the United States
expired by its own limitations in 1836. An effort was made to renew
it, which received the sanction of the two Houses of Congress, but the
then President of the United States exercised his _veto_ power and the
measure was defeated. A regard to truth requires me to say that the
President was fully sustained in the course he had taken by the popular
voice. His successor to the chair of state unqualifiedly pronounced his
opposition to any new charter of a similar institution, and not only the
popular election which brought him into power, but the elections through
much of his term, seemed clearly to indicate a concurrence with him
in sentiment on the part of the people. After the public moneys were
withdrawn from the United States Bank they were placed in deposit with
the State banks, and the result of that policy has been before the
country. To say nothing as to the question whether that experiment
was made under propitious or adverse circumstances, it may safely be
asserted that it did receive the unqualified condemnation of most of its
early advocates, and, it is believed, was also condemned by the popular
sentiment. The existing subtreasury system does not seem to stand in
higher favor with the people, but has recently been condemned in a
manner too plainly indicated to admit of a doubt. Thus in the short
period of eight years the popular voice may be regarded as having
successively condemned each of the three schemes of finance to which
I have adverted. As to the first, it was introduced at a time (1816)
when the State banks, then comparatively few in number, had been forced
to suspend specie payments by reason of the war which had previously
prevailed with Great Britain. Whether if the United States Bank charter,
which expired in 1811, had been renewed in due season it would have been
enabled to continue specie payments during the war and the disastrous
period to the commerce of the country which immediately succeeded is, to
say the least, problematical, and whether the United States Bank of 1816
produced a restoration of specie payments or the same was accomplished
through the instrumentality of other means was a matter of some
difficulty at that time to determine. Certain it is that for the first
years of the operation of that bank its course was as disastrous as
for the greater part of its subsequent career it became eminently
successful. As to the second, the experiment was tried with a redundant
Treasury, which continued to increase until it seemed to be the part
of wisdom to distribute the surplus revenue among the States, which,
operating at the same time with the specie circular and the causes
before adverted to, caused them to suspend specie payments and involved
the country in the greatest embarrassment. And as to the third, if
carried through all the stages of its transmutation from paper and
specie to nothing but the precious metals, to say nothing of the
insecurity of the public moneys, its injurious effects have been
anticipated by the country in its unqualified condemnation. What is now
to be regarded as the judgment of the American people on this whole
subject I have no accurate means of determining but by appealing to
their more immediate representatives. The late contest, which terminated
in the election of General Harrison to the Presidency, was decided on
principles well known and openly declared, and while the subtreasury
received in the result the most decided condemnation, yet no other
scheme of finance seemed to have been concurred in. To you, then, who
have come more directly from the body of our common constituents, I
submit the entire question, as best qualified to give a full exposition
of their wishes and opinions. I shall be ready to concur with you in the
adoption of such system as you may propose, reserving to myself the
ultimate power of rejecting any measure which may, in my view of it,
conflict with the Constitution or otherwise jeopardize the prosperity of
the country--a power which I could not part with even if I would, but
which I will not believe any act of yours will call into requisition.

I can not avoid recurring, in connection with this subject, to the
necessity which exists for adopting some suitable measure whereby the
unlimited creation of banks by the States may be corrected in future.
Such result can be most readily achieved by the consent of the States,
to be expressed in the form of a compact among themselves, which
they can only enter into with the consent and approbation of this
Government--a consent which might in the present emergency of the
public demands justifiably be given by Congress in advance of any action
by the States, as an inducement to such action, upon terms well defined
by the act of tender. Such a measure, addressing itself to the calm
reflection of the States, would find in the experience of the past and
the condition of the present much to sustain it; and it is greatly to be
doubted whether any scheme of finance can prove for any length of time
successful while the States shall continue in the unrestrained exercise
of the power of creating banking corporations. This power can only be
limited by their consent.

With the adoption of a financial agency of a satisfactory character the
hope may be indulged that the country may once more return to a state of
prosperity. Measures auxiliary thereto, and in some measure inseparably
connected with its success, will doubtless claim the attention of
Congress. Among such, a distribution of the proceeds of the sales of the
public lands, provided such distribution does not force upon Congress
the necessity of imposing upon commerce heavier burthens than those
contemplated by the act of 1833, would act as an efficient remedial
measure by being brought directly in aid of the States. As one sincerely
devoted to the task of preserving a just balance in our system of
Government by the maintenance of the States in a condition the most free
and respectable and in the full possession of all their power, I can no
otherwise than feel desirous for their emancipation from the situation
to which the pressure on their finances now subjects them. And while I
must repudiate, as a measure founded in error and wanting constitutional
sanction, the slightest approach to an assumption by this Government of
the debts of the States, yet I can see in the distribution adverted to
much to recommend it. The compacts between the proprietor States and
this Government expressly guarantee to the States all the benefits which
may arise from the sales. The mode by which this is to be effected
addresses itself to the discretion of Congress as the trustee for the
States, and its exercise after the most beneficial manner is restrained
by nothing in the grants or in the Constitution so long as Congress
shall consult that equality in the distribution which the compacts
require. In the present condition of some of the States the question of
distribution may be regarded as substantially a question between direct
and indirect taxation. If the distribution be not made in some form
or other, the necessity will daily become more urgent with the debtor
States for a resort to an oppressive system of direct taxation, or their
credit, and necessarily their power and influence, will be greatly
diminished. The payment of taxes after the most inconvenient and
oppressive mode will be exacted in place of contributions for the most
part voluntarily made, and therefore comparatively unoppressive. The
States are emphatically the constituents of this Government, and we
should be entirely regardless of the objects held in view by them in
the creation of this Government if we could be indifferent to their
good. The happy effects of such a measure upon all the States would
immediately be manifested. With the debtor States it would effect the
relief to a great extent of the citizens from a heavy burthen of direct
taxation, which presses with severity on the laboring classes, and
eminently assist in restoring the general prosperity. An immediate
advance would take place in the price of the State securities, and the
attitude of the States would become once more, as it should ever be,
lofty and erect. With States laboring under no extreme pressure from
debt, the fund which they would derive from this source would enable
them to improve their condition in an eminent degree. So far as this
Government is concerned, appropriations to domestic objects approaching
in amount the revenue derived from the land sales might be abandoned,
and thus a system of unequal, and therefore unjust, legislation would
be substituted by one dispensing equality to all the members of this
Confederacy. Whether such distribution should be made directly to the
States in the proceeds of the sales or in the form of profits by virtue
of the operations of any fiscal agency having those proceeds as its
basis, should such measure be contemplated by Congress, would well
deserve its consideration. Nor would such disposition of the proceeds of
the sales in any manner prevent Congress from time to time from passing
all necessary preemption laws for the benefit of actual settlers, or
from making any new arrangement as to the price of the public lands
which might in future be esteemed desirable.

I beg leave particularly to call your attention to the accompanying
report from the Secretary of War. Besides the present state of the war
which has so long afflicted the Territory of Florida, and the various
other matters of interest therein referred to, you will learn from it
that the Secretary has instituted an inquiry into abuses, which promises
to develop gross enormities in connection with Indian treaties which
have been negotiated, as well as in the expenditures for the removal and
subsistence of the Indians. He represents also other irregularities
of a serious nature that have grown up in the practice of the Indian
Department, which will require the appropriation of upward of $200,000
to correct, and which claim the immediate attention of Congress.

In reflecting on the proper means of defending the country we can not
shut our eyes to the consequences which the introduction and use of the
power of steam upon the ocean are likely to produce in wars between
maritime states. We can not yet see the extent to which this power may
be applied in belligerent operations, connecting itself as it does with
recent improvements in the science of gunnery and projectiles; but we
need have no fear of being left, in regard to these things, behind the
most active and skillful of other nations if the genius and enterprise
of our fellow-citizens receive proper encouragement and direction from
Government.

True wisdom would nevertheless seem to dictate the necessity of placing
in perfect condition those fortifications which are designed for the
protection of our principal cities and roadsteads. For the defense of
our extended maritime coast our chief reliance should be placed on
our Navy, aided by those inventions which are destined to recommend
themselves to public adoption, but no time should be lost in placing our
principal cities on the seaboard and the Lakes in a state of entire
security from foreign assault. Separated as we are from the countries of
the Old World, and in much unaffected by their policy, we are happily
relieved from the necessity of maintaining large standing armies in
times of peace. The policy which was adopted by Mr. Monroe shortly after
the conclusion of the late war with Great Britain of preserving a
regularly organized staff sufficient for the command of a large military
force should a necessity for one arise is founded as well in economy as
in true wisdom. Provision is thus made, upon filling up the rank and
file, which can readily be done on any emergency, for the introduction
of a system of discipline both promptly and efficiently. All that is
required in time of peace is to maintain a sufficient number of men
to guard our fortifications, to meet any sudden contingency, and to
encounter the first shock of war. Our chief reliance must be placed on
the militia; they constitute the great body of national guards, and,
inspired by an ardent love of country, will be found ready at all times
and at all seasons to repair with alacrity to its defense. It will be
regarded by Congress, I doubt not, at a suitable time as one of its
highest duties to attend to their complete organization and discipline.

The state of the navy pension fund requires the immediate attention of
Congress. By the operation of the act of the 3d of March, 1837, entitled
"An act for the more equitable administration of the navy pension fund,"
that fund has been exhausted. It will be seen from the accompanying
report of the Commissioner of Pensions that there will be required for
the payment of navy pensions on the 1st of July next $88,706.06-1/3, and
on the 1st of January, 1842, the sum of $69,000. In addition to these
sums, about $6,000 will be required to pay arrears of pensions which
will probably be allowed between the 1st of July and the 1st of January,
1842, making in the whole $163,706.06-1/3. To meet these payments there
is within the control of the Department the sum of $28,040, leaving a
deficiency of $139,666.06-1/3. The public faith requires that immediate
provision should be made for the payment of these sums.

In order to introduce into the Navy a desirable efficiency, a new system
of accountability may be found to be indispensably necessary. To mature
a plan having for its object the accomplishment of an end so important
and to meet the just expectations of the country require more time than
has yet been allowed to the Secretary at the head of the Department. The
hope is indulged that by the time of your next regular session measures
of importance in connection with this branch of the public service may
be matured for your consideration.

Although the laws regulating the Post-Office Department only require
from the officer charged with its direction to report at the usual
annual session of Congress, the Postmaster-General has presented to me
some facts connected with the financial condition of the Department
which are deemed worthy the attention of Congress. By the accompanying
report of that officer it appears the existing liabilities of that
Department beyond the means of payment at its command can not be less
than $500,000. As the laws organizing that branch of the public service
confine the expenditure to its own revenues, deficiencies therein
can not be presented under the usual estimates for the expenses of
Government. It must therefore be left to Congress to determine whether
the moneys now due the contractors shall be paid from the public
Treasury or whether that Department shall continue under its present
embarrassments. It will be seen by the report of the Postmaster-General
that the recent lettings of contracts in several of the States have been
made at such reduced rates of compensation as to encourage the belief
that if the Department was relieved from existing difficulties its
future operations might be conducted without any further call upon the
general Treasury.

The power of appointing to office is one of a character the most
delicate and responsible. The appointing power is evermore exposed to be
led into error. With anxious solicitude to select the most trustworthy
for official station, I can not be supposed to possess a personal
knowledge of the qualifications of every applicant. I deem it,
therefore, proper in this most public manner to invite on the part of
the Senate a just scrutiny into the character and pretensions of every
person I may bring to their notice in the regular form of a nomination
for office. Unless persons every way trustworthy are employed in the
public service, corruption and irregularity will inevitably follow.
I shall with the greatest cheerfulness acquiesce in the decision of
that body, and, regarding it as wisely constituted to aid the executive
department in the performance of this delicate duty, I shall look to its
"consent and advice" as given only in furtherance of the best interests
of the country. I shall also at the earliest proper occasion invite the
attention of Congress to such measures as in my judgment will be best
calculated to regulate and control the Executive power in reference to
this vitally important subject.

I shall also at the proper season invite your attention to the
statutory enactments for the suppression of the slave trade, which may
require to be rendered more efficient in their provisions. There is
reason to believe that the traffic is on the increase. Whether such
increase is to be ascribed to the abolition of slave labor in the
British possessions in our vicinity and an attendant diminution in the
supply of those articles which enter into the general consumption of
the world, thereby augmenting the demand from other quarters, and thus
calling for additional labor, it were needless to inquire. The highest
considerations of public honor as well as the strongest promptings of
humanity require a resort to the most vigorous efforts to suppress the
trade.

In conclusion I beg to invite your particular attention to the interests
of this District; nor do I doubt but that in a liberal spirit of
legislation you will seek to advance its commercial as well as its local
interests. Should Congress deem it to be its duty to repeal the existing
subtreasury law, the necessity of providing a suitable place of deposit
of the public moneys which may be required within the District must be
apparent to all.

I have felt it due to the country to present the foregoing topics to
your consideration and reflection. Others with which it might not seem
proper to trouble you at an extraordinary session will be laid before
you at a future day. I am happy in committing the important affairs of
the country into your hands. The tendency of public sentiment, I am
pleased to believe, is toward the adoption, in a spirit of union and
harmony, of such measures as will fortify the public interests. To
cherish such a tendency of public opinion is the task of an elevated
patriotism. That differences of opinion as to the means of accomplishing
these desirable objects should exist is reasonably to be expected. Nor
can all be made satisfied with any system of measures; but I flatter
myself with the hope that the great body of the people will readily
unite in support of those whose efforts spring from a disinterested
desire to promote their happiness, to preserve the Federal and State
Governments within their respective orbits; to cultivate peace with
all the nations of the earth on just and honorable grounds; to exact
obedience to the laws; to intrench liberty and property in full
security; and, consulting the most rigid economy, to abolish all
useless expenses.

JOHN TYLER.




SPECIAL MESSAGES.


CITY OF WASHINGTON, _June 2, 1841_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of the Treasury,
exhibiting certain transfers of appropriations that have been made in
that Department in pursuance of the power vested in the President of the
United States by the act of Congress of the 3d of March, 1809, entitled
"An act further to amend the several acts for the establishment and
regulation of the Treasury, War, and Navy Departments."

JOHN TYLER.


WASHINGTON, _June 17, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_

I transmit to the Senate the inclosed communication[1] from the
Secretary of State, in answer to a resolution of the Senate of the 12th
instant.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 1: Relating to the commissioners appointed to investigate the
condition of the public works in Washington, D.C., and transmitting
copy of the letter of instructions issued to them.]



WASHINGTON, _June 17, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit to the Senate the inclosed communication from the Secretary
of State, in answer to a resolution of the Senate of the 12th instant.

JOHN TYLER.



DEPARTMENT OF STATE, _June 15, 1841_.

The PRESIDENT.

SIR: In answer to the resolution of the Senate of the 12th instant,
calling for "any orders which may have been issued to the officers of
the Army and Navy in relation to political offenses in elections," etc.,
I inclose a copy of the circular letter addressed, under the direction
of the President, by this Department to the heads of the other
Departments, and know of no other order to which the resolution can be
supposed to have reference.

I have the honor to be, your obedient servant,

DANIEL WEBSTER.



CIRCULAR.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, _March 20, 1841_.

SIR: The President is of opinion that it is a great abuse to bring the
patronage of the General Government into conflict with the freedom of
elections, and that this abuse ought to be corrected wherever it may
have been permitted to exist, and to be prevented for the future.

He therefore directs that information be given to all officers and
agents in your department of the public service that partisan
interference in popular elections, whether of State officers or officers
of this Government, and for whomsoever or against whomsoever it may be
exercised, or the payment of any contribution or assessment on salaries,
or official compensation for party or election purposes, will be
regarded by him as cause of removal.

It is not intended that any officer shall be restrained in the free and
proper expression and maintenance of his opinions respecting public men
or public measures, or in the exercise to the fullest degree of the
constitutional right of suffrage. But persons employed under the
Government and paid for their services out of the public Treasury are
not expected to take an active or officious part in attempts to
influence the minds or votes of others, such conduct being deemed
inconsistent with the spirit of the Constitution and the duties of
public agents acting under it; and the President is resolved, so far as
depends upon him, that while the exercise of the elective franchise by
the people shall be free from undue influences of official station and
authority, opinion shall also be free among the officers and agents of
the Government.

The President wishes it further to be announced and distinctly
understood that from all collecting and disbursing officers promptitude
in rendering accounts and entire punctuality in paying balances will be
rigorously exacted. In his opinion it is time to return in this respect
to the early practice of the Government, and to hold any degree of
delinquency on the part of those intrusted with the public money just
cause of immediate removal. He deems the severe observance of this rule
to be essential to the public service, as every dollar lost to the
Treasury by unfaithfulness in office creates a necessity for a new
charge upon the people.

I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,

DANIEL WEBSTER.



WASHINGTON, D.C., _June 18, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit to the Senate a report from the Secretary of the Navy, with
accompanying documents,[2] in answer to their resolution of the 12th
instant.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 2: Correspondence of the minister in England with the officers
of the Mediterranean Squadron, in consequence of which the squadron left
that station, and the dispatches of Captain Bolton to the Secretary of
the Navy connected with that movement.]



WASHINGTON, _June, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I have the honor to transmit to the Senate the accompanying letter[3]
from the Secretary of the Treasury, in pursuance of its resolution of the
8th instant.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 3: Relating to allowances since March 4, 1841, of claims
arising under the invasion of East Florida in 1812.]



WASHINGTON, _June 22, 1841_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_:

I have the honor to submit the accompanying correspondence between
myself and the Hon. J. Burnet, J.C. Wright, and others, who arrived
some days ago in this city as a committee on behalf of the people of
Cincinnati for the purpose, with the assent of the family, of removing
the remains of the late President of the United States to North Bend for
interment. I have thought it to be my duty thus to apprise Congress of
the contemplated proceedings.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON CITY, _June 16, 1841_.

The PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

DEAR SIR: The undersigned were appointed by the citizens and the
city council of Cincinnati and by many of the surviving soldiers
of the late war to apply to the widow and family of our distinguished
fellow-citizen, the late President of the United States, for permission
to remove his remains from the city of Washington to the State of Ohio
for interment. They have made the application directed, and have
received permission to perform that sacred trust. They have now the
honor of reporting to you their arrival in this city, and of asking your
approbation of the measure contemplated and your cooperation in carrying
it into effect.

We are fully aware of the high estimate you placed on the talents and
virtues of our lamented friend and fellow-citizen, the late Chief
Magistrate of the Union, whose friendship and confidence you possessed
many years. We saw the tear fall from your eye and mingle with the tears
of the nation when the inscrutable will of Heaven removed him from us.

Knowing these things, we approach you with confidence, well assured that
you will justly appreciate our motive for undertaking the mournful duty
we have been deputed to perform, and that the same kind feeling which
has marked your course through life will prompt you on this occasion to
afford us your countenance, and, if necessary, your cooperation.

If it meet your approbation, the committee will do themselves the honor
of waiting upon you at the President's house at any hour you may please
to designate.

With high respect, we are, your friends and fellow-citizens,

J. BURNET.
  J.C. WRIGHT.
    [AND 10 OTHERS.]



WASHINGTON, _June 17, 1841_.

J. BURNET, J.C. WRIGHT, AND OTHERS OF THE COMMITTEE.

GENTLEMEN: Your letter of the 16th was duly handed me, and I lose
no time in responding to the feelings and sentiments which you have
expressed for yourselves and those you represent, and which you have
correctly ascribed to me in regard to the lamented death of the late
President. As a citizen I respected him; as a patriot I honored him;
as a friend he was near and dear to me. That the people of Cincinnati
should desire to keep watch over his remains by entombing them near
their city is both natural and becoming; that the entire West, where so
many evidences of his public usefulness are to be found, should unite in
the same wish was to have been expected; and that the surviving soldiers
of his many battles, led on by him to victory and to glory, should sigh
to perform the last melancholy duties to the remains of their old
commander is fully in consonance with the promptings of a noble and
generous sympathy. I could not, if I was authorized to do so, oppose
myself to their wishes. I might find something to urge on behalf of his
native State in my knowledge of his continued attachment to her through
the whole period of his useful life; in the claims of his relatives
there, whose desire it would be that the mortal remains of the
illustrious son should sleep under the same turf with those of his
distinguished father, one of the signers of the Declaration of
Independence; in the wish of the citizens of his native county to claim
all that is now left of him for whom they so lately cast their almost
unanimous suffrage; to say nothing of my own feelings, allied as I am
by blood to many of his near relatives, and with our names so closely
associated in much connected with the late exciting political contest.
These considerations might present some reasonable ground for opposing
your wishes; but the assent which has been given by his respected widow
and nearest relatives to the request of the people of Cincinnati admits
of no opposition on my part, neither in my individual nor official
character.

I shall feel it to be my duty, however, to submit our correspondence to
the two Houses of Congress, now in session, but anticipating no effort
from that quarter to thwart the wishes expressed by yourselves in
consonance with those of the widow and nearest relatives of the late
President. I readily promise you my cooperation toward enabling you to
fulfill the sacred trust which brought you to this city.

I tender to each of you, gentlemen, my cordial salutations.

JOHN TYLER.

[NOTE.--The remains of the late President of the United States were
removed from Washington to North Bend, Ohio, June 26, 1841.]



WASHINGTON, _June 29, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

In compliance with the resolution of the Senate of the 14th instant, I
have the honor to submit the accompanying reports from the Secretary of
State and Secretary of the Treasury, which embrace all the information
possessed by the executive department upon that subject.[4]

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 4: Payment or assumption of State stocks by the General
Government.]



WASHINGTON, _June 30, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

The accompanying memorial in favor of the passage of a bankrupt law,
signed by nearly 3,000 of the inhabitants of the city of New York, has
been forwarded to me, attended by a request that I would submit it to
the consideration of Congress. I can not waive a compliance with a
request urged upon me by so large and respectable a number of my
fellow-citizens. That a bankrupt law, carefully guarded against
fraudulent practices and embracing as far as practicable all classes of
society--the failure to do which has heretofore constituted a prominent
objection to the measure--would afford extensive relief I do not doubt.
The distress incident to the derangements of some years past has visited
large numbers of our fellow-citizens with hopeless insolvency, whose
energies, both mental and physical, by reason of the load of debt
pressing upon them, are lost to the country. Whether Congress shall deem
it proper to enter upon the consideration of this subject at its present
extraordinary session it will doubtless wisely determine. I have
fulfilled my duty to the memorialists in submitting their petition to
your consideration.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _July 1, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I have the honor herewith to submit to the Senate the copy of a letter
addressed by myself to Mrs. Harrison in compliance with the resolutions
of Congress, and her reply thereto.

JOHN TYLER.

[The same message was sent to the House of Representatives.]



WASHINGTON, _June 13, 1841_.

Mrs. ANNA HARRISON.

MY DEAR MADAM: The accompanying resolutions, adopted by the Senate and
House of Representatives of the United States, will convey to you an
expression of the deep sympathy felt by the representatives of the
States and of the people in the sad bereavement which yourself and the
country have sustained in the death of your illustrious husband. It
may now be justly considered that the public archives constitute his
enduring monument, on which are inscribed in characters not to be
effaced the proudest evidences of public gratitude for services rendered
and of sorrow for his death. A great and united people shed their tears
over the bier of a devoted patriot and distinguished public benefactor.

In conveying to you, my dear madam, the profound respect of the two
Houses of Congress for your person and character, and their sincere
condolence on the late afflicting dispensation of Providence, permit me
to mingle my feelings with theirs and to tender you my fervent wishes
for your health, happiness, and long life.

JOHN TYLER.



A RESOLUTION manifesting the sensibility of Congress upon the event
of the death of William Henry Harrison, late President of the United
States.

The melancholy event of the death of William Henry Harrison, the late
President of the United States, having occurred during the recess of
Congress, and the two Houses sharing in the general grief and desiring
to manifest their sensibility upon the occasion of that public
bereavement: Therefore,

_Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United
States of America in Congress assembled_, That the chairs of the
President of the Senate and of the Speaker of the House of
Representatives be shrouded in black during the residue of the session,
and that the President _pro tempore_ of the Senate, the Speaker of the
House of Representatives, and the members and officers of both Houses
wear the usual badge of mourning for thirty days.

_Resolved_, That the President of the United States be requested to
transmit a copy of these resolutions to Mrs. Harrison, and to assure her
of the profound respect of the two Houses of Congress for her person and
character, and of their sincere condolence on the late afflicting
dispensation of Providence.



NORTH BEND, _June 24, 1841_.

His Excellency JOHN TYLER,

_President United States, Washington City, D.C._

DEAR SIR: I have received with sentiments of deep emotion the
resolutions of the Senate and House of Representatives which you have
done me the honor of forwarding, relative to the decease of my lamented
husband.

I can not sufficiently express the thanks I owe to the nation and its
assembled representatives for their condolence, so feelingly expressed,
of my individual calamity and the national bereavement; but, mingling my
tears with the sighs of the many patriots of the land, pray to Heaven
for the enduring happiness and prosperity of our beloved country.

ANNA HARRISON.



WASHINGTON, _July 3, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

In compliance with a resolution of the Senate of the 9th instant
[ultimo], I communicate to that body a report from the Secretary of
State, conveying copies of the correspondence,[5] which contains all the
information called for by said resolution.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 5: Relating to the duties levied on American tobacco imported
into the States composing the German Commercial and Custom-House Union.]



WASHINGTON, _July 9, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit a report from the Secretary of State, in answer to the
resolution of the Senate of the 2d instant, calling for information as
to the progress and actual condition of the commission[6] under the
convention with the Mexican Republic.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 6: Appointed under the convention of April 11, 1839, for
adjusting the claims of citizens of the United States upon the Republic
of Mexico.]



WASHINGTON, _July, 14, 1841_.

_To the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives_:

In compliance with a resolution of the House of Representatives of the
21st ultimo, I have the honor to submit the accompanying communication[7]
from the Secretary of State.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 7: Transmitting correspondence with Great Britain relative to
the seizure of American vessels by British armed cruisers under the
pretense that they were engaged in the slave trade; also correspondence
with N.P. Trist, United States consul at Habana, upon the subject of
the slave trade, etc.]



WASHINGTON, _July 16, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives_:

I herewith transmit to the House of Representatives, in reply to their
resolution of the 21st ultimo, a report[8] from the Secretary of State,
with accompanying papers.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 8: Stating that there is no correspondence in his office
showing that any American citizens are British prisoners of state in Van
Diemens Land; transmitting correspondence with the British minister on
the subject of the detention or imprisonment of citizens of the United
States on account of occurrences in Canada, instructions issued to the
special agent appointed to inquire into such detention or imprisonment,
and report of said special agent.]



WASHINGTON, _July 19, 1841_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_:

The act of Congress of the 10th of March, 1838, entitled "An act
supplementary to an act entitled 'An act in addition to the act for the
punishment of certain crimes against the United States and to repeal the
acts therein mentioned,' approved 20th of April, 1818," expired by its
own limitation on the 10th of March, 1840. The object of this act was to
make further provision for preventing military expeditions or
enterprises against the territory or dominions of any prince or state or
of any colony, district, or people conterminous with the United States
and with whom they are at peace, contrary to the act of April 20, 1818,
entitled "An act in addition to the act for the punishment of certain
crimes against the United States and to repeal the acts therein
mentioned."

The act of Congress of March 10, 1838, appears to have had a very
salutary effect, and it is respectfully recommended to Congress that it
be now revived or its provisions be reenacted.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _July 27, 1841_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_:

I transmit herewith to Congress a communication from the Secretary of
State, on the subject of appropriations required for outfits and
salaries of diplomatic agents of the United States.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _August 2, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

On the 18th of February, 1832, the House of Representatives adopted a
resolution in the following words:

_Resolved_, That the President of the United States be authorized to
employ Horatio Greenough, of Massachusetts, to execute in marble a
full-length pedestrian statue of Washington, to be placed in the center
of the Rotunda of the Capitol; the head to be a copy of Houdon's
Washington, and the accessories to be left to the judgment of the
artist.

On the 23d of the same month the Secretary of State, by direction of
the President, addressed to Mr. Greenough a letter of instructions for
carrying into effect the resolution of the House.

On the 14th of July, 1832, an appropriation of the sum of $5,000 was
made "to enable the President of the United States to contract with
a skillful artist to execute in marble a pedestrian statue of George
Washington, to be placed in the center of the Rotunda of the Capitol,"
and several appropriations were made at the succeeding sessions in
furtherance of the same object.

Mr. Greenough, having been employed upon the work for several years at
Florence, completed it some months ago.

By a resolution of Congress of the 27th of May, 1840, it was directed
"that the Secretary of the Navy be authorized and instructed to take
measures for the importation and erection of the statue of Washington
by Greenough." In pursuance of this authority the Navy Department held
a correspondence with Commodore Hull, commanding on the Mediterranean
station, who entered into an agreement with the owners or master of the
ship _Sea_ for the transportation of the statue to the United States.
This ship, with the statue on board, arrived in this city on the 31st
ultimo, and now lies at the navy-yard.

As appropriations have become necessary for the payment of the freight
and other expenses, I communicate to Congress such papers as may enable
it to judge of the amount required.

JOHN TYLER.



AUGUST 3, 1841.

Hon. JOHN WHITE,

_Speaker of the House of Representatives_.

SIR: I herewith transmit a communication[9] received from the
Postmaster-General, to which I would invite the attention of Congress.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 9: Asking for a further appropriation for completing the new
General Post-Office building.]



AUGUST 3, 1841.

_To the House of Representatives_:

I herewith transmit a report from the Secretary of the Treasury, to whom
I referred the resolution of the House calling for a communication[10]
addressed to him by the French minister.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 10: Relating to the commerce and navigation between France and
the United States.]



WASHINGTON, _August 6, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives_:

In compliance with a resolution of the House of Representatives of the
16th of July, 1841, I communicate reports[11] from the several Executive
Departments, containing the information requested by said resolution.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 11: Transmitting list of officers deriving their appointments
from the nomination of the President and the concurrence of the Senate
who were removed from office since March 4, 1841, and also those who
were removed from March 4, 1829, to March 4, 1841.]



WASHINGTON, _August 25, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I herewith transmit to the Senate, in pursuance of their resolution of
the 22d ultimo, copies of the several reports of the commissioners
appointed in March last to examine into certain matters connected with
the public buildings in this city and the conduct of those employed in
their erection.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _August 27, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

I transmit herewith a letter from the Secretary of the Treasury, bearing
date this day, with the accompanying papers, in answer to the resolution
of the House of Representatives of the 16th ultimo, relative to removals
from office, etc.

These statements should have accompanied those from the other
Departments on the same subject transmitted in my message to the House
on the 7th ultimo,[12] but which have been delayed for reasons stated in
the letter of the Secretary of the Treasury above referred to.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 12: Not found. Evidently refers to message of August 6, 1841,
on preceding page.]



WASHINGTON, D.C., _September 1, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I submit to the Senate, for its consideration and constitutional action,
a treaty concluded at Oeyoowasha, on Minneesota (or St. Peters) River,
in the Territory of Iowa, on the 31st day of July last, between James
Duane Doty, commissioner on the part of the United States, and the
Seeseeahto, Wofpato, and Wofpakoota bands of the Dakota (or Sioux)
Nation of Indians.

The accompanying communication from the Secretary of War fully sets
forth the considerations which have called for the negotiation of this
treaty, and which have induced me to recommend its confirmation, with
such exceptions and modifications as the Senate may advise.

JOHN TYLER.



DEPARTMENT OF WAR, _August 31, 1841_.

The PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

SIR: I transmit herewith a treaty concluded with certain bands of
the Dahcota Nation of Indians, commonly called Sioux, which has been
received at this Department from His Excellency James D. Doty, governor
of Wisconsin, who was appointed a commissioner on the part of the United
States for the purpose of negotiating the treaty; and I desire to submit
the following facts and opinions inducing me to request its favorable
consideration:

It was known on my entering upon the duties of the Department of War
that some provision must speedily be made for the Winnebago Indians in
the Northwest. By the treaty with those Indians in 1837 it was provided
that they should move temporarily upon a narrow strip of country west of
the Mississippi River, called the neutral ground, from the object of its
purchase in 1830. That strip of country is only 40 miles in width, 20
miles of it having been purchased from the Sac and Fox Indians and 20
miles from the Sioux, the object of the purchase having been to place a
barrier between those tribes, which had been for many years at war and
parties of which were continually meeting and destroying each other upon
or adjacent to the country purchased.

When the delegation of Winnebago chiefs was in Washington negotiating
a sale of all their lands east of the Mississippi River, in 1837, a
permanent location for those Indians was not fixed upon, and a temporary
expedient was adopted, and acceded to by the Indians, by which they
agreed, within eight months from the ratification of the treaty, to move
upon and occupy a portion of the neutral ground until they should select
a permanent home.

Owing to the small extent of country thus temporarily assigned to the
Winnebagoes, utterly destitute of all preparation for the reception of
them, slenderly supplied with game, and, above all, the circumstance
that the Sac and Fox Indians were continually at war with the Sioux,
the object of the purchase having utterly failed, the neutral ground,
so called, proving literally the fighting ground of the hostile
tribes--owing to all these circumstances the Winnebagoes were extremely
reluctant to comply with the treaty. It was in part a dictate of
humanity to give them more time for removal than that allotted in the
treaty, in the hope of effecting their permanent removal beyond the
Missouri or elsewhere; but as no steps were taken to select their future
home, and as the white settlers in Wisconsin were fast crowding upon the
Indians, overrunning the country, as usual, in search of town sites,
water privileges, and farming districts, it became absolutely necessary
to make some efforts toward carrying the treaty into effect. Owing to
the excited state of the Indians and the apprehension of disturbance,
the Eighth Regiment of Infantry, in 1840, more than two years, instead
of eight months, after the ratification of the treaty, was ordered upon
the Winnebago frontier, the greater part of the Fifth Regiment being
already there, and in the presence of that force the Indians were
required to comply with the treaty. They reluctantly removed from the
banks of the Wisconsin River and crossed the Mississippi, but did not
go to that portion of the neutral ground agreed upon, which commenced
20 miles from the river, but instead of it they spread themselves along
the bank of the Mississippi, some of them recrossing that river and
ascending the Chippewa and Black rivers. Only a small portion of the
tribe has yet removed to the portion of the neutral ground assigned to
them, and it is perhaps fortunate that local attachments have not been
formed, since, from the position of the country, it was not and never
could have been intended as their permanent home.

After a careful examination of the country in the Northwest the
importance of providing for the Winnebago Indians, though immediate,
became secondary in a more national and wider prospect of benefits in
future years by arrangements which presented themselves to my mind as
not only practicable, but of easy accomplishment.

A glance at the map and at the efforts hitherto made in emigration will
show an extensive body of Indians accumulated upon the Southwestern
frontier, and, looking to the numbers yet to be emigrated from within
the circle of territory soon to become States of the American Union, it
will appear upon very many considerations to be of the utmost importance
to separate the Indians and to interpose a barrier between the masses
which are destined to be placed upon the western frontier, instead of
accumulating them within limits enabling them to unite and in concert
spread desolation over the States of Missouri and Arkansas to, perhaps,
the banks of the Mississippi.

Entertaining these views, it was determined to open negotiations with
the Sioux Indians north and northwest of the purchase of 1830, the
neutral ground, so called, with the purpose of purchasing sufficient
territory beyond the reasonable limits of Iowa to provide a resting
place for the Winnebagoes, intending to treat also with the Sac and Fox
Indians and with the Potawatamies north of the State of Missouri, and
thus enable our citizens to expand west of the Missouri River north of
the State.

It is difficult to state in a condensed report all the reasons now
imperatively urging the adoption of these measures. Besides the absolute
necessity of providing a home for the Winnebagoes, the citizens of Iowa
and of Missouri are crowding upon the territory of the Sac and Fox
Indians and already producing those irritations which in former times
have led to bloody wars. It is not to be for a moment concealed that our
enterprising and hardy population must and will occupy the territory
adjacent to that purchased in 1837 from the Sacs and Foxes, and the only
possible mode of its being done in peace is by another purchase from
those Indians. But the position of the Potawatamies will then become
relatively what that of the Sac and Fox Indians now is, with the
difference that access to their country by the Missouri River will
hasten its occupancy by our people. The only mode of guarding against
future collision, near at hand if not provided against, is by emigrating
not only the Sac and Fox Indians, but also the Potawatamies.

Great efforts have been made to induce those Indians, as also the
Winnebagoes, to move south of the Missouri, but without effect, their
opposition to it being apparently insurmountable, the Potawatamies
expressing the most decided aversion to it on being urged to join other
bands of Potawatamies on the Marais de Cygne, declaring that they would
rather at once go to California, being determined not to unite with
those bands, but to maintain an independence of them. By the purchase
from the Sioux no doubt is entertained that their prejudices may be
advantageously accommodated, for among the objects in contemplation
before adverted to it is to my mind of primary importance so to dispose
of those Indians as to enable this Government to interpose a State
between the Northern and Southern Indians along the Missouri River,
and thus, by dividing the Indians on the frontier and separating the
divisions, prevent a combination and concert of action which future
progress in civilization might otherwise enable them to effect in the
prosecution of revenge for real or imagined grievances.

Great importance is attached to this view of the subject, but scarcely
less to the means provided by the treaty for inducing the remnants of
other Northern tribes to remove to a climate congenial to their habits
and disposition.

From the earliest efforts at emigration certain Northern Indians have
strenuously objected to a removal south of the Missouri on account
of the climate; and where tribes have been induced to dispose of all
right to live east of the Mississippi within the United States, many
individuals, dreading their southern destination, have wandered to the
north and are now living in Canada, annually in the receipt of presents
from the British Government, and will be ready without doubt to side
with that power in any future conflict with this Government. In this
manner considerable numbers of the Delawares and Shawnees and other
Indians have disappeared from our settlements--a fact of great
importance, and which I apprehend has not been heretofore sufficiently
considered. There are many Potawatamies and Ottawas, as also Winnebagoes
and Menomonees, who may be easily induced to move into Canada by
seductive bribes, in the use of which the British Government has always
displayed a remarkable foresight.

Of the Chippewas and Ottawas now in the northern part of Michigan
it is believed there are over 5,000 under treaty obligations to remove
to the Southwest, the greater portion of whom openly declared their
determination to cross the line into Canada and put themselves under
the protection of the British Government in preference to a removal
to that country. These Indians may be accommodated by the arrangements
in contemplation, not only to their own satisfaction, but under
circumstances promising the greatest permanent advantages to the
United States, and separating them from all inducements and even the
possibility of entering the British service. I am not without hope,
also, that through this treaty some suitable and acceptable arrangement
may be made with the New York Indians by which they may be removed with
safety to themselves and benefit to the people of that State. The very
peculiar situation of these Indians is well known; that while they are
under treaty obligation to remove, the treaty being by the Constitution
the supreme law of the land and perfecting in this instance the title
of the land they occupy in a private land company, there is yet every
reason to sympathize with them and the highest moral inducements for
extending every possible relief to them within the legitimate powers of
the Government. I have been assured from sources entitled to my fullest
confidence that although these Indians have hitherto expressed the most
decided aversion to a removal south of the Missouri, there will probably
be no difficulty in persuading them to occupy a more northern region in
the West. I have every reason for believing that a benevolent interest
in their behalf among a portion of our own people, which, it is
supposed, has heretofore presented an obstacle to their emigration, will
be exerted to effect their removal if a portion of the Sioux country can
be appropriated to them.

It will be perceived, therefore, that a multitude of objects thus rest
upon the success of this one treaty, now submitted for examination and
approbation.

Of the Sioux Indians I will but remark that they occupy an immense
country spreading from the Mississippi north of the neutral ground west
and northwest, crossing the Missouri River more than 1,200 miles above
the city of St. Louis. They are divided into bands, which have various
names, the generic name for the whole being the Dahcota Nation. These
bands, though speaking a common language, are independent in their
occupancy of portions of country, and separate treaties may be made with
them. Treaties are already subsisting with some of the bands both on the
Mississippi and Missouri. The treaty now submitted is believed to be
advantageous, and from its provisions contemplates the reduction of
those wandering Indians from their nomadic habits to those of an
agricultural people.

If some of the provisions seem not such as might be desired, it will be
recollected that many interests have to be accommodated in framing an
Indian treaty which can only be fully known to the commissioner, who
derives his information directly from the Indians in the country which
is the object of the purchase.

It is proper to add that I had instructed the commissioner expressly not
to take into consideration what are called traders' claims, in the hope
of correcting a practice which, it is believed, has been attended with
mischievous consequences; but the commissioner has by a letter of
explanations fully satisfied me that in this instance it was absolutely
necessary to accommodate those claims as an indispensable means of
obtaining the assent of the Indians to the treaty. This results,
doubtless, from their dependence upon the traders for articles, in a
measure necessaries, which are for the most part furnished without
competition, and of the proper value of which the Indians are ignorant.

To compensate in some degree for the article in this treaty providing
for the payment of traders' claims, very judicious guards are introduced
into the treaty, calculated effectually to exclude that source of
interest adverse to the Government in all future time within the
purchase under this treaty.

There are other articles in the treaty which I have not been able fully
to realize as judicious or necessary, but for reasons already stated
they deserve respectful consideration.

Notwithstanding the article stipulating that a rejection of any of the
provisions of the treaty should render the whole null and void, I would
respectfully recommend such modified acceptance of the treaty as in the
wisdom of the Senate may seem just and proper, conditioned upon the
assent of the Indians subsequently to be obtained, the Senate making
provision for its reference back to the Indians if necessary.

It will be seen that the treaty provides for a power of regulation in
the Indian Territory by the United States Government under circumstances
not hitherto attempted, presenting an opportunity for an experiment well
worthy of mature consideration.

I ought not to dismiss this subject without adverting to one other
important consideration connected with the integrity of our Northwest
Indians and Territory. The Sioux treaty will effectually withdraw from
British influence all those who are a party to it by making them
stipendiaries of the United States and by operating a change in their
wandering habits and establishing them at known and fixed points under
the observation of Government agents, and as the British can only have
access to that region by the way of Fond du Lac, one or two small
military posts in a direction west and south from that point, it is
believed, will completely control all intercourse with the Indians in
that section of country.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

JNO. BELL.



WASHINGTON, _September 6, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I have the honor, in compliance with the resolution of the Senate of the
8th June, to communicate a letter[13] from the Secretary of the Treasury
and the correspondence accompanying it.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 13: Relating to the deposits of public moneys in banks by
disbursing officers and agents.]



WASHINGTON, _September 13, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

In compliance with a resolution of the Senate of the 14th July last,
I communicate to the Senate a report from the Secretary of State,
accompanied by copies of the correspondence[14] called for by said
resolution.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 14: Relating to the origin, progress, and conclusion of the
treaty of November 26, 1838, between Sardinia and the United States.]




VETO MESSAGES.


WASHINGTON, _August 16, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

The bill entitled "An act to incorporate the subscribers to the Fiscal
Bank of the United States," which originated in the Senate, has been
considered by me with a sincere desire to conform my action in regard
to it to that of the two Houses of Congress. By the Constitution it
is made my duty either to approve the bill by signing it or to return
it with my objections to the House in which it originated. I can not
conscientiously give it my approval, and I proceed to discharge the duty
required of me by the Constitution--to give my reasons for disapproving.

The power of Congress to create a national bank to operate _per se_
over the Union has been a question of dispute from the origin of the
Government. Men most justly and deservedly esteemed for their high
intellectual endowments, their virtue, and their patriotism have in
regard to it entertained different and conflicting opinions; Congresses
have differed; the approval of one President has been followed by the
disapproval of another; the people at different times have acquiesced in
decisions both for and against. The country has been and still is deeply
agitated by this unsettled question. It will suffice for me to say that
my own opinion has been uniformly proclaimed to be against the exercise
of any such power by this Government. On all suitable occasions during
a period of twenty-five years the opinion thus entertained has been
unreservedly expressed. I declared it in the legislature of my native
State; in the House of Representatives of the United States it has been
openly vindicated by me; in the Senate Chamber, in the presence and
hearing of many who are at this time members of that body, it has been
affirmed and reaffirmed in speeches and reports there made and by votes
there recorded; in popular assemblies I have unhesitatingly announced
it, and the last public declaration which I made--and that but a short
time before the late Presidential election--I referred to my previously
expressed opinions as being those then entertained by me. With a full
knowledge of the opinions thus entertained and never concealed, I was
elected by the people Vice-President of the United States. By the
occurrence of a contingency provided for in the Constitution and arising
under an impressive dispensation of Providence I succeeded to the
Presidential office. Before entering upon the duties of that office
I took an oath that I would "preserve, protect, and defend the
Constitution of the United States." Entertaining the opinions alluded
to and having taken this oath, the Senate and the country will see that
I could not give my sanction to a measure of the character described
without surrendering all claim to the respect of honorable men, all
confidence on the part of the people, all self-respect, all regard for
moral and religious obligations, without an observance of which no
government can be prosperous and no people can be happy. It would be to
commit a crime which I would not willfully commit to gain any earthly
reward, and which would justly subject me to the ridicule and scorn of
all virtuous men.

I deem it entirely unnecessary at this time to enter upon the reasons
which have brought my mind to the convictions I feel and entertain on
this subject. They have been over and over again repeated. If some of
those who have preceded me in this high office have entertained and
avowed different opinions, I yield all confidence that their convictions
were sincere. I claim only to have the same measure meted out to myself.
Without going further into the argument, I will say that in looking to
the powers of this Government to collect, safely keep, and disburse the
public revenue, and incidentally to regulate the commerce and exchanges,
I have not been able to satisfy myself that the establishment by this
Government of a bank of discount in the ordinary acceptation of that
term was a necessary means or one demanded by propriety to execute those
powers. What can the local discounts of the bank have to do with the
collecting, safe-keeping, and disbursing of the revenue? So far as the
mere discounting of paper is concerned, it is quite immaterial to this
question whether the discount is obtained at a State bank or a United
States bank. They are both equally local, both beginning and both ending
in a local accommodation. What influence have local discounts granted by
any form of bank in the regulating of the currency and the exchanges?
Let the history of the late United States Bank aid us in answering this
inquiry.

For several years after the establishment of that institution it dealt
almost exclusively in local discounts, and during that period the
country was for the most part disappointed in the consequences
anticipated from its incorporation. A uniform currency was not provided,
exchanges were not regulated, and little or nothing was added to the
general circulation, and in 1820 its embarrassments had become so great
that the directors petitioned Congress to repeal that article of the
charter which made its notes receivable everywhere in payment of the
public dues. It had up to that period dealt to but a very small extent
in exchanges, either foreign or domestic, and as late as 1823 its
operations in that line amounted to a little more than $7,000,000 per
annum. A very rapid augmentation soon after occurred, and in 1833 its
dealings in the exchanges amounted to upward of $100,000,000, including
the sales of its own drafts; and all these immense transactions were
effected without the employment of extraordinary means. The currency of
the country became sound, and the negotiations in the exchanges were
carried on at the lowest possible rates. The circulation was increased
to more than $22,000,000 and the notes of the bank were regarded as
equal to specie all over the country, thus showing almost conclusively
that it was the capacity to deal in exchanges, and not in local
discounts, which furnished these facilities and advantages. It may be
remarked, too, that notwithstanding the immense transactions of the bank
in the purchase of exchange, the losses sustained were merely nominal,
while in the line of discounts the suspended debt was enormous and
proved most disastrous to the bank and the country. Its power of local
discount has in fact proved to be a fruitful source of favoritism and
corruption, alike destructive to the public morals and to the general
weal.

The capital invested in banks of discount in the United States, created
by the States, at this time exceeds $350,000,000, and if the discounting
of local paper could have produced any beneficial effects the United
States ought to possess the soundest currency in the world; but the
reverse is lamentably the fact.

Is the measure now under consideration of the objectionable character
to which I have alluded? It is clearly so unless by the sixteenth
fundamental article of the eleventh section it is made otherwise. That
article is in the following words:

  The directors of the said corporation shall establish one competent
  office of discount and deposit in any State in which two thousand shares
  shall have been subscribed or may be held, whenever, upon application of
  the legislature of such State, Congress may by law require the same. And
  the said directors may also establish one or more competent offices of
  discount and deposit in any Territory or District of the United States,
  and in any State with the assent of such State, and when established the
  said office or offices shall be only withdrawn or removed by the said
  directors prior to the expiration of this charter with the previous
  assent of Congress: _Provided_, In respect to any State which shall not,
  at the first session of the legislature thereof held after the passage
  of this act, by resolution or other usual legislative proceeding,
  unconditionally assent or dissent to the establishment of such office
  or offices within it, such assent of the said State shall be thereafter
  presumed: _And provided, nevertheless_, That whenever it shall become
  necessary and proper for carrying into execution any of the powers
  granted by the Constitution to establish an office or offices in any of
  the States whatever, and the establishment thereof shall be directed by
  law, it shall be the duty of the said directors to establish such office
  or offices accordingly.

It will be seen that by this clause the directors are invested with the
fullest power to establish a branch in any State which has yielded its
assent; and having once established such branch, it shall not afterwards
be withdrawn except by order of Congress. Such assent is to be _implied_
and to have the force and sanction of an actually expressed assent,
"provided, in respect to any State which shall not, at _the first
session_ of the legislature thereof held after the passage of this act,
by _resolution_ or _other usual legislative proceeding, unconditionally_
assent or dissent to the establishment of such office or offices within
it, such assent of said State shall be thereafter presumed." The assent
or dissent is to be expressed _unconditionally at the first session of
the legislature, by some formal legislative act;_ and if not so
expressed its assent is to be _implied_, and the directors are thereupon
invested with power, at such time thereafter as they may please, to
establish branches, which can not afterwards be withdrawn except by
resolve of Congress. No matter what may be the cause which may operate
with the legislature, which either prevents it from speaking or
addresses itself to its wisdom, to induce delay, its assent is to be
implied. This iron rule is to give way to no circumstances; it is
unbending and inflexible. It is the language of the master to the
vassal; an unconditional answer is claimed forthwith, and delay,
postponement, or incapacity to answer produces an implied assent which
is ever after irrevocable. Many of the State elections have already
taken place without any knowledge on the part of the people that such a
question was to come up. The representatives may desire a submission of
the question to their constituents preparatory to final action upon it,
but this high privilege is denied; whatever may be the motives and views
entertained by the representatives of the people to induce delay, their
assent is to be presumed, and is ever afterwards binding unless their
dissent shall be unconditionally expressed at their first session after
the passage of this bill into a law. They may by formal resolution
declare the question of assent or dissent to be undecided and postponed,
and yet, in opposition to their express declaration to the contrary,
their assent is to be implied. Cases innumerable might be cited to
manifest the irrationality of such an inference. Let one or two in
addition suffice. The popular branch of the legislature may express its
dissent by an unanimous vote, and its resolution may be defeated by
a tie vote of the senate, and yet the assent is to be implied. Both
branches of the legislature may concur in a resolution of decided
dissent, and yet the governor may exert the _veto_ power conferred on
him by the State constitution, and their legislative action be defeated,
and yet the assent of the legislative authority is implied, and the
directors of this contemplated institution are authorized to establish a
branch or branches in such State whenever they may find it conducive to
the interest of the stockholders to do so; and having once established
it they can under no circumstances withdraw it except by act of
Congress. The State may afterwards protest against such unjust
inference, but its authority is gone. Its assent is implied by its
failure or inability to act at its first session, and its voice can
never afterwards be heard. To inferences so violent and, as they seem to
me, irrational I can not yield my consent. No court of justice would
or could sanction them without reversing all that is established in
judicial proceeding by introducing presumptions at variance with fact
and inferences at the expense of reason. A State in a condition of
duress would be _presumed_ to speak as an individual manacled and in
prison might be presumed to be in the enjoyment of freedom. Far better
to say to the States boldly and frankly, Congress wills and submission
is demanded.

It may be said that the directors may not establish branches under such
circumstances; but this is a question of power, and this bill invests
them with full authority to do so. If the legislature of New York or
Pennsylvania or any other State should be found to be in such condition
as I have supposed, could there be any security furnished against such a
step on the part of the directors? Nay, is it not fairly to be presumed
that this proviso was introduced for the sole purpose of meeting the
contingency referred to? Why else should it have been introduced? And
I submit to the Senate whether it can be believed that any State would
be likely to sit quietly down under such a state of things. In a great
measure of public interest their patriotism may be successfully appealed
to, but to infer their assent from circumstances at war with such
inference I can not but regard as calculated to excite a feeling at
fatal enmity with the peace and harmony of the country. I must therefore
regard this clause as asserting the power to be in Congress to establish
offices of discount in a State not only without its assent, but against
its dissent, and so regarding it I can not sanction it. On general
principles the right in Congress to prescribe terms to any State implies
a superiority of power and control, deprives the transaction of all
pretense to compact between them, and terminates, as we have seen, in
the total abrogation of freedom of action on the part of the States.
But, further, the State may express, after the most solemn form of
legislation, its dissent, which may from time to time thereafter be
repeated in full view of its own interest, which can never be separated
from the wise and beneficent operation of this Government, and yet
Congress may by virtue of the last proviso overrule its law, and upon
grounds which to such State will appear to rest on a constructive
necessity and propriety and nothing more. I regard the bill as asserting
for Congress the right to incorporate a United States bank with power
and right to establish offices of discount and deposit in the several
States of this Union with or without their consent--a principle to which
I have always heretofore been opposed and which can never obtain my
sanction; and waiving all other considerations growing out of its other
provisions, I return it to the House in which it originated with these
my objections to its approval.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _September 9, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

It is with extreme regret that I feel myself constrained by the duty
faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States
and to the best of my ability to "preserve, protect, and defend the
Constitution of the United States" to return to the House in which it
originated the bill "to provide for the better collection, safe-keeping,
and disbursement of the public revenue by means of a corporation to be
styled the Fiscal Corporation of the United States," with my written
objections.

In my message sent to the Senate on the 16th day of August last,
returning the bill "to incorporate the subscribers to the Fiscal Bank
of the United States," I distinctly declared that my own opinion had
been uniformly proclaimed to be against the exercise "of the power of
Congress to create a national bank to operate _per se_ over the Union,"
and, entertaining that opinion, my main objection to that bill was based
upon the highest moral and religious obligations of conscience and the
Constitution. I readily admit that whilst the qualified _veto_ with
which the Chief Magistrate is invested should be regarded and was
intended by the wise men who made it a part of the Constitution as a
great conservative principle of our system, without the exercise of
which on important occasions a mere representative majority might urge
the Government in its legislation beyond the limits fixed by its framers
or might exert its just powers too hastily or oppressively, yet it is
a power which ought to be most cautiously exerted, and perhaps never
except in a case eminently involving the public interest or one in which
the oath of the President, acting under his convictions, both mental
and moral, imperiously requires its exercise. In such a case he has no
alternative. He must either exert the negative power intrusted to him
by the Constitution chiefly for its own preservation, protection, and
defense or commit an act of gross moral turpitude. Mere regard to the
will of a majority must not in a constitutional republic like ours
control this sacred and solemn duty of a sworn officer. The Constitution
itself I regard and cherish as the embodied and written will of the
whole people of the United States. It is their fixed and fundamental
law, which they unanimously prescribe to the public functionaries, their
mere trustees and servants. This _their_ will and the law which _they_
have given us as the rule of our action have no guard, no guaranty of
preservation, protection, and defense, but the oaths which it prescribes
to the public officers, the sanctity with which they shall religiously
observe those oaths, and the patriotism with which the people shall
shield it by their own sovereign will, which has made the Constitution
supreme. It must be exerted against the will of a mere representative
majority or not at all. It is alone in pursuance of that will that any
measure can reach the President, and to say that because a majority
in Congress have passed a bill he should therefore sanction it is
to abrogate the power altogether and to render its insertion in the
Constitution a work of absolute supererogation. The duty is to guard the
fundamental will of the people themselves from (in this case; I admit,
unintentional) change or infraction by a majority in Congress; and in
that light alone do I regard the constitutional duty which I now most
reluctantly discharge. Is this bill now presented for my approval or
disapproval such a bill as I have already declared could not receive my
sanction? Is it such a bill as calls for the exercise of the negative
power under the Constitution? Does it violate the Constitution by
creating a national bank to operate _per se_ over the Union? Its title,
in the first place, describes its general character. It is "an act to
provide for the better collection, safe-keeping, and disbursement of the
_public_ revenue by means of a _corporation_ to be styled the _Fiscal
Corporation_ of the _United States_." In style, then, it is plainly
national in its character. Its powers, functions, and duties are those
which pertain to the _collecting, keeping_, and _disbursing_ the
_public_ revenue. The means by which these are to be exerted is a
_corporation_ to be styled the _Fiscal_ Corporation of the United
States. It is a corporation created by the Congress of the United
States, in its character of a national legislature for the whole
Union, to perform the _fiscal_ purposes, meet the _fiscal_ wants and
exigencies, supply the _fiscal_ uses, and exert the _fiscal_ agencies
of the Treasury of the United States. Such is its own description of
itself. Do its provisions contradict its title? They do not. It is true
that by its first section it provides that it shall be established in
the District of Columbia; but the amount of its capital, the manner
in which its stock is to be subscribed for and held, the persons and
bodies, corporate and politic, by whom its stock may be held, the
appointment of its directors and their powers and duties, its
fundamental articles, especially that to establish agencies in any part
of the Union, the corporate powers and business of such agencies, the
prohibition of Congress to establish any other corporation with similar
powers for twenty years, with express reservation in the same clause
to modify or create any bank for the District of Columbia, so that the
aggregate capital shall not exceed five millions, without enumerating
other features which are equally distinctive and characteristic, clearly
show that it can not be regarded as other than a bank of the United
States, with powers seemingly more limited than have heretofore been
granted to such an institution. It operates _per se_ over the Union by
virtue of the unaided and, in my view, assumed authority of Congress
as a national legislature, as distinguishable from a bank created by
Congress for the District of Columbia as the local legislature of the
District. Every United States bank heretofore created has had power to
deal in bills of exchange as well as local discounts. Both were trading
privileges conferred, and both were exercised by virtue of the aforesaid
power of Congress over the whole Union. The question of power remains
unchanged without reference to the extent of privilege granted. If this
proposed corporation is to be regarded as a local bank of the District
of Columbia, invested by Congress with general powers to operate over
the Union, it is obnoxious to still stronger objections. It assumes that
Congress may invest a local institution with general or national powers.
With the same propriety that it may do this in regard to a bank of the
District of Columbia it may as to a State bank. Yet who can indulge the
idea that this Government can rightfully, by making a State bank its
fiscal agent, invest it with the absolute and unqualified powers
conferred by this bill? When I come to look at the details of the bill,
they do not recommend it strongly to my adoption. A brief notice of some
of its provisions will suffice.

First. It may justify substantially a system of discounts of the most
objectionable character. It is to deal in bills of exchange drawn in one
State and payable in another without any restraint. The bill of exchange
may have an unlimited time to run, and its renewability is nowhere
guarded against. It may, in fact, assume the most objectionable form of
accommodation paper. It is not required to rest on any actual, real, or
substantial exchange basis. A drawer in one place becomes the accepter
in another, and so in turn the accepter may become the drawer upon a
mutual understanding. It may at the same time indulge in mere local
discounts under the name of bills of exchange. A bill drawn at
Philadelphia on Camden, N.J., at New York on a border town in New
Jersey, at Cincinnati on Newport, in Kentucky, not to multiply other
examples, might, for anything in this bill to restrain it, become a mere
matter of local accommodation. Cities thus relatively situated would
possess advantages over cities otherwise situated of so decided a
character as most justly to excite dissatisfaction.

Second. There is no limit prescribed to the premium in the purchase
of bills of exchange, thereby correcting none of the evils under which
the community now labors, and operating most injuriously upon the
agricultural States, in which the irregularities in the rates of
exchange are most severely felt. Nor are these the only consequences.
A resumption of specie payments by the banks of those States would be
liable to indefinite postponement; for as the operation of the agencies
of the interior would chiefly consist in selling bills of exchange, and
the purchases could only be made in specie or the notes of banks paying
specie, the State banks would either have to continue with their doors
closed or exist at the mercy of this national monopoly of brokerage.
Nor can it be passed over without remark that whilst the District of
Columbia is made the seat of the principal bank, its citizens are
excluded from all participation in any benefit it might afford by
a positive prohibition on the bank from all discounting within the
District.

These are some of the objections which prominently exist against the
details of the bill. Others might be urged of much force, but it would
be unprofitable to dwell upon them. Suffice it to add that this charter
is designed to continue for twenty years without a competitor; that the
defects to which I have alluded, being founded on the fundamental law of
the corporation, are irrevocable, and that if the objections be well
founded it would be overhazardous to pass the bill into a law.

In conclusion I take leave most respectfully to say that I have felt the
most anxious solicitude to meet the wishes of Congress in the adoption
of a fiscal agent which, avoiding all constitutional objections, should
harmonize conflicting opinions. Actuated by this feeling, I have been
ready to yield much in a spirit of conciliation to the opinions of
others; and it is with great pain that I now feel compelled to differ
from Congress a second time in the same session. At the commencement of
this session, inclined from choice to defer to the legislative will, I
submitted to Congress the propriety of adopting a fiscal agent which,
without violating the Constitution, would separate the public money from
the Executive control and perform the operations of the Treasury without
being burdensome to the people or inconvenient or expensive to the
Government. It is deeply to be regretted that this department of the
Government can not upon constitutional and other grounds concur with the
legislative department in this last measure proposed to attain these
desirable objects. Owing to the brief space between the period of the
death of my lamented predecessor and my own installation into office,
I was, in fact, not left time to prepare and submit a definitive
recommendation of my own in my regular message, and since my mind has
been wholly occupied in a most anxious attempt to conform my action
to the legislative will. In this communication I am confined by the
Constitution to my objections simply to this bill, but the period of the
regular session will soon arrive, when it will be my duty, under another
clause of the Constitution, "to give to Congress information of the
state of the Union and recommend to their consideration such measures
as" I "shall judge necessary and expedient." And I most respectfully
submit, in a spirit of harmony, whether the present differences of
opinion should be pressed further at this time, and whether the
peculiarity of my situation does not entitle me to a postponement of
this subject to a more auspicious period for deliberation. The two
Houses of Congress have distinguished themselves at this extraordinary
session by the performance of an immense mass of labor at a season very
unfavorable both to health and action, and have passed many laws which
I trust will prove highly beneficial to the interests of the country
and fully answer its just expectations. It has been my good fortune
and pleasure to concur with them in all measures except this. And why
should our difference on this alone be pushed to extremes? It is my
anxious desire that it should not be. I too have been burdened with
extraordinary labors of late, and I sincerely desire time for deep
and deliberate reflection on this the greatest difficulty of my
Administration. May we not now pause until a more favorable time, when,
with the most anxious hope that the Executive and Congress may cordially
unite, some measure of finance may be deliberately adopted promotive of
the good of our common country?

I will take this occasion to declare that the conclusions to which
I have brought myself are those of a settled conviction, founded, in
my opinion, on a just view of the Constitution; that in arriving at it
I have been actuated by no other motive or desire than to uphold the
institutions of the country as they have come down to us from the hands
of our godlike ancestors, and that I shall esteem my efforts to sustain
them, even though I perish, more honorable than to win the applause of
men by a sacrifice of my duty and my conscience.

JOHN TYLER.




PROCLAMATION.


[From Statutes at Large (Little, Brown & Co.), Vol. XI, p. 786.]


BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas it has come to the knowledge of the Government of the United
States that sundry secret lodges, clubs, or associations exist on the
northern frontier; that the members of these lodges are bound together
by secret oaths; that they have collected firearms and other military
materials and secreted them in sundry places; and that it is their
purpose to violate the laws of their country by making military and
lawless incursions, when opportunity shall offer, into the territories
of a power with which the United States are at peace; and

Whereas it is known that traveling agitators, from both sides of the
line, visit these lodges and harangue the members in secret meeting,
stimulating them to illegal acts; and

Whereas the same persons are known to levy contributions on the ignorant
and credulous for their own benefit, thus supporting and enriching
themselves by the basest means; and

Whereas the unlawful intentions of the members of these lodges have
already been manifested in an attempt to destroy the lives and property
of the inhabitants of Chippewa, in Canada, and the public property of
the British Government there being:

Now, therefore, I, John Tyler, President of the United States, do issue
this my proclamation, admonishing all such evil-minded persons of the
condign punishment which is certain to overtake them; assuring them that
the laws of the United States will be rigorously executed against their
illegal acts, and that if in any lawless incursion into Canada they fall
into the hands of the British authorities they will not be reclaimed as
American citizens nor any interference made by this Government in their
behalf. And I exhort all well-meaning but deluded persons who may have
joined these lodges immediately to abandon them and to have nothing more
to do with their secret meetings or unlawful oaths, as they would avoid
serious consequences to themselves. And I expect the intelligent and
well-disposed members of the community to frown on all these unlawful
combinations and illegal proceedings, and to assist the Government in
maintaining the peace of the country against the mischievous
consequences of the acts of these violators of the law.

Given under my hand, at the city of Washington, the 25th day of
September, A.D. 1841, and of the Independence of the United States the
sixty-sixth.

[SEAL.]

JOHN TYLER.

By the President:
  DANIEL WEBSTER,
    _Secretary of State_.




EXECUTIVE ORDER.


GENERAL ORDERS.


WAR DEPARTMENT,

ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

_Washington, July 5, 1841_.

Brevet Major-General Winfield Scott having been appointed by the
President, by and with the consent and advice of the Senate, the
Major-general of the Army of the United States, he is directed to assume
the command and enter upon his duties accordingly.

By command of the President of the United States:

R. JONES,
  _Adjutant-General_.




FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE.


WASHINGTON, _December 7, 1841_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_:

In coming together, fellow-citizens, to enter again upon the discharge
of the duties with which the people have charged us severally, we find
great occasion to rejoice in the general prosperity of the country.
We are in the enjoyment of all the blessings of civil and religious
liberty, with unexampled means of education, knowledge, and improvement.
Through the year which is now drawing to a close peace has been in our
borders and plenty in our habitations, and although disease has visited
some few portions of the land with distress and mortality, yet in
general the health of the people has been preserved, and we are all
called upon by the highest obligations of duty to renew our thanks and
our devotion to our Heavenly Parent, who has continued to vouchsafe to
us the eminent blessings which surround us and who has so signally
crowned the year with His goodness. If we find ourselves increasing
beyond example in numbers, in strength, in wealth, in knowledge, in
everything which promotes human and social happiness, let us ever
remember our dependence for all these on the protection and merciful
dispensations of Divine Providence.

Since your last adjournment Alexander McLeod, a British subject who was
indicted for the murder of an American citizen, and whose case has been
the subject of a correspondence heretofore communicated to you, has been
acquitted by the verdict of an impartial and intelligent jury, and has
under the judgment of the court been regularly discharged.

Great Britain having made known to this Government that the expedition
which was fitted out from Canada for the destruction of the steamboat
_Caroline_ in the winter of 1837, and which resulted in the destruction
of said boat and in the death of an American citizen, was undertaken
by orders emanating from the authorities of the British Government in
Canada, and demanding the discharge of McLeod upon the ground that
if engaged in that expedition he did but fulfill the orders of his
Government, has thus been answered in the only way in which she could be
answered by a government the powers of which are distributed among its
several departments by the fundamental law. Happily for the people of
Great Britain, as well as those of the United States, the only mode by
which an individual arraigned for a criminal offense before the courts
of either can obtain his discharge is by the independent action of the
judiciary and by proceedings equally familiar to the courts of both
countries.

If in Great Britain a power exists in the Crown to cause to be entered a
_nolle prosequi_, which is not the case with the Executive power of the
United States upon a prosecution pending in a State court, yet _there_
no more than _here_ can the chief executive power rescue a prisoner from
custody without an order of the proper tribunal directing his discharge.
The precise stage of the proceedings at which such order may be made is
a matter of municipal regulation exclusively, and not to be complained
of by any other government. In cases of this kind a government becomes
politically responsible only when its tribunals of last resort are shown
to have rendered unjust and injurious judgments in matters not doubtful.
To the establishment and elucidation of this principle no nation has
lent its authority more efficiently than Great Britain. Alexander
McLeod, having his option either to prosecute a writ of error from the
decision of the supreme court of New York, which had been rendered upon
his application for a discharge, to the Supreme Court of the United
States, or to submit his case to the decision of a jury, preferred the
latter, deeming it the readiest mode of obtaining his liberation; and
the result has fully sustained the wisdom of his choice. The manner in
which the issue submitted was tried will satisfy the English Government
that the principles of justice will never fail to govern the enlightened
decision of an American tribunal. I can not fail, however, to suggest to
Congress the propriety, and in some degree the necessity, of making such
provisions by law, so far as they may constitutionally do so, for the
removal at their commencement and at the option of the party of all
such cases as may hereafter arise, and which may involve the faithful
observance and execution of our international obligations, from the
State to the Federal judiciary. This Government, by our institutions, is
charged with the maintenance of peace and the preservation of amicable
relations with the nations of the earth, and ought to possess without
question all the reasonable and proper means of maintaining the one and
preserving the other. While just confidence is felt in the judiciary of
the States, yet this Government ought to be competent in itself for the
fulfillment of the high duties which have been devolved upon it under
the organic law by the States themselves.

In the month of September a party of armed men from Upper Canada invaded
the territory of the United States and forcibly seized upon the person
of one Grogan, and under circumstances of great harshness hurriedly
carried him beyond the limits of the United States and delivered him up
to the authorities of Upper Canada. His immediate discharge was ordered
by those authorities upon the facts of the case being brought to their
knowledge--a course of procedure which was to have been expected from
a nation with whom we are at peace, and which was not more due to the
rights of the United States than to its own regard for justice. The
correspondence which passed between the Department of State and the
British envoy, Mr. Fox, and with the governor of Vermont, as soon as the
facts had been made known to this department, are herewith communicated.

I regret that it is not in my power to make known to you an equally
satisfactory conclusion in the case of the _Caroline_ steamer, with the
circumstances connected with the destruction of which, in December,
1837, by an armed force fitted out in the Province of Upper Canada, you
are already made acquainted. No such atonement as was due for the public
wrong done to the United States by this invasion of her territory, so
wholly irreconcilable with her rights as an independent power, has yet
been made. In the view taken by this Government the inquiry whether
the vessel was in the employment of those who were prosecuting an
unauthorized war against that Province or was engaged by the owner in
the business of transporting passengers to and from Navy Island in hopes
of private gain, which was most probably the case, in no degree alters
the real question at issue between the two Governments. This Government
can never concede to any foreign government the power, except in a case
of the most urgent and extreme necessity, of invading its territory,
either to arrest the persons or destroy the property of those who may
have violated the municipal laws of such foreign government or have
disregarded their obligations arising under the law of nations. The
territory of the United States must be regarded as sacredly secure
against all such invasions until they shall voluntarily acknowledge
their inability to acquit themselves of their duties to others. And in
announcing this sentiment I do but affirm a principle which no nation on
earth would be more ready to vindicate at all hazards than the people
and Government of Great Britain. If upon a full investigation of all the
facts it shall appear that the owner of the _Caroline_ was governed by
a hostile intent or had made common cause with those who were in the
occupancy of Navy Island, then so far as he is concerned there can be no
claim to indemnity for the destruction of his boat which this Government
would feel itself bound to prosecute, since he would have acted not only
in derogation of the rights of Great Britain, but in clear violation of
the laws of the United States; but that is a question which, however
settled, in no manner involves the higher consideration of the violation
of territorial sovereignty and jurisdiction. To recognize it as an
admissible practice that each Government in its turn, upon any sudden
and unauthorized outbreak which, on a frontier the extent of which
renders it impossible for either to have an efficient force on every
mile of it, and which outbreak, therefore, neither may be able to
suppress in a day, may take vengeance into its own hands, and without
even a remonstrance, and in the absence of any pressing or overruling
necessity may invade the territory of the other, would inevitably lead
to results equally to be deplored by both. When border collisions come
to receive the sanction or to be made on the authority of either
Government general war must be the inevitable result. While it is the
ardent desire of the United States to cultivate the relations of peace
with all nations and to fulfill all the duties of good neighborhood
toward those who possess territories adjoining their own, that very
desire would lead them to deny the right of any foreign power to invade
their boundary with an armed force. The correspondence between the two
Governments on this subject will at a future day of your session be
submitted to your consideration; and in the meantime I can not but
indulge the hope that the British Government will see the propriety of
renouncing as a rule of future action the precedent which has been set
in the affair at Schlosser.

I herewith submit the correspondence which has recently taken place
between the American minister at the Court of St. James, Mr. Stevenson,
and the minister of foreign affairs of that Government on the right
claimed by that Government to visit and detain vessels sailing under
the American flag and engaged in prosecuting lawful commerce in the
African seas. Our commercial interests in that region have experienced
considerable increase and have become an object of much importance, and
it is the duty of this Government to protect them against all improper
and vexatious interruption. However desirous the United States may
be for the suppression of the slave trade, they can not consent to
interpolations into the maritime code at the mere will and pleasure of
other governments. We deny the right of any such interpolation to any
one or all the nations of the earth without our consent. We claim to
have a voice in all amendments or alterations of that code, and when we
are given to understand, as in this instance, by a foreign government
that its treaties with other nations can not be executed without the
establishment and enforcement of new principles of maritime police, to
be applied without our consent, we must employ a language neither of
equivocal import or susceptible of misconstruction. American citizens
prosecuting a lawful commerce in the African seas under the flag of
their country are not responsible for the abuse or unlawful use of that
flag by others; nor can they rightfully on account of any such alleged
abuses be interrupted, molested, or detained while on the ocean, and if
thus molested and detained while pursuing honest voyages in the usual
way and violating no law themselves they are unquestionably entitled to
indemnity. This Government has manifested its repugnance to the slave
trade in a manner which can not be misunderstood. By its fundamental law
it prescribed limits in point of time to its continuance, and against
its own citizens who might so far forget the rights of humanity as to
engage in that wicked traffic it has long since by its municipal laws
denounced the most condign punishment. Many of the States composing this
Union had made appeals to the civilized world for its suppression long
before the moral sense of other nations had become shocked by the
iniquities of the traffic. Whether this Government should now enter into
treaties containing mutual stipulations upon this subject is a question
for its mature deliberation. Certain it is that if the right to detain
American ships on the high seas can be justified on the plea of a
necessity for such detention arising out of the existence of treaties
between other nations, the same plea may be extended and enlarged by the
new stipulations of new treaties to which the United States may not be a
party. This Government will not cease to urge upon that of Great Britain
full and ample remuneration for all losses, whether arising from
detention or otherwise, to which American citizens have heretofore been
or may hereafter be subjected by the exercise of rights which this
Government can not recognize as legitimate and proper. Nor will I
indulge a doubt but that the sense of justice of Great Britain will
constrain her to make retribution for any wrong or loss which any
American citizen engaged in the prosecution of lawful commerce may have
experienced at the hands of her cruisers or other public authorities.
This Government, at the same time, will relax no effort to prevent its
citizens, if there be any so disposed, from prosecuting a traffic so
revolting to the feelings of humanity. It seeks to do no more than to
protect the fair and honest trader from molestation and injury; but
while the enterprising mariner engaged in the pursuit of an honorable
trade is entitled to its protection, it will visit with condign
punishment others of an opposite character.

I invite your attention to existing laws for the suppression of the
African slave trade, and recommend all such alterations as may give
to them greater force and efficacy. That the American flag is grossly
abused by the abandoned and profligate of other nations is but too
probable. Congress has not long since had this subject under its
consideration, and its importance well justifies renewed and anxious
attention.

I also communicate herewith the copy of a correspondence between Mr.
Stevenson and Lord Palmerston upon the subject, so interesting to
several of the Southern States, of the rice duties, which resulted
honorably to the justice of Great Britain and advantageously to the
United States.

At the opening of the last annual session the President informed
Congress of the progress which had then been made in negotiating a
convention between this Government and that of England with a view
to the final settlement of the question of the boundary between the
territorial limits of the two countries. I regret to say that little
further advancement of the object has been accomplished since last year,
but this is owing to circumstances no way indicative of any abatement of
the desire of both parties to hasten the negotiation to its conclusion
and to settle the question in dispute as early as possible. In the
course of the session it is my hope to be able to announce some further
degree of progress toward the accomplishment of this highly desirable
end.

The commission appointed by this Government for the exploration and
survey of the line of boundary separating the States of Maine and New
Hampshire from the conterminous British Provinces is, it is believed,
about to close its field labors and is expected soon to report the
results of its examinations to the Department of State. The report,
when received, will be laid before Congress.

The failure on the part of Spain to pay with punctuality the interest
due under the convention of 1834 for the settlement of claims between
the two countries has made it the duty of the Executive to call the
particular attention of that Government to the subject. A disposition
has been manifested by it, which is believed to be entirely sincere,
to fulfill its obligations in this respect so soon as its internal
condition and the state of its finances will permit. An arrangement is
in progress from the result of which it is trusted that those of our
citizens who have claims under the convention will at no distant day
receive the stipulated payments.

A treaty of commerce and navigation with Belgium was concluded and
signed at Washington on the 29th of March, 1840, and was duly sanctioned
by the Senate of the United States. The treaty was ratified by His
Belgian Majesty, but did not receive the approbation of the Belgian
Chambers within the time limited by its terms, and has therefore become
void.

This occurrence assumes the graver aspect from the consideration that in
1833 a treaty negotiated between the two Governments and ratified on the
part of the United States failed to be ratified on the part of Belgium.
The representative of that Government at Washington informs the
Department of State that he has been instructed to give explanations of
the causes which occasioned delay in the approval of the late treaty by
the legislature, and to express the regret of the King at the
occurrence.

The joint commission under the convention with Texas to ascertain the
true boundary between the two countries has concluded its labors, but
the final report of the commissioner of the United States has not been
received. It is understood, however, that the meridian line as traced
by the commission lies somewhat farther east than the position hitherto
generally assigned to it, and consequently includes in Texas some part
of the territory which had been considered as belonging to the States
of Louisiana and Arkansas.

The United States can not but take a deep interest in whatever relates
to this young but growing Republic. Settled principally by emigrants
from the United States, we have the happiness to know that the great
principles of civil liberty are there destined to flourish under wise
institutions and wholesome laws, and that through its example another
evidence is to be afforded of the capacity of popular institutions to
advance the prosperity, happiness, and permanent glory of the human
race. The great truth that government was made for the people and not
the people for government has already been established in the practice
and by the example of these United States, and we can do no other than
contemplate its further exemplification by a sister republic with the
deepest interest.

Our relations with the independent States of this hemisphere, formerly
under the dominion of Spain, have not undergone any material change
within the past year. The incessant sanguinary conflicts in or between
those countries are to be greatly deplored as necessarily tending to
disable them from performing their duty as members of the community
of nations and rising to the destiny which the position and natural
resources of many of them might lead them justly to anticipate, as
constantly giving occasion also, directly or indirectly, for complaints
on the part of our citizens who resort thither for purposes of
commercial intercourse, and as retarding reparation for wrongs already
committed, some of which are by no means of recent date.

The failure of the Congress of Ecuador to hold a session at the time
appointed for that purpose, in January last, will probably render
abortive a treaty of commerce with that Republic, which was signed at
Quito on the 13th of June, 1839, and had been duly ratified on our
part, but which required the approbation of that body prior to its
ratification by the Ecuadorian Executive.

A convention which has been concluded with the Republic of Peru,
providing for the settlement of certain claims of citizens of the United
States upon the Government of that Republic, will be duly submitted to
the Senate.

The claims of our citizens against the Brazilian Government originating
from captures and other causes are still unsatisfied. The United States
have, however, so uniformly shown a disposition to cultivate relations
of amity with that Empire that it is hoped the unequivocal tokens of the
same spirit toward us which an adjustment of the affairs referred to
would afford will be given without further avoidable delay.

The war with the Indian tribes on the peninsula of Florida has during
the last summer and fall been prosecuted with untiring activity and
zeal. A summer campaign was resolved upon as the best mode of bringing
it to a close. Our brave officers and men who have been engaged in that
service have suffered toils and privations and exhibited an energy which
in any other war would have won for them unfading laurels. In despite
of the sickness incident to the climate, they have penetrated the
fastnesses of the Indians, broken up their encampments, and harassed
them unceasingly. Numbers have been captured, and still greater numbers
have surrendered and have been transported to join their brethren on the
lands elsewhere allotted to them by the Government, and a strong hope is
entertained that under the conduct of the gallant officer at the head of
the troops in Florida that troublesome and expensive war is destined to
a speedy termination. With all the other Indian tribes we are enjoying
the blessings of peace. Our duty as well as our best interests prompts
us to observe in all our intercourse with them fidelity in fulfilling
our engagements, the practice of strict justice, as well as the constant
exercise of acts of benevolence and kindness. These are the great
instruments of civilization, and through the use of them alone can the
untutored child of the forest be induced to listen to its teachings.

The Secretary of State, on whom the acts of Congress have devolved the
duty of directing the proceedings for the taking of the sixth census or
enumeration of the inhabitants of the United States, will report to the
two Houses the progress of that work. The enumeration of persons has
been completed, and exhibits a grand total of 17,069,453, making an
increase over the census of 1830 of 4,202,646 inhabitants, and showing
a gain in a ratio exceeding 32-1/2 per cent for the last ten years.

From the report of the Secretary of the Treasury you will be informed of
the condition of the finances. The balance in the Treasury on the 1st of
January last, as stated in the report of the Secretary of the Treasury
submitted to Congress at the extra session, was $987,345.03. The
receipts into the Treasury during the first three quarters of this year
from all sources amount to $23,467,072.52; the estimated receipts for
the fourth quarter amount to $6,943,095.25, amounting to $30,410,167.77,
and making with the balance in the Treasury on the 1st of January last
$31,397,512.80. The expenditures for the first three quarters of this
year amount to $24,734,346.97. The expenditures for the fourth quarter
as estimated will amount to $7,290,723.73, thus making a total of
$32,025,070.70, and leaving a deficit to be provided for on the 1st of
January next of about $627,557.90.

Of the loan of $12,000,000 which was authorized by Congress at its late
session only $5,432,726.88 have been negotiated. The shortness of time
which it had to run has presented no inconsiderable impediment in the
way of its being taken by capitalists at home, while the same cause
would have operated with much greater force in the foreign market. For
that reason the foreign market has not been resorted to; and it is now
submitted whether it would not be advisable to amend the law by making
what remains undisposed of payable at a more distant day.

Should it be necessary, in any view that Congress may take of the
subject, to revise the existing tariff of duties, I beg leave to say
that in the performance of that most delicate operation moderate
counsels would seem to be the wisest. The Government under which it is
our happiness to live owes its existence to the spirit of compromise
which prevailed among its framers; jarring and discordant opinions could
only have been reconciled by that noble spirit of patriotism which
prompted conciliation and resulted in harmony. In the same spirit the
compromise bill, as it is commonly called, was adopted at the session of
1833. While the people of no portion of the Union will ever hesitate to
pay all necessary taxes for the support of Government, yet an innate
repugnance exists to the imposition of burthens not really necessary for
that object. In imposing duties, however, for the purposes of revenue
a right to discriminate as to the articles on which the duty shall be
laid, as well as the amount, necessarily and most properly exists;
otherwise the Government would be placed in the condition of having to
levy the same duties upon all articles, the productive as well as the
unproductive. The slightest duty upon some might have the effect of
causing their importation to cease, whereas others, entering extensively
into the consumption of the country, might bear the heaviest without any
sensible diminution in the amount imported. So also the Government may
be justified in so discriminating by reference to other considerations
of domestic policy connected with our manufactures. So long as the
duties shall be laid with distinct reference to the wants of the
Treasury no well-founded objection can exist against them. It might
be esteemed desirable that no such augmentation of the taxes should
take place as would have the effect of annulling the land-proceeds
distribution act of the last session, which act is declared to be
inoperative the moment the duties are increased beyond 20 per cent, the
maximum rate established by the compromise act. Some of the provisions
of the compromise act, which will go into effect on the 30th day of June
next, may, however, be found exceedingly inconvenient in practice under
any regulations that Congress may adopt. I refer more particularly to
that relating to the home valuation. A difference in value of the same
articles to some extent will necessarily exist at different ports, but
that is altogether insignificant when compared with the conflicts in
valuation which are likely to arise from the differences of opinion
among the numerous appraisers of merchandise. In many instances the
estimates of value must be conjectural, and thus as many different rates
of value may be established as there are appraisers. These differences
in valuation may also be increased by the inclination which, without
the slightest imputation on their honesty, may arise on the part of the
appraisers in favor of their respective ports of entry. I recommend this
whole subject to the consideration of Congress with a single additional
remark. Certainty and permanency in any system of governmental policy
are in all respects eminently desirable, but more particularly is this
true in all that affects trade and commerce, the operations of which
depend much more on the certainty of their returns and calculations
which embrace distant periods of time than on high bounties or duties,
which are liable to constant fluctuations.

At your late session I invited your attention to the condition of
the currency and exchanges and urged the necessity of adopting such
measures as were consistent with the constitutional competency of the
Government in order to correct the unsoundness of the one and, as far as
practicable, the inequalities of the other. No country can be in the
enjoyment of its full measure of prosperity without the presence of
a medium of exchange approximating to uniformity of value. What is
necessary as between the different nations of the earth is also
important as between the inhabitants of different parts of the same
country. With the first the precious metals constitute the chief medium
of circulation, and such also would be the case as to the last but for
inventions comparatively modern, which have furnished in place of gold
and silver a paper circulation. I do not propose to enter into a
comparative analysis of the merits of the two systems. Such belonged
more properly to the period of the introduction of the paper system. The
speculative philosopher might find inducements to prosecute the inquiry,
but his researches could only lead him to conclude that the paper system
had probably better never have been introduced and that society might
have been much happier without it. The practical statesman has a very
different task to perform. He has to look at things as they are, to take
them as he finds them, to supply deficiencies and to prune excesses as
far as in him lies. The task of furnishing a corrective for derangements
of the paper medium with us is almost inexpressibly great. The power
exerted by the States to charter banking corporations, and which, having
been carried to a great excess, has filled the country with, in most of
the States, an irredeemable paper medium, is an evil which in some way
or other requires a corrective. The rates at which bills of exchange
are negotiated between different parts of the country furnish an index
of the value of the local substitute for gold and silver, which is in
many parts so far depreciated as not to be received except at a large
discount in payment of debts or in the purchase of produce. It could
earnestly be desired that every bank not possessing the means of
resumption should follow the example of the late United States Bank of
Pennsylvania and go into liquidation rather than by refusing to do so
to continue embarrassments in the way of solvent institutions, thereby
augmenting the difficulties incident to the present condition of things.
Whether this Government, with due regard to the rights of the States,
has any power to constrain the banks either to resume specie payments
or to force them into liquidation, is an inquiry which will not fail
to claim your consideration. In view of the great advantages which are
allowed the corporators, not among the least of which is the authority
contained in most of their charters to make loans to three times the
amount of their capital, thereby often deriving three times as much
interest on the same amount of money as any individual is permitted by
law to receive, no sufficient apology can be urged for a long-continued
suspension of specie payments. Such suspension is productive of the
greatest detriment to the public by expelling from circulation the
precious metals and seriously hazarding the success of any effort that
this Government can make to increase commercial facilities and to
advance the public interests.

This is the more to be regretted and the indispensable necessity for
a sound currency becomes the more manifest when we reflect on the vast
amount of the internal commerce of the country. Of this we have no
statistics nor just data for forming adequate opinions. But there can
be no doubt but that the amount of transportation coastwise by sea, and
the transportation inland by railroads and canals, and by steamboats
and other modes of conveyance over the surface of our vast rivers and
immense lakes, and the value of property carried and interchanged by
these means form a general aggregate to which the foreign commerce of
the country, large as it is, makes but a distant approach.

In the absence of any controlling power over this subject, which, by
forcing a general resumption of specie payments, would at once have the
effect of restoring a sound medium of exchange and would leave to the
country but little to desire, what measure of relief falling within the
limits of our constitutional competency does it become this Government
to adopt? It was my painful duty at your last session, under the weight
of most solemn obligations, to differ with Congress on the measures
which it proposed for my approval, and which it doubtless regarded as
corrective of existing evils. Subsequent reflection and events since
occurring have only served to confirm me in the opinions then
entertained and frankly expressed. I must be permitted to add that no
scheme of governmental policy unaided by individual exertions can be
available for ameliorating the present condition of things. Commercial
modes of exchange and a good currency are but the necessary means of
commerce and intercourse, not the direct productive sources of wealth.
Wealth can only be accumulated by the earnings of industry and the
savings of frugality, and nothing can be more ill judged than to look
to facilities in borrowing or to a redundant circulation for the power
of discharging pecuniary obligations. The country is full of resources
and the people full of energy, and the great and permanent remedy
for present embarrassments must be sought in industry, economy, the
observance of good faith, and the favorable influence of time. In
pursuance of a pledge given to you in my last message to Congress, which
pledge I urge as an apology for adventuring to present you the details
of any plan, the Secretary of the Treasury will be ready to submit to
you, should you require it, a plan of finance which, while it throws
around the public treasure reasonable guards for its protection and
rests on powers acknowledged in practice to exist from the origin of
the Government, will at the same time furnish to the country a sound
paper medium and afford all reasonable facilities for regulating the
exchanges. When submitted, you will perceive in it a plan amendatory of
the existing laws in relation to the Treasury Department, subordinate in
all respects to the will of Congress directly and the will of the people
indirectly, self-sustaining should it be found in practice to realize
its promises in theory, and repealable at the pleasure of Congress. It
proposes by effectual restraints and by invoking the true spirit of our
institutions to separate the purse from the sword, or, more properly to
speak, denies any other control to the President over the agents who may
be selected to carry it into execution but what may be indispensably
necessary to secure the fidelity of such agents, and by wise regulations
keeps plainly apart from each other private and public funds. It
contemplates the establishment of a board of control at the seat of
government, with agencies at prominent commercial points or wherever
else Congress shall direct, for the safe-keeping and disbursement of the
public moneys, and a substitution at the option of the public creditor
of Treasury notes in lieu of gold and silver. It proposes to limit the
issues to an amount not to exceed $15,000,000 without the express
sanction of the legislative power. It also authorizes the receipt of
individual deposits of gold and silver to a limited amount, and the
granting certificates of deposit divided into such sums as may be called
for by the depositors. It proceeds a step further and authorizes the
purchase and sale of domestic bills and drafts resting on a real and
substantial basis, payable at sight or having but a short time to run,
and drawn on places not less than 100 miles apart, which authority,
except in so far as may be necessary for Government purposes
exclusively, is only to be exerted upon the express condition that its
exercise shall not be prohibited by the State in which the agency is
situated. In order to cover the expenses incident to the plan, it will
be authorized to receive moderate premiums for certificates issued on
deposits and on bills bought and sold, and thus, as far as its dealings
extend, to furnish facilities to commercial intercourse at the lowest
possible rates and to subduct from the earnings of industry the least
possible sum. It uses the State banks at a distance from the agencies
as auxiliaries without imparting any power to trade in its name.
It is subjected to such guards and restraints as have appeared to be
necessary. It is the creature of law and exists only at the pleasure of
the Legislature. It is made to rest on an actual specie basis in order
to redeem the notes at the places of issue, produces no dangerous
redundancy of circulation, affords no temptation to speculation, is
attended by no inflation of prices, is equable in its operation, makes
the Treasury notes (which it may use along with the certificates of
deposit and the notes of specie-paying banks) convertible at the place
where collected, receivable in payment of Government dues, and without
violating any principle of the Constitution affords the Government and
the people such facilities as are called for by the wants of both. Such,
it has appeared to me, are its recommendations, and in view of them it
will be submitted, whenever you may require it, to your consideration.

I am not able to perceive that any fair and candid objection can be
urged against the plan, the principal outlines of which I have thus
presented. I can not doubt but that the notes which it proposes to
furnish at the voluntary option of the public creditor, issued in lieu
of the revenue and its certificates of deposit, will be maintained
at an equality with gold and silver everywhere. They are redeemable in
gold and silver on demand at the places of issue. They are receivable
everywhere in payment of Government dues. The Treasury notes are limited
to an amount of one-fourth less than the estimated annual receipts of
the Treasury, and in addition they rest upon the faith of the Government
for their redemption. If all these assurances are not sufficient to make
them available, then the idea, as it seems to me, of furnishing a sound
paper medium of exchange may be entirely abandoned.

If a fear be indulged that the Government may be tempted to run into
excess in its issues at any future day, it seems to me that no such
apprehension can reasonably be entertained until all confidence in the
representatives of the States and of the people, as well as of the
people themselves, shall be lost. The weightiest considerations of
policy require that the restraints now proposed to be thrown around the
measure should not for light causes be removed. To argue against any
proposed plan its liability to possible abuse is to reject every
expedient, since everything dependent on human action is liable
to abuse. Fifteen millions of Treasury notes may be issued as the
_maximum_, but a discretionary power is to be given to the board of
control under that sum, and every consideration will unite in leading
them to feel their way with caution. For the first eight years of the
existence of the late Bank of the United States its circulation barely
exceeded $4,000,000, and for five of its most prosperous years it was
about equal to $16,000,000; furthermore, the authority given to receive
private deposits to a limited amount and to issue certificates in such
sums as may be called for by the depositors may so far fill up the
channels of circulation as greatly to diminish the necessity of any
considerable issue of Treasury notes. A restraint upon the amount of
private deposits has seemed to be indispensably necessary from an
apprehension, thought to be well founded, that in any emergency of trade
confidence might be so far shaken in the banks as to induce a withdrawal
from them of private deposits with a view to insure their unquestionable
safety when deposited with the Government, which might prove eminently
disastrous to the State banks. Is it objected that it is proposed to
authorize the agencies to deal in bills of exchange? It is answered that
such dealings are to be carried on at the lowest possible premium, are
made to rest on an unquestionably sound basis, are designed to reimburse
merely the expenses which would otherwise devolve upon the Treasury, and
are in strict subordination to the decision of the Supreme Court in the
case of the Bank of Augusta against Earle, and other reported cases, and
thereby avoids all conflict with State jurisdiction, which I hold to be
indispensably requisite. It leaves the banking privileges of the States
without interference, looks to the Treasury and the Union, and while
furnishing every facility to the first is careful of the interests of
the last. But above all, it is created by law, is amendable by law, and
is repealable by law, and, wedded as I am to no theory, but looking
solely to the advancement of the public good, I shall be among the very
first to urge its repeal if it be found not to subserve the purposes and
objects for which it may be created. Nor will the plan be submitted in
any overweening confidence in the sufficiency of my own judgment, but
with much greater reliance on the wisdom and patriotism of Congress.
I can not abandon this subject without urging upon you in the most
emphatic manner, whatever may be your action on the suggestions which
I have felt it to be my duty to submit, to relieve the Chief Executive
Magistrate, by any and all constitutional means, from a controlling
power over the public Treasury. If in the plan proposed, should you deem
it worthy of your consideration, that separation is not as complete as
you may desire, you will doubtless amend it in that particular. For
myself, I disclaim all desire to have any control over the public moneys
other than what is indispensably necessary to execute the laws which you
may pass.

Nor can I fail to advert in this connection to the debts which many of
the States of the Union have contracted abroad and under which they
continue to labor. That indebtedness amounts to a sum not less than
$200,000,000, and which has been retributed to them for the most part
in works of internal improvement which are destined to prove of vast
importance in ultimately advancing their prosperity and wealth. For the
debts thus contracted the States are alone responsible. I can do no more
than express the belief that each State will feel itself bound by every
consideration of honor as well as of interest to meet its engagements
with punctuality. The failure, however, of any one State to do so should
in no degree affect the credit of the rest, and the foreign capitalist
will have no just cause to experience alarm as to all other State stocks
because any one or more of the States may neglect to provide with
punctuality the means of redeeming their engagements. Even such States,
should there be any, considering the great rapidity with which their
resources are developing themselves, will not fail to have the means
at no very distant day to redeem their obligations to the uttermost
farthing; nor will I doubt but that, in view of that honorable conduct
which has evermore governed the States and the people of the Union, they
will each and all resort to every legitimate expedient before they will
forego a faithful compliance with their obligations.

From the report of the Secretary of War and other reports accompanying
it you will be informed of the progress which has been made in the
fortifications designed for the protection of our principal cities,
roadsteads, and inland frontier during the present year, together with
their true state and condition. They will be prosecuted to completion
with all the expedition which the means placed by Congress at the
disposal of the Executive will allow.

I recommend particularly to your consideration that portion of the
Secretary's report which proposes the establishment of a chain of
military posts from Council Bluffs to some point on the Pacific Ocean
within our limits. The benefit thereby destined to accrue to our
citizens engaged in the fur trade over that wilderness region, added
to the importance of cultivating friendly relations with savage tribes
inhabiting it, and at the same time of giving protection to our frontier
settlements and of establishing the means of safe intercourse between
the American settlements at the mouth of the Columbia River and those on
this side of the Rocky Mountains, would seem to suggest the importance
of carrying into effect the recommendations upon this head with as
little delay as may be practicable.

The report of the Secretary of the Navy will place you in possession
of the present condition of that important arm of the national defense.
Every effort will be made to add to its efficiency, and I can not too
strongly urge upon you liberal appropriations to that branch of the
public service. Inducements of the weightiest character exist for the
adoption of this course of policy. Our extended and otherwise exposed
maritime frontier calls for protection, to the furnishing of which an
efficient naval force is indispensable. We look to no foreign conquests,
nor do we propose to enter into competition with any other nation for
supremacy on the ocean; but it is due not only to the honor but to the
security of the people of the United States that no nation should be
permitted to invade our waters at pleasure and subject our towns and
villages to conflagration or pillage. Economy in all branches of the
public service is due from all the public agents to the people, but
parsimony alone would suggest the withholding of the necessary means for
the protection of our domestic firesides from invasion and our national
honor from disgrace. I would most earnestly recommend to Congress to
abstain from all appropriations for objects not absolutely necessary;
but I take upon myself, without a moment of hesitancy, all the
responsibility of recommending the increase and prompt equipment of
that gallant Navy which has lighted up every sea with its victories
and spread an imperishable glory over the country.

The report of the Postmaster-General will claim your particular
attention, not only because of the valuable suggestions which it
contains, but because of the great importance which at all times
attaches to that interesting branch of the public service. The increased
expense of transporting the mail along the principal routes necessarily
claims the public attention, and has awakened a corresponding solicitude
on the part of the Government. The transmission of the mail must keep
pace with those facilities of intercommunication which are every day
becoming greater through the building of railroads and the application
of steam power, but it can not be disguised that in order to do so the
Post-Office Department is subjected to heavy exactions. The lines of
communication between distant parts of the Union are to a great extent
occupied by railroads, which, in the nature of things, possess a
complete monopoly, and the Department is therefore liable to heavy and
unreasonable charges. This evil is destined to great increase in future,
and some timely measure may become necessary to guard against it.

I feel it my duty to bring under your consideration a practice which has
grown up in the administration of the Government, and which, I am deeply
convinced, ought to be corrected. I allude to the exercise of the power
which usage rather than reason has vested in the Presidents of removing
incumbents from office in order to substitute others more in favor with
the dominant party. My own conduct in this respect has been governed by
a conscientious purpose to exercise the removing power only in cases of
unfaithfulness or inability, or in those in which its exercise appeared
necessary in order to discountenance and suppress that spirit of active
partisanship on the part of holders of office which not only withdraws
them from the steady and impartial discharge of their official duties,
but exerts an undue and injurious influence over elections and degrades
the character of the Government itself, inasmuch as it exhibits the
Chief Magistrate as being a party through his agents in the secret plots
or open workings of political parties.

In respect to the exercise of this power nothing should be left to
discretion which may safely be regulated by law, and it is of high
importance to restrain as far as possible the stimulus of personal
interests in public elections. Considering the great increase which has
been made in public offices in the last quarter of a century and the
probability of further increase, we incur the hazard of witnessing
violent political contests, directed too often to the single object of
retaining office by those who are in or obtaining it by those who are
out. Under the influence of these convictions I shall cordially concur
in any constitutional measure for regulating and, by regulating,
restraining the power of removal.

I suggest for your consideration the propriety of making without further
delay some specific application of the funds derived under the will of
Mr. Smithson, of England, for the diffusion of knowledge, and which have
heretofore been vested in public stocks until such time as Congress
should think proper to give them a specific direction. Nor will you, I
feel confident, permit any abatement of the principal of the legacy to
be made should it turn out that the stocks in which the investments have
been made have undergone a depreciation.

In conclusion I commend to your care the interests of this District, for
which you are the exclusive legislators. Considering that this city is
the residence of the Government and for a large part of the year of
Congress, and considering also the great cost of the public buildings
and the propriety of affording them at all times careful protection, it
seems not unreasonable that Congress should contribute toward the
expense of an efficient police.

JOHN TYLER.




SPECIAL MESSAGES.


WASHINGTON, _December 7, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of War, in compliance
with a resolution of the Senate of the 3d of March last, calling for a
comparative statement of the condition of the public defenses, of all
the preparations and means of defense, and of the actual and authorized
strength of the Army on the 1st of January, 1829, and the 1st of
January, 1841.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _December 7, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit herewith a report from the War Department, in compliance with
so much of the resolution of the Senate of March 3, 1841, respecting the
military and naval defenses of the country, as relates to the defenses
under the superintendence of that Department.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _December 8, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 4th
of September last, requesting information touching the relations between
the United States and the Republic of Texas, I transmit a report from
the Secretary of State, to whom the resolution was referred.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _December 8, 1841_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of the Treasury,
exhibiting certain transfers of appropriations which have been made in
that Department in pursuance of the power vested in the President of the
United States by the act of Congress of the 3d of March, 1809, entitled
"An act further to amend the several acts for the establishment and
regulation of the Treasury, War, and Navy Departments."

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _December 29, 1841_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I herewith transmit to the Senate a report[15] from the Secretary of
State, in answer to their resolution of the 27th instant.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 15: Stating that no proposition has been made by either the
United States or Great Britain relative to the mutual right of search.]



WASHINGTON, _January 4, 1842_.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

I herewith communicate a report and statement from the Secretary of
State, in answer to a resolution of the House of the 19th of June, 1841,
requesting the aggregate amount of each description of persons within
the several districts of the United States by counties and principal
towns.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _January 10, 1842_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit to the Senate, for its consideration with a view to
ratification, a convention between the United States and the Republic
of Peru, signed at Lima on the 17th of March last, providing for the
adjustment and satisfaction of certain claims of citizens of the United
States against the Government of that Republic.

For the purpose of acquainting the Senate with the nature and amount of
those demands and with the course of the negotiation, I also communicate
a copy of such parts of the correspondence of the agents of the two
Governments as relate thereto.

JOHN TYLER.



WASHINGTON, _January 17, 1842_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit to the Senate a report from the Secretary of State, relative
to the proceedings and final decision of the commissioners under the
convention with the Republic of Texas upon the subject of the boundary
between the United States and that Republic.

JOHN TYLER.

[The same message was sent to the House of Representatives.]



WASHINGTON, _January 18, 1842_.

_To the House of Representatives_:

I transmit to the House of Representatives, in answer to the resolution
of the 14th instant, a report[16] from the Secretary of State and the
papers by which it was accompanied.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 16: Relating to American citizens captured near Santa Fe,
Mexico, by the Mexican army.]



WASHINGTON, _January 19, 1842_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit to the Senate herewith a report[17] from the Secretary of
State, with accompanying papers, in answer to their resolution of the
11th instant.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 17: Transmitting correspondence relative to the action of the
authorities of Nassau, New Providence, in the imprisonment of slaves
charged with mutiny and murder, the refusal to surrender them to the
United States consul for trial in the United States, and the liberation
of slaves, all of said slaves being a part of the cargo of the United
States brig _Creole_.]



JANUARY 27, 1842.

_To the House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith a report[18] of the Secretary of War, in answer to
the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 9th August, 1841.

JOHN TYLER.

[Footnote 18: Relating to the origin of the Seminole war, slaves
captured during said war by United States troops, etc.]



WASHINGTON, _February 5, 1842_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit herewith to the Senate copies of a report and letter from the
commissioners appointed by the President for the exploration and survey
of the boundary line between the States of Maine and New Hampshire and
the conterminous British Provinces, showing the progress made in that
work during the past season, and submitting an estimate, to which I
invite the attention of Congress, of the funds that will be requisite
for completing the surveys yet to be made on the boundary, and the
office work consequent thereon, and for completing the maps of surveys
already made.

JOHN TYLER.

[The same message was sent to the House of Representatives.]



NEW YORK, _January 4, 1842_.

Hon. DANIEL WEBSTER,

_Secretary of State_:

The undersigned, commissioners appointed by the President of the United
States for the purpose of exploring and surveying the boundary line
between the States of Maine and New Hampshire and the British Provinces
in North America, respectfully report--

That in pursuance of the duties of their appointment they have in the
course of the late season performed the following surveys and
explorations:

1. The meridian line of the monument at the source of the St. Croix has,
under the direction of J.D. Graham, been carefully and accurately traced
from the station in the vicinity of Houlton where the labors of the year
1840 terminated to a point 4 miles north of the St. John River in the
vicinity of the Grand Falls, being a distance of 81 miles from the
monument. The timber has been removed along this line to a width
necessary for its accurate prolongation and for the requisite
astronomical observations at various points upon it, and a correct
profile, or vertical section, has also been obtained by means of the
spirit level the whole of the distance above mentioned.

Besides the astronomical observations necessary to obtain and continue
the due north direction upon this line, numerous magnetic observations
have also been made at a number of points upon it, in order to show the
physical causes which must operate to produce serious discrepancies
between a meridian line properly traced and such a one as has actually
separated the jurisdiction of the two Governments since the attempt in
the years 1817 and 1818 to define and mark this portion of the boundary
under the provisions of the treaty of Ghent, although no portion of that
line was ever ratified or made binding upon the parties to the treaty.

Upon this portion of the survey there have been chained, including
measured offsets to the old line and to other important points, 85
miles.

Four hundred and fifty-two transit observations of heavenly bodies have
been made, aided by three excellent chronometers, for the determination
of the true meridian direction, most of which also served for the
computation of the correct time.

For the determination of the longitude of this meridian west of the
Royal Observatory of Greenwich and the latitudes of four important
points upon it there were made eighty-five complete sets of astronomical
observations, including altitudes of the sun and stars and the meridian
transits of the moon and moon-culminating stars.

The number of barometric observations made upon the line and in its
vicinity is 5,767; besides which there were made at Calais, for
comparison with the level of mean tide on the St. Croix, 1,336 similar
observations.

There have been determined in altitude above or below the level of the
monument, by means of the spirit level, 1,716 points, and the altitudes
of 1,816 other points have been similarly observed in order to verify
the altitude of the monument above the level of mean tide at Calais.

For the determination of the magnetic variation at a number of points on
the meridian line, more than 200 observations have been made upon four
different needles, and for the determination of the magnetic dip at four
principal stations on the same meridian 300 observations have been made
upon two different needles.

Under the directions of the same commissioner the line claimed by Great
Britain from Mars Hill and that recently chosen by Messrs. Mudge and
Featherstonhaugh have been surveyed westward from the meridian line to
the highlands near the head waters of the Aroostook, and the necessary
data obtained for the construction of a correct map of that portion of
country.

Upon this survey, without reckoning the distances traveled for
approaching many important points of observation, there have been
actually measured with the chain and coursed with proper instruments 267
miles, including the Aroostook River from its mouth to the point where
it receives the Lapawmpeag Stream, a profile of the country from the
head waters of the Moluncus to the St. John at Fish River, and such
other important lines as were necessary for obtaining the correct
topography of the country, and the altitudes of many points upon the
line claimed by Great Britain as the boundary, in the vicinity of the
Aroostook, have been obtained.

Ten principal points have been determined in latitude and longitude by
means of 115 sets of astronomical observations, aided by three good
chronometers, and seventeen other points have been determined by
triangulation with a portable theodolite. Two hundred and five points
have been determined in altitude by means of 1,319 barometric
observations, and seventeen by means of the theodolite and spirit level.
One hundred and ninety-two observations have been made for determining
the variation of the magnetic needle at three important points.

The field duties above mentioned are considered to furnish sufficient
data for a correct map of the line reported upon by the late British
commissioners, Colonel Mudge and Mr. Featherstonhaugh, between the
St. John River and the head of the Aroostook, besides some lateral
explorations of considerable extent that will have an important bearing
upon this branch of the subject. The work accomplished is full as much
as could have been properly done in a single season, marked, as the
last was, by an unusual drought of long continuance, which rendered
it impossible to ascend, even with light canoes, some of the smaller
streams, especially those forming the northwesternmost sources of the
Aroostook. These might be profitably explored another season.

2. The division under the direction of A. Talcott has, besides verifying
a part of the line of 1840 and tracing the course of Indian Stream (a
branch of the Connecticut) to its source, explored and surveyed the line
of highlands which extends from the Kennebec road to the Temiscouata
portage, and so much of the line claimed by Great Britain as extends
from the Kennebec road to the eastward as far as the head of the
Aroostook River.

In the course of this survey, without counting the lines of approach
or ground traveled over more than once, 703 miles have been passed over
and such notes taken as will form the basis of a map. Of these 703
miles, 335 are upon the lines respectively claimed as boundaries by
the Governments of the United States and Great Britain. In the course
of these surveys, in order to the geographical determination of the
position of the line, the latitudes of 54 points have been determined
by means of 114 sets of altitudes of heavenly bodies, and the sets of
subsidiary observations for time and for the determination of longitude
by chronometers amount to 245. The number of points at which
observations have been made by barometers for the purpose of determining
their altitudes is 930, of which 669 are upon the boundaries
respectively claimed by the two countries. The number of separate sets
of barometric readings made at these points amounts to 1,981, while
those made at the fixed stations, with which the former are to be
compared, amount to 1,671.

3. The division under the direction of J. Renwick has explored or
surveyed the line of highlands from the southeastern extremity of Lake
Matapediac to the vicinity of the river Du Loup, where the line of
survey has been connected with that of A. Talcott. In this survey a gap
is yet left of a few miles on the western side of the valley of the
Rimouski near its source.

In the course of the operations of this division 586 miles have been
passed over and such notes taken as will form the basis of a map. Of
these 586 miles, 275 have been actually measured, 209 are upon the
boundary claimed by the United States, and about 30 upon the line
pointed out by the proclamation of the King of Great Britain of the 7th
of October, 1763, as the southern boundary of the Province of Quebec,
making in all 239 miles of the height of land.

In the course of these surveys, in order to the geographical
determination of the position of the line, the latitudes of 47 points
have been determined by means of 85 sets of altitudes of heavenly
bodies, and the sets of subsidiary observations for time and for the
determination of longitude by chronometers amount to 130. The number
of points at which observations have been made by barometers for the
purpose of determining their altitudes is 407, of which 267 are upon the
boundary claimed by the United States. The number of separate sets of
barometric readings made at these points amounts to 1,153, while those
made at the fixed stations amount to 837.

The division of Major Graham not having returned from the field
until within a few days, neither the reduction of the astronomical
observations nor any of the office work preparatory to a general map
has yet been commenced by his division.

The office work of the divisions of A. Talcott and J. Renwick has been
steadily carried on since the return of those commissioners from the
field in the month of October, and great progress has been made in the
calculations and plotting preparatory to the construction of maps, and
necessary as materials for a general report.

In this state of the work of the several divisions the undersigned find
themselves under the necessity of communicating to the State Department
that the further progress of their operations is about to be arrested by
the exhaustion of the appropriation, and of stating that unless speedy
provision be made for the supply of the necessary funds the report of
their operations can not be made up in time to be laid before Congress
at its present session.

The position of the finances of the commission may be seen by the
following statement:


  Of the appropriation of $75,000 there have been drawn--

  By J. Renwick   $21,000
  By A. Talcott    24,200
  By J.D. Graham   25,000
  Total drawn      70,200

  Leaving in the Treasury of the United States $4,800.

  By a careful estimate it is found that to finish the office work of the
  several divisions there will be required over and above any balances in
  the hands of the several commissioners--

  For the division of J. Renwick                        $3,000
  For the division of A. Talcott                         5,800
  For the division of J.D. Graham, including some
  arrearages due for instruments and to assistant
  engineers attached to this division                    6,500

  Making in all $15,300, and leaving to be provided
  for the completion of the work of the late season    $10,500.


The undersigned can not refrain from stating that the necessity of
applying for further funds was unexpected by each of them individually,
as it is painful to them collectively. There are, however, reasons that
in their opinion are incontrovertible which have led to an expenditure
thus exceeding their estimate submitted to the Secretary of State the
11th of January, 1841:

1. The estimate for the expenses of the division under the direction of
Major Graham amounted to $22,500. This referred only, however, to the
continuation of the survey of the meridian line; and as the country had
been represented by the most authentic maps as generally rising from the
monument to the north, it was inferred that the timber to be cut away
in opening this line through a dense forest would be of the description
generally found upon elevated and dry lands, and the labor supposed to
be requisite was estimated accordingly. So far, however, from this being
the case, 26 miles out of the 32 between the base of Parks Ridge, near
Houlton, and the river Des Chutes (6 miles north of the latitude of Mars
Hill) have actually been found to be below the level of the monument and
intersected by swamps covered with a thick growth of cedar and other
timber common to such land, extremely difficult to cut away. More than
double the labor estimated had therefore to be performed in
accomplishing this and all similar portions of the work, and a
corresponding increase of expense was unavoidable.

In addition to this increased labor upon the meridian line, the division
of Major Graham has executed the surveys between that line and the head
waters of the Aroostook, already given in detail, the expenses for which
were not estimated or included in the sum above mentioned.

The cost of this survey, including the instruments that were required
for it, has amounted to $5,500, and while this sum should be added to
the original estimate for this division, the expenses of the divisions
of the other two commissioners have not in any manner been thereby
diminished, for the actual quantity of work performed by them has
exceeded what was supposed from the best maps extant to be necessary
upon the whole of the lines claimed by the two Governments,
respectively, exclusive of the meridian line, as will hereafter be
shown.

There was another cause which tended in a great degree to augment the
expenses of this division in proportion to the progress of the work,
which it was not within the power of human agency to control, and which
we should not omit to mention here.

The severe drought which prevailed throughout this region of country
during the month of August and the greater part of September caused the
fires which are annually set to the fallen timber upon newly cleared
lands to spread far and wide into the growing forest, and so rapid was
its progress and so serious its ravages as to compel the inhabitants
in many cases to fly for the preservation of life. Some check was
experienced in the duties along the meridian line from the flames that
actually embraced it, but a far more serious one from the dense smoke
which filled the atmosphere almost incessantly for six weeks, and so
obstructed the view as to render it impossible to fix the stations in
advance with the requisite precision.

While the party charged with the astronomical operations was thus
deprived of the opportunity of making scarcely any progress for six
weeks, the expense of maintaining it could not in any way be diminished,
because there was a daily hope that such a change in the weather might
occur as would have removed this difficulty.

In order to make amends as far as practicable for so much time
unavoidably lost, this division continued to prosecute its field duties
north of the forty-seventh degree of latitude until several weeks after
the severities of winter had commenced, with no other protection than
their tents, the commissioner in charge of it believing that the
expectations of the Government and of the country generally would but be
fulfilled by the investigations in relation to this important line being
pushed to the utmost attainable point. But for this it would have been
impossible to have reached the St. John River the late season.

There remains to be surveyed along this meridian line, in order to reach
the northwest angle of Nova Scotia as claimed by the United States,
about 64 miles, to accomplish which will require another season of
active field duty.

2. In the estimate for the work of the divisions of A. Talcott and J.
Renwick it was assumed that the length of the boundary remaining on the
line claimed by the United States was 320 miles, and upon the lines
claimed by Great Britain 170 miles.

Of the latter, about one-half was undertaken by Major Graham's
division,[19] leaving for the estimated distance to be surveyed by the
divisions of A. Talcott and J. Renwick 450 miles.

[Footnote 19: It has already been stated that in the survey of the
portion of this line allotted to Major Graham there were actually
measured upon it, with the chain, 276 miles, and this did not constitute
more than one-half the labor and expense incident to all the duties
enumerated and performed by his division on his portion, so much did the
work required upon this portion of it exceed what was estimated for the
whole of it.]

It will appear by the statement hereinbefore given that the joint
surveys of these two divisions upon the lines of highlands have actually
amounted to 574 miles. Upon the principle of their estimate, the
probable cost of this would have amounted to $49,746.37, and with the
addition for instruments and for the additional cost of the more remote
parts of the line to $57,079.70.

The actual cost, including the foregoing estimate for the completion of
the work, is $54,000.

It will appear, therefore, that when the increased extent of the work
performed over that made the basis of the estimate is considered, the
cost of performing it, so far from having exceeded the estimate, has
fallen short of it by $3,000.

The reason of the discrepancy between the real extent of the line, as
actually measured, and that which formed the basis of the calculation is
that the latter was made by reference to the best existing maps, which
were considered to be entitled to a certain degree of credit. Upon the
close examination which the operations of the late season have afforded,
these maps have been ascertained to be exceedingly erroneous. Well-known
streams have been found to extend in either direction many miles beyond
the points at which their sources have been laid down on the maps, and
great rivers and lakes have, as it were, been discovered, of which no
delineation had ever been given by geographers. The extent of these
errors in remote and difficultly accessible points may be inferred from
what has been found to occur in the part of the region which is most
accessible, best known, and most frequently traversed.

On the Temiscouata portage, a road traveled weekly by the mail of Her
Britannic Majesty, continually passed by the officers of her various
services, which had been carefully surveyed by civil engineers
preparatory to its reconstruction, and which has been traveled by the
surveyors of both countries under the joint commission, it had hitherto
been believed, and it was so represented on all maps, both English and
American, that the line dividing the waters crossed the road three
times. The surveys of the late season show that the boundary claimed by
the United States crosses this road five times, and it became necessary
to explore the culminating points of the valleys of four streams,
instead of two, as had been anticipated. Instances of the same sort, but
which do not admit of verbal description, have occurred on every part of
the lines of highlands.

The two commissioners whose operations are under consideration no doubt
had it in their power to have suspended their operations and returned so
soon as the portion of the appropriation placed at their disposal was so
far exhausted as to leave no more than would be needed to complete their
office work; but they feel satisfied that they would not have been
justified in so doing so long as any portion of the line remained
unsurveyed or the weather would permit a party to keep the field. Thus,
although in the original plan for the partition of the work it was
estimated that their lines would probably be connected in the parallel
of the river Ouelle, about 30 miles south of Temiscouata portage, when
it was found that, from unforeseen delays in the transportation of the
party of J. Renwick by sea to their work, and on the river St. Lawrence
from one station to another, it became doubtful whether he could pass
the Temiscouata portage before the woods became impassable, his
colleague continued his parties in the field until the junction was
effected. In this way, while the expenses of the division of J. Renwick
have not been materially diminished, those of the division of A. Talcott
have been largely increased; but a portion of the general work has been
accomplished which might otherwise have been left incomplete.

The undersigned, in conclusion, beg leave respectfully to urge the
importance of a speedy appropriation to enable them to make up their
report. A delay of any continuance will be productive of evil, either by
enhancing the cost of office work or by rendering it difficult in
consequence of the dispersion of the engineers and surveyors by whom the
field notes have been taken. Upon the completion only of such a report
will it be possible to render apparent how much of the whole task has
been accomplished and how much remains to be performed; and the
Department will then have it in its power to decide whether the part
that has not been completed is of such importance to the question at
issue as to require further operations upon it.

All which is respectfully submitted.

JAS. RENWICK,
  A. TALCOTT,
    J.D. GRAHAM,
     _Commissioners_.



WASHINGTON, _January 25, 1842_.

Hon. DANIEL WEBSTER,

_Secretary of State_.

SIR: The undersigned, commissioners appointed by the President of the
United States for the purpose of surveying and exploring the boundary
line between the States of Maine and New Hampshire and the British
Provinces, beg leave, in compliance with your directions, to submit an
estimate for the operations of the commission for the ensuing year.

So much of your directions as regards the state of the survey and the
amount required to complete the office work preparatory to a report has
already been laid before you in their report of the 4th January, 1842,
prepared in anticipation of your orders. By reference thereto it will
appear that the delineation of the meridian of the source of St. Croix
has not, in spite of every effort on the part of the commissioner to
whom it was assigned, been pursued farther than 81 miles from the
monument. Sixty-four miles, therefore, of the said meridian line remain
to be surveyed before this part of their task is completed. The other
two commissioners, while they would not have hesitated to join in a
final report in case the state of the survey of the meridian line would
have permitted it, are aware that the hasty manner in which their work
was performed, in anticipation of completing the object of their
appointment during the past year, leaves room for a more accurate
examination of some parts of the lines they have surveyed. Some
portions, also, of the lines intrusted to them, respectively, were not
reached; and, in addition, a part of the survey which was contemplated
in their original instructions from your predecessor was not included in
their estimates for the past year, in consequence of its having only a
collateral relation to the main object.

Thus the surveys respectively undertaken by Messrs. Talcott and Graham
of the lines claimed on the part of Great Britain and by Messrs. Mudge
and Featherstonhaugh, although brought near to each other, have not been
united, and a part of the highlands claimed by the United States near
the source of the Rimouski was not reached by the parties of Professor
Renwick.

The height of a part of the line explored by Captain Talcott in 1840,
lying at the source of Arnolds River, was not determined for the want of
a barometer.

Two or three miles in length of the line of highlands near the source of
the river Du Loup require to be reexamined.

The longitudes of Lake Megantic, Lake Etchemin, the source of the
Metjarmette, upon the line of Captain Talcott, and of some one point
on the line of Professor Renwick ought to be ascertained with greater
precision than the time that could be allowed during the last season
would permit.

The instructions of Mr. Forsyth contemplated an exploration of the
highlands described in the proclamation of 1763 as beginning on the
north shore of the Bay of Chaleurs. The existence of a continuous
elevated region from the tide of that bay to the termination of the
explori

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