US Presidency
1848

What amount of money the United States may be able to realize from the sales of these vacant lands must be uncertain, but it is confidently believed that with prudent management, after making liberal grants to emigrants and settlers, it will exceed the cost of the war and all the expenses to which we have been subjected in acquiring it. The resolutions also call for the evidence, or any part thereof, that the ' extensive and valuable territories ceded by Mexico to the United States constitute indemnity for the past. ' The immense value of the ceded country does not consist alone in the amount of money for which the public lands may be sold.