US Presidency
1845

If the compromises of the Constitution be preserved, if sectional jealousies and heartburnings be discountenanced, if our laws be just and the government be practically administered strictly within the limits of power prescribed to it, we may discard all apprehensions for the safety of the Union. With these views of the nature, character, and objects of the government and the value of the Union, I shall steadily oppose the creation of those institutions and systems which in their nature tend to pervert it from its legitimate purposes and make it the instrument of sections, classes, and individuals. We need no national banks or other extraneous institutions planted around the government to control or strengthen it in opposition to the will of its authors. Experience has taught us how unnecessary they are as auxiliaries of the public authorities, how impotent for good and how powerful for mischief.