This  is  a  digital  copy  of  a  book  that  was  preserved  for  generations  on  library  shelves  before  it  was  carefully  scanned  by  Google  as  part  of  a  project 
to  make  the  world's  books  discoverable  online. 
It  has  survived  long  enough  for  the  copyright  to  expire  and  the  book  to  enter  the  public  domain.  A  public  domain  book  is  one  that  was  never  subject 
to  copyright  or  whose  legal  copyright  term  has  expired.  Whether  a  book  is  in  the  public  domain  may  vary  country  to  country.  Public  domain  books 
are  our  gateways  to  the  past,  representing  a  wealth  of  history,  culture  and  knowledge  that's  often  difficult  to  discover. 
Marks,  notations  and  other  marginalia  present  in  the  original  volume  will  appear  in  this  file  -  a  reminder  of  this  book's  long  journey  from  the 
publisher  to  a  library  and  finally  to  you. 
Usage  guidelines 
Google  is  proud  to  partner  with  libraries  to  digitize  public  domain  materials  and  make  them  widely  accessible.  Public  domain  books  belong  to  the 
public  and  we  are  merely  their  custodians.  Nevertheless,  this  work  is  expensive,  so  in  order  to  keep  providing  this  resource,  we  have  taken  steps  to 
prevent  abuse  by  commercial  parties,  including  placing  technical  restrictions  on  automated  querying. 
We  also  ask  that  you: 
+  Make  non-commercial  use  of  the  files  We  designed  Google  Book  Search  for  use  by  individuals,  and  we  request  that  you  use  these  files  for 
personal,  non-commercial  purposes. 
+  Refrain  from  automated  querying  Do  not  send  automated  queries  of  any  sort  to  Google's  system:  If  you  are  conducting  research  on  machine 
translation,  optical  character  recognition  or  other  areas  where  access  to  a  large  amount  of  text  is  helpful,  please  contact  us.  We  encourage  the 
use  of  public  domain  materials  for  these  purposes  and  may  be  able  to  help. 
+  Maintain  attribution  The  Google  "watermark"  you  see  on  each  file  is  essential  for  informing  people  about  this  project  and  helping  them  find 
additional  materials  through  Google  Book  Search.  Please  do  not  remove  it. 
+  Keep  it  legal  Whatever  your  use,  remember  that  you  are  responsible  for  ensuring  that  what  you  are  doing  is  legal.  Do  not  assume  that  just 
because  we  believe  a  book  is  in  the  public  domain  for  users  in  the  United  States,  that  the  work  is  also  in  the  public  domain  for  users  in  other 
countries.  Whether  a  book  is  still  in  copyright  varies  from  country  to  country,  and  we  can't  offer  guidance  on  whether  any  specific  use  of 
any  specific  book  is  allowed.  Please  do  not  assume  that  a  book's  appearance  in  Google  Book  Search  means  it  can  be  used  in  any  manner 
anywhere  in  the  world.  Copyright  infringement  liability  can  be  quite  severe. 
About  Google  Book  Search 
Google's  mission  is  to  organize  the  world's  information  and  to  make  it  universally  accessible  and  useful.  Google  Book  Search  helps  readers 
discover  the  world's  books  while  helping  authors  and  publishers  reach  new  audiences.  You  can  search  through  the  full  text  of  this  book  on  the  web 
at|http  :  //books  .  google  .  com/
Lis  63. /6^  10 
Harvard  College 
Library 
THE  GIFT  OF 
WILLIAM  GUILD  HOWARD 
CLASS  OF  1191 
PROFESSOR  OF  GERMAN,  EMERITUS 
C'T'  .'    >"  '\  -  \-.r-^  •    .» *s-. 
v  \ 
I  *■:•*-.-:-•'        V
-'..  '^ :  'I 
r     :,  -1 
.  1  J- 
■••) .',  i^'   / .  ^ ' 
'   »-*- 
4-M:. 
- '»  _   -^   </ . , 
V-i-  -• 
*%  ^  r-. 
.^■'■^V. 
;  / 
^rl- 
^      '-U 
.t    ^'^u^' 
v> 
..  -ven^i>r^j..--  :-;>r 
A/ 
**.^.W<.       ..'...'•        4«w  •-..■<••..'.     f>*«       .«
COPYHIGHT    IB09  BY  BURKAU    OF  w-^  C\tT  V\ 
NATIONAL  LITKRATURK  AND    ART  1     OSt      vJlIlCe       1^6081111116111
m 
lA-ff-A^ 
I    1 
A  COMPIUTION 
OF  THB 
MESSAGES  AND  PAPERS 
OF  THE 
PRESIDENTS 
Prepared  Under  the  Direction  ol  the  Joint  Committee 
on  Piinting,  oi  the  House  and  Senate, 
Pufsuant    to  an  Act  ot    the    Filty-Second  Congress 
o(  the  Unitd  Slates 
(With  AJiIitions  and   Encyclopedic  Index 
by  Private  Enterprise) 
VOLUME  IV 
^3S 
POSLISHSD  BT 
BURE&O  OF  NATIOm  LITERATORE,  Inc. 
HEW  YOItK 
H 
..-i
LLS'SdJ^Jd 
HARVARD  COLLEGE  UBKARY 
GIFT  OF 
PROF.  WU.LIAM  G.  HOWARD 
JAN  14  \^m 
Copyri^t,  1897 
BT 
Jambs  D.  Richabdson 
J
ILLUSTRATIONS  IN  VOLUME  FOUR 
PAGE 
The  Post  Office  Department    ....      Frontispiece 
The  Capitol  in  Washington,  1839    1495 
Cartoons  of  the  Time    1527 
Martin  Van  Buren  (portrait)     \    1527B 
(Sketch  of  his  Kinderhook  home  on  tissue) 
Angelica  Van  Buren   (portrait)    IS27C 
President  Van   Buren's   Proclamation  Concerning  Tonnage 
Duties  ...'..,    1553 
Henry  Clay  Addressing  the  Senate  .        .        .  1585 
United  States  Military  Academy  at  West  Point,  N.  Y.,  1840  1617 
White  House — Entrance  Hall    1649 
Incidents  of  the  Seminole  Indian  War    1681 
Fremont  Placing  Flag  on  Rockies    1713 
Internal  Improvements — Bridge  Building        ....  1745 
Westward  Ho!    1777 
WTiite  House — ^The  Green  Room    1809 
Cartoon  Ridiculing  Abolitionists — Slave  Market    .        .        .  1841 
William  Henry  Harrison  (portrait)    1857B 
(Sketch  of  his  Ohio  home  on  tissue) 
Anna  Symmes  Harrison  (portrait)    1857C 
Pioneering  and  Invention    1867 
John  Tyler  (portrait)     .        .        .        .        .        .  .  1887B 
(Sketch  of  his  Virginia  home  on  tissue) 
Letitia  Christian  Tyler  (portrait)    1887C 
Commodore  Perry  Meeting  the  Commissioners  of  Japan  1893
Andrew  Jackson  1466 
in  effect  obtained  by  its  ingfenious  advocates  through  a  strained  construc- 
tion of  the  Constitution.  The  debts  of  the  Revolution  were  funded  at 
prices  which  formed  no  equivalent  compared  with  the  nominal  amount  of 
the  stock,  and  under  circumstances  which  exposed  the  motives  of  some 
of  those  who  participated  in  the  passage  of  the  act  to  distrust. 
The  facts  that  the  value  of  the  stock  was  greatly  enhanced  by  the 
creation  of  the  bank,  that  it  was  well  understood  that  such  would  be 
the  case,  and  that  some  of  the  advocates  of  the  measure  were  largely 
benefited  by  it  belong  to  the  history  of  the  times,  and  are  well  calculated 
to  diminish  the  respect  which  might  otherwise  have  been  due  to  the 
action  of  the  Congress  which  created  the  institution. 
On  the  establishment  of  a  national  bank  it  became  the  interest  of  its 
creditors  that  gold  should  be  superseded  by  the  paper  of  the  bank  as  a 
general  currency.  A  value  was  soon  attached  to  the  gold  coins  which 
made  their  exportation  to  foreign  countries  as  a  mercantile  commodity 
more  profitable  than  their  retention  and  use  at  home  as  money.  It  fol- 
lowed as  a  matter  of  course,  if  not  designed  by  those  who  established 
the  bank,  that  the  bank  became  in  effect  a  substitute  for  the  Mint  of  the 
United  States. 
Such  was  the  origin  of  a  national-bank  currency,  and  such  the  begin- 
ning of  those  difficulties  which  now  appear  in  the  excessive  issues  of  the 
banks  incorporated  by  the  various  States. 
Although  it  may  not  be  possible  by  any  legislative  means  within  our 
power  to  change  at  ouce  the  system  which  has  thus  been  introduced, 
and  has  received  the  acquiescence  of  all  portions  of  the  country,  it  is 
certainly  our  duty  to  do  all  that  is  consistent  with  our  constitutional 
obligations  in  preventing  the  mischiefs  which  are  threatened  by  its 
undue  extension.  That  the  efforts  of  the  fathers  of  our  Government  to 
guard  against  it  by  a  constitutional  provision  were  founded  on  an  inti- 
mate knowledge  of  the  subject  has  been  frequently  attested  by  the  bitter 
experience  of  the  country.  The  same  causes  which  led  them  to  refuse 
their  sanction  to  a  power  authorizing  the  establishment  of  incorporations 
for  banking  purposes  now  exist  in  a  much  stronger  degree  to  urge  us  to 
exert  the  utmost  vigilance  in  calling  into  action  the  means  necessary 
to  correct  the  evils  resulting  from  the  unfortunate  exercise  of  the  power, 
and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  opportunity  for  effecting  this  great  good 
will  be  improved  before  the  country  witnesses  new  scenes  of  embarrass- 
ment and  distress. 
Variableness  must  ever  be  the  characteristic  of  a  currency  of  which  the 
precious  metals  are  not  the  chief  ingredient,  or  which  can  be  expanded 
or  contracted  without  regard  to  the  principles  that  regulate  the  value  of 
those  metals  as  a  standard  in  the  general  trade  of  the  world.  With  us 
bank  issues  constitute  such  a  currency,  and  must  ever  do  so  until  they,  are 
made  dependent  on  tho^  just  proportions  of  gold  and  silver  as  a  circu- 
lating medium  which  experience  has  proved  to  be  necessary  not  only  in
1467  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidenis 
this  but  in  all  other  commercial  countries.  Where  those  proportions  are 
not  infused  into  the  circulation  and  do  not  control  it,  it  is  manifest  that 
prices  must  vary  according  to  the  tide  of  bank  issues,  and  the  value  and 
stability  of  property  must  stand  exposed  to  all  the  uncertainty  which 
attends  the  administration  of  institutions  that  are  constantly  liable  to  the 
temptation  of  an  interest  distinct  from  that  of  the  community  in  which 
they  are  established. 
The  progress  of  an  expansion,  or  rather  a  depreciation,  of  the  currency 
by  excessive  bank  issues  is  always  attended  by  a  loss  to  the  laboring 
classes.  This  portion  of  the  community  have  neither  time  nor  oppor- 
tunity to  watch  the  ebbs  and  flows  of  the  money  market.  Engaged  from 
day  to  day  in  their  useful  toils,  they  do  not  perceive  that  although  their 
wages  are  nominally  the  same,  or  even  somewhat  higher,  they  are  greatly 
reduced  in  fact  by  the  rapid  increase  of  a  spurious  currency,  which,  as  it 
appears  to  make  money  abound,  they  are  at  first  inclined  to  consider  a 
blessing.  It  is  not  so  with  the  speculator,  by  whom  this  operation  is 
better  understood,  and  is  made  to  contribute  to  his  advantage.  .  It  is  not 
until  the  prices  of  the  necessaries  of  life  become  so  dear  that  the  laboring 
classes  can  not  supply  their  wants  out  of  their  wages  that  the  wages  rise 
and  gradually  reach  a  justly  proportioned  rate  to  that  of  the  products  of 
their  labor.  When  thus,  by  the  depreciation  in  consequence  of  the  quan- 
tity of  paper  in  circulation,  wages  as  well  as  prices  become  exorbitant,  it 
is  soon  found  that  the  whole  eflFect  of  the  adulteration  is  a  tariff  on  our 
home  industry  for  the  benefit  of  the  countries  where  gold  and  silver  cir- 
culate and  maintain  uniformity  and  moderation  in  prices.  It  is  then  per- 
ceived that  the  enhancement  of  the  price  of  land  and  labor  produces  a 
corresponding  increase  in  the  price  of  products  until  these  products  do 
not  sustain  a  competition  with  similar  ones  in  other  countries,  and  thus 
both  manufactured  and  agricultural  productions  cease  to  bear  exportation 
from  the  country  of  the  spurious  currency,  because  they  can  not  be  sold 
for  cost.  This  is  the  process  by  which  specie  is  banished  by  the  paper 
of  the  banks.  Their  vaults  are  soon  exhausted  to  pay  for  foreign  com- 
modities. The  next  step  is  a  stoppage  of  specie  payment — a  total  degra- 
dation of  paper  as  a  currency — unusual  depression  of  prices,  the  ruin  of 
debtors,  and  the  accumulation  of  property  in  the  hands  of  creditors  and 
cautious  capitalists. 
It  was  in  view  of  these  evils,  together  with  the  dangerous  power  wielded 
by  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  and  its  repugnance  to  our  Constitution, 
that  I  was  induced  to  exert  the  power  conferred  upon  me  by  the  Ameri- 
can people  to  prevent  the  continuance  of  that  institution.  But  although 
various  dangers  to  our  republican  institutions  have  been  obviated  by  the 
failure  of  that  bank  to  extort  from  the  Government  a  renewal  of  its  char- 
ter, it  is  obvious  that  little  has  been  accomplished  except  a  salutary  change 
of  public  opinion  toward  restoring  to  the  country  the  sound  currency 
provided  for  in  the  Constitution.     In  the  acts  of  several  of  the  States
Andrezv  Jackson  1468 
prohibiting  the  circulation  of  small  notes,  and  the  auxiliary  enactments 
of  Congress  at  the  last  session  forbidding  their  reception  or  pajonent  on 
public  account,  the  true  policy  of  the  country  has  been  advanced  and  a 
larger  portion  of  the  precious  metals  infused  into  our  circulating  medium. 
These  measures  will  probably  be  followed  up  in  due  time  by  the  enact- 
ment of  State  laws  banishing  from  circulation  bank  notes  of  still  higher 
denominations,  and  the  object  may  be  materially  promoted  by  further  acts 
of  Congress  forbidding  the  employment  as  fiscal  agents  of  such  banks  as 
continue  to  issue  notes  of  low  denominations  and  throw  impediments  in 
the  way  of  the  circulation  of  gold  and  silver. 
The  effects  of  an  extension  of  bank  credits  and  overissues  of  bank 
paper  liave  been  strikingly  illustrated  in  the  sales  of  the  public  lands. 
From  the  returns  made  by  the  various  registers  and  receivers  in  the 
early  part  of  last  sununer  it  was  perceived  that  the  receipts  arising  from 
the  sales  of  the  public  lands  were  increasing  to  an  unprecedented  amount. 
In  effect,  however,  these  receipts  amountied  to  nothing  more  than  credits 
in  bank.  The  banks  lent  out  their  notes  to  speculators.  They  were 
paid  to  the  receivers  and  immediately  returned  to  the  banks,  to  be  lent 
out  again  and  again,  being  mere  instruments  to  transfer  to  speculators 
the  most  valuable  public  land  and  pay  the  Government  by  a  credit  on  the 
books  of  the  banks.  Those  credits  on  the  books  of  some  of  the  Western 
banks,  usually  called  deposits,  were  already  greatly  beyond  their  imme- 
diate means  of  payment,  and  were  rapidly  increasing.  Indeed,  each 
speculation  furnished  means  for  another;  for  no  sooner  had  one  indi- 
vidual or  company  paid  in  the  notes  than  they  were  immediately  lent  to 
another  for  a  like  pmpose,  and  the  banks  were  extending  their  business 
and  their  issues  so  largely  as  to  alarm  considerate  men  and  render  it 
doubtful  whether  these  bank  credits  if  permitted  to  accumulate  would 
ultimately  be  of  the  least  value  to  the  Government.  The  spirit  of  expan- 
sion and  speculation  was  not  confined  to  the  deposit  banks,  but  pervaded 
the  whole  multitude  of  banks  throughout  the  Union  and  was  giving  rise 
to  new  institutions  to  aggravate  the  evil. 
The  safety  of  the  public  funds  and  the  interest  of  the  people  generally 
required  that  these  operations  should  be  checked;  and  it  became  the  duty 
of  every  branch  of  the  General  and  State  Governments  to  adopt  all  legiti- 
mate and  proper  means  to  produce  that  salutary  effect.  Under  this  view 
of  my  duty  I  directed  the  issuing  of  the  order  which  will  be  laid  before 
you  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  requiring  payment  for  the  public 
lands  sold  to  be  made  in  specie,  with  an  exception  until  the  15th  of  the 
present  month  in  favor  of  actual  settlers.  This  measure  has  produced 
many  salutary  consequences.  It  checked  the  career  of  the  Western  banks 
and  gave  them  additional  strength  in  anticipation  of  the  pressure  which 
has  since  pervaded  our  Eastern  as  well  as  the  European  commercial  cities. 
By  preventing  the  extension  of  the  credit  system  it  measurably  cut  off 
the  means  of  speculation  and  retarded  its  progress  in  monopolizing  the
1469  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
most  valuable  of  the  public  lands.  It  has  tended  to  save  the  new  States 
from  a  nonresident  proprietorship,  one  of  the  greatest  obstacles  to  the 
advancement  of  a  new  country  and  the  prosperity  of  an  old  one.  It  has 
tended  to  keep  open  the  public  lands  for  entry  by  emigrants  at  Govern- 
ment prices  instead  of  their  being  compelled  to  purchase  of  speculators 
at  double  or  triple  prices.  And  it  is  conveying  into  the  interior  large 
sums  in  silver  and  gold,  there  to  enter  permanently  into  the  currency 
of  the  country  and  place  it  on  a  firmer  foundation.  It  is  confidently 
believed  that  the  country  will  find  in  the  motives  which  induced  that 
order  and  the  happy  consequences  which  will  have  ensued  much  to 
commend  and  nothing  to  condemn. 
It  remains  for  Congress  if  they  approve  the  policy  which  dictated  this 
order  to  follow  it  up  in  its  various  bearings.  Much  good,  in  my  judg- 
ment, would  be  produced  by  prohibiting  sales  of  the  public  lands  except 
to  actual  settlers  at  a  reasonable  reduction  of  price,  and  to  limit  the 
quantity  which  shall  be  sold  to  them.  Although  it  is  believed  the  Gen- 
eral Government  never  ought  to  receive  an3rthing  but  the  constitutional 
currency  in  exchange  for  the  public  lands,  that  point  would  be  of  less 
importance  if  the  lands  were  sold  for  immediate  settlement  and  cultiva- 
tion. Indeed,  there  is  scarcely  a  mischief  arising  out  of  our  present  land 
system,  including  the  accumulating  surplus  of  revenues,  which  would  not 
be  remedied  at  once  by  a  restriction  on  land  sales  to  actual  settlers;  and 
it  promises  other  advantages  to  the  country  in  general  and  to  the  new 
States  in  particular  which  can  not  faU  to  receive  the  most  profound  con- 
sideration of  Congress. 
Experience  continues  to  realize  the  expectations  entertained  as  to  the 
capacity  of  the  State  banks  to  perform  the  duties  of  fiscal  agents  for 
the  Government  at  the  time  of  the  removal  of  the  deposits.  It  was 
alleged  by  the  advocates  of  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  that  the  State 
banks,  whatever  might  be  the  regulations  of  the  Treasury  Department, 
could  not  make  the  transfers  required  by  the  Government  or  negotiate 
the  domestic  exchanges  of  the  country.  It  is  now  well  ascertained  that 
the  real  domestic  exchanges  performed  through  discounts  by  the  United 
States  Bank  and  its  twenty-five  branches  were  at  least  one-third  less 
than  those  of  the  deposit  banks  for  an  equal  period  of  time;  and  if  a  com- 
parison be  instituted  between  the  amounts  of  service  rendered  by  these 
institutions  on  the  broader  basis  which  has  been  used  by  the  advocates 
of  the  United  States  Bank  in  estimating  what  they  consider  the  domestic 
exchanges  transacted  by  it,  the  result  will  be  still  more  favorable  to  the 
deposit  banks. 
The  whole  amount  of  public  money  transferred  by  the  Bank  of  the 
United  States  in  1832  was  $16,000,000.  The  amount  transferred  and 
actually  paid  by  the  deposit  banks  in  the  year  ending  the  zst  of  October 
last  was  $39,319,899;  the  amount  transferred  and  paid  between  that 
period  and  the  6th  of  November  was  $5, 399, 000,  ^'^^  ^^  amount  of
Andrew  Jackson  X470 
transfer  warrants  outstandins:  on  that  day  was  $i4,4S<^><x>c>,  making  an 
aggregate  of  $59,168,894.  These  enormous  sums  of  money  first  men- 
tioned have  been  transferred  with  the  greatest  promptitude  and  regularity, 
and  the  rates  at  which  the  exchanges  have  been  negotiated  previously  to 
the  passage  of  the  deposit  act  were  generally  below  those  charged  by  the 
Bank  of  the  United  States.  Independently  of  these  services,  which  are 
far  greater  than  those  rendered  by  the  United  States  Bank  and  its  twenty- 
five  branches,  a  number  of  the  deposit  banks  have,  with  a  commendable 
zeal  to  aid  in  the  improvement  of  the  currency,  imported  from  abroad,  at 
their  own  expense,  large  sums  of  the  precious  metals  for  coinage  and 
circulation. 
In  the  same  manner  have  nearly  all  the  predictions  turned  out  in 
respect  to  the  effect  of  the  removal  of  the  deposits — a  step  unquestion- 
ably necessary  to  prevent  the  evils  which  it  was  foreseen  the  bank  itself 
would  endeavor  to  create  in  a  final  struggle  to  procure  a  renewal  of  its 
charter.  It  may  be  thus,  too,  in  some  degree  with  the  further  steps 
which  may  be  taken  to  prevent  the  excessive  issue  of  other  bank  paper, 
but  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  nothing  will  now  deter  the  Federal  and  State 
authorities  from  the  firm  and  vigorous  performance  of  their  duties  to 
themselves  and  to  the  people  in  this  respect. 
In  reducing  the  revenue  to  the  wants  of  the  Government  your  partic- 
ular attention  is  invited  to  those  articles  which  constitute  the  necessaries 
of  life.  The  duty  on  salt  was  laid  as  a  war  tax,  and  was  no  doubt  con- 
tinued to  assist  in  providing  for  the  payment  of  the  war  debt.  There  is 
no  article  the  release  of  which  from  taxation  would  be  felt  so  generally 
and  so  beneficially.  To  this  may  be  added  all  kinds  of  fuel  and  provi- 
sions. Justice  and  benevolence  tmite  in  favor  of  releasing  the  poor  of 
our  cities  from  burdens  which  are  not  necessary  to  the  support  of  our 
Government  and  tend  only  to  increase  the  wants  of  the  destitute. 
It  will  be  seen  by  the  report  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  and  the 
accompanying  documents  that  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  has  made 
no  pajrment  on  account  of  the  stock  held  by  the  Government  in  that 
institution,  although  urged  to  pay  any  portion  which  might  suit  its 
convenience,  and  that  it  has  given  no  information  when  payment  may 
be  expected.  Nor,  although  repeatedly  requested,  has  it  furnished  the 
information  in  relation  to  its  condition  which  Congress  authorized  the 
Secretary  to  collect  at  their  last  session.  Such  measures  as  are  within 
the  power  of  the  Executive  have  been  taken  to  ascertain  the  value  of  the 
stock  and  procure  the  payment  as  early  as  possible. 
The  conduct  and  present  condition  of  that  bank  and  the  great  amount 
of  capital  vested  in  it  by  the  United  States  require  your  careful  atten- 
tion. Its  charter  expired  on  the  3d  day  of  March  last,  and  it  has  now  no 
power  but  that  given  in  the  twenty-first  section,  "to  use  the  corporate 
name,  style,  and  capacity  for  the  purpose  of  suits  for  the  final  settlement 
and  liquidation  of  the  affairs  and  accounts  of  the  corporation,  and  for  the
147 1  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
sale  and  disposition  of  their  estate — ^real,  personal,  and  mixed — but  not  for 
any  other  purpose  or  in  any  other  manner  whatsoever,  nor  for  a  period 
exceeding  two  years  after  the  expiration  of  the  said  term  of  incorpo- 
ration." Before  the  expiration  of  the  charter  the  stockholders  of  the 
bank  obtained  an  act  of  incorporation  from  the  legislature  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, excluding  only  the  United  States.  Instead  of  proceeding  to  wind 
up  their  concerns  and  pay  over  to  the  United  States  the  amount  due  on 
account  of  the  stock  held  by  them,  the  president  and  directors  of  the  old 
bank  appear  to  have  transferred  the  books,  papers,  notes,  obligations,  and 
most  or  all  of  its  property  to  this  new  corporation,  which  entered  upon 
business  as  a  continuation  of  the  old  concern.  Amongst  other  acts  of 
questionable  validity,  the  notes  of  the  expired  corporation  are  known  to 
have  been  used  as  its  own  and  again  put  in  circulation.  That  the  old 
bank  had  no  right  to  issue  or  reissue  its  notes  after  the  expiration  of  its 
charter  can  not  be  denied,  and  that  it  could  not  confer  any  such  right 
on  its  substitute  any  more  than  exercise  it  itself  is  equally  plain.  In  law 
and  honesty  the  notes  of  the  bank  in  circulation  at  the  expiration  of  its 
charter  should  have  been  called  in  by  public  advertisement,  paid  up  as 
presented,  and,  together  with  those  on  hand,  canceled  and  destroyed. 
Their  reissue  is  sanctioned  by  no  law  and  warranted  by  no  necessity.  If 
the  United  States  be  responsible  in  their  stock  for  the  payment  of  these 
notes,  their  reissue  by  the  new  corporation  for  their  own  profit  is  a  fraud 
on  the  Government.  If  the  United  States  is  not  responsible,  then  there 
is  no  legal  responsibility  in  any  quarter,  and  it  is  a  fraud  on  the  country. 
They  are  the  redeemed  notes  of  a  dissolved  partnership,  but,  contrary  to 
the  wishes  of  the  retiring  partner  and  without  his  consent,  are  again 
reissued  and  circulated. 
It  is  the  high  and  peculiar  duty  of  Congress  to  decide  whether  any 
further  legislation  be  necessary  for  the  security  of  the  large  amount  of 
public  property  now  held  and  in  use  by  the  new  bank,  and  for  vindicating 
the  rights  of  the  Government  and  compelling  a  speedy  aijd  honest  settle- 
ment with  all  the  creditors  of  the  old  bank,  public  and  private,  or  whether 
the  subject  shall  be  left  to  the  power  now  possessed  by  the  Executive 
and  judiciary.  It  remains  to  be  seen  whether  the  persons  who  as  man- 
agers of  the  old  bank  undertook  to  control  the  Government,  retained  the 
public  dividends,  shut  their  doors  upon  a  committee  of  the  House  of 
Representatives,  and  filled  the  country  with  panic  to  accomplish  their 
own  sinister  objects  may  now  as  managers  of  a  new  bank  continue  with 
impunity  to  flood  the  country  with  a  spurious  currency,  use  the  seven 
millions  of  Government  stock  for  their  own  profit,  and  refuse  to  the 
United  States  all  information  as  to  the  present  condition  of  their  own 
property  and  the  prospect  of  recovering  it  into  their  own  possession. 
The  lessons  taught  by  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  can  not  well 
be  lost  upon  the  American  people.  They  will  take  care  never  again 
to  place  so  tremendous  a  power  in  irresponsible  hands,  and  it  will  be
Andrew  Jackson  1472 
fortunate  if  they  seriously  consider  the  consequences  which  are  likely  to 
result  on  a  smaller  scale  frpm  the  facility  with  which  corporate  powers 
are  granted  by  their  State  governments. 
It  is  believed  that  the  law  of  the  last  session  regulating  the  deposit 
banks  operates  onerously  and  unjustly  upon  them  in  many  respects,  and 
it  is  hoped  that  Congress,  on  proper  representations,  will  adopt  the  modi- 
fications which  are  necessary  to  prevent  this  consequence. 
The  report  of  the  Secretary  of  War  ad  interim  and  the  accompanying 
documents,  all  which  are  herewith  laid  before  you,  will  give  you  a  full 
view  of  the  diversified  and  important  operations  of  that  Department  dur- 
ing the  past  year.  • 
The  military  movements  rendered  necessary  by  the  aggressions  of  the 
hostile  portions  of  the  Seminole  and  Creek  tribes  of  Indians,  and  by 
other  circumstances,  have  required  the  active  emplo5mieiit  of  nearly  our 
whole  regular  force,  including  the  Marine  Corps,  and  of  large  bodies  of 
militia  and  volunteers.  With  all  these  events  so  far  as  they  were  known 
at  the  seat  of  Government  before  the  termination  of  your  last  session 
you  are  already  acquainted,  and  it  is  therefore  only  needful  in  this  place 
to  lay  before  you  a  brief  summary  of  what  has  since  occurred. 
The  war  with  the  Seminoles  during  the  summer  was  on  our  part 
chiefly  confined  to  the  protection  of  our  frontier  settlements  from  the 
incursions  of  the  enemy,  and,  as  a  necessary  and  important  means  for 
the  accomplishment  of  that  end,  to  the  maintenance  of  the  posts  previ- 
ously established.  In  the  course  of  this  duty  several  actions  took  place, 
in  which  the  bravery  and  discipline  of  both  oflScers  and  men  were  con- 
spicuously displayed,  and  which  I  have  deemed  it  proper  to  notice  in 
respect  to  the  former  by  the  granting  of  brevet  rank  for  gallant  services 
in*  the  fielll.  But  as  the  force  of  the  Indians  was  not  so  far  weakened 
by  these  partial  successes  as  to  lead  them  to  submit,  and  as  their  savage 
inroads  were  frequently  repeated,  early  measures  were  taken  for  placing 
at  the  disposal  of  Governor  Call,  who  as  commander  in  chief  of  the  Terri- 
torial militia  had  been  temporarily  invested  with  the  command,  an  ample 
force  for  the  purpose  of  resuming  oiBFensive  operations  in  the  most  effi- 
cient manner  so  soon  as  the  season  should  permit.  Major-General  Jesup 
was  also  directed,  on  the  conclusion  of  his  duties  in  the  Creek  country, 
to  repair  to  Florida  and  assume  the  command. 
The  result  of  the  first  movement  made  by  the  forces  under  the  direc- 
tion of  Governor  Call  in  October  last,  as  detailed  in  the  accompanying 
papers,  excited  much  surprise  and  disappointment.  A  full  explanation 
has  been  required  of  the  causes  which  led  to  the  failure  of  that  move- 
ment, but  has  not  yet  been  received.  In  the  meantime,  as  it  was  feared 
that  the  health  of  Governor  Call,  who  was  understood  to  have  suffered 
much  from  sickness,  might  not  be  adequate  to  the  crisis,  and  as  Major- 
General  Jesup  was  known  to  have  reached  Florida,  that  officer  was 
directed  to  assume  the  command,  and  to  prosecute  all  needful  operations
1473  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
with  the  utmost  promptitude  and  vigor.  Prom  the  force  at  his  disposal 
and  the  dispositions  he  has  made  and  is  instructed  to  make,  and  from  the 
very  efl&cient  measures  which  it  is  since  ascertained  have  been  taken  by 
Governor  Call,  there  is  reason  to  hope  that  they  will  soon  be  enabled  to 
reduce  the  enemy  to  subjection.  In  the  meantime,  as  you  will  perceive 
from  the  report  of  the  Secretary,  there  is  urgent  necessity  for  further 
appropriations  to  suppress  these  hostilities. 
Happily  for  the  interests  of  humanity,  the  hostilities  with  the  Creeks 
were  brought  to  a  close  soon  after  your  adjournment,  without  that  effu- 
sion of  blood  which  at  one  time  was  apprehended  as  inevitable.  The 
unconditional  sutnnission  of  the  hostile  party  was  followed  by  their 
speedy  removal  to  the  country  assigned  them  west  of  the  Mississippi. 
The  inquiry  as  to  alleged  frauds  in  the  purchase  of  the  reservations  of 
these  Indians  and  the  causes  of  their  hostilities,  requested  by  the  reso- 
lution of  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  ist  of  July  last  to  be  made 
by  the  President,  is  now  going  on  through  the  agency  of  commissioners 
appointed  for  that  purpose.  Their  report  may  be  expected  during  your 
present  session. 
The  difficulties  apprehended  in  the  Cherokee  country  have  been  pre- 
vented, and  the  peace  and  safety  of  that  region  and  its  vicinity  effec^ 
tually  secured,  by  the  timely  measures  taken  by  the  War  Department, 
and  still  continued. 
The  discretionary  authority  given  to  General  Gaines  to  cross  the  Sabine' 
and  to  occupy  a  position  as  far  west  as  NacogdDches,  in  tase  he  should 
deem  such  a  step  necessary  to  the  protection  of  the  frontier  and  to  the 
fulfillment  of  the  stipulations  contained  in  our  treaty  with  Mexico,  and 
the  movement  subsequently  made  by  that  officer  have  been  alluded  to 
in,  a  former  part  of  this  message.  At  the  date  of  the  latest  iatelligence 
from  Nacogdoches  our  troops  were  yet  at  that  station,  but  the  officer 
who  has  succeeded  General  Gaines  has  recently  been  advised  that  from 
the  facts  known  at  the  seat  of  Government  there  would  seem  to  be  no 
adequate  cause  for  any  longer  maintaining  that  position,  and  he  was 
accordingly  instructed,  in  case  the  troops  were  not  already  withdrawn 
under  the  discretionary  powers  before  possessed  by  him,  to  give  the 
requisite  orders  for  that  purpose  on  the  receipt  of  the  instructions,  unless 
he  shall  then  have  in  his  possession  such  information  as  shall  satisfy  him 
that  the  maintenance  of  the  post  is  essential  to  the  protection  of  our 
frontiers  and  to  the  due  execution  of  our  treaty  stipulations,  as  previously 
explained  to  him. 
Whilst  the  necessities  existing  during  the  present  year  for  the  service 
of  militia  and  volunteers  have  furnished  new  proofs  of  the  patriotism  of 
our  fellow-citizens,  they  have  also  strongly  illustrated  the  importance 
of  an  increase  in  the  rank  and  file  of  the  Regular  Army.  The  views 
of  this  subject  submitted  by  the  Secretary  of  War  in  his  report  meet 
my  entire  concurrence,  and  are  earnestly  commended  to  the  deliberate
Andreiv  Jackson  1474 
attention  of  Congress.  In  this  connection  it  is  also  proper  to  remind 
you  that  the  defects  in  our  present  militia  system  are  every  day  rendered 
more  apparent.  The  duty  of  making  further  provision  by  law  for  organ- 
izingf,  arming,  and  disciplining  this  arm  of  defense  has  been  so  repeatedly 
presented  to  Congress  by  myself  and  my  predecessors  that  I  deem  it 
sufficient  on  this  occasion  to  refer  to  the  last  annual  message  and  to 
former  Executive  communications  in  which  the  subject  has  been  dis- 
It  appears  from  the  reports  of  the  officers  charged  with  mtistering  into 
service  the  volunteers  called  for  under  the  act  of  Congress  of  the  last  ses- 
sion that  more  presented  themselves  at  the  place  of  rendezvous  in  Ten-' 
nessee  than  were  sufficient  to  meet  the  requisition  which  had  been  made 
by  the  Secretary  of  War  upon  the  governor  of  that  State.  This  was 
occasioned  by  the  omission  of  the  governor  to  apportion  the  requisition 
to  the  different  regiments  of  militia  so  as  to  obtain  the  proper  number  of 
troops  and  no  more.  It  seems  but  just  to  the  patriotic  citizens  who 
repaired  to  the  general  rendezvous  under  circumstances  authorizing  them 
to  believe  that  their  services  were  needed  and  would  be  accepted  that 
the  expenses  incurred  by  them  while  absent  from  their  homes  should  be 
paid  by  the  Government.  I  accordingly  recommend  that  a  law  to  this 
effect  be  passed  by  Congress,  giving  them  a  compensation  which  will 
cover  their  expenses  on  the  march  to  and  from  the  place  of  rendezvous 
and  while  there;  in  connection  with  which  it  will  also  be  proper  to  make 
provision  for  such  other  equitable  claims  growing  out  of  the  service  of 
the  militia  as  may  not  be  embraced  in  the  existing  laws. 
On  the  unexpected  breaking  out  of  hostilities  in  Florida,  Alabama, 
and  Georgia  it  became  necessary  in  some  cases  to  take  the  property  of 
individuals  for  public  use.  Provision  should  be  made  by  law  for  indem- 
nifjring  the  owners;  and  I  would  also  respectfully  suggest  whether  some 
provision  may  not  be  made,  consistently  with  the  principles  of  our  Gov- 
ernment, for  the  relief  of  the  sufferers  by  Indian  depredations  or  by  the 
operations  of  our  own  troops. 
No  time  was  lost  after  the  making  of  the  requisite  appropriations  in 
resuming  the  great  national  work  of  completing  the  unfinished  fortifica- 
tions on  our  seaboard  and  of  placing  them  in  a  proper  state  of  defense. 
In  consequence,  however,  of  the  very  late  day  at  which  those  bills  were 
passed,  but  little  progress  could  be  made  during  the  season  which  has 
just  closed.  A  very  large  amount  of  the  moneys  granted  at  your  last 
session  accordingly  remains  unexpended;  but  as  the  work  will  be  again 
resumed  at  the  earliest  moment  in  the  coming  spring,  the  balance  of  the 
existing  appropriations,  and  in  several  cases  which  will  be  laid  before  you, 
with  the  proper  estimates,  further  sums  for  the  like  objects,  may  be  use- 
fully expended  during  the  next  year. 
The  recommendations  of  an  increase  in  the  Engineer  Corps  and  for  a 
reorganization  of  the  Topographical  Corps,  submitted  to  you  in  my  last
1475  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
annual  message,  derive  additional  strength  from  the  great  embarrass- 
ments experienced  during  the  present  year  in  those  branches  of  the 
service,  and  under  which  they  are  now  suffering.  Several  of  the  most 
important  surveys  and  constructions  directed  by  recent  laws  have  been 
suspended  in  consequence  of  the  want  of  adequate  force  in  these  corps. 
The  like  observations  may  be  applied  to  the  Ordnance  Corps  and  to  the 
general  staff,  the  operations  of  which  as  they  are  now  organized  must 
either  be  frequently  interrupted  or  performed  by  oflBcers  takwi  from  the 
line  of  the  Army,  to  the  great  prejudice  of  the  service. 
For  a  general  view  of  the  condition  of  the  Military  Academy  and  of 
•other  branches  of  the  military  feervice  not  already  noticed,  as  well  as 
for  fuller  illustrations  of  those  which  have  been  mentioned,  I  refer  you 
to  the  accompanying  documents,  and  among  the  various  proposals  con- 
tained therein  for  legislative  action  I  would  particularly  notice  the  sug- 
gestion of  the  Secretary  of  War  for  the  revision  of  the  pay  of  the  Army 
as  entitled  to  your  favorable  regard. 
The  national  policy,  founded  alike  in  interest  and  in  humanity,  so 
long  and  so  steadily  pursued  by  this  Government  for  the  removal  of  the 
Indian  tribes  originally  settled  on  this  side/)f  the  Mississippi  to  the  west 
of  that  river,  may  be  said  to  have  been  consummated  by  the  conclusion  of 
the  late  treaty  with  the  Cherokees.  The  measures  taken  in  the  execu- 
tion of  that  treaty  and  in  relation  to  our  Indian  affairs  generally  will 
fully  appear  by  referring  to  the  accompanying  papers.  Without  dwell- 
ing on  the  numerous  and  important  topics  embraced  in  them,  I  again 
invite  your  attention  to  the  importance  of  providing  a  well-digested  and 
comprehensive  system  for  the  protection,  supervision,  and  improvement 
of  the  various  tribes  now  planted  in  th^  Indian  country.  The  sugges- 
tions submitted  by  the  Commissioner  of  Indian  Affairs,  and  enforced  by 
the  Secretary,  on  this  subject,  and  also  in  regard  to  the  establishment  of 
additional  military  posts  in  thcv  Indian  country,  are  entitled  to  your  pro- 
found consideration.  Both  measures  are  necessary,  for  the  double  pur- 
pose of  protecting  the  Indians  from  intestine  war,  and  in  other  respects 
complying  with  our  engagements  to  them,  and  of  securing  our  western 
frontier  against  incursions  which  otherwise  will  assuredly  be  made  on  it. 
The  best  hopes  of  humanity  in  regard  to  the  aboriginal  race,  the  welfare 
of  our  rapidly  extending  settlements,  and  the  honor  of  the  United  States 
are  all  deeply  involved  in  the  relations  existing  between  this  Government 
and  the  emigrating  tribes.  I  trust,  therefore,  that  the  various  matters 
submitted  in  the  accompanying  documents  in  respect  to  those  relations 
will  receive  your  early  and  mature  deliberation,  and  that  it  may  issue 
in  the  adoption  of  legislative  measures  adapted  to  the  circumstances  and 
duties  of  the  present  crisis. 
You  are  referred  to  the  report  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy  for  a  satis- 
factory view  of  the  operations  of  the  Department  under  his  charge  during 
the  present  year.     In  the  construction  of  vessels  at  the  different  navy-
A  ndrew  Jackson  1476 
yards  and  in  the  employment  of  our  ships  and  squadrons  at  sea  that 
branch  of  the  service  has  been  actively  and  usefully  employed.  While 
the  situation  of  .our  commercial  interests  in  the  West  Indies  required  a 
greater  number  than  usual  of  armed  vessels  to  be  kept  on  that  station, 
it  is  gratifying  to  perceive  that  the  protection  due  to  our  commerce  in 
other  quarters  of  the  world  has  not  proved  insufficient.  Every  effort  has 
been  made  to  facilitate  the  equipment  of  the  exploring  expedition  author- 
ized by^  the  act  of  the  last  session,  but  all  the  preparation  necessary  to 
enable  it  to  sail  has  not  yet  been  completed.  No  means  will  be  spared 
by  the  Government  to  fit  out  the  expedition  on  a  scale  corresponding 
with  the  liberal  apx>ropriations  for  the  purpose  and  with  the  elevated 
character  of  the  objects  which  are  to  be  effected  by  it. 
I  beg  leave  to  renew  the  recommendation  made  in  my  last  annual  mes- 
sage respecting  the  enlistment  of  boys  in  our  naval  service,  and  to  urge 
upon  your  attention  the  necessity  of  further  appropriations  to  increase 
the  number  of  ships  afloat  and  to  enlarge  generally  the  capacity  and  force 
of  the  Navy. .  The  increase  of  our  commerce' and  our  position  in  regard 
to  the  other  powers  of  the  world  will  always  make  it  our  policy  and 
interest  to  cherish  the  great  naval  resources  of  our  ootmtry. 
The  report  of  the  Postmaster-General  presents  a  gratifying  picture  of 
the  condition  of  the  Post-Office  Department.  Its  revenues  for  the  year 
ending  the  30th  June  last  were  $3,398,455.19,  showing  an  increase  of 
revenue  over  that  of  the  preceding  year  of  $404,878.53,  or  more  than  13 
per  cent.  The  expenditures  for  the  same  year  were  $2,755,623.76,  exhib- 
iting a  surplus  of  $642,831.43.  The  Department  has  been  redeemed 
from  embarrassment  and  debt,  has  accumulated  a  surplus  exceeding 
half  a  million  of  dollars,  has  largely  extended  and  is  preparing  still  fur- 
ther to  extend  the  mail  service,  and  recommends  a  reduction  of  postages 
equal  to  about  20  per  cent.  It  is  practicing  upon  the  great  principle 
which  should  control  every  branch  of  our  Government  of  rendering  to 
the  public  the  greatest  good  possible  with  the  least  possible  taxation 
to  the  people. 
The  scale  of  postages  suggested  by  the  Postmaster-General  recom- 
mends itself,  not  only  by  the  reduction  it  proposes,  but  by  the  simplicity 
of  its  arrangement,  its  conformity  with  the  Federal  currency,  and  the 
improvement  it  will  introduce  into  the  accounts  of  the  Department  and 
its  agents. 
Your  particular  attention  is  invited  to  the  subject  of  mail  contracts 
with  railroad  companies.  The  present  laws  providing  for  the  making  of 
contracts  are  based  upon  the  presumption  that  competition  among  bid- 
ders will  secure  the  service  at  a  fair  price;  but  on  most  of  the  railroad 
lines  there  is  no  competition  in  that  kind  of  transportation,  and  advertis- 
ing is  therefore  useless.  No  contract  can  now  be  made  with  them  except 
such  as  shall  be  negotiated  before  the  time  of  offering  or  afterwards,  and 
the  power  of  the  Postmaster-General  to  pay  them  high  prices  is  practi- 
cally without  limitation,     it  would  be  a  relief  to  him  and  no  doubt  would
1477  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
conduce  to  the  public  interest  to  prescribe  by  law  some  equitable  basis 
upon  which  such  contracts  shall  rest,  and  restrict  him  by  a  fixed  rule  of 
allowance.  Under  a  liberal  act  of  that  sort  he  would  undoubtedly  be 
able  to  secure  the  services  of  most  of  the  railroad  companies,  and  the 
interest  of  the  Department  would  be  thus  advanced. 
The  correspondence  between  the  people  of  the  United  States  and  the 
European  nations,  and  particularly  with  the  British  Islands,  has  become 
very  extensive,  and  requires  the  interposition  of  Congress  to  give  it  secu- 
rity. No  obstacle  is  perceived  to  an  interchange  of  mails  between  New 
York  and  I^iverpool  or  other  foreign  ports,  as  proposed  by  the  Postmaster- 
General.  On  the  contrary,  it  promises,  by  the  security  it  will  afford,  to 
facilitate  commercial  transactions  and  give  rise  to  an  enlarged  intercourse 
among  the  people  of  different  nations,  which  can  not  but  have  a  happy 
effect.  Through  the  dty  of  New  York  most  of  the  correspondence 
between  the  Canadas  and  Europe  is  now  carried  on,  and  urgent  repre- 
sentations have  been  received  from  the  head  of  the  provincial  post-office 
asking  the  interposition  of  the  United  States  to  guard  it  from  the  acci- 
dents and  losses  to  which  it  is  now  subjected.  Some  legislation  appears 
to  be  called  for  as  well  by  our  own  interest  as  by  comity  to  the  adjoining 
British  provinces. 
The  expediency  of  providing  a  fireproof  building  for  the  important 
books  and  papers  of  the  Post-Office  Department  is  worthy  of  considera- 
tion. In  the  present  condition  of  our  Treasury  it  is  neither  necessary 
nor  wise  to  leave  essential  public  interests  exposed  to  so  much  danger 
when  they  can  so  readily  be  made  secure.  There  are  weighty  consid- 
erations in  the  location  of  a  new  building  for  that  Department  in  favor 
of  placing  it  near  the  other  executive  buildings. 
The  important  subjects  of  a  survey  of  the  coast  and  the  manufacture 
of  a  standard  of  weights  and  measures  for  the  different  custom-houses 
have  been  in  progress  for  some  years  under  the  general  direction  of  the 
Executive  and  the  immediate  superintendence  of  a  gentleman  possessing 
high  scientific  attainments.  At  the  last  session  of  Congress  the  making 
of  a  set  of  weights  and  measures  for  each  State  in  the  Union  was  added 
to  the  others  by  a  joint  resolution. 
The  care  and  correspondence  as  to  all  these  subjects  have  been  devolved 
on  the  Treasury  Department  during  the  last  year.  A  special  report  from 
the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  will  soon  be  communicated  to  Congress, 
which  will  show  what  has  been  accomplished  as  to  the  whole,  the  num- 
ber and  compensation  of  the  persons  now  employed  in  these  duties,  and 
the  progress  expected  to  be  made  during  the  ensuing  year,  with  a  copy 
of  the  various  correspondence  deemed  necessary  to  throw  light  on  the 
subjects  which  seem  to  require  additional  legislation.  Claims  have  been 
made  for  retrospective  allowances  in  behalf  of  the  superintendent  and 
some  of  his  assistants,  which  I  did  not  feel  justified  in  granting.  Other 
claims  have  been  made  for  large  increases  in  compensation,  which,  under
Andrew  Jackson  1478 
all  the  circumstances  of  the  several  cases,  I  declined  making  without  the 
express  sanction  of  Congress.  In  order  to  obtain  that  sanction  the  sub- 
ject was  at  the  last  session,  on  my  suggestion  and  by  request  of  the 
immediate  superintendent,  submitted  by  the  Treasury  Department  to 
the  Committee  on  Commerce  of  the  House  of  Representatives.  But  no 
^  legislative  action  having  taken  place,  the  early  attention  of  Congress  is 
now  invited  to  the  enactment  of  some  express  and  detailed  provisions 
in  relation  to  the  various  claims  made  for  the  past,  and  to  the  compensa- 
tion and  allowances  deemed  proper  for  the  future. 
It  is  further  respectfully  recommended  that,  such  being  the  incon- 
venience of  attention  to  these  duties  by  the  Chief  Magistrate,  and  such 
the  great  pressure  of  business  on  the  Treasury  Department,  the  general 
supervision  of  the  coast  survey  and  the  completion  of  the  weights  and 
measures,  if  the  works  are  kept  tmited,  should  be  devolved  on  a  board 
of  officers  organized  specially  for  that  purpose,  or  on  the  Navy  Board 
attached  to  the  Navy  Department. 
All  my  experience  and  reflection  confirm  the  conviction  I  have  so  often 
expressed  to  Congress  in  favor  of  an  amendment  of  the  Constitution 
which  will  prevent  in  any  event  the  election  of  the  President  and  Vice- 
President  of  the  United  States  devolving  on  the  House  of  Representatives 
and  the  Senate,  and  I  therefore  beg  leave  again  to  solicit  your  attention 
to  the  subject.  There  were  various  other  suggestions  in  my  last  annual 
message  not  acted  upon,  particularly  that  relating  to  the  want  of  uni- 
formity in  the  laws  of  the  District  of  Columbia,  that  are  deemed  worthy 
of  your  favorable  consideration. 
Before  concluding  this  paper  I  think  it  due  to  the  various  Executive 
Departments  to  bear  testimony  to  their  prosperous  condition  and  to  the 
ability  and  integrity  with  which  they  have  been  conducted.  It  has  been 
my  aim  to  enforce  in  all  of  them  a  vigilant  and  faithful  discharge  of  the 
public  business,  and  it  Is  gratifying  to  me  to  believe  that  there  is  no  just 
cause  of  complaint  from  any  quarter  at  the  manner  in  which  they  have 
fulfilled  the  objects  of  their  creation. 
Having  now  finished  the  observations  deemed  proper  on  this  the  last 
occasion  I  shall  have  of  communicating  with  the  two  Houses  of  Congress 
at  their  meeting,  I  can  not  omit  an  expressic  *  of  the  gratitude  which 
is  due  to  the  great  body  of  my  fellow-citizens,  in  whose  partiality  and 
indulgence  I  have  found  encouragement  and  support  in  the  many  difficult 
and  trying  scenes  through  which  it  has  been  my  lot  to  pass  during  my 
public  career.  Though  deeply  sensible  that  my  exertions  have  not  been 
crowned  with  a  success  corresponding  to  the  degree  of  favor  bestowed 
upon  me,  I  am  sure  that  they  will  be  considered  as  having  been  directed 
by  an  earnest  desire  to  promote  the  good  of  my  country,  and  I  am  con- 
soled by  the  persuasion  that  whatever  errors  have  been  committed  will 
find  a  corrective  in  the  intelligence  and  patriotism  of  those  who  will  suc- 
ceed us.     All  that  has  occurred  during  my  Administration  is  calculated
1479 
Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
tp  inspire  me  with  increased  confidence  in  the  stability  of  our  institu- 
tions; and  should  I  be  spared  to  enter  upon  that  retirement  which  is  so 
suitable  to  my  age  and  infirm  health  and  so  much  desired  by  me  in  other 
respects,  1  shall  not  cease  to  invoke  that  beneficent  Being  to  whose  provi- 
dence we  are  already  so  signally  indebted  for  the  continuance  of  His 
blessings  on  our  beloved  country.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
A. — Statement  of  distribution  of  surplus  revenue  of  $30^000^000  among  the  several 
States^  agreeably  to  the  number  of  electoral  votes  for  President  and  according  to 
the  constitutional  mode  of  direct  taxation  by  representative  population  ^  and  the 
difference  arising  from^  those  two  modes  of  distribution^  as  per  census  of  i8jo. 
SUte. 
Represent* 
Elect- 
oral 
vote. 
Share  ac- 
cording to 
system  of 
direct  tax- 
aUon. 
Share  ac- 
cording to 
electoral 
vote. 
in  favor  of 
direct-Ux 
mode. 
Difference 
in  favor  of 
electoral- 
vote  mode. 
Maine   
399.454 
269,327 
610,408 
97.192 
997,665 
a8o,652 
1.918,578 
319*  921 
1,348,072 
75.431 
405.842 
1,023,502 
639.747 
455,025 
429,811 
262,507 
110,357 
171,904 
6?5.263 
621,832 
937,901 
343.  <^ 
157.  M6 
130,419 
28,557 
31,   IS 
xo 
II 
II 
1999,371 
673.813 
1,527.144 
243. 1S9 
744.711 
702,147 
4.799.978 
800,392 
3,372,662 
188,716 
1.015.352 
2.560,640 
1,600,546 
1,138,400 
1,075.319 
656.751 
276,096 
430.076 
1.564.309 
1.555.725 
2.346,479 
858,206 
393.154 
326,288 
71.445 
79,121 
|i,  oap,  408 
714.286 
1,428.571 
408,163 
816,327 
714.286 
4.285,714 
816,427 
3,061,225 
306,122 
1, 020, 408 
2,346,939 
1,530.612 
1,122,449 
1,122,449 
714.286 
408,163 
510,204 
1,530,612 
i.5y>,6i2 
2, 142. 858 
918,368 
510,204 
408,163 
306, 122 
306,102 
$21,037 
40,473 
New  Hampfthire . . 
Massachusetts  .... 
Rhode  IsUnd   
Connecticut   
I98.573 
165,004 
71,616 
12,139 
New  York   
514.264 
Pennsylvania   
Delaware  >........ 
15,935 
311.437 
117,406 
5,056 
Maryland   
Virginia   
213.701 
69,934 
15.951 
North  Carolina.... 
Georgia   
Alatmna   
47.130 
57,535 
132,067 
80,128 
Mississippi   
I/yuisiana   
Tennessee   
Kentucky   
33.697 
25,113 
203,621 
Ohio   
Indiana   
60,162 
117,050 
81,875 
234.677 
227,001 
Illinois   
Missouri   
ArkansaSr  t  . . .  r . . .  t 
Michigan   
Total   
11,991,10^ 
294 
30,000,000 
30,000,000 
1,486,291 
1,486,291 
SPECIAL  MESSAGES. 
Washington,  December  6,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives: 
I  transmit  herewith  to  Congress  copies  of  my  correspondence  with  Mrs. 
Madison,  produced  by  the  resolution  adopted  at  the  last  session  by  the 
Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  on  the  decease  of  her  venerated
Andrew  Jackson  1480 
husband.  The  occasion  seems  to  be  appropriate  to  present  a  letter  from 
her  on  the  subject  of  the  pjiblication  of  a  work  of  great  political  inter- 
est and  ability,  carefully  prepared  by  Mr.  Madison's  own  hand,  under 
circumstances  that  give  it  claims  to  be  considered  as  little  less  than 
official. 
Congress  has  already,  at  considerable  expense,  published  in  a  variety 
of  forms  the  naked  journals  of  the  Revolutionary  Congress  and  of  the 
Convention  that  formed  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  I  am 
persuaded  that  the  work  of  Mr.  Madison,  considering  the  author,  the 
subject-matter  of  it,  and  the  circumstances  under  which  it  was  prepared — 
long  withheld  from  the  public,  as  it  has  been,  by  those  motives  of  personal 
kindness  and  delicacy  that  gave  tone  to  his  intercourse  with  his  fellow- 
men,  until  he  and  all  who  had  been  participators  with  him  in  the  scenes  ^ 
he  describes  have  passed  away^— well  deserves  to  become  the  property  of 
the  nation,  and  can  not  fail,  if  pubUshed  and  disseminated  at  the  public 
charge,  to  confer  the  most  important  of  all  benefits  on  the  present  and 
all  succeeding  generations — accurate  knowledge  of  the  principles  of  their 
Government  and  the  circumstances  under  which  they  were  recommended 
and  embodied  in  the  Constitution  for  adoption. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Department  o?  State, /w/j'  9, 1836. 
The  Secretary  of  State  has  the  honor  to  report  to  the  President  that  there  is  no 
resolution  of  Congress  on  the  death  of  Mr.  Madison  on  file  in  the  De^rtment  of 
State.  By  application  at  the  offices  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Senate  and  Clerk  of  the 
House  of  Representatives  the  inclosed  certified  copy  of  a  set  of  resolutions  has  been  , 
procured.  These  resolutions,  being  joint,  should  have  been  enrolled,  signed  by 
the  presiding  officers  of  the  two  Houses,  and  submitted  for  the  Executive  appro- 
bation. By  referring  to  the  proceedings  on  the  death  of  General  Washington  such 
a  course  appears  to  have  been  thought  requisite,  but  in  this  case  it  has  been  deemed 
unnecessary  or  has  been  omitted  accidentally.  The  value  of  the  public  expression 
of  sympathy  would  be  so  much  diminished  by  postponement  to  the  next  session 
that  the  Secretary  has  thought  it  best  to  present  the  papers,  incomplete  as  they 
are,  as  the  basis  of  such  a  letter  as  the  President  may  think  proper  to  direct  to  Mrs. 
Madison. 
JOHN  FORSYTH,, 
Secretary  o/Stqfe. 
Washington,  y«/y  9, 1836. 
Mrs.  D.  P.  Madison, 
Monipelier^  Va, 
Madam:  It  appearing  to  have  been  the  intention  of  Congress  to  make  me  the 
organ  of  assuring  you  of  the  profound  respect  entertained  by  both  its  branches  for 
your  person  and  character,  and  of  their  sincere  condolence  in  the  late  afflicting  dis- 
pensation of  Providence,  which  has  at  once  deprived  you  of  a  beloved  Companion 
and  your  country  of  one  of  its  most  valued  citizens,  I  perform  that  duty  by  trans- 
mitting the  dociunents  herewith  inclosed. 
No  expression  of  my  own  sensibility  at  the  loss  sustained  by  yourself  and  the  nation 
could  add  to  the  consolation  to  be  derived  from  these  high  evidences  of  the  public 
sympathy.     Be  assured,  madam,  that  there  is  not  one  of  your  countrymen  who  feels
148 1  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
more  poi^antly  the  stroke  which  has  fallen  upon  you  or  who  will  cherish  with  a 
more  endearing  constancy  the  memory  of  the  virtues,  the  services,  and  the  parity  of 
the  illustrious  man  whose  glorious  and  patriotic  life' has  been  just  terminated  by  a 
tranquil  death. 
I  have  the  honor  to  be,  madam,  your  most  obedient  servant, 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
The  President  of  the  United  States  having  communicated  to  the  two  Houses  of 
Congress  the  melancholy  intelligence  of  the  death  of  their  illustrious  and  beloved 
fellow-citizen,  James  Madison,  of  Virginia,  late  President  of  the  United  States,  and 
the  two  Houses  sharing  in  the  general  grief  which  this  distressing  event  must 
produce: 
Resolved  by  the  Senate  and  House  0/ Representatives  0/ the  United  States  of  America 
in  Confess  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  present 
session,  and  that  the  President  of  the  Senate,  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives, and  the  members  and  officers  of  both  Houses  wear  the  usual  badge  of 
mourning  for  thirty  days. 
Resolved^  That  it  be  recommended  to  the  people  of  the  United  States  to  wear  crape 
on  the  left  arm,  as  mourning,  for  thirty  days. 
Resolved ^  That  the  President  of  the  United  States  be  requested  to  transmit  a  copy 
of  these  resolutions  to  Mrs.  Madison,  and  to  assure  her  of  the  profound  respect  of 
the  two  Houses  of  Congress  for  her  person  and  character  and  of  their  sincere  condo* 
lence  on  the  late  afflicting  dispensation  of  Providence. 
MONTPEUBR,  August  90,  J836. 
The  Prbsidbnt  op  the  Unxtbd  Statss: 
I  received,  sir,  in  due  time,  your  letter  oonvepng  to  me  the  resolutions  Congress 
were  pleased  to  adopt  on  the  occasion  of  the  death  of  my  beloved  husband— a  com- 
munication made  the  more  grateful  by  the  kind  expression  of  your  sympathy  which 
it  contained. 
The  high  and  just  estimation  of  my  husband  by  my  countrymen  and  friends 
and  their  generous  participation  in  the  sorrow  occasioned  by  our  irretrievable  loss, 
expressed  through  their  supreme  authorities  and  otherwise,  are  the  only  solace  of 
which  my  heart  is  susceptible  on  the  departure  of  him  who  had  never  lost  sight  of 
that,  consistency,  symmetry,  and  beauty  of  character  in  all  its  parts  which  secured 
to  him  the  love  and  admiration  of  his  country,  and  which  must  ever  be  the  subject 
of  peculiar  and  tender  reverence  to  one  whose  happiness  was  derived  from  their 
daily  and  constant  exercise. 
The  best  return  I  can  make  for  the  sympathy  of  my  country  is  to  fulfill  the  sacred 
trust  his  confidence  reposed  in  me,  that  of  placing  before  it  and  the  world  what  his 
pen  prepared  for  their  use  a  legacy  the  importance  of  which  is  deeply  impressed 
on  my  mind. 
With  great  respect,  D.  P.  MADISON. 
MoMTPBUBR,  November  /j,  1836, 
The  Prssidbnt  of  thb  Unitbd  Statbs. 
Sir:  The  will  of  my  late  husband,  James  Madison,  contains  the  following  pro* 
vision: 
"Considering  the  peculiarity  and  magnitude  of  the  occasion  which  produced  the 
Convention  at  Philadelphia  in  1787,  the  characters  who  composed  it,  the  Constitu- 
tion which  resulted  from  their  deliberations,  its  effects  during  a  trial  of  so  many 
years  on  the  prosperity  of  the  people  living  under  it,  and  the  interest  it  has  inspired 
among  the  friends  of  free  government,  it  is  not  an  unreasonable  inference  that  a
Andrezv  Jackson  1482 
\ 
careful  and  extended  report  of  the  proceedings  and  discussions  of  that  body,  which 
were  with  closed  doors,  by  a  member  who  was  constant  in  his  -•.ttendance,  will  be 
particularly  gratifying  to  the  people  of  the  United  States  and  to  all  who  take  an 
mterest  in  the  progress  of  political  science  and  the  cause  of  true  liberty." 
This  provision  bears  evidence  of  the  value  he  set  on  his  report  of  the  debates  in 
the  Convention,  and  he  has  charged  legacies  on  them  alone  to  the  amount  of  |i,2oo 
for  the  benefit  of  literary  institutions  and  for  benevolent  purposes,  leaving  the  residu- 
ary net  proceeds  for  the  use  of  his  widow. 
In  a^  paper  written  by  him,  and  which  it  is  proposed  to  annex  as  a  preface  to  the 
Debates,  he  traces  the  formation  of  confederacies  and  of  the  Articles  of  Confedera- 
tion, its  defects  which  caused  and  the  steps  which  led  to  the  Convention,  his  reasons 
for  taking  the  debates  and  the  manner  in  which  he  executed  the  task,  and  his  opin- 
ion of  the  framers  of  the  Constitution.  From  this  I  extract  his  description  of  the 
manner  in  which  they  were  taken,  as  it  guarantees  their  fullness  and  accuracy: 
''In  pursuance  of  the  task  I  had  assumed,  I  chose  a  seat  in  front  of  the  presiding 
member,  with  the  other  members  on  my  right  and  left  hands.  In  this  favorable 
position  for  hearing  all  that  passed  I  noted  down,  in  terms  legible  and  in  abbrevia- 
tions and  marks  intelligible  to  myself,  what  was  read  from  the  chair  or  spoken  by 
the  members,  and  losing  not  a  moment  unnecessarily  between  the  adjournment  and 
reassembling  of  the  Convention,  I  was  enabled  to  write  out  my  daily  notes  during 
the  session,  or  within  a  few  finishing  days  after  its  close,  in  the  extent  and  form 
preserved  in  jxiy  own  hand  on  my  files. 
'*  In  the  labor  and  correctness  of  this  I  was  not  a  little  aided  by  practice  and  by  a 
familiarity  with  the  style  and  the  train  of  observation  and  reasoning  whidh  charac- 
terized the  principal  speakers.  It  happened  also  that  I  was  not  absent  a  single  day, 
nor  more  than  the  casual  fraction  of  an  hour  in  any  day,  so  that  I  could  not  have 
lost  a  single  speech,  unless  a  very  short  one.'* 
However  prevailing  the  restraint  which  veiled  during  the  life  of  Mr.  Madison 
this  record  of  the  creation  of  our  Constitution,  the  grave,  which  has  closed  over  all 
those  who  participated  in  its  formation,  has  separated  their  acts  from  all  that  is 
personal  to  him  or  to  them.  His  anxiety  for  their  early  publicity  after  this  was 
removed  may  be  inferred  from  his  having  them  transcribed  and  revised  by  him- 
self; and,  it  may  be  added,  the  known  wishes  of  his  illnstrious  friend  Thomas  Jef- 
ferson and  other  distinguished  patriots,  the  important  light  they  would  shed  for 
present  as  well  as  future  usefulness,  besides  my  desire  to  fulfill  the  pecuniary  obli- 
gations imposed  by  his  will,  urged  their  appearance  without  awaiting  the  preparation 
of  his  other  works,  and  early  measures  were  accordingly  adopted  by  me  to  ascertain 
from  publishers  in  various  parts  of  the  Union  the  terms  on  which  their  publication 
could  be  effected. 
It  was  also  intended  to  publish  with  these  debates  those  taken  by  him  in  the  Con- 
gress of  the  Confederation  in  1782, 1783,  and  1787,  of  which  he  was  then  a  member, 
and  selections  made  by  himself  and  prepared  under  his  eye  from  his  letters  narrating 
the  proceedings  of  that  body  during  the  periods  of  his  service  in  it,  prefixing  the 
debates  in  1776  on  the  Declaration  of  Independence  by  Thomas  Jefferson  so  as  to 
embody  all  the  memorials  in  that  shape  known  to  exist.  This  expos^  of  the  situa- 
tion of  the  country  under  the  Confederation  and  the  defects  of  the  old  system  of 
government  evidenced  in  the  proceedings  under  it  seem  to  convey  such  preceding 
information  as  should  accompany  the  debates  on  the  formation  of  the  Constitution 
by  which  it  was  superseded. 
The  proposals  which  have  been  received,  so  far  from  corresponding  with  the  expec- 
tations of  Mr.  Madison  when  he  charged  the  first  of  these  works  with  those  lega- 
cies, have  evidenced  that  their  publication  could  not  be  engaged  in  by  me  without 
advances  of  funds  and  involving  of  risks  which  I  am  not  in  a  situation  to  make  or 
mcuv.
1483  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
Under  these  circumstances,  I  have  been  induced  to  submit  for  your  consideration 
whether  the  publication  of  these  debates  be  a  matter  of  sufficient  interest  to  the 
people  of  the  United  States  to  deserve  to  be  brought  to  the  notice  of  Congress;  and 
should  such  be  the  estimation  of  the  utility  of  these  works  by  the  representatives  of 
the  nation  as  to  induce  them  to  relieve  me  individually  from  the  obstacles  which 
impede  it,  their  general  circulation  will  be  insured  and  the  people  be  remunerated 
by  its  more  economical  distribution  among  them«  » 
With  high  respect  and  consideration,  D.  P.  MADISON. 
Washington,  December  6, 1836. 
To  the  Senate  and  H(mse  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
•    I  transmit  to  Congress  a  report  from  the  Commissioner  of  the  Public 
Buildings,  showing  the  progress  made  in  the  construction  of  the  pub- 
lic buildings  which  by  the  act  of  the  4th  of  July  last  the  President  was 
authorized  to  cause  to  be  erected. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Dhcsmbbr  20,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives. 
Genti^mkn:  Herewith  I  transmit  a  report  of  the  Postmaster-General, 
and  recommend  the  passage  of  such  laws  and  the  making  of  such  appro- 
priations as  may  be  necessary  to  carry  into  effect  the  measures  adopted 
by  him  for  resuming  the  business  of  the  Department  under  his  charge 
and  securing  the  public  property  in  the  old  Post-OflSce  building. 
It  is  understood  that  the  building  procured  for  the  temporary  use  of 
the  Department  is  far  from  being  fireproof,  and  that  the  valuable  books 
and  papers  saved  from  the  recent  conflagration  will  there  be  exposed  to 
similar  dangers.  I  therefore  feel  it  my  duty  to  recommend  an  immediate 
appropriation  for  the  construction  of  a  fireproof  General  Post-Office,  that 
the  materials  may  be  obtained  within  the  present  winter  and  the  build- 
ings erected  as  rapidly  as  practicable. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Post-Offich  Department,  December  20, 1836. 
The  Prbsibbnt  of  the  United  States. 
Sir:  On  the  morning  of  the  15th  instant  I  performed  the  painful  duty  of  reporting 
to  you  orally  the  destruction  of  the  General  Post-Office  building  by  fire,  and  received 
your  instructions  to  inquire  into  the  cause  and  extent  of  the  calamity,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  enabling  you  to  make  a  communication  to  Congress. 
A  few  hours  afterwards  I  received,  through  the  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  the 
Post-Office  and  Post-Roads  of  the  House  of  Representatives,  an  official  copy  of  a  reso- 
lution adopted  by  that  House,  instructing  the  committee  to  institute  a  similar  inquiry, 
and  the  chairman  asked  for  such  information  as  it  was  in  my  power  to  give.  The 
investigation  directed  by  you  was  thus  rendered  unnecessary. 
The  corporation  of  the  city  of  Washington  with  honorable  promptitude  offered  the 
Department  the  use  of  the  west  wing  of  the  City  Hall,  now  occupied  by  the  mayor 
and  councils  and  their  officers  and  the  officers  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Canal 
Company.     The  proprietors  of  the  medical  college  also  tendered  the  use  of  their
Andrew  Jackson  1484 
\ 
building  on  E  street,  and  offers  were  made  of  several  otlier  buildings  in  the  central 
parts  of  the  city.  An  examination  was  made  of  such  as  promise  by  their  mag^iitude 
to  afford  sufficient  room  for  the  force  employed  in  the  Department,  but  none  wexc 
found  equal  in  the  commodiousness  of  their  interior  structure  and  abundant  room  to 
Fuller's  Hotel,  opposite  the  buildings  occupied  by  the  Treasury  Department  on  Penn- 
sylvania avenue.  That  building  has  been  obtained  on  terms  which  the  accompany- 
ing papers  (marked  i  and  2)  will  fully  exhibit.  The  business  of  the  Department 
will  be  immediately  resumed  in  that  building. 
The  agreement  with  Mr.  Fuller  will  make  necessary  an  immediate  appropriation 
by  Congress,  and  upon  that  body  will  devolve  also  the  duty  of  providing  for  the  pay- 
ment of  the  rent,  if  they  shall  approve  of  the  arrangement. 
In  the  meantime  steps  have  been  taken  to  secure  all  that  is  valuable  in  the  ruins 
of  the  Post-OfiSce  building,  and  to  protect  from  the  weather  the  walls  of  so  much  of 
it  as  was  occupied  by  the  General  Post-0fl5ce  which  stand  firm. 
The  Department  has  no  fund  at  command  out  of  which  the  services  necessary  in 
the  accomplishment  of  these  objects  can  be  paid  for,  nor  has  it  the  means  to  replace 
the  furniture  which  has  been  lost  and  must  be  immediately  obtained  to  enable  the 
clerks  to  proceed  with  their  current  business. 
These  facts  I  deem  it  my  duty  to  report  to  you,  that  you  may  recommend  to  Con- 
gress such  measures  thereupon  as  you  may  deem  expedient. 
With  the  highest  respect,  your  obedient  servant, 
AMOS  KENDALL. 
Washington,  December  20,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  herewith,  for  the  consideration  and  action  of  the  Senate, 
treaties  concluded  with  the  loways  and  Sacs  of  Missouri,  with  the  Siotix, 
with  the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  and  with  the  Otoes  and  Missourias  and  Oma- 
has,  by  which  they  have  relinquished  their  rights  in  the  lands  lying 
between  the  State  of  Missouri  and  the  Missouri  River,  ceded  in  the  first 
article  of  the  treaty  with  them  of  Jtdy  15, 1830. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December  20,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  herewith  to  the  Senate,  for  their  consideration  in  reference 
to  its  ratification,  a  treaty  of  peace  and  friendship  between  the  United 
States  of  America  and  the  Emperor  of  Morocco,  concluded  at  Meccanez 
on  the  i6th  of  September,  1836,  with  a  report  of  the  Secretary  of  Stat^* 
and  the  documents  therein  mentioned. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December  21,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  0/  Representatives  of  the  United  Sides: 
During  the  last  session  information  was  given  to  Congress  by  the  Ex- 
ecutive that  measures  had  been  taken  to  ascertain  **  tlje  political,  mili- 
tary, and  civij  condition  of  Texas.  * '    I  now  submit  for  your  consideration
1485  Afessages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidculs 
extracts  from  the  report  of  the  agent  who  had  been  appointed  to  collect 
it  relative  to  the  condition  of  that  country. 
No  steps  have  been  taken  by  the  Bxecntive  toward  the  acknowledge 
ment  of  the  independence  of  Texas,  and  the  whole  subject  would  have 
been  left  without  further  remark  on  the  information  now  given  to  Con- 
gress were  it  not  that  the  two  Houses  at  their  last  session,  acting  sepa- 
rately, passed  resolutions  '*that  the  independence  of  Texas  ought  to  be 
acknowledged  by  the  United  States  whenever  satisfactory  information 
should  be  received  that  it  had  in  successful  operation  a  civil  government 
capable  of  performing  the  duties  and  fulfilling  the  obligations  of  an  inde- 
pendent power. ' '  This  mark  of  interest  in  the  question  of  the  independ- 
ence of  Texas  and  indication  of  the  views  of  Congress  make  it  proper 
that  I  should  somewhat  in  detail  present  the  considerations  that  have 
governed  the  Executive  in  continuing  to  occupy  the  ground  previously 
taken  in  the  contest  between  Mexico  and  Texas. 
The  acknowledgment  of  a  new  state  as  independent  and  entitled  to  a 
place  in  the  family  of  nations  is  at  all  times  an  act  of  great  delicacy  and 
responsibility,  but  more  especially  so  when  such  state  has  forcibly  sep- 
arated itself  from  another  of  which  it  had  formed  an  integral  part  and 
which  still  claims  dominion  over  it.  A  premature  recognition  under  these 
circumstances,  if  not  looked  upon  as  justifiable  cause  of  war,  is  always 
liable  to  be  regarded  as  a  proof  of  an  unfriendly  spirit  to  one  of  the  con- 
tending parties.  All  questions  relative  to  the  government  of  foreign 
nations,  whether  of  the  Old  or  the  New  World,  have  been  treated  by  the 
United  States  as  questions  of  fact  only,  and  our  predecessors  have  cau- 
tiotisly  abstained  from  deciding  upon  them  until  the  clearest  evidence 
was  in  their  possession  to  enable  them  not  only  to  decide  correctly,  but 
to  shield  their  decisions  from  every  unworthy  imputation.  In  all  the 
contests  that  have  arisen  out  of  the  revolutions  of  Prance,  out  of  the  dis- 
putes relating  to  the  crowns  of  Portugal  and  Spain,  out  of  the  revo- 
lutionary movements  of  those  Kingdoms,  out  of  the  separation  of  the 
American  possessions  of  both  from  the  Eu2X)pean  Governments,  and  out 
of  the  numerous  and  constantly  occurring  struggles  for  dominion  in 
Spanish  America,  so  wisely  consistent  with  our  just  principles  has  been 
the  action  of  our  Government  that  we  have  under  the  most  critical  cir- 
cumstances avoided  all  censure  and  encountered  no  other  evil  than  that 
produced  by  a  transient  estrangement  of  good  will  in  those  against  whom 
we  have  been  by  force  of  evidence  compelled  to  decide. 
It  has  thus  been  made  known  to  the  world  that  the  uniform  policy  and 
practice  of  the  United  States  is  to  avoid  all  interference  in  disputes  which 
merely  relate  to  the  internal  government  of  other  nations,  and  eventually 
to  recognize  the  authority  of  the  prevailing  party,  without  reference  to 
our  particular  interests  and  views  or  to  the  merits  of  the  original  contro- 
versy. Public  opinion  here  is  so  ^rmly  established  and  well  understood 
in  favor  of  this  policy  that  no  serious  disagreement  has  ever  arisen  among
Andrew  Jcicksan  i486 
ourselves  in  relation  to  it,  altlious:h  brought  under  review  in  a  variety  of 
forms  and  at  periods  when  the  minds  of  the  people  were  greatly  excited 
by  the  agitation  of  topics  purely  domestic  in  their  character.  Nor  has 
any  deliberate  inquiry  ever  been  instituted  in  Congress  or  in  any  of  our 
legislative  bodies  as  to  whom  belonged  the  power  of  originally  recogniz- 
ing a  new  State — a  power  the  exercise  of  which  is  equivalent  under  some 
drcumstances  to  a  declaration  of  war;  a  power  nowhere  expressly  dele- 
gated,  and  only  granted  in  the  Constitution  as  it  is  necessarily  involved 
in  some  of  the  great  powers  given  to  Congress,  in  that  given  to  the  Presi- 
dent and  Senate  to  form  treaties  with  foreign  powers  and  to  appoint 
ambassadors  and  other  public  ministers,  and  in  that  conferred  upon  the 
President  to  receive  ministers  from  foreign  nations. 
In  the  preamble  to  the  resolution  of  the  House  of  Representatives  it  is 
distinctly  intimated  that  the  expediency  of  recognizing  the  independence 
of  Texas  should  be  left  to  the  decision  of  Congress.  In  this  view,  on 
the  ground  of  expediency,  I  am  disposed  to  concur,  and  do  not,  there- 
fore,  consider  it  necessary  to  express  any  opinion  as  to  the  strict  consti- 
tutional right  of  the  Bxecutive,  either  apart  from  or  in  conjunction  with 
the  Senate,  over  the  subject.  It  is  to  be  presumed  that  on  no  future 
occasion  will  a  dispute  arise,  as  none  has  heretofore  occurred,  between 
the  Executive  and  I^egislature  in  the  exercise  of  the  power  of  recog- 
nition. It  will  always  be  considered  consistent  with  the  spirit  of  the 
Constitution,  and  most  safe,  that  it  should  be  exercised,  when  probably 
leading  to  war,  with  a  previous  understanding  with  that  body  by  whom 
war  can  alone  be  declared,  and  by  whom  all  the  provisions  for  sustain- 
ing its  perils  must  be  furnished.  Its  submission  to  Congress,  which 
represents  in  one  of  its  branches  the  States  of  this  Union  and  in  the 
other  the  people  of  the  United  States,  where  there  may  be  reasonable 
ground  to  apprehend  so  grave  a  consequence,  would  certainly  afford 
the  fullest  satisfaction  to  our  own  coimtry  and  a  perfect  guaranty  to  all 
other  nations  of  the  justice  and  prudence  of  the  measures  which  might 
be  adopted. 
In  making  these  suggestions  it  is  not  my  purpose  to  relieve  myself 
from  the  responsibility  of  expressing  my  own  opinions  of  the  course  the 
interests  of  our  country  prescribe  and  its  honor  permits  us  tp  follow. 
It  is  scarcely  to  be  imagined  that  a  question  of  this  character  could  be 
presented  in  relation  to  which  it  would  be  more  difficult  for  the  United 
States  to  avoid  exciting  the  suspicion  and  jealousy  of  other  powers,  and 
maintain  their  established  character  for  fair  and  impartial  dealing.  But 
on  this,  as  on  every  trying  occasion,  safety  is  to  be  found  in  a  rigid 
adherence  to  principle. 
In  the  contest  between  Spain  and  her  revolted  colonies  we  stood  aloof 
and  waited,  not  only  until  the  ability  of  the  new  States  to  protect  them- 
selves was  fully  established,  but  until  the  danger  of  their  being  again 
subjugated  had  entirely  passed  away.     Then,  and  not  till  then,  were
1487  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presideiits 
they  recognized.  Such  was  our  course  in  regard  to  Mexico  herself.  The 
same  policy  was  observed  in  all  the  disputes  growing  out  of  the  separa- 
tion into  distinct  governments  of  those  Spanish  American  States  who 
began  or  carried  on  the  contest  with  the  parent  country  united  under  one 
form  of  government.  We  acknowledged  the  separate  independence  of 
New  Granada,  of  Venezuela,  and  of  Ecuador  only  after  their  independent 
existence  was  no  longer  a  subject  of  dispute  or  was  actually  acquiesced 
in  by  those  with  whom  they  had  been  previously  united.  It  is  true  that, 
with  regard  to  Texas,  the  civil  authority  of  Mexico  has  been  expelled, 
its  invading  army  defeated,  the  chief  of  the  Republic  himself  captured, 
and  all  present  power  to  control  the  newly  organized  Government  of 
Texas  annihilated  within  its  confines.  But,  On  the  other  hand,  there  is, 
in  appearance  at  least,  an  immense  disparity  of  physical  force  on  the  side 
of  Mexico.  The  Mexican  Republic  under  another  executive  is  rallying 
its  forces  under  a  new  leader  and  menacing  a  fresh  invasion  to  recover  its 
lost  dominion. 
Upon  the  issue  of  this  threatened  invasion  the  independence  of  Texas 
may  be  considered  as  suspended,  and  were  there  nothing  peculiar  in  the 
relative  situation  of  the  United  States  and  Texas  our  acknowledgment 
of  its  independence  at  such  a  crisis  could  scarcely  be  regarded  as  consist* 
ent  with  that  prudent  reserve  with  which  we  have  heretofore  held  our- 
selves bound  to  treat  all  similar  questions.  But  there  are  circumstances 
in  the  relations  of  the  two  countries  which  require  us  to  act  on  this  occa^ 
sion  with  even  more  than  our  wonted  caution.  Texas  was  once  claimed 
as  a  part  of  our  property,  and  there  are  those  among  our  citizens  who, 
always  reluctant  to  abandon  that  claim,  can  not  but  regard  with  solici- 
tude the  prApect  of  the  reunion  of  the  territory  to  this  country.  A  large 
proportion  of  its  civilized  inhabitants  are  emigrants  from  the  United 
States,  speak  the  same  language  with  ourselves,  cherish  the  same  princi- 
ples, political  and  religious,  and  are  bound  to  many  of  our  citizens  by  ties 
of  friendship  and  kindred  blood;  and,  more  than  all,  it  is  known  that  the 
people  of  that  country  have  instituted  the  same  form  of  government  with 
our  own,  and  have  since  the  close  of  your  last  session  openly  resolved,  on 
the  acknowledgment  by  us  of  their  independence,  to  seek  admission 
into  the  Union  as  one  of  the  Federal  States.  This  last  circumstance  is 
a  matter  of  peculiar  delicacy,  and  forces  upon  us  considerations  of  the 
gravest  character.  The  title  of  Texas  to  the  territory  she  claims  is  iden- 
tified with  her  independence.  /  She  asks  us  to  acknowledge  that  title  to 
the  territory,  with  an  avowed  design  to  treat  immediately  of  its  transfer 
to  the  United  States.  It  becomes  us  to  beware  of  a  too  early  movement, 
as  it  might  subject  us,  however  unjustly,  to  the  imputation  of  seeking  to 
establish  the  claim  of  our  neighbors  to  a  territory  with  a  view  to  its  sub- 
sequent acquisition  by  ourselves.  Prudence,  therefore,  seems  to  dictate 
that  we  should  still  stand  aloof  and  maintain  our  present  attitude,  if  not 
until  Mexico  itself  or  one  of  the  great  foreign  powers  shall  recognize  the
A  ndrew  Jacksoii  1488 
Midependence  of  the  new  Government,  at  least  until  the  lapse  of  time  or 
the  course  of  events  shall  have  proved  beyond  cavil  or  dispute  the  ability 
of  the  people  of  that  country  to  maintain  their  separate  sovereignty  and 
to  uphold  the  Government  constituted  by  them.  Neither  of  the  contend- 
ing jjarties  can  justly  complain  of  this  course.  By  pursuing  it  we  are  but 
carrying  out  the  long-established  policy  of  otu-  Government — a  policy 
which  has  secured  to  us  respect  and  influence  abroad  and  inspired  confi- 
dence at  home. 
Having  thus  discharged  my  duty,  by  presenting  with  simplicity  and 
directness  the  views  which  after  much  reflection  I  have  been  led  to  take 
of  this  important  subject,  I  have  only  to  add  the  expression  of  my  confi- 
dence that  if  Congress  shall  differ  with  me  upon  it  their  judgment  will 
be  the  result  of  dispassionate,  prudent,  and  wise  deliberation,  with  the 
assurance  that  during  the  short  time  I  shall  continue  connected  with 
the  Government  I  shall  promptly  and  cordially  unite  with  you  in  such 
measures  as  may  be  deemed  best  fitter?  to  increase  the  prosperity  and 
perpetuate  the  peace  of  our  favored  country. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Dbcembbr  26,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  herewith  transmit  to  the  Senate  the  report  of  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,  giving  all  the  information  required  by  their  resolution  of 
the  19th  instant,  calling  for  a  list  of  the  different  appropriations  which 
will  leave  unexpended  balances  on  the  ist  day  of  January  next. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December  26,  1836. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  nominate  William  Gates,  late  major  of  the  First  Regiment  of  Artil- 
lery, for  reappointment  in  the  Army,  to  be  major  in  the  Second  Regiment 
of  Artillery,  to  take  rank  from  the  30th  May,  1832,  the  date  of  his  former 
commission.  This  officer  was  stricken  from  the  rolls  of  the  Army  by 
my  order  on  the  7th  of  June  last,  upon  a  full  consideration  by  me  of  the 
proceedings  of  a  court  of  inquiry  held  at  his  request  for  the  purpose  of 
investigating  his  conduct  during  and  subsequent  to  the  attack  on  Fort 
Barnwell,  at  Volusia,  in  Florida,  in  April  last,  which  court,  after  mature 
deliberation  on  the  testimony  before  them,  expressed  the  opinion  **that 
the  effective  force  under  the  command  of  Major  Gates  was  much  greater 
than  the  estimated  force  of  the  Indians  who  attacked  him  on  the  morn- 
ing of  the  14th  of  April,  1836,  and  that  therefore  he  was  capable  of 
meeting  the  enemy  in  the  field  if  necessary;  also,  that  the  bodies  of  two 
volunteers  killed  were  improperly  left  exposed,  and  ought  to  have  been
1489  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
brought  in  on  the  morning  when  they  were  killed,  such  exposure  neces 
sarily  ojperating  injuriously  on  thq  garrison/ '  He  is  now  nominated  for 
a  reappointment  to  the  end  that  he  may  be  brought  to  trial  before  a  court- 
*nartial,  such  a  trial  being  solicited  by  him. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December^  1836. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
By  the  second  section  of  the  act  ''to  establish  the  northern  boundary 
line  of  the  State  of  Ohio,  and  to  provide  for  the  admission  of  the  State 
of  Michigan  into  the  Union  upon  the  conditions  therein  expressed,*' 
approved  June  15,  1836,  the  constitution  and  State  government  which 
the  people  of  Michigan  had  formed  for  themselves  was  ratified  and  con- 
firmed and  the  State  of  Michigan  declared  to  be  one  of  the  United  States 
of  America,  and  admitted  into  the  Union  upon  an  equal  footing  with  the 
original  States,  but  on  the  express  condition  that  the  said  State  should 
consist  of  and  have  jurisdiction  over  all  the  territory  included  within 
certain  boundaries  described  in  the  act,  and  over  none  other.  It  was 
further  enacted  by  the  third  section  of  the  same  law  that,  as  a  compli- 
ance with  the  fundamental  condition  of  admission,  the  boundaries  of  the 
State  of  Michigan,  as  thus  described,  declared,  and  established,  should 
"receive  the  assent  of  a  convention  of  delegates  elected  by  the" people 
of  said  State  for  the  sole  purpose  of  giving  the  assent ' '  therein  required; 
that  as  soon  as  such  assent  should  be  given  the  President  of  the  United 
States  should  announce  the  same  by  proclamation,  and  that  thereupon, 
and  without  any  further  proceeding  on  the  part  of  Congress,  the  admis- 
sion of  the  State  into  the  Union  as  one  of  the  United  States  of  America 
should  be  considered  as  complete,  and  the  Senators  and  Representatives 
in  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  entitled  to  take  their  seats  with- 
out further  delay. 
In  the  month  of  November  last  I  received  a  communication  inclosing 
the  official  proceedings  of  a  convention  assembled  at  Ann  Arbor,  in  Mich- 
igan, on  the  26th  of  September,  1836,  all  which  (marked  A)  are  herewith 
laid  before  you.  It  will  be  seen  by  these  papers  that  the  convention 
therein  referred  to  was  elected  by  the  people  of  Michigan  pursuant  to  an 
act  of  the  State  legislature  passed  on  the  25th  of  July  last  in  consequence 
of  the  above-mentioned  act  of  Congress,  and  that  it  declined  giving  its 
assent  to  the  fundamental  condition  prescribed  by  Congress  and  rejected 
the  same. 
On  the  24th  instant  the  accompanying  paper  (marked  B),  with  its 
inclosure,  containing  the  proceedings  of  a  convention  of  delegates  sub- 
sequently elected  and  held  in  the  State  of  Michigan,  was  presented  to  me. 
By  these  papers,  which  are  also  herewith  submitted  for  your  considera- 
tion, it  appears  that  elections  were  teld  in  all  the  counties  of  the  State,
Andrew  Jackson  1490 
except  two,  on  the  5th  and  6th  days  of  December  instant,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  electing  a  convention  of  delegates  to  give  the  assent  required  by 
Congress;  that  the  delegates  then  elected  assembled  in  convention  on 
the  14th  day  of  December  instant,  and  that  on  the  following'  day  the 
assent  of  the  body  to  the  fundamental  condition,  above  stated  was  formally 
given. 
This  latter  convention  was  not  held  or  elected  by  virtue  of  any  act  of 
the  Territorial  or  State  legislature;  it  originated  from  the  people  them- 
selves, and  was  chosen  by  them  in  pursuance  of  resolutions  adopted  in 
primary  assemblies  held  in  the  respective  counties.  The  act  of  Congress, 
however,  does  not  prescribe  by  what  authoitty  the  convention  shall  be 
ordered,  or  the  time  when  or  the  manner  in  which  it  shall  be  chosen. 
Had  these  latter  proceedings  come  to  me  during  the  recess  of  Congress, 
I  should  therefore  have  felt  it  my  duty,  on  being  satisfied  that  they 
emanated  from  a  convention  of  delegates  elected  in  point  of  fact  by  the 
people  of  the  State  for  the  purpose  required,  to  have  issued  my  procla- 
mation thereon  as  provided  by  law;  but  as  the  authority  conferred  on 
the  President  was  evidently  given  to  him  under  the  expectation  that  the 
assent  of  the  convention  might  be  laid  before  him  during  the  recess  of 
Congress  and  to  avoid  the  delay  of  a  postponement  until  the  meeting 
of  that  body,  and  as  the  circumstances  which  now  attend  the  case  are  in 
other  respects  peculiar  and  such  as  could  not  have  been  foreseen  when 
the  act  of  June  15,  1836,  ^i^as  passed,  I  deem  it  most  agreeable  to  the 
'  intent  of  that  law,  and  proper  for  other  reasons,  that  the  whole  subject 
should  be  submitted  to  the  decision  of  Congress.  The  importance  of 
your  early  action  upon  it  is  too  obvious  to  need  remark. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December  28, 1836. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
In  compliance  with  the  resolution  of  the  House  of  Representatives 
of  the  23d  instant,  I  herewith  transmit  a  report*  from  the  Secretary  of 
State,  to  whom  the  resolution  was  referred,  containing  all  the  informa- 
tion upon  the  subject  which  he  is  now  able  to  communicate. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  to  the  Senate  a  report  t  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  com- 
plying with  their  resolution  of  thfe  24th  of  May,  1836. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
December  29,  1836. 
*  Relatinsr  to  the  bequest  of  James  Smithson. 
t  Relating  to  the  survey  of  the  harbors  south  of  the  Chesapeake.
I49I  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
Washington,  December  30,  18 j6. 
To  the  Senate  and  Hottse  of  Representatives: 
I  transmit  herewith  a  communication  from  the  Secretary  of  War  ad 
interim,  with  certain  accompanying  papers*  from  the  Engineer  Depart-, 
ment,  required  to  complete  the  annual  report  from  that  Department. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December  jo,  1836, 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  herewith,  for  your  consideration  and  action,  four  treaties 
with  bands  of  Potawatamie  Indians  in  Indiana,  accompanied  by  a  report 
from  the  War  Department  and  sundry  other  papers. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  December  30,  1836, 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  Staies: 
I  transmit  herewith,  for  your  consideration  and  action,  a  treaty  with 
the  Menomonie  tribe  of  Indians,  accompanied  by  a  report  from  the  War 
Department.     I  recommend  the  modifications  proposed  in  the  report. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  fanuaty  7, 1837. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  herewith  transmit  to  Congress  a  report  of  the  Secretary  of  State,  with 
the  accompanying  letter,  addressed  to  him  by  the  commission  appointed 
under  the  act  of  Congress  of  the  last  session  for  carrying  into  effect  the 
convention  between  the  United  States  and  Spain. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  fanuaty  p,  1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
Immediately  after  the  passage  by  the  Senate,  at  a  former  session, 
of  the  resolution  requesting  the  President  to  consider  the  expediency  of 
opening  negotiations  with  the  governments  of  other  nations,  and  particu- 
larly with  the  Governments  of  Central  America  and  New  Granada,  for 
the  purpose  of  effectually  protecting,  by  equitable  treaty  stipulations 
with  them,  such  individuals  or  companies  as  might  undertake  to  open  a 
communication  between  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  oceans  by  the  construc- 
tion of  a  ship  canal  across  the  isthmus  which  connects  North  and  South 
America,  and  of  sectuing  forever  by  such  stipulations  the  free  and  equal 
right  of  navigating  such  caual  to  all  sucli  nations  on  the  payment  of  such 
*  Reports  of  the  superintendents  of  the  Cumberland  road  in   Indiana  and   Illinois  auU   of  ibc 
improvement  of  the  Ohio  River  above  the  Falls.
Andrew  Jackson  1492 
reasonable  tolls  as  ought  to  be  established  to  compensate  the  capitalists 
who  might  engage  in  such  undertaking  and  complete  the  work,  an  agent 
was  employed  to  obtain  information  in  respect  to  the  situation  and  char- 
acter of  the  country  through  which  the  line  of  communication,  if  estab- 
lished, would  necessarily  pass,  and  the  state  of  the  projects  which  were 
understood  to  be  contemplated  for  opening  such  communication  by  a 
canal  or  a  railroad.  The  agent  returned  to  the  United  States  in  Septem- 
ber last,  and  although  the  information  collected  by  him  is  not  as  full  as 
could  have  been  desired,  yet  it  is  sufficient  to  show  that  the  probability 
of  an  early  execution  of  any  of  the  projects  which  have  been  set  on  foot 
for  the  construction  of  the  communication  alluded  to  is  not  so  great  as 
to  render  it  expedient  to  open  a  negotiation  at  present  with  any  foreign 
government  upon  the  subject. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  JantuLty  17, 1837. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  hereby  submit  to  the  House  of  Representatives  certain  commtmica- 
tions  from  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  and  the  attorney  of  the  United 
States  for  the  District  of  Columbia.  They  relate  to  the  difficulties  which 
have  been  interposed  under  the  existing  laws  in  bringing  to  conviction 
and  punishment  the  supposed  incendiaries  of  the  Treasury  buildings  in 
the  year  1833. 
The  peculiar  circumstances  of  this  case,  so  long  concealed,  and  of  the 
flagrant  frauds  by  persons  disconnected  with  the  Government,  which  were 
still  longer  concealed,  and  to  screen  some  of  which  forever  was  probably 
a  principal  inducement  to  the  burning  of  the  buildings,  lead  me  ear- 
nestly to  recommend  a  revision  of  the  laws  on  this  subject.  I  do  this 
with  a  wish  not  only  to  render  the  punishment  hereafter  more  severe  for 
the  wanton  destruction  of  the  public  property,  but  to  repeal  entirely  the 
statute  of  limitation  in  all  criminal  cases,  except  small  misdemeanors, 
and  in  no  event  to  allow  a  party  to  avail  himself  of  its  benefits  during 
the  period  the  commission  of  the  crime  was  kept  concealed  or  the  persons 
on  trial  were  not  suspected  of  having  perpetrated  the  oflFense. 
It  must  be  manifest  to  Congress  that  the  exposed  state  of  the  public 
records  here,  without  fireproof  buildings,  imperatively  requires  the  most 
ample  remedies  for  their  protection,  and  the  greatest  vigilance  and  fidelity 
in  all  officers,  whether  executive  or  judicial,  in  bringing  to  condign  pun- 
ishment the  real  offenders. 
Without  these  the  public  property  is  in  that  deplorable  situation  which 
depends  quite  as  much  on  accident  and  good  fortune  as  the  laws,  for 
safety. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
[The  same  message  was  sent  to  the  Senate.]
1493  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
Washington,  January  17  y  1837. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  to  Congress  herewith  the  copy  of  an  act  of  the  State  of  Mis* 
souri  passed  on  the  i6th  ultimo,  expressing  the  assent  of  that  State  to 
the  .several  provisions  of  the  act  <rf  Congress  entitled  "An  act  to  extend 
the  western  boundary  of  the  State  of  Missouri  to  the  Missouri  River," 
approved  June  7,  1836.  A  copy  of  the  act,  duly,  authenticated,  has  been 
deposited  in  the  Department  of  State.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States:  January  18,  1837. 
In  compliance  with  a  resolution  of  the  Sen&te  at  their  last  session,  I 
herewith  transmit  the  inclosed  documents,  which  contain  all  the  informa- 
tion on  the  subject  of  the  claim  of  the  heirs  of  George  Galphin  within 
the  power  of  the  Executive.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  January  18, 1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  UniUd  States: 
In  compliance  with  the  resolution  of  the  Senate  dated  the  i6th  instant, 
I  transmit  a  copy  and  a  translation  of  a  letter  addressed  to  me  on  the  4th 
of  July  last  by  the  President,  of  the  Mexican  Republic,  and  a  copy  of  my 
reply  to  the  same  on  the  4th  of  September.  No  other  communication 
on  the  subject  of  the  resolution  referred  to  has  been  made  to  the  Exec- 
utive by  any  other  foreign  government,  or  by  any  person  claiming  to  act 
in  behalf  of  Mexico.  ANDRBW  JACKSON. 
The  President  of  the  Mexican  Republic  to  the  President  of  the  United  States. 
Coi^UMBiA.,  IN  TSXAS,  July  4, 1836, 
His  Bzcellency  General  Andrsw  Jackson, 
President  of  the  United  States  of  America. 
Much  Bstbbmbd  Sir:  In  fulfillment  of  the  daties  whidi  patriotiBm  and  honor 
impose  upon  a  public  man,  I  came  to  this  country  at  the  head  of  6,000  Mexicans. 
The  chances  of  war,  made  inevitable  by  drcumstances,  reduced  me  to  the  condition 
of  a  prisoner,  in  which  I  stiU  remain,  as  you  may  have  already  learned.  The  dis- 
position evinced  by  General  Samuel  Houston,  the  commander  in  chief  of  the  Texan 
army,  and  by  his  successor.  General  Thomas  J.  Rusk,  for  the  termination  of  the  war; 
the  decision  of  the  President  and  cabinet  of  Texas  in  favor  of  a  proper  compromise 
between  the  contending  parties,  and  my  own  conviction,  produced  the  conventions  of 
which  I  send  you  copies  inclosed,  and  the  orders  given  by  me  to  General  Filisola, 
my  second  in  command,  to  retire  from  the  river  Brasos,  where  he  was  posted,  to  the 
other  side  of  the  river  Bravo  del  Norte. 
As  there  was  no  doubt  that  General  Filisola  would  religiously  comply,  as  far  as 
concerned  himself,  the  President  and  cabinet  agreed  that  I  should  set  off  for  Mexico, 
in  order  to  fulfill  the  other  engagements,  and  with  that  intent  I  embarked  on  board 
the  schooner  Invincible^  which  was  to  carry  me  to  the  port  of  Vera  Cruz.  Unfortu- 
nately, however,  some  indiscreet  persons  raised  a  mob,  which  obliged  the  authorities 
to  have  me  landed  by  force  and  brought  back  into  strict  captivity.  This  incident 
has  prevented  me  from  going  to  Mexico^  where  I  should  otherwise  have  arrived  eai^
A  ndrew  Jackson  1494 
in  last  month;  and  in  consequence  of  it  the  Government  of  that  country,  doubtless 
ignorant  of  what  has  occurred,  has  withdrawn  the  command  of  the  arm^  (rom  Gen- 
eral Filisola  and  has  ordered  his-successor,  General  Urrea,  to  continue  its  operations, 
in  obedience  to  which  order  that  general  is,  according,  to  the  latest  accounts,  already 
at  the  river  Nueces.  In  vain  have  some  reflecting  and  worthy  men  endeavored  to 
demonstrate  the  necessity  of  moderation  and  of  my  going  to  Mexico  according  to  the 
convention;  but  the  excitement  of  the  public  mind  has  increased  with  the  retum'of 
the  Mexican  army  to  Texas.  Such  is  the  state  of  things  here  at  present.  The  con- 
tinuation of  the  war  and  of  its  disasters  is  therefore  inevitable  unless  the  voke  of 
i^eason  be  heard  in  proper  time  from  the  mouth  of  some  powerful  individual.  It 
appears  to  me  that  you,  sir,  have  it  in  your  power  to  perform  this  good  oflice,  by 
interfering  in  favor  of  the  execution  of  the  said  convention,  which  shall  be  strictly 
fulfilled  on  my  part  When  I  offered  to  treat  with  this  Government,  I  was  convinced 
Chat  it  was  useless  for  Mexico  to  continue  the  war.  I  have  acqtdred  exact  informa- 
tion respecting  this  country  which  I  did  not  possess  four  months  ago.  I  have  too 
much  zeal  for  the  interests  of  my  country  to  wish  for  anything  which  is  not  com- 
patible with  them.  Being  always  ready  to  sacrifice  myself  for  its  glory  and  advantage, 
I  never  would  have  hesitated  to  subject  myself  to  torments  or  death  rather  than  con- 
sent to  any  compromise  if  Mexico  could  thereby  have  obtained  the  slightest  benefit. 
I  am  firmly  convinced  that  it  is  proper  to  terminate  this  question  by  political  nego- 
tiation. That  conviction  alone  determined  me  sincerely  to  agree  to  what  has  been 
stipulated,  and  in  the  same  spirit  I  make  to  you  this  ^rank  declaration.  Be  pleased, 
sir,  to  favor  me  by  a  like  confidence  on  your  part.  Afford  me  the  satisfaction  of 
avoiding  approaching  evils  and  of  contributing  to  that  good  which  my  heart  advises. 
Let  us  enter  into  negotiations  by  which  the  friendship  between  your  nation  and  the 
Mexican  may  be  strengthened,  both  being  amicably  engaged  in  giving  being  and 
stability  to  a  people  who  are  desirous  of  appearing  in  the  political  world,  and  who, 
under  the  protection  of  the  two  nations,  will  attain  its  object  within  a  few  years. 
The  Mexicans  are  magnammous  when  treated  with  consideration.  I  will  clearly 
set  before  them  the  proper  and  humane  reasons  which  require  noble  and  frank  con- 
duct on  their  part,  and  I  doubt  not  that  they  wUl  act  thus  as  soon  as  they  have  been 
convinced. 
By  what  I  have  here  submitted  you  will  see  the  sentiments  which  animate  me,  and 
with  which  I  remain,  your  most  humble  and  obedient  servant, 
ANTONIO  LOPEZ  DE  SANTA  ANNA. 
The  President  of  the  United  States  to  the  Pnsident  of  the  Mexican  Republic. 
Hbrmitagb,  September  4, 1836. 
General  Antonio  Lopbz  ds  Santa  Anna. 
Sir:  I  have  the  honor  to  acknowledge  the  receipt  of  your  letter  of  the  4th  day  of 
July  last,  which  has  been  forwarded  to  me  by  General  Samuel  Houston,  under  cover 
of  one  from  him,  transmitted  by  an  express  from  General  Gaines,  who  is  in  com- 
mand of  the  United  States  forces  on  the  Texan  frontier.  The  great  object  of  these 
communications  appears  to  be  to  put  an  end  to  the  disasters  which  necessarily  attend 
the  civil  war  now  raging  in  Texas,  and  asking  the  interposition  of  the  United  States 
in  furthering  so  humane  and  desirable  a  purpose.  That  any  well-intended  e£Fort  of 
yours  in  aid  of  this  object  should  have  been  defeAed  is  calculated  to  excite  the  regret 
of  all  who  justly  appreciate  the  blessings  of  peace,  and  who  take  an  interest  in  the 
causes  which  contribute  to  the  prosperity  of  Mexico  in  her  domestic  as  well  as  her 
foreign  relations. 
The  Government  of  the  United  States  is  ever  anxious  to  cultivate  peace  and  friend- 
ship with  aU  nations;  but  it  proceeds  on  the  principle  that  all  nations  have  the  right 
to  alter,  amend,  orchange  their  own  government  as  the  sovereign  power — the  people — 
may  direct     In  this  respect  it  never  interferes  with  the  policy  of  other  powers,  nor
I49S  Afes sages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
can  it  permit  any  on  the  part  of  others  witli  its  internal  policy.  Consistently  with 
this  principle,  whatever  we  can  do  to  restore  peace  between  contending  nations  or 
remove  the  causes  of  misonderstaxiding  is  cheerfully  at  the  service  of  those  who  are 
willing  to  rely  upon  our  good  offices  as  a  friend  or  mediator. 
In  reference,  however,  to  the  agreement  which  you,  as  the  representative  of  Mexico, 
have  made  with  Texas,  and  which  invites  the  interposition  of  the  United  States, 
you  will  at  once  see  that  we  are  forbidden  by  the  character  of  the  communications 
made  to  us  through  the  Mexican  minister  from  considering  it.  That  Government 
has  notified  us  that  as  long  as  you  are  a  prisoner  no  act  of  yours  will  be  regarded  as 
binding  by  the  Mexican  authorities.  Under  these  circumstances  it  will  be  manifest 
to  you  that  good  faith  to  Mexico,  as  well  as  the  general  principle  to  which  I  have 
adverted  as  forming  the  basis  of  our  intercourse  with  all  foreign  powers,  make  it 
impossible  for  me  to  take  any  step  like  that  you  have  anticipated.  If,  however, 
Mexico  should  signify  her  willingness  to  avail  herself  of  our  good  offices  in  bringing 
about  the  desirable  result  you  have  described,  nothing  could  give  me  more  pleasure 
than  to  devote  my  best  services  to  it.  To  be  instnmiental  in  terminating  tlie  evils 
of  civil  war  and  in  substituting  in  their  stead  the  blessings  of  peace  is  a  divine  privi- 
lege. Every  government  and  the  people  of  all  countries  should  feel  it  their  highest 
happiness  to  enjoy  an  opportunity  of  thus  manifesting  their  love  of  each  other  and 
their  interest  in  the  general  principles  which  apply  to  them  all  as  members  of  the 
common  family  of  man. 
Yom:  letter,  and  that  of  General  Houston,  commander  in  chief  of  the  Texan  armj', 
will  be  made  the  basis  of  an  early  interview  with  the  Mexican  minister  at  Washing- 
ton. They  will  hasten  my  return  to  Washington,  to  which  place  I  will  set  out  in  a 
few  days,  expecting  to  reach  it'  by  the  ist  of  October.  In  the  meantime  I  hope 
Mexico  and  Texas,  feeling  that  war  is  the  greatest  of  calamities,  will  pause  before 
another  campaign  is  Undertaken  and  can  add  to  the  number  of  those  scenes  of 
bloodshed  which  have  already  marked  the  progress  of  their  contest  and  have  given 
so  much  pain  to  their  Christian  friends  throughout  the  world. 
This  is  sent  under  cover  to  General  Houston,  who  will  give  it  a  safe  conveyance 
to  you. 
I  am,  very  respectfully,  your  obedient  servant, 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
January  19,  1837. 
To  the  Senate  and  Home  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  herewith  transmit  a  copy  of  the  annual  report  of  the  Director  of  the 
Mint,  showing  the  operations  of  the  institution  during  the  past  year 
and  also  the  progress  made  toward  completion  of  the  branch  mints  in 
North  Carolina,  Georgia,  and  Louisiana. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  fanuary  20,  1837. 
To  tlu  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives: 
In  compliance  with  the  act  of  Congress  of  the  3d  of  March,  1829,  I 
herewith  transmit  to  Congres^  the  report  of  the  board  of  inspectors  of 
the  penitentiary  of  Washington,  and  beg  leave  to  draw  their  attention 
to  the  fact  presented  with  the  report,  **  that  the  inspectors  have  received 
no  compensation  for  their  services  for  two  years,  viz,  1829  and  1830," 
and  request  that  an  appropriation  be  made  for  the  same. 
ANDREW  JACKSON.
THE  CAPITOL  OF  THE  UmTED  STATES 
The  design  of  the  first  Capitol  is  suggested  by  the  illustratioii  elsewhere 
whi€h  shows  the  British  burning  it.  When  the  seat  of  Government  was 
moved  from  Philadelphia  to  Washington  it  was  Uke  moving  into  a  wilderness. 
Only  one  wing  of  the  building  was  finished,  and  it  was  made  to  accommodate 
both  Senators  and  Representatives.  The  Executive  Mansion  was  complete 
externally,  but  much  work  remained  to  make  it  habitable.  The  sole  tavern 
could  not  accommodate  half  the  Members  of  Congress.  The  President's 
House  was  connected  with  the  Capitol  by  a  footpath  running  through  an  alder 
swamp.  Mrs.  Adams  wrote  that  she  could  suffer  everything  but  the  lack 
of  fuel.  Surrounded  by  forests  they  could  not  find  the  people  to  chop  and 
cut  the  wood. 
After  the  burning  of  the  old  Capitol,  Madison  turned  the  residence  of  the 
French  Minister  into  an  Executive  Mansion,  placed  the  Treasury  Department 
in  the  British  legation,  and  Blodgett's  Hotel  became  the  Hall  of  Congress. 
Before  the  next  meeting  of  Congress,  however,  the  citizens  of  the  District 
built,  at  their  own  expense,  commodious  new  quarters  for  Congress.  The 
construction  of  the  present  building  was  then  authorized,  and  in  1839  it 
presented  the  appearance  shown  in  the  illustration.  See  the  article  entitied 
**  Capitol,"  in  the  Encyclopedic  Index.
A  ndrew  Jackson  1496 
Washington,  Ja^mary  21,  18 jy. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit,  for  your  constitutional  action,  a  report  from  the  War 
Department,  accompanied  by  a  treaty  with  the  Stockbridge  and  Munsee 
^^^^^-  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  January  21,  1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit,  for  your  constitutional  action,  a  report  from  the  .War 
Department,  accompanied  by  a  treaty  with  a  portion  of  the  New  York 
^^^®-  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  January  25,  1837. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
In  compliance  with  the  resolution  of  the  House  of  Representatives  of 
the  17th  instant,  I  transmit  a  report  *  from  the  Secretary  of  State,  together 
with  the  documents  by  which  it  was  accompanied. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  January  27,  1837, 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives: 
I  transmit  herewith  certain  papers  from  the  War  Department,  relative 
to  the  improvement  of  Brunswick  Harbor,  Georgia. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  January  30, 1837. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  herewith  transmit  to  the  House  the  copy  of  a  letter  addressed  to  me 
by  the  governor  of  the  State  of  Maine  on  the  30th  of  June  last,  com- 
municating sundry  resolutions  of  the  legislature  of  that  State  and  claim- 
ing the  reimbursement  of  certain  moneys  paid  to  John  and  Phineas  R. 
Harford  for  losses  and  expenses  incurred  by  them  under  circumstances 
explained  in  the  accompanying  papers. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February  6,  1837, 
The  Spsakkr  op  thk  Housk  of  RUPimSKNTATrVBS: 
In  compliance  with  the  resolution  of  the  House  of  Representatives  of 
the  3d  instant,  I  herewith  transmit  the  report  f  of  the  Secretary  of  the 
Navy,  which  affords  all  the  information  required  by  said  resolution .    The 
*  Relatinff  to  the  condition  of  the  political  relations  between  the  United  States  and  Mexico,  and 
to  the  condition  of  Texas. 
iRtiatiiur  to  the  South  Sea  exploring  expedition.
1497  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  President 
President  begs  leave  to  add  that  he  trusts  that  all  facilities  will  be  given 
to  this  exploring  expedition  that  Congress  can  bestow  and  the  honor  of 
the  nation  demands.  ANDREW  JACKSON, 
Washington,  February  6, 1837. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
At  the  beginning  of  this  session  Congress  was  informed  that  our  claims 
upon  Mexico  had  not  been  adjusted,  but  that  notwithstanding  the  irri- 
tating effect  upon  her  councils  of  the  movements  in  Texas,  I  hoped,  by 
great  forbearance,  to  avoid  the  necessity  of  again  bringing  the  subject 
of  them  to  your  notice.  That  hope  has  been  disappointed.  Having  in 
vain  urged  upon  that  Government  the  justice  of  those  claims  and  my 
indispensable  obligation  to  insist  that  there  should  be  "  no  further  delay 
in  the  acknowledgment,  if  not  in  the  redress,  of  the  injuries  complained 
of,"  my  duty  requires  that  the  whole  subject  should  be  presented,  as  it 
now  is,  for  the  action  of  Congress,  whose  exclusive  right  it  is  to  decide 
on  the  further  measures  of  redress  to  be  employed.  The  length  of  time 
since  some  of  the  injiuies  have  been  committed,  the  repeated  and  unavail- 
ing applications  for  redress,  the  wanton  character  of  some  of  the  outrages 
upon  the  property  and  persons  of  otir  citizens,  upon  the  officers  and  flag 
of  the  United  States,  independent  of  recent  insults  to  this  Government 
and  people  by  the  late  extraordinary  Mexican  minister,  would  justify  in 
the  eyes  of  all  nations  immediate  war.  That  remedy,  however,  should 
not  be  used  by  just  and  generous  nations,  confiding;  in  their  strength  for 
injuries  committed,  if  it  can  be'  honorably  avoided;  and  it  has  occurred 
to  me  that,  considering  the  present  embarrassed  condition  of  that  coun- 
try, we  should  act  with  both  wisdom  and  moderation  by  giving  to  Mexico 
one  more  opportunity  to  atone  for  the  past  before  we  take  redress  into 
our  own  hands.  To  avoid  all  misconception  on  the  part  of  Mexico,  as 
well  as  to  protect  our  own  national  character  from  reproach,  this  oppor- 
tunity should  be  given  with  the  avowed  design  and  full  preparation  to 
take  immediate  satisfaction  if  it  should  not  be  obtained  on  a  repetition 
of  the  demand  for  it.  To  this  end  I  recommend  that  an  act  be  passed 
authorizing  reprisals,  and  the  use  .of  the  naval  force  of  the  United  States 
by  the  Executive  against  Mexico  to  enforce  them,  in  the  event  of  a 
refusal  by  the  Mexican  Government  to  come  to  an  amicable  adjustment 
of  the  matters  in  controversy  between  us  upon  another  demand  thereof 
made  from  on  board  one  of  our  vessels  of  war  on  the  coast  of  Mexico. 
The  documents  herewith  transmitted,  with  those  accompanjdng  my 
message  in  answer  to  a  call  of  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  17  th 
ultimo,  will  enable  Congress  to  judge  of  the  propriety  of  the  course  here- 
tofore pursued  and  to  decide  upon  the  necessity  of  that  now  recommended. 
If  these  views  should  fail  to  meet  the  concurrence  of  Congress,  and 
that  body  be  able  to  find  in  the  condition  of  the  affairs  between  the
Andrew  Jackson  1498 
two  countries,  as  disclosed  by  the  accompanying  documents,  with  those 
referred  to,  any  well-grounded  reasons  to  hope  that  an  adjustment  of  the 
controversy  between  them  can  be  effected  without  a  resort  to  the  meas- 
ures I  have  felt  it  my  duty  to  recommend,  they  may  be  assured  of  my 
cooperation  in  any  other  course  that  shall  be  deemed  honorable  and 
P^^P^-  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February  7,  1837, 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  communications  from  the  War  Department  relating  to  the 
treaty  with  the  Sacs  and  Poxes  recently  submitted  to  the  Senate. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February  7,  1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  Untied  States: 
I  transmit  herewith,  for  the  constitutional  action  of  the  Senate,  a  report 
from  the  War  Department,  accompanied  by  a  treaty  with  the  Saganaw 
tribe  of  Chippewa  Indians.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February,  1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit,  for  your  consideration  and  action,  a  treaty  with  certain  Pot- 
awatamie  Indians,  aooompanied  by  a  report  from  the  War  Department. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February  p.  1837. 
To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  communicate  to  Congress  printed  copies  of  the  treaty  of  peace  and 
commerce  between  the  United  States  and  the  Empire  of  Morocco,  con- 
cluded at  Meccanez  on  the  i6th  day  of  September  last,  and  duly  ratified 
by  the  respective  Governments.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
r 
Washington,  February  77, 1837. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States: 
I  herewith  transmit  to  the  House  of  Representatives  a  letter  addressed 
to  me  on  the  30th  ultimo  by  the  governor  of  the  State  of  New  Hamp- 
shire, communicating  several  resolutions  of  the  legislature  of  that  Com- 
monwealth and  claiming  the  reimbursement  of  certain  expenses  incurred 
by  that  State  in  maintaining  jurisdiction  over  that  portion  of  its  territory 
north  of  the  forty-fifth  degree  of  north  latitude,  known  by  the  name  of 
Indian  Stream,  under  circumstances  explained  in  his  excellency's  letter. 
X  ANDREW  JACKSON.
1499  Messages  afid  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
Washington,  February  ij,  i^j/. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  herewith  transmit  to  the  Senate  a  report*  from  the  Secretary  of 
State,  with  accompanying  papers,  embracing  a  copy  of  the  correspond- 
ence requested  by  the  resolution  of  the  7th  instant,  and  such  additional 
documents  as  were  deemed  necessary  to  a  correct  understanding  of  the 
whole  subject.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington  City,  February  14, 1837. 
To  the  House  of  Representatives: 
I  transmit  herewith  a  copy  of  the  instructions,  prepared  under  my 
direction  by  the  War  Department,  for  the  commissioners  appointed  by 
me,  in  ptursuance  of  the  request  contained  in  the  resolution  adopted  by 
the  House  of  Representatives  on  the  ist  of  July  last,  to  investigate  the 
causes  of  the  hostilities  then  existing  with  the  Creek  Indians,  and  also 
copies  of  the  reports  on  that  subject  received  from  the  commissioners. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States:  Fbbruary  15.  1837. 
I  herewith  transmit  to  the  Senate  a  report  of  the  Postmaster-General, 
on  the  subject  of  the  claims  of  Messrs.  Stockton  and  Stokes,  with  a 
review  of  that  report  by  the  Solicitor  of  the  Treasury,  to  whom,  under 
a  law  of  the  last  session  of  Congress,  all  the  suspended  debts  of  those 
contractors  had  been  submitted;  also  a  supplemental  rejoinder  by  the 
Postmaster-General  since  the  report  of  the  Solicitor  of  the  Treasury  was 
made,  with  the  papers  accompanying  the  same,  all  of  which  are  respect- 
fully submitted  for  the  consideration  of  the  Senate. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February  75, 1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  herewith,  for  your  consideration  and  action,  a  treaty  lately 
made  with  the  Sioux  of  the  Mississippi,  accompanied  by  a  report  from 
the  War  Department.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  February,  1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
I  transmit  herewith  a  convention  between  the  Choctaws  and  Chicka- 
saws,  which  meets  my  approbation,  and  for  which  I  ask  your  favorable 
consideration  and  action.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
*  Relatinsr  to  the  seizure  of  slaves  on  board  the  bri^s  Encomium  and  Enterprise  by  the  authorities 
of  Bermuda  and  N%w  Providence.
A  ndreiv  Jackson  1500 
Washington,  February  20,  j8j7. 
To  the  House  of  Represeniahves  of  the  United  States: 
In  compliance  with  the  resolution  of  the  House  of  Representatives  of 
the  9th  ultimo,  I  transmit  a  report  from  the  Secretary  of  State  and  the 
documents*  by  which  it  was  accompanied. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
WashingTOK,  February  ;?/,  1837. 
To  the  House  of  RepresentaHves: 
I  transmit  a  letter  from  the  Secretary  of  War  ad  interim^  accompanied 
by  various  documents,  in  relation  to  a  survey  recently  made  of  the  mouths 
of  the  Mississippi  River  under  a  law  of  the  last  session  of  Congress. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  March  3,  ^837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
In  the  month  of  October  last,  the  office  of  Secretary  of  War  being 
vacant,  I  appointed  Benjamin  P.  Butler,  of  the  State  of  New  York,  to 
perform  the  duties  thereof  during  the  pleasure  of  the  President,  but  with 
the  expectation  that  the  office  would  be  otherwise  filled,  on  the  nomina- 
tion of  my  successor,  immediately  on  the  commencement  of  his  term  of 
service.  This  expectation  I  have  reason  to  believe  will  be  fulfilled,  but 
as  it  is  necessary  in  the  present  state  of  the  public  service  that  the 
vacancy  should  actually  occur,  and  as  it  is  doubtful  whether  Mr.  Butler 
can  act  under  his  present  appointment  after  the  expiration  of  the  present 
session  of  the  Senate,  I  hereby  nominate  the  said  Benjamin  P.  Butler  to 
be  Secretary  of  War  of  the  United  States,  to  hold  the  said  office  during 
the  pleasure  of  the  President  until  a  successor  duly  appointed  shall  accept 
such  office  and  enter  on  the  duties  thereof. 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
Washington,  March  3, 1837. 
To  the  Senate  of  the  United  States: 
In  my  message  to  Congress  of  the  21st  of  December  last  I  laid  before 
that  body,  without  reserve,  my  views  concerning  the  recognition  of  the 
independence  of  Texas,  with  a  report  of  the  agent  employed  by  the  Exec- 
utive to  obtain  information  in  respect  to  the  condition  of  that  country. 
Since  that  time  the  subject  has  been  repeatedly  discussed  in  both  branches 
of  the  Legislature.  These  discussions  have  resulted  in  the  insertion  of  a 
clause  in  the  g^eneral  appropriation  law  passed  by  both  Houses  providiii«j 
*Corre6pondeuce  of  William  Tudor.  Jr..  while  consul,  etc..  of  the  United  States  to  Peru  and 
charsf  d'affaires  at  Rio  de  Janeiro.
150 1  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
for  the  outfit  and  salary  of  a  diplomatic  agent  to  be  sent  to  the  Republic 
of  Texas  whenever  the  President  of  the  United  States  may  receive  satis- 
factory evidence  that  Texas  is  an  independent  power  and  shall  deem  it 
expedient  to  appoint  such  minister,  and  in  the  adoption  of  a  resolution 
by  the  Senate,  the  constitutional  advisers  of  the  Executive  on  the  diplo- 
matic intercourse  of  the  United  States  with  foreign  powers,  expressing 
the  opinion  that ' '  the  State  of  Texas  having  established  and  maintained 
an  independent  government  capable  of  performing  those  duties,  foreign 
and  domestic,  which  appertain  to  independent  governments,  and  it  appear- 
ing that  there  is  no  longer  any  reasonable  prospect  of  the  successful 
prosecution  of  the  war  by  Mexico  against  said  State,  it  is  expedient  and 
proper  and  in  conformity  with  the  laws  of  nations  and  the  practice  of 
this  Government  in  like  cases  that  the  independent, political  existence 
of  said  State  be  acknowledged  by  the  Government  of  the  United  States. ' ' 
Regarding  these  proceedings  as  a  virtual  decision  of  the  question  sub- 
mitted by  me  to  Congress,  I  think  it  my  duty  to  acquiesce  therein;  and 
therefore  I  nominate  Alc6e  La  Branche,  of  I/>uisiana,  to  be  charge 
d'affaires  to  the  Republic  of  Texas, 
ANDREW  JACKSON, 
VETO  MESSAGE-' 
March  3,  1837—11.45  p.  m. 
The  bill  from  the  Senate  ^titled  "An  act  designating  and  limiting  the 
funds  receivable  for  the  revenues  of  the  United  States '  *  came  to  my  hands 
yesterday  at  2  o'clock  p.  m.  On  perusing  it  I  found  its  provisions  so 
complex  and  uncertain  that  I  deemed  it  necessary  to  obtain  the  opinion 
of  the  Attorney-General  of  the  United  States  on  several  important  ques- 
tions touching  its  construction  and  effect  before  I  could  decide  on  the 
disposition  to  be  made  of  it.  The  Attorney-General  took  up  the  subject 
immediately,  and  his  reply  was  reported  to  me  this  day  at  5  o'clock  p,  m. , 
and  is  hereunto  annexed.  As  this  officer,  after  a  careful  and  laborious 
examination  of  the  bill  and  a  distinct  expression  of  his  opinion  on  the 
points  proposed  to  him  still  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  construction 
of  the  bill,  should  it  become  a  law,  would  yet  be  a  subject  of  much  per- 
plexity and  doubt  (a  view  of  the  bill  entirely  coincident  with  my  own), 
and  as  I  can  not  think  it  proper,  in  a  matter  of  such  vital  interest  and  of 
such  constant  application,  to  approve  a  bill  so  liable  to  diversity  of  inter- 
pretations, and  more  especially  as  I  have  not  had  time,  amid  the  duties 
*  Pocket  veto.     This  messaire  was  never  sent  to  Concress,  but  was  deposited  in  the  Deoartmen> 
of  SUte.
Andrew  Jackson  1502 
constantly  pressing;  cm  me,  to  give  the  subject  that  deliberate  considera- 
tion which  its  importance  demands,  I  am  constrained  to  retain  the  bill, 
without  acting  definitively  thereon;  and  to  the  end  that  my  reasons  for 
this  step  may  be  fully  understood  I  shall  cause  this  paper,  with  the  opin- 
ion of  the  Attorney-General  and  the  bill  in  question,  to  be  deposited  in 
the  Department  of  State, 
ANDREW  JACKSON. 
At¥0]timv-GBMSRAi«'s  Ovncs,  March  j,  /^j/. 
Hie  Prbsxdsny  o9  ths  Umitisd  States. 
Sir:  I  have  had  the  honor  to  receive  the  several  questiotts  proposed  to  me  by 
you  on  the  bill  which  has  just  passed  the  two  Houses  of  Congress,  entitled  "An 
act  designating  and  limiting  the  fnnds  receivable  for  the  revenues  of  the  United 
States,"  and  which  is  now  before  you  for  consideration.  These  questions  may  be 
arranged  under  three  general  heads,  and  in  thstt  order  I  shall  proceed  to  reply  to 
them. 
I.  Will  the  proposed  bill,  if  approved,  repeal  or  alter  the  laws  now  in  force  desig- 
nating the  currency  required  to  be  received  in  pa3rment  of  the  public  dues,  for  lands 
or  otherwise? 
Will  it  compel  the  Treasury  officers  to  receive  the  notes  of  specie-paying  banks 
having  the  characteristics  described  in  its  first  and  second  sections? 
In  what  respect  does  it  differ  from  and  how  far  will  it  change  the  joint  resolution 
of  April  30, 1816? 
Answer,  In  order  to  a  correct  reply  to  this  question,  and  indeed  to  any  other 
question  arising  on  this  obscurely  penned  bill,  we  must  first  obtidn  a  general  view 
of  all  its  provisions. 
The  first  section  requires  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  to  take  measures  for  col- 
lecting the  public  revenue,  first,  in  the  legal  currency  of  the  United  States  (i.  e., 
gold  and  silver),  or,  second,  in  the  notes  of  such  specie-paying  bcmks  as  shall  from 
time  to  time  conform  to  certain  conditions  in  regard  to  small  bills,  described  in  the 
section.  This  section  does  not  expressly  give  the  Secretary  power  to  direct  that  any 
particular  notes  shall  be  received  for  lands  or  for  duties,  but  xt  forbids  the  receipt 
of  any  paper  currency  other  than  such  bank  notes  as  are  described  in  the  section; 
and  it  requires  the  Secretary  to  adopt  measures,  in  his  discretion,  to  effectuate  that 
prohibition. 
The  second  section  extends  the  prohibition  still  further,  by  forbidding  the  receipt 
of  any  notes  which  the  banks  in  which  they  are  to  be  deposited  shall  not,  under  the 
supervision  and  control  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  agree  to  pass  to  the  credit 
of  the  United  States  as  cash;  to  which  is  added  a  proviso  authorizing  the  Secretary 
to  withdraw  the  public  deposits  from  any  bank  which  shall  refuse  to  receive  as  cash 
from  the  United  States  any  notes  receivable  under  the  law  which  such  bank  receives 
in  the  ordinary  course  of  business  on  general  deposit. 
The  third  and  last  section  allows  the  receipt,  as  heretofore,  of  land  scrip  and 
Treasury  certificates  for  public  lands,  and  forbids  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  to 
make  any  discrimination  in  the  funds  receivable  (other  than  such  as  results  from 
the  receipt  of  land  scrip  or  Treasury  certificates)  between  the  different  branches 
of  the  public  revenue. 
From  this  analysis  of  the  bill  it  appears  that,  so  far  as  regards  bank  notes,  the  bill 
designates  and  limits  their  receivableness  for  the  revenues  of  the  United  States,  first, 
by  forbidding  the  receipts  of  any  except  such  as  have  all  the  characteristics  described 
in  the  first  and  second  sections  of  the  bill,  and,  secondly,  by  restraining  the  Secretary 
J
1503  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
of  the  Treasury  from  making  any  discrimination  in  this  respect  between  the  dif- 
ferent branches  of  the  public  revenue.  In  this  way  the  bill  performs,  to  a  certain 
extent,  the  office  of  ''  designating  and  limiting  the  funds  receivable  for  the  revenues 
of  the  United  States,"  as  mentioned  in  its  title;  but  it  would  seem  from  what  has 
been  stated  that  it  is  only  in  this  way  that  any  such  office  is  performed.  This 
impression  will  be  fully  confirmed  as  we  proceed. 
The  bill,  should  it  be  approved,  will  be  supplementary  to  the  laws  now  in  force 
relating  to  the  same  subject,  but  as  it  contains  no  repealing  clause  no  provision  of 
those  former  laws,  except  such  as  may  be  plainly  repugnant  to  the  present  bill,  will 
be  repealed  by  k. 
The  existing  laws  embraced  in  the  above  question,  and  applicable  to  the  subject, 
are: 
First,  As  to  duties  on  goods  imported.'-The  seventy-fourth  section  of  the  col- 
lection law  of  the  2d  of  March,  1799,  the  first  of  which,  reenacting  in  this  respect 
the  act  of  the  31st  of  July,  1789,  provides  "that  all  duties  and  fees  to  be  collected 
shall  he  payable  in  money  of  the  United  States  or  in  foreign  gold  and  silver  coins  at 
flie  following  rates,'*  etc  The  residue  of  the  section,  as  to  rates,  has  been  altered 
by  subsequent  laws,  and  .the  clause  quoted  was  varied  during  the  existence  of  the 
Bank  of  the  United  States,  the  notes  of  which  were  expressly  made  receivable  in 
all  payments  to  the  United  States,  and  during  the  existence  of  the  act  making 
Treasury  notes  receivable  by  such  act;  but  in  no  other  respects  has  it  ever  been 
repealed.  > 
Second,  As  tofiudlic  lands,— the  general  land  law  of  the  loth  of  May,  1800,  section 
5,  provided  that  no  lands  should  b^  sold,  '*at  either  public  or  private  sale,  for  less 
than  $2  per  acre,  and  payment  may  be  made  for  the  same  by  all  purchasers  either  in 
specie  or  in  evidences  of  the  public  debt  of  the  United  States^  at  the  rates  prescribed  ** 
by  a  prior  law.  This  provision  was  varied  by  the  acts  relative  to  Treasury  notes  and 
the  Bank  of  the  United  States  in  like  manner  as  above  mentioned.  The  second 
section  of  the  general  land  law  of  the  24th  of  April,  1820,  abrogated  the  allowance  of 
credits  on  the  sale  of  public  lands  after  the  ist  day  of  July  then  next;  required  every 
purchaser  at  public  sale  to  make  complete  pa3anent  on  the  day  of  purchase,  and 
the  purchaser  at  private  sale  to  produce  to  the  register  a  receipt  from  the  Treasurer 
of  the  United  States  or  from  the  receiver  of  the  district  for  the  amount  of  the  pur- 
chase money.  The  proviso  to  the  fourth  section  of  the  same  law  enacted,  in  respect 
to  reverted  lands  and  lands  remaining  unsold,  that  they  should  not  be  sold  for 
less  price  than  f  1.25  per  acre,  '*  nor  on  any  other  terms  than  that  of  cash  pa3anent." 
This  latter  act  has  been  further  modified  by  the  allowing  Virginia  land  scrip  to  be 
received  in  payment  for  public  lands. 
Third,  As  to  both  duties  and  lands,— The  joint  resolution  of  the  30th  of  April, 
1816,  provides  that  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  **  be  required  and  directed  to  adopt 
such  measures  as  he  may  deem  necessary  to  cause,  as  soon  as  may  be,  all  duties, 
taxes,  debts,  or  sums  of  money  accruing  or  becoming  payable  to  the  United  States  to 
be  collected  and  paid  in  the  legal  currency  of  the  United  States,  or  Treasury  notes, 
or  notes  of  the  Bank  of  the  United  States,  fls  by  law  provided  and  declared^  or  in 
notes  of  banks  which  are  payable  and  paid  on  demand  in  the  said  legal  currency  of 
the  United  States,  and  that  from  and  after  the  20th  day  of  February  next  no  such 
duties,  taxes,  debts,  or  sums  of  money  accruing  or  becoming  payable  to  the  United 
States  as  aforesaid  ought  to  be  collected  or  received  otherwise  than  in  the  legal 
currency  of  the  United  States,  or  Treasury  notes,  or  notes  of  the  Bank  of  the  United 
States,  or  in  notes  of  banks  which  are  payable  and  paid  on  demand  in  the  legal  cur- 
rency of  the  United  States.*'  According  to  the  opinion  given  by  me  as  a  member  of 
your  Cabinet  in  the  month  of  July  last,  and  to  which  I  still  adhere,  this  resolution 
was  mandatory  only  as  it  respected  the  legall  currency  of  the  United  States,  Treasury 
notes,  and  notes  of  the  Bank  of  the  United  States,  and  in  respect  to  the  notes  of  the
Andrew  Jackson  1504 
state  banks,  thongrh  payable  and  paid  in  specie,  waa  permissive  merely  in  the  discre- 
tion of  the  Secretary;  and  in  accordance  with  this  opinion  has  been  the  practical 
constmction  given  to  the  resolution  by  the  Treasury  Department.  It  is  known  to 
you,  however,  that  distinguished  names  have  been  vouched  for  the  opinion  that  the 
resolution  was  mandatory  as  to  the  notes  of  all  specie-paying  banks;  that  the  debtor 
had  the  right,  at  his  option,  to  make  payment  in  such  notes,  and  that  if  tendered  by 
him  the  Treasury  officers  had  no  discretion  to  refuse  them. 
It  is  thus  seen  that  the  laws  now  in  force,  so  far  as  they  positively  enjoin  the 
receipt  of  any  particular  currency  in  pa3anent  of  public  dues,  are  confined  to  gold 
and  silver,  except  that  in  certain  cases  Virginia  land  scrip  and  Treasury  certifi- 
cates are  directed  to  be  received  on  the  sale  of  public  lands.  In  my  opinion,  there  is 
nothing  in  the  bill  before  me  repugjnant  to  those  laws.  The  bill  does  not  expressly 
declare  and  enact  that  any  particular  species  of  currency  shall  be  receivable  in  pay« 
ment  of  the  public  revenue.  On  the  contrary,  as  the  provisions  of  the  first  and  sec- 
ond sections  are  chiefly  of  a  negative  character,  I  think  they  do  not  take  away  the 
power  of  the  Secretary,  previously  possessed  under  the  acts  of  Congress,  and  as 
the  agent  of  the  President,  to  forbid  the  receipt  of  any  bank  notes  which  are  not 
by  some  act  of  Congress  expressly  made  absolutely  ^ceivable  in  pa3anent  of  the 
public  dues. 
The  above  view  will,  I  think,  tie  cotifirmed  by  a  closer  examination  of  the  bill.  It 
sets  out  with  the  assumption  that  there  is  a  currency  established  by  law  (i.  e.,  gold 
and  silver);  and  it  further  assumes  that  the  public  revenue  of  all  descriptions  ought 
to  be  collected  exclusively  in  such  legal  currency,  or  in  bank  notes  of  a  certain  char- 
acter; and  therefore  it  provides  that  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  shall  take  meas- 
ures to  effect  a  collection  of  the  revenue  "in  the  legal  currency  of  the  United 
States,  or  in  notes  of  banks  which  are  payable  and  paid  on  demand  in  the  said  legal 
currency,"  under  certain  restrictions,  afterwards  mentioned  in  the  act. 
The  questiot  then  arises:  Are  bank  notes  having  the  requisite  characteristics 
placed  by  the  clause  just  quoted  on  the  same  footing  with  the  legal  currency,  so  as 
to  make  it  the  duty  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  to  allow  the  receipt  of  them 
when  tendered  by  the  debtor?  In  my  judgment,  such  is  not  the  effect  of  the  pro- 
vision. 
If  Congress  had  intended  to  make  so  important  an  alteration  of  the  existing  law 
as  to  compel  the  receiving  officers  to  take  pa3anent  in  the  bank  notes  described  in 
the  bill,  the  natural  phraseology  would  have  been,  *'  in  the  legal  currency  of  the 
United  States  and  in  notes  of  banks  which  are  payable  and  paid  in  the  legal  cur- 
rency," etc.  And  it  is  reasonable  to  presume  that  Congress  would  have  used  such 
phraseology,  or  would  have  gone  on  to  make  a  distinct  provision  expressly  declar- 
ing that  such  bank  notes  should  be  receivable^  as  was  done  in  the  bank  charters 
of  1790  and  1816,  and  as  was  also  done  by  the  acts  relative  to  evidences  of  debt. 
Treasury  notes,  and  Virginia  land  scrip.  The  form  of  one  of  these  provisions  (the 
fourteenth  section  of  the  act  incorporating  the  late  Bank  of  the  United  States)  will 
illustrate  the  idea  I  desire  to  present: 
"Skc.  14.  And  be  it  further  enacted  ^  That  the  bills  or  notes  of  the  said  corpora- 
tion, originally  made  payable,  or  which  shall  have  become  payable,  on  demand,  shall 
be  receivable  in  all  pa3rments  to  the  United  States,  unless  otherwise  directed  by  act 
of  Congress.*' 
The  difference  between  the  language  there  used  and  that  employed  in  the  present 
bill  is  too  obvious  to  require  comment.  It  is  true  that  the  word  '  'or,**  when  it  occurs 
in  wills  and  agreements,  is  sometimes  construed  to  mean  '  *and,"  in  order  to  give  effect 
to  the  plain  intent  of  the  parties;  and  such  a  construction  of  the  word  may  sometimes 
be  given  when  it  occurs  in  statutes,  where  the  general  intent  of  the  lawmakers  evi- 
dently requires  it.  But  this  construction  of  the  word  in  the  present  case  is  not  only 
i-.nnecessary,  but,  in  my  opinion,  repugnant  to  the  whole  scope  of  the  bill,  which,  so
1505  Messages  and  Papers  0/  the  Presidents 
far  from  commanding  the  public  officers  to  receive  bank  notes  in  cases  not  require?! 
by  the  existing  laws,  introduces  several  new  prohibitions  on  the  receipt  of  such  notes. 
Nor  do  I  think  this  one  of  those  cases  in  which  a  choice  is  given  to  the  debtor  to 
pay  in  one  or  other  of  two  descriptions  of  currency,  both  of  which  are  receivable  by 
law.  Such  a  choice  was  given  by  the  land  law  of  the  loth  of  May,  1800,  section  5, 
between  specie  and  the  evidences  of  the  public  debt  of  the  United  States  then  receiv- 
able by  law,  and  also  by  the  joint  resolution  of  the  30th  of  April,  1816,  between 
**the  legal  currency  of  the  United  States,  or  Treasury  notes,  or  notes  of  the  Bank  of  the 
United  States,  as  by  law  provided  and  declared.*'  The  option  given  by  that  resolu- 
tion continued  in  force  so  long  as  the  laws  providing  and  declaring  that  Treasury 
notes  and  notes  of  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  should  be  receivable  in  payments 
to  the  United  States,  and  ceased  when  those  laws  expired.  The  distinction  between 
that  description  of  paper  currency  which  is  by  law  expressly  made  receivable  in  pay- 
ment of  public  dues,  and  the  notes  of  the  State  banks,  which  were  only  permitted  to 
be  received,  is  pl&inly  marked  in  the  resolution  of  1816.  While  the  former  are  placed 
on  the  same  footing  with  the  legal  currency,  because  by  previous  laws  it  had  been 
BO  *^ provided  and  declared ^*^  the  latter  were  left  to  be  received  or  not  received,  at  the 
discretion  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  eitcept  that  he  was  restricted  from  allow- 
ing any  to  be  received  which  were  not  payable  and  paid  on  demand  in  the  legal 
ciurrency.  The  bank  notes  spoken  of  in  the  bill  before  me,  having  never  been  made 
receivable  by  law,  must  be  regarded  as  belonging  to  the  latter  class,  and  not  to  the 
former;  and  there  can  therefore  be  no  greater  obligation  under  the  present  bill, 
should  it  become  a  law,  to  receive  them  in  pa3r9ient  than  thei%  was  to  receive  the 
paper  of  the  State  bcmks  imder  the  resolution  of  1816. 
As  to  the  difference  between  this  bill  and  the  joint  resolution  of  1816,  the  bill 
differs  from  that  resolution  in  the  following  particulars: 
First.  It  says  nothing  of  Treasury  notes  and  the  notes  of  the  Bank  of  the  United 
States,  which  by  the  resolution  of  1816  are  recognized  as  having  betn  made  receiv- 
able by  laws  then  in  force  in  payment  of  public  dues  of  all  descriptions. 
Second.  It  abridges  the  discretion  left  with  the  Secretary  of  the  Treastiry  by  that 
resolution,  by  positively  forbidding  the  receipt  of  bank  notes  not  having  the  charac- 
teristics described  in  the  first  and  second  sections  of  the  bill;  whereas  ^<&  receipt  of 
some  of  the  notes  so  forbidden  might,  under  the  resolution  of  1816,  have  been  allowed 
by  the  Secretary. 
Third.  It  forbids  the  making  of  any  discrimination  in  respect  to  the  receipt  of 
bank  notes  between  the  different  brandies  of  the  public  revenue;  whereas  the  Secre- 
tary of  the  Treasury,  under  the  resolution  of  1816,  was  subject  to  no  such  restraint, 
and  had  the  power  to  make  the  discrimination  forbidden  by  the  bill,  except  as  to  the 
notes  of  the  Bank  of  the  United  States  and  Treasury  notes. 
This  bill,  if  approved,  will  change  the  resolution  of  1816,  so  far  as  it  now  remains 
in  force,  in  the  second  and  third  particulars  just  mentioned,  but  in  my  opinion,  as 
already  suggested,  will  change  it  in  no  other  respect. 
II.  What  is  the  extent  of  the  supervision  and  control  allowed  by  this  bill  to  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  over  the  notes  to  be  received  by  the  deposit  banks? 
And  does  it  allow  him  to  direct  what  particular  notes  shall  or  shall  not  be  received 
for  lands  or  for  duties? 
Answer,  After  maturely  considering,  so  far  as  time  has  been  allowed  me,  the  sev- 
eral provisions  of  the  bill,  I  think  the  following  conclusions  may  fairly  be  drawn 
from  them  when  taken  in  connection  with  the  laws  now  in  force,  and  above  referred 
to,  and  that  should  it  become  a  law  they  will  probably  express  its  legal  effect. 
First.  That  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  can  not  direct  the  receipt  of  any  notes 
except  such  as  are  issued  by  banks  which  conform  to  the  first  section  of  the  law  and 
such  as  will  be  passed  by  the  proper  deposit  bank  to  the  credit  of  the  United  States 
as  cash.
Andrew  Jackson  1506 
Second.  That  he  may  dinct  the  receipt  of  notes  issaed  by  banks  which  conform 
to  the  first  section,  provided  the  deposit  bank  ift  which  the  notes  are  to  be  deposited 
shall  agree  to  credit  them  as  cash. 
Third.  That  if  the  deposit  bank  in  which  the  money  is  to  be  deposited  shall  refuse 
to  receive  as  cash  the  notes  designated  by  the  Secretary,  and  which  such  bank  receives 
in  the  ordinary  course  of  business  on  general  deposit,  he  may  withdraw  the  public 
deposits  and  select  another  depository  which  will  agree  to  receive  them. 
Fourth.  That  if  he  can  not  find  a  depository  which  will  so  agree,  then  that  the  Sec- 
retary can  not  direct  or  authorize  the  receipt  of  any  notes  except  such  as  the  deposit 
bank  primarily  entitled  to  the  deposits  will  agree  to  receive  and  deposit  as  cash. 
Fifth.  That  although  a  deposit  bank  might  be  willing  to  receive  from  the  collectors 
and  receivers,  and  to  credit  as  cash^  notes  of  certain  banks  which  conform  to  the 
first  section,  yet,  for  the  reasons  before  stated,  I  am  of  opinion  that  the  Secretary  is 
not  obliged  to  allow  the  receipt  of  such  notes. 
Sixth.  The  Secretary  is  forbidden  to  make  any  discrimination  in  ^^  funds  receive 
able  "between  the  different  branches  of  the  public  revenue,**  and  therefore,  though 
he  may  forbid  the  receipt  of  the  notes  of  any  particular  bank  or  class  of  banks  not 
excluded,  by  the  bill,  and  may  forbid  the  receipt  of  notes  of  denominations  larger 
than  those  named  in  the  bill,  yet  when  he  issues  any  such  prohibition  it  must  spply 
to  all  the  branches  of  the  public  revenue. 
Seventh.  If  I  am  right  in  the  foregoing  propositions,  the  result  will  be  that  the 
proposed  law  will  leave  in  tjie  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  power  to  prohibit  the  receipt 
of  particular  not&A  provided  his  prohibition  apply  to  both  lands  and  duties ^  and  power 
to  direct  what  particular  notes  allowed  by  the  law  shall  be  received  provided  he  can 
find  a  deposit  bank  which  urill  agree  to  receive  and  \credif\  them  as  cash, 
in.  Are  the  deposit  banks  the  sole  judges  under  this  bill  of  what  notes  they  will 
receive,  or  are  they  bound  to  receive  the  notes  of  every  specie-paying  bank,  char- 
tered or  unchartered,  wherever  situated,  in  any  part  of  the  United  States? 
Answer,  In  my  opinion  the  deposit  banks,  under  the  bill  in  question,  will  be  the 
sole  judges  of  the  notes  to  be  received  by  them  from  any  collector  or  receiver  of 
public  money,  and  they  will  not  be  bound  to  receive  the  notes  of  any  other  bank 
whose  notes  they  may  choose  to  reject,  provided  they  apply  the  same  rule  to  the 
United  States  which  they  apply  to  their  own  depositors.  In  other  words,  the  gen- 
eral rule  as  to  what  notes  are  to  be  received  as  cash,  prescribed  by  each  deposit  bank 
for  the  regulation  of  its  ordinary  business,  must  be  complied  with  by  the  collectors 
and  receivers  whose  moneys  are  to  be  deposited  with  that  bank.  But  it  will  not 
therefore  follow  that  those  officers  will  be  bound  to  receive  what  the  bank  generally 
receives,  because,  as  already  stated,  they  may  refuse  of  their  own  accord,  or  under 
the  direction  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  any  bank  notes  not  expressly  directed 
by  act  of  Congress  to  be  received  in  pa3anent  of  the  public  dues. 
I  have  thus  answered  the  several  questions  proposed  on  the  bill  before  me;  and 
though  I  have  been  necessarily  obliged  to  examine  the  subject  with  much  haste,  I 
have  no  other  doubts  as  to  the  soundness  of  the  construction  above  given  than  such 
as  belong  to  discussions  of  this  nature  and  to  a  proper  sense  of  the  fallibility  of 
human  judgment.  It  is,  however,  my  duty  to  remind  you  that  very  different  opinions 
were  expressed  in  the  course  of  the  debates  on  the  proposed  law  by  some  of  the 
members  who  took  part  therein.  It  would  seem  from  these  debates  that  the  bill,  in 
some  instances  at  least,  was  supported  under  the  impression  that  it  would  compel 
the  Treasury  officers  to  receive  all  bank  notes  possessing  all  the  characteristics 
described  in  the  first  and  second  sections,  and  that  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury 
would  have  no  power  to  forbid  their  receipt.  It  must  be  confessed  that  the  lan- 
guage is  sufficiently  ambiguous  to  give  some  plausibility  to  such  a  construction,  and 
that  it  seems  to  derive  some  support  from  the  refusal  of  the  House  of  Representatives 
to  consider  an  amendment  reported  by  the  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means  of  that
1507  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
House,  which  would  substantially  have  given  the  bill,  in  explicit  terms,  the  inter- 
pretation I  have  put  on  it,  and  have  removed  the  uncertainty  which  now  pervades  it 
Under  these  circumstances  it  may  reasonably  be  expected  that  the  true  meaning  of 
the  bill,  should  it  be  passed  into  a  law,  will  become  a  subject  of  discussion  and  con- 
troversy, and  probably  remain  involved  in  much  perplexity  and  doubt  until  it  shall 
have  been  settled  by  a  judicial  decision.  How  far  these  latter  considerations  are  to 
be  regarded  by  you  in  your  decision  on  the  bill  is  a  question  which  belongs  to  another 
place,  and  on  which,  therefore,  I  forbear  to  enlarge  in  this  communication. 
I  have  the  honor  to  be,  sir,  with  high  respect,  your  obedient  servant, 
B.  F.  BUTIyER- 
AN  ACT  designatitisr  and  llmititig  the  funds  receivable  for  the  reveaues  of  the  United  States. 
Be  it  enacted  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States  of 
America  in  Congress  assembled^  That  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  be,  and  hereby 
is,  required  to  adopt  such  measures  as  he  may  deem  necessary  to  effect  a  collection  of 
the  public  revenue  of  the  United  States,  whether  arising  from  duties,  taxes,  debts, 
or  sales  of  lands,  in  the  manner  and  on  the  principles  herein  provided;  that  is,  that 
no  such  duties,  taxes,  debts,  or  sums  of  money,  payable  for  land^  shall  be  collected 
or  received  otherwise  than  in  the  legal  currency  of  the  United  States,  or  in  notes  of 
banks  which  are  payable  and  paid  on  demand  in  the  said  legal  currency  of  the 
United  States  imder  the  following  restrictions  and  conditions  in  regard  to  such  notes, 
to  wit:  From  and  after  the  passage  of  this  act  the  notes  of  no  bank  which  shall  issue 
or  circulate  bills  or  notes  of  a  less  denomination  than  five  dollars  shall  be  received 
on  account  of  the  public  dues;  and  from  and  after  the  thirtieth  day  of  December, 
eighteen  hundred  and  thirty-nine,  the  notes  of  no  bank  which  shall  issue  or  circulate 
bills  or  notes  of  a  less  denomination  than  ten  dollars  shall  be  so  receivable;  and 
from  and  after  the  thirtieth  day  of  December,  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and  forty- 
one,  the  like  prohibition  shall  be  extended  to  the  notes  of  all  banks  issuing  bills  or 
notes  of  a  less  denomination  than  twenty  dollars. 
Sbc.  2.  And  be  it  further  etMcted^  That  no  notes  shall  be  received  by  the  collectors 
or  receivers  of  the  public  money  which  the  banks  in  which  they  are  to  be  deposited 
shall  no^  under  the  supervision  and  control  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  agree 
to  pass  to  the  credit  of  the  United  States  as  cash:  Provided^  That  if  any  deposit 
bank  shall  refuse  to  receive  and  pass  to  the  credit  of  the  United  States  as  cash  any 
notes  receivable  imder  the  provisions  of  this  act,  which  said  bank,  in  the  ordinary 
course  of  business,  receives  on  general  deposit,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  is  hereby 
authorized  to  withdraw  the  public  deposits  from  said  bank. 
Sec.  3.  And  be  it  further  enacted^  That  this  act  shall  not  be  so  construed  as  to 
prohibit  receivers  or  collectors  of  the  dues  of  the  Government  from  receiving  for  the 
public  lands  any  kind  of  land  scrip  or  Treasury  certificates  now  authorized  by  law, 
but  the  same  shall  hereafter  be  received  for  the  public  lands  in  the  same  way  and 
manner  as  has  heretofore  been  practiced;  and  it  shall  not  be  lawful  for  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  to  make  any  discrimination  in  the  funds  receivable  between  the  dif- 
ferent branches  of  the  public  revenue,  except  as  is  provided  in  this  section. 
JAMES  K.  POLK, 
Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
W.  R.  KING, 
President  of  the  Senate  pro  tempore, 
I  certify  that  this  act  did  originate  in  the  Senate. 
ASBURY  DICKINS,  Secretary,
A  ndrew  Jackson  1 5^^ 
PROCLAMATION. 
(Prom  Senate  Journal,  Twenty-fourth  Congress,  second  session,  p.  355.) 
DSCEMBKR   20,  1836. 
The  President  of  the  United  States  to   ,  Senator  for  the  State  of  / 
By  virtue  of  the  power  vested  in  me  by  the  Constitution,  I  hereby 
convene  the  Senate  of  the  United  States  to  meet  m  the  Senate  Chamber 
on  the  4th  day  of  March  next,  at  10  o'clock  in  the  forenoon,  to  receive 
any  communication  the  President  of  the  United  States  may  think  it  his 
duty  to  make. 
ANDRFAV  JACKSON. 
EXECUTIVE  ORDERS. 
War  D^partmsnt,  February  75,  1837. 
Major-General  Ai^^xandbr  Macomb, 
President  of  the  Court  of  Inquiry,  etc. 
Sir:  I  have  the  honor  to  inclose  a  copy  of  the  opinion  of  the  President 
of  the  United  States  on  the  proceedings  of  the  court  of  inquiry  of  which 
you  are  president,  relative  to  the  campaign  against  the  Creek  Indians, 
and,  in  compliance  with  the  direction  at  the  close  thereof,  to  transmit 
herewith  those  proceedings,  with  the  documentary  evidence  referred  to 
therein,  for  the  further  action  of  the  court. 
Very  respectfully,  your  most  obedient  servant, 
B.  F.  BUTLER, 
Secretary  of  War  ad  interim. 
P.  S. — ^The  proceedings  and  a  portion  of  the  documents  accompany 
this.  The  balance  of  the  documents  (except  Nos.  204  and  209,  which 
will  be  sent  to-morrow)  are  in  a  separate  package,  and  sent  by  the  same 
mail. 
Washington,  February  14.,  1837. 
The  President  has  carefully  examined  the  proceedings  of  the  court  of 
inquiry  recently  held  at  the  dty  of  Frederick,  by  virtue  of  Orders  Nos. 
65  and  68,  so  far  as  the  same  relate  to  the  causes  of  the  delay  in  opening 
and  prosecuting  the  campaign  in  Georgia  and  Alabama  against  the  hos- 
tile Creek  Indians  in  the  year  1836,  and  has  maturely  considered  the 
opinion  of  the  court  on  this  part  of  the  subject  referred  to  it. 
The  order  constituting  the  court  directs  it,  among  other  things— 
To  inqtiire  and  examine  into  the  causes  of  the  delay  in  opening  and  prosecuting 
the  campaign  in  Georgia  and  Alabama  against  the  hostile  Creek  Indians  in  the  year
1509  Messages  and  Papers  0/  the  Presidenls 
1836,  and  into  every  subject  connected  with  the  military  operations  in  the  campaign 
aforesaid,  and,  after  fully  investigating  the  same,  to  report  the  facts,  together  with  its 
opinion  on  the  whole  subject,  for  the  information  of  the  President. 
It  appears  from  the  proceedings  that  after  the  testimony  of  nine  wit- 
nesses had  been  received  by  the  court,  and  after  more  than  one  hundred 
documents  bearing  on  the  subject  had  also  been  produced  in  evidence,  and 
after  Major-General  Scott  had  addressed  the  court  on  the  subject,  the 
court  proceeded  to  pronounce  its  opinion,  as  follows: 
Upon  a  careful  examination  of  the  abundant  testimony  taken  in  the  foregoing  case 
the  court  is  of  opinion  that  ho  delay  which  it  was  practicable  to  have  avoided  was 
made  by  Major-General  Scott  in  opening  the  campaign  against  the  Creek  Indians. 
On  the  contrary,  it  appears  that  he  took  the  earliest  measures  to  provide  arms,  muni- 
tions, and  provisions  for  his  forces,  who  were  found  almost  wholly  destitute;  and  as- 
soon  as  arms  could  be  put  into  the  hands  of  the  volunteers  they  were,  in  succession, 
detached  and  placed  in  position  to  prevent  the  enemy  from  retiring  upon  Florida, 
and  whence  they  could  move  against  the  main  body  of  the  enemy  as  soon  as  equipped 
for  offensive  operations. 
From  the  testimony  of  the  governor  of  Georgia,  of  Major-General  Sanford,  com- 
mander of  the  Georgia  volunteers,  and  many  other  witnesses  of  high  rank  and  stand- 
ing who  were  acquainted  with  the  topography  of  the  country  and  the  position  and 
strength  of  the  enemy,  the  court  is  of  opinion  that  the  plan  of  campaign  adopted  by 
Major-General  Scott  was  weU  calculated  to  lead  to  successful  results,  and  that  it  was 
prosecuted  by  him,  as  far  as  practicable,  with  zeal  and  ability,  imtil  recalled  from 
the  command  upon  representations  made  by  Major-General  Jesup,  his  second  in  com- 
mand, from  Fort  Mitchell,  in  a  letter  bearing  date  the  20th  of  June,  1836,  addressed 
to  F.  P.  Blair,  esq.,  at  Washington,  marked  "private,**  containing  a  request  that  it  be 
shown  to  the  President;  which  letter  was  exposed  and  brought  to  light  by  the  dig- 
nified and  magnanimous  act  of  the  President  in  causing  it  to  be  placed  on  file  in  the 
Department  of  War  as  an  official  document,  and  which  forms  part  of  the  proceedings. 
(See  Document  No.  214. )  Conduct  so  extraordinary  and  inexplicable  on  the  part  of 
Major-General  Jesup,  in  reference  to  the  character  of  said  letter,  should,  in  the  opin- 
ion of  the  court,  be  investigated. 
The  foregoing  opinion  is  not  accompanied  by  any  report  of  the  fads 
in  the  case,  as  required  by  the  order  constituting  the  court;  on  the  con- 
trary, the  facts  are  left  to  be  gathered  from  the  mass  of  oral  and  docu- 
mentary evidence  contained  in  the  proceedings,  and  thus  a  most  important 
part  of  the  duty  assigned  to  the  court  remains  unexecuted.  Had  the 
court  stated  the  facts  of  the  case  as  established  to  its  satisfaction  by 
the  evidence  before  it,  the  President,  on  comparing  such  state  of  facts 
found  by  the  court  with  its  opinion,  would  have  distinctly  understood  the 
views  entertained  by  the  court  in  respect  to  the  degree  of  promptitude 
and  energy  which  ought  to  be  displayed  in  a  campaign  against  Indians — 
a  point  manifestly  indispensable  to  a  correct  appreciation  of  the  opinion, 
and  one  which  the  President's  examination  of  the  evidence  has  not  sup- 
plied, inasmuch  as  he  has  no  means  of  knowing  whether  the  conclusions 
drawn  by  him  from  the  evidence  agree  with  those  of  the  court. 
The  opinion  of  the  court  is  also  argumentative,  and  wanting  in  requi- 
site precision,  inasmuch  as  it  states  that  *'no  delay  which  it  was  practicable
Andrew  Jackson  15  lo 
to  have  avoided  was  mad^  by  Major-General  Scott  in  opening  the  campaign 
against  the  Creek  Indians/'  etc.;  thus  leaving  it  to  be  inferred,  but  not 
distinctly  finding,  that  there  was  some  delay,  and  that  it  was  made  by 
some  person  other  than  Major-General  Scott,  without  specifying  in  what 
such  delay  consisted,  when  it  occurred,  how  long  it  continued,  oor  by 
whom  it  was  occasioned.  Had  the  court  found  a  state  of  facts,  as  required 
by  the  order  constituting  it,  the  uncertainty  now  existing  in  this  part  of 
the  opinion  would  have  been  obviated  and  the  justice  of  the  opinion  itself 
readily  determined. 
That  part  of  the  opinion  of  the  court  which  animadverts  on  the  letter 
addressed  by  Major-General  Jesup  to  P.  P.  Blair,  esq.,  bearing  date  the 
20th  of  June,  1836,  and  which  presents  the  same  as  a  subject  demanding 
investigation,  appears  to  the  President  to  be  wholly  unauthorized  by  the 
order  constituting  the  court,  and  by  which  its  jurisdiction  was.  confined 
to  an  inquiry  into  the  causes  of  the  delay  in  opening  and  prosecuting  the 
campaign  against  the  hostile  Creeks  and  into  such  subjects  as  were  con- 
nected with  the  military  operations  in  that  campaign.  The  causes  of 
the  recall  of  Major-General  Scott  from  the  command  and  the  propriety 
or  impropriety  of  the  conduct  of  General  Jesup  in  writing  the  letter 
referred  to  were  not  submitted  to  the  court  as  subjects  of  inquiry.  The 
court  itself  appears  to  have  been  of  this  opinion,  inasmuch  as  no  notice 
#ras  given  to  General  Jesup  of  the  pendency  of  the  proceedings,  nor  had 
he  any  opportunity  to  cross-examine  and  interrogate  the  witnesses,  nor 
to  be  heard  in  respect  to  his  conduct  in  the  matter  remarked  on  by  the 
court. 
For  the  several  reasons  above  assigned,  the  President  disapproves  the 
opinion  of  the  court,  and  remits  to  it  the  proceedings  in  question,  to 
the  end  that  the  court  may  resume  the  consideration  of  the  evidence  and 
frc»n  the  same,  and  from  such  further  evidence  as  shall  be  taken  (in  case 
the  court  shall  deem  it  necessary  to  take  further  evidence),  may  ascertain 
and  report  with  distinctness  and  precision,  especially  as  to  time,  place, 
distanqes,  and  other  circumstances,  all  the  facts  touching  the  opening 
and  prosecuting  of  the  campaign  in  Georgia  and  Alabama  against  the 
hostile  Creek  Indians  in  the  year  1836,  and  the  military  operations  in 
the  said  campaign,  and  touching  the  delay,  if  any  there  was,  in  the  open* 
faig  or  prosecuting  of  said  campaign,  and  the  causes  of  such  delay;  and 
to  the  end,  also,  that  the  court,  whilst  confining  its  opinion  to  the  subject- 
matters  submitted  to  it,  may  fully  and  distinctly  express  its  opinion  op 
those  matters  for  the  information- of  the  President. 
The  Secretary  of  War  ad  interim  will  cause  the  proceedings  of  the 
court  on  the  subject  of  the  campaign  against  the  Creek  Indians,  with 
the  documentary  evidence  referred  to  therein  and  a  copy  of  the  foregoing 
opinion,  to  be  transmitted  to  Major-General  Alexander  Macoml^  j^resi- 
dcnt  of  the  court,  for  the  proper  action  thereon. 
ANDREW  JACKSON.
iSii  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
_  Washington,  February  i8,  1837, 
The  proceedings  of  the  court  of  inquiry  recently  assembled  and  still 
sitting  at  Frederick  by  virtue  of  Orders  Nos.  65  and  68,  so  far  as  the 
same  relate  to  the  causes  of  the  failure  of  the  campaign  of  Major-General 
Scott  against  the  Seminole  Indians  in  1836,  were  heretofore  submitted 
to  the  President,  and  the  examination  thereof  suspended  in  consequence 
of  the  necessary  connection  between  the  case  of  Major-General  Scott  and 
that  of  Major-General  Gaines,  also  referred  to  the  same  court,  and  not  yet 
reported  on.  Certain  other  proceedings  of  the  same  court  having  been 
since  examinea  oy  the  President,  and  having  beto  found  defective,  and 
therefore  remitted  to  the  court  for  reconsideration,  the  President  has 
deemed  it  proper,  in  order  to  expedite  the  matter,  to  look  into  the  first- 
mentioned  proceedings  for  the  purpose  of  ascertaining  whether  or  not  the 
like  defects  existed  therein.  On  this  inspection  of  the  record  he  per- 
ceives that  the  court  has  not  reported,  except  in  a  few  instances,  the  facts 
of  the  case,  as  required  by  the  order  constituting  the  court,  and  in  those 
instances  the  facts  found  by  the  court  are  stated  in  a  very  general  form 
and  without  sufficient  minuteness  and  precision;  and  he  therefore  remits 
the  said  proceedings  to  the  court,  to  the  end  that  the  court  may  resmne  the 
consideration  of  the  evidence,  and  from  the  same,  and  from  such  further 
evidence  as  may  be  taken  (in  case  the  court  shall  deem  it  necessary  to 
take  further  evidence),  may  ascertain  and  report  with  distinctness  and 
precision  all  the  facts  touching  the  subject  to  be  inquired  of,  established 
to  the  satisfaction  of  the  court  by  the  evidence  before  it,  and  especially 
the  tildes  when  and  places  where  the  several  occurrences  which  are 
deemed  material  by  the  court  in  the  formation  of  its  opinion  actually 
took  place,  with  the  amount  of  force  on  both  sides  at  the  different  periods 
of  time  embraced  in  the  transactions,  and  the  positions  thereof,  and  such 
other  circumstances  as  are  deemed  material  by  the  court;  together  with 
its  opinion  on  the  whole  subject,  for  the  information  of  the  President. 
The  Secretary  of  War  ad  interim  will  cause  the  proceedings  of  the 
court  in  the  case  of  Major-General  Scott,  first  above  mentioned,  with  the 
documentary  evidence  referred  to  therein  and  a  copy  hereof,  to  be  trans- 
mitted to  Major-General  Alexander  Macomb,  president  of  the  court,  for 
the  proper  action  thereon.  ANDREW  JACKSON. 
FAREWELL  ADDRESS. 
March  4,  1837. 
Fki,ix>w-Citizens:  Being  about  to  retire  finally  from  public  life,  I  beg 
leave  to  offer  you  my  grateful  thanks  for  the  many  proofs  of  kindness  and 
confidence  which  I  have  received  at  your  hands.     It  has  been  my  fortune 
in  the  discharge  of  public  duties,  civil  and  military,  frequently  to  have
Andrew  Jackson  15 12 
fotind  myself  in  difficult  and  trying  situations,  where  prompt  decision  and 
energetic  action  were  necessary,  and  where  the  interest  of  the  country 
required  that  high  responsibilities  should  be  fearlessly  encountered;  and 
it  is  with  the  deepest  emotions  of  gratitude  that  I  acknowledge  the  con- 
tinued and  unbroken  confidence  with  which  you  have  sustained  me  in 
every  trial.  My  public  life  has  been  a  long  one,  and  I  can  not  hope  that 
it  has  at  all  times  been  free  from  errors;  but  I  have  the  consolation  of 
knowing  that  if  mistakes  have  been  committed  they  have  not  seriously 
injtured  the  country  I  so  anxiously  endeavored  to*  serve,  and  at  the 
moment  when  I  surrender  my  last  public  trust  I  leave  this  great  people 
prosperous  and  happy,  in  the  full  enjoyment  of  liberty  and  peace,  and 
honored  and  respected  by  every  nation  of  the  world. 
K  my  humble  efforts  have  in  any  degree  contributed  to  preserve  to  you 
these  blessings,  I  have  been  more  than  rewarded  by  the  honors  you  have 
heaped  upon  me,  and,  above  all,  by  the  generous  confidence  with  which 
you  have  supported  me  in  every  peril,  and  with  which  you  have  continued 
to  animate  and  cheer  my  path  to  the  closing  hour  of  my  political  life. 
The  time  has  now  come  when  advanced  age  and  a  broken  frame  warn  me 
to  retire  from  public  concerns,  but  the  recollection  of  the  many  favors  you 
have  bestowed  upon  me  is  engraven  upon  my  heart,  and  I  have  felt  that 
I  could  not  part  from  your  service  without  making  this  public  acknowl- 
edgment of  the  gratitude  I  owe  you.  And  if  I  use  the  occasion  to  offer 
to  you  the  counsels  of  age  and  experience,  you  will,  I  trust,  receive  them 
with  the  same  indulgent  kindness  which  you  have  so  often  extended  to 
me,  and  will  at  least  see  in  them  an  earnest  desire  to  perpetuate  in  this 
favored  land  the  blessings  of  liberty  and  equal  law. 
We  have  now  lived  almost  fifty  years  under  the  Constitution  framed 
by  the  sages  and  patriots  of  'the  Revolution.  The  conflicts  in  which 
the  nations  of  Europe  were  engaged  during  a  great  part  of  this  period, 
the  spirit  in  which  they  waged  war  against  each  other,  and  our  intimate 
commercial  connections  with  every  p^  of  the  civilized  world  rendered 
it  a  time  of  much  difficulty  for  the  Government  of  the  United  States. 
We  have  had  our  seasons  of  peace  and  of  war,  with  all  the  evils  which 
precede  or  follow  a  state  of  hostility  with  powerful  nations.  We  encoun- 
tered these  trials  with  our  Constitution  yet  in  its  infancy,  and  under 
the  disadvantages  which  a  new  and  untried  government  must  always 
feel  when  it  is  called  upon  to  put  forth  its  whole  strength  without  the 
lights  of  experience  to  guide  it  or  the  weight  of  precedents  to  justify  its 
measures.  But  we  have  passed  triumphantly  through  all  these  difficul- 
ties. Our  Constitution  is  no  longer  a  doubtful  experiment,  and  at  the 
end  of  nearly  half  a  century  we  find  that  it  has  preserved  unimpaired 
the  liberties  of  the  people,  secured  the  rights  of  property,  and  that  our 
country  has  improved  and  is  flourishing  beyond  any  former  example 
in  the  history  of  nations. 
In  our  domestic  concerns  there  is  everything  to  encourage  us,  and
1513  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
if  you  are  true  to  yourselves  nothing  can  impede  your  march  to  the 
highest  point  of  national  prosperity.  The  States  which  had  so  long  been 
retarded  in  their  improvement  by  the  Indian  tribes  residing  in  the  midst 
of  them  are  at  length  relieved  from  the  evil,  and  this  unhappy  race — the 
original  dwellers  in  oiu:  land — are  now  placed  in  a  situation  where  we 
may  well  hope  that  they  will  share  in  the  blessings  of  civilization  and 
be  saved  from  that  degradation  and  destruction  to  which  they  were  rapidly 
hastening  while  they  remained  in  the  States;  and  while  the  safety  and 
comfort  of  our  own  citizens  have  been  greatly  promoted  by  their  removal, 
the  philanthropist  will  rejoice  that  the  remnant  of  that  ill-fated  race  has 
been  at  length  placed  beyond  the  reach  of  injury  or  oppression,  and  that 
the  paternal  care  of  the  General  Government  will  hereafter  watch  over 
them  and  protect  them. 
K  we  turn  to  our  relations  with  foreign  powers,  we  find  our  condition 
equally  gratifying.  Actuated  by  the  sincere  desire  to  do  justice  to  every 
nation  and  to  preserve  the  blessings  of  peace,  our  intercourse  with  them 
has  been  conducted  on  the  pert  of  this  Government  in  the  spirit  of  frank- 
ness; and  I  take  pleasure  in  sa3dng  that  it  has  generally  been  met  in  a 
corresponding  temper.  Difficulties  of  old  standing  have  been  surmounted 
by  friendly  discussion  and  the  mutual  desire  to  be  just,  and  the  claims  of 
our  citizens,  which  had  been  long  withheld,  have  at  length  been  acknowl- 
edged and  adjusted  and  satisfactory  arrangements  made  for  their  final 
payment;  and  with  a  limited,  and  I  trust  a  temporary,  exception,  our  rela- 
tions with  every  foreign  power  are  now  of  the  most  friendly  character, 
our  commerce  continually  expanding,  and  our  flag  respected  in  every 
quarter  of  the  world. 
These  cheering  and  grateful  prospects  and  these  multiplied  favors 
we  owe,  under  Providence,  to  the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitution. 
It  is  no  longer  a  question  whether  this  great  country  can  remain  happily 
united  and  flourish  under  our  present  form  of  government.  Experience, 
the  unerring  test  of  all  human  undertakings,  has  shown  the  wisdom  and 
foresight  of  those  who  formed  it,  and  has  proved  that  in  the  union  of 
these  States  there  is  a  sure  foundation  for  the  brightest  hopes  of  free- 
dom and  for  the  happiness  of  the  people.  At  every  hazard  and  by  every 
sacrifice  this  Union  must  be  preserved. 
The  necessity  of  watching  with  jealous  anxiety  for  the  preservation  of 
the  Union  was  earnestly  pressed  upon  his  fellow-citizens  by  the  Father 
of  his  Country  in  his  Farewell  Address.  He  has  there  told  us  that 
' '  while  experience  shall  not  have  demonstrated  its  impracticabiUty ,  there 
will  always  be  reason  to  distrust  the  patriotism  of  those  who  in  any 
quarter  may  endeavor  to  weaken  its  bands;"  and  he  has  cautioned  us 
in  the  strongest  terms  against  the  formation  of  parties  on  geographical 
discriminations,  as  one  of  the  means  which  might  diattu-b  our  Union  and 
to  which  designing  men  would  be  likely  to  resort. 
The  lessons  contained  in  this  invaluable  legacy  of  Washington  to  his
A  ndreuf  Jackson  1 5 14 
countrymen  should  be  cherished  in  th^  heart  of  every  citizen  to  the  latest 
generation;  and  perhaps  at  no  period  of  time  could  they  be  more  usefully 
remembered  than  at  the  present  moment;  for  when  we  look  upon  the 
scenes  that  are  passing  around  us  and  dwell  upon  the  pages  of  his  parting 
address,  his  paternal  counsels  would  seem  to  be  not  merely  the  offspring 
of  wisdom  and  foresight,  but  the  voice  of  prophecy,  foretelling  events  and 
warning  us  of  the  evil  to  come.  Forty  years  have  passed  since  this  imper- 
ishable document  was  given  to  his  countrymen.  The  Federal  Constitu- 
tion was  then  regarded  by  him  as  an  experiment — and  he  so  speaks  of  it  in 
his  Address — ^but  an  experiment  upon  the  success  of  i^jhich  the  best  hopes 
of  his  country  depended;  and  we  all  know  that  he  was  prepared  to  lay 
down  his  life,  if  necessary,  to  secure  to  it  a  full  and  a  fair  trial.  The  trial 
has  been  made.  It  has  succeeded  beyond  the  proudest  hopes  of  those 
who  framed  it.  Every  quarter  of  this  widely  extended  nation  has  felt  its 
blessings  and  shared  in  the  general  prosperity  produced  by  its  adoption. 
But  amid  this  general  prosperity  and  splendid  success  the  dangers  of  which 
he  warned  us  are  becoming  every  day  more  evident,  and  the  signs  of  evil 
are  sufficiently  apparent  to  awaken  the  deepest  anxiety  in  the  bosom  of 
the  patriot.  We  behold  systematic  efforts  publicly  made  to  sow  the  seeds 
of  discord  between  different  parts  of  Ihe  United  States  and  to  place  party 
divisions  directly  upon  geographical  distinctions;  to  excite  the  South 
against  the  North  and  the  North  against  the  South,  and  to  force  into  the 
controversy  the  most  delicate  and  exciting  topics — ^topics  upon  which  it  is 
impossible  that  a  large  portion  of  the  Union  can  ever  speak  without  strong 
emotion.  Appeals,  too,  are  constantly  made  to  sectional  interests  in  order 
to  influence  the  election  of  the  Chief  Magistrate,  as  if  it  were  desired  that 
he  should  favor  a  particular  quarter  of  thfe  country  instead  of  fulfilling 
the  duties  of  his  station  with  impartial  justice  to  all;  and  the  possible 
dissolution  of  the  Union  has  at  length  become  an  ordinary  and  familiar 
subject  of  discussion.  Has  the  warning  voice  of  Washington  been  for- 
gotten, or  have  designs  already  been  formed  to  sever  the  Union  ?  Let  it 
not  be  supposed  that  I  impute  to  all  of  those  who  have  taken  an  active 
part  in  these  unwise  and  unprofitable  discussions  a  want  of  patriotism 
or  of  public  virtue.  The  honorable  feeling  of  State  pride  and  local 
attachments  finds  a  place  in  the  bosoms  of  the  most  enlightened  and  pure. 
But  while  such  men  are  conscious  of  their  own  integrity  and  honesty  of 
purpose,  they  ought  never  to  forget  that  the  citizens  of  other  States  are 
their  political  brethren,  and  that  however  mistaken  they  may  be  in  their 
views,  the  great  body  of  them  are  equally  honest  and  upright  with  them- 
selves. Mutual  suspicions  and  reproaches  may  in  time  create  mutual 
hostility,  and  artful  and  designing  men  will  always  be  fouiM  who  are 
ready  to  foment  these  fatal  divisions  and  to  inflame  the  natural  jealousies 
of  different  sections  of  the  country.  The  history  of  the  world  is  full  of 
such  examples,  and  especially  the  history  of  republics. 
What  have  you  to  gain  by  division  and  dissension?     Delude  notyoyf*^
1515  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
selves  with  the  belief  that  a  breach^nce  made  maybe  afterwards  repaired. 
If  the  Union  is  once  severed,  the  line  of  separation  will  grow  wider  and 
wider,  and  the  controversies  which  are  now  debated  and  settled  in  the 
halls  of  legislation  will  then  be  tried  in  fields  of  battle  and  determined 
by  the  sword.  Neither  should  you  deceive  yourselves  with  the  hope 
that  the  first  line  of  separation  would  be  the  permanent  one,  and  that 
nothing  but  harmony  and  concord  would  be  found  in  the  new  associations 
formed  upon  the  dissolution  of  this  Union.  Local  interests  would  still  be 
found  there,  and  unchastened  ambition.  And  if  the  recollection  of  com- 
mon dangers,  in  which  the  people  of  these  United  States  stood  side  by  side 
against  the  common  foe,  the  memory  of  victories  won  by  their  united 
valor,  the  prosperity  and  happiness  they  have  enjoyed  under  the  present 
Constitution,  the  proud  name  they  bear  as  citizens  of  this  great  Republic — 
if  all  these  recollections  and  proofs  of  common  interest  are  not  strong 
enough  to  bind  us  together  as  one  people,  what  tie  will  hold  united  the 
new  divisions  of  empire  when  these  bonds  have  been  broken  and  this 
Union  dissevered?  The  first  line  of  separation  would  not  last  for  a  single 
generation;  new  fragments  would  be  torn  off,  new  leaders  would  spring 
up,  and  this  great  and  glorious  Republic  would  soon  be  broken  into  a 
multitude  of  petty  States,  without  Commerce,  without  credit,  jealous  of 
one  another,  armed  for  mutual  aggression,  loaded  with  taxes  to  pay 
armies  and  leaders,  seeking  aid  -against  each  other  from  foreign  powers, 
insulted  and  trampled  upon  by  the  nations  of  Europe,  until,  harassed  with 
conflicts  and  humbled  and  debased  in  spirit,  they  would  be  ready  to  sub- 
mit to  the  absolute  dominion  of  any  military  adventurer  and  to  surrender 
their  liberty  for  the  sake  of  repose.  It  is  impossible  to  look  on  the  con- 
sequences that  would  inevitably  follow  the  destruction  of  this  Govern- 
ment and  not  feel  indignant  when  we  hear  cold  calculations  about  the 
value  of  the  Union  and  have  so  constantly  before  us  a  line  of  conduct  so 
well  calculated  to  weaken  its  ties. 
There  is  too  much  at  stake  to  allow  pride  or  passion  to*  influence  your 
decision.  Never  for  a  moment  believe  that  the  great  body  of  the  citizens 
of  any  State  or  States  can  deliberately  intend  to  do  wrong.  They  may, 
under  the  influence  of  temporary  excitement  or  misguided  opinions,  com- 
mit mistakes;  they  may  be  misled  for  a  time  by  the  suggestions  of  self- 
interest;  but  in  a  community  so  enlightened  and  patriotic  as  the  people 
of  the  United  States  argument  will  soon  make  them  sensible  of  their 
errors,  and  when  convinced  they  will  be  ready  to  repair  them.  If  they 
have  no  higher  or  better  motives  to  govern  them,  they  will  at  least  per- 
ceive that  their  own  interest  requires  them  to  be  just  to  others,  as  they 
hope  to  re€eive  justice  at  their  hands. 
But  in  order  to  maintain  the  Union  unimpaired  it  is  absolutely  neces- 
sary that  the  laws  passed  by  the  constituted  authorities  should  be  faith- 
fully executed  in  every  part  of  the  country,  and  that  every  good  citizen 
should  at  all  times  stand  ready  to  put  down,  with  the  combined  force  of
Andrew  Jackson  1516 
the  nation,  every  attempt  at  unlawful  resistance,  under  whatever  pretext 
it  may  be  made  or  whatever  shape  it  may  assume.  Unconstitutional  or 
oppressive  laws  may  no  doubt  be  passed  by  Congress,  either  from  erro- 
neous views  or  the  want  of  due  consideration;  if  they  are  within  the 
reach  of  judicial  authority,  the  remedy  is  easy  and  peaceful;  and  if,  from 
the  character  of  the  law,  it  is  an  abuse  of  power  not  within  the  control 
of  the  judiciary,  then  free  discussion  and  calm  appeals  to  reason  and 
to  the  justice  of  the  people  will  not  fail  to  redress  the  wrong.  But  until 
the  law  shall  be  declared  void  by  the  courts  or  repealed  by  Congress 
no  individual  or  combination  of  individuals  can  be  justified  in  forcibly 
resisting  its  execution.  It  is  impossible  tliat  any  government  can  con- 
tinue to  exist  upon  any  other  principles.  It  would  cease  to  be  a  govern- 
ment and  be  unworthy  of  the  name  if  it  had  not  the  power  to  enforce 
the  execution  of  its  own  laws  within  its  own  sphere  of  action. 
It  is  true  that  cases  may  be  imagined  disclosing  such  a  settled  purpose 
of  usurpation  and  oppression  on  the  part  of  the  Government  as  would 
justify  an  appeal  to  arms.  These,  however,  are  extreme  cases,  which  we 
have  no  reason  to  apprehend  in  a  government  where  the  power  is  in  the 
hands  of  a  patriotic  people.  And  no  citizen  who  loves  his  country  would 
in  any  case  whatever  resort  to  forcible  resistance  imless  he  clearly  saw 
that  the  time  had  come  when  a  freeman  should  prefer  death  to  submis- 
sion; for  if  such  a  struggle  is  once  begun,  and  the  citizens  of  one  section 
of  the  country  arrayed  in  arms  against  those  of  another  in  doubtful  con- 
flict, let  the  battle  result  as  it  may,  there  will  be  an  end  of  the  Union 
and  with  it  an  end  to  the  hopes  of  freedom.  The  victory  of  the  injured 
would  not  secure  to  them  the  blessings  of  liberty;  it  would  avenge  their 
wrongs,  but  they  would  themselves  share  in  the  common  ruin. 
But  the  Constitution  can  not  be  maintained  nor  the  Union  preserved, 
in  opposition  to  public  feeling,  by  the  mere  exertion  of  the  coercive 
powers  confided  to  the  General  Government.  The  foundations  must  be 
laid  in  the  affections  of  the  people,  in  the  security  it  gives  to  life,  lib- 
erty, character,  and  property  in  every  quarter  of  the  country,  and  in  the 
fraternal  attachment  which  the  citizens  of  the  several  States  bear  to  one 
another  as  members  of  one  political  family,  mutually  contributing  to 
promote  the  happiness  of  each  other.  Hence  the  citizens  of  every  State 
should  studiously  avoid  everjrthing  calculated  to  wound  the  sensibility  or 
offend  the  just  pride  of  the  people  of  other  States,  and  they  should  frown 
upon  any  proceedings  within  their  own  borders  likely  to  disturb  the 
tranquillity  of  their  political  brethren  in  other  portions  of  the  Union. 
In  a  country  so  extensive  as  the  United  States,  and  with  pursuits  so 
varied,  the  internal  regulations  of  the  several  States  must  frequently 
differ  from  one  another  in  important  particulars,  and  this  difference  is 
unavoidably  increased  by  the  varjring  principles  upon  which  the  Ameri- 
can colonies  were  originally  planted — ^principles  which  had  taken  deep 
root  in  their  social  relations  before  the  Revolution,   and  therefore  of
15 1 7  Messages  and  Papers  of  the  Presidents 
necessity  influencing  their  policy  since  they  became  free  and  independent 
States.  But  each  State  has  the  unquestionable  right  to  regulate  its  own 
internal  concerns  according  to  its  own  pleasure,  and  while  it  does  not 
interfere  with  the  rights  of  the  people  of  other  States  or  the  rights  of  the 
Union,  every  State  must  be  the  sole  judge  of  the  measures  proper  to 
secure  the  safety  of  its. citizens  and  promote  their  happiness;  and  all 
efforts  on  the  part  of  people  of  other  States  to  cast  odium  upon  their 
institutions,  and  all  measures  calcu^Ated  to  disturb  their  rights  of  property 
or  to  put  in  jeopardy  their  peace  and  internal  tranquillity,  are  in  direct 
opposition  to  the  spirit  in  which  the  Union  was  formed,  and  must  endan- 
ger its  safety.  Motives  of  philanthropy  may  be  assigned  for  this  unwar- 
rantable interference,  and  weak  men  may  persuade  themselves  for  a 
moment  that  they  are  laboring  in  the  cause  of  humanity  and  asserting 
the  rights  of  the  human  race;  but  everyone,  upon  sober  reflection,  will 
see  that  nothing  but  mischief  can  come  from  these  improper  assaults  upon 
the  feelings  and  rights  of  others.  Rest  assured  that  the  men  found  busy 
in  this  work  of  discord  are  not  worthy  of  your  confidence,  and  deserve 
your  strongest  reprobation. 
In  the  legislation  of  Congress  also,  and  in  every  measure  of  the  Gen- 
eral Government,  justice  to  every  portion  of  the  United  States  should  be 
faithfully  observed.  No  free  government  can  stand  without  virtue  in 
the  people  and  a  lofty  spirit  of  patriotism,  and  if  the  sordid  feelings  of 
mere  selfishness  shall  usurp  the  place  which  ought  to  be  filled  by  public 
spirit,  the  legislation  of  Congress  will  soon  be  converted  into  a  scramble 
for  personal  and  sectional  advantages.  Under  our  free  institutions  the 
citizens  of  every  quarter  of  our  country  are  capable  of  attaining  a  high 
degree  of  prosperity  and  happiness  without  seeking  to  profit  themselves 
at  the  expense  of  others;  and  every  such  attempt  must  in  the  end  fail  to 
succeed,  for  the  people  in  every  part  of  the  United  States  are  too  enlight- 
ened not  to  understand  their  own  rights  and  interests  and  to  detect  and 
defeat  every  effort  to  gain  undue  advantages  over  them;  and  when  such 
designs  are  discovered  it  naturally  provokes  resentments  which  can  not 
always  be  easily  allayed.  Justice — full  and  ample  justice — to  every  por- 
tion of  the  United  States  should  be  the  ruling  principle  of  every  freeman, 
.  and  should  guide  the  deliberations  of  every  public  body,  whether  it  be. 
State  or  national. 
It  is  well  known  that  there  have  always  been  those  amongst  us  who 
wish  to  enlarge  the  powers  of  the  General  Government,  and  experience 
would  seem  to  indicate  that  there  is  a  tendency  on  the  part  of  this  Gov- 
ernment to  overstep  the  boundaries  marked  out  for  it  by  the  Consti- 
tution. Its  legitimate  authority  is  abimdantly  sufficient  for  all  the 
purposes  for  which  it  was  created,  and  its  powers  being  expressly 
enumerated,  there  can  be  no  justification  for  claiming  an3rthing  beyond 
them.  Every  attempt  to  exercise  power  beyond  these  limits  should  be 
promptly  and  firmly  opposed,  for  one  evil  example  will  lead  to  other
Andrew  Jackson  15 18 
measures  still  more  mischievous;  and  if  the  principle  of  constructive 
powers  or  supposed  advantages  or  temporary  circumstances  shall  ever 
be  permitted  to  justify  the  assumption  of  a  power  not  given  by  the  Con- 
stitution, the  General  Government  will  before  long  absorb  all  the  powers 
of  legislation,  and  you  will  have  in  effect  but  one  consolidated  govern- 
ment. From  the  extent  of  our  country,  its  diversified  interests,  different 
pursuits,  and  different  habits,  it  is  too  obvious  for  argument  that  a  sin- 
gle consolidated  government  would  be  wholly  inadequate  to  watch  over 
and  protect  ijs  interests;  and  every  friend  of  our  free  institutions  should 
be  always  prepared  to  maintain  unimpaired  and  in  full  vigor  the  rights 
and  sovereignty  of  the  States  and  to  confine  the  action  of  the  General 
Government  strictly  to  the  sphere  of  its  appropriate  duties. 
There  is,  perhaps,  no  one  of  the  powers  .conferred  on  the  Federal 
Government  so  liable  to  abuse  as  the  taxing  power.  The  most  pro- 
ductive and  convenient  sources  of  revenue  were  necessarily  given  to  it, 
that  it  might  be  able  to  perform  the  important  duties  imposed  upon 
it;  and  the  taxes  which  it  lays  upon  commerce  being  concealed  from 
the  real  payer  in  the  price  of  the  article,  they  do  not  so  readily  attract  the 
attention  of  the  people  as  smaller  sums  demanded  from  them  directly 
by  the  taxgatherer.  But  the  tax  imposed  on  goods  enhances  by  so 
much  the  price  of  the  commodity  to  the  consumer,  and  as  many  of  these 
duties  are  imposed  on  articles  of  necessity  which  are  daily  used  by  the 
great  body  of  the  people,  the  money  raised  by  these  imposts  is  drawn 
from.their  pockets.  Congress  has  no  right  under  the  Constitution  to 
take  money  from  the  people  imless  it  is  required  to  execute  some  one  of 
the  specific  powers  intrusted  to  the  Government;  and  if  they  raise  more 
than  is  necessary  for  such  purposes,  it  is  an  abuse  of  the  power  of  taxa- 
tion, and  unjust  and  oppressive.  It  may  indeed  happen  that  the  revenue 
will  sometimes  exceed  the  amount  anticipated  when  the  taxes  were  laid. 
When,  however,  this  is  ascertained,  it  is  easy  to  reduce  them,  and  in 
such  a  case  it  is  unquestionably  the  duty  of  the  Government  to  reduce 
them,  for  no  circumstances  can  justify  it  in  assuming  a  power  not  given 
to  it  by  the  Constitution  nor  in  taking  away  the  money  of  the  people 
when  it  is  not  needed  for  the  legitimate  wants  of  the  Government. 
Plain  as  these  principles  appear  to  be,  you  will  yet  find  there  is  a  con- 
stant effort  to  induce  the  General  Govemmeift  to  go  beyond  the  limits 
of  its  taxing  power  and  to  impose  unnecessary  burdens  upon  the  people. 
Many  powerful  interests  are  continually  at  work  to  procure  heavy  duties 
on  commerce  and  to  swell  the  revenue  beyond  the  real  necessities  of 
the  public  service,  and  the  country  has  already  felt  the  injurious  effects 
of  their  combined  influence.  They  succeeded  in  obtaining  a  tariff  of 
duties  bearing  most  oppressively  on  the  agricultural  and  laboring  classes 
of  society  and  producing  a  revenue  that  could  not  be  usefully  employed 
within  the  range  of  the  powers  conferred  upon  Congress,  and  in  order 
to  fasten  upon  the  people  this  unjust  and  tmequal  system  of  taxation