in commerce and in the fisheries, have also made it necessary to maintain a naval force there. In disposing of this force, in both instances, the most effectual measures in our power have been taken, without interfering with its other duties, for the suppression of the slave-trade, and of piracy, in the neighboring seas.

The situation of the United States, in regard to their resources, the extent of their revenue, and the facility with which it is raised, affords a most gratifying spectacle. The payment of nearly sixty-seven millions of dollars of the public debt, with the great progress made in measures of defence, and in other improvements of various kinds, since the late war, are conclusive proofs of this extraordinary prosperity, especially when it is recollected, that these expenditures have been defrayed, without a burthen on the people, the direct tax and excise having been repealed soon after the conclusion of the late war, and the revenue applied to these great objects having been raised in a manner not to be felt. Our great resources, therefore, remain untouched, for any purpose which may affect the vital interests of the nation. For all such purposes they are inexhaustible. They are more especially to be found in the virtue, patriotism, and intelligence of our fellow-citizens, and in the devotion with which they would yield up, by any just measure of taxation, all their property, in support of the rights and honor of their country.

Under the present depression of prices, affecting all the productions of the country, and every branch of industry, proceeding from causes explained on a former occasion, the revenue has considerably diminished; the effect of which has been to compel Congress, either to abandon these great measures of defence, or to resort to loans or internal taxes, to supply the deficiency. On the presumption that this depression, and the deficiency in the revenue arising from it, would be temporary, loans were authorized for the demands of the last and present year. Anxious to relieve my fellow-citizens in 1817, from every burden which could be dispensed with, and the state of the treasury permitting it, I recommended the repeal of the internal taxes, knowing that such relief was then peculiarly necessary, in consequence of the great exertions made in the late I made that recommendation under a pledge, that should the public exigencies require a recurrence to them at any time while I remained in this trust, I would, with equal promptitude, perform the duty which would then be alike incumbent on me. By the experiment now making, it will be seen, by the next session of Congress, whether the revenue shall have been so augmented as to be adequate to all these necessary purposes. Should the deficiency still continue, and especially, should it be probable that it would be permanent, the course to be pursued, appears to me to be obvious. I am satisfied that, under certain circumstances, loans may be resorted to with great advantage. I am equally well satisfied, as a general rule, that the demands of the current year, especially in time of peace, should be provided for by the revenue of that year.

war.

I have never dreaded, nor have I ever shunned, in any situation in which I have been placed, making appeals to the virtue and patriotism of my fellow-citizens, well knowing that they could never be made in vain, especially in times of great emergency, or for purposes of high national importance. Independently of the exigency of the case, many considerations of great weight urge a policy having in view a provision of revenue, to meet, to a certain extent, the demands of the nation, without relying altogether on the precarious resource of foreign commerce. I am satisfied

that internal duties and excises, with corresponding imposts on foreign articles of the same kind, would, without imposing any serious burdens on the people, enhance the price of produce, promote our manufactures, and augment the revenue, at the same time that they made it more secure and permanent.

The care of the Indian tribes within our limits has long been an essential part of our system; but unfortunately it has not been executed in a manner to accomplish all the objects intended by it. We have treated them as independent nations, without their having any substantial pretensions to that rank. The distinction has flattered their pride, retarded their improvement, and, in many instances, paved the way to their destruction. The progress of our settlements westward, supported as they are by a dense population, has constantly driven them back, with almost the total sacrifice of the lands which they have been compelled to abandon. They have claims on the magnanimity, and, I may add, on the justice of this nation, which we must all feel. We should become their real benefactors; we should perform the office of their great father, the endearing title which they emphatically give to the chief magistrate of our Union. Their sovereignty over territories should cease, in lieu of which, the right of soil should be secured to each individual and his posterity, in competent portions; and for the territory, thus ceded by each tribe, some reasonable equivalent should be granted, to be vested in permanent funds for the support of civil government over them, and for the education of their children, for their instruction in the arts of husbandry, and to provide sustenance for them until they could provide it for themselves. My earnest hope is, that Congress will digest some plan, founded on these principles, with such improvements as their wisdom may suggest, and carry it into effect as soon as it may be practicable.

Europe is again unsettled, and the prospect of war increasing. Should the flame light up in any quarter, how far it may extend it is impossible to foresee. It is our peculiar felicity to be altogether unconnected with the causes which produce this menacing aspect elsewhere. With every power we are in perfect amity, and it is our interest to remain so, if it be practicable on just conditions. I see no reasonable cause to apprehend variance with any power, unless it proceed from a violation of our maritime rights. In these contests, should they occur, and to whatever extent they may be carried, we shall be neutral; but, as a neutral power, we have rights which it is our duty to maintain. For like injuries, it will be incumbent on us to seek redress in a spirit of amity, in full confidence that, injuring none, none would knowingly injure us. For more imminent dangers we should be prepared, and it should always be recollected, that such preparation, adapted to the circumstances, and sanctioned by the judgment and wishes of our constituents, can not fail to have a good effect, in averting dangers of every kind. We should recollect, also, that the season of peace is best adapted to these preparations.

If we turn our attention, fellow-citizens, more immediately to the internial concerns of our country, and more especially to those on which its future welfare depends, we have every reason to anticipate the happiest results. It is now rather more than forty-four years since we declared our independence, and thirty-seven since it was acknowledged. The talents and virtues which were displayed in that great struggle were a sure presage of all that has since followed. A people who were able to surmount, in their infant state, such great perils, would be more competent.

as they rose into manhood, to repel any which they might meet in their progress. Their physical strength would be more adequate to foreign danger, and the practice of self-government, aided by the light of experience, could not fail to produce an effect, equally salutary, on all those questions connected with the internal organization. These favorable anticipations

have been realized.

In our whole system, national and state, we have shunned all the defects which unceasingly preyed on the vitals and destroyed the ancient republics. In them, there were distinct orders, a nobility and people, or the people governed in one assembly. Thus, in the one instance, there was a perpetual conflict between the orders in society for the ascendency, in which the victory of either terminated in the overthrow of the government, and the ruin of the state. In the other, in which the people governed in a body, and whose dominions seldom exceeded the dimensions of a county in one of our states, a tumultuous and disorderly movement, permitted only a transitory existence. In this great nation there is but one order, that of the people, whose power, by a peculiarly happy improvement of the representative principle, is transferred from them, without impairing in the slightest degree their sovereignty, to bodies of their own creation, and to persons elected by themselves, in the full extent necessary, for all the purposes of free, enlightened, and efficient government. The whole system is elective, the complete sovereignty being in the people, and every officer, in every department, deriving his authority from, and being responsible to, them for his conduct.

Our career has corresponded with this great outline. Perfection in our organization could not have been expected in the outset, either in the national or state governments, or in tracing the line between their respective powers. But no serious conflict has arisen, nor any contest but such as are managed by argument, and by a fair appeal to the good sense of the people; and many of the defects, which experience had clearly demonstrated in both governments, have been remedied. By steadily pursuing this course, in this spirit, there is every reason to believe that our system will soon attain the highest degree of perfection of which human institutions are capable, and that the movement, in all its branches, will exhibit such a degree of order and harmony, as to command the admiration and respect of the civilized world.

Our physical attainments have not been less eminent. Twenty-five years ago, the river Mississippi was shut up, and our western brethren had no outlet for their commerce. What has been the progress since that time? The river has not only become the property of the United States, from its source to the ocean, with all its tributary streams (with the exception of the upper part of Red river only), but Louisiana, with a fair and liberal boundary on the western side, and the Floridas on the eastern, have been ceded to us. The United States now enjoy the complete and uninterrupted sovereignty over the whole territory from St. Croix to the Sabine. New states, settled from among ourselves, in this and in other parts, have been admitted into our Union, in equal participation in the national sovereignty with the original states. Our population has augmented in an astonishing degree, and extended in every direction. We now, fellowcitizens, comprise within our limits the dimensions and faculties of a great power, under a government possessing all the energies of any government ever known to the old world, with an utter incapacity to oppress the people.

Entering, with these views, the office which I have just solemnly sworn to execute with fidelity, and to the utmost of my ability, I derive great satisfaction from a knowledge that I shall be assisted in the several departments by the very enlightened and upright citizens from whom I have received so much aid in the preceding term. With full confidence in the continuance of that candor and generous indulgence from my fellow-citizens at large, which I have heretofore experienced, and with a firm reliance on the protection of Almighty God, I shall forthwith commence the duties of the high trust to which you have called me.

FIFTH

ANNUAL MESSAGE.

DECEMBER 3, 1821.

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :— THE progress of our affairs since the last session has been such as may justly be claimed and expected under a government deriving all its powers from an enlightened people, and under laws formed by their representatives, on great consideration, for the sole purpose of promoting the welfare and happiness of their constituents. In the execution of those laws, and of the powers vested by the constitution in the executive, unremitted atten. tion has been paid to the great objects to which they extend. In the con. cerns which are exclusively internal, there is good cause to be satisfied with the result. The laws have had their due operation and effect. In those relating to foreign powers, I am happy to state that peace and amity are preserved with all, by a strict observance on both sides of the rights of each. In matters touching our commercial intercourse, where a difference of opinion has existed as to the conditions on which it should be placed, each party has pursued its own policy, without giving just cause of offence to the other. In this annual communication, especially when it is addressed to a new Congress, the whole scope of our political concerns naturally comes into view, that errors, if such have been committed, may be corrected; that defects which have become manifest may be remedied; and on the other hand, that measures which were adopted on due deliberation, and which experience has shown are just in themselves and essential to the public welfare, should be persevered in and supported. In performing this necessary and very important duty, I shall endeavor to place before you, on its merits, every subject that is thought to be entitled to your particular attention, in as distinct and clear a light as I may be able. By an act of the 3d of March, 1815, so much of the several acts as imposed higher duties on the tonnage of foreign vessels, and on the manufactures and productions of foreign nations, when imported into the United States in foreign vessels, than when imported in vessels of the United States, were repealed, so far as respected the manufactured productions of the nation to which such vessels belonged, on the condition that the repeal should take effect only in favor of any foreign nation, when the executive should be satisfied that such discriminating duties to the disadvantage of the United States had likewise been repealed by such nation. By this act, a proposition was made to all nations to place our commerce with each on a lasis which it was presumed would be acceptable to all. Every nation

was allowed to bring its manufactures and productions into our ports, and to take the manufactures and productions of the United States back to their ports, in their own vessels, on the same conditions that they might be transported in vessels of the United States; and in return, it was required that a like accommodation should be granted to the vessels of the United States in the ports of other power. The articles to be admitted or prohibited on either side, formed no part of the proposed arrangement. Each party would retain the right to admit or prohibit such articles from the other as it thought proper, and on its own conditions.

When the nature of the commerce between the United States and every other country was taken into view, it was thought that this proposition would be considered fair, and even liberal, by every power. The exports of the United States consist generally of articles of the first necessity, and of rude materials in demand for foreign manufactories, of great bulk, requiring for their transportation many vessels, the return for which, in the manufactures and productions of any foreign country, even when disposed of there to advantage, may be brought in a single vessel. This observation is the more especially applicable to those countries from which manufactures alone are imported, but it applies in a great extent to the European dominions of every European power, and in a certain extent to all the colonies of those powers.

By placing, then, the navigation precisely on the same ground, in the transportation of exports and imports between the United States and other countries, it was presumed that all was offered which could be desired. It seemed to be the only proposition which could be devised which would retain even the semblance of equality in our favor.

Many considerations of great weight gave us a right to expect that this commerce should be extended to the colonies, as well as to the European dominions of other powers. With the latter, especially with countries exclusively manufacturing, the advantage was manifestly on their side. An indemnity for that loss was expected from a trade with the colonies, and with the greater reason, as it was known that the supplies which the colonies derived from us were of the highest importance to them, their labor being bestowed with so much greater profit in the culture of other articles; and because, likewise, the articles of which those supplies consisted, forming so large a proportion of the exports of the United States, were never admitted into any of the ports of Europe, except in cases of great emergency, to avert a serious calamity. When no article is admitted which is not required to supply the wants of the party admitting it, and admitted then, not in favor of any particular country, to the disadvantage of others, but on conditions equally applicable to all, it seems just that the articles thus admitted and invited should be carried thither in the vessels of the country affording such supply, and that the reciprocity should be found in a corresponding accommodation on the other side. By allowing each party to participate in the transportation of such supplies, on the payment of equal tonnage, strong proof was afforded of an accommodating spirit. To abandon to it the transportation of the whole would be a sacrifice which ought not to be expected. The demand in the present instance, would be the more unreasonable, in consideration of the great inequality existing in the trade of the parent-country.

Such was the basis of our system, as established by the act of 1815, and such its true character. In the year in which this act was passed, a treaty was concluded with Great Britain, in strict conformity with its prin