The brief space which has elapsed since the close of your last session has been marked by no extraordinary political event. The quadrennial election of Chief Magistrate has passed off with less than the usual excitement. However individuals and parties may have been disappointed in the result, it is, nevertheless, a subject of national congratulation that the choice has been effected by the independent suffrages of a free people, undisturbed by those influences which in other countries have too often affected the purity of popular elections. Our grateful thanks are due to an all-merciful Providence, not only for staying the pestilence which in different forms has desolated some of our cities, but for crowning the labors of the husbandman with an abundant harvest and the nation generally with the blessings of peace and prosperity. Within a few weeks the public mind has been deeply affected by the death of Daniel Webster, filling at his decease the office of Secretary of State. His associates in the executive government have sincerely sympathized with his family and the public generally on this mournful occasion. His commanding talents, his great political and professional eminence, his well-tried patriotism, and his long and faithful services in the most important public trusts have caused his death to be lamented throughout the country and have earned for him a lasting place in our history. In the course of the last summer considerable anxiety was caused for a short time by an official intimation from the Government of Great Britain that orders had been given for the protection of the fisheries upon the coasts of the British provinces in North America against the alleged encroachments of the fishing vessels of the United States and France. The shortness of this notice and the season of the year seemed to make it a matter of urgent importance. It was at first apprehended that an increased naval force had been ordered to the fishing grounds to carry into effect the British interpretation of those provisions in the convention of 1818 in reference to the true intent of which the two Governments differ. It was soon discovered that such was not the design of Great Britain, and satisfactory explanations of the real objects of the measure have been given both here and in London. The unadjusted difference, however, between the two Governments as to the interpretation of the first article of the convention of 1818 is still a matter of importance. American fishing vessels, within nine or ten years, have been excluded from waters to which they had free access for twenty-five years after the negotiation of the treaty. In 1845 this exclusion was relaxed so far as concerns the Bay of Fundy, but the just and liberal intention of the home Government, in compliance with what we think the true construction of the convention, to open all the other outer bays to our fishermen was abandoned in consequence of the opposition of the colonies. Notwithstanding this, the United States have, since the Bay of Fundy was reopened to our fishermen in 1845, pursued the most liberal course toward the colonial fishing interests. By the revenue law of 1846 the duties on colonial fish entering our ports were very greatly reduced, and by the warehousing act it is allowed to be entered in bond without payment of duty. In this way colonial fish has acquired the monopoly of the export trade in our market and is entering to some extent into the home consumption. These facts were among those which increased the sensibility of our fishing interest at the movement in question. These circumstances and the incidents above alluded to have led me to think the moment favorable for a reconsideration of the entire subject of the fisheries on the coasts of the British Provinces, with a view to place them upon a more liberal footing of reciprocal privilege. A willingness to meet us in some arrangement of this kind is understood to exist on the part of Great Britain, with a desire on her part to include in one comprehensive settlement as well this subject as the commercial intercourse between the United States and the British Provinces. I have thought that, whatever arrangements may be made on these two subjects, it is expedient that they should be embraced in separate conventions. The illness and death of the late Secretary of State prevented the commencement of the contemplated negotiation. Pains have been taken to collect the information required for the details of such an arrangement. The subject is attended with considerable difficulty. If it is found practicable to come to an agreement mutually acceptable to the two parties, conventions may be concluded in the course of the present winter. The control of Congress over all the provisions of such an arrangement affecting the revenue will of course be reserved. The affairs of Cuba formed a prominent topic in my last annual message. They remain in an uneasy condition, and a feeling of alarm and irritation on the part of the Cuban authorities appears to exist. This feeling has interfered with the regular commercial intercourse between the United States and the island and led to some acts of which we have a fight to complain. But the Captain-General of Cuba is clothed with no power to treat with foreign governments, nor is he in any degree under the control of the Spanish minister at Washington. Any communication which he may hold with an agent of a foreign power is informal and matter of courtesy. Anxious to put an end to the existing inconveniences (which seemed to rest on a misconception), I directed the newly appointed minister to Mexico to visit Havana on his way to Vera Cruz. He was respectfully received by the Captain-General, who conferred with him freely on the recent occurrences, but no permanent arrangement was effected. In the meantime the refusal of the Captain-Generalto allow passengers and the mail to be landed in certain cases, for a reason which does not furnish, in the opinion of this Government, even a good presumptive ground for such prohibition, has been made the subject of a serious remonstrance at Madrid, and I have no reason to doubt that due respect will be paid by the Government of Her Catholic Majesty to the representations which our minister has been instructed to make on the subject. It is but justice to the Captain-General to add that his conduct toward the steamers employed to carry the mails of the United States to Havana has, with the exceptions above alluded to, been marked with kindness and liberality, and indicates no general purpose of interfering with the commercial correspondence and intercourse between the island and this country. Early in the present year official notes were received from the ministers of France and England inviting the Government of the United States to become a party with Great Britain and France to a tripartite convention, in virtue of which the three powers should severally and collectively disclaim now and for the future all intention to obtain possession of the island of Cuba, and should bind themselves to discountenance all attempts to that effect on the part of any power or individual whatever. This invitation has been respectfully declined, for reasons which it would occupy too much space in this communication to state in detail, but which led me to think that the proposed measure would be of doubtful constitutionality, impolitic, and unavailing. I have, however, in common with several of my predecessors, directed the ministers of France and England to be assured that the United States entertain no designs against Cuba, but that, on the contrary, I should regard its incorporation into the Union at the present time as fraught with serious peril. Were this island comparatively destitute of inhabitants or occupied by a kindred race, I should regard it, if voluntarily ceded by Spain, as a most desirable acquisition. But under existing circumstances I should look upon its incorporation into our Union as a very hazardous measure. It would bring into the Confederacy a population of a different national stock, speaking a different language, and not likely to harmonize with the other members. It would probably affect in a prejudicial manner the industrial interests of the South, and it might revive those conflicts of opinion between the different sections of the country which lately shook the Union to its center, and which have been so happily compromised. The rejection by the Mexican Congress of the convention which had been concluded between that Republic and the United States for the protection of a transit way across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and of the interests of those citizens of the United States who had become proprietors of the rights which Mexico had conferred on one of her own citizens in regard to that transit has thrown a serious obstacle in the way of the attainment of a very desirable national object. I am still willing to hope that the differences on the subject which exist, or may hereafter arise, between the Governments will be amicably adjusted. This subject, however, has already engaged the attention of the Senate of the United States, and requires no further comment in this communication. The settlement of the question respecting the port of San Juan de Nicaragua and of the controversy between the Republics of Costa Rica and Nicaragua in regard to their boundaries was considered indispensable to the commencement of the ship canal between the two oceans, which was the subject of the convention between the United States and Great Britain of the 19th of April, 1850. Accordingly, a proposition for the same purposes, addressed to the two Governments in that quarter and to the Mosquito Indians, was agreed to in April last by the Secretary of State and the minister of Her Britannic Majesty. Besides the wish to aid in reconciling the differences of the two Republics, I engaged in the negotiation from a desire to place the great work of a ship canal between the two oceans under one jurisdiction and to establish the important port of San Juan de Nicaragua under the government of a civilized power. The proposition in question was assented to by Costs Rica and the Mosquito Indians. It has not proved equally acceptable to Nicaragua, but it is to be hoped that the further negotiations on the subject which are in train will be carried on in that spirit of conciliation and compromise which ought always to prevail on such occasions, and that they will lead to a satisfactory result. I have the satisfaction to inform you that the executive government of Venezuela has acknowledged some claims of citizens of the United States which have for many years past been urged by our charge' d'affaires at Caracas. It is hoped that the same sense of justice will actuate the Congress of that Republic in providing the means for their payment. The recent revolution in Buenos Ayres and the Confederated States having opened the prospect of an improved state of things in that quarter, the Governments of Great Britain and France determined to negotiate with the chief of the new confederacy for the free access of their commerce to the extensive countries watered by the tributaries of the La Plata; and they gave a friendly notice of this purpose to the United States, that we might, if we thought proper, pursue the same course. In compliance with this invitation, our minister at Rio Janeiro and our charge' d'affaires at Buenos Ayres have been fully authorized to conclude treaties with the newly organized confederation or the States composing it. The delays which have taken place in the formation of the new government have as yet prevented the execution of those instructions, but there is every reason to hope that these vast countries will be eventually opened to our commerce. A treaty of commerce has been concluded between the United States and the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, which will be laid before the Senate. Should this convention go into operation, it will open to the commercial enterprise of our citizens a country of great extent and unsurpassed in natural resources, but from which foreign nations have hitherto been almost wholly excluded. The correspondence of the late Secretary of State with the Peruvian charge' d'affaires relative to the Lobos Islands was communicated to Congress toward the close of the last session. Since that time, on further investigation of the subject, the doubts which had been entertained of the title of Peru to those islands have been removed, and I have deemed it just that the temporary wrong which had been unintentionally done her from want of information should be repaired by an unreserved acknowledgment of her sovereignty. I have the satisfaction to inform you that the course pursued by Peru has been creditable to the liberality of her Government. Before it was known by her that her title would be acknowledged at Washington, her minister of foreign affairs had authorized our charge' d'affaires at Lima to announce to the American vessels which had gone to the Lobos for guano that the Peruvian Government was willing to freight them on its own account. This intention has been carried into effect by the Peruvian minister here by an arrangement which is believed to be advantageous to the parties in interest. Our settlements on the shores of the Pacific have already given a great extension, and in some respects a new direction, to our commerce in that ocean. A direct and rapidly increasing intercourse has sprung up with eastern Asia. The waters of the Northern Pacific, even into the Arctic Sea, have of late years been frequented by our whalemen. The application of steam to the general purposes of navigation is becoming daily more common, and makes it desirable to obtain fuel and other necessary supplies at convenient points on the route between Asia and our Pacific shores. Our unfortunate countrymen who from time to time suffer shipwreck on the coasts of the eastern seas are entitled to protection. Besides these specific objects, the general prosperity of our States on the Pacific requires that an attempt should be made to open the opposite regions of Asia to a mutually beneficial intercourse. It is obvious that this attempt could be made by no power to so great advantage as by the United States, whose constitutional system excludes every idea of distant colonial dependencies. I have accordingly been led to order an appropriate naval force to Japan, under the command of a discreet and intelligent officer of the highest rank known to our service. He is instructed to endeavor to obtain from the Government of that country some relaxation of the inhospitable and antisocial system which it has pursued for about two centuries. He has been directed particularly to remonstrate in the strongest language against the cruel treatment to which our shipwrecked mariners have often been subjected and to insist that they shall be treated with humanity. He is instructed, however, at the same time, to give that Government the amplest assurances that the objects of the United States are such, and such only, as I have indicated, and that the expedition is friendly and peaceful. Notwithstanding the jealousy with which the Governments of eastern Asia regard all overtures from foreigners, I am not without hopes of a beneficial result of the expedition. Should it be crowned with success, the advantages will not be confined to the United States, but, as in the case of China, will be equally enjoyed by all the other maritime powers. I have much satisfaction in stating that in all the steps preparatory to this expedition the Government of the United States has been materially aided by the good offices of the King of the Netherlands, the only European power having any commercial relations with Japan. In passing from this survey of our foreign relations, I invite the attention of Congress to the condition of that Department of the Government to which this branch of the public business is intrusted. Our intercourse with foreign powers has of late years greatly increased, both in consequence of our own growth and the introduction of many new states into the family of nations. In this way the Department of State has become overburdened. It has by the recent establishment of the Department of the Interior been relieved of some portion of the domestic business. If the residue of the business of that kind--such as the distribution of Congressional documents, the keeping, publishing, and distribution of the laws of the United States, the execution of the copyright law, the subject of reprieves and pardons, and some other subjects relating to interior administration--should be transferred from the Department of State, it would unquestionably be for the benefit of the public service. I would also suggest that the building appropriated to the State Department is not fireproof; that there is reason to think there are defects in its construction, and that the archives of the Government in charge of the Department, with the precious collections of the manuscript papers of Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, and Monroe, are exposed to destruction by fire. A similar remark may be made of the buildings appropriated to the War and Navy Departments. The condition of the Treasury is exhibited in the annual report from that Department. The cash receipts into the Treasury for the fiscal year ending the 30th June last, exclusive of trust funds, were $49,728,386.89, and the expenditures for the same period, likewise exclusive of trust funds, were $46,007,896.20, of which $9,455,815.83 was on account of the principal and interest of the public debt, including the last installment of the indemnity to Mexico under the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, leaving a balance of $14,632,136.37 in the Treasury on the 1st day of July last. Since this latter period further purchases of the principal of the public debt have been made to the extent of $2,456,547.49, and the surplus in the Treasury will continue to be applied to that object whenever the stock can be procured within the limits as to price authorized by law. The value of foreign merchandise imported during the last fiscal year was $207,240,101, and the value of domestic productions exported was $149,861,911, besides $17,204,026 of foreign merchandise exported, making the aggregate of the entire exports $167,065,937. Exclusive of the above, there was exported $42,507,285 in specie, and imported from foreign ports $5,262,643. In my first annual message to Congress I called your attention to what seemed to me some defects in the present tariff, and recommended such modifications as in my judgment were best adapted to remedy its evils and promote the prosperity of the country. Nothing has since occurred to change my views on this important question. Without repeating the arguments contained in my former message in favor of discriminating protective duties, I deem it my duty to call your attention to one or two other considerations affecting this subject. The first is the effect of large importations of foreign goods upon our currency. Most of the gold of California, as fast as it is coined, finds its way directly to Europe in payment for goods purchased. In the second place, as our manufacturing establishments are broken down by competition with foreigners, the capital invested in them is lost, thousands of honest and industrious citizens are thrown out of employment, and the farmer, to that extent, is deprived of a home market for the sale of his surplus produce. In the third place, the destruction of our manufactures leaves the foreigner without competition in our market, and he consequently raises the price of the article sent here for sale, as is now seen in the increased cost of iron imported from England. The prosperity and wealth of every nation must depend upon its productive industry. The farmer is stimulated to exertion by finding a ready market for his surplus products, and benefited by being able to exchange them without loss of time or expense of transportation for the manufactures which his comfort or convenience requires. This is always done to the best advantage where a portion of the community in which he lives is engaged in other pursuits. But most manufactures require an amount of capital and a practical skill which can not be commanded unless they be protected for a time from ruinous competition from abroad. Hence the necessity of laying those duties upon imported goods which the Constitution authorizes for revenue in such a manner as to protect and encourage the labor of our own citizens. Duties, however, should not be fixed at a rate so high as to exclude the foreign article, but should be so graduated as to enable the domestic manufacturer fairly to compete with the foreigner in our own markets, and by this competition to reduce the price of the manufactured article to the consumer to the lowest rate at which it can be produced. This policy would place the mechanic by the side of the farmer, create a mutual interchange of their respective commodities, and thus stimulate the industry of the whole country and render us independent of foreign nations for the supplies required by the habits or necessities of the people. Another question, wholly independent of protection, presents itself, and that is, whether the duties levied should be upon the value of the article at the place of shipment, or, where it is practicable, a specific duty, graduated according to quantity, as ascertained by weight or measure. All our duties are at present ad valorem. A certain percentage is levied on the price of the goods at the port of shipment in a foreign country. Most commercial nations have found it indispensable, for the purpose of preventing fraud and perjury, to make the duties specific whenever the article is of such a uniform value in weight or measure as to justify such a duty. Legislation should never encourage dishonesty or crime. It is impossible that the revenue officers at the port where the goods are entered and the duties paid should know with certainty what they cost in the foreign country. Yet the law requires that they should levy the duty according to such cost. They are therefore compelled to resort to very unsatisfactory evidence to ascertain what that cost was. They take the invoice of the importer, attested by his oath, as the best evidence of which the nature of the case admits. But everyone must see that the invoice may be fabricated and the oath by which it is supported false, by reason of which the dishonest importer pays a part only of the duties which are paid by the honest one, and thus indirectly receives from the Treasury of the United States a reward for his fraud and perjury. The reports of the Secretary of the Treasury heretofore made on this subject show conclusively that these frauds have been practiced to a great extent. The tendency is to destroy that high moral character for which our merchants have long been distinguished, to defraud the Government of its revenue, to break down the honest importer by a dishonest competition, and, finally, to transfer the business of importation to foreign and irresponsible agents, to the great detriment of our own citizens. I therefore again most earnestly recommend the adoption of specific duties wherever it is practicable, or a home valuation, to prevent these frauds. I would also again call your attention to the fact that the present tariff in some cases imposes a higher duty upon the raw material imported than upon the article manufactured from it, the consequence of which is that the duty operates to the encouragement of the foreigner and the discouragement of our own citizens. For full and detailed information in regard to the general condition of our Indian affairs, I respectfully refer you to the report of the Secretary of the Interior and the accompanying documents. The Senate not having thought proper to ratify the treaties which have been negotiated with the tribes of Indians in California and Oregon, our relations with them have been left in a very unsatisfactory condition. In other parts of our territory particular districts of country have been set apart for the exclusive occupation of the Indians, and their right to the lands within those limits has been acknowledged and respected. But in California and Oregon there has been no recognition by the Government of the exclusive right of the Indians to any part of the country. They are therefore mere tenants at sufferance, and liable to be driven from place to place at the pleasure of the whites. The treaties which have been rejected proposed to remedy this evil by allotting to the different tribes districts of country suitable to their habits of life and sufficient for their support. This provision, more than any other, it is believed, led to their rejection; and as no substitute for it has been adopted by Congress, it has not been deemed advisable to attempt to enter into new treaties of a permanent character, although no effort has been spared by temporary arrangements to preserve friendly relations with them. If it be the desire of Congress to remove them from the country altogether, or to assign to them particular districts more remote from the settlements of the whites, it will be proper to set apart by law the territory which they are to occupy and to provide the means necessary for removing them to it. Justice alike to our own citizens and to the Indians requires the prompt action of Congress on this subject. The amendments proposed by the Senate to the treaties which were negotiated with the Sioux Indians of Minnesota have been submitted to the tribes who were parties to them, and have received their assent. A large tract of valuable territory has thus been opened for settlement and cultivation, and all danger of collision with these powerful and warlike bands has been happily removed. The removal of the remnant of the tribe of Seminole Indians from Florida has long been a cherished object of the Government, and it is one to which my attention has been steadily directed. Admonished by past experience of the difficulty and cost of the attempt to remove them by military force, resort has been had to conciliatory measures. By the invitation of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, several of the principal chiefs recently visited Washington, and whilst here acknowledged in writing the obligation of their tribe to remove with the least possible delay. Late advices from the special agent of the Government represent that they adhere to their promise, and that a council of their people has been called to make their preliminary arrangements. A general emigration may therefore be confidently expected at an early day. The report from the General Land Office shows increased activity in its operations. The survey of the northern boundary of Iowa has been completed with unexampled dispatch. Within the last year 9,522,953 acres of public land have been surveyed and 8,032,463 acres brought into market. Acres In the last fiscal year there were sold 1,553,071 Located with bounty-land warrants 3,201,314 Located with other certificates 115,682 Making a total of 4,870,067 In addition there were-- Reported under swamp-land grants 5,219,188 For internal improvements, railroads, etc 3,025,920 Making an aggregate of 13,115,175 Being an increase of the amount sold and located under land warrants of 569,220 acres over the previous year. The whole amount thus sold, located under land warrants, reported under swamp-land grants, and selected for internal improvements exceeds that of the previous year by 3,342,372 acres; and the sales would without doubt have been much larger but for the extensive reservations for railroads in Missouri, Mississippi, and Alabama. Acres For the quarter ending 30th September, 1852, there were sold 243,255 Located with bounty-land warrants 1,387,116 Located with other certificates 15,649 Reported under swamp-land grants 2,485,233 Making an aggregate for the quarter of 4,131,253 Much the larger portion of the labor of arranging and classifying the returns of the last census has been finished, and it will now devolve upon Congress to make the necessary provision for the publication of the results in such form as shall be deemed best. The apportionment of representation on the basis of the new census has been made by the Secretary of the Interior in conformity with the provisions of law relating to that subject, and the recent elections have been made in accordance with it. I commend to your favorable regard the suggestion contained in the report of the Secretary of the Interior that provision be made by law for the publication and distribution, periodically, of an analytical digest of all the patents which have been or may hereafter be granted for useful inventions and discoveries, with such descriptions and illustrations as may be necessary to present an intelligible view of their nature and operation. The cost of such publication could easily be defrayed out of the patent fund, and I am persuaded that it could be applied to no object more acceptable to inventors and beneficial to the public at large. An appropriation of $100,000 having been made at the last session for the purchase of a suitable site and for the erection, furnishing, and fitting up of an asylum for the insane of the District of Columbia and of the Army and Navy of the United States, the proper measures have been adopted to carry this beneficent purpose into effect. By the latest advices from the Mexican boundary commission it appears that the survey of the river Gila from its continence with the Colorado to its supposed intersection with the western line of New Mexico has been completed. The survey of the Rio Grande has also been finished from the point agreed on by the commissioners as "the point where it strikes the southern boundary of New Mexico" to a point 135 miles below Eagle Pass, which is about two-thirds of the distance along the course of the river to its mouth. The appropriation which was made at the last session of Congress for the continuation of the survey is subject to the following proviso: Provided, That no part of this appropriation shall be used or expended until it shall be made satisfactorily to appear to the President of the United States that the southern boundary of New Mexico is not established by the commissioner and surveyor of the United States farther north of the town called "Paso" than the same is laid down in Disturnell's map, which is added to the treaty. My attention was drawn to this subject by a report from the Department of the Interior, which reviewed all the facts of the case and submitted for my decision the question whether under existing circumstances any part of the appropriation could be lawfully used or expended for the further prosecution of the work. After a careful consideration of the subject I came to the conclusion that it could not, and so informed the head of that Department. Orders were immediately issued by him to the commissioner and surveyor to make no further requisitions on the Department, as they could not be paid, and to discontinue all operations on the southern line of New Mexico. But as the Department had no exact information as to the amount of provisions and money which remained unexpended in the hands of the commissioner and surveyor, it was left discretionary with them to continue the survey down the Rio Grande as far as the means at their disposal would enable them or at once to disband the commission. A special messenger has since arrived from the officer in charge of the survey on the river with information that the funds subject to his control were exhausted and that the officers and others employed in the service were destitute alike of the means of prosecuting the work and of returning to their homes. The object of the proviso was doubtless to arrest the survey of the southern and western lines of New Mexico, in regard to which different opinions have been expressed; for it is hardly to be supposed that there could be any objection to that part of the line which extends along the channel of the Rio Grande. But the terms of the law are so broad as to forbid the use of any part of the money for the prosecution of the work, or even for the payment to the officers and agents of the arrearages of pay which are justly due to them. I earnestly invite your prompt attention to this subject, and recommend a modification of the terms of the proviso, so as to enable the Department to use as much of the appropriation as will be necessary to discharge the existing obligations of the Government and to complete the survey of the Rio Grande to its mouth. It will also be proper to make further provision by law for the fulfillment of our treaty with Mexico for running and marking the residue of the boundary line between the two countries. Permit me to invite your particular attention to the interests of the District of Columbia, which are confided by the Constitution to your peculiar care. Among the measures which seem to me of the greatest importance to its prosperity are the introduction of a copious supply of water into the city of Washington and the construction of suitable bridges across the Potomac to replace those which were destroyed by high water in the early part of the present year. At the last session of Congress an appropriation was made to defray the cost of the surveys necessary for determining the best means of affording an unfailing supply of good and wholesome water. Some progress has been made in the survey, and as soon as it is completed the result will be laid before you. Further appropriations will also be necessary for grading and paving the streets and avenues and inclosing and embellishing the public grounds within the city of Washington. I commend all these objects, together with the charitable institutions of the District, to your favorable regard. Every effort has been made to protect our frontier and that of the adjoining Mexican States from the incursions of the Indian tribes. Of about 11,000 men of which the Army is composed, nearly 8,000 are employed in the defense of the newly acquired territory (including Texas) and of emigrants proceeding thereto. I am gratified to say that these efforts have been unusually successful. With the exception of some partial outbreaks in California and Oregon and occasional depredations on a portion of the Rio Grande, owing, it is believed, to the disturbed state of that border region, the inroads of the Indians have been effectually restrained. Experience has shown, however, that whenever the two races are brought into contact collisions will inevitably occur. To prevent these collisions the United States have generally set apart portions of their territory for the exclusive occupation of the Indian tribes. A difficulty occurs, however, in the application of this policy to Texas. By the terms of the compact by which that State was admitted into the Union she retained the ownership of all the vacant lands within her limits. The government of that State, it is understood, has assigned no portion of her territory to the Indians, but as fast as her settlements advance lays it off into counties and proceeds to survey and sell it. This policy manifestly tends not only to alarm and irritate the Indians, but to compel them to resort to plunder for subsistence. It also deprives this Government of that influence and control over them without which no durable peace can ever exist between them and the whites. I trust, therefore, that a due regard for her own interests, apart from considerations of humanity and justice, will induce that State to assign a small portion of her vast domain for the provisional occupancy of the small remnants of tribes within her borders, subject, of course, to her ownership and eventual jurisdiction. If she should fail to do this, the fulfillment of our treaty stipulations with Mexico and our duty to the Indians themselves will, it is feared, become a subject of serious embarrassment to the Government. It is hoped, however, that a timely and just provision by Texas may avert this evil. No appropriations for fortifications were made at the two last sessions of Congress. The cause of this omission is probably to be found in a growing belief that the system of fortifications adopted in 1816, and heretofore acted on, requires revision. The subject certainly deserves full and careful investigation, but it should not be delayed longer than can be avoided. In the meantime there are certain works which have been commenced, some of them nearly completed, designed to protect our principal seaports from Boston to New Orleans and a few other important points. In regard to the necessity for these works, it is believed that little difference of opinion exists among military men. I therefore recommend that the appropriations necessary to prosecute them be made. I invite your attention to the remarks on this subject and on others connected with his Department contained in the accompanying report of the Secretary of War. Measures have been taken to carry into effect the law of the last session making provision for the improvement of certain rivers and harbors, and it is believed that the arrangements made for that purpose will combine efficiency with economy. Owing chiefly to the advanced season when the act was passed, little has yet been done in regard to many of the works beyond making the necessary preparations. With respect to a few of the improvements, the sums already appropriated will suffice to complete them; but most of them will require additional appropriations. I trust that these appropriations will be made, and that this wise and beneficent policy, so auspiciously resumed, will be continued. Great care should be taken, however, to commence no work which is not of sufficient importance to the commerce of the country to be viewed as national in its character. But works which have been commenced should not be discontinued until completed, as otherwise the sums expended will in most cases be lost. The report from the Navy Department will inform you of the prosperous condition of the branch of the public service committed to its charge. It presents to your consideration many topics and suggestions of which I ask your approval. It exhibits an unusual degree of activity in the operations of the Department during the past year. The preparations for the Japan expedition, to which I have already alluded; the arrangements made for the exploration and survey of the China Seas, the Northern Pacific, and Behrings Straits; the incipient measures taken toward a reconnoissance of the continent of Africa eastward of Liberia; the preparation for an early examination of the tributaries of the river La Plata, which a recent decree of the provisional chief of the Argentine Confederation has opened to navigation--all these enterprises and the means by which they are proposed to be accomplished have commanded my full approbation, and I have no doubt will be productive of most useful results. Two officers of the Navy were heretofore instructed to explore the whole extent of the Amazon River from the confines of Peru to its mouth. The return of one of them has placed in the possession of the Government an interesting and valuable account of the character and resources of a country abounding in the materials of commerce, and which if opened to the industry of the world will prove an inexhaustible fund of wealth. The report of this exploration will be communicated to you as soon as it is completed. Among other subjects offered to your notice by the Secretary of the Navy, I select for special commendation, in view of its connection with the interests of the Navy, the plan submitted by him for the establishment of a permanent corps of seamen and the suggestions he has presented for the reorganization of the Naval Academy. In reference to the first of these, I take occasion to say that I think it will greatly improve the efficiency of the service, and that I regard it as still more entitled to favor for the salutary influence it must exert upon the naval discipline, now greatly disturbed by the increasing spirit of insubordination resulting from our present system. The plan proposed for the organization of the seamen furnishes a judicious substitute for the law of September, 1850, abolishing corporal punishment, and satisfactorily sustains the policy of that act under conditions well adapted to maintain the authority of command and the order and security of our ships. It is believed that any change which proposes permanently to dispense with this mode of punishment should be preceded by a system of enlistment which shall supply the Navy with seamen of the most meritorious class, whose good deportment and pride of character may preclude all occasion for a resort to penalties of a harsh or degrading nature. The safety of a ship and her crew is often dependent upon immediate obedience to a command, and the authority to enforce it must be equally ready. The arrest of a refractory seaman in such moments not only deprives the ship of indispensable aid, but imposes a necessity for double service on others, whose fidelity to their duties may be relied upon in such an emergency. The exposure to this increased and arduous labor since the passage of the act of 1850 has already had, to a most observable and injurious extent, the effect of preventing the enlistment of the best seamen in the Navy. The plan now suggested is designed to promote a condition of service in which this objection will no longer exist. The details of this plan may be established in great part, if not altogether, by the Executive under the authority of existing laws, but I have thought it proper, in accordance with the suggestion of the Secretary of the Navy, to submit it to your approval. The establishment of a corps of apprentices for the Navy, or boys to be enlisted until they become of age, and to be employed under such regulations as the Navy Department may devise, as proposed in the report, I cordially approve and commend to your consideration; and I also concur in the suggestion that this system for the early training of seamen may be most usefully ingrafted upon the service of our merchant marine. The other proposition of the report to which I have referred--the reorganization of the Naval Academy--I recommend to your attention as a project worthy of your encouragement and support. The valuable services already rendered by this institution entitle it to the continuance of your fostering care. Your attention is respectfully called to the report of the Postmaster General for the detailed operation of his Department during the last fiscal year, from which it will be seen that the receipts from postages for that time were less by $1,431,696 than for the preceding fiscal year, being a decrease of about 23 per cent. This diminution is attributable to the reduction in the rates of postage made by the act of March 3, 1851, which reduction took effect at the commencement of the last fiscal year. Although in its operation during the last year the act referred to has not fulfilled the predictions of its friends by increasing the correspondence of the country in proportion to the reduction of postage, I should, nevertheless, question the policy of returning to higher rates. Experience warrants the expectation that as the community becomes accustomed to cheap postage correspondence will increase. It is believed that from this cause and from the rapid growth of the country in population and business the receipts of the Department must ultimately exceed its expenses, and that the country may safely rely upon the continuance of the present cheap rate of postage. In former messages I have, among other things, respectfully recommended to the consideration of Congress the propriety and necessity of further legislation for the protection and punishment of foreign consuls residing in the United States; to revive, with certain modifications, the act of 10th March, 1838, to restrain unlawful military expeditions against the inhabitants of conterminous states or territories; for the preservation and protection from mutilation or theft of the papers, records, and archives of the nation; for authorizing the surplus revenue to be applied to the payment of the public debt in advance of the time when it will become due; for the establishment of land offices for the sale of the public lands in California and the Territory of Oregon; for the construction of a road from the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific Ocean; for the establishment of a bureau of agriculture for the promotion of that interest, perhaps the most important in the country; for the prevention of frauds upon the Government in applications for pensions and bounty lands; for the establishment of a uniform fee bill, prescribing a specific compensation for every service required of clerks, district attorneys, and marshals; for authorizing an additional regiment of mounted men for the defense of our frontiers against the Indians and for fulfilling our treaty stipulations with Mexico to defend her citizens against the Indians "with equal diligence and energy as our own;" for determining the relative rank between the naval and civil officers in our public ships and between the officers of the Army and Navy in the various grades of each; for reorganizing the naval establishment by fixing the number of officers in each grade, and providing for a retired list upon reduced pay of those unfit for active duty; for prescribing and regulating punishments in the Navy; for the appointment of a commission to revise the public statutes of the United States by arranging them in order, supplying deficiencies, correcting incongruities, simplifying their language, and reporting them to Congress for its final action; and for the establishment of a commission to adjudicate and settle private claims against the United States. I am not aware, however, that any of these subjects have been finally acted upon by Congress. Without repeating the reasons for legislation on these subjects which have been assigned in former messages, I respectfully recommend them again to your favorable consideration. I think it due to the several Executive Departments of this Government to bear testimony to the efficiency and integrity with which they are conducted. With all the careful superintendence which it is possible for the heads of those Departments to exercise, still the due administration and guardianship of the public money must very much depend on the vigilance, intelligence, and fidelity of the subordinate officers and clerks, and especially on those intrusted with the settlement and adjustment of claims and accounts. I am gratified to believe that they have generally performed their duties faithfully and well. They are appointed to guard the approaches to the public Treasury, and they occupy positions that expose them to all the temptations and seductions which the cupidity of peculators and fraudulent claimants can prompt them to employ. It will be but a wise precaution to protect the Government against that source of mischief and corruption, as far as it can be done, by the enactment of all proper legal penalties. The laws in this respect are supposed to be defective, and I therefore deem it my duty to call your attention to the subject and to recommend that provision be made by law for the punishment not only of those who shall accept bribes, but also of those who shall either promise, give, or offer to give to any of those officers or clerks a bribe or reward touching or relating to any matter of their official action or duty. It has been the uniform policy of this Government, from its foundation to the present day, to abstain from all interference in the domestic affairs of other nations. The consequence has been that while the nations of Europe have been engaged in desolating wars our country has pursued its peaceful course to unexampled prosperity and happiness. The wars in which we have been compelled to engage in defense of the rights and honor of the country have been, fortunately, of short duration. During the terrific contest of nation against nation which succeeded the French Revolution we were enabled by the wisdom and firmness of President Washington to maintain our neutrality. While other nations were drawn into this wide-sweeping whirlpool, we sat quiet and unmoved upon our own shores. While the flower of their numerous armies was wasted by disease or perished by hundreds of thousands upon the battlefield, the youth of this favored land were permitted to enjoy the blessings of peace beneath the paternal roof. While the States of Europe incurred enormous debts, under the burden of which their subjects still groan, and which must absorb no small part of the product of the honest industry of those countries for generations to come, the United States have once been enabled to exhibit the proud spectacle of a nation free from public debt, and if permitted to pursue our prosperous way for a few years longer in peace we may do the same again. But it is now said by some that this policy must be changed. Europe is no longer separated from us by a voyage of months, but steam navigation has brought her within a few days' sail of our shores. We see more of her movements and take a deeper interest in her controversies. Although no one proposes that we should join the fraternity of potentates who have for ages lavished the blood and treasure of their subjects in maintaining "the balance of power," yet it is said that we ought to interfere between contending sovereigns and their subjects for the purpose of overthrowing the monarchies of Europe and establishing in their place republican institutions. It is alleged that we have heretofore pursued a different course from a sense of our weakness, but that now our conscious strength dictates a change of policy, and that it is consequently our duty to mingle in these contests and aid those who are struggling for liberty. This is a most seductive but dangerous appeal to the generous sympathies of freemen. Enjoying, as we do, the blessings of a free Government, there is no man who has an American heart that would not rejoice to see these blessings extended to all other nations. We can not witness the struggle between the oppressed and his oppressor anywhere without the deepest sympathy for the former and the most anxious desire for his triumph. Nevertheless, is it prudent or is it wise to involve ourselves in these foreign wars? Is it indeed true that we have heretofore refrained from doing so merely from the degrading motive of a conscious weakness? For the honor of the patriots who have gone before us, I can not admit it. Men of the Revolution, who drew the sword against the oppressions of the mother country and pledged to Heaven "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor" to maintain their freedom, could never have been actuated by so unworthy a motive. They knew no weakness or fear where right or duty pointed the way, and it is a libel upon their fair fame for us, while we enjoy the blessings for which they so nobly fought and bled, to insinuate it. The truth is that the course which they pursued was dictated by a stern sense of international justice, by a statesmanlike prudence and a far-seeing wisdom, looking not merely to the present necessities but to the permanent safety and interest of the country. They knew that the world is governed less by sympathy than by reason and force; that it was not possible for this nation to become a "propagandist" of free principles without arraying against it the combined powers of Europe, and that the result was more likely to be the overthrow of republican liberty here than its establishment there. History has been written in vain for those who can doubt this. France had no sooner established a republican form of government than she manifested a desire to force its blessings on all the world. Her own historian informs us that, hearing of some petty acts of tyranny in a neighboring principality, "the National Convention declared that she would afford succor and fraternity to all nations who wished to recover their liberty, and she gave it in charge to the executive power to give orders to the generals of the French armies to aid all citizens who might have been or should be oppressed in the cause of liberty." Here was the false step which led to her subsequent misfortunes. She soon found herself involved in war with all the rest of Europe. In less than ten years her Government was changed from a republic to an empire, and finally, after shedding rivers of blood, foreign powers restored her exiled dynasty and exhausted Europe sought peace and repose in the unquestioned ascendency of monarchical principles. Let us learn wisdom from her example. Let us remember that revolutions do not always establish freedom. Our own free institutions were not the offspring of our Revolution. They existed before. They were planted in the free charters of self-government under which the English colonies grew up, and our Revolution only freed us from the dominion of a foreign power whose government was at variance with those institutions. But European nations have had no such training for self-government, and every effort to establish it by bloody revolutions has been, and must without that preparation continue to be, a failure. Liberty unregulated by law degenerates into anarchy, which soon becomes the most horrid of all despotisms. Our policy is wisely to govern ourselves, and thereby to set such an example of national justice, prosperity, and true glory as shall teach to all nations the blessings of self-government and the unparalleled enterprise and success of a free people. We live in an age of progress, and ours is emphatically a country of progress. Within the last half century the number of States in this Union has nearly doubled, the population has almost quadrupled, and our boundaries have been extended from the Mississippi to the Pacific. Our territory is checkered over with railroads and furrowed with canals. The inventive talent of our country is excited to the highest pitch, and the numerous applications for patents for valuable improvements distinguish this age and this people from all others. The genius of one American has enabled our commerce to move against wind and tide and that of another has annihilated distance in the transmission of intelligence. The whole country is full of enterprise. Our common schools are diffusing intelligence among the people and our industry is fast accumulating the comforts and luxuries of life. This is in part owing to our peculiar position, to our fertile soil and comparatively sparse population; but much of it is also owing to the popular institutions under which we live, to the freedom which every man feels to engage in any useful pursuit according to his taste or inclination, and to the entire confidence that his person and property will be protected by the laws. But whatever may be the cause of this unparalleled growth in population, intelligence, and wealth, one tiring is clear--that the Government must keep pace with the progress of the people. It must participate in their spirit of enterprise, and while it exacts obedience to the laws and restrains all unauthorized invasions of the rights of neighboring states, it should foster and protect home industry and lend its powerful strength to the improvement of such means of intercommunication as are necessary to promote our internal commerce and strengthen the ties which bind us together as a people. It is not strange, however much it may be regretted, that such an exuberance of enterprise should cause some individuals to mistake change for progress and the invasion of the rights of others for national prowess and glory. The former are constantly agitating for some change in the organic law, or urging new and untried theories of human rights. The latter are ever ready to engage in any wild crusade against a neighboring people, regardless of the justice of the enterprise and without looking at the fatal consequences to ourselves and to the cause of popular government. Such expeditions, however, are often stimulated by mercenary individuals, who expect to share the plunder or profit of the enterprise without exposing themselves to danger, and are led on by some irresponsible foreigner, who abuses the hospitality of our own Government by seducing the young and ignorant to join in his scheme of personal ambition or revenge under the false and delusive pretense of extending the area of freedom. These reprehensible aggressions but retard the true progress of our nation and tarnish its fair fame. They should therefore receive the indignant frowns of every good citizen who sincerely loves his country and takes a pride in its prosperity and honor. Our Constitution, though not perfect, is doubtless the best that ever was formed. Therefore let every proposition to change it be well weighed and, if found beneficial, cautiously adopted. Every patriot will rejoice to see its authority so exerted as to advance the prosperity and honor of the nation, whilst he will watch with jealousy any attempt to mutilate this charter of our liberties or pervert its powers to acts of aggression or injustice. Thus shall conservatism and progress blend their harmonious action in preserving the form and spirit of the Constitution and at the same time carry forward the great improvements of the country with a rapidity and energy which freemen only can display. In closing this my last annual communication, permit me, fellow-citizens, to congratulate you on the prosperous condition of our beloved country. Abroad its relations with all foreign powers are friendly, its rights are respected, and its high place in the family of nations cheerfully recognized. At home we enjoy an amount of happiness, public and private, which has probably never fallen to the lot of any other people. Besides affording to our own citizens a degree of prosperity of which on so large a scale I know of no other instance, our country is annually affording a refuge and a home to multitudes, altogether without example, from the Old World. We owe these blessings, under Heaven, to the happy Constitution and Government which were bequeathed to us by our fathers, and which it is our sacred duty to transmit in all their integrity to our children. We must all consider it a great distinction and privilege to have been chosen by the people to bear a part in the administration of such a Government. Called by an unexpected dispensation to its highest trust at a season of embarrassment and alarm, I entered upon its arduous duties with extreme diffidence. I claim only to have discharged them to the best of an humble ability, with a single eye to the public good, and it is with devout gratitude in retiring from office that I leave the country in a state of peace and prosperity.
The brief space which has elapsed since the close of your last session has been marked by no extraordinary political event. The quadrennial election of Chief Magistrate has passed off with less than the usual excitement. However individuals and parties may have been disappointed in the result, it is, nevertheless, a subject of national congratulation that the choice has been effected by the independent suffrages of a free people, undisturbed by those influences which in other countries have too often affected the purity of popular elections. Our grateful thanks are due to an all-merciful Providence, not only for staying the pestilence which in different forms has desolated some of our cities, but for crowning the labors of the husbandman with an abundant harvest and the nation generally with the blessings of peace and prosperity. Within a few weeks the public mind has been deeply affected by the death of Daniel Webster, filling at his decease the office of Secretary of State. His associates in the executive government have sincerely sympathized with his family and the public generally on this mournful occasion. His commanding talents, his great political and professional eminence, his well-tried patriotism, and his long and faithful services in the most important public trusts have caused his death to be lamented throughout the country and have earned for him a lasting place in our history. In the course of the last summer considerable anxiety was caused for a short time by an official intimation from the Government of Great Britain that orders had been given for the protection of the fisheries upon the coasts of the British provinces in North America against the alleged encroachments of the fishing vessels of the United States and France. The shortness of this notice and the season of the year seemed to make it a matter of urgent importance. It was at first apprehended that an increased naval force had been ordered to the fishing grounds to carry into effect the British interpretation of those provisions in the convention of 1818 in reference to the true intent of which the two Governments differ. It was soon discovered that such was not the design of Great Britain, and satisfactory explanations of the real objects of the measure have been given both here and in London. The unadjusted difference, however, between the two Governments as to the interpretation of the first article of the convention of 1818 is still a matter of importance. American fishing vessels, within nine or ten years, have been excluded from waters to which they had free access for twenty-five years after the negotiation of the treaty. In 1845 this exclusion was relaxed so far as concerns the Bay of Fundy, but the just and liberal intention of the home Government, in compliance with what we think the true construction of the convention, to open all the other outer bays to our fishermen was abandoned in consequence of the opposition of the colonies. Notwithstanding this, the United States have, since the Bay of Fundy was reopened to our fishermen in 1845, pursued the most liberal course toward the colonial fishing interests. By the revenue law of 1846 the duties on colonial fish entering our ports were very greatly reduced, and by the warehousing act it is allowed to be entered in bond without payment of duty. In this way colonial fish has acquired the monopoly of the export trade in our market and is entering to some extent into the home consumption. These facts were among those which increased the sensibility of our fishing interest at the movement in question. These circumstances and the incidents above alluded to have led me to think the moment favorable for a reconsideration of the entire subject of the fisheries on the coasts of the British Provinces, with a view to place them upon a more liberal footing of reciprocal privilege. A willingness to meet us in some arrangement of this kind is understood to exist on the part of Great Britain, with a desire on her part to include in one comprehensive settlement as well this subject as the commercial intercourse between the United States and the British Provinces. I have thought that, whatever arrangements may be made on these two subjects, it is expedient that they should be embraced in separate conventions. The illness and death of the late Secretary of State prevented the commencement of the contemplated negotiation. Pains have been taken to collect the information required for the details of such an arrangement. The subject is attended with considerable difficulty. If it is found practicable to come to an agreement mutually acceptable to the two parties, conventions may be concluded in the course of the present winter. The control of Congress over all the provisions of such an arrangement affecting the revenue will of course be reserved. The affairs of Cuba formed a prominent topic in my last annual message. They remain in an uneasy condition, and a feeling of alarm and irritation on the part of the Cuban authorities appears to exist. This feeling has interfered with the regular commercial intercourse between the United States and the island and led to some acts of which we have a fight to complain. But the Captain-General of Cuba is clothed with no power to treat with foreign governments, nor is he in any degree under the control of the Spanish minister at Washington. Any communication which he may hold with an agent of a foreign power is informal and matter of courtesy. Anxious to put an end to the existing inconveniences (which seemed to rest on a misconception), I directed the newly appointed minister to Mexico to visit Havana on his way to Vera Cruz. He was respectfully received by the Captain-General, who conferred with him freely on the recent occurrences, but no permanent arrangement was effected. In the meantime the refusal of the Captain-Generalto allow passengers and the mail to be landed in certain cases, for a reason which does not furnish, in the opinion of this Government, even a good presumptive ground for such prohibition, has been made the subject of a serious remonstrance at Madrid, and I have no reason to doubt that due respect will be paid by the Government of Her Catholic Majesty to the representations which our minister has been instructed to make on the subject. It is but justice to the Captain-General to add that his conduct toward the steamers employed to carry the mails of the United States to Havana has, with the exceptions above alluded to, been marked with kindness and liberality, and indicates no general purpose of interfering with the commercial correspondence and intercourse between the island and this country. Early in the present year official notes were received from the ministers of France and England inviting the Government of the United States to become a party with Great Britain and France to a tripartite convention, in virtue of which the three powers should severally and collectively disclaim now and for the future all intention to obtain possession of the island of Cuba, and should bind themselves to discountenance all attempts to that effect on the part of any power or individual whatever. This invitation has been respectfully declined, for reasons which it would occupy too much space in this communication to state in detail, but which led me to think that the proposed measure would be of doubtful constitutionality, impolitic, and unavailing. I have, however, in common with several of my predecessors, directed the ministers of France and England to be assured that the United States entertain no designs against Cuba, but that, on the contrary, I should regard its incorporation into the Union at the present time as fraught with serious peril. Were this island comparatively destitute of inhabitants or occupied by a kindred race, I should regard it, if voluntarily ceded by Spain, as a most desirable acquisition. But under existing circumstances I should look upon its incorporation into our Union as a very hazardous measure. It would bring into the Confederacy a population of a different national stock, speaking a different language, and not likely to harmonize with the other members. It would probably affect in a prejudicial manner the industrial interests of the South, and it might revive those conflicts of opinion between the different sections of the country which lately shook the Union to its center, and which have been so happily compromised. The rejection by the Mexican Congress of the convention which had been concluded between that Republic and the United States for the protection of a transit way across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and of the interests of those citizens of the United States who had become proprietors of the rights which Mexico had conferred on one of her own citizens in regard to that transit has thrown a serious obstacle in the way of the attainment of a very desirable national object. I am still willing to hope that the differences on the subject which exist, or may hereafter arise, between the Governments will be amicably adjusted. This subject, however, has already engaged the attention of the Senate of the United States, and requires no further comment in this communication. The settlement of the question respecting the port of San Juan de Nicaragua and of the controversy between the Republics of Costa Rica and Nicaragua in regard to their boundaries was considered indispensable to the commencement of the ship canal between the two oceans, which was the subject of the convention between the United States and Great Britain of the 19th of April, 1850. Accordingly, a proposition for the same purposes, addressed to the two Governments in that quarter and to the Mosquito Indians, was agreed to in April last by the Secretary of State and the minister of Her Britannic Majesty. Besides the wish to aid in reconciling the differences of the two Republics, I engaged in the negotiation from a desire to place the great work of a ship canal between the two oceans under one jurisdiction and to establish the important port of San Juan de Nicaragua under the government of a civilized power. The proposition in question was assented to by Costs Rica and the Mosquito Indians. It has not proved equally acceptable to Nicaragua, but it is to be hoped that the further negotiations on the subject which are in train will be carried on in that spirit of conciliation and compromise which ought always to prevail on such occasions, and that they will lead to a satisfactory result. I have the satisfaction to inform you that the executive government of Venezuela has acknowledged some claims of citizens of the United States which have for many years past been urged by our charge' d'affaires at Caracas. It is hoped that the same sense of justice will actuate the Congress of that Republic in providing the means for their payment. The recent revolution in Buenos Ayres and the Confederated States having opened the prospect of an improved state of things in that quarter, the Governments of Great Britain and France determined to negotiate with the chief of the new confederacy for the free access of their commerce to the extensive countries watered by the tributaries of the La Plata; and they gave a friendly notice of this purpose to the United States, that we might, if we thought proper, pursue the same course. In compliance with this invitation, our minister at Rio Janeiro and our charge' d'affaires at Buenos Ayres have been fully authorized to conclude treaties with the newly organized confederation or the States composing it. The delays which have taken place in the formation of the new government have as yet prevented the execution of those instructions, but there is every reason to hope that these vast countries will be eventually opened to our commerce. A treaty of commerce has been concluded between the United States and the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, which will be laid before the Senate. Should this convention go into operation, it will open to the commercial enterprise of our citizens a country of great extent and unsurpassed in natural resources, but from which foreign nations have hitherto been almost wholly excluded. The correspondence of the late Secretary of State with the Peruvian charge' d'affaires relative to the Lobos Islands was communicated to Congress toward the close of the last session. Since that time, on further investigation of the subject, the doubts which had been entertained of the title of Peru to those islands have been removed, and I have deemed it just that the temporary wrong which had been unintentionally done her from want of information should be repaired by an unreserved acknowledgment of her sovereignty. I have the satisfaction to inform you that the course pursued by Peru has been creditable to the liberality of her Government. Before it was known by her that her title would be acknowledged at Washington, her minister of foreign affairs had authorized our charge' d'affaires at Lima to announce to the American vessels which had gone to the Lobos for guano that the Peruvian Government was willing to freight them on its own account. This intention has been carried into effect by the Peruvian minister here by an arrangement which is believed to be advantageous to the parties in interest. Our settlements on the shores of the Pacific have already given a great extension, and in some respects a new direction, to our commerce in that ocean. A direct and rapidly increasing intercourse has sprung up with eastern Asia. The waters of the Northern Pacific, even into the Arctic Sea, have of late years been frequented by our whalemen. The application of steam to the general purposes of navigation is becoming daily more common, and makes it desirable to obtain fuel and other necessary supplies at convenient points on the route between Asia and our Pacific shores. Our unfortunate countrymen who from time to time suffer shipwreck on the coasts of the eastern seas are entitled to protection. Besides these specific objects, the general prosperity of our States on the Pacific requires that an attempt should be made to open the opposite regions of Asia to a mutually beneficial intercourse. It is obvious that this attempt could be made by no power to so great advantage as by the United States, whose constitutional system excludes every idea of distant colonial dependencies. I have accordingly been led to order an appropriate naval force to Japan, under the command of a discreet and intelligent officer of the highest rank known to our service. He is instructed to endeavor to obtain from the Government of that country some relaxation of the inhospitable and antisocial system which it has pursued for about two centuries. He has been directed particularly to remonstrate in the strongest language against the cruel treatment to which our shipwrecked mariners have often been subjected and to insist that they shall be treated with humanity. He is instructed, however, at the same time, to give that Government the amplest assurances that the objects of the United States are such, and such only, as I have indicated, and that the expedition is friendly and peaceful. Notwithstanding the jealousy with which the Governments of eastern Asia regard all overtures from foreigners, I am not without hopes of a beneficial result of the expedition. Should it be crowned with success, the advantages will not be confined to the United States, but, as in the case of China, will be equally enjoyed by all the other maritime powers. I have much satisfaction in stating that in all the steps preparatory to this expedition the Government of the United States has been materially aided by the good offices of the King of the Netherlands, the only European power having any commercial relations with Japan. In passing from this survey of our foreign relations, I invite the attention of Congress to the condition of that Department of the Government to which this branch of the public business is intrusted. Our intercourse with foreign powers has of late years greatly increased, both in consequence of our own growth and the introduction of many new states into the family of nations. In this way the Department of State has become overburdened. It has by the recent establishment of the Department of the Interior been relieved of some portion of the domestic business. If the residue of the business of that kind--such as the distribution of Congressional documents, the keeping, publishing, and distribution of the laws of the United States, the execution of the copyright law, the subject of reprieves and pardons, and some other subjects relating to interior administration--should be transferred from the Department of State, it would unquestionably be for the benefit of the public service. I would also suggest that the building appropriated to the State Department is not fireproof; that there is reason to think there are defects in its construction, and that the archives of the Government in charge of the Department, with the precious collections of the manuscript papers of Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, and Monroe, are exposed to destruction by fire. A similar remark may be made of the buildings appropriated to the War and Navy Departments. The condition of the Treasury is exhibited in the annual report from that Department. The cash receipts into the Treasury for the fiscal year ending the 30th June last, exclusive of trust funds, were $49,728,386.89, and the expenditures for the same period, likewise exclusive of trust funds, were $46,007,896.20, of which $9,455,815.83 was on account of the principal and interest of the public debt, including the last installment of the indemnity to Mexico under the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, leaving a balance of $14,632,136.37 in the Treasury on the 1st day of July last. Since this latter period further purchases of the principal of the public debt have been made to the extent of $2,456,547.49, and the surplus in the Treasury will continue to be applied to that object whenever the stock can be procured within the limits as to price authorized by law. The value of foreign merchandise imported during the last fiscal year was $207,240,101, and the value of domestic productions exported was $149,861,911, besides $17,204,026 of foreign merchandise exported, making the aggregate of the entire exports $167,065,937. Exclusive of the above, there was exported $42,507,285 in specie, and imported from foreign ports $5,262,643. In my first annual message to Congress I called your attention to what seemed to me some defects in the present tariff, and recommended such modifications as in my judgment were best adapted to remedy its evils and promote the prosperity of the country. Nothing has since occurred to change my views on this important question. Without repeating the arguments contained in my former message in favor of discriminating protective duties, I deem it my duty to call your attention to one or two other considerations affecting this subject. The first is the effect of large importations of foreign goods upon our currency. Most of the gold of California, as fast as it is coined, finds its way directly to Europe in payment for goods purchased. In the second place, as our manufacturing establishments are broken down by competition with foreigners, the capital invested in them is lost, thousands of honest and industrious citizens are thrown out of employment, and the farmer, to that extent, is deprived of a home market for the sale of his surplus produce. In the third place, the destruction of our manufactures leaves the foreigner without competition in our market, and he consequently raises the price of the article sent here for sale, as is now seen in the increased cost of iron imported from England. The prosperity and wealth of every nation must depend upon its productive industry. The farmer is stimulated to exertion by finding a ready market for his surplus products, and benefited by being able to exchange them without loss of time or expense of transportation for the manufactures which his comfort or convenience requires. This is always done to the best advantage where a portion of the community in which he lives is engaged in other pursuits. But most manufactures require an amount of capital and a practical skill which can not be commanded unless they be protected for a time from ruinous competition from abroad. Hence the necessity of laying those duties upon imported goods which the Constitution authorizes for revenue in such a manner as to protect and encourage the labor of our own citizens. Duties, however, should not be fixed at a rate so high as to exclude the foreign article, but should be so graduated as to enable the domestic manufacturer fairly to compete with the foreigner in our own markets, and by this competition to reduce the price of the manufactured article to the consumer to the lowest rate at which it can be produced. This policy would place the mechanic by the side of the farmer, create a mutual interchange of their respective commodities, and thus stimulate the industry of the whole country and render us independent of foreign nations for the supplies required by the habits or necessities of the people. Another question, wholly independent of protection, presents itself, and that is, whether the duties levied should be upon the value of the article at the place of shipment, or, where it is practicable, a specific duty, graduated according to quantity, as ascertained by weight or measure. All our duties are at present ad valorem. A certain percentage is levied on the price of the goods at the port of shipment in a foreign country. Most commercial nations have found it indispensable, for the purpose of preventing fraud and perjury, to make the duties specific whenever the article is of such a uniform value in weight or measure as to justify such a duty. Legislation should never encourage dishonesty or crime. It is impossible that the revenue officers at the port where the goods are entered and the duties paid should know with certainty what they cost in the foreign country. Yet the law requires that they should levy the duty according to such cost. They are therefore compelled to resort to very unsatisfactory evidence to ascertain what that cost was. They take the invoice of the importer, attested by his oath, as the best evidence of which the nature of the case admits. But everyone must see that the invoice may be fabricated and the oath by which it is supported false, by reason of which the dishonest importer pays a part only of the duties which are paid by the honest one, and thus indirectly receives from the Treasury of the United States a reward for his fraud and perjury. The reports of the Secretary of the Treasury heretofore made on this subject show conclusively that these frauds have been practiced to a great extent. The tendency is to destroy that high moral character for which our merchants have long been distinguished, to defraud the Government of its revenue, to break down the honest importer by a dishonest competition, and, finally, to transfer the business of importation to foreign and irresponsible agents, to the great detriment of our own citizens. I therefore again most earnestly recommend the adoption of specific duties wherever it is practicable, or a home valuation, to prevent these frauds. I would also again call your attention to the fact that the present tariff in some cases imposes a higher duty upon the raw material imported than upon the article manufactured from it, the consequence of which is that the duty operates to the encouragement of the foreigner and the discouragement of our own citizens. For full and detailed information in regard to the general condition of our Indian affairs, I respectfully refer you to the report of the Secretary of the Interior and the accompanying documents. The Senate not having thought proper to ratify the treaties which have been negotiated with the tribes of Indians in California and Oregon, our relations with them have been left in a very unsatisfactory condition. In other parts of our territory particular districts of country have been set apart for the exclusive occupation of the Indians, and their right to the lands within those limits has been acknowledged and respected. But in California and Oregon there has been no recognition by the Government of the exclusive right of the Indians to any part of the country. They are therefore mere tenants at sufferance, and liable to be driven from place to place at the pleasure of the whites. The treaties which have been rejected proposed to remedy this evil by allotting to the different tribes districts of country suitable to their habits of life and sufficient for their support. This provision, more than any other, it is believed, led to their rejection; and as no substitute for it has been adopted by Congress, it has not been deemed advisable to attempt to enter into new treaties of a permanent character, although no effort has been spared by temporary arrangements to preserve friendly relations with them. If it be the desire of Congress to remove them from the country altogether, or to assign to them particular districts more remote from the settlements of the whites, it will be proper to set apart by law the territory which they are to occupy and to provide the means necessary for removing them to it. Justice alike to our own citizens and to the Indians requires the prompt action of Congress on this subject. The amendments proposed by the Senate to the treaties which were negotiated with the Sioux Indians of Minnesota have been submitted to the tribes who were parties to them, and have received their assent. A large tract of valuable territory has thus been opened for settlement and cultivation, and all danger of collision with these powerful and warlike bands has been happily removed. The removal of the remnant of the tribe of Seminole Indians from Florida has long been a cherished object of the Government, and it is one to which my attention has been steadily directed. Admonished by past experience of the difficulty and cost of the attempt to remove them by military force, resort has been had to conciliatory measures. By the invitation of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, several of the principal chiefs recently visited Washington, and whilst here acknowledged in writing the obligation of their tribe to remove with the least possible delay. Late advices from the special agent of the Government represent that they adhere to their promise, and that a council of their people has been called to make their preliminary arrangements. A general emigration may therefore be confidently expected at an early day. The report from the General Land Office shows increased activity in its operations. The survey of the northern boundary of Iowa has been completed with unexampled dispatch. Within the last year 9,522,953 acres of public land have been surveyed and 8,032,463 acres brought into market. Acres In the last fiscal year there were sold 1,553,071 Located with bounty-land warrants 3,201,314 Located with other certificates 115,682 Making a total of 4,870,067 In addition there were-- Reported under swamp-land grants 5,219,188 For internal improvements, railroads, etc 3,025,920 Making an aggregate of 13,115,175 Being an increase of the amount sold and located under land warrants of 569,220 acres over the previous year. The whole amount thus sold, located under land warrants, reported under swamp-land grants, and selected for internal improvements exceeds that of the previous year by 3,342,372 acres; and the sales would without doubt have been much larger but for the extensive reservations for railroads in Missouri, Mississippi, and Alabama. Acres For the quarter ending 30th September, 1852, there were sold 243,255 Located with bounty-land warrants 1,387,116 Located with other certificates 15,649 Reported under swamp-land grants 2,485,233 Making an aggregate for the quarter of 4,131,253 Much the larger portion of the labor of arranging and classifying the returns of the last census has been finished, and it will now devolve upon Congress to make the necessary provision for the publication of the results in such form as shall be deemed best. The apportionment of representation on the basis of the new census has been made by the Secretary of the Interior in conformity with the provisions of law relating to that subject, and the recent elections have been made in accordance with it. I commend to your favorable regard the suggestion contained in the report of the Secretary of the Interior that provision be made by law for the publication and distribution, periodically, of an analytical digest of all the patents which have been or may hereafter be granted for useful inventions and discoveries, with such descriptions and illustrations as may be necessary to present an intelligible view of their nature and operation. The cost of such publication could easily be defrayed out of the patent fund, and I am persuaded that it could be applied to no object more acceptable to inventors and beneficial to the public at large. An appropriation of $100,000 having been made at the last session for the purchase of a suitable site and for the erection, furnishing, and fitting up of an asylum for the insane of the District of Columbia and of the Army and Navy of the United States, the proper measures have been adopted to carry this beneficent purpose into effect. By the latest advices from the Mexican boundary commission it appears that the survey of the river Gila from its continence with the Colorado to its supposed intersection with the western line of New Mexico has been completed. The survey of the Rio Grande has also been finished from the point agreed on by the commissioners as "the point where it strikes the southern boundary of New Mexico" to a point 135 miles below Eagle Pass, which is about two-thirds of the distance along the course of the river to its mouth. The appropriation which was made at the last session of Congress for the continuation of the survey is subject to the following proviso: Provided, That no part of this appropriation shall be used or expended until it shall be made satisfactorily to appear to the President of the United States that the southern boundary of New Mexico is not established by the commissioner and surveyor of the United States farther north of the town called "Paso" than the same is laid down in Disturnell's map, which is added to the treaty. My attention was drawn to this subject by a report from the Department of the Interior, which reviewed all the facts of the case and submitted for my decision the question whether under existing circumstances any part of the appropriation could be lawfully used or expended for the further prosecution of the work. After a careful consideration of the subject I came to the conclusion that it could not, and so informed the head of that Department. Orders were immediately issued by him to the commissioner and surveyor to make no further requisitions on the Department, as they could not be paid, and to discontinue all operations on the southern line of New Mexico. But as the Department had no exact information as to the amount of provisions and money which remained unexpended in the hands of the commissioner and surveyor, it was left discretionary with them to continue the survey down the Rio Grande as far as the means at their disposal would enable them or at once to disband the commission. A special messenger has since arrived from the officer in charge of the survey on the river with information that the funds subject to his control were exhausted and that the officers and others employed in the service were destitute alike of the means of prosecuting the work and of returning to their homes. The object of the proviso was doubtless to arrest the survey of the southern and western lines of New Mexico, in regard to which different opinions have been expressed; for it is hardly to be supposed that there could be any objection to that part of the line which extends along the channel of the Rio Grande. But the terms of the law are so broad as to forbid the use of any part of the money for the prosecution of the work, or even for the payment to the officers and agents of the arrearages of pay which are justly due to them. I earnestly invite your prompt attention to this subject, and recommend a modification of the terms of the proviso, so as to enable the Department to use as much of the appropriation as will be necessary to discharge the existing obligations of the Government and to complete the survey of the Rio Grande to its mouth. It will also be proper to make further provision by law for the fulfillment of our treaty with Mexico for running and marking the residue of the boundary line between the two countries. Permit me to invite your particular attention to the interests of the District of Columbia, which are confided by the Constitution to your peculiar care. Among the measures which seem to me of the greatest importance to its prosperity are the introduction of a copious supply of water into the city of Washington and the construction of suitable bridges across the Potomac to replace those which were destroyed by high water in the early part of the present year. At the last session of Congress an appropriation was made to defray the cost of the surveys necessary for determining the best means of affording an unfailing supply of good and wholesome water. Some progress has been made in the survey, and as soon as it is completed the result will be laid before you. Further appropriations will also be necessary for grading and paving the streets and avenues and inclosing and embellishing the public grounds within the city of Washington. I commend all these objects, together with the charitable institutions of the District, to your favorable regard. Every effort has been made to protect our frontier and that of the adjoining Mexican States from the incursions of the Indian tribes. Of about 11,000 men of which the Army is composed, nearly 8,000 are employed in the defense of the newly acquired territory (including Texas) and of emigrants proceeding thereto. I am gratified to say that these efforts have been unusually successful. With the exception of some partial outbreaks in California and Oregon and occasional depredations on a portion of the Rio Grande, owing, it is believed, to the disturbed state of that border region, the inroads of the Indians have been effectually restrained. Experience has shown, however, that whenever the two races are brought into contact collisions will inevitably occur. To prevent these collisions the United States have generally set apart portions of their territory for the exclusive occupation of the Indian tribes. A difficulty occurs, however, in the application of this policy to Texas. By the terms of the compact by which that State was admitted into the Union she retained the ownership of all the vacant lands within her limits. The government of that State, it is understood, has assigned no portion of her territory to the Indians, but as fast as her settlements advance lays it off into counties and proceeds to survey and sell it. This policy manifestly tends not only to alarm and irritate the Indians, but to compel them to resort to plunder for subsistence. It also deprives this Government of that influence and control over them without which no durable peace can ever exist between them and the whites. I trust, therefore, that a due regard for her own interests, apart from considerations of humanity and justice, will induce that State to assign a small portion of her vast domain for the provisional occupancy of the small remnants of tribes within her borders, subject, of course, to her ownership and eventual jurisdiction. If she should fail to do this, the fulfillment of our treaty stipulations with Mexico and our duty to the Indians themselves will, it is feared, become a subject of serious embarrassment to the Government. It is hoped, however, that a timely and just provision by Texas may avert this evil. No appropriations for fortifications were made at the two last sessions of Congress. The because of this omission is probably to be found in a growing belief that the system of fortifications adopted in 1816, and heretofore acted on, requires revision. The subject certainly deserves full and careful investigation, but it should not be delayed longer than can be avoided. In the meantime there are certain works which have been commenced, some of them nearly completed, designed to protect our principal seaports from Boston to New Orleans and a few other important points. In regard to the necessity for these works, it is believed that little difference of opinion exists among military men. I therefore recommend that the appropriations necessary to prosecute them be made. I invite your attention to the remarks on this subject and on others connected with his Department contained in the accompanying report of the Secretary of War. Measures have been taken to carry into effect the law of the last session making provision for the improvement of certain rivers and harbors, and it is believed that the arrangements made for that purpose will combine efficiency with economy. Owing chiefly to the advanced season when the act was passed, little has yet been done in regard to many of the works beyond making the necessary preparations. With respect to a few of the improvements, the sums already appropriated will suffice to complete them; but most of them will require additional appropriations. I trust that these appropriations will be made, and that this wise and beneficent policy, so auspiciously resumed, will be continued. Great care should be taken, however, to commence no work which is not of sufficient importance to the commerce of the country to be viewed as national in its character. But works which have been commenced should not be discontinued until completed, as otherwise the sums expended will in most cases be lost. The report from the Navy Department will inform you of the prosperous condition of the branch of the public service committed to its charge. It presents to your consideration many topics and suggestions of which I ask your approval. It exhibits an unusual degree of activity in the operations of the Department during the past year. The preparations for the Japan expedition, to which I have already alluded; the arrangements made for the exploration and survey of the China Seas, the Northern Pacific, and Behrings Straits; the incipient measures taken toward a reconnoissance of the continent of Africa eastward of Liberia; the preparation for an early examination of the tributaries of the river La Plata, which a recent decree of the provisional chief of the Argentine Confederation has opened to navigation--all these enterprises and the means by which they are proposed to be accomplished have commanded my full approbation, and I have no doubt will be productive of most useful results. Two officers of the Navy were heretofore instructed to explore the whole extent of the Amazon River from the confines of Peru to its mouth. The return of one of them has placed in the possession of the Government an interesting and valuable account of the character and resources of a country abounding in the materials of commerce, and which if opened to the industry of the world will prove an inexhaustible fund of wealth. The report of this exploration will be communicated to you as soon as it is completed. Among other subjects offered to your notice by the Secretary of the Navy, I select for special commendation, in view of its connection with the interests of the Navy, the plan submitted by him for the establishment of a permanent corps of seamen and the suggestions he has presented for the reorganization of the Naval Academy. In reference to the first of these, I take occasion to say that I think it will greatly improve the efficiency of the service, and that I regard it as still more entitled to favor for the salutary influence it must exert upon the naval discipline, now greatly disturbed by the increasing spirit of insubordination resulting from our present system. The plan proposed for the organization of the seamen furnishes a judicious substitute for the law of September, 1850, abolishing corporal punishment, and satisfactorily sustains the policy of that act under conditions well adapted to maintain the authority of command and the order and security of our ships. It is believed that any change which proposes permanently to dispense with this mode of punishment should be preceded by a system of enlistment which shall supply the Navy with seamen of the most meritorious class, whose good deportment and pride of character may preclude all occasion for a resort to penalties of a harsh or degrading nature. The safety of a ship and her crew is often dependent upon immediate obedience to a command, and the authority to enforce it must be equally ready. The arrest of a refractory seaman in such moments not only deprives the ship of indispensable aid, but imposes a necessity for double service on others, whose fidelity to their duties may be relied upon in such an emergency. The exposure to this increased and arduous labor since the passage of the act of 1850 has already had, to a most observable and injurious extent, the effect of preventing the enlistment of the best seamen in the Navy. The plan now suggested is designed to promote a condition of service in which this objection will no longer exist. The details of this plan may be established in great part, if not altogether, by the Executive under the authority of existing laws, but I have thought it proper, in accordance with the suggestion of the Secretary of the Navy, to submit it to your approval. The establishment of a corps of apprentices for the Navy, or boys to be enlisted until they become of age, and to be employed under such regulations as the Navy Department may devise, as proposed in the report, I cordially approve and commend to your consideration; and I also concur in the suggestion that this system for the early training of seamen may be most usefully ingrafted upon the service of our merchant marine. The other proposition of the report to which I have referred--the reorganization of the Naval Academy--I recommend to your attention as a project worthy of your encouragement and support. The valuable services already rendered by this institution entitle it to the continuance of your fostering care. Your attention is respectfully called to the report of the Postmaster General for the detailed operation of his Department during the last fiscal year, from which it will be seen that the receipts from postages for that time were less by $1,431,696 than for the preceding fiscal year, being a decrease of about 23 per cent. This diminution is attributable to the reduction in the rates of postage made by the act of March 3, 1851, which reduction took effect at the commencement of the last fiscal year. Although in its operation during the last year the act referred to has not fulfilled the predictions of its friends by increasing the correspondence of the country in proportion to the reduction of postage, I should, nevertheless, question the policy of returning to higher rates. Experience warrants the expectation that as the community becomes accustomed to cheap postage correspondence will increase. It is believed that from this because and from the rapid growth of the country in population and business the receipts of the Department must ultimately exceed its expenses, and that the country may safely rely upon the continuance of the present cheap rate of postage. In former messages I have, among other things, respectfully recommended to the consideration of Congress the propriety and necessity of further legislation for the protection and punishment of foreign consuls residing in the United States; to revive, with certain modifications, the act of 10th March, 1838, to restrain unlawful military expeditions against the inhabitants of conterminous states or territories; for the preservation and protection from mutilation or theft of the papers, records, and archives of the nation; for authorizing the surplus revenue to be applied to the payment of the public debt in advance of the time when it will become due; for the establishment of land offices for the sale of the public lands in California and the Territory of Oregon; for the construction of a road from the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific Ocean; for the establishment of a bureau of agriculture for the promotion of that interest, perhaps the most important in the country; for the prevention of frauds upon the Government in applications for pensions and bounty lands; for the establishment of a uniform fee bill, prescribing a specific compensation for every service required of clerks, district attorneys, and marshals; for authorizing an additional regiment of mounted men for the defense of our frontiers against the Indians and for fulfilling our treaty stipulations with Mexico to defend her citizens against the Indians "with equal diligence and energy as our own;" for determining the relative rank between the naval and civil officers in our public ships and between the officers of the Army and Navy in the various grades of each; for reorganizing the naval establishment by fixing the number of officers in each grade, and providing for a retired list upon reduced pay of those unfit for active duty; for prescribing and regulating punishments in the Navy; for the appointment of a commission to revise the public statutes of the United States by arranging them in order, supplying deficiencies, correcting incongruities, simplifying their language, and reporting them to Congress for its final action; and for the establishment of a commission to adjudicate and settle private claims against the United States. I am not aware, however, that any of these subjects have been finally acted upon by Congress. Without repeating the reasons for legislation on these subjects which have been assigned in former messages, I respectfully recommend them again to your favorable consideration. I think it due to the several Executive Departments of this Government to bear testimony to the efficiency and integrity with which they are conducted. With all the careful superintendence which it is possible for the heads of those Departments to exercise, still the due administration and guardianship of the public money must very much depend on the vigilance, intelligence, and fidelity of the subordinate officers and clerks, and especially on those intrusted with the settlement and adjustment of claims and accounts. I am gratified to believe that they have generally performed their duties faithfully and well. They are appointed to guard the approaches to the public Treasury, and they occupy positions that expose them to all the temptations and seductions which the cupidity of peculators and fraudulent claimants can prompt them to employ. It will be but a wise precaution to protect the Government against that source of mischief and corruption, as far as it can be done, by the enactment of all proper legal penalties. The laws in this respect are supposed to be defective, and I therefore deem it my duty to call your attention to the subject and to recommend that provision be made by law for the punishment not only of those who shall accept bribes, but also of those who shall either promise, give, or offer to give to any of those officers or clerks a bribe or reward touching or relating to any matter of their official action or duty. It has been the uniform policy of this Government, from its foundation to the present day, to abstain from all interference in the domestic affairs of other nations. The consequence has been that while the nations of Europe have been engaged in desolating wars our country has pursued its peaceful course to unexampled prosperity and happiness. The wars in which we have been compelled to engage in defense of the rights and honor of the country have been, fortunately, of short duration. During the terrific contest of nation against nation which succeeded the French Revolution we were enabled by the wisdom and firmness of President Washington to maintain our neutrality. While other nations were drawn into this wide-sweeping whirlpool, we sat quiet and unmoved upon our own shores. While the flower of their numerous armies was wasted by disease or perished by hundreds of thousands upon the battlefield, the youth of this favored land were permitted to enjoy the blessings of peace beneath the paternal roof. While the States of Europe incurred enormous debts, under the burden of which their subjects still groan, and which must absorb no small part of the product of the honest industry of those countries for generations to come, the United States have once been enabled to exhibit the proud spectacle of a nation free from public debt, and if permitted to pursue our prosperous way for a few years longer in peace we may do the same again. But it is now said by some that this policy must be changed. Europe is no longer separated from us by a voyage of months, but steam navigation has brought her within a few days' sail of our shores. We see more of her movements and take a deeper interest in her controversies. Although no one proposes that we should join the fraternity of potentates who have for ages lavished the blood and treasure of their subjects in maintaining "the balance of power," yet it is said that we ought to interfere between contending sovereigns and their subjects for the purpose of overthrowing the monarchies of Europe and establishing in their place republican institutions. It is alleged that we have heretofore pursued a different course from a sense of our weakness, but that now our conscious strength dictates a change of policy, and that it is consequently our duty to mingle in these contests and aid those who are struggling for liberty. This is a most seductive but dangerous appeal to the generous sympathies of freemen. Enjoying, as we do, the blessings of a free Government, there is no man who has an American heart that would not rejoice to see these blessings extended to all other nations. We can not witness the struggle between the oppressed and his oppressor anywhere without the deepest sympathy for the former and the most anxious desire for his triumph. Nevertheless, is it prudent or is it wise to involve ourselves in these foreign wars? Is it indeed true that we have heretofore refrained from doing so merely from the degrading motive of a conscious weakness? For the honor of the patriots who have gone before us, I can not admit it. Men of the Revolution, who drew the sword against the oppressions of the mother country and pledged to Heaven "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor" to maintain their freedom, could never have been actuated by so unworthy a motive. They knew no weakness or fear where right or duty pointed the way, and it is a libel upon their fair fame for us, while we enjoy the blessings for which they so nobly fought and bled, to insinuate it. The truth is that the course which they pursued was dictated by a stern sense of international justice, by a statesmanlike prudence and a far-seeing wisdom, looking not merely to the present necessities but to the permanent safety and interest of the country. They knew that the world is governed less by sympathy than by reason and force; that it was not possible for this nation to become a "propagandist" of free principles without arraying against it the combined powers of Europe, and that the result was more likely to be the overthrow of republican liberty here than its establishment there. History has been written in vain for those who can doubt this. France had no sooner established a republican form of government than she manifested a desire to force its blessings on all the world. Her own historian informs us that, hearing of some petty acts of tyranny in a neighboring principality, "the National Convention declared that she would afford succor and fraternity to all nations who wished to recover their liberty, and she gave it in charge to the executive power to give orders to the generals of the French armies to aid all citizens who might have been or should be oppressed in the because of liberty." Here was the false step which led to her subsequent misfortunes. She soon found herself involved in war with all the rest of Europe. In less than ten years her Government was changed from a republic to an empire, and finally, after shedding rivers of blood, foreign powers restored her exiled dynasty and exhausted Europe sought peace and repose in the unquestioned ascendency of monarchical principles. Let us learn wisdom from her example. Let us remember that revolutions do not always establish freedom. Our own free institutions were not the offspring of our Revolution. They existed before. They were planted in the free charters of self-government under which the English colonies grew up, and our Revolution only freed us from the dominion of a foreign power whose government was at variance with those institutions. But European nations have had no such training for self-government, and every effort to establish it by bloody revolutions has been, and must without that preparation continue to be, a failure. Liberty unregulated by law degenerates into anarchy, which soon becomes the most horrid of all despotisms. Our policy is wisely to govern ourselves, and thereby to set such an example of national justice, prosperity, and true glory as shall teach to all nations the blessings of self-government and the unparalleled enterprise and success of a free people. We live in an age of progress, and ours is emphatically a country of progress. Within the last half century the number of States in this Union has nearly doubled, the population has almost quadrupled, and our boundaries have been extended from the Mississippi to the Pacific. Our territory is checkered over with railroads and furrowed with canals. The inventive talent of our country is excited to the highest pitch, and the numerous applications for patents for valuable improvements distinguish this age and this people from all others. The genius of one American has enabled our commerce to move against wind and tide and that of another has annihilated distance in the transmission of intelligence. The whole country is full of enterprise. Our common schools are diffusing intelligence among the people and our industry is fast accumulating the comforts and luxuries of life. This is in part owing to our peculiar position, to our fertile soil and comparatively sparse population; but much of it is also owing to the popular institutions under which we live, to the freedom which every man feels to engage in any useful pursuit according to his taste or inclination, and to the entire confidence that his person and property will be protected by the laws. But whatever may be the because of this unparalleled growth in population, intelligence, and wealth, one tiring is clear--that the Government must keep pace with the progress of the people. It must participate in their spirit of enterprise, and while it exacts obedience to the laws and restrains all unauthorized invasions of the rights of neighboring states, it should foster and protect home industry and lend its powerful strength to the improvement of such means of intercommunication as are necessary to promote our internal commerce and strengthen the ties which bind us together as a people. It is not strange, however much it may be regretted, that such an exuberance of enterprise should because some individuals to mistake change for progress and the invasion of the rights of others for national prowess and glory. The former are constantly agitating for some change in the organic law, or urging new and untried theories of human rights. The latter are ever ready to engage in any wild crusade against a neighboring people, regardless of the justice of the enterprise and without looking at the fatal consequences to ourselves and to the because of popular government. Such expeditions, however, are often stimulated by mercenary individuals, who expect to share the plunder or profit of the enterprise without exposing themselves to danger, and are led on by some irresponsible foreigner, who abuses the hospitality of our own Government by seducing the young and ignorant to join in his scheme of personal ambition or revenge under the false and delusive pretense of extending the area of freedom. These reprehensible aggressions but retard the true progress of our nation and tarnish its fair fame. They should therefore receive the indignant frowns of every good citizen who sincerely loves his country and takes a pride in its prosperity and honor. Our Constitution, though not perfect, is doubtless the best that ever was formed. Therefore let every proposition to change it be well weighed and, if found beneficial, cautiously adopted. Every patriot will rejoice to see its authority so exerted as to advance the prosperity and honor of the nation, whilst he will watch with jealousy any attempt to mutilate this charter of our liberties or pervert its powers to acts of aggression or injustice. Thus shall conservatism and progress blend their harmonious action in preserving the form and spirit of the Constitution and at the same time carry forward the great improvements of the country with a rapidity and energy which freemen only can display. In closing this my last annual communication, permit me, fellow-citizens, to congratulate you on the prosperous condition of our beloved country. Abroad its relations with all foreign powers are friendly, its rights are respected, and its high place in the family of nations cheerfully recognized. At home we enjoy an amount of happiness, public and private, which has probably never fallen to the lot of any other people. Besides affording to our own citizens a degree of prosperity of which on so large a scale I know of no other instance, our country is annually affording a refuge and a home to multitudes, altogether without example, from the Old World. We owe these blessings, under Heaven, to the happy Constitution and Government which were bequeathed to us by our fathers, and which it is our sacred duty to transmit in all their integrity to our children. We must all consider it a great distinction and privilege to have been chosen by the people to bear a part in the administration of such a Government. Called by an unexpected dispensation to its highest trust at a season of embarrassment and alarm, I entered upon its arduous duties with extreme diffidence. I claim only to have discharged them to the best of an humble ability, with a single eye to the public good, and it is with devout gratitude in retiring from office that I leave the country in a state of peace and prosperity.
the brief space which has elapsed since the close of your last session has been marked by no extraordinary political event the quadrennial election of chief magistrate has passed off with less than the usual excitement however individuals and parties may have been disappointed in the result it is nevertheless a subject of national congratulation that the choice has been effected by the independent suffrages of a free people undisturbed by those influences which in other countries have too often affected the purity of popular elections our grateful thanks are due to an providence not only for staying the pestilence which in different forms has desolated some of our cities but for crowning the labors of the husbandman with an abundant harvest and the nation generally with the blessings of peace and prosperity within a few weeks the public mind has been deeply affected by the death of daniel webster filling at his decease the office of secretary of state his associates in the executive government have sincerely sympathized with his family and the public generally on this mournful occasion his commanding talents his great political and professional eminence his patriotism and his long and faithful services in the most important public trusts have caused his death to be lamented throughout the country and have earned for him a lasting place in our history in the course of the last summer considerable anxiety was caused for a short time by an official intimation from the government of great britain that orders had been given for the protection of the fisheries upon the coasts of the british provinces in north america against the alleged encroachments of the fishing vessels of the united states and france the shortness of this notice and the season of the year seemed to make it a matter of urgent importance it was at first apprehended that an increased naval force had been ordered to the fishing grounds to carry into effect the british interpretation of those provisions in the convention of 1818 in reference to the true intent of which the two governments differ it was soon discovered that such was not the design of great britain and satisfactory explanations of the real objects of the measure have been given both here and in london the unadjusted difference however between the two governments as to the interpretation of the first article of the convention of 1818 is still a matter of importance american fishing vessels within nine or ten years have been excluded from waters to which they had free access for years after the negotiation of the treaty in 1845 this exclusion was relaxed so far as concerns the bay of fundy but the just and liberal intention of the home government in compliance with what we think the true construction of the convention to open all the other outer bays to our fishermen was abandoned in consequence of the opposition of the colonies notwithstanding this the united states have since the bay of fundy was reopened to our fishermen in 1845 pursued the most liberal course toward the colonial fishing interests by the revenue law of 1846 the duties on colonial fish entering our ports were very greatly reduced and by the warehousing act it is allowed to be entered in bond without payment of duty in this way colonial fish has acquired the monopoly of the export trade in our market and is entering to some extent into the home consumption these facts were among those which increased the sensibility of our fishing interest at the movement in question these circumstances and the incidents above alluded to have led me to think the moment favorable for a reconsideration of the entire subject of the fisheries on the coasts of the british provinces with a view to place them upon a more liberal footing of reciprocal privilege a willingness to meet us in some arrangement of this kind is understood to exist on the part of great britain with a desire on her part to include in one comprehensive settlement as well this subject as the commercial intercourse between the united states and the british provinces i have thought that whatever arrangements may be made on these two subjects it is expedient that they should be embraced in separate conventions the illness and death of the late secretary of state prevented the commencement of the contemplated negotiation pains have been taken to collect the information required for the details of such an arrangement the subject is attended with considerable difficulty if it is found practicable to come to an agreement mutually acceptable to the two parties conventions may be concluded in the course of the present winter the control of congress over all the provisions of such an arrangement affecting the revenue will of course be reserved the affairs of cuba formed a prominent topic in my last annual message they remain in an uneasy condition and a feeling of alarm and irritation on the part of the cuban authorities appears to exist this feeling has interfered with the regular commercial intercourse between the united states and the island and led to some acts of which we have a fight to complain but the of cuba is clothed with no power to treat with foreign governments nor is he in any degree under the control of the spanish minister at washington any communication which he may hold with an agent of a foreign power is informal and matter of courtesy anxious to put an end to the existing inconveniences which seemed to rest on a misconception i directed the newly appointed minister to mexico to visit havana on his way to vera cruz he was respectfully received by the who conferred with him freely on the recent occurrences but no permanent arrangement was effected in the meantime the refusal of the allow passengers and the mail to be landed in certain cases for a reason which does not furnish in the opinion of this government even a good presumptive ground for such prohibition has been made the subject of a serious remonstrance at madrid and i have no reason to doubt that due respect will be paid by the government of her catholic majesty to the representations which our minister has been instructed to make on the subject it is but justice to the to add that his conduct toward the steamers employed to carry the mails of the united states to havana has with the exceptions above alluded to been marked with kindness and liberality and indicates no general purpose of interfering with the commercial correspondence and intercourse between the island and this country early in the present year official notes were received from the ministers of france and england inviting the government of the united states to become a party with great britain and france to a tripartite convention in virtue of which the three powers should severally and collectively disclaim now and for the future all intention to obtain possession of the island of cuba and should bind themselves to discountenance all attempts to that effect on the part of any power or individual whatever this invitation has been respectfully declined for reasons which it would occupy too much space in this communication to state in detail but which led me to think that the proposed measure would be of doubtful constitutionality impolitic and unavailing i have however in common with several of my predecessors directed the ministers of france and england to be assured that the united states entertain no designs against cuba but that on the contrary i should regard its incorporation into the union at the present time as fraught with serious peril were this island comparatively destitute of inhabitants or occupied by a kindred race i should regard it if voluntarily ceded by spain as a most desirable acquisition but under existing circumstances i should look upon its incorporation into our union as a very hazardous measure it would bring into the confederacy a population of a different national stock speaking a different language and not likely to harmonize with the other members it would probably affect in a prejudicial manner the industrial interests of the south and it might revive those conflicts of opinion between the different sections of the country which lately shook the union to its center and which have been so happily compromised the rejection by the mexican congress of the convention which had been concluded between that republic and the united states for the protection of a transit way across the isthmus of tehuantepec and of the interests of those citizens of the united states who had become proprietors of the rights which mexico had conferred on one of her own citizens in regard to that transit has thrown a serious obstacle in the way of the attainment of a very desirable national object i am still willing to hope that the differences on the subject which exist or may hereafter arise between the governments will be amicably adjusted this subject however has already engaged the attention of the senate of the united states and requires no further comment in this communication the settlement of the question respecting the port of san juan de nicaragua and of the controversy between the republics of costa rica and nicaragua in regard to their boundaries was considered indispensable to the commencement of the ship canal between the two oceans which was the subject of the convention between the united states and great britain of the 19th of april 1850 accordingly a proposition for the same purposes addressed to the two governments in that quarter and to the mosquito indians was agreed to in april last by the secretary of state and the minister of her britannic majesty besides the wish to aid in reconciling the differences of the two republics i engaged in the negotiation from a desire to place the great work of a ship canal between the two oceans under one jurisdiction and to establish the important port of san juan de nicaragua under the government of a civilized power the proposition in question was assented to by costs rica and the mosquito indians it has not proved equally acceptable to nicaragua but it is to be hoped that the further negotiations on the subject which are in train will be carried on in that spirit of conciliation and compromise which ought always to prevail on such occasions and that they will lead to a satisfactory result i have the satisfaction to inform you that the executive government of venezuela has acknowledged some claims of citizens of the united states which have for many years past been urged by our charge at caracas it is hoped that the same sense of justice will actuate the congress of that republic in providing the means for their payment the recent revolution in buenos ayres and the confederated states having opened the prospect of an improved state of things in that quarter the governments of great britain and france determined to negotiate with the chief of the new confederacy for the free access of their commerce to the extensive countries watered by the tributaries of the la plata and they gave a friendly notice of this purpose to the united states that we might if we thought proper pursue the same course in compliance with this invitation our minister at rio janeiro and our charge at buenos ayres have been fully authorized to conclude treaties with the newly organized confederation or the states composing it the delays which have taken place in the formation of the new government have as yet prevented the execution of those instructions but there is every reason to hope that these vast countries will be eventually opened to our commerce a treaty of commerce has been concluded between the united states and the oriental republic of uruguay which will be laid before the senate should this convention go into operation it will open to the commercial enterprise of our citizens a country of great extent and unsurpassed in natural resources but from which foreign nations have hitherto been almost wholly excluded the correspondence of the late secretary of state with the peruvian charge relative to the lobos islands was communicated to congress toward the close of the last session since that time on further investigation of the subject the doubts which had been entertained of the title of peru to those islands have been removed and i have deemed it just that the temporary wrong which had been unintentionally done her from want of information should be repaired by an unreserved acknowledgment of her sovereignty i have the satisfaction to inform you that the course pursued by peru has been creditable to the liberality of her government before it was known by her that her title would be acknowledged at washington her minister of foreign affairs had authorized our charge at lima to announce to the american vessels which had gone to the lobos for guano that the peruvian government was willing to freight them on its own account this intention has been carried into effect by the peruvian minister here by an arrangement which is believed to be advantageous to the parties in interest our settlements on the shores of the pacific have already given a great extension and in some respects a new direction to our commerce in that ocean a direct and rapidly increasing intercourse has sprung up with eastern asia the waters of the northern pacific even into the arctic sea have of late years been frequented by our whalemen the application of steam to the general purposes of navigation is becoming daily more common and makes it desirable to obtain fuel and other necessary supplies at convenient points on the route between asia and our pacific shores our unfortunate countrymen who from time to time suffer shipwreck on the coasts of the eastern seas are entitled to protection besides these specific objects the general prosperity of our states on the pacific requires that an attempt should be made to open the opposite regions of asia to a mutually beneficial intercourse it is obvious that this attempt could be made by no power to so great advantage as by the united states whose constitutional system excludes every idea of distant colonial dependencies i have accordingly been led to order an appropriate naval force to japan under the command of a discreet and intelligent officer of the highest rank known to our service he is instructed to endeavor to obtain from the government of that country some relaxation of the inhospitable and antisocial system which it has pursued for about two centuries he has been directed particularly to remonstrate in the strongest language against the cruel treatment to which our shipwrecked mariners have often been subjected and to insist that they shall be treated with humanity he is instructed however at the same time to give that government the amplest assurances that the objects of the united states are such and such only as i have indicated and that the expedition is friendly and peaceful notwithstanding the jealousy with which the governments of eastern asia regard all overtures from foreigners i am not without hopes of a beneficial result of the expedition should it be crowned with success the advantages will not be confined to the united states but as in the case of china will be equally enjoyed by all the other maritime powers i have much satisfaction in stating that in all the steps preparatory to this expedition the government of the united states has been materially aided by the good offices of the king of the netherlands the only european power having any commercial relations with japan in passing from this survey of our foreign relations i invite the attention of congress to the condition of that department of the government to which this branch of the public business is intrusted our intercourse with foreign powers has of late years greatly increased both in consequence of our own growth and the introduction of many new states into the family of nations in this way the department of state has become overburdened it has by the recent establishment of the department of the interior been relieved of some portion of the domestic business if the residue of the business of that kind such as the distribution of congressional documents the keeping publishing and distribution of the laws of the united states the execution of the copyright law the subject of reprieves and pardons and some other subjects relating to interior administration should be transferred from the department of state it would unquestionably be for the benefit of the public service i would also suggest that the building appropriated to the state department is not fireproof that there is reason to think there are defects in its construction and that the archives of the government in charge of the department with the precious collections of the manuscript papers of washington jefferson hamilton madison and monroe are exposed to destruction by fire a similar remark may be made of the buildings appropriated to the war and navy departments the condition of the treasury is exhibited in the annual report from that department the cash receipts into the treasury for the fiscal year ending the 30th june last exclusive of trust funds were and the expenditures for the same period likewise exclusive of trust funds were of which was on account of the principal and interest of the public debt including the last installment of the indemnity to mexico under the treaty of guadalupe hidalgo leaving a balance of in the treasury on the 1st day of july last since this latter period further purchases of the principal of the public debt have been made to the extent of and the surplus in the treasury will continue to be applied to that object whenever the stock can be procured within the limits as to price authorized by law the value of foreign merchandise imported during the last fiscal year was and the value of domestic productions exported was besides of foreign merchandise exported making the aggregate of the entire exports exclusive of the above there was exported in specie and imported from foreign ports in my first annual message to congress i called your attention to what seemed to me some defects in the present tariff and recommended such modifications as in my judgment were best adapted to remedy its evils and promote the prosperity of the country nothing has since occurred to change my views on this important question without repeating the arguments contained in my former message in favor of discriminating protective duties i deem it my duty to call your attention to one or two other considerations affecting this subject the first is the effect of large importations of foreign goods upon our currency most of the gold of california as fast as it is coined finds its way directly to europe in payment for goods purchased in the second place as our manufacturing establishments are broken down by competition with foreigners the capital invested in them is lost thousands of honest and industrious citizens are thrown out of employment and the farmer to that extent is deprived of a home market for the sale of his surplus produce in the third place the destruction of our manufactures leaves the foreigner without competition in our market and he consequently raises the price of the article sent here for sale as is now seen in the increased cost of iron imported from england the prosperity and wealth of every nation must depend upon its productive industry the farmer is stimulated to exertion by finding a ready market for his surplus products and benefited by being able to exchange them without loss of time or expense of transportation for the manufactures which his comfort or convenience requires this is always done to the best advantage where a portion of the community in which he lives is engaged in other pursuits but most manufactures require an amount of capital and a practical skill which can not be commanded unless they be protected for a time from ruinous competition from abroad hence the necessity of laying those duties upon imported goods which the constitution authorizes for revenue in such a manner as to protect and encourage the labor of our own citizens duties however should not be fixed at a rate so high as to exclude the foreign article but should be so graduated as to enable the domestic manufacturer fairly to compete with the foreigner in our own markets and by this competition to reduce the price of the manufactured article to the consumer to the lowest rate at which it can be produced this policy would place the mechanic by the side of the farmer create a mutual interchange of their respective commodities and thus stimulate the industry of the whole country and render us independent of foreign nations for the supplies required by the habits or necessities of the people another question wholly independent of protection presents itself and that is whether the duties levied should be upon the value of the article at the place of shipment or where it is practicable a specific duty graduated according to quantity as ascertained by weight or measure all our duties are at present ad valorem a certain percentage is levied on the price of the goods at the port of shipment in a foreign country most commercial nations have found it indispensable for the purpose of preventing fraud and perjury to make the duties specific whenever the article is of such a uniform value in weight or measure as to justify such a duty legislation should never encourage dishonesty or crime it is impossible that the revenue officers at the port where the goods are entered and the duties paid should know with certainty what they cost in the foreign country yet the law requires that they should levy the duty according to such cost they are therefore compelled to resort to very unsatisfactory evidence to ascertain what that cost was they take the invoice of the importer attested by his oath as the best evidence of which the nature of the case admits but everyone must see that the invoice may be fabricated and the oath by which it is supported false by reason of which the dishonest importer pays a part only of the duties which are paid by the honest one and thus indirectly receives from the treasury of the united states a reward for his fraud and perjury the reports of the secretary of the treasury heretofore made on this subject show conclusively that these frauds have been practiced to a great extent the tendency is to destroy that high moral character for which our merchants have long been distinguished to defraud the government of its revenue to break down the honest importer by a dishonest competition and finally to transfer the business of importation to foreign and irresponsible agents to the great detriment of our own citizens i therefore again most earnestly recommend the adoption of specific duties wherever it is practicable or a home valuation to prevent these frauds i would also again call your attention to the fact that the present tariff in some cases imposes a higher duty upon the raw material imported than upon the article manufactured from it the consequence of which is that the duty operates to the encouragement of the foreigner and the discouragement of our own citizens for full and detailed information in regard to the general condition of our indian affairs i respectfully refer you to the report of the secretary of the interior and the accompanying documents the senate not having thought proper to ratify the treaties which have been negotiated with the tribes of indians in california and oregon our relations with them have been left in a very unsatisfactory condition in other parts of our territory particular districts of country have been set apart for the exclusive occupation of the indians and their right to the lands within those limits has been acknowledged and respected but in california and oregon there has been no recognition by the government of the exclusive right of the indians to any part of the country they are therefore mere tenants at sufferance and liable to be driven from place to place at the pleasure of the whites the treaties which have been rejected proposed to remedy this evil by allotting to the different tribes districts of country suitable to their habits of life and sufficient for their support this provision more than any other it is believed led to their rejection and as no substitute for it has been adopted by congress it has not been deemed advisable to attempt to enter into new treaties of a permanent character although no effort has been spared by temporary arrangements to preserve friendly relations with them if it be the desire of congress to remove them from the country altogether or to assign to them particular districts more remote from the settlements of the whites it will be proper to set apart by law the territory which they are to occupy and to provide the means necessary for removing them to it justice alike to our own citizens and to the indians requires the prompt action of congress on this subject the amendments proposed by the senate to the treaties which were negotiated with the sioux indians of minnesota have been submitted to the tribes who were parties to them and have received their assent a large tract of valuable territory has thus been opened for settlement and cultivation and all danger of collision with these powerful and warlike bands has been happily removed the removal of the remnant of the tribe of seminole indians from florida has long been a cherished object of the government and it is one to which my attention has been steadily directed admonished by past experience of the difficulty and cost of the attempt to remove them by military force resort has been had to conciliatory measures by the invitation of the commissioner of indian affairs several of the principal chiefs recently visited washington and whilst here acknowledged in writing the obligation of their tribe to remove with the least possible delay late advices from the special agent of the government represent that they adhere to their promise and that a council of their people has been called to make their preliminary arrangements a general emigration may therefore be confidently expected at an early day the report from the general land office shows increased activity in its operations the survey of the northern boundary of iowa has been completed with unexampled dispatch within the last year acres of public land have been surveyed and acres brought into market acres in the last fiscal year there were sold located with warrants located with other certificates making a total of in addition there were reported under grants for internal improvements railroads etc making an aggregate of being an increase of the amount sold and located under land warrants of acres over the previous year the whole amount thus sold located under land warrants reported under grants and selected for internal improvements exceeds that of the previous year by acres and the sales would without doubt have been much larger but for the extensive reservations for railroads in missouri mississippi and alabama acres for the quarter ending 30th september 1852 there were sold located with warrants located with other certificates reported under grants making an aggregate for the quarter of much the larger portion of the labor of arranging and classifying the returns of the last census has been finished and it will now devolve upon congress to make the necessary provision for the publication of the results in such form as shall be deemed best the apportionment of representation on the basis of the new census has been made by the secretary of the interior in conformity with the provisions of law relating to that subject and the recent elections have been made in accordance with it i commend to your favorable regard the suggestion contained in the report of the secretary of the interior that provision be made by law for the publication and distribution periodically of an analytical digest of all the patents which have been or may hereafter be granted for useful inventions and discoveries with such descriptions and illustrations as may be necessary to present an intelligible view of their nature and operation the cost of such publication could easily be defrayed out of the patent fund and i am persuaded that it could be applied to no object more acceptable to inventors and beneficial to the public at large an appropriation of having been made at the last session for the purchase of a suitable site and for the erection furnishing and fitting up of an asylum for the insane of the district of columbia and of the army and navy of the united states the proper measures have been adopted to carry this beneficent purpose into effect by the latest advices from the mexican boundary commission it appears that the survey of the river gila from its continence with the colorado to its supposed intersection with the western line of new mexico has been completed the survey of the rio grande has also been finished from the point agreed on by the commissioners as the point where it strikes the southern boundary of new mexico to a point 135 miles below eagle pass which is about of the distance along the course of the river to its mouth the appropriation which was made at the last session of congress for the continuation of the survey is subject to the following proviso provided that no part of this appropriation shall be used or expended until it shall be made satisfactorily to appear to the president of the united states that the southern boundary of new mexico is not established by the commissioner and surveyor of the united states farther north of the town called paso than the same is laid down in disturnell map which is added to the treaty my attention was drawn to this subject by a report from the department of the interior which reviewed all the facts of the case and submitted for my decision the question whether under existing circumstances any part of the appropriation could be lawfully used or expended for the further prosecution of the work after a careful consideration of the subject i came to the conclusion that it could not and so informed the head of that department orders were immediately issued by him to the commissioner and surveyor to make no further requisitions on the department as they could not be paid and to discontinue all operations on the southern line of new mexico but as the department had no exact information as to the amount of provisions and money which remained unexpended in the hands of the commissioner and surveyor it was left discretionary with them to continue the survey down the rio grande as far as the means at their disposal would enable them or at once to disband the commission a special messenger has since arrived from the officer in charge of the survey on the river with information that the funds subject to his control were exhausted and that the officers and others employed in the service were destitute alike of the means of prosecuting the work and of returning to their homes the object of the proviso was doubtless to arrest the survey of the southern and western lines of new mexico in regard to which different opinions have been expressed for it is hardly to be supposed that there could be any objection to that part of the line which extends along the channel of the rio grande but the terms of the law are so broad as to forbid the use of any part of the money for the prosecution of the work or even for the payment to the officers and agents of the arrearages of pay which are justly due to them i earnestly invite your prompt attention to this subject and recommend a modification of the terms of the proviso so as to enable the department to use as much of the appropriation as will be necessary to discharge the existing obligations of the government and to complete the survey of the rio grande to its mouth it will also be proper to make further provision by law for the fulfillment of our treaty with mexico for running and marking the residue of the boundary line between the two countries permit me to invite your particular attention to the interests of the district of columbia which are confided by the constitution to your peculiar care among the measures which seem to me of the greatest importance to its prosperity are the introduction of a copious supply of water into the city of washington and the construction of suitable bridges across the potomac to replace those which were destroyed by high water in the early part of the present year at the last session of congress an appropriation was made to defray the cost of the surveys necessary for determining the best means of affording an unfailing supply of good and wholesome water some progress has been made in the survey and as soon as it is completed the result will be laid before you further appropriations will also be necessary for grading and paving the streets and avenues and inclosing and embellishing the public grounds within the city of washington i commend all these objects together with the charitable institutions of the district to your favorable regard every effort has been made to protect our frontier and that of the adjoining mexican states from the incursions of the indian tribes of about men of which the army is composed nearly are employed in the defense of the newly acquired territory including texas and of emigrants proceeding thereto i am gratified to say that these efforts have been unusually successful with the exception of some partial outbreaks in california and oregon and occasional depredations on a portion of the rio grande owing it is believed to the disturbed state of that border region the inroads of the indians have been effectually restrained experience has shown however that whenever the two races are brought into contact collisions will inevitably occur to prevent these collisions the united states have generally set apart portions of their territory for the exclusive occupation of the indian tribes a difficulty occurs however in the application of this policy to texas by the terms of the compact by which that state was admitted into the union she retained the ownership of all the vacant lands within her limits the government of that state it is understood has assigned no portion of her territory to the indians but as fast as her settlements advance lays it off into counties and proceeds to survey and sell it this policy manifestly tends not only to alarm and irritate the indians but to compel them to resort to plunder for subsistence it also deprives this government of that influence and control over them without which no durable peace can ever exist between them and the whites i trust therefore that a due regard for her own interests apart from considerations of humanity and justice will induce that state to assign a small portion of her vast domain for the provisional occupancy of the small remnants of tribes within her borders subject of course to her ownership and eventual jurisdiction if she should fail to do this the fulfillment of our treaty stipulations with mexico and our duty to the indians themselves will it is feared become a subject of serious embarrassment to the government it is hoped however that a timely and just provision by texas may avert this evil no appropriations for fortifications were made at the two last sessions of congress the because of this omission is probably to be found in a growing belief that the system of fortifications adopted in 1816 and heretofore acted on requires revision the subject certainly deserves full and careful investigation but it should not be delayed longer than can be avoided in the meantime there are certain works which have been commenced some of them nearly completed designed to protect our principal seaports from boston to new orleans and a few other important points in regard to the necessity for these works it is believed that little difference of opinion exists among military men i therefore recommend that the appropriations necessary to prosecute them be made i invite your attention to the remarks on this subject and on others connected with his department contained in the accompanying report of the secretary of war measures have been taken to carry into effect the law of the last session making provision for the improvement of certain rivers and harbors and it is believed that the arrangements made for that purpose will combine efficiency with economy owing chiefly to the advanced season when the act was passed little has yet been done in regard to many of the works beyond making the necessary preparations with respect to a few of the improvements the sums already appropriated will suffice to complete them but most of them will require additional appropriations i trust that these appropriations will be made and that this wise and beneficent policy so auspiciously resumed will be continued great care should be taken however to commence no work which is not of sufficient importance to the commerce of the country to be viewed as national in its character but works which have been commenced should not be discontinued until completed as otherwise the sums expended will in most cases be lost the report from the navy department will inform you of the prosperous condition of the branch of the public service committed to its charge it presents to your consideration many topics and suggestions of which i ask your approval it exhibits an unusual degree of activity in the operations of the department during the past year the preparations for the japan expedition to which i have already alluded the arrangements made for the exploration and survey of the china seas the northern pacific and behrings straits the incipient measures taken toward a reconnoissance of the continent of africa eastward of liberia the preparation for an early examination of the tributaries of the river la plata which a recent decree of the provisional chief of the argentine confederation has opened to navigation all these enterprises and the means by which they are proposed to be accomplished have commanded my full approbation and i have no doubt will be productive of most useful results two officers of the navy were heretofore instructed to explore the whole extent of the amazon river from the confines of peru to its mouth the return of one of them has placed in the possession of the government an interesting and valuable account of the character and resources of a country abounding in the materials of commerce and which if opened to the industry of the world will prove an inexhaustible fund of wealth the report of this exploration will be communicated to you as soon as it is completed among other subjects offered to your notice by the secretary of the navy i select for special commendation in view of its connection with the interests of the navy the plan submitted by him for the establishment of a permanent corps of seamen and the suggestions he has presented for the reorganization of the naval academy in reference to the first of these i take occasion to say that i think it will greatly improve the efficiency of the service and that i regard it as still more entitled to favor for the salutary influence it must exert upon the naval discipline now greatly disturbed by the increasing spirit of insubordination resulting from our present system the plan proposed for the organization of the seamen furnishes a judicious substitute for the law of september 1850 abolishing corporal punishment and satisfactorily sustains the policy of that act under conditions well adapted to maintain the authority of command and the order and security of our ships it is believed that any change which proposes permanently to dispense with this mode of punishment should be preceded by a system of enlistment which shall supply the navy with seamen of the most meritorious class whose good deportment and pride of character may preclude all occasion for a resort to penalties of a harsh or degrading nature the safety of a ship and her crew is often dependent upon immediate obedience to a command and the authority to enforce it must be equally ready the arrest of a refractory seaman in such moments not only deprives the ship of indispensable aid but imposes a necessity for double service on others whose fidelity to their duties may be relied upon in such an emergency the exposure to this increased and arduous labor since the passage of the act of 1850 has already had to a most observable and injurious extent the effect of preventing the enlistment of the best seamen in the navy the plan now suggested is designed to promote a condition of service in which this objection will no longer exist the details of this plan may be established in great part if not altogether by the executive under the authority of existing laws but i have thought it proper in accordance with the suggestion of the secretary of the navy to submit it to your approval the establishment of a corps of apprentices for the navy or boys to be enlisted until they become of age and to be employed under such regulations as the navy department may devise as proposed in the report i cordially approve and commend to your consideration and i also concur in the suggestion that this system for the early training of seamen may be most usefully ingrafted upon the service of our merchant marine the other proposition of the report to which i have referred the reorganization of the naval academy i recommend to your attention as a project worthy of your encouragement and support the valuable services already rendered by this institution entitle it to the continuance of your fostering care your attention is respectfully called to the report of the postmaster general for the detailed operation of his department during the last fiscal year from which it will be seen that the receipts from postages for that time were less by than for the preceding fiscal year being a decrease of about 23 per cent this diminution is attributable to the reduction in the rates of postage made by the act of march 3 1851 which reduction took effect at the commencement of the last fiscal year although in its operation during the last year the act referred to has not fulfilled the predictions of its friends by increasing the correspondence of the country in proportion to the reduction of postage i should nevertheless question the policy of returning to higher rates experience warrants the expectation that as the community becomes accustomed to cheap postage correspondence will increase it is believed that from this because and from the rapid growth of the country in population and business the receipts of the department must ultimately exceed its expenses and that the country may safely rely upon the continuance of the present cheap rate of postage in former messages i have among other things respectfully recommended to the consideration of congress the propriety and necessity of further legislation for the protection and punishment of foreign consuls residing in the united states to revive with certain modifications the act of 10th march 1838 to restrain unlawful military expeditions against the inhabitants of conterminous states or territories for the preservation and protection from mutilation or theft of the papers records and archives of the nation for authorizing the surplus revenue to be applied to the payment of the public debt in advance of the time when it will become due for the establishment of land offices for the sale of the public lands in california and the territory of oregon for the construction of a road from the mississippi valley to the pacific ocean for the establishment of a bureau of agriculture for the promotion of that interest perhaps the most important in the country for the prevention of frauds upon the government in applications for pensions and bounty lands for the establishment of a uniform fee bill prescribing a specific compensation for every service required of clerks district attorneys and marshals for authorizing an additional regiment of mounted men for the defense of our frontiers against the indians and for fulfilling our treaty stipulations with mexico to defend her citizens against the indians with equal diligence and energy as our own for determining the relative rank between the naval and civil officers in our public ships and between the officers of the army and navy in the various grades of each for reorganizing the naval establishment by fixing the number of officers in each grade and providing for a retired list upon reduced pay of those unfit for active duty for prescribing and regulating punishments in the navy for the appointment of a commission to revise the public statutes of the united states by arranging them in order supplying deficiencies correcting incongruities simplifying their language and reporting them to congress for its final action and for the establishment of a commission to adjudicate and settle private claims against the united states i am not aware however that any of these subjects have been finally acted upon by congress without repeating the reasons for legislation on these subjects which have been assigned in former messages i respectfully recommend them again to your favorable consideration i think it due to the several executive departments of this government to bear testimony to the efficiency and integrity with which they are conducted with all the careful superintendence which it is possible for the heads of those departments to exercise still the due administration and guardianship of the public money must very much depend on the vigilance intelligence and fidelity of the subordinate officers and clerks and especially on those intrusted with the settlement and adjustment of claims and accounts i am gratified to believe that they have generally performed their duties faithfully and well they are appointed to guard the approaches to the public treasury and they occupy positions that expose them to all the temptations and seductions which the cupidity of peculators and fraudulent claimants can prompt them to employ it will be but a wise precaution to protect the government against that source of mischief and corruption as far as it can be done by the enactment of all proper legal penalties the laws in this respect are supposed to be defective and i therefore deem it my duty to call your attention to the subject and to recommend that provision be made by law for the punishment not only of those who shall accept bribes but also of those who shall either promise give or offer to give to any of those officers or clerks a bribe or reward touching or relating to any matter of their official action or duty it has been the uniform policy of this government from its foundation to the present day to abstain from all interference in the domestic affairs of other nations the consequence has been that while the nations of europe have been engaged in desolating wars our country has pursued its peaceful course to unexampled prosperity and happiness the wars in which we have been compelled to engage in defense of the rights and honor of the country have been fortunately of short duration during the terrific contest of nation against nation which succeeded the french revolution we were enabled by the wisdom and firmness of president washington to maintain our neutrality while other nations were drawn into this whirlpool we sat quiet and unmoved upon our own shores while the flower of their numerous armies was wasted by disease or perished by hundreds of thousands upon the battlefield the youth of this favored land were permitted to enjoy the blessings of peace beneath the paternal roof while the states of europe incurred enormous debts under the burden of which their subjects still groan and which must absorb no small part of the product of the honest industry of those countries for generations to come the united states have once been enabled to exhibit the proud spectacle of a nation free from public debt and if permitted to pursue our prosperous way for a few years longer in peace we may do the same again but it is now said by some that this policy must be changed europe is no longer separated from us by a voyage of months but steam navigation has brought her within a few days sail of our shores we see more of her movements and take a deeper interest in her controversies although no one proposes that we should join the fraternity of potentates who have for ages lavished the blood and treasure of their subjects in maintaining the balance of power yet it is said that we ought to interfere between contending sovereigns and their subjects for the purpose of overthrowing the monarchies of europe and establishing in their place republican institutions it is alleged that we have heretofore pursued a different course from a sense of our weakness but that now our conscious strength dictates a change of policy and that it is consequently our duty to mingle in these contests and aid those who are struggling for liberty this is a most seductive but dangerous appeal to the generous sympathies of freemen enjoying as we do the blessings of a free government there is no man who has an american heart that would not rejoice to see these blessings extended to all other nations we can not witness the struggle between the oppressed and his oppressor anywhere without the deepest sympathy for the former and the most anxious desire for his triumph nevertheless is it prudent or is it wise to involve ourselves in these foreign wars is it indeed true that we have heretofore refrained from doing so merely from the degrading motive of a conscious weakness for the honor of the patriots who have gone before us i can not admit it men of the revolution who drew the sword against the oppressions of the mother country and pledged to heaven their lives their fortunes and their sacred honor to maintain their freedom could never have been actuated by so unworthy a motive they knew no weakness or fear where right or duty pointed the way and it is a libel upon their fair fame for us while we enjoy the blessings for which they so nobly fought and bled to insinuate it the truth is that the course which they pursued was dictated by a stern sense of international justice by a statesmanlike prudence and a wisdom looking not merely to the present necessities but to the permanent safety and interest of the country they knew that the world is governed less by sympathy than by reason and force that it was not possible for this nation to become a propagandist of free principles without arraying against it the combined powers of europe and that the result was more likely to be the overthrow of republican liberty here than its establishment there history has been written in vain for those who can doubt this france had no sooner established a republican form of government than she manifested a desire to force its blessings on all the world her own historian informs us that hearing of some petty acts of tyranny in a neighboring principality the national convention declared that she would afford succor and fraternity to all nations who wished to recover their liberty and she gave it in charge to the executive power to give orders to the generals of the french armies to aid all citizens who might have been or should be oppressed in the because of liberty here was the false step which led to her subsequent misfortunes she soon found herself involved in war with all the rest of europe in less than ten years her government was changed from a republic to an empire and finally after shedding rivers of blood foreign powers restored her exiled dynasty and exhausted europe sought peace and repose in the unquestioned ascendency of monarchical principles let us learn wisdom from her example let us remember that revolutions do not always establish freedom our own free institutions were not the offspring of our revolution they existed before they were planted in the free charters of under which the english colonies grew up and our revolution only freed us from the dominion of a foreign power whose government was at variance with those institutions but european nations have had no such training for and every effort to establish it by bloody revolutions has been and must without that preparation continue to be a failure liberty unregulated by law degenerates into anarchy which soon becomes the most horrid of all despotisms our policy is wisely to govern ourselves and thereby to set such an example of national justice prosperity and true glory as shall teach to all nations the blessings of and the unparalleled enterprise and success of a free people we live in an age of progress and ours is emphatically a country of progress within the last half century the number of states in this union has nearly doubled the population has almost quadrupled and our boundaries have been extended from the mississippi to the pacific our territory is checkered over with railroads and furrowed with canals the inventive talent of our country is excited to the highest pitch and the numerous applications for patents for valuable improvements distinguish this age and this people from all others the genius of one american has enabled our commerce to move against wind and tide and that of another has annihilated distance in the transmission of intelligence the whole country is full of enterprise our common schools are diffusing intelligence among the people and our industry is fast accumulating the comforts and luxuries of life this is in part owing to our peculiar position to our fertile soil and comparatively sparse population but much of it is also owing to the popular institutions under which we live to the freedom which every man feels to engage in any useful pursuit according to his taste or inclination and to the entire confidence that his person and property will be protected by the laws but whatever may be the because of this unparalleled growth in population intelligence and wealth one tiring is clear that the government must keep pace with the progress of the people it must participate in their spirit of enterprise and while it exacts obedience to the laws and restrains all unauthorized invasions of the rights of neighboring states it should foster and protect home industry and lend its powerful strength to the improvement of such means of intercommunication as are necessary to promote our internal commerce and strengthen the ties which bind us together as a people it is not strange however much it may be regretted that such an exuberance of enterprise should because some individuals to mistake change for progress and the invasion of the rights of others for national prowess and glory the former are constantly agitating for some change in the organic law or urging new and untried theories of human rights the latter are ever ready to engage in any wild crusade against a neighboring people regardless of the justice of the enterprise and without looking at the fatal consequences to ourselves and to the because of popular government such expeditions however are often stimulated by mercenary individuals who expect to share the plunder or profit of the enterprise without exposing themselves to danger and are led on by some irresponsible foreigner who abuses the hospitality of our own government by seducing the young and ignorant to join in his scheme of personal ambition or revenge under the false and delusive pretense of extending the area of freedom these reprehensible aggressions but retard the true progress of our nation and tarnish its fair fame they should therefore receive the indignant frowns of every good citizen who sincerely loves his country and takes a pride in its prosperity and honor our constitution though not perfect is doubtless the best that ever was formed therefore let every proposition to change it be well weighed and if found beneficial cautiously adopted every patriot will rejoice to see its authority so exerted as to advance the prosperity and honor of the nation whilst he will watch with jealousy any attempt to mutilate this charter of our liberties or pervert its powers to acts of aggression or injustice thus shall conservatism and progress blend their harmonious action in preserving the form and spirit of the constitution and at the same time carry forward the great improvements of the country with a rapidity and energy which freemen only can display in closing this my last annual communication permit me to congratulate you on the prosperous condition of our beloved country abroad its relations with all foreign powers are friendly its rights are respected and its high place in the family of nations cheerfully recognized at home we enjoy an amount of happiness public and private which has probably never fallen to the lot of any other people besides affording to our own citizens a degree of prosperity of which on so large a scale i know of no other instance our country is annually affording a refuge and a home to multitudes altogether without example from the old world we owe these blessings under heaven to the happy constitution and government which were bequeathed to us by our fathers and which it is our sacred duty to transmit in all their integrity to our children we must all consider it a great distinction and privilege to have been chosen by the people to bear a part in the administration of such a government called by an unexpected dispensation to its highest trust at a season of embarrassment and alarm i entered upon its arduous duties with extreme diffidence i claim only to have discharged them to the best of an humble ability with a single eye to the public good and it is with devout gratitude in retiring from office that i leave the country in a state of peace and prosperity
brief space elapsed since close last session marked extraordinary political event quadrennial election chief magistrate passed less usual excitement however individuals parties may disappointed result nevertheless subject national congratulation choice effected independent suffrages free people undisturbed influences countries often affected purity popular elections grateful thanks due providence staying pestilence different forms desolated cities crowning labors husbandman abundant harvest nation generally blessings peace prosperity within weeks public mind deeply affected death daniel webster filling decease office secretary state associates executive government sincerely sympathized family public generally mournful occasion commanding talents great political professional eminence patriotism long faithful services important public trusts caused death lamented throughout country earned lasting place history course last summer considerable anxiety caused short time official intimation government great britain orders given protection fisheries upon coasts british provinces north america alleged encroachments fishing vessels united states france shortness notice season year seemed make matter urgent importance first apprehended increased naval force ordered fishing grounds carry effect british interpretation provisions convention 1818 reference true intent two governments differ soon discovered design great britain satisfactory explanations real objects measure given london unadjusted difference however two governments interpretation first article convention 1818 still matter importance american fishing vessels within nine ten years excluded waters free access years negotiation treaty 1845 exclusion relaxed far concerns bay fundy liberal intention home government compliance think true construction convention open outer bays fishermen abandoned consequence opposition colonies notwithstanding united states since bay fundy reopened fishermen 1845 pursued liberal course toward colonial fishing interests revenue law 1846 duties colonial fish entering ports greatly reduced warehousing act allowed entered bond without payment duty way colonial fish acquired monopoly export trade market entering extent home consumption facts among increased sensibility fishing interest movement question circumstances incidents alluded led think moment favorable reconsideration entire subject fisheries coasts british provinces view place upon liberal footing reciprocal privilege willingness meet us arrangement kind understood exist part great britain desire part include one comprehensive settlement well subject commercial intercourse united states british provinces thought whatever arrangements may made two subjects expedient embraced separate conventions illness death late secretary state prevented commencement contemplated negotiation pains taken collect information required details arrangement subject attended considerable difficulty found practicable come agreement mutually acceptable two parties conventions may concluded course present winter control congress provisions arrangement affecting revenue course reserved affairs cuba formed prominent topic last annual message remain uneasy condition feeling alarm irritation part cuban authorities appears exist feeling interfered regular commercial intercourse united states island led acts fight complain cuba clothed power treat foreign governments degree control spanish minister washington communication may hold agent foreign power informal matter courtesy anxious put end existing inconveniences seemed rest misconception directed newly appointed minister mexico visit havana way vera cruz respectfully received conferred freely recent occurrences permanent arrangement effected meantime refusal allow passengers mail landed certain cases reason furnish opinion government even good presumptive ground prohibition made subject serious remonstrance madrid reason doubt due respect paid government catholic majesty representations minister instructed make subject justice add conduct toward steamers employed carry mails united states havana exceptions alluded marked kindness liberality indicates general purpose interfering commercial correspondence intercourse island country early present year official notes received ministers france england inviting government united states become party great britain france tripartite convention virtue three powers severally collectively disclaim future intention obtain possession island cuba bind discountenance attempts effect part power individual whatever invitation respectfully declined reasons would occupy much space communication state detail led think proposed measure would doubtful constitutionality impolitic unavailing however common several predecessors directed ministers france england assured united states entertain designs cuba contrary regard incorporation union present time fraught serious peril island comparatively destitute inhabitants occupied kindred race regard voluntarily ceded spain desirable acquisition existing circumstances look upon incorporation union hazardous measure would bring confederacy population different national stock speaking different language likely harmonize members would probably affect prejudicial manner industrial interests south might revive conflicts opinion different sections country lately shook union center happily compromised rejection mexican congress convention concluded republic united states protection transit way across isthmus tehuantepec interests citizens united states become proprietors rights mexico conferred one citizens regard transit thrown serious obstacle way attainment desirable national object still willing hope differences subject exist may hereafter arise governments amicably adjusted subject however already engaged attention senate united states requires comment communication settlement question respecting port san juan de nicaragua controversy republics costa rica nicaragua regard boundaries considered indispensable commencement ship canal two oceans subject convention united states great britain 19th april 1850 accordingly proposition purposes addressed two governments quarter mosquito indians agreed april last secretary state minister britannic majesty besides wish aid reconciling differences two republics engaged negotiation desire place great work ship canal two oceans one jurisdiction establish important port san juan de nicaragua government civilized power proposition question assented costs rica mosquito indians proved equally acceptable nicaragua hoped negotiations subject train carried spirit conciliation compromise ought always prevail occasions lead satisfactory result satisfaction inform executive government venezuela acknowledged claims citizens united states many years past urged charge caracas hoped sense justice actuate congress republic providing means payment recent revolution buenos ayres confederated states opened prospect improved state things quarter governments great britain france determined negotiate chief new confederacy free access commerce extensive countries watered tributaries la plata gave friendly notice purpose united states might thought proper pursue course compliance invitation minister rio janeiro charge buenos ayres fully authorized conclude treaties newly organized confederation states composing delays taken place formation new government yet prevented execution instructions every reason hope vast countries eventually opened commerce treaty commerce concluded united states oriental republic uruguay laid senate convention go operation open commercial enterprise citizens country great extent unsurpassed natural resources foreign nations hitherto almost wholly excluded correspondence late secretary state peruvian charge relative lobos islands communicated congress toward close last session since time investigation subject doubts entertained title peru islands removed deemed temporary wrong unintentionally done want information repaired unreserved acknowledgment sovereignty satisfaction inform course pursued peru creditable liberality government known title would acknowledged washington minister foreign affairs authorized charge lima announce american vessels gone lobos guano peruvian government willing freight account intention carried effect peruvian minister arrangement believed advantageous parties interest settlements shores pacific already given great extension respects new direction commerce ocean direct rapidly increasing intercourse sprung eastern asia waters northern pacific even arctic sea late years frequented whalemen application steam general purposes navigation becoming daily common makes desirable obtain fuel necessary supplies convenient points route asia pacific shores unfortunate countrymen time time suffer shipwreck coasts eastern seas entitled protection besides specific objects general prosperity states pacific requires attempt made open opposite regions asia mutually beneficial intercourse obvious attempt could made power great advantage united states whose constitutional system excludes every idea distant colonial dependencies accordingly led order appropriate naval force japan command discreet intelligent officer highest rank known service instructed endeavor obtain government country relaxation inhospitable antisocial system pursued two centuries directed particularly remonstrate strongest language cruel treatment shipwrecked mariners often subjected insist shall treated humanity instructed however time give government amplest assurances objects united states indicated expedition friendly peaceful notwithstanding jealousy governments eastern asia regard overtures foreigners without hopes beneficial result expedition crowned success advantages confined united states case china equally enjoyed maritime powers much satisfaction stating steps preparatory expedition government united states materially aided good offices king netherlands european power commercial relations japan passing survey foreign relations invite attention congress condition department government branch public business intrusted intercourse foreign powers late years greatly increased consequence growth introduction many new states family nations way department state become overburdened recent establishment department interior relieved portion domestic business residue business kind distribution congressional documents keeping publishing distribution laws united states execution copyright law subject reprieves pardons subjects relating interior administration transferred department state would unquestionably benefit public service would also suggest building appropriated state department fireproof reason think defects construction archives government charge department precious collections manuscript papers washington jefferson hamilton madison monroe exposed destruction fire similar remark may made buildings appropriated war navy departments condition treasury exhibited annual report department cash receipts treasury fiscal year ending 30th june last exclusive trust funds expenditures period likewise exclusive trust funds account principal interest public debt including last installment indemnity mexico treaty guadalupe hidalgo leaving balance treasury 1st day july last since latter period purchases principal public debt made extent surplus treasury continue applied object whenever stock procured within limits price authorized law value foreign merchandise imported last fiscal year value domestic productions exported besides foreign merchandise exported making aggregate entire exports exclusive exported specie imported foreign ports first annual message congress called attention seemed defects present tariff recommended modifications judgment best adapted remedy evils promote prosperity country nothing since occurred change views important question without repeating arguments contained former message favor discriminating protective duties deem duty call attention one two considerations affecting subject first effect large importations foreign goods upon currency gold california fast coined finds way directly europe payment goods purchased second place manufacturing establishments broken competition foreigners capital invested lost thousands honest industrious citizens thrown employment farmer extent deprived home market sale surplus produce third place destruction manufactures leaves foreigner without competition market consequently raises price article sent sale seen increased cost iron imported england prosperity wealth every nation must depend upon productive industry farmer stimulated exertion finding ready market surplus products benefited able exchange without loss time expense transportation manufactures comfort convenience requires always done best advantage portion community lives engaged pursuits manufactures require amount capital practical skill commanded unless protected time ruinous competition abroad hence necessity laying duties upon imported goods constitution authorizes revenue manner protect encourage labor citizens duties however fixed rate high exclude foreign article graduated enable domestic manufacturer fairly compete foreigner markets competition reduce price manufactured article consumer lowest rate produced policy would place mechanic side farmer create mutual interchange respective commodities thus stimulate industry whole country render us independent foreign nations supplies required habits necessities people another question wholly independent protection presents whether duties levied upon value article place shipment practicable specific duty graduated according quantity ascertained weight measure duties present ad valorem certain percentage levied price goods port shipment foreign country commercial nations found indispensable purpose preventing fraud perjury make duties specific whenever article uniform value weight measure justify duty legislation never encourage dishonesty crime impossible revenue officers port goods entered duties paid know certainty cost foreign country yet law requires levy duty according cost therefore compelled resort unsatisfactory evidence ascertain cost take invoice importer attested oath best evidence nature case admits everyone must see invoice may fabricated oath supported false reason dishonest importer pays part duties paid honest one thus indirectly receives treasury united states reward fraud perjury reports secretary treasury heretofore made subject show conclusively frauds practiced great extent tendency destroy high moral character merchants long distinguished defraud government revenue break honest importer dishonest competition finally transfer business importation foreign irresponsible agents great detriment citizens therefore earnestly recommend adoption specific duties wherever practicable home valuation prevent frauds would also call attention fact present tariff cases imposes higher duty upon raw material imported upon article manufactured consequence duty operates encouragement foreigner discouragement citizens full detailed information regard general condition indian affairs respectfully refer report secretary interior accompanying documents senate thought proper ratify treaties negotiated tribes indians california oregon relations left unsatisfactory condition parts territory particular districts country set apart exclusive occupation indians right lands within limits acknowledged respected california oregon recognition government exclusive right indians part country therefore mere tenants sufferance liable driven place place pleasure whites treaties rejected proposed remedy evil allotting different tribes districts country suitable habits life sufficient support provision believed led rejection substitute adopted congress deemed advisable attempt enter new treaties permanent character although effort spared temporary arrangements preserve friendly relations desire congress remove country altogether assign particular districts remote settlements whites proper set apart law territory occupy provide means necessary removing justice alike citizens indians requires prompt action congress subject amendments proposed senate treaties negotiated sioux indians minnesota submitted tribes parties received assent large tract valuable territory thus opened settlement cultivation danger collision powerful warlike bands happily removed removal remnant tribe seminole indians florida long cherished object government one attention steadily directed admonished past experience difficulty cost attempt remove military force resort conciliatory measures invitation commissioner indian affairs several principal chiefs recently visited washington whilst acknowledged writing obligation tribe remove least possible delay late advices special agent government represent adhere promise council people called make preliminary arrangements general emigration may therefore confidently expected early day report general land office shows increased activity operations survey northern boundary iowa completed unexampled dispatch within last year acres public land surveyed acres brought market acres last fiscal year sold located warrants located certificates making total addition reported grants internal improvements railroads etc making aggregate increase amount sold located land warrants acres previous year whole amount thus sold located land warrants reported grants selected internal improvements exceeds previous year acres sales would without doubt much larger extensive reservations railroads missouri mississippi alabama acres quarter ending 30th september 1852 sold located warrants located certificates reported grants making aggregate quarter much larger portion labor arranging classifying returns last census finished devolve upon congress make necessary provision publication results form shall deemed best apportionment representation basis new census made secretary interior conformity provisions law relating subject recent elections made accordance commend favorable regard suggestion contained report secretary interior provision made law publication distribution periodically analytical digest patents may hereafter granted useful inventions discoveries descriptions illustrations may necessary present intelligible view nature operation cost publication could easily defrayed patent fund persuaded could applied object acceptable inventors beneficial public large appropriation made last session purchase suitable site erection furnishing fitting asylum insane district columbia army navy united states proper measures adopted carry beneficent purpose effect latest advices mexican boundary commission appears survey river gila continence colorado supposed intersection western line new mexico completed survey rio grande also finished point agreed commissioners point strikes southern boundary new mexico point 135 miles eagle pass distance along course river mouth appropriation made last session congress continuation survey subject following proviso provided part appropriation shall used expended shall made satisfactorily appear president united states southern boundary new mexico established commissioner surveyor united states farther north town called paso laid disturnell map added treaty attention drawn subject report department interior reviewed facts case submitted decision question whether existing circumstances part appropriation could lawfully used expended prosecution work careful consideration subject came conclusion could informed head department orders immediately issued commissioner surveyor make requisitions department could paid discontinue operations southern line new mexico department exact information amount provisions money remained unexpended hands commissioner surveyor left discretionary continue survey rio grande far means disposal would enable disband commission special messenger since arrived officer charge survey river information funds subject control exhausted officers others employed service destitute alike means prosecuting work returning homes object proviso doubtless arrest survey southern western lines new mexico regard different opinions expressed hardly supposed could objection part line extends along channel rio grande terms law broad forbid use part money prosecution work even payment officers agents arrearages pay justly due earnestly invite prompt attention subject recommend modification terms proviso enable department use much appropriation necessary discharge existing obligations government complete survey rio grande mouth also proper make provision law fulfillment treaty mexico running marking residue boundary line two countries permit invite particular attention interests district columbia confided constitution peculiar care among measures seem greatest importance prosperity introduction copious supply water city washington construction suitable bridges across potomac replace destroyed high water early part present year last session congress appropriation made defray cost surveys necessary determining best means affording unfailing supply good wholesome water progress made survey soon completed result laid appropriations also necessary grading paving streets avenues inclosing embellishing public grounds within city washington commend objects together charitable institutions district favorable regard every effort made protect frontier adjoining mexican states incursions indian tribes men army composed nearly employed defense newly acquired territory including texas emigrants proceeding thereto gratified say efforts unusually successful exception partial outbreaks california oregon occasional depredations portion rio grande owing believed disturbed state border region inroads indians effectually restrained experience shown however whenever two races brought contact collisions inevitably occur prevent collisions united states generally set apart portions territory exclusive occupation indian tribes difficulty occurs however application policy texas terms compact state admitted union retained ownership vacant lands within limits government state understood assigned portion territory indians fast settlements advance lays counties proceeds survey sell policy manifestly tends alarm irritate indians compel resort plunder subsistence also deprives government influence control without durable peace ever exist whites trust therefore due regard interests apart considerations humanity justice induce state assign small portion vast domain provisional occupancy small remnants tribes within borders subject course ownership eventual jurisdiction fail fulfillment treaty stipulations mexico duty indians feared become subject serious embarrassment government hoped however timely provision texas may avert evil appropriations fortifications made two last sessions congress omission probably found growing belief system fortifications adopted 1816 heretofore acted requires revision subject certainly deserves full careful investigation delayed longer avoided meantime certain works commenced nearly completed designed protect principal seaports boston new orleans important points regard necessity works believed little difference opinion exists among military men therefore recommend appropriations necessary prosecute made invite attention remarks subject others connected department contained accompanying report secretary war measures taken carry effect law last session making provision improvement certain rivers harbors believed arrangements made purpose combine efficiency economy owing chiefly advanced season act passed little yet done regard many works beyond making necessary preparations respect improvements sums already appropriated suffice complete require additional appropriations trust appropriations made wise beneficent policy auspiciously resumed continued great care taken however commence work sufficient importance commerce country viewed national character works commenced discontinued completed otherwise sums expended cases lost report navy department inform prosperous condition branch public service committed charge presents consideration many topics suggestions ask approval exhibits unusual degree activity operations department past year preparations japan expedition already alluded arrangements made exploration survey china seas northern pacific behrings straits incipient measures taken toward reconnoissance continent africa eastward liberia preparation early examination tributaries river la plata recent decree provisional chief argentine confederation opened navigation enterprises means proposed accomplished commanded full approbation doubt productive useful results two officers navy heretofore instructed explore whole extent amazon river confines peru mouth return one placed possession government interesting valuable account character resources country abounding materials commerce opened industry world prove inexhaustible fund wealth report exploration communicated soon completed among subjects offered notice secretary navy select special commendation view connection interests navy plan submitted establishment permanent corps seamen suggestions presented reorganization naval academy reference first take occasion say think greatly improve efficiency service regard still entitled favor salutary influence must exert upon naval discipline greatly disturbed increasing spirit insubordination resulting present system plan proposed organization seamen furnishes judicious substitute law september 1850 abolishing corporal punishment satisfactorily sustains policy act conditions well adapted maintain authority command order security ships believed change proposes permanently dispense mode punishment preceded system enlistment shall supply navy seamen meritorious class whose good deportment pride character may preclude occasion resort penalties harsh degrading nature safety ship crew often dependent upon immediate obedience command authority enforce must equally ready arrest refractory seaman moments deprives ship indispensable aid imposes necessity double service others whose fidelity duties may relied upon emergency exposure increased arduous labor since passage act 1850 already observable injurious extent effect preventing enlistment best seamen navy plan suggested designed promote condition service objection longer exist details plan may established great part altogether executive authority existing laws thought proper accordance suggestion secretary navy submit approval establishment corps apprentices navy boys enlisted become age employed regulations navy department may devise proposed report cordially approve commend consideration also concur suggestion system early training seamen may usefully ingrafted upon service merchant marine proposition report referred reorganization naval academy recommend attention project worthy encouragement support valuable services already rendered institution entitle continuance fostering care attention respectfully called report postmaster general detailed operation department last fiscal year seen receipts postages time less preceding fiscal year decrease 23 per cent diminution attributable reduction rates postage made act march 3 1851 reduction took effect commencement last fiscal year although operation last year act referred fulfilled predictions friends increasing correspondence country proportion reduction postage nevertheless question policy returning higher rates experience warrants expectation community becomes accustomed cheap postage correspondence increase believed rapid growth country population business receipts department must ultimately exceed expenses country may safely rely upon continuance present cheap rate postage former messages among things respectfully recommended consideration congress propriety necessity legislation protection punishment foreign consuls residing united states revive certain modifications act 10th march 1838 restrain unlawful military expeditions inhabitants conterminous states territories preservation protection mutilation theft papers records archives nation authorizing surplus revenue applied payment public debt advance time become due establishment land offices sale public lands california territory oregon construction road mississippi valley pacific ocean establishment bureau agriculture promotion interest perhaps important country prevention frauds upon government applications pensions bounty lands establishment uniform fee bill prescribing specific compensation every service required clerks district attorneys marshals authorizing additional regiment mounted men defense frontiers indians fulfilling treaty stipulations mexico defend citizens indians equal diligence energy determining relative rank naval civil officers public ships officers army navy various grades reorganizing naval establishment fixing number officers grade providing retired list upon reduced pay unfit active duty prescribing regulating punishments navy appointment commission revise public statutes united states arranging order supplying deficiencies correcting incongruities simplifying language reporting congress final action establishment commission adjudicate settle private claims united states aware however subjects finally acted upon congress without repeating reasons legislation subjects assigned former messages respectfully recommend favorable consideration think due several executive departments government bear testimony efficiency integrity conducted careful superintendence possible heads departments exercise still due administration guardianship public money must much depend vigilance intelligence fidelity subordinate officers clerks especially intrusted settlement adjustment claims accounts gratified believe generally performed duties faithfully well appointed guard approaches public treasury occupy positions expose temptations seductions cupidity peculators fraudulent claimants prompt employ wise precaution protect government source mischief corruption far done enactment proper legal penalties laws respect supposed defective therefore deem duty call attention subject recommend provision made law punishment shall accept bribes also shall either promise give offer give officers clerks bribe reward touching relating matter official action duty uniform policy government foundation present day abstain interference domestic affairs nations consequence nations europe engaged desolating wars country pursued peaceful course unexampled prosperity happiness wars compelled engage defense rights honor country fortunately short duration terrific contest nation nation succeeded french revolution enabled wisdom firmness president washington maintain neutrality nations drawn whirlpool sat quiet unmoved upon shores flower numerous armies wasted disease perished hundreds thousands upon battlefield youth favored land permitted enjoy blessings peace beneath paternal roof states europe incurred enormous debts burden subjects still groan must absorb small part product honest industry countries generations come united states enabled exhibit proud spectacle nation free public debt permitted pursue prosperous way years longer peace may said policy must changed europe longer separated us voyage months steam navigation brought within days sail shores see movements take deeper interest controversies although one proposes join fraternity potentates ages lavished blood treasure subjects maintaining balance power yet said ought interfere contending sovereigns subjects purpose overthrowing monarchies europe establishing place republican institutions alleged heretofore pursued different course sense weakness conscious strength dictates change policy consequently duty mingle contests aid struggling liberty seductive dangerous appeal generous sympathies freemen enjoying blessings free government man american heart would rejoice see blessings extended nations witness struggle oppressed oppressor anywhere without deepest sympathy former anxious desire triumph nevertheless prudent wise involve foreign wars indeed true heretofore refrained merely degrading motive conscious weakness honor patriots gone us admit men revolution drew sword oppressions mother country pledged heaven lives fortunes sacred honor maintain freedom could never actuated unworthy motive knew weakness fear right duty pointed way libel upon fair fame us enjoy blessings nobly fought bled insinuate truth course pursued dictated stern sense international justice statesmanlike prudence wisdom looking merely present necessities permanent safety interest country knew world governed less sympathy reason force possible nation become propagandist free principles without arraying combined powers europe result likely overthrow republican liberty establishment history written vain doubt france sooner established republican form government manifested desire force blessings world historian informs us hearing petty acts tyranny neighboring principality national convention declared would afford succor fraternity nations wished recover liberty gave charge executive power give orders generals french armies aid citizens might oppressed liberty false step led subsequent misfortunes soon found involved war rest europe less ten years government changed republic empire finally shedding rivers blood foreign powers restored exiled dynasty exhausted europe sought peace repose unquestioned ascendency monarchical principles let us learn wisdom example let us remember revolutions always establish freedom free institutions offspring revolution existed planted free charters english colonies grew revolution freed us dominion foreign power whose government variance institutions european nations training every effort establish bloody revolutions must without preparation continue failure liberty unregulated law degenerates anarchy soon becomes horrid despotisms policy wisely govern thereby set example national justice prosperity true glory shall teach nations blessings unparalleled enterprise success free people live age progress emphatically country progress within last half century number states union nearly doubled population almost quadrupled boundaries extended mississippi pacific territory checkered railroads furrowed canals inventive talent country excited highest pitch numerous applications patents valuable improvements distinguish age people others genius one american enabled commerce move wind tide another annihilated distance transmission intelligence whole country full enterprise common schools diffusing intelligence among people industry fast accumulating comforts luxuries life part owing peculiar position fertile soil comparatively sparse population much also owing popular institutions live freedom every man feels engage useful pursuit according taste inclination entire confidence person property protected laws whatever may unparalleled growth population intelligence wealth one tiring clear government must keep pace progress people must participate spirit enterprise exacts obedience laws restrains unauthorized invasions rights neighboring states foster protect home industry lend powerful strength improvement means intercommunication necessary promote internal commerce strengthen ties bind us together people strange however much may regretted exuberance enterprise individuals mistake change progress invasion rights others national prowess glory former constantly agitating change organic law urging new untried theories human rights latter ever ready engage wild crusade neighboring people regardless justice enterprise without looking fatal consequences popular government expeditions however often stimulated mercenary individuals expect share plunder profit enterprise without exposing danger led irresponsible foreigner abuses hospitality government seducing young ignorant join scheme personal ambition revenge false delusive pretense extending area freedom reprehensible aggressions retard true progress nation tarnish fair fame therefore receive indignant frowns every good citizen sincerely loves country takes pride prosperity honor constitution though perfect doubtless best ever formed therefore let every proposition change well weighed found beneficial cautiously adopted every patriot rejoice see authority exerted advance prosperity honor nation whilst watch jealousy attempt mutilate charter liberties pervert powers acts aggression injustice thus shall conservatism progress blend harmonious action preserving form spirit constitution time carry forward great improvements country rapidity energy freemen display closing last annual communication permit congratulate prosperous condition beloved country abroad relations foreign powers friendly rights respected high place family nations cheerfully recognized home enjoy amount happiness public private probably never fallen lot people besides affording citizens degree prosperity large scale know instance country annually affording refuge home multitudes altogether without example old world owe blessings heaven happy constitution government bequeathed us fathers sacred duty transmit integrity children must consider great distinction privilege chosen people bear part administration government called unexpected dispensation highest trust season embarrassment alarm entered upon arduous duties extreme diffidence claim discharged best humble ability single eye public good devout gratitude retiring office leave country state peace prosperity
brief space elapse since close last session mark extraordinary political event quadrennial election chief magistrate pass less usual excitement however individual party may disappoint result nevertheless subject national congratulation choice effect independent suffrage free people undisturbed influence country often affect purity popular election grateful thanks due providence stay pestilence different form desolate city crown labor husbandman abundant harvest nation generally blessings peace prosperity within week public mind deeply affected death daniel webster fill decease office secretary state associate executive government sincerely sympathize family public generally mournful occasion command talent great political professional eminence patriotism long faithful service important public trust cause death lament throughout country earn lasting place history course last summer considerable anxiety cause short time official intimation government great britain order give protection fishery upon coast british province north america alleged encroachment fish vessel united state france shortness notice season year seem make matter urgent importance first apprehend increase naval force order fishing ground carry effect british interpretation provision convention 1818 reference true intent two government differ soon discovered design great britain satisfactory explanation real object measure give london unadjusted difference however two government interpretation first article convention 1818 still matter importance american fishing vessel within nine ten year exclude water free access year negotiation treaty 1845 exclusion relax far concern bay fundy liberal intention home government compliance think true construction convention open outer bay fisherman abandon consequence opposition colony notwithstanding united state since bay fundy reopen fisherman 1845 pursued liberal course toward colonial fishing interest revenue law 1846 duty colonial fish entering port greatly reduce warehouse act allow enter bond without payment duty way colonial fish acquire monopoly export trade market enter extent home consumption facts among increased sensibility fishing interest movement question circumstance incident allude lead think moment favorable reconsideration entire subject fishery coast british province view place upon liberal foot reciprocal privilege willingness meet u arrangement kind understood exist part great britain desire part include one comprehensive settlement well subject commercial intercourse united state british province think whatever arrangement may make two subject expedient embrace separate convention illness death late secretary state prevent commencement contemplate negotiation pain take collect information require detail arrangement subject attend considerable difficulty find practicable come agreement mutually acceptable two party convention may conclude course present winter control congress provision arrangement affect revenue course reserve affair cuba form prominent topic last annual message remain uneasy condition feel alarm irritation part cuban authority appear exist feel interfere regular commercial intercourse united state island lead act fight complain cuba clothe power treat foreign government degree control spanish minister washington communication may hold agent foreign power informal matter courtesy anxious put end exist inconvenience seem rest misconception direct newly appoint minister mexico visit havana way vera cruz respectfully receive conferred freely recent occurrence permanent arrangement effect meantime refusal allow passenger mail land certain case reason furnish opinion government even good presumptive ground prohibition make subject serious remonstrance madrid reason doubt due respect pay government catholic majesty representation minister instruct make subject justice add conduct toward steamer employ carry mail united state havana exception allude marked kindness liberality indicate general purpose interfere commercial correspondence intercourse island country early present year official note receive minister france england invite government united state become party great britain france tripartite convention virtue three power severally collectively disclaim future intention obtain possession island cuba bind discountenance attempt effect part power individual whatever invitation respectfully decline reason would occupy much space communication state detail lead think propose measure would doubtful constitutionality impolitic unavailing however common several predecessor direct minister france england assure united state entertain design cuba contrary regard incorporation union present time fraught serious peril island comparatively destitute inhabitant occupy kindred race regard voluntarily cede spain desirable acquisition exist circumstance look upon incorporation union hazardous measure would bring confederacy population different national stock speak different language likely harmonize member would probably affect prejudicial manner industrial interest south might revive conflict opinion different section country lately shake union center happily compromise rejection mexican congress convention conclude republic united state protection transit way across isthmus tehuantepec interest citizen united state become proprietor right mexico confer one citizen regard transit thrown serious obstacle way attainment desirable national object still willing hope difference subject exist may hereafter arise government amicably adjust subject however already engage attention senate united state require comment communication settlement question respect port san juan de nicaragua controversy republic costa rica nicaragua regard boundary consider indispensable commencement ship canal two ocean subject convention united state great britain 19th april 1850 accordingly proposition purpose address two government quarter mosquito indian agree april last secretary state minister britannic majesty besides wish aid reconcile difference two republic engage negotiation desire place great work ship canal two ocean one jurisdiction establish important port san juan de nicaragua government civilize power proposition question assent cost rica mosquito indian prove equally acceptable nicaragua hop negotiation subject train carry spirit conciliation compromise ought always prevail occasion lead satisfactory result satisfaction inform executive government venezuela acknowledge claim citizen united state many year past urged charge caracas hop sense justice actuate congress republic providing mean payment recent revolution buenos ayres confederate state open prospect improve state thing quarter government great britain france determine negotiate chief new confederacy free access commerce extensive country water tributary la plata give friendly notice purpose united state might think proper pursue course compliance invitation minister rio janeiro charge buenos ayres fully authorize conclude treaty newly organize confederation state compose delay take place formation new government yet prevent execution instruction every reason hope vast country eventually open commerce treaty commerce conclude united state oriental republic uruguay lay senate convention go operation open commercial enterprise citizen country great extent unsurpassed natural resource foreign nation hitherto almost wholly excluded correspondence late secretary state peruvian charge relative lobos island communicate congress toward close last session since time investigation subject doubt entertain title peru island remove deem temporary wrong unintentionally do want information repair unreserved acknowledgment sovereignty satisfaction inform course pursue peru creditable liberality government know title would acknowledge washington minister foreign affair authorize charge lima announce american vessel go lobos guano peruvian government willing freight account intention carry effect peruvian minister arrangement believe advantageous party interest settlement shore pacific already give great extension respect new direction commerce ocean direct rapidly increase intercourse sprung eastern asia water northern pacific even arctic sea late year frequent whalemen application steam general purpose navigation become daily common make desirable obtain fuel necessary supply convenient point route asia pacific shore unfortunate countryman time time suffer shipwreck coast eastern sea entitle protection besides specific object general prosperity state pacific require attempt make open opposite region asia mutually beneficial intercourse obvious attempt could make power great advantage united state whose constitutional system exclude every idea distant colonial dependency accordingly lead order appropriate naval force japan command discreet intelligent officer high rank know service instruct endeavor obtain government country relaxation inhospitable antisocial system pursue two century direct particularly remonstrate strong language cruel treatment shipwreck mariner often subject insist shall treat humanity instruct however time give government ample assurance object united state indicate expedition friendly peaceful notwithstanding jealousy government eastern asia regard overtures foreigner without hope beneficial result expedition crown success advantage confine united state case china equally enjoyed maritime power much satisfaction state step preparatory expedition government unite state materially aid good office king netherlands european power commercial relation japan pass survey foreign relation invite attention congress condition department government branch public business intrust intercourse foreign power late year greatly increase consequence growth introduction many new state family nation way department state become overburden recent establishment department interior relieve portion domestic business residue business kind distribution congressional document keep publish distribution law united state execution copyright law subject reprieve pardon subject relate interior administration transfer department state would unquestionably benefit public service would also suggest building appropriate state department fireproof reason think defect construction archive government charge department precious collection manuscript paper washington jefferson hamilton madison monroe expose destruction fire similar remark may make building appropriated war navy department condition treasury exhibit annual report department cash receipt treasury fiscal year end 30th june last exclusive trust fund expenditures period likewise exclusive trust fund account principal interest public debt include last installment indemnity mexico treaty guadalupe hidalgo leave balance treasury 1st day july last since latter period purchase principal public debt make extent surplus treasury continue apply object whenever stock procure within limit price authorize law value foreign merchandise import last fiscal year value domestic production export besides foreign merchandise export make aggregate entire export exclusive export specie import foreign port first annual message congress call attention seem defect present tariff recommend modification judgment best adapt remedy evil promote prosperity country nothing since occur change view important question without repeat argument contain former message favor discriminate protective duty deem duty call attention one two consideration affect subject first effect large importation foreign good upon currency gold california fast coin find way directly europe payment good purchase second place manufacturing establishment break competition foreigner capital invest lost thousand honest industrious citizen thrown employment farmer extent deprive home market sale surplus produce third place destruction manufacture leave foreigner without competition market consequently raise price article send sale see increase cost iron import england prosperity wealth every nation must depend upon productive industry farmer stimulate exertion find ready market surplus product benefit able exchange without loss time expense transportation manufacture comfort convenience require always do best advantage portion community live engage pursuit manufacture require amount capital practical skill command unless protected time ruinous competition abroad hence necessity lay duty upon import good constitution authorize revenue manner protect encourage labor citizen duty however fix rate high exclude foreign article graduate enable domestic manufacturer fairly compete foreigner market competition reduce price manufacture article consumer low rate produce policy would place mechanic side farmer create mutual interchange respective commodity thus stimulate industry whole country render u independent foreign nation supply require habit necessity people another question wholly independent protection present whether duty levy upon value article place shipment practicable specific duty graduate accord quantity ascertain weight measure duty present ad valorem certain percentage levy price good port shipment foreign country commercial nation find indispensable purpose prevent fraud perjury make duty specific whenever article uniform value weight measure justify duty legislation never encourage dishonesty crime impossible revenue officer port good entered duty pay know certainty cost foreign country yet law require levy duty accord cost therefore compel resort unsatisfactory evidence ascertain cost take invoice importer attest oath best evidence nature case admit everyone must see invoice may fabricate oath support false reason dishonest importer pay part duty pay honest one thus indirectly receive treasury united state reward fraud perjury report secretary treasury heretofore make subject show conclusively frauds practice great extent tendency destroy high moral character merchant long distinguish defraud government revenue break honest importer dishonest competition finally transfer business importation foreign irresponsible agent great detriment citizen therefore earnestly recommend adoption specific duty wherever practicable home valuation prevent fraud would also call attention fact present tariff case impose high duty upon raw material import upon article manufacture consequence duty operate encouragement foreigner discouragement citizen full detailed information regard general condition indian affair respectfully refer report secretary interior accompany document senate think proper ratify treaty negotiate tribe indian california oregon relation leave unsatisfactory condition part territory particular district country set apart exclusive occupation indian right land within limit acknowledge respect california oregon recognition government exclusive right indian part country therefore mere tenant sufferance liable driven place place pleasure white treaty reject proposed remedy evil allot different tribe district country suitable habit life sufficient support provision believe led rejection substitute adopt congress deem advisable attempt enter new treaty permanent character although effort spar temporary arrangement preserve friendly relation desire congress remove country altogether assign particular district remote settlement white proper set apart law territory occupy provide mean necessary remove justice alike citizen indian require prompt action congress subject amendment propose senate treaty negotiate sioux indian minnesota submit tribes party receive assent large tract valuable territory thus open settlement cultivation danger collision powerful warlike band happily remove removal remnant tribe seminole indian florida long cherish object government one attention steadily direct admonished past experience difficulty cost attempt remove military force resort conciliatory measure invitation commissioner indian affair several principal chief recently visit washington whilst acknowledge write obligation tribe remove least possible delay late advice special agent government represent adhere promise council people call make preliminary arrangement general emigration may therefore confidently expect early day report general land office show increase activity operation survey northern boundary iowa complete unexampled dispatch within last year acre public land survey acre bring market acre last fiscal year sell locate warrant locate certificate make total addition report grant internal improvement railroad etc make aggregate increase amount sell locate land warrant acres previous year whole amount thus sell locate land warrant report grant select internal improvement exceeds previous year acre sale would without doubt much large extensive reservation railroad missouri mississippi alabama acre quarter end 30th september 1852 sell locate warrant locate certificate report grant make aggregate quarter much large portion labor arrange classify return last census finish devolve upon congress make necessary provision publication result form shall deem best apportionment representation basis new census make secretary interior conformity provision law relate subject recent election make accordance commend favorable regard suggestion contain report secretary interior provision make law publication distribution periodically analytical digest patent may hereafter grant useful invention discovery description illustration may necessary present intelligible view nature operation cost publication could easily defray patent fund persuade could apply object acceptable inventor beneficial public large appropriation make last session purchase suitable site erection furnish fit asylum insane district columbia army navy united state proper measure adopt carry beneficent purpose effect late advice mexican boundary commission appear survey river gila continence colorado suppose intersection western line new mexico complete survey rio grande also finish point agree commissioner point strike southern boundary new mexico point 135 mile eagle pass distance along course river mouth appropriation make last session congress continuation survey subject follow proviso provide part appropriation shall use expend shall make satisfactorily appear president united state southern boundary new mexico establish commissioner surveyor united state far north town call paso laid disturnell map add treaty attention drawn subject report department interior review fact case submit decision question whether exist circumstance part appropriation could lawfully use expend prosecution work careful consideration subject come conclusion could inform head department order immediately issue commissioner surveyor make requisition department could pay discontinue operation southern line new mexico department exact information amount provision money remain unexpended hand commissioner surveyor leave discretionary continue survey rio grande far mean disposal would enable disband commission special messenger since arrived officer charge survey river information fund subject control exhaust officer others employ service destitute alike mean prosecuting work return home object proviso doubtless arrest survey southern western line new mexico regard different opinion express hardly suppose could objection part line extend along channel rio grande term law broad forbid use part money prosecution work even payment officer agent arrearages pay justly due earnestly invite prompt attention subject recommend modification term proviso enable department use much appropriation necessary discharge exist obligation government complete survey rio grande mouth also proper make provision law fulfillment treaty mexico run mark residue boundary line two country permit invite particular attention interest district columbia confide constitution peculiar care among measure seem great importance prosperity introduction copious supply water city washington construction suitable bridge across potomac replace destroyed high water early part present year last session congress appropriation make defray cost survey necessary determine best mean afford unfailing supply good wholesome water progress make survey soon complete result laid appropriation also necessary grade pave street avenues inclose embellish public ground within city washington commend object together charitable institution district favorable regard every effort make protect frontier adjoin mexican state incursion indian tribe men army compose nearly employ defense newly acquire territory include texas emigrant proceed thereto gratify say effort unusually successful exception partial outbreak california oregon occasional depredation portion rio grande owe believe disturbed state border region inroad indians effectually restrain experience show however whenever two race bring contact collision inevitably occur prevent collision united state generally set apart portion territory exclusive occupation indian tribe difficulty occur however application policy texas term compact state admit union retain ownership vacant land within limit government state understood assign portion territory indian fast settlement advance lay county proceeds survey sell policy manifestly tend alarm irritate indian compel resort plunder subsistence also deprive government influence control without durable peace ever exist white trust therefore due regard interest apart consideration humanity justice induce state assign small portion vast domain provisional occupancy small remnant tribe within border subject course ownership eventual jurisdiction fail fulfillment treaty stipulation mexico duty indian fear become subject serious embarrassment government hop however timely provision texas may avert evil appropriation fortification make two last session congress omission probably find grow belief system fortification adopt 1816 heretofore act require revision subject certainly deserve full careful investigation delay longer avoided meantime certain work commence nearly complete design protect principal seaport boston new orleans important point regard necessity work believe little difference opinion exist among military men therefore recommend appropriation necessary prosecute make invite attention remark subject others connect department contain accompany report secretary war measure take carry effect law last session make provision improvement certain river harbor believe arrangement make purpose combine efficiency economy owe chiefly advance season act pass little yet do regard many work beyond make necessary preparation respect improvement sum already appropriate suffice complete require additional appropriation trust appropriation make wise beneficent policy auspiciously resume continued great care take however commence work sufficient importance commerce country view national character work commence discontinue complete otherwise sum expend case lose report navy department inform prosperous condition branch public service commit charge present consideration many topic suggestion ask approval exhibit unusual degree activity operation department past year preparation japan expedition already allude arrangement make exploration survey china seas northern pacific behring strait incipient measure take toward reconnoissance continent africa eastward liberia preparation early examination tributary river la plata recent decree provisional chief argentine confederation open navigation enterprise mean propose accomplished command full approbation doubt productive useful result two officer navy heretofore instruct explore whole extent amazon river confines peru mouth return one place possession government interest valuable account character resource country abound material commerce open industry world prove inexhaustible fund wealth report exploration communicate soon complete among subject offer notice secretary navy select special commendation view connection interest navy plan submit establishment permanent corp seaman suggestion present reorganization naval academy reference first take occasion say think greatly improve efficiency service regard still entitle favor salutary influence must exert upon naval discipline greatly disturb increase spirit insubordination result present system plan propose organization seaman furnish judicious substitute law september 1850 abolish corporal punishment satisfactorily sustain policy act condition well adapt maintain authority command order security ship believe change proposes permanently dispense mode punishment precede system enlistment shall supply navy seaman meritorious class whose good deportment pride character may preclude occasion resort penalty harsh degrade nature safety ship crew often dependent upon immediate obedience command authority enforce must equally ready arrest refractory seaman moment deprive ship indispensable aid impose necessity double service others whose fidelity duty may rely upon emergency exposure increase arduous labor since passage act 1850 already observable injurious extent effect prevent enlistment best seaman navy plan suggest designed promote condition service objection longer exist detail plan may establish great part altogether executive authority exist law think proper accordance suggestion secretary navy submit approval establishment corp apprentice navy boy enlist become age employed regulation navy department may devise propose report cordially approve commend consideration also concur suggestion system early training seaman may usefully ingraft upon service merchant marine proposition report refer reorganization naval academy recommend attention project worthy encouragement support valuable service already render institution entitle continuance foster care attention respectfully call report postmaster general detailed operation department last fiscal year see receipt postage time less precede fiscal year decrease 23 per cent diminution attributable reduction rate postage make act march 3 1851 reduction take effect commencement last fiscal year although operation last year act refer fulfilled prediction friend increase correspondence country proportion reduction postage nevertheless question policy return high rate experience warrant expectation community becomes accustom cheap postage correspondence increase believe rapid growth country population business receipt department must ultimately exceed expense country may safely rely upon continuance present cheap rate postage former message among thing respectfully recommend consideration congress propriety necessity legislation protection punishment foreign consuls reside united state revive certain modification act 10th march 1838 restrain unlawful military expedition inhabitant conterminous state territory preservation protection mutilation theft paper record archive nation authorize surplus revenue apply payment public debt advance time become due establishment land office sale public land california territory oregon construction road mississippi valley pacific ocean establishment bureau agriculture promotion interest perhaps important country prevention frauds upon government application pension bounty land establishment uniform fee bill prescribe specific compensation every service require clerk district attorney marshal authorize additional regiment mount men defense frontier indians fulfil treaty stipulation mexico defend citizen indian equal diligence energy determine relative rank naval civil officer public ship officer army navy various grade reorganize naval establishment fix number officer grade provide retired list upon reduced pay unfit active duty prescribe regulate punishment navy appointment commission revise public statute united state arrange order supply deficiency correct incongruity simplify language reporting congress final action establishment commission adjudicate settle private claim unite state aware however subject finally act upon congress without repeat reason legislation subject assign former message respectfully recommend favorable consideration think due several executive department government bear testimony efficiency integrity conduct careful superintendence possible head department exercise still due administration guardianship public money must much depend vigilance intelligence fidelity subordinate officer clerk especially intrust settlement adjustment claim account gratified believe generally perform duty faithfully well appoint guard approach public treasury occupy position expose temptation seduction cupidity peculator fraudulent claimant prompt employ wise precaution protect government source mischief corruption far do enactment proper legal penalty law respect suppose defective therefore deem duty call attention subject recommend provision make law punishment shall accept bribe also shall either promise give offer give officer clerk bribe reward touch relate matter official action duty uniform policy government foundation present day abstain interference domestic affair nation consequence nation europe engage desolating war country pursue peaceful course unexampled prosperity happiness war compel engage defense right honor country fortunately short duration terrific contest nation nation succeed french revolution enable wisdom firmness president washington maintain neutrality nation draw whirlpool sit quiet unmoved upon shore flower numerous army waste disease perish hundred thousand upon battlefield youth favor land permit enjoy blessing peace beneath paternal roof state europe incur enormous debt burden subject still groan must absorb small part product honest industry country generation come united state enable exhibit proud spectacle nation free public debt permit pursue prosperous way year longer peace may say policy must change europe longer separate u voyage month steam navigation brought within day sail shore see movement take deep interest controversy although one propose join fraternity potentates age lavish blood treasure subject maintain balance power yet say ought interfere contend sovereigns subject purpose overthrow monarchy europe establish place republican institution allege heretofore pursue different course sense weakness conscious strength dictate change policy consequently duty mingle contest aid struggle liberty seductive dangerous appeal generous sympathy freemen enjoy blessing free government man american heart would rejoice see blessing extend nation witness struggle oppress oppressor anywhere without deep sympathy former anxious desire triumph nevertheless prudent wise involve foreign war indeed true heretofore refrain merely degrade motive conscious weakness honor patriot go u admit men revolution draw sword oppression mother country pledge heaven life fortune sacred honor maintain freedom could never actuate unworthy motive knew weakness fear right duty point way libel upon fair fame u enjoy blessing nobly fight bleed insinuate truth course pursue dictated stern sense international justice statesmanlike prudence wisdom look merely present necessity permanent safety interest country know world govern less sympathy reason force possible nation become propagandist free principle without array combined power europe result likely overthrow republican liberty establishment history write vain doubt france sooner establish republican form government manifest desire force blessing world historian inform u hear petty act tyranny neighbor principality national convention declare would afford succor fraternity nation wish recover liberty give charge executive power give order general french army aid citizen might oppress liberty false step lead subsequent misfortune soon find involved war rest europe less ten year government change republic empire finally shed river blood foreign power restore exiled dynasty exhaust europe seek peace repose unquestioned ascendency monarchical principle let u learn wisdom example let u remember revolution always establish freedom free institution offspring revolution exist planted free charter english colony grow revolution free u dominion foreign power whose government variance institution european nation train every effort establish bloody revolution must without preparation continue failure liberty unregulated law degenerate anarchy soon become horrid despotism policy wisely govern thereby set example national justice prosperity true glory shall teach nation blessing unparalleled enterprise success free people live age progress emphatically country progress within last half century number state union nearly double population almost quadrupled boundary extend mississippi pacific territory checker railroad furrow canal inventive talent country excite high pitch numerous application patent valuable improvement distinguish age people others genius one american enable commerce move wind tide another annihilated distance transmission intelligence whole country full enterprise common school diffuse intelligence among people industry fast accumulate comfort luxury life part owe peculiar position fertile soil comparatively sparse population much also owe popular institution live freedom every man feel engage useful pursuit accord taste inclination entire confidence person property protect law whatever may unparalleled growth population intelligence wealth one tire clear government must keep pace progress people must participate spirit enterprise exact obedience law restrain unauthorized invasion right neighbor state foster protect home industry lend powerful strength improvement mean intercommunication necessary promote internal commerce strengthen tie bind u together people strange however much may regret exuberance enterprise individual mistake change progress invasion right others national prowess glory former constantly agitate change organic law urge new untried theory human right latter ever ready engage wild crusade neighbor people regardless justice enterprise without look fatal consequence popular government expedition however often stimulate mercenary individual expect share plunder profit enterprise without expose danger lead irresponsible foreigner abuse hospitality government seduce young ignorant join scheme personal ambition revenge false delusive pretense extend area freedom reprehensible aggression retard true progress nation tarnish fair fame therefore receive indignant frown every good citizen sincerely love country take pride prosperity honor constitution though perfect doubtless best ever form therefore let every proposition change well weigh find beneficial cautiously adopt every patriot rejoice see authority exert advance prosperity honor nation whilst watch jealousy attempt mutilate charter liberty pervert power act aggression injustice thus shall conservatism progress blend harmonious action preserve form spirit constitution time carry forward great improvement country rapidity energy freeman display close last annual communication permit congratulate prosperous condition beloved country abroad relation foreign power friendly right respect high place family nation cheerfully recognize home enjoy amount happiness public private probably never fall lot people besides afford citizen degree prosperity large scale know instance country annually afford refuge home multitude altogether without example old world owe blessing heaven happy constitution government bequeath u father sacred duty transmit integrity child must consider great distinction privilege choose people bear part administration government call unexpected dispensation high trust season embarrassment alarm enter upon arduous duty extreme diffidence claim discharge best humble ability single eye public good devout gratitude retire office leave country state peace prosperity