within this District on a scale and for objects worthy of the American
nation induces me to renew my recommendation of it to the favorable
consideration of Congress. And I particularly invite again their attention
to the expediency of exercising their existing powers, and, where
necessary, of resorting to the prescribed mode of enlarging them, in order
to effectuate a comprehensive system of roads and canals, such as will have
the effect of drawing more closely together every part of our country by
promoting intercourse and improvements and by increasing the share of every
part in the common stock of national prosperity.
Occurrences having taken place which shew that the statutory provisions for
the dispensation of criminal justice are deficient in relation both to
places and to persons under the exclusive cognizance of the national
authority, an amendment of the law embracing such cases will merit the
earliest attention of the Legislature. It will be a seasonable occasion
also for inquiring how far legislative interposition may be further
requisite in providing penalties for offenses designated in the
Constitution or in the statutes, and to which either no penalties are
annexed or none with sufficient certainty. And I submit to the wisdom of
Congress whether a more enlarged revisal of the criminal code be not
expedient for the purpose of mitigating in certain cases penalties which
were adopted into it antecedent to experiment and examples which justify
and recommend a more lenient policy.
The United States, having been the first to abolish within the extent of
their authority the transportation of the natives of Africa into slavery,
by prohibiting the introduction of slaves and by punishing their citizens
participating in the traffic, can not but be gratified at the progress made
by concurrent efforts of other nations toward a general suppression of so
great an evil. They must feel at the same time the greater solicitude to
give the fullest efficacy to their own regulations. With that view, the
interposition of Congress appears to be required by the violations and
evasions which it is suggested are chargeable on unworthy citizens who
mingle in the slave trade under foreign flags and with foreign ports, and
by collusive importations of slaves into the United States through
adjoining ports and territories. I present the subject to Congress with a
full assurance of their disposition to apply all the remedy which can be
afforded by an amendment of the law. The regulations which were intended to
guard against abuses of a kindred character in the trade between the
several States ought also to be rendered more effectual for their humane
object.
To these recommendations I add, for the consideration of Congress, the
expediency of a remodification of the judiciary establishment, and of an
additional department in the executive branch of the Government.
The first is called for by the accruing business which necessarily swells
the duties of the Federal courts, and by the great and widening space
within which justice is to be dispensed by them. The time seems to have
arrived which claims for members of the Supreme Court a relief from
itinerary fatigues, incompatible as well with the age which a portion of
them will always have attained as with the researches and preparations
which are due to their stations and to the juridical reputation of their
country. And considerations equally cogent require a more convenient
organization of the subordinate tribunals, which may be accomplished
without an objectionable increase of the number or expense of the judges.
The extent and variety of executive business also accumulating with the
progress of our country and its growing population call for an additional
department, to be charged with duties now over-burdening other departments
and with such as have not been annexed to any department.
The course of experience recommends, as another improvement in the
executive establishment, that the provision for the station of
Attorney-General, whose residence at the seat of Government, official
connections with it, and the management of the public business before the
judiciary preclude an extensive participation in professional emoluments,
be made more adequate to his services and his relinquishments, and that,
with a view to his reasonable accommodation and to a proper depository of
his official opinions and proceedings, there be included in the provision
the usual appurtenances to a public office.
In directing the legislative attention to the state of the finances it is a
subject of great gratification to find that even within the short period
which has elapsed since the return of peace the revenue has far exceeded
all the current demands upon the Treasury, and that under any probable
diminution of its future annual products which the vicissitudes of commerce
may occasion it will afford an ample fund for the effectual and early
extinguishment of the public debt. It has been estimated that during the
year 1816 the actual receipts of revenue at the Treasury, including the
balance at the commencement of the year, and excluding the proceeds of
loans and Treasury notes, will amount to about the sum of $47 millions;
that during the same year the actual payments at the Treasury, including
the payment of the arrearages of the War Department as well as the payment
of a considerable excess beyond the annual appropriations, will amount to
about the sum of $38 millions, and that consequently at the close of the
year there will be a surplus in the Treasury of about the sum of $9
millions.
The operations of the Treasury continued to be obstructed by difficulties
arising from the condition of the national currency, but they have
nevertheless been effectual to a beneficial extent in the reduction of the
public debt and the establishment of the public credit. The floating debt
of Treasury notes and temporary loans will soon be entirely discharged. The
aggregate of the funded debt, composed of debts incurred during the wars of
1776 and 1812, has been estimated with reference to the first of January
next at a sum not exceeding $110 millions. The ordinary annual expenses of
the Government for the maintenance of all its institutions, civil,
military, and naval, have been estimated at a sum greater than $20
millions, and the permanent revenue to be derived from all the existing
sources has been estimated at a sum of $25 millions.
Upon this general view of the subject it is obvious that there is only
wanting to the fiscal prosperity of the Government the restoration of an
uniform medium of exchange. The resources and the faith of the nation,
displayed in the system which Congress has established, insure respect and
confidence both at home and abroad. The local accumulations of the revenue
have already enabled the Treasury to meet the public engagements in the
local currency of most of the States, and it is expected that the same
cause will produce the same effect throughout the Union; but for the
interests of the community at large, as well as for the purposes of the
Treasury, it is essential that the nation should possess a currency of
equal value, credit, and use wherever it may circulate. The Constitution
has intrusted Congress exclusively with the power of creating and
regulating a currency of that description, and the measures which were
taken during the last session in execution of the power give every promise
of success. The Bank of the United States has been organized under auspices
the most favorable, and can not fail to be an important auxiliary to those
measures.
For a more enlarged view of the public finances, with a view of the
measures pursued by the Treasury Department previous to the resignation of
the late Secretary, I transmit an extract from the last report of that
officer. Congress will perceive in it ample proofs of the solid foundation
on which the financial prosperity of the nation rests, and will do justice
to the distinguished ability and successful exertions with which the duties
of the Department were executed during a period remarkable for its
difficulties and its peculiar perplexities.
The period of my retiring from the public service being at little distance,
I shall find no occasion more proper than the present for expressing to my
fellow citizens my deep sense of the continued confidence and kind support
which I have received from them. My grateful recollection of these
distinguished marks of their favorable regard can never cease, and with the
consciousness that, if I have not served my country with greater ability, I
have served it with a sincere devotion will accompany me as a source of
unfailing gratification.
Happily, I shall carry with me from the public theater other sources, which
those who love their country most will best appreciate. I shall behold it
blessed with tranquillity and prosperity at home and with peace and respect
abroad. I can indulge the proud reflection that the American people have
reached in safety and success their 40th year as an independent nation;
that for nearly an entire generation they have had experience of their
present Constitution, the off-spring of their undisturbed deliberations and
of their free choice; that they have found it to bear the trials of adverse
as well as prosperous circumstances; to contain in its combination of the
federate and elective principles a reconcilement of public strength with
individual liberty, of national power for the defense of national rights
with a security against wars of injustice, of ambition, and vain-glory in
the fundamental provision which subjects all questions of war to the will
of the nation itself, which is to pay its costs and feel its calamities.
Nor is it less a peculiar felicity of this Constitution, so dear to us all,
that it is found to be capable, without losing its vital energies, of
expanding itself over a spacious territory with the increase and expansion
of the community for whose benefit it was established.
And may I not be allowed to add to this gratifying spectacle that I shall
read in the character of the American people, in their devotion to true
liberty and to the Constitution which is its palladium, sure presages that
the destined career of my country will exhibit a Government pursuing the
public good as its sole object, and regulating its means by the great
principles consecrated in its charter and by those moral principles to
which they are so well allied; a Government which watches over the purity
of elections, the freedom of speech and of the press, the trial by jury,
and the equal interdict against encroachments and compacts between religion
and the state; which maintains inviolably the maxims of public faith, the
security of persons and property, and encourages in every authorized mode
the general diffusion of knowledge which guarantees to public liberty its
permanency and to those who possess the blessing the true enjoyment of it;
a Government which avoids intrusions on the internal repose of other
nations, and repels them from its own; which does justice to all nations
with a readiness equal to the firmness with which it requires justice from
them; and which, whilst it refines its domestic code from every ingredient
not congenial with the precepts of an enlightened age and the sentiments of
a virtuous people, seeks by appeals to reason and by its liberal examples
to infuse into the law which governs the civilized world a spirit which may
diminish the frequency or circumscribe the calamities of war, and meliorate
the social and beneficent relations of peace; a Government, in a word,
whose conduct within and without may bespeak the most noble of ambitions--
that of promoting peace on earth and good will to man.
These contemplations, sweetening the remnant of my days, will animate my
prayers for the happiness of my beloved country, and a perpetuity of the
institutions under which it is enjoyed.