WASHINGTON, _June 11, 1844_.
_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:
I return to the House of Representatives, in which it originated, the
bill entitled "An act making appropriations for the improvement of
certain harbors and rivers," with the following objections to its
becoming a law:
At the adoption of the Constitution each State was possessed of a
separate and independent sovereignty and an exclusive jurisdiction
over all streams and water courses within its territorial limits.
The Articles of Confederation in no way affected this authority or
jurisdiction, and the present Constitution, adopted for the purpose of
correcting the defects which existed in the original Articles, expressly
reserves to the States all powers not delegated. No such surrender of
jurisdiction is made by the States to this Government by any express
grant, and if it is possessed it is to be deduced from the clause in the
Constitution which invests Congress with authority "to make all laws
which are necessary and proper for carrying into execution" the granted
powers. There is, in my view of the subject, no pretense whatever for
the claim to power which the bill now returned substantially sets up.
The inferential power, in order to be legitimate, must be clearly and
plainly incidental to some granted power and necessary to its exercise.
To refer it to the head of convenience or usefulness would be to throw
open the door to a boundless and unlimited discretion and to invest
Congress with an unrestrained authority. The power to remove
obstructions from the water courses of the States is claimed under the
granted power "to regulate commerce with foreign nations, _among the
several States_, and with the Indian tribes;" but the plain and obvious
meaning of this grant is that Congress may adopt rules and regulations
prescribing the terms and conditions on which the citizens of the United
States may carry on commercial operations with foreign states or
kingdoms, and on which the citizens or subjects of foreign states or
kingdoms may prosecute trade with the United States or either of them.
And so the power to regulate commerce _among the several States_ no more
invests Congress with jurisdiction over the water courses of the States
than the first branch of the grant does over the water courses of
foreign powers, which would be an absurdity.
The right of common use of the people of the United States to the
navigable waters of each and every State arises from the express
stipulation contained in the Constitution that "the citizens of each
State shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in
the several States." While, therefore, the navigation of any river in
any State is by the laws of such State allowed to the citizens thereof,
the same is also secured by the Constitution of the United States on the
same terms and conditions to the citizens of every other State; and so
of any other privilege or immunity.
The application of the revenue of this Government, if the power to do
so was admitted, to improving the navigation of the rivers by removing
obstructions or otherwise would be for the most part productive only of
local benefit. The consequences might prove disastrously ruinous to as
many of our fellow-citizens as the exercise of such power would benefit.
I will take one instance furnished by the present bill--out of no
invidious feeling, for such it would be impossible for me to feel, but
because of my greater familiarity with locations--in illustration of the
above opinion: Twenty thousand dollars are proposed to be appropriated
toward improving the harbor of Richmond, in the State of Virginia. Such
improvement would furnish advantages to the city of Richmond and add to
the value of the property of its citizens, while it might have a most
disastrous influence over the wealth and prosperity of Petersburg, which
is situated some 25 miles distant on a branch of James River, and which
now enjoys its fair portion of the trade. So, too, the improvement of
James River to Richmond and of the Appomattox to Petersburg might, by
inviting the trade to those two towns, have the effect of prostrating
the town of Norfolk. This, too, might be accomplished without adding a
single vessel to the number now engaged in the trade of the Chesapeake
Bay or bringing into the Treasury a dollar of additional revenue. It
would produce, most probably, the single effect of concentrating the
commerce now profitably enjoyed by three places upon one of them. This
case furnishes an apt illustration of the effect of this bill in several
other particulars.
There can not, in fact, be drawn the slightest discrimination between
the improving the streams of a State under the power to regulate
commerce and the most extended system of internal improvements on land.
The excavating a canal and paving a road are equally as much incidents
to such claim of power as the removing obstructions from water courses;
nor can such power be restricted by any fair course of reasoning to the
mere fact of making the improvement. It reasonably extends also to the
right of seeking a return of the means expended through the exaction of
tolls and the levying of contributions. Thus, while the Constitution
denies to this Government the privilege of acquiring a property in the
soil of any State, even for the purpose of erecting a necessary
fortification, without a grant from such State, this claim to power
would invest it with control and dominion over the waters and soil of
each State without restriction. Power so incongruous can not exist in
the same instrument.
The bill is also liable to a serious objection because of its blending
appropriations for numerous objects but few of which agree in their
general features. This necessarily produces the effect of embarrassing
Executive action. Some of the appropriations would receive my sanction
if separated from the rest, however much I might deplore the
reproduction of a system which for some time past has been permitted
to sleep with apparently the acquiescence of the country. I might
particularize the Delaware Breakwater as an improvement which looks
to the security from the storms of our extended Atlantic seaboard of
the vessels of all the country engaged either in the foreign or the
coastwise trade, as well as to the safety of the revenue; but when, in
connection with that, the same bill embraces improvements of rivers at
points far in the interior, connected alone with the trade of such river
and the exertion of mere local influences, no alternative is left me but
to use the qualified veto with which the Executive is invested by the
Constitution, and to return the bill to the House in which it originated
for its ultimate reconsideration and decision.
In sanctioning a bill of the same title with that returned, for the
improvement of the Mississippi and its chief tributaries and certain
harbors on the Lakes, if I bring myself apparently in conflict with any
of the principles herein asserted it will arise on my part exclusively
from the want of a just appreciation of localities. The Mississippi
occupies a footing altogether different from the rivers and water
courses of the different States. No one State or any number of States
can exercise any other jurisdiction over it than for the punishment of
crimes and the service of civil process. It belongs to no particular
State or States, but of common right, by express reservation, to all
the States. It is reserved as a great common highway for the commerce
of the whole country. To have conceded to Louisiana, or to any other
State admitted as a new State into the Union, the exclusive jurisdiction,
and consequently the right to make improvements and to levy tolls on
the segments of the river embraced within its territorial limits, would
have been to have disappointed the chief object in the purchase of
Louisiana, which was to secure the free use of the Mississippi to all
the people of the United States. Whether levies on commerce were made
by a foreign or domestic government would have been equally burdensome
and objectionable. The United States, therefore, is charged with
its improvement for the benefit of all, and the appropriation of
governmental means to its improvement becomes indispensably necessary
for the good of all.
As to the harbors on the Lakes, the act originates no new improvements,
but makes appropriations for the continuance of works already begun.
It is as much the duty of the Government to construct good harbors,
without reference to the location or interests of cities, for the
shelter of the extensive commerce of the Lakes as to build breakwaters
on the Atlantic coast for the protection of the trade of that ocean.
These great inland seas are visited by destructive storms, and the
annual loss of ships and cargoes, and consequently of revenue to the
Government, is immense. If, then, there be any work embraced by that act
which is not required in order to afford shelter and security to the
shipping against the tempests which so often sweep over those great
inland seas, but has, on the contrary, originated more in a spirit of
speculation and local interest than in one of the character alluded to,
the House of Representatives will regard my approval of the bill more as
the result of misinformation than any design to abandon or modify the
principles laid down in this message. Every system is liable to run into
abuse, and none more so than that under consideration; and measures can
not be too soon taken by Congress to guard against this evil.