_President of the United States_.
SIR: The House of Representatives unite with you in deploring the
effects of the desolating malady by which the seat of Government and
other parts of our country have recently been visited. In calling our
attention to the fatality of its repeated ravages and inviting us to
consider the expediency of exercising our constitutional powers in aid
of the health laws of the respective States, your recommendation is
sanctioned by the dictates of humanity and liberal policy. On this
interesting subject we feel the necessity of adopting every wise
expedient for preventing a calamity so distressing to individual
sufferers and so prejudicial to our national commerce.
That our finances are in a prosperous state notwithstanding the
commercial derangements resulting from this calamity and from external
embarrassments is a satisfactory manifestation of the great extent and
solidity of the public resources. Connected with this situation of our
fiscal concerns, the assurance that the legal provisions for obtaining
revenue by direct taxation will fulfill the views of the Legislature is
peculiarly acceptable.
Desirous as we are that all causes of hostility may be removed by the
amicable adjustment of national differences, we learn with satisfaction
that in pursuance of our treaties with Spain and with Great Britain
advances have been made for definitively settling the controversies
relative to the southern and northeastern limits of the United States.
With similar sentiments have we received your information that the
proceedings under commissions authorized by the same treaties afford to
a respectable portion of our citizens the prospect of a final decision
on their claims for maritime injuries committed by subjects of those
powers.
It would be the theme of mutual felicitation were we assured of
experiencing similar moderation and justice from the French Republic,
between which and the United States differences have unhappily arisen;
but this is denied us by the ultimate failure of the measures which have
been taken by this Government toward an amicable adjustment of those
differences and by the various inadmissible pretensions on the part of
that nation.
The continuing in force the decree of January last, to which you
have more particularly pointed our attention, ought of itself to be
considered as demonstrative of the real intentions of the French
Government. That decree proclaims a predatory warfare against the
unquestionable rights of neutral commerce which with our means of
defense our interest and our honor command us to repel. It therefore
now becomes the United States to be as determined in resistance as
they have been patient in suffering and condescending in negotiation.
While those who direct the affairs of France persist in the enforcement
of decrees so hostile to our essential rights, their conduct forbids us
to confide in any of their professions of amity.
As, therefore, the conduct of France hitherto exhibits nothing which
ought to change or relax our measures of defense, the policy of
extending and invigorating those measures demands our sedulous
attention. The sudden and remarkable advantages which this country has
experienced from a small naval armament sufficiently prove the utility
of its establishment. As it respects the guarding of our coast, the
protection of our trade, and the facility of safely transporting the
means of territorial defense to every part of our maritime frontier,
an adequate naval force must be considered as an important object of
national policy. Nor do we hesitate to adopt the opinion that, whether
negotiations with France are resumed or not, vigorous preparations for
war will be alike indispensable.
In this conjuncture of affairs, while with you we recognize our abundant
cause of gratitude to the Supreme Disposer of Events for the ordinary
blessings of Providence, we regard as of high national importance the
manifestation in our country of a magnanimous spirit of resistance to
foreign domination. This spirit merits to be cherished and invigorated
by every branch of Government as the estimable pledge of national
prosperity and glory.
Disdaining a reliance on foreign protection, wanting no foreign guaranty
of our liberties, resolving to maintain our national independence
against every attempt to despoil us of this inestimable treasure, we
confide under Providence in the patriotism and energies of the people of
these United States for defeating the hostile enterprises of any foreign
power.
To adopt with prudent foresight such systematical measures as may be
expedient for calling forth those energies wherever the national
exigencies may require, whether on the ocean or on our own territory,
and to reconcile with the proper security of revenue the convenience of
mercantile enterprise, on which so great a proportion of the public
resources depends, are objects of moment which shall be duly regarded in
the course of our deliberations.
Fully as we accord with you in the opinion that the United States ought
not to submit to the humiliation of sending another minister to France
without previous assurances sufficiently determinate that he will be
duly accredited, we have heard with cordial approbation the declaration
of your purpose steadily to observe those maxims of humane and pacific
policy by which the United States have hitherto been governed. While it
is left with France to take the requisite steps for accommodation, it is
worthy the Chief Magistrate of a free people to make known to the world
that justice on the part of France will annihilate every obstacle to the
restoration of a friendly intercourse, and that the Executive authority
of this country will respect the sacred rights of embassy. At the same
time, the wisdom and decision which have characterized your past
Administration assure us that no illusory professions will seduce you
into any abandonment of the rights which belong to the United States as
a free and independent nation.
December 13, 1798.