A COMPILATION OF THE MESSAGES AND PAPERS OF THE PRESIDENTS.
BY JAMES D. RICHARDSON
Thomas Jefferson
March 4, 1801, to March 4, 1809
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was born at Shadwell, Albemarle County, Va., on April
2 (old style), 1743. He was the oldest son of Peter Jefferson, who died
in 1757. After attending private schools, he entered William and Mary
College in 1760. In 1767 began the practice of the law. In 1769 was
chosen to represent his county in the Virginia house of burgesses, a
station he continued to fill up to the period of the Revolution. He
married Mrs. Martha Skelton in 1772, she being a daughter of John
Wayles, an eminent lawyer of Virginia. On March 12, 1773, was chosen
a member of the first committee of correspondence established by the
Colonial legislature. Was elected a delegate to the Continental Congress
in 1775; was placed on the Committee of Five to prepare the Declaration
of Independence, and at the request of that committee he drafted the
Declaration, which, with slight amendments, was adopted July 4, 1776.
Resigned his seat in Congress and occupied one in the Virginia
legislature in October, 1776. Was elected governor of Virginia by the
legislature on June 1, 1779, to succeed Patrick Henry. Retired to
private life at the end of his term as governor, but was the same year
elected again to the legislature. Was appointed commissioner with others
to negotiate treaties with France in 1776, but declined. In 1782 he was
appointed by Congress minister plenipotentiary to act with others in
Europe in negotiating a treaty of peace with Great Britain. Was again
elected a Delegate to Congress in 1783, and as a member of that body
he advocated and had adopted the dollar as the unit and the present
system of coins and decimals. In May, 1784, was appointed minister
plenipotentiary to Europe to assist John Adams and Benjamin Franklin
in negotiating treaties of commerce. In March, 1785, was appointed by
Congress minister at the French Court to succeed Dr. Franklin, and
remained in France until September, 1789. On his arrival at Norfolk,
November 23, 1789, received a letter from Washington offering him the
appointment of Secretary of State in his Cabinet. Accepted and became
the first Secretary of State under the Constitution. December 31, 1793,
resigned his place in the Cabinet and retired to private life at his
home. In 1796 was brought forward by his friends as a candidate for
President, but Mr. Adams, receiving the highest number of votes, was
elected President, and Jefferson became Vice-President for four years
from March 4, 1797. In 1800 was again voted for by his party for
President. He and Mr. Burr received an equal number of electoral votes,
and under the Constitution the House of Representatives was called upon
to elect. Mr. Jefferson was chosen on the thirty-sixth ballot. Was
reelected in 1804, and retired finally from public life March 4, 1809.
He died on the 4th day of July, 1826, and was buried at Monticello, Va.
NOTIFICATION OF ELECTION.
Mr. Pinckney, from the committee instructed on the 18th instant to wait
on the President elect to notify him of his election, reported that the
committee had, according to order, performed that service, and addressed
the President elect in the following words, to wit:
The committee beg leave to express their wishes for the prosperity of
your Administration and their sincere desire that it may promote your
own happiness and the welfare of our country.
To which the President elect was pleased to make the following reply:
I receive, gentlemen, with profound thankfulness this testimony of
confidence from the great representative council of our nation. It fills
up the measure of that grateful satisfaction which had already been
derived from the suffrages of my fellow-citizens themselves, designating
me as one of those to whom they were willing to commit this charge, the
most important of all others to them. In deciding between the candidates
whom their equal vote presented to your choice, I am sensible that age
has been respected rather than more active and useful qualifications.
I know the difficulties of the station to which I am called, and feel
and acknowledge my incompetence to them. But whatsoever of
understanding, whatsoever of diligence, whatsoever of justice or of
affectionate concern for the happiness of man, it has pleased Providence
to place within the compass of my faculties shall be called forth for
the discharge of the duties confided to me, and for procuring to my
fellow-citizens all the benefits which our Constitution has placed under
the guardianship of the General Government.
Guided by the wisdom and patriotism of those to whom it belongs to
express the legislative will of the nation, I will give to that will
a faithful execution.
I pray you, gentlemen, to convey to the honorable body from which you
are deputed the homage of my humble acknowledgments and the sentiments
of zeal and fidelity by which I shall endeavor to merit these proofs of
confidence from the nation and its Representatives; and accept
yourselves my particular thanks for the obliging terms in which you have
been pleased to communicate their will.
TH. JEFFERSON.
FEBRUARY 20, 1801.
LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT ELECT.
The President laid before the Senate a letter from the President elect
of the United States, which was read, as follows:
WASHINGTON, _March 2, 1801_.
The PRESIDENT PRO TEMPORE OF THE SENATE.
SIR: I beg leave through you to inform the honorable the Senate of the
United States that I propose to take the oath which the Constitution
prescribes to the President of the United States before he enters on the
execution of his office on Wednesday, the 4th instant, at 12 o'clock, in
the Senate Chamber.
I have the honor to be, with the greatest respect, sir, your most
obedient and most humble servant,
TH. JEFFERSON.
(The same letter was sent to the House of Representatives.)
FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
AT WASHINGTON, D.C.
_Friends and Fellow-Citizens_.
Called upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of our
country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my
fellow-citizens which is here assembled to express my grateful thanks
for the favor with which they have been pleased to look toward me, to
declare a sincere consciousness that the task is above my talents, and
that I approach it with those anxious and awful presentiments which the
greatness of the charge and the weakness of my powers so justly inspire.
A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land, traversing all
the seas with the rich productions of their industry, engaged in
commerce with nations who feel power and forget right, advancing rapidly
to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye--when I contemplate these
transcendent objects, and see the honor, the happiness, and the hopes of
this beloved country committed to the issue and the auspices of this
day, I shrink from the contemplation, and humble myself before the
magnitude of the undertaking. Utterly, indeed, should I despair did not
the presence of many whom I here see remind me that in the other high
authorities provided by our Constitution I shall find resources of
wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal on which to rely under all difficulties.
To you, then, gentlemen, who are charged with the sovereign functions of
legislation, and to those associated with you, I look with encouragement
for that guidance and support which may enable us to steer with safety
the vessel in which we are all embarked amidst the conflicting elements
of a troubled world.
During the contest of opinion through which we have passed the animation
of discussions and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect which might
impose on strangers unused to think freely and to speak and to write
what they think; but this being now decided by the voice of the nation,
announced according to the rules of the Constitution, all will, of
course, arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in
common efforts for the common good. All, too, will bear in mind this
sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases
to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the
minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and
to violate would be oppression. Let us, then, fellow-citizens, unite
with one heart and one mind. Let us restore to social intercourse that
harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but
dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from our land
that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and
suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political
intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody
persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient world,
during the agonizing spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood and
slaughter his long-lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the agitation
of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful shore; that
this should be more felt and feared by some and less by others, and
should divide opinions as to measures of safety. But every difference of
opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different
names brethren of the same principle. We are all Republicans, we are all
Federalists. If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this
Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as
monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated
where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed, that some honest
men fear that a republican government can not be strong, that this
Government is not strong enough; but would the honest patriot, in the
full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so
far kept us free and firm on the theoretic and visionary fear that this
Government, the world's best hope, may by possibility want energy to
preserve itself? I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary, the
strongest Government on earth. I believe it the only one where every
man, at the call of the law, would fly to the standard of the law, and
would meet invasions of the public order as his own personal concern.
Sometimes it is said that man can not be trusted with the government of
himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others? Or have
we found angels in the forms of kings to govern him? Let history answer
this question.
Let us, then, with courage and confidence pursue our own Federal and
Republican principles, our attachment to union and representative
government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the
exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to
endure the degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country, with
room enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth
generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of
our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our own industry, to honor and
confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not from birth, but from
our actions and their sense of them; enlightened by a benign religion,
professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of them
inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man;
acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its
dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and
his greater happiness hereafter--with all these blessings, what more is
necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one thing
more, fellow-citizens--a wise and frugal Government, which shall
restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free
to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall
not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the
sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our
felicities.
About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which
comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should
understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and
consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will
compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the
general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice
to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political;
peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling
alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their
rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns
and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies; the
preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional
vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a
jealous care of the right of election by the people--a mild and safe
corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where
peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the
decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which
is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of
despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and
for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them; the
supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the
public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened; the honest payment
of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement
of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of
information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public
reason; freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person
under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries
impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation
which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of
revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our
heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed
of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by
which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from
them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps
and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety.
I repair, then, fellow-citizens, to the post you have assigned me. With
experience enough in subordinate offices to have seen the difficulties
of this the greatest of all, I have learnt to expect that it will rarely
fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station with the
reputation and the favor which bring him into it. Without pretensions to
that high confidence you reposed in our first and greatest revolutionary
character, whose preeminent services had entitled him to the first place
in his country's love and destined for him the fairest page in the
volume of faithful history, I ask so much confidence only as may give
firmness and effect to the legal administration of your affairs. I shall
often go wrong through defect of judgment. When right, I shall often be
thought wrong by those whose positions will not command a view of the
whole ground. I ask your indulgence for my own errors, which will never
be intentional, and your support against the errors of others, who may
condemn what they would not if seen in all its parts. The approbation
implied by your suffrage is a great consolation to me for the past, and
my future solicitude will be to retain the good opinion of those who
have bestowed it in advance, to conciliate that of others by doing them
all the good in my power, and to be instrumental to the happiness and
freedom of all.
Relying, then, on the patronage of your good will, I advance with
obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become
sensible how much better choice it is in your power to make. And may
that Infinite Power which rules the destinies of the universe lead our
councils to what is best, and give them a favorable issue for your peace
and prosperity.
MARCH 4, 1801.
PROCLAMATION.
[From the National Intelligencer, March 13, 1801.]
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
Whereas by the first article of the terms and conditions declared by the
President of the United States on the iyth day of October, 1791, for
regulating the materials and manner of buildings and improvements on the
lots in the city of Washington, it is provided "that the outer and party
walls of all houses in the said city shall be built of brick or stone;"
and by the third article of the same terms and conditions it is declared
"that the wall of no house shall be higher than 40 feet to the roof in
any part of the city, nor shall any be lower than 35 feet in any of the
avenues;" and
Whereas the above-recited articles were found to impede the settlement
in the city of mechanics and others whose circumstances did not admit of
erecting houses authorized by the said regulations, for which cause the
President of the United States, by a writing under his hand, bearing
date the 25th day of June, 1796, suspended the operation of the said
articles until the first Monday of December, 1800, and the beneficial
effects arising from such suspension having been experienced, it is
deemed proper to revive the same:
Wherefore I, Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States, do
declare that the operation of the first and third articles above recited
shall be, and the same is hereby, suspended until the ist day of
January, 1802, and that all the houses which shall be erected in the
said city of Washington previous to the said 1st day of January, 1802,
conformable in other respects to the regulations aforesaid, shall be
considered as lawfully erected, except that no wooden house shall be
erected within 24 feet of any brick or stone house.
Given under my hand this 11th day of March, 1801.
TH. JEFFERSON.
In communicating his first message to Congress, President Jefferson
addressed the following letter to the presiding officer of each branch
of the National Legislature:
DECEMBER 8, 1801.
The Honorable the PRESIDENT OF THE SENATE.
SIR: The circumstances under which we find ourselves at this place
rendering inconvenient the mode heretofore practiced of making by
personal address the first communications between the legislative and
executive branches, I have adopted that by message, as used on all
subsequent occasions through the session. In doing this I have had
principal regard to the convenience of the Legislature, to the economy
of their time, to their relief from the embarrassment of immediate
answers on subjects not yet fully before them, and to the benefits
thence resulting to the public affairs. Trusting that a procedure
founded in these motives will meet their approbation, I beg leave
through you, sir, to communicate the inclosed message, with the
documents accompanying it, to the honorable the Senate, and pray you
to accept for yourself and them the homage of my high respect and
consideration.
TH. JEFFERSON.
FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE.
DECEMBER 8, 1801.
_Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives_:
It is a circumstance of sincere gratification to me that on meeting the
great council of our nation I am able to announce to them on grounds of
reasonable certainty that the wars and troubles which have for so many
years afflicted our sister nations have at length come to an end, and
that the communications of peace and commerce are once more opening
among them. Whilst we devoutly return thanks to the beneficent Being who
has been pleased to breathe into them the spirit of conciliation and
forgiveness, we are bound with peculiar gratitude to be thankful to Him
that our own peace has been preserved through so perilous a season, and
ourselves permitted quietly to cultivate the earth and to practice and
improve those arts which tend to increase our comforts. The assurances,
indeed, of friendly disposition received from all the powers with whom
we have principal relations had inspired a confidence that our peace
with them would not have been disturbed. But a cessation of
irregularities which had affected the commerce of neutral nations and of
the irritations and injuries produced by them can not but add to this
confidence, and strengthens at the same time the hope that wrongs
committed on unoffending friends under a pressure of circumstances will
now be reviewed with candor, and will be considered as founding just
claims of retribution for the past and new assurance for the future.
Among our Indian neighbors also a spirit of peace and friendship
generally prevails, and I am happy to inform yon that the continued
efforts to introduce among them the implements and the practice of
husbandry and of the household arts have not been without success; that
they are becoming more and more sensible of the superiority of this
dependence for clothing and subsistence over the precarious resources of
hunting and fishing, and already we are able to announce that instead of
that constant diminution of their numbers produced by their wars and
their wants, some of them begin to experience an increase of population.
To this state of general peace with which we have been blessed, one only
exception exists. Tripoli, the least considerable of the Barbary States,
had come forward with demands unfounded either in right or in compact,
and had permitted itself to denounce war on our failure to comply before
a given day. The style of the demand admitted but one answer. I sent a
small squadron of frigates into the Mediterranean, with assurances to
that power of our sincere desire to remain in peace, but with orders to
protect our commerce against the threatened attack. The measure was
seasonable and salutary. The Bey had already declared war. His cruisers
were out. Two had arrived at Gibraltar.
Our commerce in the Mediterranean was blockaded and that of the Atlantic
in peril. The arrival of our squadron dispelled the danger. One of the
Tripolitan cruisers having fallen in with and engaged the small schooner
_Enterprise_, commanded by Lieutenant Sterret, which had gone as a
tender to our larger vessels, was captured, after a heavy slaughter of
her men, without the loss of a single one on our part. The bravery
exhibited by our citizens on that element will, I trust, be a testimony
to the world that it is not the want of that virtue which makes us seek
their peace, but a conscientious desire to direct the energies of our
nation to the multiplication of the human race, and not to its
destruction. Unauthorized by the Constitution, without the sanction of
Congress, to go beyond the line of defense, the vessel, being disabled
from committing further hostilities, was liberated with its crew. The
Legislature will doubtless consider whether, by authorizing measures of
offense also, they will place our force on an equal footing with that of
its adversaries. I communicate all material information on this subject,
that in the exercise of this important function confided by the
Constitution to the Legislature exclusively their judgment may form
itself on a knowledge and consideration of every circumstance of weight.
I wish I could say that our situation with all the other Barbary States
was entirely satisfactory. Discovering that some delays had taken place
in the performance of certain articles stipulated by us, I thought it my
duty, by immediate measures for fulfilling them, to vindicate to
ourselves the right of considering the effect of departure from
stipulation on their side. From the papers which will be laid before you
you will be enabled to judge whether our treaties are regarded by them
as fixing at all the measure of their demands or as guarding from the
exercise of force our vessels within their power, and to consider how
far it will be safe and expedient to leave our affairs with them in
their present posture.
I lay before you the result of the census lately taken of our
inhabitants, to a conformity with which we are now to reduce the ensuing
ratio of representation and taxation. You will perceive that the
increase of numbers during the last ten years, proceeding in geometrical
ratio, promises a duplication in little more than twenty-two years. We
contemplate this rapid growth and the prospect it holds up to us, not
with a view to the injuries it may enable us to do others in some future
day, but to the settlement of the extensive country still remaining
vacant within our limits to the multiplication of men susceptible of
happiness, educated in the love of order, habituated to self-government,
and valuing its blessings above all price.
Other circumstances, combined with the increase of numbers, have
produced an augmentation of revenue arising from consumption in a ratio
far beyond that of population alone; and though the changes in foreign
relations now taking place so desirably for the whole world may for a
season affect this branch of revenue, yet weighing all probabilities of
expense as well as of income, there is reasonable ground of confidence
that we may now safely dispense with all the internal taxes,
comprehending excise, stamps, auctions, licenses, carriages, and refined
sugars, to which the postage on newspapers may be added to facilitate
the progress of information, and that the remaining sources of revenue
will be sufficient to provide for the support of Government, to pay the
interest of the public debts, and to discharge the principals within
shorter periods than the laws or the general expectation had
contemplated. War, indeed, and untoward events may change this prospect
of things and call for expenses which the imposts could not meet; but
sound principles will not justify our taxing the industry of our
fellow-citizens to accumulate treasure for wars to happen we know not
when, and which might not, perhaps, happen but from the temptations
offered by that treasure.
These views, however, of reducing our burthens are formed on the
expectation that a sensible and at the same time a salutary reduction
may take place in our habitual expenditures. For this purpose those of
the civil Government, the Army, and Navy will need revisal.
When we consider that this Government is charged with the external, and
mutual relations only of these States; that the States themselves have
principal care of our persons, our property, and our reputation,
constituting the great field of human concerns, we may well doubt
whether our organization is not too complicated, too expensive; whether
offices and officers have not been multiplied unnecessarily and
sometimes injuriously to the service they were meant to promote. I will
cause to be laid before you an essay toward a statement of those who,
under public employment of various kinds, draw money from the Treasury
or from our citizens. Time has not permitted a perfect enumeration, the
ramifications of office being too multiplied and remote to be completely
traced in a first trial. Among those who are dependent on Executive
discretion I have begun the reduction of what was deemed unnecessary.
The expenses of diplomatic agency have been considerably diminished. The
inspectors of internal revenue who were found to obstruct the
accountability of the institution have been discontinued. Several
agencies created by Executive authority, on salaries fixed by that also,
have been suppressed, and should suggest the expediency of regulating
that power by law, so as to subject its exercises to legislative
inspection and sanction. Other reformations of the same kind will be
pursued with that caution which is requisite in removing useless things,
not to injure what is retained. But the great mass of public offices is
established by law, and therefore by law alone can be abolished. Should
the Legislature think it expedient to pass this roll in review and try
all its parts by the test of public utility, they may be assured of
every aid and light which Executive information can yield. Considering
the general tendency to multiply offices and dependencies and to
increase expense to the ultimate term of burthen which the citizen can
bear, it behooves us to avail ourselves of every occasion which presents
itself for taking off the surcharge, that it never may be seen here that
after leaving to labor the smallest portion of its earnings on which it
can subsist, Government shall itself consume the whole residue of what
it was instituted to guard.
In our care, too, of the public contributions intrusted to our direction
it would be prudent to multiply barriers against their dissipation by
appropriating specific sums to every specific purpose susceptible of
definition; by disallowing all applications of money varying from the
appropriation in object or transcending it in amount; by reducing the
undefined field of contingencies and thereby circumscribing
discretionary powers over money, and by bringing back to a single
department all accountabilities for money, where the examinations may be
prompt, efficacious, and uniform.
An account of the receipts and expenditures of the last year, as
prepared by the Secretary of the Treasury, will, as usual, be laid
before you. The success which has attended the late sales of the public
lands shews that with attention they may be made an important source of
receipt. Among the payments those made in discharge of the principal and
interest of the national debt will shew that the public faith has been
exactly maintained. To these will be added an estimate of appropriations
necessary for the ensuing year. This last will, of course, be affected
by such modifications of the system of expense as you shall think proper
to adopt.
A statement has been formed by the Secretary of War, on mature
consideration, of all the posts and stations where garrisons will be
expedient and of the number of men requisite for each garrison. The
whole amount is considerably short of the present military
establishment. For the surplus no particular use can be pointed out. For
defense against invasion their number is as nothing, nor is it conceived
needful or safe that a standing army should be kept up in time of peace
for that purpose. Uncertain as we must ever be of the particular point
in our circumference where an enemy may choose to invade us, the only
force which can be ready at every point and competent to oppose them is
the body of neighboring citizens as formed into a militia. On these,
collected from the parts most convenient in numbers proportioned to the
invading force, it is best to rely not only to meet the first attack,
but if it threatens to be permanent to maintain the defense until
regulars may be engaged to relieve them. These considerations render it
important that we should at every session continue to amend the defects
which from time to time shew themselves in the laws for regulating the
militia until they are sufficiently perfect. Nor should we now or at any
time separate until we can say we have done everything for the militia
which we could do were an enemy at our door.
The provision of military stores on hand will be laid before you, that
you may judge of the additions still requisite.
With respect to the extent to which our naval preparations should be
carried some difference of opinion may be expected to appear, but just
attention to the circumstances of every part of the Union will doubtless
reconcile all. A small force will probably continue to be wanted for
actual service in the Mediterranean. Whatever annual sum beyond that you
may think proper to appropriate to naval preparations would perhaps be
better employed in providing those articles which may be kept without
waste or consumption, and be in readiness when any exigence calls them
into use. Progress has been made, as will appear by papers now
communicated, in providing materials for 74-gun ships as directed by
law.
How far the authority given by the Legislature for procuring and
establishing sites for naval purposes has been perfectly understood and
pursued in the execution admits of some doubt. A statement of the
expenses already incurred on that subject is now laid before you. I have
in certain cases suspended or slackened these expenditures, that the
Legislature might determine whether so many yards are necessary as have
been contemplated. The works at this place are among those permitted to
go on, and five of the seven frigates directed to be laid up have been
brought and laid up here, where, besides the safety of their position,
they are under the eye of the Executive Administration, as well as of
its agents, and where yourselves also will be guided by your own view in
the legislative provisions respecting them which may from time to time
be necessary. They are preserved in such condition, as well the vessels
as whatever belongs to them, as to be at all times ready for sea on a
short warning. Two others are yet to be laid up so soon as they shall
have received the repairs requisite to put them also into sound
condition. As a superintending officer will be necessary at each yard,
his duties and emoluments, hitherto fixed by the Executive, will be a
more proper subject for legislation. A communication will also be made
of our progress in the execution of the law respecting the vessels
directed to be sold.
The fortifications of our harbors, more or less advanced, present
considerations of great difficulty. While some of them are on a scale
sufficiently proportioned to the advantages of their position, to the
efficacy of their protection, and the importance of the points within
it, others are so extensive, will cost so much in their first erection,
so much in their maintenance, and require such a force to garrison them
as to make it questionable what is best now to be done. A statement of
those commenced or projected, of the expenses already incurred, and
estimates of their future cost, as far as can be foreseen, shall be laid
before you, that you may be enabled to judge whether any alteration is
necessary in the laws respecting this subject.
Agriculture, manufactures, commerce, and navigation, the four pillars of
our prosperity, are then most thriving when left most free to individual
enterprise. Protection from casual embarrassments, however, may
sometimes be seasonably interposed. If in the course of your
observations or inquiries they should appear to need any aid within the
limits of our constitutional powers, your sense of their importance is a
sufficient assurance they will occupy your attention. We can not,
indeed, but all feel an anxious solicitude for the difficulties under
which our carrying trade will soon be placed. How far it can be
relieved, otherwise than by time, is a subject of important
consideration.
The judiciary system of the United States, and especially that portion
of it recently erected, will of course present itself to the
contemplation of Congress, and, that they may be able to judge of the
proportion which the institution bears to the business it has to
perform, I have caused to be procured from the several States and now
lay before Congress an exact statement of all the causes decided since
the first establishment of the courts, and of those which were depending
when additional courts and judges were brought in to their aid.
And while on the judiciary organization it will be worthy your
consideration whether the protection of the inestimable institution of
juries has been extended to all the cases involving the security of our
persons and property. Their impartial selection also being essential to
their value, we ought further to consider whether that is sufficiently
secured in those States where they are named by a marshal depending on
Executive will or designated by the court or by officers dependent on
them.
I can not omit recommending a revisal of the laws on the subject of
naturalization. Considering the ordinary chances of human life, a denial
of citizenship under a residence of fourteen years is a denial to a
great proportion of those who ask it, and controls a policy pursued from
their first settlement by many of these States, and still believed of
consequence to their prosperity; and shall we refuse to the unhappy
fugitives from distress that hospitality which the savages of the
wilderness extended to our fathers arriving in this land? Shall
oppressed humanity find no asylum on this globe? The Constitution indeed
has wisely provided that for admission to certain offices of important
trust a residence shall be required sufficient to develop character and
design. But might not the general character and capabilities of a
citizen be safely communicated to everyone manifesting a bona fide
purpose of embarking his life and fortunes permanently with us, with
restrictions, perhaps, to guard against the fraudulent usurpation of our
flag, an abuse which brings so much embarrassment and loss on the
genuine citizen and so much danger to the nation of being involved in
war that no endeavor should be spared to detect and suppress it?
These, fellow-citizens, are the matters respecting the state of the
nation which I have thought of importance to be submitted to your
consideration at this time. Some others of less moment or not yet ready
for communication will be the subject of separate messages. I am happy
in this opportunity of committing the arduous affairs of our Government
to the collected wisdom of the Union. Nothing shall be wanting on my
part to inform as far as in my power the legislative judgment, nor to
carry that judgment into faithful execution. The prudence and temperance
of your discussions will promote within your own walls that conciliation
which so much befriends rational conclusion, and by its example will
encourage among our constituents that progress of opinion which is
tending to unite them in object and in will. That all should be
satisfied with any one order of things is not to be expected; but I
indulge the pleasing persuasion that the great body of our citizens will
cordially concur in honest and disinterested efforts which have for
their object to preserve the General and State Governments in their
constitutional form and equilibrium; to maintain peace abroad, and order
and obedience to the laws at home; to establish principles and practices
of administration favorable to the security of liberty and property, and
to reduce expenses to what is necessary for the useful purposes of
Government.
TH. JEFFERSON.
SPECIAL MESSAGES.
DECEMBER 11, 1801.
_Gentlemen of the Senate_:
Early in the last month I received the ratification by the First Consul
of France of the convention between the United States and that nation.
His ratification not being pure and simple in the ordinary form, I have
thought it my duty, in order to avoid all misconception, to ask a second
advice and consent of the Senate before I give it the last sanction by
proclaiming it to be a law of the land.
TH. JEFFERSON.
DECEMBER 22, 1801.
_Gentlemen of the Senate_:
The States of Georgia and Tennessee being peculiarly interested in our
carrying into execution the two acts passed by Congress on the 19th of
February, 1799 (chapter 115), and 13th May, 1800 (chapter 62),
commissioners were appointed early in summer and other measures taken
for the purpose. The objects of these laws requiring meetings with the
Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaws, and Creeks, the inclosed instructions
were prepared for the proceedings with the three first nations. Our
applications to the Cherokees failed altogether. Those to the Chickasaws
produced the treaty now laid before you for your advice and consent,
whereby we obtained permission to open a road of communication with the
Mississippi Territory. The commissioners are probably at this time in
conference with the Choctaws. Further information having been wanting
when these instructions were, formed to enable us to prepare those
respecting the Creeks, the commissioners were directed to proceed with
the others. We have now reason to believe the conferences with the
Creeks can not take place till the spring.
The journals and letters of the commissioners relating to the subject of
the treaty now inclosed accompany it.
TH. JEFFERSON.
DECEMBER 22, 1801.
_Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_:
I now inclose sundry documents supplementary to those communicated to
you with my message at the commencement of the session. Two others of
considerable importance--the one relating to our transactions with the
Barbary Powers, the other presenting a view of the offices of the
Government--shall be communicated as soon as they can be completed.
TH. JEFFERSON.
DECEMBER 23, 1801.
_Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_:
Another return of the census of the State of Maryland is just received
from the marshal of that State, which he desires may be substituted as
more correct than the one first returned by him and communicated by me
to Congress. This new return, with his letter, is now laid before you.
TH. JEFFERSON.
JANUARY 11, 1802.
_Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_.
I now communicate to you a memorial of the commissioners of the city of
Washington, together with a letter of later date, which, with their
memorial of January 28, 1801, will possess the Legislature fully of the
state of the public interests and of those of the city of Washington
confided to them. The moneys now due, and soon to become due, to the
State of Maryland on the loan guaranteed by the United States call for
an early attention. The lots in the city which are chargeable with the
payment of these moneys are deemed not only equal to the indemnification
of the public, but to insure a considerable surplus to the city to be
employed for its improvement, provided they are offered for sale only in
sufficient numbers to meet the existing demand. But the act of 1796
requires that they shall be positively sold in such numbers as shall be
necessary for the punctual payment of the loans. Nine thousand dollars
of interest are lately become due, $3,000 quarter yearly will continue
to become due, and $50,000, an additional loan, are reimbursable on the
1st day of November next. These sums would require sales so far beyond
the actual demand of the market that it is apprehended that the whole
property may be thereby sacrificed, the public security destroyed, and
the residuary interest of the city entirely lost. Under these
circumstances I have thought it my duty before I proceed to direct a
rigorous execution of the law to submit the subject to the consideration
of the Legislature. Whether the public interest will be better secured
in the end and that of the city saved by offering sales commensurate
only to the demand at market, and advancing from the Treasury in the
first instance what these may prove deficient, to be replaced by
subsequent sales, rests for the determination of the Legislature. If
indulgence for the funds can be admitted, they will probably form a
resource of great and permanent value; and their embarrassments have
been produced only by overstrained exertions to provide accommodations
for the Government of the Union
TH. JEFFERSON.
JANUARY 12, 1802.
_Gentlemen of the Senate_:
I now communicate to you a letter from the Secretary of State inclosing
an estimate of the expenses which appear at present necessary for
carrying into effect the convention between the United States of America
and the French Republic, which has been prepared at the request of the
House of Representatives.
TH. JEFFERSON.
JANUARY 27, 1802.
_Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_:
I lay before you the accounts of our Indian trading houses, as rendered
up to the 1st day of January, 1801, with a report of the Secretary of
War thereon, explaining the effects and the situation of that commerce
and the reasons in favor of its further extension. But it is believed
that the act authorizing this trade expired so long ago as the 3d of
March, 1799. Its revival, therefore, as well as its extension, is
submitted to the consideration of the Legislature.
The act regulating trade and intercourse with the Indian tribes will
also expire on the 3d day of March next. While on the subject of its
continuance it will be worthy the consideration of the Legislature
whether the provisions of the law inflicting on Indians, in certain
cases, the punishment of death by hanging might not permit its
commutation into death by military execution, the form of the punishment
in the former way being peculiarly repugnant to their ideas and
increasing the obstacles to the surrender of the criminal.
These people are becoming very sensible of the baneful effects produced
on their morals, their health, and existence by the abuse of ardent
spirits, and some of them earnestly desire a prohibition of that article
from being carried among them. The Legislature will consider whether the
effectuating that desire would not be in the spirit of benevolence and
liberality which they have hitherto practiced toward these our
neighbors, and which has had so happy an effect toward conciliating
their friendship. It has been found, too, in experience that the same
abuse gives frequent rise to incidents tending much to commit our peace
with the Indians.
It is now become necessary to run and mark the boundaries between them
and us in various parts. The law last mentioned has authorized this to
be done, but no existing appropriation meets the expense.
Certain papers explanatory of the grounds of this communication are
herewith inclosed.
TH. JEFFERSON.
FEBRUARY 2, 1802.
_Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_:
I now lay before you--
1. A return of ordnance, arms, and military stores the property of the
United States.
2. Returns of muskets and bayonets fabricated at the armories of the
United States at Springfield and Harpers Ferry, and of the expenditures
at those places; and
3. An estimate of expenditures which may be necessary for fortifications
and barracks for the present year.
Besides the permanent magazines established at Springfield, West Point,
and Harpers Ferry, it is thought one should be established in some point
convenient for the States of North Carolina, South Carolina, and
Georgia. Such a point will probably be found near the border of the
Carolinas, and some small provision by the Legislature preparatory to
the establishment will be necessary for the present year.
We find the United States in possession of certain iron mines and works
in the county of Berkeley and State of Virginia, purchased, as is
presumable, on the idea of establishing works for the fabrication of
cannon and other military articles by the public. Whether this method of
supplying what may be wanted will be most advisable or that of
purchasing at market where competition brings everything to its proper
level of price and quality is for the Legislature to decide, and if the
latter alternative be preferred, it will rest for their further
consideration in what way the subjects of this purchase may be best
employed or disposed of. The Attorney-General's opinion on the subject
of the title accompanies this.
There are in various parts of the United States small parcels of land
which have been purchased at different times for cantonments and other
military purposes. Several of them are in situations not likely to be
accommodated to future purposes. The loss of the records prevents a
detailed statement of these until they can be supplied by inquiry. In
the meantime, one of them, containing 88 acres, in the county of Essex,
in New Jersey, purchased in 1799 and sold the following year to
Cornelius Vermule and Andrew Codmas, though its price has been received,
can not be conveyed without authority from the Legislature.