Chapter 22 1805

JANUARY 31, 1805.

 To the House of Representatives of the United States :

In compliance with the desire of the House of Representatives, expressed
in their resolution of yesterday, I have to inform them that by a letter
of the 30th of May last from the Secretary of War to Samuel Hammond, a
member of the House, it was proposed to him to accept a commission of
colonel-commandant for the district of Louisiana when the new government
there should commence. By a letter of the 30th of June he signified a
willingness to accept, but still more definitively by one of October 26,
a copy of which is therefore now communicated. A commission had been
made out for him bearing date the ist day of October last, and forwarded
before the receipt of his letter of October 26. No later communication
has been received from him, nor is anything later known of his
movements.

TH. JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 1, 1805.

 To the House of Representatives of the United States :

For some weeks past I have had reason to expect by every mail from New
Orleans information which would have fully met the views of the House of
Representatives, expressed in their resolution of December 31, on the
subject of a post-road from the city of Washington to New Orleans; but
this being not yet received, I think it my duty without further delay to
communicate to the House the information I possess, however imperfect.

Isaac Briggs, one of the surveyors-general of the United States, being
about to return in July last to his station at Natchez, and apprised of
the anxiety existing to have a practicable road explored for forwarding
the mail to New Orleans without crossing the mountains, offered his
services voluntarily to return by the route contemplated, taking as
he should go such observations of longitude and latitude as would
enable him to delineate it exactly, and by protraction to show of what
shortenings it would admit, The offer was accepted and he was furnished
with an accurate sextant for his observations. The route proposed was
from Washington by Fredericksburg, Cartersville, Lower Sauratown,
Salisbury, Franklin Court-House in Georgia, Tuckabachee, Fort Stoddert,
and the mouth of Pearl River to New Orleans. It is believed he followed
this route generally, deviating at times only for special purposes, and
returning again into it. His letters, herewith communicated, will
shew his opinion to have been, after completing his journey, that the
practicable distance between Washington and New Orleans will be a little
over 1,000 miles. He expected to forward his map and special report
within one week from the date of his last letter, but a letter of
December 10, from another person, informs me he had been unwell, but
would forward them within a week from that time. So soon as they shall
be received they shall be communicated to the House of Representatives.

TH. JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 5, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

The Secretary of State has lately received a note from the Danish charge
d'affaires, claiming,  in the name of his Government , restitution
in the case of the brig  Henrich , communicated to Congress at a
former session, in which note were transmitted sundry documents chiefly
relating to the value and neutral character of the vessel, and to the
question whether the judicial proceedings were instituted and conducted
without the concurrence of the captain of the  Henrich . As these
documents appear to form a necessary appendage to those already before
Congress, and throw additional light on the subject, I transmit copies
of them herewith.

TH. JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 13, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

In the message to Congress at the opening of the present session I
informed them that treaties had been entered into with the Delaware and
Piankeshaw Indians for the purchase of their right to certain lands on
the Ohio. I have since received another, entered into with the Sacs and
Foxes, for a portion of country on both sides of the river Mississippi.
These treaties, having been advised and consented to by the Senate, have
accordingly been ratified, but as they involve conditions which require
legislative provision, they are now submitted to both branches for
consideration.

TH. JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 20, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

I communicate, for the information of Congress, a letter of September 18
from Commodore Preble, giving a detailed account of the transactions of
the vessels under his command from July the 9th to the 10th of September
last past.

The energy and judgment displayed by this excellent officer through the
whole course of the service lately confided to him and the zeal and
valor of his officers and men in the several enterprises executed by
them can not fail to give high satisfaction to Congress and their
country, of whom they have deserved well.

TH. JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 28, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

I now lay before Congress a statement of the militia of the United
States, according to the returns last received from the several States.
It will be perceived that some of these are not of recent dates, and
that from the States of Maryland, Delaware, and Tennessee no returns are
stated. As far as appears from our records, none were ever rendered from
either of these States.

TH. JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 28, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

I now render to Congress the account of the fund established by the act
of May 1, 1802, for defraying the contingent charges of Government. No
occasion having arisen for making use of any part of the balance of
$18,560 unexpended on the 31st day of December, 1803, when the last
account was rendered by message, that balance has been carried to the
credit of the surplus fund.

TH. JEFFERSON.

SECOND INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

Proceeding, fellow-citizens, to that qualification which the
Constitution requires before my entrance on the charge again conferred
on me, it is my duty to express the deep sense I entertain of this new
proof of confidence from my fellow-citizens at large, and the zeal with
which it inspires me so to conduct myself as may best satisfy their just
expectations.

On taking this station on a former occasion I declared the principles
on which I believed it my duty to administer the affairs of our
Commonwealth. My conscience tells me I have on every occasion acted
up to that declaration according to its obvious import and to the
understanding of every candid mind.

In the transaction of your foreign affairs we have endeavored to
cultivate the friendship of all nations, and especially of those with
which we have the most important relations. We have clone them justice
on all occasions, favored where favor was lawful, and cherished mutual
interests and intercourse on fair and equal terms. We are firmly
convinced, and we act on that conviction, that with nations as with
individuals our interests soundly calculated will ever be found
inseparable from our moral duties, and history bears witness to the
fact that a just nation is trusted on its word when recourse is had
to armaments and wars to bridle others.

At home, fellow-citizens, you best know whether we have done well or
ill. The suppression of unnecessary offices, of useless establishments
and expenses, enabled us to discontinue our internal taxes. These,
covering our land with officers and opening our doors to their
intrusions, had already begun that process of domiciliary vexation which
once entered is scarcely to be restrained from reaching successively
every article of property and produce. If among these taxes some minor
ones fell which had not been inconvenient, it was because their amount
would not have paid the officers who collected them, and because, if
they had any merit, the State authorities might adopt them instead of
others less approved.

The remaining revenue on the consumption of foreign articles is paid
chiefly by those who can afford to add foreign luxuries to domestic
comforts, being collected on our seaboard and frontiers only, and,
incorporated with the transactions of our mercantile citizens, it may be
the pleasure and the pride of an American to ask, What farmer, what
mechanic, what laborer ever sees a taxgatherer of the United States?
These contributions enable us to support the current expenses of the
Government, to fulfill contracts with foreign nations, to extinguish the
native right of soil within our limits, to extend those limits, and to
apply such a surplus to our public debts as places at a short day their
final redemption, and that redemption once effected the revenue thereby
liberated may, by a just repartition of it among the States and a
corresponding amendment of the Constitution, be applied  in time
of peace  to rivers, canals, roads, arts, manufactures, education,
and other great objects within each State.  In time of war , if
injustice by ourselves or others must sometimes produce war, increased
as the same revenue will be by increased population and consumption, and
aided by other resources reserved for that crisis, it may meet within
the year all the expenses of the year without encroaching on the rights
of future generations by burthening them with the debts of the past. War
will then be but a suspension of useful works, and a return to a state
of peace a return to the progress of improvement.

I have said, fellow-citizens, that the income reserved had enabled us to
extend our limits, but that extension may possibly pay for itself before
we are called on, and in the meantime may keep down the accruing
interest; in all events, it will replace the advances we shall have
made. I know that the acquisition of Louisiana has been disapproved by
some from a candid apprehension that the enlargement of our territory
would endanger its union. But who can limit the extent to which the
federative principle may operate effectively? The larger our association
the less will it be shaken by local passions; and in any view is it not
better that the opposite bank of the Mississippi should be settled by
our own brethren and children than by strangers of another family? With
which should we be most likely to live in harmony and friendly
intercourse?

In matters of religion I have considered that its free exercise is
placed by the Constitution independent of the powers of the General
Government. I have therefore undertaken on no occasion to prescribe
the religious exercises suited to it, but have left them, as the
Constitution found them, under the direction and discipline of the
church or state authorities acknowledged by the several religious
societies.

The aboriginal inhabitants of these countries I have regarded with the
commiseration their history inspires. Endowed with the faculties and the
rights of men, breathing an ardent love of liberty and independence, and
occupying a country which left them no desire but to be undisturbed, the
stream of overflowing population from other regions directed itself on
these shores; without power to divert or habits to contend against
it, they have been overwhelmed by the current or driven before it;
now reduced within limits too narrow for the hunter's state, humanity
enjoins us to teach them agriculture and the domestic arts; to encourage
them to that industry which alone can enable them to maintain their
place in existence and to prepare them in time for that state of society
which to bodily comforts adds the improvement of the mind and morals. We
have therefore liberally furnished them with the implements of husbandry
and household use; we have placed among them instructors in the arts of
first necessity, and they are covered with the aegis of the law against
aggressors from among ourselves.

But the endeavors to enlighten them on the fate which awaits their
present course of life, to induce them to exercise their reason, follow
its dictates, and change their pursuits with the change of circumstances
have powerful obstacles to encounter; they are combated by the habits
of their bodies, prejudices of their minds, ignorance, pride, and the
influence of interested and crafty individuals among them who feel
themselves something in the present order of things and fear to become
nothing in any other. These persons inculcate a sanctimonious reverence
for the customs of their ancestors; that whatsoever they did must be
done through all time; that reason is a false guide, and to advance
under its counsel in their physical, moral, or political condition is
perilous innovation; that their duty is to remain as their Creator made
them, ignorance being safety and knowledge full of danger; in short,
my friends, among them also is seen the action and counteraction of
good sense and of bigotry; they too have their antiphilosophists who
find an interest in keeping things in their present state, who dread
reformation, and exert all their faculties to maintain the ascendency of
habit over the duty of improving our reason and obeying its mandates.

In giving these outlines I do not mean, fellow-citizens, to arrogate to
myself the merit of the measures. That is due, in the first place, to
the reflecting character of our citizens at large, who, by the weight of
public opinion, influence and strengthen the public measures. It is due
to the sound discretion with which they select from among themselves
those to whom they confide the legislative duties. It is due to the zeal
and wisdom of the characters thus selected, who lay the foundations of
public happiness in wholesome laws, the execution of which alone remains
for others, and it is due to the able and faithful auxiliaries, whose
patriotism has associated them with me in the executive functions.

During this course of administration, and in order to disturb it,
the artillery of the press has been leveled against us, charged with
whatsoever its licentiousness could devise or dare. These abuses of
an institution so important to freedom and science are deeply to be
regretted, inasmuch as they tend to lessen its usefulness and to sap
its safety. They might, indeed, have been corrected by the wholesome
punishments reserved to and provided by the laws of the several States
against falsehood and defamation, but public duties more urgent press on
the time of public servants, and the offenders have therefore been left
to find their punishment in the public indignation.

Nor was it uninteresting to the world that an experiment should be
fairly and fully made, whether freedom of discussion, unaided by power,
is not sufficient for the propagation and protection of truth  whether
a government conducting itself in the true spirit of its constitution,
with zeal and purity, and doing no act which it would be unwilling
the whole world should witness, can be written down by falsehood and
defamation. The experiment has been tried: you have witnessed the scene;
our fellow-citizens looked on, cool and collected; they saw the latent
source from which these outrages proceeded; they gathered around their
public functionaries, and when the Constitution called them to the
decision by suffrage, they pronounced their verdict, honorable to those
who had served them and consolatory to the friend of man who believes
that he may be trusted with the control of his own affairs.

No inference is here intended that the laws provided by the States
against false and defamatory publications should not be enforced; he
who has time renders a service to public morals and public tranquillity
in reforming these abuses by the salutary coercions of the law; but
the experiment is noted to prove that, since truth and reason have
maintained their ground against false opinions in league with false
facts, the press, confined to truth, needs no other legal restraint;
the public judgment will correct false reasonings and opinions on a
full hearing of all parties; and no other definite line can be drawn
between the inestimable liberty of the press and its demoralizing
licentiousness. If there be still improprieties which this rule would
not restrain, its supplement must be sought in the censorship of public
opinion.

Contemplating the union of sentiment now manifested so generally as
auguring harmony and happiness to our future course, I offer to our
country sincere congratulations. With those, too, not yet rallied to
the same point the disposition to do so is gaining strength; facts are
piercing through the veil drawn over them, and our doubting brethren
will at length see that the mass of their fellow-citizens with whom they
can not yet resolve to act as to principles and measures, think as they
think and desire what they desire; that our wish as well as theirs is
that the public efforts may be directed honestly to the public good,
that peace be cultivated, civil and religious liberty unassailed, law
and order preserved, equality of rights maintained, and that state of
property, equal or unequal, which results to every man from his own
industry or that of his father's. When satisfied of these views it is
not in human nature that they should not approve and support them. In
the meantime let us cherish them with patient affection, let us do them
justice, and more than justice, in all competitions of interest, and we
need not doubt that truth, reason, and their own interests will at
length prevail, will gather them into the fold of their country, and
will complete that entire union of opinion which gives to a nation the
blessing of harmony and the benefit of all its strength.

I shall now enter on the duties to which my fellow-citizens have again
called me, and shall proceed in the spirit of those principles which
they have approved. I fear not that any motives of interest may lead me
astray; I am sensible of no passion which could seduce me knowingly from
the path of justice, but the weaknesses of human nature and the limits
of my own understanding will produce errors of judgment sometimes
injurious to your interests. I shall need, therefore, all the indulgence
which I have heretofore experienced from my constituents; the want of
it will certainly not lessen with increasing years. I shall need, too,
the favor of that Being in whose hands we are, who led our fathers, as
Israel of old, from their native land and planted them in a country
flowing with all the necessaries and comforts of life; who has covered
our infancy with His providence and our riper years with His wisdom and
power, and to whose goodness I ask you to join in supplications with
me that He will so enlighten the minds of your servants, guide their
councils, and prosper their measures that whatsoever they do shall
result in your good, and shall secure to you the peace, friendship,
and approbation of all nations.

MARCH 4, 1805.

FIFTH ANNUAL MESSAGE.

DECEMBER 3, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States .

At a moment when the nations of Europe are in commotion and arming
against each other, and when those with whom we have principal
intercourse are engaged in the general contest, and when the countenance
of some of them toward our peaceable country threatens that even that
may not be unaffected by what is passing on the general theater, a
meeting of the representatives of the nation in both Houses of Congress
has become more than usually desirable. Coming from every section of our
country, they bring with them the sentiments and the information of the
whole, and will be enabled to give a direction to the public affairs
which the will and the wisdom of the whole will approve and support.

In taking a view of the state of our country we in the first place
notice the late affliction of two of our cities under the fatal fever
which in latter times has occasionally visited our shores. Providence in
His goodness gave it an early termination on this occasion and lessened
the number of victims which have usually fallen before it. In the course
of the several visitations by this disease it has appeared that it
is strictly local, incident to cities and on the tide waters only,
incommunicable in the country either by persons under the disease or by
goods carried from diseased places; that its access is with the autumn
and it disappears with the early frosts. These restrictions within
narrow limits of time and space give security even to our maritime
cities during three-fourths of the year, and to the country always.
Although from these facts it appears unnecessary, yet to satisfy the
fears of foreign nations and cautions on their part not to be complained
of in a danger whose limits are yet unknown to them I have strictly
enjoined on the officers at the head of the customs to certify with
exact truth for every vessel sailing for a foreign port the state of
health respecting this fever which prevails at the place from which she
sails. Under every motive from character and duty to certify the truth,
I have no doubt they have faithfully executed this injunction. Much real
injury has, however, been sustained from a propensity to identify with
this endemic and to call by the same name fevers of very different
kinds, which have been known at all times and in all countries, and
never have been placed among those deemed contagious. As we advance in
our knowledge of this disease, as facts develop the source from which
individuals receive it, the State authorities charged with the care of
the public health, and Congress with that of the general commerce, will
become able to regulate with effect their respective functions in these
departments. The burthen of quarantines is felt at home as well as
abroad; their efficacy merits examination. Although the health laws of
the States should be found to need no present revisal by Congress, yet
commerce claims that their attention be ever awake to them.

Since our last meeting the aspect of our foreign relations has
considerably changed. Our coasts have been infested and our harbors
watched by private armed vessels, some of them without commissions,
some with illegal commissions, others with those of legal form, but
committing piratical acts beyond the authority of their commissions.
They have captured in the very entrance of our harbors, as well as
on the high seas, not only the vessels of our friends coming to trade
with us, but our own also. They have carried them off under pretense of
legal adjudication, but not daring to approach a court of justice, they
have plundered and sunk them by the way or in obscure places where no
evidence could arise against them, maltreated the crews, and abandoned
them in boats in the open sea or on desert shores without food or
covering. These enormities appearing to be unreached by any control of
their sovereigns, I found it necessary to equip a force to cruise within
our own seas, to arrest all vessels of these descriptions found hovering
on our coasts within the limits of the Gulf Stream and to bring the
offenders in for trial as pirates.

The same system of hovering on our coasts and harbors under color of
seeking enemies has been also carried on by public armed ships to the
great annoyance and oppression of our commerce. New principles, too,
have been interpolated into the law of nations, founded neither in
justice nor the usage or acknowledgment of nations. According to these
a belligerent takes to itself a commerce with its own enemy which it
denies to a neutral on the ground of its aiding that enemy in the war;
but reason revolts at such an inconsistency, and the neutral having
equal right with the belligerent to decide the question, the interests
of our constituents and the duty of maintaining the authority of reason,
the only umpire between just nations, impose on us the obligation of
providing an effectual and determined opposition to a doctrine so
injurious to the rights of peaceable nations. Indeed, the confidence
we ought to have in the justice of others still countenances the hope
that a sounder view of those rights will of itself induce from every
belligerent a more correct observance of them.

With Spain our negotiations for a settlement of differences have not
had a satisfactory issue. Spoliations during a former war, for which
she had formally acknowledged herself responsible, have been refused
to be compensated but on conditions affecting other claims in no wise
connected with them. Yet the same practices are renewed in the present
war and are already of great amount. On the Mobile, our commerce passing
through that river continues to be obstructed by arbitrary duties and
vexatious searches. Propositions for adjusting amicably the boundaries
of Louisiana have not been acceded to. While, however, the right is
unsettled, we have avoided changing the state of things by taking new
posts or strengthening ourselves in the disputed territories, in the
hope that the other power would not by a contrary conduct oblige us to
meet their example and endanger conflicts of authority the issue of
which may not be easily controlled. But in this hope we have now reason
to lessen our confidence. Inroads have been recently made into the
Territories of Orleans and the Mississippi, our citizens have been
seized and their property plundered in the very parts of the former
which had been actually delivered up by Spain, and this by the regular
officers and soldiers of that Government. I have therefore found it
necessary at length to give orders to our troops on that frontier to be
in readiness to protect our citizens, and to repel by arms any similar
aggressions in future. Other details necessary for your full information
of the state of things between this country and that shall be the
subject of another communication.

In reviewing these injuries from some of the belligerent powers the
moderation, the firmness, and the wisdom of the Legislature will all be
called into action. We ought still to hope that time and a more correct
estimate of interest as well as of character will produce the justice
we are bound to expect. But should any nation deceive itself by false
calculations, and disappoint that expectation, we must join in the
unprofitable contest of trying which party can do the other the most
harm. Some of these injuries may perhaps admit a peaceable remedy. Where
that is competent it is always the most desirable. But some of them are
of a nature to be met by force only, and all of them may lead to it.
I can not, therefore, but recommend such preparations as circumstances
call for. The first object is to place our seaport towns out of the
danger of insult. Measures have been already taken for furnishing them
with heavy cannon for the service of such land batteries as may make a
part of their defense against armed vessels approaching them. In aid of
these it is desirable we should have a competent number of gunboats, and
the number, to be competent, must be considerable. If immediately begun,
they may be in readiness for service at the opening of the next season.
Whether it will be necessary to augment our land forces will be decided
by occurrences probably in the course of your session. In the meantime
you will consider whether it would not be expedient for a state of peace
as well as of war so to organize or class the militia as would enable
us on any sudden emergency to call for the services of the younger
portions, unencumbered with the old and those having families. Upward
of 300,000 able-bodied men between the ages of 18 and 26 years, which
the last census shews we may now count within our limits, will furnish
a competent number for offense or defense in any point where they may
be wanted, and will give time for raising regular forces after the
necessity of them shall become certain; and the reducing to the early
period of life all its active service can not but be desirable to our
younger citizens of the present as well as future times, inasmuch as it
engages to them in more advanced age a quiet and undisturbed repose in
the bosom of their families. I can not, then, but earnestly recommend
to your early consideration the expediency of so modifying our militia
system as, by a separation of the more active part from that which is
less so, we may draw from it when necessary an efficient corps fit for
real and active service, and to be called to it in regular rotation.

Considerable provision has been made under former authorities from
Congress of materials for the construction of ships of war of 74 guns.
These materials are on hand subject to the further will of the
Legislature.

An immediate prohibition of the exportation of arms and ammunition is
also submitted to your determination.

Turning from these unpleasant views of violence and wrong, I
congratulate you on the liberation of our fellow-citizens who were
stranded on the coast of Tripoli and made prisoners of war. In a
government bottomed on the will of all the life and liberty of every
individual citizen become interesting to all. In the treaty, therefore,
which has concluded our warfare with that State an article for the
ransom of our citizens has been agreed to. An operation by land by a
small band of our countrymen and others, engaged for the occasion in
conjunction with the troops of the ex-Bashaw of that country, gallantly
conducted by our late consul, Eaton, and their successful enterprise
on the city of Derne, contributed doubtless to the impression which
produced peace, and the conclusion of this prevented opportunities of
which the officers and men of our squadron destined for Tripoli would
have availed themselves to emulate the acts of valor exhibited by
their brethren in the attack of the last year. Reflecting with high
satisfaction on the distinguished bravery displayed whenever occasions
permitted in the late Mediterranean service, I think it would be an
useful encouragement as well as a just reward to make an opening for
some present promotion by enlarging our peace establishment of captains
and lieutenants.

With Tunis some misunderstandings have arisen not yet sufficiently
explained, but friendly discussions with their ambassador recently
arrived and a mutual disposition to do whatever is just and reasonable
can not fail of dissipating these, so that we may consider our peace on
that coast, generally, to be on as sound a footing as it has been at any
preceding time. Still, it will not be expedient to withdraw immediately
the whole of our force from that sea.

The law providing for a naval peace establishment fixes the number of
frigates which shall be kept in constant service in time of peace, and
prescribes that they shall be manned by not more than two-thirds of
their complement of seamen and ordinary seamen. Whether a frigate may
be trusted to two-thirds only of her proper complement of men must
depend on the nature of the service on which she is ordered; that may
sometimes, for her safety as well as to insure her object, require her
fullest complement. In adverting to this subject Congress will perhaps
consider whether the best limitation on the Executive discretion in
this case would not be by the number of seamen which may be employed in
the whole service rather than by the number of the vessels. Occasions
oftener arise for the employment of small than of large vessels, and it
would lessen risk as well as expense to be authorized to employ them of
preference. The limitation suggested by the number of seamen would admit
a selection of vessels best adapted to the service.

Our Indian neighbors are advancing, many of them with spirit, and
others beginning to engage in the pursuits of agriculture and household
manufacture. They are becoming sensible that the earth yields
subsistence with less labor and more certainty than the forest, and find
it their interest from time to time to dispose of parts of their surplus
and waste lands for the means of improving those they occupy and of
subsisting their families while they are preparing their farms. Since
your last session the Northern tribes have sold to us the lands between
the Connecticut Reserve and the former Indian boundary and those on the
Ohio from the same boundary to the rapids and for a considerable depth
inland. The Chickasaws and Cherokees have sold us the country between
and adjacent to the two districts of Tennessee, and the Creeks the
residue of their lands in the fork of Ocmulgee up to the Ulcofauhatche.
The three former purchases are important, inasmuch as they consolidate
disjoined parts of our settled country and render their intercourse
secure; and the second particularly so, as, with the small point on
the river which we expect is by this time ceded by the Piankeshaws, it
completes our possession of the whole of both banks of the Ohio from its
source to near its mouth, and the navigation of that river is thereby
rendered forever safe to our citizens settled and settling on its
extensive waters. The purchase from the Creeks, too, has been for some
time particularly interesting to the State of Georgia.

The several treaties which have been mentioned will be submitted to both
Houses of Congress for the exercise of their respective functions.

Deputations now on their way to the seat of Government from various
nations of Indians inhabiting the Missouri and other parts beyond the
Mississippi come charged with assurances of their satisfaction with the
new relations in which they are placed with us, of their dispositions
to cultivate our peace and friendship, and their desire to enter into
commercial intercourse with us. A state of our progress in exploring the
principal rivers of that country, and of the information respecting them
hitherto obtained, will be communicated so soon as we shall receive some
further relations which we have reason shortly to expect.

The receipts at the Treasury during the year ending on the 30th day of
September last have exceeded the sum of $13,000,000, which, with not
quite five millions in the Treasury at the beginning of the year, have
enabled us after meeting other demands to pay nearly two millions of the
debt contracted under the British treaty and convention, upward of four
millions of principal of the public debt, and four millions of interest.
These payments, with those which had been made in three years and a half
preceding, have extinguished of the funded debt nearly eighteen millions
of principal. Congress by their act of November 10, 1803, authorized us
to borrow $1,750,000 toward meeting the claims of our citizens assumed
by the convention with France. We have not, however, made use of this
authority, because the sum of four millions and a half, which remained
in the Treasury on the same 30th day of September last, with the
receipts which we may calculate on for the ensuing year, besides paying
the annual sum of $8,000,000 appropriated to the funded debt and meeting
all the current demands which may be expected, will enable us to pay
the whole sum of $3,750,000 assumed by the French convention and still
leave us a surplus of nearly $1,000,000 at our free disposal. Should
you concur in the provisions of arms and armed vessels recommended by
the circumstances of the times, this surplus will furnish the means of
doing so.

On this first occasion of addressing Congress since, by the choice of
my constituents, I have entered on a second term of administration, I
embrace the opportunity to give this public assurance that I will exert
my best endeavors to administer faithfully the executive department,
and will zealously cooperate with you in every measure which may
tend to secure the liberty, property, and personal safety of our
fellow-citizens, and to consolidate the republican forms and principles
of our Government.

In the course of your session you shall receive all the aid which I
can give for the dispatch of public business, and all the information
necessary for your deliberations, of which the interests of our own
country and the confidence reposed in us by others will admit a
communication.

TH. JEFFERSON.

SPECIAL MESSAGES.

DECEMBER 6, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

The depredations which had been committed on the commerce of the United
States during a preceding war by persons under the authority of Spain
are sufficiently known to all. These made it a duty to require from that
Government indemnifications for our injured citizens. A convention was
accordingly entered into between the minister of the United States at
Madrid and the minister of that Government for foreign affairs, by which
it was agreed that spoliations committed by Spanish subjects and carried
into ports of Spain should be paid for by that nation, and that those
committed by French subjects and carried into Spanish ports should
remain for further discussion. Before this convention was returned
to Spain with our ratification the transfer of Louisiana by France to
the United States took place, an event as unexpected as disagreeable
to Spain. From that moment she seemed to change her conduct and
dispositions toward us. It was first manifested by her protest against
the right of France to alienate Louisiana to us, which, however, was
soon retracted and the right confirmed. Then high offense was manifested
at the act of Congress establishing a collection district on the Mobile,
although by an authentic declaration immediately made it was expressly
confined to our acknowledged limits; and she now refused to ratify the
convention signed by her own minister under the eye of his Sovereign
unless we would consent to alterations of its terms which would have
affected our claims against her for the spoliations by French subjects
carried into Spanish ports.

To obtain justice as well as to restore friendship I thought a special
mission advisable, and accordingly appointed James Monroe minister
extraordinary and plenipotentiary to repair to Madrid, and in
conjunction with our minister resident there to endeavor to procure a
ratification of the former convention and to come to an understanding
with Spain as to the boundaries of Louisiana. It appeared at once that
her policy was to reserve herself for events, and in the meantime to
keep our differences in an undetermined state. This will be evident
from the papers now communicated to you. After nearly five months of
fruitless endeavor to bring them to some definite and satisfactory
result, our ministers ended the conferences without having been able to
obtain indemnity for spoliations of any description or any satisfaction
as to the boundaries of Louisiana, other than a declaration that we had
no rights eastward of the Iberville, and that our line to the west was
one which would have left us but a string of land on that bank of the
river Mississippi. Our injured citizens were thus left without any
prospect of retribution from the wrongdoer, and as to boundary each
party was to take its own course. That which they have chosen to pursue
will appear from the documents now communicated. They authorize the
inference that it is their intention to advance on our possessions until
they shall be repressed by an opposing force. Considering that Congress
alone is constitutionally invested with the power of changing our
condition from peace to war, I have thought it my duty to await their
authority for using force in any degree which could be avoided. I have
barely instructed the officers stationed in the neighborhood of the
aggressions to protect our citizens from violence, to patrol within the
borders actually delivered to us, and not to go out of them but when
necessary to repel an inroad or to rescue a citizen or his property; and
the Spanish officers remaining at New Orleans are required to depart
without further delay. It ought to be noted here that since the late
change in the state of affairs in Europe Spain has ordered her cruisers
and courts to respect our treaty with her.

The conduct of France and the part she may take in the misunderstandings
between the United States and Spain are too important to be
unconsidered. She was prompt and decided in her declarations that our
demands on Spain for French spoliations carried into Spanish ports were
included in the settlement between the United States and France. She
took at once the ground that she had acquired no right from Spain, and
had meant to deliver us none eastward of the Iberville, her silence as
to the western boundary leaving us to infer her opinion might be against
Spain in that quarter. Whatever direction she might mean to give to
these differences, it does not appear that she has contemplated their
proceeding to actual rupture, or that at the date of our last advices
from Paris her Government had any suspicion of the hostile attitude
Spain had taken here; on the contrary, we have reason to believe that
she was disposed to effect a settlement on a plan analogous to what our
ministers had proposed, and so comprehensive as to remove as far as
possible the grounds of future collision and controversy on the eastern
as well as western side of the Mississippi.

The present crisis in Europe is favorable for pressing such a
settlement, and not a moment should be lost in availing ourselves of
it. Should it pass unimproved, our situation would become much more
difficult. Formal war is not necessary  it is not probable it will
follow; but the protection of our citizens, the spirit and honor of our
country require that force should be interposed to a certain degree it
will probably contribute to advance the object of peace,

But the course to be pursued will require the command of means which
it belongs to Congress exclusively to yield or to deny. To them I
communicate every fact material for their information and the documents
necessary to enable them to judge for themselves. To their wisdom, then,
I look for the course I am to pursue, and will pursue with sincere zeal
that which they shall approve.

TH. JEFFERSON.

DECEMBER 11, 1805.

 To the Senate of the United States :

I now lay before the Senate the several treaties and conventions
following, which have been entered into on the part of the United
States since their last session:

1. A treaty of peace and amity between the United States of America
and the Bashaw, Bey, and subjects of Tripoli, in Barbary.

2. A treaty between the United States and the Wyandot, Ottawa, Chippewa,
Munsee, and Delaware, Shawnee, and Potawatamie nations of Indians.

3. A treaty between the United States and the agents of the Connecticut
Land Companies on one part and the Wyandot, Ottawa, Chippewa, Munsee,
and Delaware, Shawnee, and Potawatamie nations of Indians.

4. A treaty between the United States and the Delawares, Potawatamies,
Miamis, Eel-rivers, and Weeas.

5. A treaty between the United States and the Chickasaw Nation of
Indians.

6. A treaty between the United States of America and the Cherokee
Indians.

7. A convention between the United States and the Creek Nation of
Indians; with the several documents necessary for their explanation.

The Senate having dissented to the ratification of the treaty with the
Creeks submitted to them at their last session, which gave a sum of
$200,000 for the country thereby conveyed, it is proper now to observe
that instead of that sum, which was equivalent to a perpetual annuity of
$12,000, the present purchase gives them an annuity of $12,000 for eight
years only and of $11,000 for ten years more, the payments of which
would be effected by a present sum of $130,000 placed at an annual
interest of 6 per cent. If from this sum we deduct the reasonable
value of the road ceded through the whole length of their country from
Ocmulgee toward New Orleans, a road of indispensable necessity to us,
the present convention will be found to give little more than the half
of the sum which was formerly proposed to be given. This difference is
thought sufficient to justify the presenting this subject a second time
to the Senate. On these several treaties I have to request that the
Senate will advise whether I shall ratify them or not.

TH. JEFFERSON.

DECEMBER 23, 1805.

 To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States :

The governor and presiding judge of the Territory of Michigan have made
a report to me of the state of that Territory, several matters in which
being within the reach of the legislative authority only, I lay the
report before Congress.

TH. JEFFERSON.

DECEMBER 31, 1805.

 To the House of Representatives of the United States :

I now communicate to the House of Representatives all the information
which the executive offices furnish on the subject of their resolution
of the 23d instant respecting the States indebted to the United States.

TH. JEFFERSON.