during the course of this year. West Florida was occupied by the United States troops, which elicited a remonstrance from Don Onis, the Spanish Minister, who insisted that this portion of the territory be surrendered to his Catholic Majesty. The direct and official relations between the two Governments had been broken off since the year 1808, during which period the territory alluded to had been reduced into the possession of the United States. The communication of the Spanish Minister further presented, that expeditions were fitting out on the Mississippi against New Spain, and demanded that no intercourse should be allowed between the United States and the revolted Colonies of the King of Spain. The communication of Don Onis was not only passionate and violent, but in extremely bad taste; to all of which the Secretary of State replied with becoming dignity and force. After a brief and pointed allusion to the treaty which a few years back had been entered into between Spain and the United States, providing indemnity for the unlawful seizure and condemnation of American vessels in the ports of Spain, he noticed the several points made in the communication of this restless and uncouth diplomatic functionary.

In reference to the occupation of West Florida, there was but one answer to be given,-that the United States claimed by cession, at a fair equivalent, the Province of Louisiana, as it was held by France prior to the treaty of 1763, extending from the Perdido, on the eastern side of the Mississippi, to the Bravo or Grande, on the western; to the territory within these limits the right of the United States was established by treaty.

In reference to the second demand,-that the troops that were being raised to fight in behalf of the revolted Provinces of Mexico should be arrested and tried,-Monroe denied that the men engaged in the expeditions alluded to were American citizens; that the expedition assembled by Toledo consisted of Spaniards and Frenchmen, living in the wilderness between the settlements of the United States and Spain, and not within the settled parts of Louisiana, and beyond the actual operation of our laws; and that this Government could not be called upon to surrender the inhabitants of Spain or of the Spanish Provinces, on the demand of Spain, such people not being punishable by the laws of the United States for acts committed beyond their jurisdiction, the case of pirates alone excepted. Yet the Secretary of State fully

and manfully met the question as far as it was within the operation of our laws and the principles of national jurisprudence, by assuring the Spanish Minister that whenever American citizens were detected in such enterprises they would be brought to immediate trial.

In reply to the third demand made by the Spanish Minister, the exclusion of the flag of the revolted Provinces from our ports, the Secretary of State justly and correctly contended that, in consequence of the unsettled state of many countries and repeated changes of the ruling authority in each, there being at the same time several competitors, and each party bearing its appropriate flag, the President thought it proper to give orders to the collectors not to make the flag of any vessel the criterion of its admission into the ports of the United States. This Government took no part in the convulsions which shook and agitated and destroyed other powers, and it was consistent not only with our interest, but with the received and just principles of public law, to admit into our ports vessels of all countries under whatever flag they sailed, piratical ones alone excepted. Whether the able and dignified State paper of Secretary Monroe satisfied or convinced the querulous Embassador or not is unknown; the Spanish difficulties were not agitated again for several years, when Monroe had been transferred from the cabinet to the Executive Chair. It is a fundamental policy of this Government, recognized and practiced from its earliest days, to maintain the strictest neutrality in reference to the quarrels of foreign nations, and of this the Spanish Government was assured in reference to her revolted Provinces in South America; yet there was no impropriety and no injustice in trading with them, be their political allegiance bound to a Spanish King or in transitu from despotism to freedom.* To the second session of the Fourteenth Con

1816. gress, which assembled on the 2d of December, the Chief Magistrate of the United States addressed his eighth and last Annual Message.

In directing the legislative attention to the state of the national finances, it was a subject of gratification to find that within the short period which had elapsed since the return of peace the revenue had largely exceeded the current demands upon the Treasury. It was estimated that during the year

* Bradford, p. 240; American State Papers, vol. xi. p. 54.

1816 the receipts of the revenue at the Treasury, including the balance at the end of the year and excluding the proceeds of loans and Treasury notes, would reach the sum of forty-seven millions of dollars. The amount, however, received was about thirty-eight millions, which left at the end of the year a surplus of about nine millions in the Treasury. The operations of the Treasury continued to be obstructed by difficulties arising from the condition of the national currency; the bank had as yet done but little good, which could be but temporary, though the President thought it had been organized under "auspices the most favorable."

The floating debt of the Treasury notes and temporary loans, was soon to be discharged. The aggregate of the funded debt did not exceed one hundred and ten millions of dollars. The annual expenses of the Government,-civil, military, and naval,—were estimated at less than twenty millions; the permanent revenue from all sources was estimated to exceed twenty-five millions.

It was upon this general view that the President thought there was only wanting to the fiscal prosperity of the Government, the restoration of a uniform medium of exchange.

The political views which the President at this time entertained were generally, though not always, approved by the Democratic party. The policy he recommended differed in some respects most materially from the views hitherto expressed. Protection to domestic manufactures was urged as deserving the especial guardianship of the Government. The bank was a favorite scheme; and, indeed, it did appear that many of the repudiated doctrines of the Federal school had no small occupancy in the mind of the Executive.

In view of an approaching retirement from the chief magistracy of the nation, Madison,-a beautiful and effective writer, always forcible, brilliant, and clear,-drew a striking and philosophic picture of the great duty and destiny of the country he had faithfully served and ardently loved; in which he exhibited the character of the American people in their devotion to true liberty and to the Constitution, which is its palladium. Sure presages that the destined career of the country will exhibit a Government pursuing the public good as its sole object, and regulating its means by the great principles consecrated by its charter, and by those moral principles to which they are so well allied; a Government which watches over the purity of elections, the freedom of speech and of the

press, the trial by jury, and the equal interdict against the encroachments and compacts between religion and State; which maintains inviolable the maxims of public faith, the security of persons and property, and encourages, in every authorized mode, that general diffusion of knowledge which guaranties to public liberty its permanency, and to those who possess the blessing the true enjoyment of it; a Government which avoids intrusion on the internal repose of other nations, and repels them from its own; which does justice to all nations with a readiness equal to the firmness with which it requires justice from them; and which, while it refines its domestic code from every ingredient not congenial with the precepts of our enlightened age, and the sentiments of a virtuous people, seeks by appeals to reason and by its liberal examples, to infuse into the law which governs the civilized world a spirit which may diminish the frequency or circumscribe the calamities of war, and meliorate the social and beneficent relations of peace; a Government, in a word, whose conduct, within. and without, may bespeak the most noble of all ambitions,that of promoting peace on earth and good-will to men. Such were the lessons of truth which Madison addressed to the last Congress which assembled under his administration; and long may they be remembered and appreciated by a free and virtuous people!

Under that extensive power of the free principles of the American Constitution, another State was added to the bright galaxy of the Union,-Indiana, which had formed a part of the Northwestern Territory till January, 1801, when it was, by act of Congress, erected into a Territorial government, with the usual power and privileges. Under this form of government it remained till 1816, when the population being sufficient, Congress passed a law authorizing the people to establish a State government. A constitution was 1816. adopted on the 29th of June, 1816, and on the 6th

of December was admitted into the Union as the nineteenth State.

It is a lesson of striking import, which should be referred to with pride and satisfaction, to observe the easy and undisturbed manner in which the State of Indiana was brought into the fellowship of union with the other States. Free from party feeling and sectional strife, Morrow, the Senator from Ohio, from the select committee to whom was referred the resolution for admitting the State of Indiana into the

Union, reported the simple preamble and resolution that,"Whereas, in pursuance of an act of the Congress of the United States, passed on the 19th day of April, 1816, entitled 'An act to enable the people of the Indiana Territory to form a State government, and for the admission of that State into the Union, the people of the said Territory did, on the 29th day of June in the present year, by a convention called for that purpose, form for themselves a constitution and State government; which constitution and State government, so formed, is republican, and in conformity to the principles of the Articles of Compact between the original States and the people, and the States in the territory northwest of the River Ohio, passed on the 23d day of July, 1787;'

therefore be it

"Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the State of Indiana shall be one, and is hereby declared to be one of the United States of America, and admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original States in all respects whatsoever."

This was all the legislation the constitution required. The only condition to be exacted was a republican form of government, which being complied with, Congress had no legitimate right to hesitate for a moment about its admission as a State, upon an equal footing with the other members of the Confederacy.*

The allusion in the preamble to the ordinance of 1787, was rendered essential for the obvious reason, that the law of Congress passed at that day prohibited slavery in what was known as the Northwest Territory.†

At this session the western portion of the Territory of Mississippi was erected into the new Territory of Alabama, over which Bibb, of Georgia, was appointed the first Governor, and authority given to the eastern portion to establish a constitution for the State of Mississippi.

The rapid development of the resources of the southwestern portion of the Confederacy, and the great profits likely to accrue from the cultivation of cotton, had revived the African

* Niles's Register, vol. xi. p. 256.

+ Journal of Congress, 1787.

Hild. Hist. of U. S., second series, vol. iii. p. 613; Niles's Register, vol. xi. p. 398.