left the same to make the most for its stockholders; not to regulate the currency of the country. Nor has it, as far as we are advised, been found to be greatly otherwise elsewhere. The national character given to the Bank of England, has not prevented excessive fluctuations in their currency, and it proved unable to keep off a suspension of specie payments, which lasted for nearly a quarter of a century. And why should we expect to be otherwise? A national institution, though deriving its charter from a different source than the state banks, is yet constituted upon the same principles; is conducted by men equally exposed to temptation; and is liable to the same disasters; with the additional disadvantage that its magnitude occasions an extent of confusion and distress which the mismanagement of smaller institutions could not produce. It can scarcely be doubted that the recent suspension of the United States Bank of Pennsylvania-of which the effects are felt not in that state alone, but over half the Union-had its origin in course of business commenced while it was a national institution; and ther is no good reason for supposing that the same consequences would not hae followed, had it still derived its powers from the general government. Itis in vain, when the influences and impulses are the same, to look for a dfference in conduct or results. By such creations, we do therefore but ncrease the mass of paper credit and paper currency, without checking their attendant evils and fluctuations. The extent of power and the efficac of organization which we give, so far from being beneficial, are in pracice postively injurious. They strengthen the chain of dependence throughout the Union, subject all parts more certainly to common disaster, and ind every bank more effectually, in the first instance, to those of our commercial cities, and, in the end, to a foreign power. In a word, I cannot bit believe that, with the full understanding of the operations of our banking system which experience has produced, public sentiment is not less oppoed to the creation of a national bank for purposes connected with currency anċcommerce, than for those connected with the fiscal operations of the government.

Yet the commerce and currency of the country are suffering evib from operations of the state banks which can not and ought not to be overboked. By their means we have been flooded with a depreciated paper, which it was evidently the design of the framers of the constitution to prevent, when they required Congress to "coin money and regulate the value of foreigncoins," and when they forbade the states to "coin money, emit bills of credt, make anything but gold and silver a tender in payment of debts," or "pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts." If they did not guard nore explicitly against the present state of things, it was because they could not have anticipated that the few banks then existing were to swell to an extent which would expel to so great a degree the gold and silver for which they had provided, from the channels of circulation, and fill them with a currency that defeats the object they had in view. The remedy for this must chiefly rest with the state from whose legislation it has sprung. No good that might accrue in a particular case from the exercise of powers not obviously conferred on the general government would authorize its interference, or justify a course that might, in the slightest degree, increase, at the expense of the state, the power of the federal authorities; nor do I doubt that the states will apply the remedy. Within the last few years, events have appealed to them too strongly to be disregarded. They have seen that the constitution, though theoretically adhered to, is subverted in practice; that while on the statute books there is no legal tender but gold and

silver, no law impairing the obligation, of contracts yet that, in 'point of fact, the privileges conferred on banking corporations have made their notes the currency of the country; that the obligations imposed by these notes are violated under the impulses of interest or convenience; and that the number and power of the persons connected with these corporations, or placed under their influence, give them a fearful weight when their interest is in opposition to the spirit of the constitution and laws. To the people it is immaterial whether these results are produced by open violations of the latter, or by the workings of a system of which the result is the same. An inflexible execution even of the existing statutes of most of the states would redress many evils now endured; would effectually show the banks the dangers of mismanagement which impunity encourages them to repeat; and would teach all corporations the useful lesson that they are the subjects of the law and the servants of the people. What is still wanting to effect hese objects must be sought in additional legislation; or, if that be inadeuate, in such farther constitutional grants or restrictions as may bring us hack into the path from which we have so widely wandered.

In the mean time, it is the duty of the general government to co-operate with the states, by a wise exercise of its constitutional powers, and the erforcement of its existing laws. The extent to which it may do so by father enactments I have already adverted to, and the wisdom of Congress may yet enlarge them. But, above all, it is incumbent upon us to hold eret the principles of morality and law, constantly executing our own contracs in accordance with the provisions of the constitution, and thus serving as arallying point by which our whole country may be brought back to thatsafe and honored standard.

Our people will not long be insensible to the extent of the burdens entailed upon them by the false system that has been operating on their sanguine, energetic, and industrious character; nor to the means necessary to extricate themselves from these embarrassments. The weight which presses upon large portion of the people and the states is an enormous debt, foreign and domestic. The foreign debt of our states, corporations, and men of busness, can scarcely be less than two hundred millions of dollars, requiring more than ten millions a year to pay the interest. This sum has to be paid out of the exports of the country, and must of necessity cut off imports to that extent, or plunge the country more deeply in debt from year to year. It is easy to see that the increase of this foreign debt must augment the annual demand on the exports to pay the interest, and to the same extent diminish the imports; and in proportion to the enlargement of the foreign debt, and the consequent increase of interest, must be the decrease of the import trade. In lieu of the comforts which it now brings us, we might have our gigantic banking institutions, and splendid, but in many instances profitless, ailroads and canals, absorbing to a great extent, in interest upon the capital borrowed to construct them, the surplus fruits of national industry for years to come, and securing to posterity no adequate return for the comforts which the labors of their hands might otherwise have secured. It is not by the increase of this debt that relief is to be sought, but in its diminution. Upon this point there is, I am happy to say, hope before us; not so much in the return of confidence abroad, which will enable the states to borrow more money, as .in a change of public feeling at home, which prompts our people to pause in their career, and think of the means by which debts are to be paid before they are contracted. If we would escape

embarrassment, public and private, we must cease to run in debt, except for objects of necessity, or such as will yield a certain return. Let the faith of the states, corporations, and individuals, already pledged, be kept with the most punctilious regard. It is due to our national character, as well as to justice, that this should on the part of each be a fixed principle of conduct. But it behooves us all to be more chary in pledging it hereafter. By ceasing to run in debt, and applying the surplus of our crops and incomes to the discharge of existing obligations, buying less and selling more, and managing all affairs, public and private, with strict economy and frugality, we shall see our country soon recover from a temporary oppression, arising not from natural and permanent causes, but from those I have enumerated, and advance with renewed vigor in her career of prosperity.

Fortunately for us, at this moment, when the balance of trade is greatly against us, and the difficulty of meeting it enhanced by the disturbed state of our money affairs, the bounties of Providence have come to relieve us from the consequences of past errors. A faithful application of the immense results of the labors of the last season will afford partial relief for the present, and perseverance in the same course will, in due season, accomplish the rest. We have had full experience, in times past, of the extraordinary results which can, in this respect, be brought about, in a short period, by the united and well-directed efforts of a community like ours. Our surplus profits, the energy and industry of our population, and the wonderful advantages which Providence has bestowed upon our country, in its climate, its various productions, indispensable to other nations, will, in due time, afford abundant means to perfect the most useful of those objects, for which the states have been plunging themselves of late in embarrassment and debt, without imposing on ourselves or our children such fearful burdens.

But let it be indelibly engraved on our minds, that relief is not to be found in expedients. Indebtedness cannot be lessened by borrowing more money, or by changing the form of the debt. The balance of trade is not to be turned in our favor by creating new demands upon us abroad. Our currency cannot be improved by the creation of new banks, or more issues from those which now exist. Although these devices sometimes appear to give temporary relief, they almost invariably aggravate the evil in the end. It is only by retrenchment and reform, by curtailing public and private expenditures, by paying our debts, and by reforming our banking system, that we are to expect effectual relief, security for the future, and an enduring prosperity. In shaping the institutions and policy of the general government so as to promote, as far as it can with its limited powers, these important ends, you may rely on my most cordial co-operation.

That there should have been, in the progress of recent events, doubts in many quarters, and in some a heated opposition to every change, cannot surprise us. Doubts are properly attendant on all reform; and it is peculiarly in the nature of such abuses as we are now encountering, to seek to perpetuate their power by means of the influence which they have been permitted to acquire. It is their result, if not their object, to gain for the few an ascendancy over the many, by securing to them the monopoly of the currency, the medium through which most of the wants of mankind are supplied to produce throughout society a chain of dependence which leads all classes to look to privileged associations for the means of speculation and extravagance-to nourish, in preference to the manly virtues that give dignity to human nature, a craving desire for luxurious enjoyment and

sudden wealth, which renders those who seek them dependent on those who supply them-to substitute for republican simplicity and economical habits a sickly appetite for effeminate indulgence, and an imitation of that reckless extravagance which impoverished and enslaved the industrious people of foreign lands; and at last to fix upon us, instead of those political rights the acquisition of which was alike the object and supposed reward of our revolutionary struggle, a system of exclusive privileges conferred by partial legislation. To remove the influences which had thus gradually grown up among us to deprive them of their deceptive advantages-to test them by the light of wisdom and truth-to oppose the force which they concentrate in their support-all this was necessarily the work of time, even among a people so enlightened and pure as that of the United States. In most other countries, perhaps, it could only have been accomplished through that series of revolutionary movements which are too often found necessary to effect any great and radical reform; but it is the crowning merit of our institutions, that they create and nourish, in the vast majority of! our people, a disposition and a power peaceably to remedy abuses which have elsewhere caused the effusion of rivers of blood, and the sacrifice of thousands of the human race. The result thus far is most honorable to the self-denial, the intelligence, and the patriotism of our citizens; it justifies the confident hope that they will carry through the reform which has been so well begun, and that they will go still farther than they have yet gone in illustrating the important truth, that a people as free and enlightened as ours, will, whenever it becomes necessary, show themselves to be indeed capable of self-government by voluntarily adopting appropriate remedies for every abuse, and submitting to temporary sacrifices, however great, to insure their temporary welfare.

My own exertions for the fartherance of these desirable objects have been bestowed throughout my official career with a zeal that is nourished by ardent wishes for the welfare of my country, and by an unlimited reliance on the wisdom that marks its ultimate decision on all great and controverted questions. Impressed with the solemn obligations imposed upon me by the constitution, desirous also of laying before my fellow citizens, with whose confidence and support I have been so highly honored, such measures as appear to me conducive to their prosperity, and anxious to submit to their fullest consideration the grounds upon which my opinions are formed, I have on this, as on preceding occasions, freely offered my views on those points of domestic policy that seem, at the present time, most prominently to require the action of the government. I know that they will receive from Congress that full and able consideration which the importance of the subjects merits, and I can repeat the assurance heretofore made, that I shall cheerfully and readily co-operate with you in every measure that will tend to promote the welfare of the Union.

FOURTH ANNUAL MESSAGE.

DECEMBER 5, 1840.

Fellow Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:

OUR devout gratitude is due to the Supreme Being for having graciously continued to our beloved country, through the vicissitudes of another year,

the invaluable blessings of health, plenty and peace. Seldom has this favored land been so generally exempted from the ravages of disease, or the labor of the husbandman more amply rewarded; and never before have our relations with other countries been placed on a more favorable basis than that which they so happily occupy at this critical conjuncture in the affairs of the world. A rigid and persevering abstinence from all interference with the domestic and political relations of other states, alike due to the genius and distinctive character of our government and to the principles by which it is directed; a faithful observance, in the management of our foreign relations, of the practice of speaking plainly, dealing justly, and requiring truth and justice in return, as the best conservative of the peace of nations; a strict impartiality in our manifestations of friendship, in the commercial privileges we concede, and those we require from others; these, accompanied by a disposition as prompt to maintain, in every emergency, our own rights, as we are from principle averse to the invasion of those of others, have given to our country and government a standing in the great family of nations, of which we have just cause to be proud, and the advantages of which are experienced by our citizens throughout every portion of the earth to which their enterprise and adventurous spirit may carry them. Few, if any, remain insensible to the value of our friendship, or ignorant of the terms on which it can be acquired, and by which it can alone be preserved.

A series of questions of long standing, difficult in their adjustment and important in their consequences, in which the rights of our citizens and the honor of the country were deeply involved, have, in the course of a few years, (the most of them during the successful administration of my immediate predecessor,) been brought to a satisfactory conclusion; and the most important of those remaining are, I am happy to believe, in a fair way of being speedily and satisfactorily adjusted.

With all the powers of the world our relations are those of honorable peace. Since your adjournment, nothing serious has occurred to interrupt or threaten this desirable harmony. If clouds have lowered above the other hemisphere, they have not cast their portentous shadows upon our happy shores. Bound by no entangling alliances, yet linked by a common nature and interest with the other nations of mankind, our aspirations are for the preservation of peace, in whose solid and civilizing triumphs all may participate with a generous emulation. Yet it behooves us to be prepared for any event, and to be always ready to maintain those just and enlightened principles of national intercourse for which this government has ever contended. In the shock of contending empires, it is only by assuming a resolute bearing, and clothing themselves with defensive armor, that neutral nations can maintain their independent rights.

The excitement which grew out of the territorial controversy between the United States and Great Britain having in a great measure subsided, it is hoped that a favorable period is approaching for its final settlement. Both governments must now be convinced of the dangers with which the question is fraught; and it must be their desire, as it is their interest, that this perpetual cause of irritation should be removed as speedily as practicable. In my last annual message you were informed that a proposition for a commission of exploration and survey promised by Great Britain had been received, and that a counter-project, including also a provision for the certain and final adjustment of the limits in dispute, was then before the British government for its consideration. The answer of that government, accom