I earnestly advise you to avoid the practice, by far too prevalent, of local and special legislation. The great evil sought to be remedied by our present Constitution was that of monopolies and of class legislation. If difficulties arise let general laws be amended or passed, but let our policy be opposed to special enactments. No rule can be more equitable than that of laying down general laws and requiring all alike to regulate their conduct by them. Special laws interfere with the administration of justice, operate unequally upon our citizens, engage the time and energies of the Legislature, and serve to confound rather than to protect the rights of the people.

Our financial condition presents some interesting facts which I doubt not you will carefully consider.

The receipts of the treasury from all sources, during the fiscal year ending with September 30th, 1860, were....

The balance in Treasury on Oct. 1, 1859, was

The total payments from the Treasury during the fiscal year, were..

Leaving a balance in the Treasury on
Oct. 1, 1860, of...

$15,538,263.09 1,909,942.04

$17,448,205.13

14,148,667.64

$3,299,537.49

The Funded Debt of the State on October 1,

1860, was, of General Fund debt......... $6,505,654.37

Of Canal debt....

Making a total of...

27,064,584.48

$33,570,238.85

The stock of Funded Canal Debt outstanding on September 30, was authorized by the Constitution, as follows, viz:

When, in any year, the surplus revenues of the canals do not exceed the sum of seventeen hundred thousand dollars, the Constitution requires that the interest on the Old Canal Debt, amounting in the last fiscal year, to five hundred and fifty-seven thousand six hundred and seventy-seven dollars, shall first be paid therefrom, and the balance, which last year was one million one hundred and eleven thousand nine hundred and thirty-four dollars sixty-one cents, shall go to the Sinking Fund established by Article 7, section 1, to redeem the principal.

The balance of $966,629.28 due for annual interest on the Canal Debt alone, was, last year, paid by anticipating the income of the direct tax, and will necessarily continue to be paid in the same manner so long as the surplus revenues are insufficient.

If the surplus revenues of the canals shall enable the Commissioners to set apart annually, to this Sinking Fund the whole sum of one million seven hundred thousand dollars, it will form a fund sufficient to extinguish the debt of 1846, amounting to $10,721,998.99 by the first day of January, 1867. This portion of the public debt is to be immediately reduced, by the payment of nearly one million dollars thereof due this day, the money for which is in the Treas

ury.

The Legislature of last winter authorized a levy of one and one-eighth of a mill tax to pay the interest on loans, overdrafts and interest on overdrafts, but the money being needed before the taxes could be collected, the Commissioners of the Canal Fund, under authority of chapter 335, of the laws of 1855, anticipated the collection of so much of it by borrowing the sum of one million two hundred thousand dollars. This sum, which forms in the above table a part of the debt of $13,200,000, will, with the accrued interest, be paid from the proceeds of that levy on the 1st of January next.

There was, on the 30th of September last, of ascertained canal claims unpaid, the sum of $580,653.84, consisting of drafts and certificates of Canal Commissioners, and of awards for land damages made by the Canal Appraisers. Of this sum $187,500 have been or will be paid out of the Floating Debt loan; and the remainder, $393,153.84 from the proceeds of the direct tax raised and to be raised under chapter 213, of the Laws of 1860. There are unascertained claims outstanding for the 15 per cent. withheld on contracts not yet completed. When due these will also be payable from the taxes as above.

Under the provisions of chapter 105, of the laws of 1857, the Contracting Board placed the ordinary repairs of the canals under contract to the lowest bidder. The aggregate annual cost under these contracts is $259,372. Certain portions of the repairs, such as rebuilding locks and aqueducts and other important structures, are excepted, and it is not, therefore, expected that that sum will cover the entire cost of the ordinary repairs. Although there are some evils consequent upon this system, yet its advantages are so manifest that, for the present at least, it should be continued.

Assuming the correctness of the estimates of the State Engineer, the sum of six hundred thousand dollars, already raised on the credit of the half mill tax and applicable to

that object, will complete ready for navigation by the first of May next, all the work under contract on the 1st of October last, thus opening the enlarged water channel of seven feet by seventy, throughout the entire line of the Erie, Oswego, and Cayuga and Seneca canals.

Although enlarged at too great a cost, and the completion quite too long delayed, it is nevertheless a matter of much congratulation that the end approaches, and that no more laws imposing taxes for construction will be required, and ere you will have concluded your labors the present session, New York will possess, finished and complete, a system of internal works unequaled both for capacity and extent in this or any country.

The Constitution disposes of the revenues derived from the canals, annually, in the following order and for the purposes designated:

1st. To pay the expenses of collection, superintendence and ordinary repairs of the canals, which, during the fiscal year ending with September 30, amounted to $726,976.03.

2d. To pay the interest and provide a Sinking Fund, to pay the principal of the canal debt as it existed on the 1st of June, 1846, $1,700,000.

3d. To pay the interest and provide a Sinking Fund to pay the principal of the General Fund Debt, $350,000.

4th. To pay the interest and provide a Sinking Fund to pay, in eighteen years, the canal debt of twelve million dollars, contracted to enlarge and complete the canals, viz:

Of interest

Of Sinking Fund. .. ..

$710,000.00
406,242.65

$1,116,242.65

5th. For the support of government, $200,000.

b Const. 1846, art. 7, §§ 1, 2, 3, am. 1854.

6th. To pay the interest and provide a Sinking Fund to pay, in eighteen years, the Floating Debt loan of $2,500,000, contracted under authority of art. 7, sec. 12 of the Constitution, and chapter 271, laws of 1859, $288,888.88.

7th. The remainder to be expended each year upon the canals, until they are completed, and after that as the Legislature may direct.

From this brief statement of the requirements of the Constitution, as they affect the direction of the canal revenues, it will be seen that a gross sum of $4,382,107.56 was necessary the past fiscal year to meet all its demands. A reference to this will also show that the principal of the canal debt will be reduced to the extent of two million two hundred thousand dollars by the 1st of January next, leaving due of that debt $24,864,584.48, after that date.

It will appear from the Auditor's annual
report of the present year, that on the
30th of September, 1859, there was, in the
Treasury, and invested, belonging to the
Canal Fund, the sum of...
Received during the past fiscal year..

$1,403,166.34

7,947,166.15

$9,350,332.49

The payments during the year for all purposes pertaining to the Canal Fund, have been...

6,975,314.73

Leaving a balance to the credit of the
Canal Fund on the 30th of Septem-
ber of

Of this balance there was on deposit in banks, to the credit of the Treasurer on account of the Canal Fund...

$2,375,017.76

$2,266,385.05