On 22 January 1828 President Adams sent this special message:
To the Senate of the United States:
I transmit to the Senate, for their consideration and
advice, articles of agreement signed at the Creek Agency
on the 15th of November last by Thomas L. McKenney
and John Crowell in behalf of the United States and by
the Little Prince and other chiefs and headmen of the
Creek Nation, with a supplementary article concluded
by the said John Crowell with the chiefs and headmen
of the nation in general council convened on the 3rd instant,
embracing a cession by the Creek Nation of all the
remnant of their lands within the State of Georgia.
Documents connected with the negotiation of the treaty
and the instructions under which it was effected
are also communicated to the Senate.1
President John Quincy Adams wrote this in his Memoirs on January 23:
23rd. Dr. Watkins came in behalf of Governor Barbour,
to enquire if there was a prospect that I would
nominate him for the mission to Great Britain,
and said that Mr. Clay had induced him to expect it.
I told the Doctor that it would be exceedingly
agreeable to me to gratify any wish of Governor Barbour,
but that I should make no nomination for that mission now,
nor probably till the close of the present session,
and that I had induced expectations in another
quarter which I could not disappoint.
Mr. Lincoln came with Mr. McCoy, a Baptist
missionary among the Indians, with whom
I had some conversation upon the subject of that
unfortunate race of hunters, who are themselves
hunted by us like a partridge upon the mountains.
Mr. McCoy wishes the Government of the United States
to assume the protection of them and assign to them
a territory where they may remain unmolested.
I observed that the Secretary of War had proposed
a plan for the government of them at the last
session of Congress, which had not been acted upon.
I observed that our engagements with the Indians,
and those among ourselves in relation to their lands,
were inconsistent with each other.
We had thus contracted with Georgia to extinguish
the Indian title to all the lands within the Creeks and
Cherokees that they should hold their lands forever.
We have talked of benevolence and humanity,
and preached them into civilization, but none of
this benevolence is felt where the right of the Indian
comes in collision with the interest of the white man.
The Cherokees in Georgia have now been making a written
Constitution, but this imperium in imperio is impracticable,
and in the instances of the New York Indians removed
to Green Bay, and of the Cherokees removed to the
Territory of Arkansas, we have scarcely given them
time to build their wigwams before we are called upon
by our own people to drive them out again.
My own opinion is that the most benevolent course
towards them would be to give them the rights and subject
them to the duties of citizens, as a part of our own people.
But even this the people of the States within which
they are situated will not permit.2
President Adams on January 28 sent this message:
To the Senate of the United States:
I transmit to the Senate‑
1. A treaty concluded at the Butte des Morts, on Fox River,
in the Territory of Michigan, on 11th of August, 1827,
between Lewis Cass and Thomas L. McKenney,
commissioners of the United States, and the chiefs
and headmen of the Chippewa, Menomonie,
and Winnebago tribes of Indians.
2. A treaty concluded at St. Joseph, in the Territory
of Michigan, on the 19th of September, 1827, between
Lewis Cass, commissioner of the United States, and the
chiefs and warriors of the Potawatamie tribe of Indians.
Upon which treaties I request the advice of the Senate.
The instructions and other documents relating to the
negotiation of them are herewith communicated.3
The Niles’ Register in the summer of 1827 advocated another protective tariff,
and on 31 January 1828 United States Senator Martin Van Buren and Representatives
Silas Wright of New York and James Buchanan of Pennsylvania introduced tariffs
to punish New England and help the South, assuming they would fail.
On 6 February 1828 President Adams wrote in his Memoirs:
6th. The Cabinet meeting was held
from one to four o’clock.
Present all the members.
I first referred to their consideration a letter I received
this morning from John Forsyth, Governor of Georgia,
enclosing a printed pamphlet containing a Constitution
of the Cherokee Nation of Indians, regularly formed
by an Assembly of Chiefs last July; in all essential
points resembling the Constitution of our States,
establishing a legislative power in two branches,
an elective Chief Magistrate, and a judiciary
of a Supreme and subordinate Courts.
The Governor of Georgia considers this as violating
the article of the Constitution of the United States
that no new State shall be formed within any of
the separate States, or by uniting parts of different States;
and he calls upon me to be informed what the
General Administration intend to do in this case.
I observed that I did not consider the article of the
Constitution cited by the Governor of Georgia
as applicable to the case, supposing its operation must
necessarily be limited to the parties of the compact;
but I thought that the Indians could not by any formation
of a Constitution change the character of their relations
towards the United States, or establish an independent
civilized government within the Territories of the Union.
There was some discussion upon this point,
and Mr. Clay inclined to the opinion that the principle which
I assumed did bring the subject within the article of the
Constitution to which the Governor of Georgia appeals.
He also thought that the right of the Cherokees
to form a Constitution might depend
upon the nature of the Constitution itself.
He did not view it as a necessary consequence that their
Constitution must be incompatible with our territorial rights.
I therefore requested the members of the Administration
to take and examine the papers with a view to
an early meeting to determine what shall be done.
The other and proper object of the present meeting,
was the answer to be given to Mr. Vaughan’s note,
upon the complaint of Lieutenant Holland, for the seizure
of the Africans by the Collector at Key West;
the instructions to be given to the Collector; the course
to be pursued with regard to the claim for the salvage,
and the probable contingency that a Spanish claimant
may hereafter appear of the wrecked slave-trader.
I never knew a transaction entangled
with so many controvertible questions.
After long discussion, which terminated more
in passing from one difficulty to another than
in settling any one of them, I concluded—
1. That the answer to Mr. Vaughan should explicitly
deny all right of complaint by Lieutenant Holland for
the seizure of the negroes, and rather waive the claim
of the Collector to payment of duties on the goods;
but the claim to salvage to be explicitly stated to him.
An offer of time to be made within which Lieutenant Holland
may bring the question of his right to the negroes
before the competent judicial tribunal within the
United States, but with information that the men,
being emancipated by our laws, must within a reasonable
time be sent to the colony of Liberia in Africa.
Corresponding instructions are to be given
to the Collector at Key West, and Mr. Southard
is to be making all necessary preparations to provide,
without unnecessary delay, for the transportation
of these people from Key West to the Colony.4
On 3 March 1828 President John Quincy Adams sent this message:
To the Senate of the United States:
In compliance with a resolution of the Senate of the
3rd of January last, requesting the communication of
information in my possession relative to alleged aggression
on the rights of citizens of the United States by persons
claiming authority under the government of the Province of
New Brunswick, I communicate a report from the Secretary
of State, with a copy of that of the special agent mentioned
in my message at the commencement of the present session
of Congress as having been sent to visit the spot where the
cause of complaint had occurred to ascertain the state of the
facts, and the result of whose inquiries I then promised to
communicate to Congress when it should be received.
The Senate are requested to receive this communication
as the fulfillment of that engagement; and in making it
I deem it proper to notice with just acknowledgment the
liberality with which the minister of His Britannic Majesty
residing here and the government of the Province
of New Brunswick have furnished the agent
of the United States with every facility for
the attainment of the information which it
was the object of his mission to procure.
Considering the exercise of exclusive territorial jurisdiction
upon the grounds in controversy by the government of
New Brunswick in the arrest and imprisonment of
John Baker as incompatible with the mutual understanding
existing between the Governments of the United States
and of Great Britain on this subject, a demand has been
addressed to the provincial authorities through the minister
of Great Britain for the release of that individual from prison,
and of indemnity to him for his detention.
In doing this it has not been intended to maintain
the regularity of his own proceedings or of those
with whom he was associated, to which they were
not authorized by any sovereign authority of this country.
The documents appended to the report of the agent
being original papers belonging to the files of the
Department of State, a return of them is requested
when the Senate shall have no further use for them.5
On March 7 President John Quincy Adams sent this message:
To the Senate of the United States:
The resolution of the Senate of the 28th ultimo,
requesting me to cause to be laid before the Senate
all papers which might be in the Department of War
relating to the treaty concluded at the Butte des Morts,
on Fox River, between Lewis Cass and Thomas L.
McKenney, commissioners on the part of the United States,
and the Chippewa, Menomonie, and Winnebago tribes
of Indians, having been referred to the Secretary of War,
the report of that officer thereon is herewith enclosed.
The papers therein referred to were all
transmitted to the Senate with the treaty.
Before that event, however, a petition and several other
papers had been addressed directly to me, in behalf of
certain Indians originally and in part still residing within the
State of New York, objecting to the ratification of the treaty,
as affecting injuriously their rights and interests.
The treaty was itself withheld from the Senate until it was
understood at the War Department and by me that by the
consent of the persons representing the New York Indians
their objections were withdrawn, as by one of them,
the Reverend Eleazer Williams, I was personally assured.
Those papers, however, addressed directly to me,
and which have not been upon the files of the
War Department, are now transmitted to the Senate.6
Also on 7 March 1828 President Adams wrote in his Memoirs:
7th. Stephen Fitch, a man having the appearance
and manners of a Quaker, came and told me that
he had come hither with Red Jacket and two others
of the New York Seneca and Oneida Indians to complain
of wrongs in regard to the purchase of their lands;
that he himself had been extremely anxious to see me,
and although he had been advised not to come,
and told that I should probably not receive him,
he had yet determined to make the experiment,
and Red Jacket was equally desirous
to see his father the President.
I told him that I had been glad to see him and would
with equal pleasure see Red Jacket; but that any
complaint or representation that they had to make with
regard to the lands must be to the Department of War.
I had this day sent to the Senate message No. 23,
with all the papers addressed directly to me,
relating to these complaints of the New York Indians.
I sent them in answer to a resolution of the Senate
requesting all the papers relating to the treaty made by
Governor Cass and T. L. McKenney at the Butte des Morts
last summer with the Winnebago and Menomonee Indians,
which is now before the Senate.
The direct access to the President in all their
transactions with this Government, and especially
in the representation of all their grievances,
they take greatly to heart, and with much more reason
than the white hunters—that is, office-hunters.
This access I have never denied to anyone of any color,
and in my opinion of the duties of a Chief Magistrate
of the United States, it ought never to be denied.
The place-hunters are not pleasant visitors
or correspondents, and they consume
an enormous disproportion of time.
To this personal importunity the President ought
not to be subjected; but it is perhaps not possible
to relieve him from it without secluding the man
from the intercourse of the people more than
comports with the nature of our institutions.7
President Adams wrote in his Memoirs on 8 March 1828:
About two o’clock Mr. Clay came and presented
to me Don Joaquin Campino, who delivered his
letter of credence as Minister Extraordinary
and Plenipotentiary from the republic of Chile.
He addressed me in a very few words in Spanish,
which were explained to me by his interpreter,
and which comprised only a small part of
the speech which he had delivered in writing.
The speech was complimentary to the United States
and personally to me, expressing the grateful
acknowledgment of the Chilean Government that the
United States had been the first power which had recognized
the independence of Chile and to send them a Minister.
In return it observed that he was the first Minister
ever sent by Chile to a foreign power; apologized
for the delay of this reciprocation; expressed the
satisfaction of his Government with the conduct of
Mr. Allen during his residence among them, and also
with that of Mr. Larned, now the Chargé d’Affaires;
finally, expressed the earnest wish of Mr. Campino that
while residing here he might be instrumental in cementing
the friendly relations between the two Governments.
I answered briefly every part of his speech
as if he had delivered it, first expressing my regret
at not being able to speak to him in his own language.
I desired his interpreter to say that the people and
Government of the United States had witnessed with
deep and constant sympathy the arduous struggle
of the people of Chile for national independence.
They had taken pleasure in being the first among the
nations to recognize that event, and in sending the first
diplomatic mission which had ever been received in Chile.
I desired him in writing to his Government to say
that I had learned with the highest satisfaction that
our late Minister, Mr. Allen, had so conducted himself
during his residence as to have secured the approbation
of the Chilean Government; and that our present
Chargé d’Affaires, Mr. Larned, had also made himself
acceptable, as I hoped and trusted he would continue to do.
For the sentiments of personal respect and kindness
tendered from the President of Chile to myself,
I requested him to say that I received them with much
sensibility and with a cordial and reciprocal return.
I joined also very sincerely in the wish of Mr. Campino
that his mission might contribute to improve the
intercourse and friendly relations between the two
countries; that his reception and treatment here might
render his residence among us as agreeable as possible,
and that on finally returning home he might carry
with him an opinion of our country still more
favorable than that with which he had come….
Mr. Bailey of Massachusetts came and passed
a couple of hours with me this evening.
His object was to make a proposition in the first instance not
very distinctly disclosed, but which I chose immediately to
understand, and to meet in a manner altogether explicit.
He ultimately informed me that
it had been suggested to him by Mr. Webster.
He said that the election of Governor and of the
Legislature of Kentucky would take place next August;
that the great and decisive struggle of the parties
would be at that election, which would decide the
fate of the subsequent election of Electors of
President and Vice-President in November.
These Electors, by a recent Act of the Legislature,
are to be chosen by a general ticket throughout the State.
Immense exertions are making by the opposition
party to carry this election of August.
They spend much money, and there is an indispensable
necessity of counteracting them in the same manner.
Now, Mr. Bailey’s question to me was, whether I had a sum,
from five to ten thousand dollars, that I was disposed to
give without enquiring how it would be disposed of,
but which would be employed to secure the election of
General Metcalf as Governor of Kentucky next August.
I answered that there was a sentiment expressed
first by the late Mr. Lowndes, much repeated since by
General Jackson and his friends, though not practiced
upon by them, but hitherto invariably observed by me,
that the Presidency of the United States
was an office neither to be sought nor declined.
To pay money for securing it, directly or indirectly,
was in my opinion incorrect in principle.
This was my first and decisive reason
for declining such a contribution.
A second reason was that I could not even command
a sum of five thousand dollars without involving myself
in debt for it; and a third was, that if I once departed
from the principle and gave money, there was no rule,
either of expediency or of morality, which would enable me
to limit the amount of expenditure which I ought to incur.
I could certainly appropriate half a million dollars
to the same object without transcending any law,
and with as much propriety as I could devote
five thousand to the election of a Governor of Kentucky.
Mr. Bailey seemed surprised to hear that I could not
raise five thousand dollars without borrowing, and said
Mr. Webster had told him I had a large sum—fifty or
sixty thousand dollars—lying dead in a bank at Boston.
I told Mr. Bailey candidly the state of my affairs;
that the expenses of my family and the support of my three
sons now absorb very nearly the whole of my public salary;
that all my real estate in Quincy and Boston is mortgaged
for the payment of my debts; that the income of my whole
private estate is less than six thousand dollars a year,
and that I am paying at least two thousand
of that for interest upon my debt.
Finally, that upon going out of office in one year
from this time, destitute of all means of acquiring property,
it will only be by the sacrifice of that which I now
possess that I shall be able to support my family.
I note as a remarkable incident this proposition to me
to contribute five or ten thousand dollars to carry the
election of a Governor and Legislature of Kentucky.
The mode of expenditure is by the circulation
of newspapers, pamphlets, and handbills.
It is practiced by all parties, and its tendency
is to render elections altogether venal.
The coincidence of Mr. Clark’s proposal that I should write
a pamphlet in answer to Ingham’s slanders about my
accounts, with Mr. Clay’s opinion that Mr. Webster,
if he insists upon it, should be appointed to the mission to
Great Britain, and with Mr. Webster’s proposal that I should
sport five or ten thousand dollars upon the election of a
Governor of Kentucky, is perhaps accidental; but in the
operations of parties objects of great dissimilarity to each
other are often connected by imperceptible links together.8
On 30 April 1828 President John Quincy Adams sent this message:
To the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States:
In the month of December last 121 African negroes
were landed at Key West from a Spanish slave-trading
vessel stranded within the jurisdiction of the
United States while pursued by an armed
schooner in His Britannic Majesty’s service.
The collector of the customs at Key West took possession
of these persons, who were afterwards delivered over to
the marshal of the Territory of East Florida, by whom they
were conveyed to St. Augustine, where they still remain.
Believing that the circumstances under which they
have been cast upon the compassion of the country
are not embraced by the provisions of the act of Congress
of 3rd March, 1819, or of the other acts prohibiting
the slave trade, I submit to the consideration of Congress
the expediency of a supplementary act directing and
authorizing such measures as may be necessary for
removing them from the territory of the United States and
for fulfilling toward them the obligations of humanity.9
On May 19 both houses of Congress passed the “Tariff of Abominations”
which put about a 40% tax on 92% of imported goods such as manufactured
textiles, glass, ironware, wool, hemp, and shipbuilding materials.
The wool tariff helped sheep-raisers like Van Buren.
The House passed the bill without amendments,
but the Senate amended it to please New England.
Adams designed it to look like he was against protectionism,
but he signed the amended bill.
Jacksonians wanted the bill to help them get votes from the swing states
while ignoring the concerns of the Jacksonian South and Adams’ New England.
This is an early example of political triangulation that
President Bill Clinton would use in the 1990s.
On May 24 the Congress passed the Reciprocity Act to eliminate duties
discriminating against goods from cooperative nations such as Prussia and Austria.
This is what President Adams wrote in his Memoirs for 28 May 1828:
28th. I took this morning a ride of about fourteen miles,
but found my horse so often tripping as to give me
a significant warning of the probable consequences
of indulging myself in this exercise, which however
is otherwise precisely that which I need.
Its effect is to fatigue me, so that for an hour or two
from about noon and again about as long in the evening,
I am overpowered with lassitude,
but the remainder of the day am fresh and vigorous.
Mr. Southard called upon me after breakfast
upon business both of the War and Navy Departments.
The first object requiring attention is the instructions to
Governor Cass and Pierre Menard, the Commissioners for
treating with the Winnebago and other tribes of Indians,
upon the purport of which we agreed.
I enquired when the sloop of war bound to the
Mediterranean would be ready to sail;
and he said in not less than a month.
Mr. Williams, Senator from Mississippi, and Mr. McKee,
member of the House of Representatives from Alabama,
called to take leave and to urge the appointment of
engineers for a survey in which their States have
a special interest; also for the appointment of
a person whom they recommended as an Agent
to accompany the Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians
intending to remove west of the Mississippi.
I desired them to see Mr. Southard on the subject,
assuring them that their wishes should be attended to.
Mr. Brent was here, and I requested him
to send me the papers relating to Commodore Rodgers’s
negotiation with the Capitan Pacha;
also forms of commissions for treating with Oriental
powers and copies, printed or manuscript, of any treaties
between European powers and the Ottoman Porte.
And I requested him to call here tomorrow morning
with George Watkins, whom I propose to employ
as the confidential clerk to assist me
in the transaction of this business.
General Harrison called to express his satisfaction
at receiving the appointment of Envoy Extraordinary and
Minister Plenipotentiary to the republic of Colombia, and to
take leave, being on the point of departure for Cincinnati.
He proposes to embark for his destination in the autumn,
when the unhealthy season of that region will be over.10
On 3 June 1828 President John Quincy Adams wrote in his Memoirs:
Mr. Bradley, the Assistant Postmaster-General,
was here and gave me further information respecting
the delinquency of the late Postmaster at Philadelphia.
He thinks the defalcation will be of
more than twenty-five thousand dollars.
He also says that he believes that S. D. Ingham
has a deed of defeasance releasing him from
responsibility upon his bond as surety to Bache.
The mass of evidence shows extraordinary indulgence
to Bache; a high probability that it will result in a heavy
loss of money to the public, and the cause of which is
clearly traceable to Mr. McLean’s political connections
with Ingham, and with Vice-President Calhoun,
of whom Ingham is the servile tool.
The conduct of Mr. McLean has been
that of deep and treacherous duplicity.
With solemn protestations of personal friendship for me,
and of devotion to the cause of the Administration,
he has been three years using the extensive patronage
of his office in undermining it among the people.
With the names of Harry Lee, of Charles K. Gardner,
of Mower, of Magee, of Reesides, and others,
Mr. Bradley related to me transactions
which can leave no doubt upon my mind.
McLean is a double-dealer.
“His words are smoother than butter,
but war is in his heart.”11
President Adams wrote in his Memoirs on 4 June 1828:
At one o’clock Mr. Clay came and introduced
Mr. Rumpff, the Minister Plenipotentiary from
the Hanseatic cities to an audience for taking leave.
He addressed me in a short speech, as usual upon
such occasions, expressive of the friendship and
good will of the Governments of the three cities of
Lubeck, Bremen, and Hamburg towards the United States,
and of his own grateful sense of the kind reception and
friendly treatment that he had experienced in this country.
He spoke in French, and I
answered him in the same language.
I desired him, upon his return to his constituents, to assure
them of the friendly feelings of the Government of the
United States towards them, and of great satisfaction with
which we had concluded the treaty of amity and commerce
which it had been the object of his mission to negotiate.
It had been the more gratifying to me as I had
from a period of very early youth been personally
acquainted with two of the three confederated cities,
and recollected with warm gratitude the kind and
hospitable treatment I had received in them, and its
repetition more than once afterwards in Hamburg.
As to himself, I was happy to learn that he had been
pleased with his reception here and could express
no other sentiment than that of regret at his departure
with cordial good wishes that his voyage might be
favorable and his future life prosperous and happy.
After this interchange of official compliments,
I invited him to be seated; we conversed a few minutes
upon indifferent topics, and he withdrew.12
On June 13 Charles Hammond’s Gazette listed fourteen “juvenile indiscretions”
committed by Jackson that ended with his killing Charles Dickinson,
brawling with the Bentons, and dispatching Samuel Jackson.
Also in 1828 US Postmaster General McLean announced that
Negroes could carry mail only if a white man supervised them.
Clay and Secretary Barbour accused McLean of perfidious influence
and patronage, but Adams saw no evidence and said he would not remove him
for supporting Jackson’s presidential candidacy.
Neither John Quincy Adams nor Andrew Jackson
campaigned for President in 1828,
leaving that to their supporters and newspapers.
Those supporting Adams called themselves National Republicans.
Jackson controlled his campaign from his home in Nashville.
Jacksonians considered Adams a Federalist and themselves Democrats,
and they also appealed to states rights’ Republicans.
Both parties sponsored many state conventions.
This was one of the dirtiest campaigns in American history.
Jackson was criticized for his vindictive anger, for fighting duels, and for “living in sin”
with married Rachel from 1790 until her divorce led to their wedding in 1794.
Jacksonians portrayed Adams as aristocratic for putting a billiard table
in the White House and for heresy because of his Unitarian theology.
Jacksonians emphasized the difference “between J. Q. Adams
who can write and Andy Jackson who can fight.”
In 1828 the “Coffin Handbill” on the “bloody deeds of GENERAL JACKSON”
was published with the names of six militia men who wanted to return to their homes
after their enlistment ended during the Creek War;
but they were charged with desertion, and Jackson had them shot.
Philadelphia Press editor John Binns also included an account of a quarrel that
Jackson ended by using his cane sword to run through Samuel Jackson
as he was bending down to pick up a stone,
though a grand jury acquitted General Jackson because of self-defense.
President John Quincy Adams in his Memoirs for June 16 wrote,
16th. Mr. Clay called, being about to leave
the city upon his summer excursion.
He had sent me his draft of general instructions to Governor
Barbour as Minister to Great Britain, which I approved.
He left with me a copy of a pamphlet just published by him,
supplementary to the former one in defense of his own
character against the charges of General Jackson;
and he spoke of the recent appointment of a
Postmaster at Cumberland as a subject of great
complaint against the Postmaster-General.
Mr. Wirt, the Attorney-General, spent an hour with me,
spoke of the unlucky controversy that has arisen
between the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal and the Baltimore
Railroad companies, which must terminate in a lawsuit.
He intimated that the Railroad Company had applied to
him for his professional services, and asked if this would
interfere with his official duty as Attorney-General.
I said I thought it would, the United States being
interested in the stock of the Canal Company
by their subscription of one million dollars.13
President Adams in his Memoirs on 23 June 1828 mentioned this:
Mr. Brent sent me several dispatches, received
since Mr. Clay’s departure yesterday morning—
among the letters from William B. Rochester,
Chargé d’Affaires to Guatemala,
who has returned, and landed at Savannah.
The republic of Central America is in a state of civil war,
and the Government is virtually dissolved.14
On 1 July 1828 President Adams issued this Proclamation:
Whereas by an act of the Congress of the United States
of the 7th of January, 1824, entitled “An act concerning
discriminating duties of tonnage and impost,” it is provided
that upon satisfactory evidence being given to the President
of the United States by the government of any foreign nation
that no discriminating duties of tonnage or impost are
imposed or levied within the ports of the said nation upon
vessels belonging wholly to citizens of the United States
or upon merchandise the produce or manufacture thereof
imported in the same, the President is thereby authorized
to issue his proclamation declaring that the foreign
discriminating duties of tonnage and impost within the
United States are and shall be suspended and discontinued
so far as respects the vessels of the said nation and the
merchandise of its produce or manufacture imported into
the United States in the same, the said suspension to take
effect from the time of such notification being given to the
President of the United States, and to continue so long as
the reciprocal exemption of vessels belonging to citizens
of the United States and merchandise as aforesaid
thereon laden shall be continued, and no longer; and
Whereas satisfactory evidence has been received
by me from His Britannic Majesty, as King of Hanover,
through the Right Honorable Charles Richard Vaughan,
his envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary,
that vessels wholly belonging to citizens of the United States
or merchandise the produce or manufacture thereof
imported in such vessels are not nor shall be on their
entering any Hanoverian port subject to the payment
of higher duties of tonnage or impost than are levied
on Hanoverian ships or merchandise the produce or
manufacture of the United States imported in such vessels:
Now, therefore, I, John Quincy Adams, President of
the United States of America, do hereby declare and
proclaim that so much of the several acts imposing duties
on the tonnage of ships and vessels and on goods, wares,
and merchandise imported into the United States as
imposed a discriminating duty of tonnage between the
vessels of the Kingdom of Hanover and vessels of the
United States and between goods imported into the
United States in vessels of the Kingdom of Hanover and
vessels of the United States are suspended and discontinued
so far as the same respect the produce or manufacture of
the said Kingdom of Hanover, the said suspension to take
effect this day and to continue henceforward so long as
the reciprocal exemption of the vessels of the United States
and of the merchandise laden therein as aforesaid shall
be continued in the ports of the Kingdom of Hanover.
Given under my hand, at the city of Washington, this
1st day of July, A. D. 1828, and the fifty-second year
of the Independence of the United States.15
Also on July 1 President Adams wrote this for that date:
July 1st. Mr. Rush brought me an estimate of the
state of the Treasury this day after the payment of
upwards of five millions of principal of the public debt;
from which it appears that there will remain in the
Treasury a balance of four million nine hundred thousand
dollars, and that the receipts of the Treasury for the first
half-year have been twelve million three hundred and
sixty-nine thousand dollars; so far exceeding our estimates
of last winter as to warrant the expectation that the
receipts of the whole year will exceed the estimates.
We have, therefore, every encouragement to hope
that we shall at the expiration of the year
have paid off seven millions of the debt.16
President Adams wrote in his Memoirs for July 19:
Mr. Rush was here and consulted me upon some questions,
which relate to the execution of the new tariff law.
Different measures have been adopted respecting
appraisements at Boston, Baltimore, and Richmond.
He proposed to adopt general regulations
which may extend uniformly to all the ports.17
On August 2 the pamphlet Gen. Jackson’s Negro Speculations
accused him of investing in the purchase and sale of slaves.
The campaign depressed Adams so much that
he stopped keeping his diary until after the election.
He emphasized progress and improvements, but Jackson took moderate positions
on those while accepting slavery and opening Indian land to white settlers.
Vice President Calhoun supported Jackson and became his running mate
while Adams chose Richard Rush of Pennsylvania.
After the sudden death of DeWitt Clinton on February 11, Senator Van Buren
decided to run for Governor of New York, and he was elected on November 7.
Thurlow Weed was supported by William Henry Seward and edited
the Anti-Masonic Enquirer which opposed Grand Master Mason Andrew Jackson.
Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton promoted a new agrarian policy
for distributing public land and backed Jackson.
Amos Kendall and Richard Mentor Johnson started the Argus of Western America,
and their New Court Party was supported by pamphleteer Francis Preston Blair.
They turned against Clay and supported Jackson’s democratic ideas.
The US Senate made Duff Green its official printer, and in Washington
he used the United States Telegraph to criticize President Adams and Henry Clay.
Green had fought in the War of 1812 and became a brigadier general
in Missouri territory where he blamed government agents for causing
most of the conflicts between Indians and settlers.
In 1820 he was a delegate at the Missouri Constitutional Convention,
and he was elected to the Missouri General Assembly.
During the depression he backed relief programs in the Missouri Intelligencer.
He borrowed money to buy the St. Louis Enquirer but sold it after the 1824 election.
In 1826 John Eaton loaned him money to buy the United States Telegraph.
Green wrote editorials, and Jackson thanked him for taking control of the Telegraph.
He promoted Jackson as the candidate of the people and the Democracy party,
and “Rough” Green attacked the aristocratic coalition of Adams and Clay.
From March 1827 to October 1828 Green published the daily Telegraph
concentrating on the election, promoting the National Republican Ticket
of Jackson for President and Calhoun for Vice President.
North Carolina had nine Jacksonian newspapers, and Ohio added eighteen.
On the other side was Truth’s Advocate and Monthly Anti-Jackson Expositor
by the Cincinnati Gazette editor Charles Hammond.
Adams was particularly upset by Samuel D. Ingham’s anonymous
Exposition of the Political Conduct and Principles of John Quincy Adams
which accused him of wanting “aristocratical and hereditary government.”
In this election voters with a 57.5% turnout were triple what they were in 1824.
Many more people voted in western states than in New England.
In 1828 only South Carolina and Delaware did not choose electors
by the popular vote which was 1,555,340 men.
The national elections in 1828 were held from 31 October to December 2.
Andrew Jackson of Tennessee ran for President for the Democratic Party,
and President John Quincy Adams of Massachusetts
was on the ballot as the National Republican.
Jackson got 638,348 votes to 507,440 for Adams.
Jackson won about 50% of the votes in free states and 73% in slave states.
Because three-fifths of slaves were counted for state representation,
Jackson gained 105 electoral votes from 200,000 votes in the South
while he got only 73 electoral votes in the north from 400,000 votes.
Jackson got all the electoral votes in the South and the West plus
Pennsylvania and a majority of New York’s; he narrowly won New York,
Ohio, and Kentucky by a total of only about 20,000 votes.
If Adams had won those states, and if New York had used winner-take-all,
Adams might have won by two electoral votes.
Yet Jackson’s 56% of the popular vote would not be surpassed in the 19th century.
He proposed amending the Constitution to replace
the Electoral College with the national popular vote.
Vice President John C. Calhoun of South Carolina was re-elected with
171 electoral votes over 83 for the Republican candidate Richard Rush of Pennsylvania.
The Republican Adams won only nine states in the northeast including Maryland,
while the Democrat Jackson had fifteen states including Pennsylvania and New York.
On 2 December 1828 President John Quincy Adams
issued his Fourth Annual Message to:
Fellow Citizens of the Senate and
of the House of Representatives:
If the enjoyment in profusion of the bounties of
Providence forms a suitable subject of mutual gratulation
and grateful acknowledgment, we are admonished at
this return of the season when the representatives of the
nation are assembled to deliberate upon their concerns
to offer up the tribute of fervent and grateful hearts
for the never failing mercies of Him who rules over all.
He has again favored us with healthful seasons and
abundant harvests; He has sustained us in peace with
foreign countries and in tranquility within our borders;
He has preserved us in the quiet and undisturbed possession
of civil and religious liberty; He has crowned the year with
His goodness, imposing on us no other condition than of
improving for our own happiness the blessings bestowed by
His hands, and, in the fruition of all His favors, of devoting
his faculties with which we have been endowed by Him to
His glory and to our own temporal and eternal welfare.
In the relations of our Federal Union with our brethren of
the human race the changes which have occurred since
the close of your last session have generally tended to the
preservation of peace and to the cultivation of harmony.
Before your last separation a war had unhappily been
kindled between the Empire of Russia, one of those with
which our intercourse has been no other than a constant
exchange of good offices, and that of the Ottoman Porte,
a nation from which geographical distance, religious opinions
and maxims of government on their part little suited to the
formation of those bonds of mutual benevolence which
result from the benefits of commerce had kept us in a state,
perhaps too much prolonged, of coldness and alienation.
The extensive, fertile, and populous dominions
of the Sultan belong rather to the Asiatic than
the European division of the human family.
They enter but partially into the system of Europe,
nor have their wars with Russia and Austria,
the European States upon which they border,
for more than a century past disturbed the pacific relations
of those States with the other great powers of Europe.
Neither France nor Prussia nor Great Britain
has ever taken part in them, nor is it
to be expected that they will at this time.
The declaration of war by Russia has received the
approbation or acquiescence of her allies, and we
may indulge the hope that its progress and termination
will be signalized by the moderation and forbearance
no less than by the energy of the Emperor Nicholas,
and that it will afford the opportunity for such collateral
agency in behalf of the suffering Greeks as will secure to
them ultimately the triumph of humanity and of freedom.
The state of our particular relations with France
has scarcely varied in the course of the present year.
The commercial intercourse between the two countries
has continued to increase for the mutual benefit of both.
The claims of indemnity to numbers of our fellow
citizens for depredations upon their property,
heretofore committed during the revolutionary
governments, remain unadjusted, and still form
the subject of earnest representation and remonstrance.
Recent advices from the minister of the United States
at Paris encourage the expectation that the appeal
to the justice of the French Government will
ere long receive a favorable consideration.
The last friendly expedient has been resorted to for
the decision of the controversy with Great Britain relating
to the northeastern boundary of the United States.
By an agreement with the British Government, carrying into
effect the provisions of the 5th article of the treaty of Ghent,
and the convention of 1827-09-29, His Majesty the
King of the Netherlands has by common consent
been selected as the umpire between the parties.
The proposal to him to accept the designation for the
performance of this friendly office will be made at an
early day, and the United States, relying upon the justice
of their cause, will cheerfully commit the arbitrament
of it to a prince equally distinguished for the independence
of his spirit, his indefatigable assiduity to the duties
of his station, and his inflexible personal probity.
Our commercial relations with Great Britain
will deserve the serious consideration of Congress
and the exercise of a conciliatory and forbearing
spirit in the policy of both Governments.
The state of them has been materially changed by the
act of Congress, passed at their last session, in alteration
of several acts imposing duties on imports, and by
acts of more recent date of the British Parliament.
The effect of the interdiction of direct trade, commenced
by Great Britain and reciprocated by the United States,
has been, as was to be foreseen, only to substitute
different channels for an exchange of commodities
indispensable to the colonies and profitable
to a numerous class of our fellow citizens.
The exports, the revenue, the navigation of the
United States have suffered no diminution by our
exclusion from direct access to the British colonies.
The colonies pay more dearly for the necessaries of life
which their Government burdens with the charges of double
voyages, freight, insurance, and commission, and the profits
of our exports are somewhat impaired and more injuriously
transferred from one portion of our citizens to another.
The resumption of this old and otherwise exploded
system of colonial exclusion has not secured to the
shipping interest of Great Britain the relief which,
at the expense of the distant colonies and of the
United States, it was expected to afford.
Other measures have been resorted to more pointedly
bearing upon the navigation of the United States, and more
pointedly bearing upon the navigation of the United States,
and which, unless modified by the construction given
to the recent acts of Parliament, will be manifestly
incompatible with the positive stipulations of the
commercial convention existing between the two countries.
That convention, however, may be terminated with
12 months’ notice, at the option of either party.
A treaty of amity, navigation, and commerce
between the United States and His Majesty the
Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary and Bohemia,
has been prepared for signature by the Secretary
of State and by the Baron de Lederer, entrusted
with full powers of the Austrian Government.
Independently of the new and friendly relations
which may be thus commenced with one of the most
eminent and powerful nations of the earth, the occasion
has been taken in it, as in other recent treaties concluded
by the United States, to extend those principles of
liberal intercourse and of fair reciprocity which intertwine
with the exchanges of commerce the principles of
justice and the feelings of mutual benevolence.
This system, first proclaimed to the world in the first
commercial treaty ever concluded by the United States—
that of 1778-02-06, with France—has been
invariably the cherished policy of our Union.
It is by treaties of commerce alone that
it can be made ultimately to prevail as the
established system of all civilized nations.
With this principle our fathers extended the hand
of friendship to every nation of the globe,
and to this policy our country has ever since adhered.
Whatever of regulation in our laws has ever been
adopted unfavorable to the interest of any foreign
nation has been essentially defensive and counteracting
to similar regulations of theirs operating against us.
Immediately after the close of the War of Independence
commissioners were appointed by the Congress
of the Confederation authorized to conclude treaties
with every nation of Europe disposed to adopt them.
Before the wars of the French Revolution such
treaties had been consummated with the
United Netherlands, Sweden, and Prussia.
During those wars treaties with Great Britain and Spain had
been effected, and those with Prussia and France renewed.
In all these some concessions to the liberal principles
of intercourse proposed by the United States had been
obtained; but as in all the negotiations they came
occasionally in collision with previous internal
regulations or exclusive and excluding compacts
of monopoly with which the other parties had been
trammeled, the advances made in them toward
the freedom of trade were partial and imperfect.
Colonial establishments, chartered companies,
and ship building influence pervaded and encumbered
the legislation of all the great commercial states;
and the United States, in offering free trade
and equal privilege to all, were compelled
to acquiesce in many exceptions with each
of the parties to their treaties, accommodated
to their existing laws and anterior agreements.
The colonial system by which this whole hemisphere
was bound has fallen into ruins, totally abolished by
revolutions converting colonies into independent nations
throughout the two American continents, excepting
a portion of territory chiefly at the northern extremity
of our own, and confined to the remnants of dominion
retained by Great Britain over the insular archipelago,
geographically the appendages of our part of the globe.
With all the rest we have free trade, even with the insular
colonies of all the European nations, except Great Britain.
Her Government also had manifested approaches to the
adoption of a free and liberal intercourse between her
colonies and other nations, though by a sudden and
scarcely explained revulsion the spirit of exclusion has
been revived for operation upon the United States alone.
The conclusion of our last treaty of peace with
Great Britain was shortly afterwards followed by
a commercial convention, placing the direct intercourse
between the two countries upon a footing of more
equal reciprocity than had ever before been admitted.
The same principle has since been much further extended
by treaties with France, Sweden, Denmark, the Hanseatic
cities, Prussia, in Europe, and with the Republics of
Colombia and of Central America in this hemisphere.
The mutual abolition of discriminating duties
and charges upon the navigation and commercial
intercourse between the parties is the general
maxim which characterizes them all.
There is reason to expect that it will at no
distant period be adopted by other nations,
both of Europe and America, and to hope that
by its universal prevalence one of the fruitful sources
of wars of commercial competition will be extinguished.
Among the nations upon whose Governments
many of our fellow citizens have had long-pending
claims of indemnity for depredations upon their
property during a period when the rights of neutral
commerce were disregarded was that of Denmark.
They were soon after the events occurred the subject of a
special mission from the United States, at the close of which
the assurance was given by His Danish Majesty that at a
period of more tranquility and of less distress they would
be considered, examined, and decided upon in a spirit
of determined purpose for the dispensation of justice.
I have much pleasure in informing Congress that
the fulfillment of this honorable promise is now in progress;
that a small portion of the claims has already been settled
to the satisfaction of the claimants, and that we have
reason to hope that the remainder will shortly be
placed in a train of equitable adjustment.
This result has always been confidently expected,
from the character of personal integrity and of
benevolence which the Sovereign of the Danish dominions
has through every vicissitude of fortune maintained.
The general aspect of the affairs of our neighboring
American nations of the south has been rather of
approaching than of settled tranquility.
Internal disturbances have been more frequent among
them than their common friends would have desired.
Our intercourse with all has continued to be
that of friendship and of mutual good will.
Treaties of commerce and of boundaries with the United
Mexican States have been negotiated, but, from various
successive obstacles, not yet brought to a final conclusion.
The civil war which unfortunately still prevails in the
Republics of Central America has been unpropitious to
the cultivation of our commercial relations with them;
and the dissensions and revolutionary changes in the
Republics of Colombia and of Peru have been
seen with cordial regret by us, who would
gladly contribute to the happiness of both.
It is with great satisfaction, however, that we have
witnessed the recent conclusion of a peace between
the Governments of Buenos Aires and of Brazil,
and it is equally gratifying to observe that indemnity has
been obtained for some of the injuries which our fellow
citizens had sustained in the latter of those countries.
The rest are in a train of negotiation, which we hope
may terminate to mutual satisfaction, and that it may be
succeeded by a treaty of commerce and navigation,
upon liberal principles, propitious to a great and growing
commerce, already important to the interests of our country.
The condition and prospects of the revenue
are more favorable than our most sanguine
expectations had anticipated.
The balance in the Treasury on 1828-01-01,
exclusive of the moneys received under the convention
of 1826-11-13, with Great Britain, was $5,861,972.83.
The receipts into the Treasury from 1828-01-01 to
1828-09-30, so far as they have been ascertained to form
the basis of an estimate, amount to $18,633,580.27,
which, with the receipts of the present quarter,
estimated at $5,461,283.40, form an aggregate
of receipts during the year of $24,094,863.67.
The expenditures of the year may probably
amount to $25,637,111.63, and leave in the
Treasury on 1829-01-01 the sum of $5,125,638.14.
The receipts of the present year have amounted
to near $2,000,000 more than was anticipated at
the commencement of the last session of Congress.
The amount of duties secured on importations from
the first of January to the 30th of September was
about $22,997,000, and that of the estimated
accruing revenue is $5,000,000, forming an
aggregate for the year of near $28,000,000.
This is $1,000,000 more than the estimate last December
for the accruing revenue of the present year, which, with
allowances for draw-backs and contingent deficiencies,
was expected to produce an actual revenue of $22,300,000.
Had these only been realized the expenditures of
the year would have been also proportionally reduced,
for of these $24,000,000 received upward of $9,000,000
have been applied to the extinction of public debt,
bearing an interest of 6% a year, and of course
reducing the burden of interest annually payable
in future by the amount of more than $500,000.
The payments on account of interest during the current year
exceed $3,000,000, presenting an aggregate of more than
$12,000,000 applied during the year to the discharge
of the public debt, the whole of which remaining due
on 1829-01-01 will amount only to $58,362,135.78.
That the revenue of the ensuing year will not
fall short of that received in the one now expiring there
are indications which can scarcely prove deceptive.
In our country a uniform experience of 40 years has shown
that whatever the tariff of duties upon articles imported
from abroad has been, the amount of importations has
always borne an average value nearly approaching to that
of the exports, though occasionally differing in the balance,
sometimes being more and sometimes less.
It is, indeed, a general law of prosperous commerce
that the real value of exports should by a small, and
only a small, balance exceed that of imports, that balance
being a permanent addition to the wealth of the nation.
The extent of the prosperous commerce of the nation
must be regulated by the amount of its exports,
and an important addition to the value of these will
draw after it a corresponding increase of importations.
It has happened in the vicissitudes of the seasons
that the harvests of all Europe have in the late summer
and autumn fallen short of their usual average.
A relaxation of the interdict upon the importation of grain
and flour from abroad has ensued, a propitious market
has been opened to the granaries of our country,
and a new prospect of reward presented to the labors of
the husbandman, which for several years has been denied.
This accession to the profits of agriculture in the middle and
western portions of our Union is accidental and temporary.
It may continue only for a single year.
It may be, as has been often experienced
in the revolutions of time, but the first of
several scanty harvests in succession.
We may consider it certain that for the approaching
year it has added an item of large amount to the
value of our exports and that it will produce
a corresponding increase of importations.
It may therefore confidently be foreseen that the revenue
of 1829 will equal and probably exceed that of 1828,
and will afford the means of extinguishing $10,000,000
more of the principal of the public debt.
This new element of prosperity to that part of our
agricultural industry which is occupied in producing the
first article of human subsistence is of the most
cheering character to the feelings of patriotism.
Proceeding from a cause which humanity will view
with concern, the sufferings of scarcity in distant lands,
it yields a consolatory reflection that this scarcity
is in no respect attributable to us; that it comes from
the dispensation of Him who ordains all in wisdom
and goodness, and who permits evil itself only as an
instrument of good; that, far from contributing to this
scarcity, our agency will be applied only to the alleviation
of its severity, and that in pouring forth from the abundance
of our own garners the supplies which will partially
restore plenty to those who are in need we shall ourselves
reduce our stores and add to the price of our own bread,
so as in some degree to participate in the wants which
it will be the good fortune of our country to relieve.
The great interests of an agricultural, commercial,
and manufacturing nation are so linked in union together
that no permanent cause of prosperity to one of them
can operate without extending its influence to the others.
All these interests are alike under the protecting power of
the legislative authority, and the duties of the representative
bodies are to conciliate them in harmony together.
So far as the object of taxation is to raise a revenue for
discharging the debts and defraying the expenses of the
community, its operation should be adapted as much as
possible to suit the burden with equal hand upon all in
proportion with their ability of bearing it without oppression.
But the legislation of one nation is sometimes intentionally
made to bear heavily upon the interests of another.
That legislation, adapted, as it is meant to be, to the special
interests of its own people, will often press most unequally
upon the several component interests of its neighbors.
Thus the legislation of Great Britain, when, as has recently
been avowed, adapted to the depression of a rival nation,
will naturally abound with regulations to interdict upon the
productions of the soil or industry of the other which come
in competition with its own, and will present encouragement,
perhaps even bounty, to the raw material of the other
State which it cannot produce itself, and which is essential
for the use of its manufactures, competitors in the
markets of the world with those of its commercial rival.
Such is the state of commercial legislation
of Great Britain as it bears upon our interests.
It excludes with interdicting duties all importation
(except in time of approaching famine) of the great staple
of production of our Middle and Western States;
it proscribes with equal rigor the bulkier lumber
and livestock of the same portion and also of
the Northern and Eastern part of our Union.
It refuses even the rice of the South unless
aggravated with a charge of duty upon the
Northern carrier who brings it to them.
But the cotton, indispensable for their looms, they will
receive almost duty free to weave it into a fabric for our
own wear, to the destruction of our own manufactures,
which they are enabled thus to under-sell.
Is the self-protecting energy of this nation so helpless
that there exists in the political institutions of our country
no power to counter-act the bias of this foreign legislation;
that the growers of grain must submit to this exclusion from
the foreign markets of their produce; that the shippers must
dismantle their ships, the trade of the North stagnate at the
wharves, and the manufacturers starve at their looms,
while the whole people shall pay tribute to foreign industry
to be clad in a foreign garb; that the Congress of the Union
are impotent to restore the balance in favor of native
industry destroyed by the statutes of another realm?
More just and generous sentiments will, I trust, prevail.
If the tariff adopted at the last session of Congress shall be
found by experience to bear oppressively upon the interests
of any one section of the Union, it ought to be, and I
cannot doubt will be, so modified as to alleviate its burden.
To the voice of just complaint from any portion of their
constituents the representatives of the States
and of the people will never turn away their ears.
But so long as the duty of the foreign shall operate only
as a bounty upon the domestic article; while the planter
and the merchant and the shepherd and the husbandman
shall be found thriving in their occupations under the duties
imposed for the protection of domestic manufactures,
they will not repine at the prosperity shared with
themselves by their fellow citizens of other professions,
nor denounce as violations of the Constitution
the deliberate acts of Congress to shield from the
wrongs of foreigners the native industry of the Union.
While the tariff of the last session of Congress
was a subject of legislative deliberation it was foretold
by some of its opposers that one of its necessary
consequences would be to impair the revenue.
It is yet too soon to pronounce with confidence
that this prediction was erroneous.
The obstruction of one avenue of trade
not unfrequently opens an issue to another.
The consequence of the tariff will be to increase the
exportation and to diminish the importation of some
specific articles; but by the general law of trade the
increase of exportation of one article will be followed
by an increased importation of others, the duties
upon which will supply the deficiencies which the
diminished importation would otherwise occasion.
The effect of taxation upon revenue can
seldom be foreseen with certainty.
It must abide the test of experience.
As yet no symptoms of diminution are
perceptible in the receipts of the Treasury.
As yet little addition of cost has even been experienced upon
the articles burdened with heavier duties by the last tariff.
The domestic manufacturer supplies the same or a kindred
article at a diminished price, and the consumer pays the
same tribute to the labor of his own country-man which
he must otherwise have paid to foreign industry and toil.
The tariff of the last session was in its details not
acceptable to the great interests of any portion
of the Union, not even to the interest which
it was specially intended to subserve.
Its object was to balance the burdens upon native
industry imposed by the operation of foreign laws,
but not to aggravate the burdens of one section
of the Union by the relief afforded to another.
To the great principle sanctioned by that act—
one of those upon which the Constitution itself was formed—
I hope and trust the authorities of the Union will adhere.
But if any of the duties imposed by the act only relieve the
manufacturer by aggravating the burden of the planter,
let a careful revisal of its provisions, enlightened by the
practical experience of its effects, be directed to retain
those which impart protection to native industry and
remove or supply the place of those which only alleviate
one great national interest by the depression of another.
The United States of America and the people
of every State of which they are composed
are each of them sovereign powers.
The legislative authority of the whole is
exercised by Congress under authority
granted them in the common Constitution.
The legislative power of each State is exercised
by assemblies deriving their authority
from the constitution of the State.
Each is sovereign within its own province.
The distribution of power between them presupposes that
these authorities will move in harmony with each other.
The members of the State and General Governments
are all under oath to support both, and
allegiance is due to the one and to the other.
The case of a conflict between these two powers
has not been supposed, nor has any provision
been made for it in our institutions; as a virtuous
nation of ancient times existed more than five centuries
without a law for the punishment of parricide.
More than once, however, in the progress of our history
have the people and the legislatures of one or more States,
in moments of excitement, been instigated to this conflict;
and the means of effecting this impulse
have been allegations that the acts of Congress
to be resisted were unconstitutional.
The people of no one State have ever delegated
to their legislature the power of pronouncing an act
of Congress unconstitutional, but they have delegated
to them powers by the exercise of which the execution
of the laws of Congress within the State may be resisted.
If we suppose the case of such conflicting legislation
sustained by the corresponding executive and judicial
authorities, patriotism and philanthropy turn their eyes
from the condition in which the parties would be placed, and
from that of the people of both, which must be its victims.
The reports from the Secretary of War and the various
subordinate offices of the resort of that Department
present an exposition of the public administration of affairs
connected with them through the course of the current year.
The present state of the Army and the distribution
of the force of which it is composed will be seen
from the report of the Major General.
Several alterations in the disposal of the troops
have been found expedient in the course of the year,
and the discipline of the Army, though not entirely
free from exception, has been generally good.
The attention of Congress is particularly invited to that
part of the report of the Secretary of War which concerns
the existing system of our relations with the Indian tribes.
At the establishment of the Federal Government under
the present Constitution of the United States the
principle was adopted of considering them as foreign
and independent powers and also as proprietors of lands.
They were, moreover, considered as savages, whom it was
our policy and our duty to use our influence in converting to
Christianity and in bringing within the pale of civilization.
As independent powers, we negotiated with them
by treaties; as proprietors, we purchased of them all the
lands which we could prevail upon them to sell; as brethren
of the human race, rude and ignorant, we endeavored
to bring them to the knowledge of religion and letters.
The ultimate design was to incorporate in our own
institutions that portion of them which could
be converted to the state of civilization.
In the practice of European States, before our Revolution,
they had been considered as children to be governed;
as tenants at discretion, to be dispossessed as
occasion might require; as hunters to be indemnified
by trifling concessions for removal from the grounds
from which their game was extirpated.
In changing the system it would seem as if
a full contemplation of the consequences
of the change had not been taken.
We have been far more successful in the acquisition
of their lands than in imparting to them the principles
or inspiring them with the spirit of civilization.
But in appropriating to ourselves their hunting grounds
we have brought upon ourselves the obligation of providing
them with subsistence; and when we have had the rare
good fortune of teaching them the arts of civilization
and the doctrines of Christianity we have unexpectedly
found them forming in the midst of ourselves communities
claiming to be independent of ours and rivals of sovereignty
within the territories of the members of our Union.
This state of things requires that a remedy should be
provided—a remedy which, while it shall do justice to those
unfortunate children of nature, may secure to the members
of our confederation their rights of sovereignty and of soil.
As the outline of a project to that effect, the views
presented in the report of the Secretary of War
are recommended to the consideration of Congress.
The report from the Engineer Department presents
a comprehensive view of the progress which has been
made in the great systems promotive of the public interest,
commenced and organized under authority of Congress,
and the effects of which have already contributed
to the security, as they will hereafter largely
contribute to the honor and dignity of the nation.
The first of these great systems is that of fortifications,
commenced immediately after the close of our last war,
under the salutary experience which the events of that war
had impressed upon our countrymen of its necessity.
Introduced under the auspices of my immediate
predecessor, it has been continued with the
persevering and liberal encouragement of the Legislature,
and, combined with corresponding exertions for the
gradual increase and improvement of the Navy,
prepares for our extensive country a condition
of defense adapted to any critical emergency
which the varying course of events may bring forth.
Our advances in these concerted systems have
for the last 10 years been steady and progressive,
and in a few years more will be so completed as to
leave no cause for apprehension that our sea coast
will ever again offer a theater of hostile invasion.
The next of these cardinal measures of policy is
the preliminary to great and lasting works of public
improvement in the surveys of roads, examination
for the course of canals, and labors for the removal
of the obstructions of rivers and harbors,
first commenced by the act of Congress of 1824-04-30.
The report exhibits in one table the funds appropriated
at the last and preceding sessions of Congress for all these
fortifications, surveys, and works of public improvement,
the manner in which these funds have been applied,
the amount expended upon the several works under
construction, and the further sums which may be necessary
to complete them; in a second, the works projected by the
Board of Engineers which have not been commenced, and
the estimate of their cost; in a third, the report of the annual
Board of Visitors at the Military Academy at West Point.
For 13 fortifications erecting on various points
of our Atlantic coast, from Rhode Island to Louisiana,
the aggregate expenditure of the year
has fallen little short of $1,000,000.
For the preparation of 5 additional reports of reconnaissance
and surveys since the last session of Congress,
for the civil construction upon 37 different public works
commenced, 8 others for which specific appropriations have
been made by acts of Congress, and 20 other incipient
surveys under the authority given by the act of 1824-04-30,
about $1,000,000 more has been drawn from the Treasury.
To these $2,000,000 is to be added the appropriation of
$250,000 to commence the erection of a break-water near
the mouth of the Delaware River, the subscriptions to the
Delaware and Chesapeake, the Louisville and Portland,
the Dismal Swamp, and the Chesapeake and Ohio canals,
the large donations of lands to the States of Ohio, Indiana,
Illinois, and Alabama for objects of improvements within
those States, and the sums appropriated for light-houses,
buoys, and piers on the coast; and a full view will be taken
of the munificence of the nation in the application of its
resources to the improvement of its own condition.
Of these great national undertakings the Academy
at West Point is among the most important in itself
and the most comprehensive in its consequences.
In that institution a part of the revenue of the nation
is applied to defray the expense of educating
a competent portion of her youth chiefly to the
knowledge and the duties of military life.
It is the living armory of the nation.
While the other works of improvement enumerated
in the reports now presented to the attention of Congress
are destined to ameliorate the face of nature, to multiply
the facilities of communication between the different
parts of the Union, to assist the labors, increase the
comforts, and enhance the enjoyments of individuals,
the instruction acquired at West Point enlarges the
dominion and expands the capacities of the mind.
Its beneficial results are already experienced
in the composition of the Army, and their influence
is felt in the intellectual progress of society.
The institution is susceptible still of great improvement
from benefactions proposed by several successive
Boards of Visitors, to whose earnest and repeated
recommendations I cheerfully add my own.
With the usual annual reports from the Secretary
of the Navy and the Board of Commissioners will be
exhibited to the view of Congress the execution of
the laws relating to that department of the public service.
The repression of piracy in the West Indian
and in the Grecian seas has been effectually
maintained with scarcely any exception.
During the war between the Governments of Buenos Ayres
and of Brazil frequent collisions between the belligerent acts
of power and the rights of neutral commerce occurred.
Licentious blockades, irregularly enlisted or
impressed sea men, and the property of honest commerce
seized with violence, and even plundered under
legal pretenses, are disorders never separable
from the conflicts of war upon the ocean.
With a portion of them the correspondence
of our commanders on the eastern aspect of the
South American coast and among the islands of
Greece discover how far we have been involved.
In these the honor of our country and the rights
of our citizens have been asserted and vindicated.
The appearance of new squadrons in the Mediterranean
and the blockade of the Dardanelles indicate the danger
of other obstacles to the freedom of commerce and
the necessity of keeping our naval force in those seas.
To the suggestions repeated in the report of the
Secretary of the Navy, and tending to the
permanent improvement of this institution,
I invite the favorable consideration of Congress.
A resolution of the House of Representatives
requesting that one of our small public vessels
should be sent to the Pacific Ocean and South Sea
to examine the coasts, islands, harbors, shoals, and reefs
in those seas, and to ascertain their true situation
and description, has been put in a train of execution.
The vessel is nearly ready to depart.
The successful accomplishment of the expedition
may be greatly facilitated by suitable legislative
provisions and particularly by an appropriation
to defray its necessary expense.
The addition of a 2nd, and perhaps a 3rd, vessel with
a slight aggravation of the cost, would contribute
much to the safety of the citizens embarked
on this undertaking, the results of which
may be of the deepest interest to our country.
With the report of the Secretary of the Navy will be
submitted, in conformity to the act of Congress of
1827-03-03, for the gradual improvement of the
Navy of the United States, statements of the
expenditures under that act and of the
measures for carrying the same into effect.
Every section of that statute contains a distinct
provision looking to the great object of the whole—
the gradual improvement of the Navy.
Under its salutary sanction stores of ship timber
have been procured and are in process of seasoning
and preservation for the future uses of the Navy.
Arrangements have been made for the preservation of the
live oak timber growing on the lands of the United States,
and for its reproduction, to supply at future and distant
days the waste of that most valuable material for ship
building by the great consumption of it yearly for the
commercial as well as for the military marine of our country.
The construction of the two dry docks at
Charlestown and at Norfolk is making satisfactory
progress toward a durable establishment.
The examinations and inquiries to ascertain the
practicability and expediency of a marine railway
at Pensacola, though not yet accomplished,
have been postponed but to be more effectually made.
The navy yards of the United States have been examined,
and plans for their improvement and the preservation
of the public property therein at Portsmouth, Charlestown,
Philadelphia, Washington, and Gosport, and to which
2 others are to be added, have been prepared and received
my sanction; and no other portion of my public duties
has been performed with a more intimate conviction of its
importance to the future welfare and security of the Union.
With the report from the Postmaster General is exhibited
a comparative view of the gradual increase of that
establishment, from 5 to 5 years, since 1792 ‘til this time
in the number of post offices, which has grown from less
than 200 to nearly 8,000; in the revenue yielded by them,
which from $67,000 has swollen to upward of $1,500,000,
and in the number of miles of post roads,
which from 5,642 have multiplied to 114,536.
While in the same period of time the population
of the Union has about thrice doubled, the rate of
increase of these offices is nearly 40, and of the
revenue and of traveled miles from 20 to 25 for one.
The increase of revenue within the last 5 years
has been nearly equal to the
whole revenue of the Department in 1812.
The expenditures of the Department during the year
which ended on 1828-07-01 have exceeded
the receipts by a sum of about $25,000.
The excess has been occasioned by the
increase of mail conveyances and facilities
to the extent of near 800,000 miles.
It has been supplied by collections from the
postmasters of the arrearages of preceding years.
While the correct principle seems to be that the income
levied by the Department should defray all its expenses,
it has never been the policy of this Government
to raise from this establishment any revenue
to be applied to any other purposes.
The suggestion of the Postmaster General that the insurance
of the safe transmission of moneys by the mail might be
assumed by the Department for a moderate and competent
remuneration will deserve the consideration of Congress.
A report from the commissioner of the public
buildings in this city exhibits the expenditures
upon them in the course of the current year.
It will be seen that the humane and benevolent
intentions of Congress in providing, by the act of
1826-05-20, for the erection of a penitentiary
in this District have been accomplished.
The authority of further legislation is now required
for the removal to this tenement of the offenders
against the laws sentenced to atone by personal
confinement for their crimes, and to provide a code for
their employment and government while thus confined.
The commissioners appointed, conformably to the act
of 1827-03-02, to provide for the adjustment of claims
of persons entitled to indemnification under the first
article of the treaty of Ghent, and for the distribution
among such claimants of the sum paid by the
Government of Great Britain under the convention of
1826-11-13, closed their labors on 1828-08-30 last
by awarding to the claimants the sum of $1,197,422.18,
leaving a balance of $7,537.82, which was distributed
ratably amongst all the claimants to whom awards
had been made, according to the directions of the act.
The exhibits appended to the report from the
Commissioner of the General Land Office present
the actual condition of that common property of the Union.
The amount paid into the Treasury from the proceeds
of lands during the year 1827 and for the first half
of 1828 falls little short of $2,000,000.
The propriety of further extending the time for the
extinguishment of the debt due to the United States by the
purchasers of the public lands, limited by the act of
1828-03-21 to 1829-07-04, will claim the consideration
of Congress, to whose vigilance and careful attention
the regulation, disposal, and preservation
of this great national inheritance has by the
people of the United States been entrusted.
Among the important subjects to which the attention
of the present Congress has already been invited,
and which may occupy their further and deliberate
discussion, will be the provision to be made for
taking the 5th census of enumeration of the
inhabitants of the United States.
The Constitution of the United States requires that this
enumeration should be made within every term of 10 years,
and the date from which the last enumeration commenced
was the first Monday of August of the year 1820.
The laws under which the former enumerations
were taken were enacted at the session of
Congress immediately preceding the operation;
but considerable inconveniences were experienced
from the delay of legislation to so late a period.
That law, like those of the preceding enumerations,
directed that the census should be taken by the marshals
of the several districts and Territories of the Union
under instructions from the Secretary of State.
The preparation and transmission to the marshals
of those instructions required more time than
was then allowed between the passage of the law
and the day when the enumeration was to commence.
The term of 6 months limited for the returns of the
marshals was also found even then too short, and must
be more so now, when an additional population of
at least 3,000,000 must be presented upon the returns.
As they are to be made at the short session of Congress,
it would, as well as from other considerations,
be more convenient to commence the enumeration from
an earlier period of the year than the first of August.
The most favorable season would be the spring.
On a review of the former enumerations it will be found
that the plan for taking every census has contained
many improvements upon that of its predecessor.
The last is still susceptible of much improvement.
The 3rd Census was the first at which any account
was taken of the manufactures of the country.
It was repeated at the last enumeration, but the
returns in both cases were necessarily very imperfect.
They must always be so, resting, of course, only upon
the communications voluntarily made by individuals
interested in some of the manufacturing establishments.
Yet they contained much valuable information,
and may by some supplementary provision
of the law be rendered more effective.
The columns of age, commencing from infancy,
have hitherto been confined to a few periods,
all under the number of 45 years.
Important knowledge would be obtained by
extending these columns, in intervals of 10 years,
to the utmost boundaries of human life.
The labor of taking them would be a trifling addition to that
already prescribed, and the result would exhibit comparative
tables of longevity highly interesting to the country.
I deem it my duty further to observe that much
of the imperfections in the returns of the last and
perhaps of preceding enumerations proceeded from
the inadequateness of the compensations allowed
to the marshals and their assistants in taking them.
In closing this communication it only remains for me
to assure the Legislature of my continued earnest wish
for the adoption of measures recommended by me
heretofore and yet to be acted on by them,
and of the cordial concurrence on my part in every
constitutional provision which may receive their sanction
during the session tending to the general welfare.18
On 3 December 1828 President Adams wrote this in his Memoirs:
3rd. A continual stream of visitors, members of Congress,
and a few others, from breakfast till near four P.M.,
when I took my ride of an hour and a half on horseback.
Most of the members of Congress who came were friends,
and they had but one topic of conversation—
the loss of this day’s election.
I have only to submit to it with resignation, and to ask what
I and those who are dear to me may be sustained under it.
The sun of my political life sets in the deepest gloom.
But that of my country shines unclouded.
Mr. Crowell, the Agent to the Creek Indians,
came to ask for the argument of Walter Jones
that he had left with me, claiming for the Indians
the balance of a sum stipulated by Treaty of 1821,
and reserved for indemnity to citizens of Georgia.
I had given it to the Attorney-General Wirt for his opinion.
The Legislature and delegation of Georgia claim
the same balance for citizens of that State.
Received this morning a letter
from the late President Monroe.
I was myself engaged on the draft of
an answer to the Boston federalists.19
Cotton farming in South Carolina was exhausting soil,
and many there believed that high tariffs damaged their economy.
John C. Calhoun in “The South Carolina Exposition and Protest,” argued that the
abominable tariff was unconstitutional because protectionism favors special interests.
On December 19 the South Carolina legislature declared
the state’s right to nullify an act of the national government.
Calhoun complained that southerners were paying to protect
manufacturing in the North against foreign competition even though
that made them less able to compete in the world market.
He contended that the tariff was unconstitutional because it subsidized
manufacturing at the expense of commerce and agriculture.
He suggested that the constitutional remedy was for the states to have
the right to interpose to protect their reserved powers.
He noted that this nullification did not suspend the national law except in the
state protesting, and he argued that the Constitution would have to be amended
by three-quarters of the states to overcome the nullification.
President-elect Jackson wanted Indians moved west to prevent their annihilation,
and on December 20 the Georgia legislature proclaimed that
Indians would come under their jurisdiction in June 1829.
On 31 December 1828 President Adams published
his Reply to the Massachusetts Federalists.
Also on that day he wrote in his Memoirs:
Mr. Clay spoke to me with great concern of the
prospects of the country—the threats of disunion from
the South, and the grasping after all the public lands,
which are disclosing themselves in the Western States.
He spoke of a long message from Ninian Edwards,
Governor of Illinois, to the Legislature of that State,
who, he said, wished to take the lead from
T. H. Benton, Senator from Missouri, who
commenced this inroad upon the public lands.
I told Mr. Clay that it would be impossible for me to
divest myself of a deep interest in whatever should
affect the welfare of the country, but that after the 3rd
of March I should consider my public life closed, and take
from that time as little part in public concerns as possible.
I shall have enough to do to defend and
vindicate my own reputation from the double
persecution under which I have fallen.20
On 11 February 1829 President Adams sent this message to:
To the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States:
By the act of Congress of the 23d of May last,
“supplementary to the several acts providing for the
settlement and confirmation of private land claims in
Florida,” provision was made for the final adjudication
of such claims by the judges of the superior courts of
the districts wherein the lands claimed respectively lie,
and by appeal from them to the Supreme Court of the
United States; and the attorneys of the United States
in the several districts were charged with the duty,
in every case where the decision should be against the
United States by the judge of the superior court of the
district, to make out and transmit to the Attorney-General
of the United States a statement containing the facts of the
case and the points of law on which the same was decided,
and it was made the duty of the Attorney-General in most
of those cases to direct an appeal to be made to the
Supreme Court of the United States and to appear
for the United States and prosecute such appeals.
By the same act the President of the United States
was authorized to appoint a law agent to superintend
the interests of the United States in the premises,
and to employ assistant counsel if in his opinion
the public interest should require the same.
In the process of carrying into execution this law
it was the opinion of the Attorney-General of the
United States that a translated complete collection of
all the Spanish and French ordinances, etc., affecting the
land titles in Florida and the other territories heretofore
belonging to France and Spain, would be indispensable
to a just decision of those claims by the Supreme Court.
At his suggestion the task of preparing this compilation
was undertaken by Joseph M. White, of Florida, who was
employed as assistant counsel in behalf of the United States.
The collection has accordingly been made and is deposited
in manuscript at the Department of State, subject to such
order as Congress may see fit to take concerning it.
The letter from Mr. White to the Secretary of State,
with a descriptive list of the documents collected and
thus deposited, is herewith transmitted to Congress.21
President Adams on 25 February 1829 wrote in his Memoirs:
25th. President Jackson’s Cabinet is arranged:
Mr. Van Buren, Secretary of State;
S. D. Ingham, Secretary of the Treasury;
J. McLean, Postmaster-General;
John H. Eaton, Secretary of War;
John Branch, Secretary of the Navy;
and John M. Berrien, Attorney-General.22
John Quincy Adams on 26 February 1829 presented this message:
To the Senate of the United States.
I transmit herewith to the Senate, for their constitutional
advice with regard to its ratification, a treaty of amity,
commerce, and navigation between the United States
and His Majesty the Emperor of Brazil, signed by the
plenipotentiaries of the respective Governments at
Rio de Janeiro on the 12th day of December last.
A copy of the treaty is likewise enclosed with copies
of the instructions under which it was negotiated and
a letter from Mr. Tudor elucidating some of its provisions.
It is requested that at the convenience
of the Senate the original papers may
be returned to the Department of State.23
On February 28 President Adams sent this message:
To the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States:
I transmit to Congress copies of two Indian treaties,
which have been duly ratified:
1. A treaty with the Chippewa, Menominie, and
Winnebago Indians, concluded on the 11th of August, 1827,
at the Butte des Morts, on Fox River, in the Territory of
Michigan, between Lewis Cass and Thomas L. McKenney,
commissioners on the part of the United States, and
certain chiefs and warriors of the said tribes on their part.
2. A treaty with the Potawatamie tribe of Indians,
concluded the 19th of September, 1827, at St. Joseph,
in the Territory of Michigan, between Lewis Cass,
commissioner on the part of the United States, and the
chiefs and warriors of the said tribes, on their part.24
Also on February 28 John Quincy Adams wrote in his Memoirs:
This month has been remarkable, as the last
of my public service; and the preceding pages
will show that the business of my office crowds
upon me with accumulation as it draw near its end.
Three days more, and I shall be restored
to private life and left to an old age of retirement,
though certainly not of repose.
I go into it with a combination of parties and of
public men against my character and reputation
such as I believe never before was exhibited
against any man since this Union existed.
Posterity will scarcely believe it, but so it is,
that this combination against me has been formed
and is now exulting in triumph over me,
for the devotion of my life and of all the faculties
of my soul to the Union, and to the improvement,
physical, moral, and intellectual of my country.
The North assails me for my fidelity to the Union;
the South for my ardent aspirations of improvement.
Yet “bate I not a jot of heart and hope.”
Passion, prejudice, envy, and jealousy will pass.
The cause of Union and of improvement will remain,
and I have duties to it and
to my country yet to discharge.25
On 3 March 1829 President John Quincy Adams sent this message:
To the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States:
I transmit herewith to Congress a copy of the
instructions prepared by the Secretary of State and
furnished to the ministers of the United States appointed to
attend at the assembly of American plenipotentiaries first
held at Panama and thence transferred to Tacubaya.
The occasion upon which they were given has passed away,
and there is no present probability of the renewal of the
negotiations; but the purposes for which they were
intended are still of the deepest interest to our country
and to the world, and may hereafter call again for
the active efforts and beneficent energies of
the Government of the United States.
The motives for withholding them from general publication
having ceased, justice to the Government from which
they emanated and to the people for whose benefit it
was instituted requires that they should be made known.
With this view, and from the consideration that
the subjects embraced by these instructions must
probably engage hereafter the deliberations of our
successors, I deem it proper to make this
communication to both Houses of Congress.
One copy only of the instructions being prepared,
I send it to the Senate, requesting that it may be
transmitted also to the House of Representatives.26
Also on 3 March 1829 President Adams wrote in his Memoirs:
About noon I rode with my son John and T. B. Adams, Jr.,
to the Capitol and sent to both Houses of Congress
message No. 8 with the Panama instructions.
I signed fifteen bills, and between two and three o’clock
a joint committee, S. Smith and Burnet of the Senate,
Ward and Bates of Massachusetts, announced to me
that the Houses were ready to adjourn.
I told them that I had no further communication
to make to the Houses, and wished every
individual member health and happiness.
I walked back to the President’s house.
Concluded the contract with Persico.
Consulted the members of the Administration
whether I should attend the inauguration tomorrow.
All were against it except Mr. Rush.
About nine in the evening I left the President’s house,
and with my son John and T. B. Adams, Jr.,
came out and joined my family at Meridian Hill.27
Notes
1. A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908,
Volume II ed. James D. Richardson, p. 394-395.
2. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams ed. Charles Francis Adams,
Volume VII, p. 410-411.
3. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 395.
4. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Volume VII, p. 422-423.
5. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 397.
6. Ibid., p. 397-398.
7. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Volume VII, p. 465.
8. Ibid., p. 467-468, 468-470.
9. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 401.
10. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Volume VIII, p. 16-17.
11. Ibid., p. 24-25.
12. Ibid., p. 26.
13. Ibid., p. 33.
14. Ibid., p. 42.
15. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 404-405.
16. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Volume VIII, p. 47.
17. Ibid., p. 60.
18. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 407-421.
19. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Volume VIII, p. 78.
20. Ibid., p. 87-88.
21. Ibid., p. 99.
22. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 427-428.
23. Ibid., p. 430.
24. Ibid.
25. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams, Volume VIII, p. 100-101.
26. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, A 1789-1908, Volume II, p. 431.
27. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams, Volume VIII, p. 103-104.
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