Speech Transcript:

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:

The continued disorganization of the Union, to which the President
has so often called the attention of Congress, is yet a subject of
profound and patriotic concern. We may, however, find some relief
from that anxiety in the reflection that the painful political
situation, although before untried by ourselves, is not new in the
experience of nations. Political science, perhaps as highly perfected
in our own time and country as in any other, has not yet disclosed any
means by which civil wars can be absolutely prevented. An enlightened
nation, however, with a wise and beneficent constitution of free
government, may diminish their frequency and mitigate their severity
by directing all its proceedings in accordance with its fundamental
law.

When a civil war has been brought to a close, it is manifestly the
first interest and duty of the state to repair the injuries which the
war has inflicted, and to secure the benefit of the lessons it teaches
as fully and as speedily as possible. This duty was, upon the
termination of the rebellion, promptly accepted not only by the
executive department, but by the insurrectionary States themselves,
and restoration in the first moment of peace was believed to be as
easy and certain as it was indispensable. The expectations, however,
then so reasonably and confidently entertained were disappointed by
legislation from which I felt constrained by my obligations to the
Constitution to withhold my assent.

It is therefore a source of profound regret that in complying with
the obligation imposed upon the President by the Constitution to give
to Congress from time to time information of the state of the Union I
am unable to communicate any definitive adjustment satisfactory to
the American people, of the questions which since the close of the
rebellion have agitated the public mind. On the contrary, candor
compels me to declare that at this time there is no Union as our
fathers understood the term, and as they meant it to be understood by
us. The Union which they established can exist only where all the
States are represented in both Houses of Congress; where one State is
as free as another to regulate its internal concerns according to its
own will, and where the laws of the central Government, strictly
confined to matters of national jurisdiction, apply with equal force
to all the people of every section. That such is not the present
"state of the Union" is a melancholy fact, and we must all
acknowledge that the restoration of the States to their proper legal
relations with the Federal Government and with one another, according
to the terms of the original compact, would be the greatest temporal
blessing which God, in His kindest providence, could bestow upon this
nation. It becomes our imperative duty to consider whether or not it
is impossible to effect this most desirable consummation. The Union
and the Constitution are inseparable. As long as one is obeyed by all
parties, the other will be preserved; and if one is destroyed, both
must perish together. The destruction of the Constitution will be
followed by other and still greater calamities. It was ordained not
only to form a more perfect union between the States, but to
"establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the
common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings
of liberty to ourselves and our posterity." Nothing but implicit
obedience to its requirements in all parts of the country will
accomplish these great ends. Without that obedience we can look
forward only to continual outrages upon individual rights, incessant
breaches of the public peace, national weakness, financial dishonor,
the total loss of our prosperity, the general corruption of morals,
and the final extinction of popular freedom. To save our country from
evils so appalling as these, we should renew our efforts again and
again.

To me the process of restoration seems perfectly plain and simple. It
consists merely in a faithful application of the Constitution and
laws. The execution of the laws is not now obstructed or opposed by
physical force. There is no military or other necessity, real or
pretended, which can prevent obedience to the Constitution, either
North or South. All the rights and all the obligations of States and
individuals can be protected and enforced by means perfectly
consistent with the fundamental law. The courts may be everywhere
open, and if open their process would be unimpeded. Crimes against
the United States can be prevented or punished by the proper judicial
authorities in a manner entirely practicable and legal. There is
therefore no reason why the Constitution should not be obeyed, unless
those who exercise its powers have determined that it shall be
disregarded and violated. The mere naked will of this Government, or
of some one or more of its branches, is the only obstacle that can
exist to a perfect union of all the States.

On this momentous question and some of the measures growing out of it
I have had the misfortune to differ from Congress, and have expressed
my convictions without reserve, though with becoming deference to the
opinion of the legislative department. Those convictions are not only
unchanged, but strengthened by subsequent events and further
reflection The transcendent importance of the subject will be a
sufficient excuse for calling your attention to some of the reasons
which have so strongly influenced my own judgment. The hope that we
may all finally concur in a mode of settlement consistent at once
with our true interests and with our sworn duties to the Constitution
is too natural and too just to be easily relinquished.

It is clear to my apprehension that the States lately in rebellion
are still members of the National Union. When did they cease to be
so? The "ordinances of secession" adopted by a portion (in most of
them a very small portion) of their citizens were mere nullities. If
we admit now that they were valid and effectual for the purpose
intended by their authors, we sweep from under our feet the whole
ground upon which we justified the war. Were those States afterwards
expelled from the Union by the war? The direct contrary was averred
by this Government to be its purpose, and was so understood by all
those who gave their blood and treasure to aid in its prosecution. It
can not be that a successful war, waged for the preservation of the
Union, had the legal effect of dissolving it. The victory of the
nation's arms was not the disgrace of her policy; the defeat of
secession on the battlefield was not the triumph of its lawless
principle. Nor could Congress, with or without the consent of the
Executive, do anything which would have the effect, directly or
indirectly, of separating the States from each other. To dissolve the
Union is to repeal the Constitution which holds it together, and that
is a power which does not belong to any department of this
Government, or to all of them united.

This is so plain that it has been acknowledged by all branches of the
Federal Government. The Executive (my predecessor as well as myself)
and the heads of all the Departments have uniformly acted upon the
principle that the Union is not only undissolved, but indissoluble.
Congress submitted an amendment of the Constitution to be ratified by
the Southern States, and accepted their acts of ratification as a
necessary and lawful exercise of their highest function. If they were
not States, or were States out of the Union, their consent to a change
in the fundamental law of the Union would have been nugatory, and
Congress in asking it committed a political absurdity. The judiciary
has also given the solemn sanction of its authority to the same view
of the case. The judges of the Supreme Court have included the
Southern States in their circuits, and they are constantly, in banc
and elsewhere, exercising jurisdiction which does not belong to them
unless those States are States of the Union.

If the Southern States are component parts of the Union, the
Constitution is the supreme law for them, as it is for all the other
States. They are bound to obey it, and so are we. The right of the
Federal Government, which is clear and unquestionable, to enforce the
Constitution upon them implies the correlative obligation on our part
to observe its limitations and execute its guaranties. Without the
Constitution we are nothing; by, through, and under the Constitution
we are what it makes us. We may doubt the wisdom of the law, we may
not approve of its provisions, but we can not violate it merely
because it seems to confine our powers within limits narrower than we
could wish. It is not a question of individual or class or sectional
interest, much less of party predominance, but of duty--of high and
sacred duty--which we are all sworn to perform. If we can not support
the Constitution with the cheerful alacrity of those who love and
believe in it, we must give to it at least the fidelity of public
servants who act under solemn obligations and commands which they
dare not disregard.

The constitutional duty is not the only one which requires the States
to be restored. There is another consideration which, though of minor
importance, is yet of great weight. On the 22d day of July, 1861,
Congress declared by an almost unanimous vote of both Houses that the
war should be conducted solely for the purpose of preserving the Union
and maintaining the supremacy of the Federal Constitution and laws,
without impairing the dignity, equality, and rights of the States or
of individuals, and that when this was done the war should cease. I
do not say that this declaration is personally binding on those who
joined in making it, any more than individual members of Congress are
personally bound to pay a public debt created under a law for which
they voted. But it was a solemn public, official pledge of the
national honor, and I can not imagine upon what grounds the
repudiation of it is to be justified. If it be said that we are not
bound to keep faith with rebels, let it be remembered that this
promise was not made to rebels only. Thousands of true men in the
South were drawn to our standard by it, and hundreds of thousands in
the North gave their lives in the belief that it would be carried
out. It was made on the day after the first great battle of the war
had been fought and lost. All patriotic and intelligent men then saw
the necessity of giving such an assurance, and believed that without
it the war would end in disaster to our cause. Having given that
assurance in the extremity of our peril, the violation of it now, in
the day of our power, would be a rude rending of that good faith
which holds the moral world together; our country would cease to have
any claim upon the confidence of men; it would make the war not only a
failure, but a fraud.

Being sincerely convinced that these views are correct, I would be
unfaithful to my duty if I did not recommend the repeal of the acts
of Congress which place ten of the Southern States under the
domination of military masters. If calm reflection shall satisfy a
majority of your honorable bodies that the acts referred to are not
only a violation of the national faith, but in direct conflict with
the Constitution, I dare not permit myself to doubt that you will
immediately strike them from the statute book.

To demonstrate the unconstitutional character of those acts I need do
no more than refer to their general provisions. It must be seen at
once that they are not authorized. To dictate what alterations shall
be made in the constitutions of the several States; to control the
elections of State legislators and State officers, members of
Congress and electors of President and Vice-President, by arbitrarily
declaring who shall vote and who shall be excluded from that
privilege; to dissolve State legislatures or prevent them from
assembling; to dismiss judges and other civil functionaries of the
State and appoint others without regard to State law; to organize and
operate all the political machinery of the States; to regulate the
whole administration of their domestic and local affairs according to
the mere will of strange and irresponsible agents, sent among them for
that purpose--these are powers not granted to the Federal Government
or to any one of its branches. Not being granted, we violate our
trust by assuming them as palpably as we would by acting in the face
of a positive interdict; for the Constitution forbids us to do
whatever it does not affirmatively authorize, either by express words
or by clear implication. If the authority we desire to use does not
come to us through the Constitution, we can exercise it only by
usurpation, and usurpation is the most dangerous of political crimes.
By that crime the enemies of free government in all ages have worked
out their designs against public liberty and private right. It leads
directly and immediately to the establishment of absolute rule, for
undelegated power is always unlimited and unrestrained.

The acts of Congress in question are not only objectionable for their
assumption of ungranted power, but many of their provisions are in
conflict with the direct prohibitions of the Constitution. The
Constitution commands that a republican form of government shall be
guaranteed to all the States; that no person shall be deprived of
life, liberty, or property without due process of law, arrested
without a judicial warrant, or punished without a fair trial before
an impartial jury; that the privilege of habeas corpus shall not be
denied in time of peace, and that no bill of attainder shall be
passed even against a single individual. Yet the system of measures
established by these acts of Congress does totally subvert and
destroy the form as well as the substance of republican government in
the ten States to which they apply. It binds them hand and foot in
absolute slavery, and subjects them to a strange and hostile power,
more unlimited and more likely to be abused than any other now known
among civilized men. It tramples down all those rights in which the
essence of liberty consists, and which a free government is always
most careful to protect. It denies the habeas corpus and the trial by
jury. Personal freedom, property, and life, if assailed by the
passion, the prejudice, or the rapacity of the ruler, have no
security whatever. It has the effect of a bill of attainder or bill
of pains and penalties, not upon a few individuals, but upon whole
masses, including the millions who inhabit the subject States, and
even their unborn children. These wrongs, being expressly forbidden,
can not be constitutionally inflicted upon any portion of our people,
no matter how they may have come within our jurisdiction, and no
matter whether they live in States, Territories, or districts.

I have no desire to save from the proper and just consequences of
their great crime those who engaged in rebellion against the
Government, but as a mode of punishment the measures under
consideration are the most unreasonable that could be invented. Many
of those people are perfectly innocent; many kept their fidelity to
the Union untainted to the last; many were incapable of any legal
offense; a large proportion even of the persons able to bear arms
were forced into rebellion against their will, and of those who are
guilty with their own consent the degrees of guilt are as various as
the shades of their character and temper. But these acts of Congress
confound them all together in one common doom. Indiscriminate
vengeance upon classes, sects, and parties, or upon whole
communities, for offenses committed by a portion of them against the
governments to which they owed obedience was common in the barbarous
ages of the world; but Christianity and civilization have made such
progress that recourse to a punishment so cruel and unjust would meet
with the condemnation of all unprejudiced and right-minded men. The
punitive justice of this age, and especially of this country, does
not consist in stripping whole States of their liberties and reducing
all their people, without distinction, to the condition of slavery. It
deals separately with each individual, confines itself to the forms of
law, and vindicates its own purity by an impartial examination of
every case before a competent judicial tribunal. If this does not
satisfy all our desires with regard to Southern rebels, let us
console ourselves by reflecting that a free Constitution, triumphant
in war and unbroken in peace, is worth far more to us and our
children than the gratification of any present feeling.

I am aware it is assumed that this system of government for the
Southern States is not to be perpetual. It is true this military
government is to be only provisional, but it is through this
temporary evil that a greater evil is to be made perpetual. If the
guaranties of the Constitution can be broken provisionally to serve a
temporary purpose, and in a part only of the country, we can destroy
them everywhere and for all time. Arbitrary measures often change,
but they generally change for the worse. It is the curse of despotism
that it has no halting place. The intermitted exercise of its power
brings no sense of security to its subjects, for they can never know
what more they will be called to endure when its red right hand is
armed to plague them again. Nor is it possible to conjecture how or
where power, unrestrained by law, may seek its next victims. The
States that are still free may be enslaved at any moment; for if the
Constitution does not protect all, it protects none.

It is manifestly and avowedly the object of these laws to confer upon
Negroes the privilege of voting and to disfranchise such a number of
white citizens as will give the former a clear majority at all
elections in the Southern States. This, to the minds of some persons,
is so important that a violation of the Constitution is justified as a
means of bringing it about. The morality is always false which excuses
a wrong because it proposes to accomplish a desirable end. We are not
permitted to do evil that good may come. But in this case the end
itself is evil, as well as the means. The subjugation of the States
to Negro domination would be worse than the military despotism under
which they are now suffering. It was believed beforehand that the
people would endure any amount of military oppression for any length
of time rather than degrade themselves by subjection to the Negro
race. Therefore they have been left without a choice. Negro suffrage
was established by act of Congress, and the military officers were
commanded to superintend the process of clothing the Negro race with
the political privileges torn from white men.

The blacks in the South are entitled to be well and humanely
governed, and to have the protection of just laws for all their
rights of person and property. If it were practicable at this time to
give them a Government exclusively their own, under which they might
manage their own affairs in their own way, it would become a grave
question whether we ought to do so, or whether common humanity would
not require us to save them from themselves. But under the
circumstances this is only a speculative point. It is not proposed
merely that they shall govern themselves, but that they shall rule
the white race, make and administer State laws, elect Presidents and
members of Congress, and shape to a greater or less extent the future
destiny of the whole country. Would such a trust and power be safe in
such hands?

The peculiar qualities which should characterize any people who are
fit to decide upon the management of public affairs for a great state
have seldom been combined. It is the glory of white men to know that
they have had these qualities in sufficient measure to build upon
this continent a great political fabric and to preserve its stability
for more than ninety years, while in every other part of the world all
similar experiments have failed. But if anything can be proved by
known facts, if all reasoning upon evidence is not abandoned, it must
be acknowledged that in the progress of nations Negroes have shown
less capacity for government than any other race of people. No
independent government of any form has ever been successful in their
hands. On the contrary, wherever they have been left to their own
devices they have shown a constant tendency to relapse into
barbarism. In the Southern States, however, Congress has undertaken
to confer upon them the privilege of the ballot. Just released from
slavery, it may be doubted whether as a class they know more than
their ancestors how to organize and regulate civil society. Indeed,
it is admitted that the blacks of the South are not only regardless
of the rights of property, but so utterly ignorant of public affairs
that their voting can consist in nothing more than carrying a ballot
to the place where they are directed to deposit it. I need not remind
you that the exercise of the elective franchise is the highest
attribute of an American citizen, and that when guided by virtue,
intelligence, patriotism, and a proper appreciation of our free
institutions it constitutes the true basis of a democratic form of
government, in which the sovereign power is lodged in the body of the
people. A trust artificially created, not for its own sake, but solely
as a means of promoting the general welfare, its influence for good
must necessarily depend upon the elevated character and true
allegiance of the elector. It ought, therefore, to be reposed in none
except those who are fitted morally and mentally to administer it
well; for if conferred upon persons who do not justly estimate its
value and who are indifferent as to its results, it will only serve
as a means of placing power in the hands of the unprincipled and
ambitious, and must eventuate in the complete destruction of that
liberty of which it should be the most powerful conservator. I have
therefore heretofore urged upon your attention the great danger--to
be apprehended from an untimely extension of the elective franchise
to any new class in our country, especially when the large majority
of that class, in wielding the power thus placed in their hands, can
not be expected correctly to comprehend the duties and
responsibilities which pertain to suffrage. Yesterday, as it were,
4,000,000 persons were held in a condition of slavery that had
existed for generations; to-day they are freemen and are assumed by
law to be citizens. It can not be presumed, from their previous
condition of servitude, that as a class they are as well informed as
to the nature of our Government as the intelligent foreigner who
makes our land the home of his choice. In the case of the latter
neither a residence of five years and the knowledge of our
institutions which it gives nor attachment to the principles of the
Constitution are the only conditions upon which he can be admitted to
citizenship; he must prove in addition a good moral character, and
thus give reasonable ground for the belief that he will be faithful
to the obligations which he assumes as a citizen of the Republic.
Where a people--the source of all political power--speak by their
suffrages through the instrumentality of the ballot box, it must be
carefully guarded against the control of those who are corrupt in
principle and enemies of free institutions, for it can only become to
our political and social system a safe conductor of healthy popular
sentiment when kept free from demoralizing influences. Controlled
through fraud and usurpation by the designing, anarchy and despotism
must inevitably follow. In the hands of the patriotic and worthy our
Government will be preserved upon the principles of the Constitution
inherited from our fathers. It follows, therefore, that in admitting
to the ballot box a new class of voters not qualified for the
exercise of the elective franchise we weaken our system of government
instead of adding to its strength and durability.

I yield to no one in attachment to that rule of general suffrage
which distinguishes our policy as a nation. But there is a limit,
wisely observed hitherto, which makes the ballot a privilege and a
trust, and which requires of some classes a time suitable for
probation and preparation. To give it indiscriminately to a new
class, wholly unprepared by previous habits and opportunities to
perform the trust which it demands, is to degrade it, and finally to
destroy its power, for it may be safely assumed that no political
truth is better established than that such indiscriminate and
all-embracing extension of popular suffrage must end at last in its
destruction. I repeat the expression of my willingness to join in any
plan within the scope of our constitutional authority which promises
to better the condition of the Negroes in the South, by encouraging
them in industry, enlightening their minds, improving their morals,
and giving protection to all their just rights as freedmen. But the
transfer of our political inheritance to them would, in my opinion,
be an abandonment of a duty which we owe alike to the memory of our
fathers and the rights of our children.

The plan of putting the Southern States wholly and the General
Government partially into the hands of Negroes is proposed at a time
peculiarly unpropitious. The foundations of society have been broken
up by civil war. Industry must be reorganized, justice reestablished,
public credit maintained, and order brought out of confusion. To
accomplish these ends would require all the wisdom and virtue of the
great men who formed our institutions originally. I confidently
believe that their descendants will be equal to the arduous task
before them, but it is worse than madness to expect that Negroes will
perform it for us. Certainly we ought not to ask their assistance till
we despair of our own competency.

The great difference between the two races in physical, mental, and
moral characteristics will prevent an amalgamation or fusion of them
together in one homogeneous mass. If the inferior obtains the
ascendency over the other, it will govern with reference only to its
own interests for it will recognize no common interest--and create
such a tyranny as this continent has never yet witnessed. Already the
Negroes are influenced by promises of confiscation and plunder. They
are taught to regard as an enemy every white man who has any respect
for the rights of his own race. If this continues it must become
worse and worse, until all order will be subverted, all industry
cease, and the fertile fields of the South grow up into a wilderness.
Of all the dangers which our nation has yet encountered, none are
equal to those which must result from the success of the effort now
making to Africanize the half of our country.

I would not put considerations of money in competition with justice
and right; but the expenses incident to "reconstruction" under the
system adopted by Congress aggravate what I regard as the intrinsic
wrong of the measure itself. It has cost uncounted millions already,
and if persisted in will add largely to the weight of taxation,
already too oppressive to be borne without just complaint, and may
finally reduce the Treasury of the nation to a condition of
bankruptcy. We must not delude ourselves. It will require a strong
standing army and probably more than $200,000,000 per annum to
maintain the supremacy of Negro governments after they are
established. The sum thus thrown away would, if properly used, form a
sinking fund large enough to pay the whole national debt in less than
fifteen years. It is vain to hope that Negroes will maintain their
ascendency themselves. Without military power they are wholly
incapable of holding in subjection the white people of the South.

I submit to the judgment of Congress whether the public credit may
not be injuriously affected by a system of measures like this. With
our debt and the vast private interests which are complicated with
it, we can not be too cautious of a policy which might by possibility
impair the confidence of the world in our Government. That confidence
can only be retained by carefully inculcating the principles of
justice and honor on the popular mind and by the most scrupulous
fidelity to all our engagements of every sort. Any serious breach of
the organic law, persisted in for a considerable time, can not but
create fears for the stability of our institutions. Habitual
violation of prescribed rules, which we bind ourselves to observe,
must demoralize the people. Our only standard of civil duty being set
at naught, the sheet anchor of our political morality is lost, the
public conscience swings from its moorings and yields to every
impulse of passion and interest. If we repudiate the Constitution, we
will not be expected to care much for mere pecuniary obligations. The
violation of such a pledge as we made on the 22d day of July, 1861,
will assuredly diminish the market value of our other promises.
Besides, if we acknowledge that the national debt was created, not to
hold the States in the Union, as the taxpayers were led to suppose,
but to expel them from it and hand them over to be governed by
Negroes, the moral duty to pay it may seem much less clear. I say it
may seem so, for I do not admit that this or any other argument in
favor of repudiation can be entertained as sound; but its influence
on some classes of minds may well be apprehended. The financial honor
of a great commercial nation, largely indebted and with a republican
form of government administered by agents of the popular choice, is a
thing of such delicate texture and the destruction of it would be
followed by such unspeakable calamity that every true patriot must
desire to avoid whatever might expose it to the slightest danger.

The great interests of the country require immediate relief from
these enactments. Business in the South is paralyzed by a sense of
general insecurity, by the terror of confiscation, and the dread of
Negro supremacy. The Southern trade, from which the North would have
derived so great a profit under a government of law, still
languishes, and can never be revived until it ceases to be fettered
by the arbitrary power which makes all its operations unsafe. That
rich country--the richest in natural resources the world ever saw--is
worse than lost if it be not soon placed under the protection of a
free constitution. Instead of being, as it ought to be, a source of
wealth and power, it will become an intolerable burden upon the rest
of the nation.

Another reason for retracing our steps will doubtless be seen by
Congress in the late manifestations of public opinion upon this
subject. We live in a country where the popular will always enforces
obedience to itself, sooner or later. It is vain to think of opposing
it with anything short of legal authority backed by overwhelming
force. It can not have escaped your attention that from the day on
which Congress fairly and formally presented the proposition to
govern the Southern States by military force, with a view to the
ultimate establishment of Negro supremacy, every expression of the
general sentiment has been more or less adverse to it. The affections
of this generation can not be detached from the institutions of their
ancestors. Their determination to preserve the inheritance of free
government in their own hands and transmit it undivided and
unimpaired to their own posterity is too strong to be successfully
opposed. Every weaker passion will disappear before that love of
liberty and law for which the American people are distinguished above
all others in the world.

How far the duty of the President "to preserve, protect, and defend
the Constitution" requires him to go in opposing an unconstitutional
act of Congress is a very serious and important question, on which I
have deliberated much and felt extremely anxious to reach a proper
conclusion. Where an act has been passed according to the forms of
the Constitution by the supreme legislative authority, and is
regularly enrolled among the public statutes of the country,
Executive resistance to it, especially in times of high party
excitement, would be likely to produce violent collision between the
respective adherents of the two branches of the Government. This
would be simply civil war, and civil war must be resorted to only as
the last remedy for the worst of evils. Whatever might tend to
provoke it should be most carefully avoided. A faithful and
conscientious magistrate will concede very much to honest error, and
something even to perverse malice, before he will endanger the public
peace; and he will not adopt forcible measures, or such as might lead
to force, as long as those which are peaceable remain open to him or
to his constituents. It is true that cases may occur in which the
Executive would be compelled to stand on its rights, and maintain
them regardless of all consequences. If Congress should pass an act
which is not only in palpable conflict with the Constitution, but
will certainly, if carried out, produce immediate and irreparable
injury to the organic structure of the Government, and if there be
neither judicial remedy for the wrongs it inflicts nor power in the
people to protect themselves without the official aid of their
elected defender--if, for instance, the legislative department should
pass an act even through all the forms of law to abolish a coordinate
department of the Government--in such a case the President must take
the high responsibilities of his office and save the life of the
nation at all hazards. The so-called reconstruction acts, though as
plainly unconstitutional as any that can be imagined, were not
believed to be within the class last mentioned. The people were not
wholly disarmed of the power of self-defense. In all the Northern
States they still held in their hands the sacred right of the ballot,
and it was safe to believe that in due time they would come to the
rescue of their own institutions. It gives me pleasure to add that
the appeal to our common constituents was not taken in vain, and that
my confidence in their wisdom and virtue seems not to have been
misplaced.

It is well and publicly known that enormous frauds have been
perpetrated on the Treasury and that colossal fortunes have been made
at the public expense. This species of corruption has increased, is
increasing, and if not diminished will soon bring us into total ruin
and disgrace. The public creditors and the taxpayers are alike
interested in an honest administration of the finances, and neither
class will long endure the large-handed robberies of the recent past.
For this discreditable state of things there are several causes. Some
of the taxes are so laid as to present an irresistible temptation to
evade payment. The great sums which officers may win by connivance at
fraud create a pressure which is more than the virtue of many can
withstand, and there can be no doubt that the open disregard of
constitutional obligations avowed by some of the highest and most
influential men in the country has greatly weakened the moral sense
of those who serve in subordinate places. The expenses of the United
States, including interest on the public debt, are more than six
times as much as they were seven years ago. To collect and disburse
this vast amount requires careful supervision as well as systematic
vigilance. The system, never perfected, was much disorganized by the
"tenure-of-office bill," which has almost destroyed official
accountability. The President may be thoroughly convinced that an
officer is incapable, dishonest, or unfaithful to the Constitution,
but under the law which I have named the utmost he can do is to
complain to the Senate and ask the privilege of supplying his place
with a better man. If the Senate be regarded as personally or
politically hostile to the President, it is natural, and not
altogether unreasonable, for the officer to expect that it will take
his part as far as possible, restore him to his place, and give him a
triumph over his Executive superior. The officer has other chances of
impunity arising from accidental defects of evidence, the mode of
investigating it, and the secrecy of the hearing. It is not wonderful
that official malfeasance should become bold in proportion as the
delinquents learn to think themselves safe. I am entirely persuaded
that under such a rule the President can not perform the great duty
assigned to him of seeing the laws faithfully executed, and that it
disables him most especially from enforcing that rigid accountability
which is necessary to the due execution of the revenue laws.

The Constitution invests the President with authority to decide
whether a removal should be made in any given case; the act of
Congress declares in substance that he shall only accuse such as he
supposes to be unworthy of their trust. The Constitution makes him
sole judge in the premises, but the statute takes away his
jurisdiction, transfers it to the Senate, and leaves him nothing but
the odious and sometimes impracticable duty of becoming a prosecutor.
The prosecution is to be conducted before a tribunal whose members are
not, like him, responsible to the whole people, but to separate
constituent bodies, and who may hear his accusation with great
disfavor. The Senate is absolutely without any known standard of
decision applicable to such a case. Its judgment can not be
anticipated, for it is not governed by any rule. The law does not
define what shall be deemed good cause for removal. It is impossible
even to conjecture what may or may not be so considered by the
Senate. The nature of the subject forbids clear proof. If the charge
be incapacity, what evidence will support it? Fidelity to the
Constitution may be understood or misunderstood in a thousand
different ways, and by violent party men, in violent party times,
unfaithfulness to the Constitution may even come to be considered
meritorious. If the officer be accused of dishonesty, how shall it be
made out? Will it be inferred from acts unconnected with public duty,
from private history, or from general reputation, or must the
President await the commission of an actual misdemeanor in office?
Shall he in the meantime risk the character and interest of the
nation in the hands of men to whom he can not give his confidence?
Must he forbear his complaint until the mischief is done and can not
be prevented? If his zeal in the public service should impel him to
anticipate the overt act, must he move at the peril of being tried
himself for the offense of slandering his subordinate? In the present
circumstances of the country someone must be held responsible for
official delinquency of every kind. It is extremely difficult to say
where that responsibility should be thrown if it be not left where it
has been placed by the Constitution. But all just men will admit that
the President ought to be entirely relieved from such responsibility
if he can not meet it by reason of restrictions placed by law upon
his action.

The unrestricted power of removal from office is a very great one to
be trusted even to a magistrate chosen by the general suffrage of the
whole people and accountable directly to them for his acts. It is
undoubtedly liable to abuse, and at some periods of our history
perhaps has been abused. If it be thought desirable and
constitutional that it should be so limited as to make the President
merely a common informer against other public agents, he should at
least be permitted to act in that capacity before some open tribunal,
independent of party politics, ready to investigate the merits of
every case, furnished with the means of taking evidence, and bound to
decide according to established rules. This would guarantee the safety
of the accuser when he acts in good faith, and at the same time secure
the rights of the other party. I speak, of course, with all proper
respect for the present Senate, but it does not seem to me that any
legislative body can be so constituted as to insure its fitness for
these functions.

It is not the theory of this Government that public offices are the
property of those who hold them. They are given merely as a trust for
the public benefit, sometimes for a fixed period, sometimes during
good behavior, but generally they are liable to be terminated at the
pleasure of the appointing power, which represents the collective
majesty and speaks the will of the people. The forced retention in
office of a single dishonest person may work great injury to the
public interests. The danger to the public service comes not from the
power to remove, but from the power to appoint. Therefore it was that
the framers of the Constitution left the power of removal
unrestricted, while they gave the Senate a fight to reject all
appointments which in its opinion were not fit to be made. A little
reflection on this subject will probably satisfy all who have the
good of the country at heart that our best course is to take the
Constitution for our guide, walk in the path marked out by the
founders of the Republic, and obey the rules made sacred by the
observance of our great predecessors.

The present condition of our finances and circulating medium is one
to which your early consideration is invited.

The proportion which the currency of any country should bear to the
whole value of the annual produce circulated by its means is a
question upon which political economists have not agreed. Nor can it
be controlled by legislation, but must be left to the irrevocable
laws which everywhere regulate commerce and trade. The circulating
medium will ever irresistibly flow to those points where it is in
greatest demand. The law of demand and supply is as unerring as that
which regulates the tides of the ocean; and, indeed, currency, like
the tides, has its ebbs and flows throughout the commercial world.

At the beginning of the rebellion the bank-note circulation of the
country amounted to not much more than $200,000,000; now the
circulation of national-bank notes and those known as "legal-tenders"
is nearly seven hundred millions. While it is urged by some that this
amount should be increased, others contend that a decided reduction
is absolutely essential to the best interests of the country. In view
of these diverse opinions, it may be well to ascertain the real value
of our paper issues when compared with a metallic or convertible
currency. For this purpose let us inquire how much gold and silver
could be purchased by the seven hundred millions of paper money now
in circulation. Probably not more than half the amount of the latter,
showing that when our paper currency is compared with gold and silver
its commercial value is compressed into three hundred and fifty
millions. This striking fact makes it the obvious duty of the
Government, as early as may be consistent with the principles of
sound political economy, to take such measures as will enable the
holder of its notes and those of the national banks to convert them
without loss into specie or its equivalent. A reduction of our paper
circulating medium need not necessarily follow. This, however, would
depend upon the law of demand and supply, though it should be borne
in mind that by making legal-tender and bank notes convertible into
coin or its equivalent their present specie value in the hands of
their holders would be enhanced 100 per cent.

Legislation for the accomplishment of a result so desirable is
demanded by the highest public considerations. The Constitution
contemplates that the circulating medium of the country shall be
uniform in quality and value. At the time of the formation of that
instrument the country had just emerged from the War of the
Revolution, and was suffering from the effects of a redundant and
worthless paper currency. The sages of that period were anxious to
protect their posterity from the evils that they themselves had
experienced. Hence in providing a circulating medium they conferred
upon Congress the power to coin money and regulate the value thereof,
at the same time prohibiting the States from making anything but gold
and silver a tender in payment of debts.

The anomalous condition of our currency is in striking contrast with
that which was originally designed. Our circulation now embraces,
first, notes of the national banks, which are made receivable for all
dues to the Government, excluding imposts, and by all its creditors,
excepting in payment of interest upon its bonds and the securities
themselves; second, legal-tender notes, issued by the United States,
and which the law requires shall be received as well in payment of
all debts between citizens as of all Government dues, excepting
imposts; and, third, gold and silver coin. By the operation of our
present system of finance, however, the metallic currency, when
collected, is reserved only for one class of Government creditors,
who, holding its bonds, semiannually receive their interest in coin
from the National Treasury. They are thus made to occupy an invidious
position, which may be used to strengthen the arguments of those who
would bring into disrepute the obligations of the nation. In the
payment of all its debts the plighted faith of the Government should
be inviolably maintained. But while it acts with fidelity toward the
bondholder who loaned his money that the integrity of the Union might
be preserved, it should at the same time observe good faith with the
great masses of the people, who, having rescued the Union from the
perils of rebellion, now bear the burdens of taxation, that the
Government may be able to fulfill its engagements. There is no reason
which will be accepted as satisfactory by the people why those who
defend us on the land and protect us on the sea; the pensioner upon
the gratitude of the nation, bearing the scars and wounds received
while in its service; the public servants in the various Departments
of the Government; the farmer who supplies the soldiers of the Army
and the sailors of the Navy; the artisan who toils in the nation's
workshops, or the mechanics and laborers who build its edifices and
construct its forts and vessels of war, should, in payment of their
just and hard-earned dues, receive depreciated paper, while another
class of their countrymen, no more deserving, are paid in coin of
gold and silver. Equal and exact justice requires that all the
creditors of the Government should be paid in a currency possessing a
uniform value. This can only be accomplished by the restoration of the
currency to the standard established by the Constitution; and by this
means we would remove a discrimination which may, if it has not
already done so, create a prejudice that may become deep rooted and
widespread and imperil the national credit.

The feasibility of making our currency correspond with the
constitutional standard may be seen by reference to a few facts
derived from our commercial statistics.

The production of precious metals in the United States from 1849 to
1857, inclusive, amounted to $579,000,000; from 1858 to 1860,
inclusive, to $137,500,000, and from 1861 to 1867, inclusive, to
$457,500,000--making the grand aggregate of products since 1849
$1,174,000,000. The amount of specie coined from 1849 to 1857
inclusive, was $439,000,000; from 1858 to 1860, inclusive,
$125,000,000, and from 1861 to 1867, inclusive, $310,000,000--making
the total coinage since 1849 $874,000,000. From 1849 to 1857,
inclusive, the net exports of specie amounted to $271,000,000; from
1858 to 1860, inclusive, to $148,000,000, and from 1861 to 1867,
inclusive, $322,000,000--making the aggregate of net exports since
1849 $741,000,000. These figures show an excess of product over net
exports of $433,000,000. There are in the Treasury $111,000,000 in
coin, something more than $40,000,000 in circulation on the Pacific
Coast, and a few millions in the national and other banks--in all
about $160,000,000. This, however, taking into account the specie in
the country prior to 1849 leaves more than $300,000,000 which have
not been accounted for by exportation, and therefore may yet remain
in the country.

These are important facts and show how completely the inferior
currency will supersede the better, forcing it from circulation among
the masses and causing it to be exported as a mere article of trade,
to add to the money capital of foreign lands. They show the necessity
of retiring our paper money, that the return of gold and silver to the
avenues of trade may be invited and a demand created which will cause
the retention at home of at least so much of the productions of our
rich and inexhaustible gold-bearing fields as may be sufficient for
purposes of circulation. It is unreasonable to expect a return to a
sound currency so long as the Government by continuing to issue
irredeemable notes fills the channels of circulation with depreciated
paper. Notwithstanding a coinage by our mints, since 1849, of
$874,000,000, the people are now strangers to the currency which was
designed for their use and benefit, and specimens of the precious
metals bearing the national device are seldom seen, except when
produced to gratify the interest excited by their novelty. If
depreciated paper is to be continued as the permanent currency of the
country, and all our coin is to become a mere article of traffic and
speculation, to the enhancement in price of all that is indispensable
to the comfort of the people, it would be wise economy to abolish our
mints thus saving the nation the care and expense incident to such
establishments, and let all our precious metals be exported in
bullion. The time has come, however, when the Government and national
banks should be required to take the most efficient steps and make all
necessary arrangements for a resumption of specie payments at the
earliest practicable period. Specie payments having been once resumed
by the Government and banks, all notes or bills of paper issued by
either of a less denomination than $20 should by law be excluded from
circulation, so that the people may have the benefit and convenience
of a gold and silver currency which in all their business
transactions will be uniform in value at home and abroad. Every man
of property or industry, every man who desires to preserve what he
honestly possesses or to obtain what he can honestly earn, has a
direct interest in maintaining a safe circulating medium--such a
medium as shall be real and substantial, not liable to vibrate with
opinions, not subject to be blown up or blown down by the breath of
speculation, but to be made stable and secure. A disordered currency
is one of the greatest political evils. It undermines the virtues
necessary for the support of the social system and encourages
propensities destructive of its happiness; it wars against industry,
frugality, and economy, and it fosters the evil spirits of
extravagance and speculation. It has been asserted by one of our
profound and most gifted statesmen that--Of all the contrivances for
cheating the laboring classes of mankind, none has been more
effectual than that which deludes them with paper money. This is the
most effectual of inventions to fertilize the rich man's fields by
the sweat of the poor man's brow. Ordinary tyranny, oppression,
excessive taxation--these bear lightly on the happiness of the mass
of the community compared with a fraudulent currency and the
robberies committed by depreciated paper. Our own history has
recorded for our instruction enough, and more than enough, of the
demoralizing tendency, the injustice, and the intolerable oppression
on the virtuous and well disposed of a degraded paper currency
authorized by law or in any way countenanced by government. It is one
of the most successful devices, in times of peace or war, expansions
or revulsions, to accomplish the transfer of all the precious metals
from the great mass of the people into the hands of the few, where
they are hoarded in secret places or deposited in strong boxes under
bolts and bars, while the people are left to endure all the
inconvenience, sacrifice, and demoralization resulting from the use
of a depreciated and worthless paper money.

The condition of our finances and the operations of our revenue
system are set forth and fully explained in the able and instructive
report of the Secretary of the Treasury. On the 30th of June, 1866,
the public debt amounted to $2,783,425,879; on the 30th of June last
it was $2,692,199,215, showing a reduction during the fiscal year of
$91,226,664. During the fiscal year ending June 30, 1867, the
receipts were $490,634,010 and the expenditures $346,729,129, leaving
an available surplus of $143,904,880. It is estimated that the
receipts for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1868, will be
$417,161,928 and that the expenditures will reach the sum of
$393,269,226, leaving in the Treasury a surplus of $23,892,702. For
the fiscal year ending June 30, 1869, it is estimated that the
receipts will amount to $381,000,000 and that the expenditures will
be $372,000,000, showing an excess of $9,000,000 in favor of the
Government.

The attention of Congress is earnestly invited to the necessity of a
thorough revision of our revenue system. Our internal-revenue laws
and impost system should be so adjusted as to bear most heavily on
articles of luxury, leaving the necessaries of life as free from
taxation as may be consistent with the real wants of the Government,
economically administered. Taxation would not then fall unduly on the
man of moderate means; and while none would be entirely exempt from
assessment, all, in proportion to their pecuniary abilities, would
contribute toward the support of the State. A modification of the
internal-revenue system, by a large reduction in the number of
articles now subject to tax, would be followed by results equally
advantageous to the citizen and the Government. It would render the
execution of the law less expensive and more certain, remove
obstructions to industry, lessen the temptations to evade the law,
diminish the violations and frauds perpetrated upon its provisions,
make its operations less inquisitorial, and greatly reduce in numbers
the army of taxgatherers created by the system, who "take from the
mouth of honest labor the bread it has earned." Retrenchment, reform,
and economy should be carried into every branch of the public service,
that the expenditures of the Government may be reduced and the people
relieved from oppressive taxation; a sound currency should be
restored, and the public faith in regard to the national debt
sacredly observed. The accomplishment of these important results,
together with the restoration of the Union of the States upon the
principles of the Constitution, would inspire confidence at home and
abroad in the stability of our institutions and bring to the nation
prosperity, peace, and good will.

The report of the Secretary of War ad interim exhibits the operations
of the Army and of the several bureaus of the War Department. The
aggregate strength of our military force on the 30th of September
last was 56,315. The total estimate for military appropriations is
$77,124,707, including a deficiency in last year's appropriation of
$13,600,000. The payments at the Treasury on account of the service
of the War Department from January 1 to October 29, 1867--a period of
ten months--amounted to $109,807,000. The expenses of the military
establishment, as well as the numbers of the Army, are now three
times as great as they have ever been in time of peace, while the
discretionary, power is vested in the Executive to add millions to
this expenditure by an increase of the Army to the maximum strength
allowed by the law.

The comprehensive report of the Secretary of the Interior furnishes
interesting information in reference to the important branches of the
public service connected with his Department. The menacing attitude of
some of the warlike bands of Indians inhabiting the district of
country between the Arkansas and Platte rivers and portions of Dakota
Territory required the presence of a large military force in that
region. Instigated by real or imaginary grievances, the Indians
occasionally committed acts of barbarous violence upon emigrants and
our frontier settlements; but a general Indian war has been
providentially averted. The commissioners under the act of 20th July,
1867, were invested with full power to adjust existing difficulties,
negotiate treaties with the disaffected bands, and select for them
reservations remote from the traveled routes between the Mississippi
and the Pacific. They entered without delay upon the execution of
their trust, but have not yet made any official report of their
proceedings. It is of vital importance that our distant Territories
should be exempt from Indian outbreaks, and that the construction of
the Pacific Railroad, an object of national importance, should not be
interrupted by hostile tribes. These objects, as well as the material
interests and the moral and intellectual improvement of the Indians,
can be most effectually secured by concentrating them upon portions
of country set apart for their exclusive use and located at points
remote from our highways and encroaching white settlements.

Since the commencement of the second session of the Thirty-ninth
Congress 510 miles of road have been constructed on the main line and
branches of the Pacific Railway. The line from Omaha is rapidly
approaching the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains, while the
terminus of the last section of constructed road in California,
accepted by the Government on the 24th day of October last, was but
11 miles distant from the summit of the Sierra Nevada. The remarkable
energy evinced by the companies offers the strongest assurance that
the completion of the road from Sacramento to Omaha will not be long
deferred.

During the last fiscal year 7,041,114 acres of public land were
disposed of, and the cash receipts from sales and fees exceeded by
one-half million dollars the sum realized from those sources during
the preceding year. The amount paid to pensioners, including expenses
of disbursements, was $18,619,956, and 36,482 names were added to the
rolls. The entire number of pensioners on the 30th of June last was
155,474. Eleven thousand six hundred and fifty-five patents and
designs were issued during the year ending September 30, 1867, and at
that date the balance in the Treasury to the credit of the patent fund
was $286,607.

The report of the Secretary of the Navy states that we have seven
squadrons actively and judiciously employed, under efficient and able
commanders, in protecting the persons and property of American
citizens, maintaining the dignity and power of the Government, and
promoting the commerce and business interests of our countrymen in
every part of the world. Of the 238 vessels composing the present
Navy of the United States, 56, carrying 507 guns, are in squadron
service. During the year the number of vessels in commission has been
reduced 12, and there are 13 less on squadron duty than there were at
the date of the last report. A large number of vessels were commenced
and in the course of construction when the war terminated, and
although Congress had made the necessary appropriations for their
completion, the Department has either suspended work upon them or
limited the slow completion of the steam vessels, so as to meet the
contracts for machinery made with private establishments. The total
expenditures of the Navy Department for the fiscal year ending June
30, 1867, were $31,034,011. No appropriations have been made or
required since the close of the war for the construction and repair
of vessels, for steam machinery, ordnance, provisions and clothing,
fuel, hemp, etc., the balances under these several heads having been
more than sufficient for current expenditures. It should also be
stated to the credit of the Department that, besides asking no
appropriations for the above objects for the last two years, the
Secretary of the Navy, on the 30th of September last, in accordance
with the act of May 1, 1820, requested the Secretary of the Treasury
to carry to the surplus fund the sum of $65,000.000, being the amount
received from the sales of vessels and other war property and the
remnants of former appropriations.

The report of the Postmaster-General shows the business of the
Post-Office Department and the condition of the postal service in a
very favorable light, and the attention of Congress is called to its
practical recommendations. The receipts of the Department for the
year ending June 30, 1867, including all special appropriations for
sea and land service and for free mail matter, were $19,978,693. The
expenditures for all purposes were $19,235,483, leaving an unexpended
balance in favor of the Department of $743,210, which can be applied
toward the expenses of the Department for the current year. The
increase of postal revenue, independent of specific appropriations,
for the year 1867 over that of 1866 was $850,040. The increase of
revenue from the sale of stamps and stamped envelopes was $783,404.
The increase of expenditures for 1867 over those of the previous year
was owing chiefly to the extension of the land and ocean mail service.
During the past year new postal conventions have been ratified and
exchanged with the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland,
Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the North German Union, Italy,
and the colonial government at Hong Kong, reducing very largely the
rates of ocean and land postages to and from and within those
countries.

The report of the Acting Commissioner of Agriculture concisely
presents the condition, wants, and progress of an interest eminently
worthy the fostering care of Congress, and exhibits a large measure
of useful results achieved during the year to which it refers.

The reestablishment of peace at home and the resumption of extended
trade, travel, and commerce abroad have served to increase the number
and variety of questions in the Department for Foreign Affairs. None
of these questions, however, have seriously disturbed our relations
with other states.

The Republic of Mexico, having been relieved from foreign
intervention, is earnestly engaged in efforts to reestablish her
constitutional system of government. A good understanding continues
to exist between our Government and the Republics of Hayti and San
Domingo, and our cordial relations with the Central and South
American States remain unchanged. The tender, made in conformity with
a resolution of Congress, of the good offices of the Government with a
view to an amicable adjustment of peace between Brazil and her allies
on one side and Paraguay on the other, and between Chile and her
allies on the one side and Spain on the other, though kindly
received, has in neither case been fully accepted by the
belligerents. The war in the valley of the Parana is still vigorously
maintained. On the other hand, actual hostilities between the Pacific
States and Spain have been more than a year suspended. I shall, on
any proper occasion that may occur, renew the conciliatory
recommendations which have been already made. Brazil, with
enlightened sagacity and comprehensive statesmanship, has opened the
great channels of the Amazon and its tributaries to universal
commerce. One thing more seems needful to assure a rapid and cheering
progress in South America. I refer to those peaceful habits without
which states and nations can not in this age well expect material
prosperity or social advancement.

The Exposition of Universal Industry at Paris has passed, and seems
to have fully realized the high expectations of the French
Government. If due allowance be made for the recent political
derangement of industry here, the part which the United States has
borne in this exhibition of invention and art may be regarded with
very high satisfaction. During the exposition a conference was held
of delegates from several nations, the United States being one, in
which the inconveniences of commerce and social intercourse resulting
from the diverse standards of money value were very fully discussed,
and plans were developed for establishing by universal consent a
common principle for the coinage of gold. These conferences are
expected to be renewed, with the attendance of many foreign states
not hitherto represented. A report of these interesting proceedings
will be submitted to Congress, which will, no doubt, justly
appreciate the great object and be ready to adopt any measure which
may tend to facilitate its ultimate accomplishment.

On the 25th of February, 1862, Congress declared by law that Treasury
notes, without interest, authorized by that act should be legal tender
in payment of all debts, public and private, within the United States.
An annual remittance of $30,000, less stipulated expenses, accrues to
claimants under the convention made with Spain in 1834. These
remittances, since the passage of that act, have been paid in such
notes. The claimants insist that the Government ought to require
payment in coin. The subject may be deemed worthy of your attention.

No arrangement has yet been reach