solid state of the public credit that reliance may be justly placed on any legal provision that may be made for resorting to it in a convenient form and to an adequate amount. To the Senate of the United States: JAMES MADISON. JANUARY 9, 1810. I lay before the Senate, for their consideration whether they will advise and consent to the ratification thereof, a treaty concluded on the 9th day of December last with the Kickapoo tribe of Indians, accompanied by explanations in an extract of a letter from the governor of the Indiana Territory, To the Senate of the United States: JAMES MADISON. JANUARY 15, 1810. I lay before the Senate, for their consideration whether they will advise and consent to the ratification thereof, a treaty concluded with the Great and Little Osage Indians on the 10th day of November, 1808, and the 31st day of August, 1809. JAMES MADISON. To the Senate of the United States: JANUARY 22, 1810. I transmit to the Senate a report of the Secretary of the Treasury, complying with their resolution of the 27th of December, on the subject of disbursements in the intercourse with the Barbary Powers. JAMES MADISON. FEBRUARY 28, 1810. To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States: I now lay before you copies of the treaties concluded with the Delaware, Pottawatamie, Miami, Eel River, and Wea tribes of Indians for the extinguishment of their title to the lands therein described, and I recommend to the consideration of Congress the making provision by law for carrying them into execution. JAMES MADISON. MARCH 15, 1810. To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States: A treaty having been entered into and duly ratified with the Kickapoo tribe of Indians for the extinguishment of their title to certain lands within the Indiana Territory, involving conditions which require legislative provision, I submit copies thereof to both branches for consideration. JAMES MADISON. To the House of Representatives of the United States: MARCH 27, 1810. In consequence of your resolution of the 26th instant, an inquiry has been made into the correspondence of our minister at the Court of London with the Department of State, from which it appears that no official communication has been received from him since his receipt of the letter of November 23 last from the Secretary of State. A letter of January 4, 1810, has been received from that minister by Mr. Smith, but being stated to be private and unofficial, and involving, moreover, personal considerations of a delicate nature, a copy is considered as not within the purview of the call of the House. JAMES MADISON. PROCLAMATIONS. BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF America. A PROCLAMATION. Whereas the territory south of the Mississippi Territory and eastward of the river Mississippi, and extending to the river Perdido, of which possession was not delivered to the United States in pursuance of the treaty concluded at Paris on the 30th April, 1803, has at all times, as is well known, been considered and claimed by them as being within the colony of Louisiana conveyed by the said treaty in the same extent that it had in the hands of Spain and that it had when France originally possessed it; and Whereas the acquiescence of the United States in the temporary continuance of the said territory under the Spanish authority was not the result of any distrust of their title, as has been particularly evinced by the general tenor of their laws and by the distinction made in the application of those laws between that territory and foreign countries, but was occasioned by their conciliatory views and by a confidence in the justice of their cause and in the success of candid discussion and amicable negotiation with a just and friendly power; and Whereas a satisfactory adjustment, too long delayed, without the fault of the United States, has for some time been entirely suspended by events over which they had no control; and Whereas a crisis has at length arrived subversive of the order of things under the Spanish authorities, whereby a failure of the United States to take the said territory into its possession may lead to events ultimately contravening the views of both parties, whilst in the meantime the tranquillity and security of our adjoining territories are endangered and new facilities given to violations of our revenue and commercial laws and of those prohibiting the introduction of slaves; Considering, moreover, that under these peculiar and imperative circumstances a forbearance on the part of the United States to occupy the territory in question, and thereby guard against the confusions and contingencies which threaten it, might be construed into a dereliction of their title or an insensibility to the importance of the stake; considering that in the hands of the United States it will not cease to be a subject of fair and friendly negotiation and adjustment; considering, finally, that the acts of Congress, though contemplating a present possession by a foreign authority, have contemplated also an eventual possession of the said territory by the United States, and are accordingly so framed as in that case to extend in their operation to the same: Now be it known that I, James Madison, President of the United States of America, in pursuance of these weighty and urgent considerations, have deemed it right and requisite that possession should be taken of the said territory in the name and behalf of the United States. William C. C. Claiborne, governor of the Orleans Territory, of which the said Territory is to be taken as part, will accordingly proceed to execute the same and to exercise over the said Territory the authorities and functions legally appertaining to his office; and the good people inhabiting the same are invited and enjoined to pay due respect to him in that character, to be obedient to the laws, to maintain order, to cherish harmony, and in every manner to conduct themselves as peaceable citizens, under full assurance that they will be protected in the enjoyment of their liberty, property, and religion. In testimony whereof I have caused the seal of the United States to be hereunto affixed, and signed the same with my hand. Done at the city of Washington, the 27th day of October, A. D. 1810, and in the thirty-fifth year of the Independence of the said United States. [SEAL.] By the President: JAMES MADISON. R. SMITH, Secretary of State. [From Annals of Congress, Eleventh Congress, third session, 1248.] BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. A PROCLAMATION. Whereas by the fourth section of the act of Congress passed on the Ist day of May, 1810, entitled "An act concerning the commercial intercourse between the United States and Great Britain and France and their dependencies, and for other purposes," it is provided “that in case either Great Britain or France shall before the 3d day of March next so revoke or modify her edicts as that they shall cease to violate the neutral commerce of the United States, which fact the President of the United States shall declare by proclamation, and if the other nation shall not M P-VOL I—31 within three months thereafter so revoke or modify her edicts in like manner, then the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, and eighteenth sections of the act entitled 'An act to interdict the commercial intercourse between the United States and Great Britain and France and their dependencies, and for other purposes,' shall from and after the expiration of three months from the date of the proclamation aforesaid be revived and have full force and effect so far as relates to the dominions, colonies, and dependencies, and to the articles the growth, produce, or manufacture of the dominions, colonies, and dependencies, of the nation thus refusing or neglecting to revoke or modify her edicts in the manner aforesaid. And the restrictions imposed by this act shall, from the date of such proclamation cease and be discontinued in relation to the nation revoking or modifying her decrees in the manner aforesaid;" and Whereas it has been officially made known to this Government that the edicts of France violating the neutral commerce of the United States have been so revoked as to cease to have effect on the 1st of the present month: Now, therefore, I, James Madison, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim that the said edicts of France have been so revoked as that they ceased on the said 1st day of the present month to violate the neutral commerce of the United States, and that from the date of these presents all the restrictions imposed by the aforesaid act shall cease and be discontinued in relation to France and their dependencies. In testimony whereof I have caused the seal of the United States to be hereunto affixed, and signed the same with my hand, at the [SEAL.] city of Washington, this 2d day of November, A. D. 1810, and of the Independence of the United States the thirty-fifth. By the President: R. SMITH, Secretary of State. JAMES MADISON. SECOND ANNUAL MESSAGE. WASHINGTON, December 5, 1810. Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives: The embarrassments which have prevailed in our foreign relations, and so much employed the deliberations of Congress, make it a primary duty in meeting you to communicate whatever may have occurred in that branch of our national affairs. The act of the last session of Congress concerning the commercial intercourse between the United States and Great Britain and France and their dependencies having invited in a new form a termination of their edicts against our neutral commerce, copies of the act were immediately forwarded to our ministers at London and Paris, with a view that its object might be within the early attention of the French and British Governments. By the communication received through our minister at Paris it appeared that a knowledge of the act by the French Government was followed by a declaration that the Berlin and Milan decrees were revoked, and would cease to have effect on the 1st day of November ensuing. These being the only known edicts of France within the description of the act, and the revocation of them being such that they ceased at that date to violate our neutral commerce, the fact, as prescribed by law, was announced by a proclamation bearing date the 2d day of November. It would have well accorded with the conciliatory views indicated by this proceeding on the part of France to have extended them to all the grounds of just complaint which now remain unadjusted with the United States. It was particularly anticipated that, as a further evidence of just dispositions toward them, restoration would have been immediately made of the property of our citizens seized under a misapplication of the principle of reprisals combined with a misconstruction of a law of the United States. This expectation has not been fulfilled. From the British Government no communication on the subject of the act has been received. To a communication from our minister at London of a revocation by the French Government of its Berlin and Milan decrees it was answered that the British system would be relinquished as soon as the repeal of the French decrees should have actually taken effect and the commerce of neutral nations have been restored to the condition in which it stood previously to the promulgation of those decrees. This pledge, although it does not necessarily import, does not exclude the intention of relinquishing, along with the orders in council, the practice of those novel blockades which have a like effect of interrupting our neutral commerce, and this further justice to the United States is the rather to be looked for, inasmuch as the blockades in question, being not more contrary to the established law of nations than inconsistent with the rules of blockade formally recognized by Great Britain herself, could have no alleged basis other than the plea of retaliation alleged as the basis of the orders in council. Under the modification of the original orders of November, 1807, into the orders of April, 1809, there is, indeed, scarcely a nominal distinction between the orders and the blockades. One of those illegitimate blockades, bearing date in May, 1806, having been expressly avowed to be still unrescinded, and to be in effect comprehended in the orders in council, was too distinctly brought within the purview of the act of Congress not to be comprehended in the explanation of the requisites to a compliance with it. The British Government was accordingly apprised by our minister near it that such was the light in which the subject was to be regarded. |