Proceeding, fellow citizens, to that qualification which the constitution
requires, before my entrance on the charge again conferred upon me, it
is my duty to express the deep sense I entertain of this new proof of confidence
from my fellow citizens at large, and the zeal with which it inspires me,
so to conduct myself as may best satisfy their just expectations.
On taking this station on a former occasion, I declared the principles
on which I believed it my duty to administer the affairs of our commonwealth.
My conscience tells me that I have, on every occasion, acted up to that
declaration, according to its obvious import, and to the understanding
of every candid mind.
In the transaction of your foreign affairs, we have endeavored to cultivate
the friendship of all nations, and especially of those with which we have
the most important relations. We have done them justice on all occasions,
favored where favor was lawful, and cherished mutual interests and intercourse
on fair and equal terms. We are firmly convinced, and we act on that conviction,
that with nations, as with individuals, our interests soundly calculated,
will ever be found inseparable from our moral duties; and history bears
witness to the fact, that a just nation is taken on its word, when recourse
is had to armaments and wars to bridle others.
At home, fellow citizens, you best know whether we have done well or
ill. The suppression of unnecessary offices, of useless establishments
and expenses, enabled us to discontinue our internal taxes. These covering
our land with officers, and opening our doors to their intrusions, had
already begun that process of domiciliary vexation which, once entered,
is scarcely to be restrained from reaching successively every article of
produce and property. If among these taxes some minor ones fell which had
not been inconvenient, it was because their amount would not have paid
the officers who collected them, and because, if they had any merit, the
state authorities might adopt them, instead of others less approved.
The remaining revenue on the consumption of foreign articles, is paid
cheerfully by those who can afford to add foreign luxuries to domestic
comforts, being collected on our seaboards and frontiers only, and incorporated
with the transactions of our mercantile citizens, it may be the pleasure
and pride of an American to ask, what farmer, what mechanic, what laborer,
ever sees a tax-gatherer of the United States? These contributions enable
us to support the current expenses of the government, to fulfil contracts
with foreign nations, to extinguish the native right of soil within our
limits, to extend those limits, and to apply such a surplus to our public
debts, as places at a short day their final redemption, and that redemption
once effected, the revenue thereby liberated may, by a just repartition
among the states, and a corresponding amendment of the constitution, be
applied, _in time of peace_, to rivers, canals, roads, arts, manufactures,
education, and other great objects within each state. _In time of war_,
if injustice, by ourselves or others, must sometimes produce war, increased
as the same revenue will be increased by population and consumption, and
aided by other resources reserved for that crisis, it may meet within the
year all the expenses of the year, without encroaching on the rights of
future generations, by burdening them with the debts of the past. War will
then be but a suspension of useful works, and a return to a state of peace,
a return to the progress of improvement.
I have said, fellow citizens, that the income reserved had enabled us
to extend our limits; but that extension may possibly pay for itself before
we are called on, and in the meantime, may keep down the accruing interest;
in all events, it will repay the advances we have made. I know that the
acquisition of Louisiana has been disapproved by some, from a candid apprehension
that the enlargement of our territory would endanger its union. But who
can limit the extent to which the federative principle may operate effectively?
The larger our association, the less will it be shaken by local passions;
and in any view, is it not better that the opposite bank of the Mississippi
should be settled by our own brethren and children, than by strangers of
another family? With which shall we be most likely to live in harmony and
friendly intercourse?
In matters of religion, I have considered that its free exercise is
placed by the constitution independent of the powers of the general government.
I have therefore undertaken, on no occasion, to prescribe the religious
exercises suited to it; but have left them, as the constitution found them,
under the direction and discipline of state or church authorities acknowledged
by the several religious societies.
The aboriginal inhabitants of these countries I have regarded with the
commiseration their history inspires. Endowed with the faculties and the
rights of men, breathing an ardent love of liberty and independence, and
occupying a country which left them no desire but to be undisturbed, the
stream of overflowing population from other regions directed itself on
these shores; without power to divert, or habits to contend against, they
have been overwhelmed by the current, or driven before it; now reduced
within limits too narrow for the hunter's state, humanity enjoins us to
teach them agriculture and the domestic arts; to encourage them to that
industry which alone can enable them to maintain their place in existence,
and to prepare them in time for that state of society, which to bodily
comforts adds the improvement of the mind and morals. We have therefore
liberally furnished them with the implements of husbandry and household
use; we have placed among them instructors in the arts of first necessity;
and they are covered with the aegis of the law against aggressors from
among ourselves.
But the endeavors to enlighten them on the fate which awaits their present
course of life, to induce them to exercise their reason, follow its dictates,
and change their pursuits with the change of circumstances, have powerful
obstacles to encounter; they are combated by the habits of their bodies,
prejudice of their minds, ignorance, pride, and the influence of interested
and crafty individuals among them, who feel themselves something in the
present order of things, and fear to become nothing in any other. These
persons inculcate a sanctimonious reverence for the customs of their ancestors;
that whatsoever they did, must be done through all time; that reason is
a false guide, and to advance under its counsel, in their physical, moral,
or political condition, is perilous innovation; that their duty is to remain
as their Creator made them, ignorance being safety, and knowledge full
of danger; in short, my friends, among them is seen the action and counteraction
of good sense and bigotry; they, too, have their anti-philosophers, who
find an interest in keeping things in their present state, who dread reformation,
and exert all their faculties to maintain the ascendency of habit over
the duty of improving our reason, and obeying its mandates.
In giving these outlines, I do not mean, fellow citizens, to arrogate
to myself the merit of the measures; that is due, in the first place, to
the reflecting character of our citizens at large, who, by the weight of
public opinion, influence and strengthen the public measures; it is due
to the sound discretion with which they select from among themselves those
to whom they confide the legislative duties; it is due to the zeal and
wisdom of the characters thus selected, who lay the foundations of public
happiness in wholesome laws, the execution of which alone remains for others;
and it is due to the able and faithful auxiliaries, whose patriotism has
associated with me in the executive functions.
During this course of administration, and in order to disturb it, the
artillery of the press has been levelled against us, charged with whatsoever
its licentiousness could devise or dare. These abuses of an institution
so important to freedom and science, are deeply to be regretted, inasmuch
as they tend to lessen its usefulness, and to sap its safety; they might,
indeed, have been corrected by the wholesome punishments reserved and provided
by the laws of the several States against falsehood and defamation; but
public duties more urgent press on the time of public servants, and the
offenders have therefore been left to find their punishment in the public
indignation.
Nor was it uninteresting to the world, that an experiment should be
fairly and fully made, whether freedom of discussion, unaided by power,
is not sufficient for the propagation and protection of truth -- whether
a government, conducting itself in the true spirit of its constitution,
with zeal and purity, and doing no act which it would be unwilling the
whole world should witness, can be written down by falsehood and defamation.
The experiment has been tried; you have witnessed the scene; our fellow
citizens have looked on, cool and collected; they saw the latent source
from which these outrages proceeded; they gathered around their public
functionaries, and when the constitution called them to the decision by
suffrage, they pronounced their verdict, honorable to those who had served
them, and consolatory to the friend of man, who believes he may be intrusted
with his own affairs.
No inference is here intended, that the laws, provided by the State
against false and defamatory publications, should not be enforced; he who
has time, renders a service to public morals and public tranquillity, in
reforming these abuses by the salutary coercions of the law; but the experiment
is noted, to prove that, since truth and reason have maintained their ground
against false opinions in league with false facts, the press, confined
to truth, needs no other legal restraint; the public judgment will correct
false reasonings and opinions, on a full hearing of all parties; and no
other definite line can be drawn between the inestimable liberty of the
press and its demoralizing licentiousness. If there be still improprieties
which this rule would not restrain, its supplement must be sought in the
censorship of public opinion.
Contemplating the union of sentiment now manifested so generally, as
auguring harmony and happiness to our future course, I offer to our country
sincere congratulations. With those, too, not yet rallied to the same point,
the disposition to do so is gaining strength; facts are piercing through
the veil drawn over them; and our doubting brethren will at length see,
that the mass of their fellow citizens, with whom they cannot yet resolve
to act, as to principles and measures, think as they think, and desire
what they desire; that our wish, as well as theirs, is, that the public
efforts may be directed honestly to the public good, that peace be cultivated,
civil and religious liberty unassailed, law and order preserved; equality
of rights maintained, and that state of property, equal or unequal, which
results to every man from his own industry, or that of his fathers. When
satisfied of these views, it is not in human nature that they should not
approve and support them; in the meantime, let us cherish them with patient
affection; let us do them justice, and more than justice, in all competitions
of interest; and we need not doubt that truth, reason, and their own interests,
will at length prevail, will gather them into the fold of their country,
and will complete their entire union of opinion, which gives to a nation
the blessing of harmony, and the benefit of all its strength.
I shall now enter on the duties to which my fellow citizens have again
called me, and shall proceed in the spirit of those principles which they
have approved. I fear not that any motives of interest may lead me astray;
I am sensible of no passion which could seduce me knowingly from the path
of justice; but the weakness of human nature, and the limits of my own
understanding, will produce errors of judgment sometimes injurious to your
interests. I shall need, therefore, all the indulgence I have heretofore
experienced -- the want of it will certainly not lessen with increasing
years. I shall need, too, the favor of that Being in whose hands we are,
who led our forefathers, as Israel of old, from their native land, and
planted them in a country flowing with all the necessaries and comforts
of life; who has covered our infancy with his providence, and our riper
years with his wisdom and power; and to whose goodness I ask you to join
with me in supplications, that he will so enlighten the minds of your servants,
guide their councils, and prosper their measures, that whatsoever they
do, shall result in your good, and shall secure to you the peace, friendship,
and approbation of all nations.
