sponding proportions; and the number of independent communities associated in our federal union, has, since that time, nearly doubled. The legislative representation of the states and people, in the two houses of congress, has grown with the growth of their constituent bodies. The house, which then consisted of 65 members, now numbers upwards of two hundred. The senate, which consisted of twentysix members, has now forty-eight. But the executive, and still more the judiciary department, are yet, in a great measure, confined to their primitive organization, and are now not adequate to the urgent wants of a still growing community. present maturity. Nine years have elapsed since a predecessor in this office, now not the last, the citizen, who, perhaps, of all others throughout the union, contributed most to the formation and establishment of our constitution, in his valedictory address to congress, immediately preceding his retirement from public life, urgently recommended the revision of the judiciary, and the establishment of an additional executive department. The exigencies of the public service, and its unavoidable deficiencies, as now in exercise, have added yearly cumulative weight to the considerations presented by him as persuasive to the measure; and in recommending it to your deliberations, I am happy to have the influence of his high authority, in aid of the undoubting convictions of my own experience. The laws relating to the administration of the patent office are deserving of much consideration, and, perhaps, susceptible of some improvement. The grant of power to regulate the action of con The naval armaments, which, at an early period, forced themselves upon the necessities of the union, soon led to the establishment of a department of the navy. But the departments of foreign affairs, and of the interior, which, early after the formation of the government had been united in one, continue so united at this time, to the unquestionable detriment of the pub-gress on this subject has specified lic service. The multiplication of our relations with the nations and governments of the old world, has kept pace with that of our population and commerce, while within the last ten years a new family of nations, in our own hemisphere, has arisen among the inhabitants of the earth, with whom our intercourse, commercial and political, would of itself furnish occupation to an active and industrious department. The constitution of the judiciary, experimental and imperfect as it was, even in the infancy of our existing government, is yet more inadequate to the administration of national justice at our both the end to be attained, and the means by which it is to be ef fected. To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing, for limited times, to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries. If an honest pride might be indulged in the reflection, that on the records of that office are already found inventions the usefulness of which has scarcely been transcended in the annals of human ingenuity, would not its exultation be allayed by the inquiry, whether the laws have effectively insured to the inventors the reward destined to them by the con stitution, even a limited term of exclusive right to their discoveries ? On the 24th of December, 1799, it was resolved by congress that a marble monument should be erected by the United States, in the capitol at the city of Washington: that the family of general Washington should be requested to permit his body to be deposited under it; and that the monument be so designed as to commemorate the great events of his military and political life. In reminding congress of this resolution, and that the monument contemplated by it remains yet without execution, I shall indulge only the remarks, that the works in the capitol are approaching to completion: That the consent of the family desired by the resolution, was requested and obtained: That a monument has been recently erected in this city, at the expense of the nation, over the remains of another distinguished patriot of the revolution; and that a spot has been reserved within the walls where you are deliberating for the benefit of this and future ages, in which the mortal remains may be deposited of him whose spirit hovers over you, and listens with delight, to every act of the representatives of his nation which can tend to exalt and adorn his and their country. The constitution under which you are assembled is a charter of limited powers; after full and solemn deliberation upon all or any of the objects which, urged by an irresistible sense of my own duty, I have recommended to your attention, should you come to the conclusion, that, however desirable, in themselves, the enactment of laws for effecting them, would transcend the powers committed to you by that venerable instrument which we are all bound to support, let no consideration induce you to as sume the exercise of powers not granted to you by the people. But if the power to exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever over the district of Columbia; if the power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States; if the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes to fix the standard of weights and measures; to establish post-offices and post roads; to declare war ; to raise and support armies; to provide and maintain a navy; to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States; and to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying these powers into execution: If these powers, and others enumerated in the constitution, may be effectually brought into action by laws promoting the improvement of agriculture, commerce and manufactures, the cultivation and encouragement of the mechanic and of the elegant arts, the advancement of literature, and the progress of the sciences, ornamental and profound, to refrain from exercising them for the benefit of the people themselves, would be to hide in the earth the talent committed to our charge-would be treachery to the most sacred of trusts. The spirit of improvement is abroad upon the earth. It stimulates the heart, and sharpens the faculties, not of our fellow-citizens alone, but of the nations of Europe, and of their rulers. While dwelling with pleasing satisfaction upon the superior excellence of our political institutions, let us not be unmindful that liberty is power; that the nation blessed with the largest portion of liberty, must, in proportion to its numbers, be the most powerful nation upon earth; and that the tenure of power by man, is, in the moral purposes of his Creator, upon condition that it shall be exercised to ends of beneficence, to improve the condition of himself and his fellow-men. While foreign nations, less blessed with that freedom which is power, than ourselves, are advancing with gigantic strides in the career of public improvement, were we to slumber in indolence, or fold up our arms and proclaim to the world that we are palsied by the will of our constituents, would it not be to cast away the bounties of Providence, and doom ourselves to perpetual inferiority? In the course of the year now drawing to its close, we have beheld, under the auspices, and at the expense of one state of this union, a new university unfolding its portals to the sons of science, and holding up the torch of human improvement to eyes that seek the light. We have seen, under the persevering and enlightened enterprise of another state, the waters of our western lakes mingled with those of the ocean. If undertakings like these have been accomplished in the compass of a few years, by the authority of single members of our confederation, can we, the representative authorities of the whole union, fall behind our fellow-servants in the exercise of the trust committed to us for the benefit of our common sovereign, by the accomplishment of works important to the whole, and to which neither the authority nor the resources of any one state can be adequate? Finally, fellow-citizens, I shall await with cheering hope, and faithful co-operation, the result of your deliberations; assured that, without encroaching upon the powers reserved to the authorities of the respective states, or to the people, you will, with a due sense of your obligations to your country, and of the high responsibilities weighing upon yourselves, give efficacy to the means committed to you for the common good. And may He who searches the hearts of the children of men prosper your exertions to secure the blessings of peace, and promote the highest welfare of our country. JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. Boundary of the UNITED STATES on the PACIFIC OCEAN. MR. ADAMS TO MR. RUSHI. Department of State, Washington, July 22d, 1823. Sir-Among the subjects of negotiation with Great Britain which are pressing upon the attention of this government, is the present condition of the Northwest Coast of this continent. This interest is connected, in a manner becoming, from day to day, more important, with our territorial rights; with the whole system of our intercourse with the Indian tribes; with the boundary relations be tween us and the British North American dominions; with the fur trade; the fisheries in the Pacific Ocean; the commerce with the Sandwich Islands and China; with our boundary upon Mexico; and lastly, with our political standing and intercourse with the Russian Empire. By the third article of the convention between the United States and Great Britain, of 20th October, 1818, it is agreed, that," any country that may be claimed by either party, on the Northwest Coast of America, westward of the Stony Mountains, shall, together with its harbors, bays, and creeks, and the navigation of all rivers within the same, be free and open for the term of ten years, from the date of the signature of the convention, to the vessels, citizens, and subjects, of the two powers: it being well understood, that this agreement is not to be construed to the prejudice of any claim which either of the two high contracting parties may have to any part of the said country; nor shall it be taken to affect the claims of any other power or state, to any part of the said country: the only object of the high contracting parties, in that respect, being to prevent disputes and differences amongst themselves." On the 6th of October, 1818, fourteen days before the signature of this convention, the settlement at the mouth of the Columbia river had been formally restored to the United States, by order of the British government. (Message P. U. S. to H. R. 15th April, 1822, p. 13. Letter of Mr. Prevost to the secretary of state, of 11th Nov. 1818.) By the treaty of amity, settle ment, and limits, between the United States and Spain, of 22d February, 1819, the boundary line between them was fixed at the 42° of lat. from the source of the Arkansas river to the South sea. By which treaty, the United States acquired all the rights of Spain north of that parallel. The right of the United States to the Columbia river, and to the interior territory washed by its waters, rests upon its discovery from the sea, and nomination, by a citizen of the United States; upon its exploration to the sea by captains Lewis and Clarke; upon the settlement of Astoria, made under the protection of the United States, and thus restored to them in 1818; and upon the subsequent acquision of all the rights of Spain, the only European power who, prior to the discovery of the river, had any pretensions to territorial rights on the Northwest Coast of America. The waters of the Columbia river extend, by the Multnomah, to the 42° of lat. where its source approaches within a few miles of those of Platte and Arkansas, and by Clarke's river, to the 50th or 51st degree of lat.; thence descending southward till its sources almost intersect those of the Missouri. To the territory thus watered and immediately contiguous to the original possessions of the United States, as first bounded by the Mississippi, they consider their right to be now established by all the principles which have ever been applied to European settlements upon the American hemisphere. By the Ukase of the emperor Alexander, of September, 1821, an exclusive territorial right, on the Northwest Coast of America, is asserted as belonging to Russia, and as extending from the northern extremity of the continent to latitude 51, and the navigation and fishery of all other nations are interdicted by the same Ukase, to the extent of 100 Italian miles from the coast. When Mr. Poletica, the late Russian minister here, was called upon to set forth the grounds of right, conformable to the laws of nations, which authorised the issuing of this decree, he answered, in his letters of 28th February and 2d April, 1822, by alleging, first, discovery, occupancy, and uninterrupted possession. It appears, upon examination, that these claims have no foundation in fact. The right of discovery, on this continent, claimed by Russia, is reduced to the probability that, in in 1741, captain Tchirikoff saw, from the sea, the mountain called St. Elias, in about the 59th degree of north latitude. The Spanish navigators, as early as 1582, had discovered, as far north as 57° 30'. As to occupancy, captain Cook, in 1779, had the express declaration of Mr. Ismaloff, the chief of the Russian settlement at Oonalaska, that they knew nothing of the continent in America; and in the Nootka Sound controvery, between Spain and Great Britain, it is explicitly stated, in the Spanish documents, that Russia had disclaimed all pretension to interfere with the Spanish exclusive rights to beyond Prince William's Sound, lat. 61. No evidence has been exhibited of any Russian settlement on this continent, south and east of Prince William's Sound, to this day, with the exception of that in California, made in 1816. It never has been admitted, by the various European nations which have formed settlements in this hemisphere, that the occupation of an island gave any claim whatever to territorial possessions on the continent to which it was adjoining. The recognised principle has rather been the reverse; as, by the law of nature, islands must be rather considered as appendages to continents, than continents to islands. The only color of claim alleged by Mr. Poletica, which has an appearance of plausibility, is that which he asserts as an authentic fact, that, in 1789, the Spanish packet St. Charles, commanded by captain Haro, found, in the latitude 48 and 49, Russian settlements to the number of eight, consisting, in the whole, of twenty families, and 462 individuals.” But, more than twenty years since, Flurieu had shown, in his introduction to the voyage of Marchand, that, in this statement there was a mistake of, at least, ten degrees of latitude; and that, instead of 48 and 49, it should read, 58 and 59. This is, probably, not the only mistake in the account. It rests, altogether, upon the credit of two private letters; one written from St. Blas, and the other from the city of Mexico to Spain, there communicated to a French consul in one of the Spanish ports, and by him to the French minister of marine. They were written in October, 1788, and August, 1789. We have seen that, in 1790, Russia explicitly disclaimed interfering with the exclusive rights of Spain to beyond Prince William's Sound, in latitude 61; and Vancouver, in |