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Britain, and Russia, have devoted the genius, the intelligence, the treasures of their respective nations, to the common improvement of the species in these branches of science, is it not incumbent upon us to inquire whether we are not bound by obligations of a high and honourable character, to contribute our portion of energy and exertion to the common stock. The voyages of discovery, prosecuted in the course of that time, at the expense of those nations, have not only redounded to their glory, but to the improvement of human know ledge. We have been partakers of that improvement, and owe for it a sacred debt, not only of gratitude, but of equal or proportional exertion in the same common cause. Of the cost of these undertakings, if the mere expenditure of outfit, equipment, and completion of the expeditions, were to be considered the only charges, it would be unworthy of a great and generous nation to take a second thought. One hundred expeditions of circumnavigation, like those of Cook and La Perouse, would not burthen the exchequer of the nation fitting them out, so much as the ways and means of defraying a single campaign in war. But if we take into the account the lives of those benefactors of mankind, of which their services in the cause of their species were the purchase, how shall the cost of those heroic enterprises be estimated? And what compensation can be made to them, or to their countries for them? Is it not by bearing them in affectionate remembrance? Is it not still more by imitating their example? By enabling countrymen of our own to pursue the same career, and to hazard their lives in the same cause?

In inviting the attention of congress to the subject of internal improvements upon a view thus enlarged, it is not my design to recommend the equipment of an expedition for circumnavigating the globe for the purpose of scientific research and inquiry. We have objects of useful investigation nearer home, and to which our cares may be more beneficially applied. The interior of our own territories has yet been very imperfectly explored. Our coasts along many degrees of latitude upon the shores of the Pacific Ocean, though much frequented by our spirited commercial navigators, have been barely visited by our public ships. The River of the West, first fully discovered and navigated by a countryman of our own, still bears the name of the ship in which he ascended its waters, and claims the protection of our armed national flag at its mouth. With the establishment of a military post there, or at some other point on that coast, recommended by my predecessor, and already matured in the deliberations of the last congress, I would suggest the expediency of connecting the equipment of a public ship for the exploration of the whole North-west coast of this continent.

The establishment of an uniform standard of weights and measures was one of the specific objects contemplated in the formation of our constitution, and to fix that standard was one of the powers delegated by express terms, in that instrument to congress. The governments of Great Britain and France have scarcely ceased to be occupied with inquiries and speculations on the same subject, since the existence of our constitution, and with

them it has expanded into profound, laborious and expensive researches into the figure of the earth, and the comparative length of the pendulum vibrating seconds, in various latitudes from the equator to the pole. The researches have resulted in the composition and publication of several works highly interesting to the cause of science. The experiments are yet in the process of performance. Some of them have recently been made on our own shores, within the walls of one of our own colleges, and partly by one of our own fellow citizens. It would be honourable to our country if the sequel of the same experiment should be countenanced by the patronage of our government as they have hitherto been by those of France and Britain.

Connected with the establishment of an university, or separate from it, might be undertaken the erection of an astronomical observatory, with provision for the support of an astronomer, to be in constant attendance and observation upon the phenomena of the heavens; and for the periodical publication of his observations. It is with no feeling of pride, as an American, that the remark may be made, that on the comparatively small territorial surface of Europe, there are existing upwards of onehundred-and-thirty of these lighthouses of the skies; while throughout the whole American hemisphere there is not one. If we reflect a moment upon the discoveries, which in the last four centuries have been made in the physical constitution of the uni

verse, by means of these buildings, and of observers stationed in them, shall we doubt of their usefulness to every nation ? And while

scarcely a year passes over our heads without bringing some new astronomical discovery to light, which we must fain receive at second hand from Europe, are we not cutting ourselves off from the means of returning light for light, while we have neither observatory or observer upon our half of the globe, and the earth revolves in perpetual darkness to our unsearching eyes?

When, on the 25th of October, 1791, the first president of the United States announced to congress the result of the first enumeration of the inhabitants of this Union, he informed them that the population of the United States bordered on four millions of persons.

At the distance of thirty years from that time, the last enumeration, five years since completed, presented a population bordering upon ten millions. Perhaps, of all the evidences of a prosperous and happy condition of human society the rapidity of the increase of population is the most unequivocal. But the demonstration of our prosperity rests not alone upon this indication. Our commerce, our wealth, and the extent of our territories, have increased in corresponding 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 26 members, has now 48. 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.

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 department of Foreign Affairs, and of the interior, which, early after the formation of the government had been united in one, continued united at this time, to the unquestionable detriment of the public service. The multiplication of our relations with the nation 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 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 depart

ment.

The exigencies of the public service, and its unavoidable deficiencies, as now in exercise, have VOL. LXVII.

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 undoubted 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 congress on this subject has specified both the end to be attained and the means by which it is to be effected

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 constitution, 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 I*

by it remains yet without execution, I shall indulge only the remark, 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 the 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 assume the powers not granted to you by the people. But if the power to exercise exclusive legis lation in all cases whatsoever over the district of Colombia, 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 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 were 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, can we, the representative authorities of the whole Union, fall behind our fel

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low-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.

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MESSAGE of the VICE-PRESIDENT of COLOMBIA in charge of the GOVERNMENT, to the CONGRESS of 1825.

Fellow Citizens of the Senate and Chamber of Representatives. This is the precise day appointed by our Constitution for the assembly of the Representatives of the Republic, in order that they may exert themselves for the happiness and prosperity of their constituents. If, in the two former sessions, Congress assembled at a later period than is provided for by the Constitution, owing to to causes which are inherent in infant societies (although the enemies of the Republic have affected to overlook them), the present assembly will convince them, that with the pro

gress of time, we approach nearer to the exact observance of constitutional principles. I must congratulate Colombia and yourselves on an event which gives stability to the political system and hopes of the most happy results from the present session. It is with the greatest pleasure that the Executive is about to fulfil its duty, and contribute to this favourable issue, by giving you an accurate idea of the state of the affairs of the Republic in the various branches of its administration.

The government of his Catholic majesty, far from abandoning its

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