UNITED STATES, April 8, 1796.

Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives:

By an act of Congress passed on the 26th of May, 1790, it was declared that the inhabitants of the territory of the United States south of the river Ohio should enjoy all the privileges, benefits, and advantages set forth in the ordinance of Congress for the government of the territory of the United States northwest of the river Ohio, and that the government of the said territory south of the Ohio should be similar to that which was then exercised in the territory northwest of the Ohio, except so far as was otherwise provided in the conditions expressed in an act of Congress passed the 2d of April, 1790, entitled "An act to accept a cession of the claims of the State of North Carolina to a certain district of western territory."

Among the privileges, benefits, and advantages thus secured to the inhabitants of the territory south of the river Ohio appear to be the right of forming a permanent constitution and State government, and of admission as a State, by its Delegates, into the Congress of the United States, on an equal footing with the original States in all respects whatever, when it should have therein 60,000 free inhabitants; provided the constitution and government so to be formed should be republican, and in conformity to the principles contained in the articles of the said ordinance.

As proofs of the several requisites to entitle the territory south of the river Ohio to be admitted as a State into the Union, Governor Blount has transmitted a return of the enumeration of its inhabitants and a printed copy of the constitution and form of government on which they have agreed, which, with his letters accompanying the same, are herewith laid before Congress.

GO WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, April 28, 1796.

Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives:

Herewith I lay before you a letter from the Attorney-General of the United States, relative to compensation to the attorneys of the United States in the several districts, which is recommended to your consideration.

Gentlemen of the Senate:

GO WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, May 2, 1796.

Some time last year Jeremiah Wadsworth was authorized to hold a treaty with the Cohnawaga Indians, styling themselves the Seven Nations of Canada, to enable the State of New York to extinguish, by purchase, a claim which the said Indians had set up to a parcel of land lying within that State. The negotiation having issued without effecting its object,

and the State of New York having requested a renewal of the negotiation, and the Indians having come forward with an application on the same subject, I now nominate Jeremiah Wadsworth to be a commissioner to hold a treaty with the Cohnawaga Indians, styling themselves the Seven Nations of Canada, for the purpose of enabling the State of New York to extinguish the aforesaid claim.

GO WASHINGTON.

Gentlemen of the Senate:

UNITED STATES, May 5, 1796.

I lay before you, for your consideration and advice, an explanatory article proposed to be added to the treaty of amity, commerce, and navigation between the United States and Great Britain, together with a copy of the full power to the Secretary of State to negotiate the same.

GO WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, May 25, 1796.

Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives:

The measures now in operation for taking possession of the posts of Detroit and Michilimackinac render it proper that provision should be made for extending to these places and any others alike circumstanced the civil authority of the Northwestern Territory. To do this will require an expense to defray which the ordinary salaries of the governor and secretary of that Territory appear to be incompetent.

The forming of a new county, or new counties, and the appointment of the various officers, which the just exercise of government must require, will oblige the governor and secretary to visit those places, and to spend considerable time in making the arrangements necessary for introducing and establishing the Government of the United States. Congress will consider what provision will in this case be proper.

GO WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, May 28, 1796.

Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives:

The extraordinary expenses to be incurred in the present year in supporting our foreign intercourse I find will require a provision beyond the ordinary appropriation and the additional $20,000 already granted.

I have directed an estimate to be made, which is sent herewith, and will exhibit the deficiency for which an appropriation appears to be necessary.

GO WASHINGTON.

✓ EIGHTH ANNUAL ADDRESS.

UNITED STATES, December 7, 1796.

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives:

In recurring to the internal situation of our country since I had last the pleasure to address you, I find ample reason for a renewed expression of that gratitude to the Ruler of the Universe which a continued series. of prosperity has so often and so justly called forth.

The acts of the last session which required special arrangements have been as far as circumstances would admit carried into operation.

Measures calculated to insure a continuance of the friendship of the Indians and to preserve peace along the extent of our interior frontier have been digested and adopted. In the framing of these care has been taken to guard on the one hand our advanced settlements from the predatory incursions of those unruly individuals who can not be restrained by their tribes, and on the other hand to protect the rights secured to the Indians by treaty-to draw them nearer to the civilized state and inspire them with correct conceptions of the power as well as justice of the Government.

The meeting of the deputies from the Creek Nation at Colerain, in the State of Georgia, which had for a principal object the purchase of a parcel of their land by that State, broke up without its being accomplished, the nation having previous to their departure instructed them against making any sale. The occasion, however, has been improved to confirm by a new treaty with the Creeks their preexisting engagements with the United States, and to obtain their consent to the establishment of trading houses and military posts within their boundary, by means of which their friendship and the general peace may be more effectually secured.

The period during the late session at which the appropriation was passed for carrying into effect the treaty of amity, commerce, and navigation between the United States and His Britannic Majesty necessarily procrastinated the reception of the posts stipulated to be delivered beyond the date assigned for that event. As soon, however, as the Governor-General of Canada could be addressed with propriety on the subject, arrangements were cordially and promptly concluded for their evacuation, and the United States took possession of the principal of them, comprehending Oswego, Niagara, Detroit, Michilimackinac, and Fort Miami, where such repairs and additions have been ordered to be made as appeared indispensable.

The commissioners appointed on the part of the United States and of Great Britain to determine which is the river St. Croix mentioned in the treaty of peace of 1783, agreed in the choice of Egbert Benson, esq., of New York, for the third commissioner. The whole met at St. Andrews, in Passamaquoddy Bay, in the beginning of October, and directed surveys

to be made of the rivers in dispute; but deeming it impracticable to have these surveys completed before the next year, they adjourned to meet at Boston in August, 1797, for the final decision of the question.

Other commissioners appointed on the part of the United States, agreeably to the seventh article of the treaty with Great Britain, relative to captures and condemnation of vessels and other property, met the commissioners of His Britannic Majesty in London in August last, when John Trumbull, esq., was chosen by lot for the fifth commissioner. In October following the board were to proceed to business. As yet there has been no communication of commissioners on the part of Great Britain to unite with those who have been appointed on the part of the United States for carrying into effect the sixth article of the treaty.

The treaty with Spain required that the commissioners for running the boundary line between the territory of the United States and His Catholic Majesty's provinces of East and West Florida should meet at the Natchez before the expiration of six months after the exchange of the ratifications, which was effected at Aranjuez on the 25th day of April; and the troops of His Catholic Majesty occupying any posts within the limits of the United States were within the same period to be withdrawn. The commissioner of the United States therefore commenced his journey for the Natchez in September, and troops were ordered to occupy the posts from which the Spanish garrisons should be withdrawn. Information has been recently received of the appointment of a commissioner on the part of His Catholic Majesty for running the boundary line, but none of any appointment for the adjustment of the claims of our citizens whose vessels were captured by the armed vessels of Spain.

In pursuance of the act of Congress passed in the last session for the protection and relief of American seamen, agents were appointed, one to reside in Great Britain and the other in the West Indies. The effects of the agency in the West Indies are not yet fully ascertained, but those which have been communicated afford grounds to believe the measure will be beneficial. The agent destined to reside in Great Britain declining to accept the appointment, the business has consequently devolved on the minister of the United States in London, and will command his attention until a new agent shall be appointed.

After many delays and disappointments arising out of the European war, the final arrangements for fulfilling the engagements made to the Dey and Regency of Algiers will in all present appearance be crowned with success, but under great, though inevitable, disadvantages in the pecuniary transactions occasioned by that war, which will render further provision necessary. The actual liberation of all our citizens who were prisoners in Algiers, while it gratifies every feeling heart, is itself an earnest of a satisfactory termination of the whole negotiation. Measures are in operation for effecting treaties with the Regencies of Tunis and Tripoli.

To an active external commerce the protection of a naval force is indispensable. This is manifest with regard to wars in which a State is itself a party. But besides this, it is in our own experience that the most sincere neutrality is not a sufficient guard against the depredations of nations at war. To secure respect to a neutral flag requires a naval force organized and ready to vindicate it from insult or aggression. This may even prevent the necessity of going to war by discouraging belligerent powers from committing such violations of the rights of the neutral party as may, first or last, leave no other option. From the best information I have been able to obtain it would seem as if our trade to the Mediterranean without a protecting force will always be insecure and our citizens exposed to the calamities from which numbers of them have but just been relieved.

These considerations invite the United States to look to the means, and to set about the gradual creation of a navy. The increasing progress of their navigation promises them at no distant period the requisite supply of seamen, and their means in other respects favor the undertaking. It is an encouragement, likewise, that their particular situation will give weight and influence to a moderate naval force in their hands. Will it not, then, be advisable to begin without delay to provide and lay up the materials for the building and equipping of ships of war, and to proceed in the work by degrees, in proportion as our resources shall render it practicable without inconvenience, so that a future war of Europe may not find our commerce in the same unprotected state in which it was found by the present?

Congress have repeatedly, and not without success, directed their attention to the encouragement of manufactures. The object is of too much consequence not to insure a continuance of their efforts in every way which shall appear eligible. As a general rule, manufactures on public account are inexpedient; but where the state of things in a country leaves little hope that certain branches of manufacture will for a great length of time obtain, when these are of a nature essential to the furnishing and equipping of the public force in time of war, are not establishments for procuring them on public account to the extent of the ordinary demand for the public service recommended by strong considerations of national policy as an exception to the general rule? Ought our country to remain in such cases dependent on foreign supply, precarious because liable to be interrupted? If the necessary article should in this mode cost more in time of peace, will not the security and independence thence arising form an ample compensation? Establishments of this sort, commensurate only with the calls of the public service in time of peace, will in time of war easily be extended in proportion to the exigencies of the Government, and may even perhaps be made to yield a surplus for the supply of our citizens at large, so as to mitigate the privations from the interruption of their trade. If adopted, the plan ought to exclude all those branches