Besides the ordinary objects submitted to your care, it will
remain with your judgment to decide how far an exercise of the
occasional power delegated by the fifth article of the
Constitution is rendered expedient at the present juncture by the
nature of objections which have been urged against the system, or
by the degree of inquietude which has given birth to them. Instead
of undertaking particular recommendations on this subject, in
which I could be guided by no lights derived from official
opportunities, I shall again give way to my entire confidence in
your discernment and pursuit of the public good; for I assure
myself that whilst you carefully avoid every alteration which
might endanger the benefits of an united and effective government,
or which ought to await the future lessons of experience, a reverence
for the characteristic rights of freemen and a regard for the public
harmony will sufficiently influence your deliberations on the question
how far the former can be impregnably fortified or the latter be safely
and advantageously promoted.
To the foregoing observations I have one to add, which will be
most properly addressed to the House of Representatives. It
concerns myself, and will therefore be as brief as possible. When
I was first honored with a call into the service of my country,
then on the eve of an arduous struggle for its liberties, the
light in which I contemplated my duty required that I should
renounce every pecuniary compensation.
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