The addresses are separated by three asterisks: ***
Dates of addresses by James Monroe in this eBook:
December 12, 1817
November 16, 1818
December 7, 1819
November 14, 1820
December 3, 1821
December 3, 1822
December 2, 1823
December 7, 1824
***
State of the Union Address
James Monroe
December 12, 1817
Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:
At no period of our political existence had we so much cause to felicitateourselves at the prosperous and happy condition of our country. Theabundant fruits of the earth have filled it with plenty. An extensive andprofitable commerce has greatly augmented our revenue. The public credithas attained an extraordinary elevation. Our preparations for defense incase of future wars, from which, by the experience of all nations, we oughtnot to expect to be exempted, are advancing under a well-digested systemwith all the dispatch which so important a work will admit. Our freeGovernment, founded on the interest and affections of the people, hasgained and is daily gaining strength. Local jealousies are rapidly yieldingto more generous, enlarged, and enlightened views of national policy. Foradvantages so numerous and highly important it is our duty to unite ingrateful acknowledgements to that Omnipotent Being from whom they arederived, and in unceasing prayer that He will endow us with virtue andstrength to maintain and hand them down in their utmost purity to ourlatest posterity.
I have the satisfaction to inform you that an arrangement which had beencommenced by my predecessor with the British Government for the reductionof the naval force by Great Britain and the United States on the Lakes hasbeen concluded, by which it is provided that neither party shall keep inservice on Lake Champlain more than one vessel, on Lake Ontario more thanone, and on Lake Erie and the upper lakes more than two, to be armed eachwith one cannon only, and that all the other armed vessels of both parties,of which an exact list is interchanged, shall be dismantled. It is alsoagreed that the force retained shall be restricted in its duty to theinternal purposes of each party, and that the arrangement shall remain inforce until six months shall have expired after notice given by one of theparties to the other of its desire that it should terminate. By thisarrangement useless expense on both sides and, what is of still greaterimportance, the danger of collision between armed vessels in those inlandwaters, which was great, is prevented.
I have the satisfaction also to state that the commissioners under thefourth article of the treaty of Ghent, to whom it was referred to decide towhich party the several islands in the bay of Passamaquoddy belonged underthe treaty of 1783, have agreed in a report, by which all the islands inthe possession of each party before the late war have been decreed to it.The commissioners acting under the other articles of the treaty of Ghentfor the settlement of boundaries have also been engaged in the discharge oftheir respective duties, but have not yet completed them.
The difference which arose between the two Governments under that treatyrespecting the right of the US to take and cur