George MacDonald - "Unspoken Sermons"

L. Frank Baum - "Rinkitink In Oz"

Thomas Hardy - "Two on a Tower"

William Shakespeare - "The Sonnets"

State of the Union Addresses of James Madison

J >> James Madison >> State of the Union Addresses of James Madison




Upon this general view of the subject it is obvious that there is only
wanting to the fiscal prosperity of the Government the restoration of an
uniform medium of exchange. The resources and the faith of the nation,
displayed in the system which Congress has established, insure respect and
confidence both at home and abroad. The local accumulations of the revenue
have already enabled the Treasury to meet the public engagements in the
local currency of most of the States, and it is expected that the same
cause will produce the same effect throughout the Union; but for the
interests of the community at large, as well as for the purposes of the
Treasury, it is essential that the nation should possess a currency of
equal value, credit, and use wherever it may circulate. The Constitution
has intrusted Congress exclusively with the power of creating and
regulating a currency of that description, and the measures which were
taken during the last session in execution of the power give every promise
of success. The Bank of the United States has been organized under auspices
the most favorable, and can not fail to be an important auxiliary to those
measures.

For a more enlarged view of the public finances, with a view of the
measures pursued by the Treasury Department previous to the resignation of
the late Secretary, I transmit an extract from the last report of that
officer. Congress will perceive in it ample proofs of the solid foundation
on which the financial prosperity of the nation rests, and will do justice
to the distinguished ability and successful exertions with which the duties
of the Department were executed during a period remarkable for its
difficulties and its peculiar perplexities.

The period of my retiring from the public service being at little distance,
I shall find no occasion more proper than the present for expressing to my
fellow citizens my deep sense of the continued confidence and kind support
which I have received from them. My grateful recollection of these
distinguished marks of their favorable regard can never cease, and with the
consciousness that, if I have not served my country with greater ability, I
have served it with a sincere devotion will accompany me as a source of
unfailing gratification.

Happily, I shall carry with me from the public theater other sources, which
those who love their country most will best appreciate. I shall behold it
blessed with tranquillity and prosperity at home and with peace and respect
abroad. I can indulge the proud reflection that the American people have
reached in safety and success their 40th year as an independent nation;
that for nearly an entire generation they have had experience of their
present Constitution, the off-spring of their undisturbed deliberations and
of their free choice; that they have found it to bear the trials of adverse
as well as prosperous circumstances; to contain in its combination of the
federate and elective principles a reconcilement of public strength with
individual liberty, of national power for the defense of national rights
with a security against wars of injustice, of ambition, and vain-glory in
the fundamental provision which subjects all questions of war to the will
of the nation itself, which is to pay its costs and feel its calamities.
Nor is it less a peculiar felicity of this Constitution, so dear to us all,
that it is found to be capable, without losing its vital energies, of
expanding itself over a spacious territory with the increase and expansion
of the community for whose benefit it was established.

And may I not be allowed to add to this gratifying spectacle that I shall
read in the character of the American people, in their devotion to true
liberty and to the Constitution which is its palladium, sure presages that
the destined career of my country will exhibit a Government pursuing the
public good as its sole object, and regulating its means by the great
principles consecrated in its charter and by those moral principles to
which they are so well allied; a Government which watches over the purity
of elections, the freedom of speech and of the press, the trial by jury,
and the equal interdict against encroachments and compacts between religion
and the state; which maintains inviolably the maxims of public faith, the
security of persons and property, and encourages in every authorized mode
the general diffusion of knowledge which guarantees to public liberty its
permanency and to those who possess the blessing the true enjoyment of it;
a Government which avoids intrusions on the internal repose of other
nations, and repels them from its own; which does justice to all nations
with a readiness equal to the firmness with which it requires justice from
them; and which, whilst it refines its domestic code from every ingredient
not congenial with the precepts of an enlightened age and the sentiments of
a virtuous people, seeks by appeals to reason and by its liberal examples
to infuse into the law which governs the civilized world a spirit which may
diminish the frequency or circumscribe the calamities of war, and meliorate
the social and beneficent relations of peace; a Government, in a word,
whose conduct within and without may bespeak the most noble of ambitions--
that of promoting peace on earth and good will to man.

These contemplations, sweetening the remnant of my days, will animate my
prayers for the happiness of my beloved country, and a perpetuity of the
institutions under which it is enjoyed.

Copyright (c) 2007. topbookz.net. All rights reserved.