I shall, indeed, in the first instance, consider the assembly as merely consultative.

The faith of the United States to foreign powers can not otherwise be pledged.

I now transmit to the House a report from the Secretary of State, with the correspondence and information requested by the resolution.

I would have sent ministers to the meeting had it been merely to give them such advice as they might have desired, even with reference to their own interests, not involving ours.

ThatAmericahas a set of primary interests which have none or a remote relation to Europe.

My first and greatest inducement was to meet in the spirit of kindness and friendship an overture made in that spirit by three sister Republics of this hemisphere.

It was not considered a conclusive reason for declining this invitation that the proposal for assembling such a Congress had not first been made by ourselves.

I transmit to the Senate, for the exercise of its constitutional power, a treaty lately concluded at the Indian Springs.

To remove all doubt on the subject, I submit to the consideration of Congress the propriety of passing a declaratory act to that effect.

upon the subject of the capture and detention of American fishermen the past season in the Bay of Fundy

I transmit to the House of Representatives a further report from the Secretary of State

It belongs to Congress alone to terminate this distressing incident on just principles, with a view to the highest interests of our Union.

The attitude assumed by the State formed a case which was not contemplated by the existing laws of the United States relating to militia services.

I transmit to the Senate a convention, signed by the plenipotentiaries of the United States and of the Republic of Colombia at Bogota on the 10th of December, 1824, together with the documents appertaining to the negotiation of the same, for the constitutional consideration of the Senate with regard to its ratification.

The exposure being common to the whole District, the regulation should apply to the whole, to make which Congress alone possesses the adequate power.

That the regulation should be made by Congress is the more necessary from the consideration that this being the seat of the Government, its protection against such diseases must form one of its principal objects.

I transmit to the House of Representatives a report from the Secretary of State, containing the information called for by their resolution of the 1st of this month, touching the capture and detention of American fishermen during the last season.

From the view which I have taken of these reports I contemplate results of incalculable advantage to our Union