Andrew Johnson: “The principles of American liberty are still the inheritance of this people and ever should be.”

No power exists in the Constitution authorizing the joint resolution or the supposed law--the only difference being that one would be more palpably unconstitutional and revolutionary than the other.

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of the Interior, made in reply to the resolution adopted by the House of Representatives on the 13th instant.

Would it not be the part of wisdom to take for our guide the Federal Constitution, rather than resort to measures which, looking only to the present, may in a few years renew, in an aggravated form, the strife and bitterness caused by…

As a mark of respect for his memory, it is ordered that the Executive Departments be immediately placed in mourning and all business be suspended on the day of the funeral.