I recommend that at your present session you adopt such measures in order to carry into effect the Smithsonian bequest.

I shall be permitted to exchange congratulations with you, gentlemen of the two Houses of Congress, on these auspicious circumstances.

Since the last adjournment of Congress the Executive has relaxed no effort to render indestructible the relations of amity which so happily exist between the United States and other countries.

The occasional interruption experienced by our fellow-citizens engaged in the fisheries on the neighboring coast of Nova Scotia has not failed to claim the attention of the Executive.

I can not take leave of this painful subject without adverting to the aid rendered upon the occasion by the British authorities at Gibraltar.

We could not be expected quietly to permit any such interference to our disadvantage.

It is time that this war had ceased.

As preparatory, therefore, to entering once more upon the high duties of legislation, it becomes us humbly to acknowledge our dependence upon Him as our guide and protector.

I did so in full view of his consummate abilities, his unquestioned patriotism and full capacity to discharge with honor to himself and advantage to the country.

The respect which I have for the wisdom of the Senate has caused me again, since his rejection, to reconsider his merits and his qualifications.

I was led to do so by considerations of his high talent, his exalted character, and great moral worth.

I feel it, therefore, to be my duty to renominate him.

His rejection by the Senate has caused me to reconsider his qualifications, and I see no cause to doubt that he is eminently qualified for the station.

That review has satisfied me that I could not have a more able adviser in the administration of public affairs or the country a more faithful officer.

The copy of the report which was transmitted to the House of Representatives is missing from the files of the House.

The country, I feel assured, would be represented at Paris in the person of Mr. Wise by one wholly unsurpassed in exalted patriotism and well fitted to be the representative of his country abroad.

A careful search in the Government libraries of Washington warrants me in asserting that the report has never been printed.

I herewith transmit to the House of Representatives copies of the final report and appendices of the joint commission appointed to explore and survey the boundary line between the States of Maine and New Hampshire and the adjoining British…