Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 11.djvu/825

 APPENDIX. PBOCLAMATIONS. Nos. 26, 27. 781 Fellow-citizens of the United States! The threat of unhallowed disunion— the names of those once respected, by whom it is uttered—the array of military force to support it-—denote the approach of a crisis in our affairs, on which the continuance of our unexampled prosperity, our political existence, and perhaps that of all free governments may depend. The conjuncture demanded a free, a full, and explicit ennnciation, not only of my intentions, but of my principles of action ; and as the claim was asserted of a right by a State to annul the laws of the Union, and even to secede from it at pleasure, afrank exposition of my opinions in relation to the origin and form of our government, and the construction I give to the instrument by which it was created, seemed to be proper. Having the fullest confidence in the justness of the legal and constitutional opinion of my duties, which has been expressed, I rely, with equal confidence, on your undivided support in my determination to execute the laws——t0 preserve the Union by all constitutional means»——to arrest, if possible, by moderate but firm measures, the necessity of a recourse to force; and, if it be the will of Heaven, that the recurrence of its primeval curse on man for the shedding of a brother’s blood should fall upon our land, that it be not called down by any offensive act on the part of the United States. Fellow-citizens! The momentous case is before you. On your undivided support of your government depends the decision of the great question itinvolves, whether your sacred Union will be reserved, and the blessing it secures to us as one people, shall be perpetuated. To one can doubt that the unanimity with which that decision wil be expressed, will be such as to inspire new conH— dence in republican institutions, and that the prudence, the wisdom, and the courage which it will bring to their defence, will transmit them unimpaircd and invigorated to our children. May the great Ruler of Nations grant that the signal blessings with which he has favored ours, may not, by the madness of party or personal ambition, be disregarded and lost; and may his wise Providence bring those who have produced this crisis to see the folly, before they feel the misery of civil strife; and inspire a returning veneration for that Union which, if we may dare to penetrate his designs, he has chosen as the only means of attaining the high destinics to which we may reasonably as ire. In testimony whereof; I have caused the seal of the United States to be hereunto affixed, having signed the same with my hand. Done at the city of Washington, this 10th day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eivht hundred and thirty-two, and of the [L' S'] Independenceof the United States the fifty-seventh. ANDIKEW JACKSON. BY run PRESIDENT: EDW. LIVINGSTON, Secretary if State. No. 27. Suspending discriminating Duties as to Ilkchlenberg Schwerin. BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. April 28, 1835. A PROCLAMATION. Wummas by an act of Congress of the United States, of the twenty-fourth Preamble m_ of May, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-eight, entitled “An act in Cgggng act km. addition to an act entitled ‘ An act concerning discriminating duties of tonnage five to discrimand impostf and to equalize the duties on Prussian vessels and their cargoes," ““’·““S d““"$· it is provided, that upon satisfactory evidence being given to the President of 1828. <>h·i1i· tlie United States by the government of any foreign nation, that no discriininatp VOL gv_ p_ 303, ing duties of tonnage or impost are imposed or levied in the ports of the said nation, upon vessels wholly belonging to citizens of the United States, or upon the produce, manufactures, or merchandise, imported in the same, from the United States, or from any foreign country, die President is hereby authorized to issue his proclamation, declaring that the foreign discriminating duties of tonnage and impost, within the United States, are and shall be suspended and discontinued, so far as respects the vessels of the said foreign nation, and the produce, manufactures, or merchandise, imported into the United States, in the