The receipts into the treasury, during the year ending on the thirtieth of September last, have exceeded thirteen millions and a half of dollars, and have enabled us to defray the current expenses, including the interest on the publick debt, and to reimburse more than five millions of dollars of the principal, without recurring to the loan authorized by the act of the last session. The temporary loan obtained in the latter end of the year one thousand eight hundred and ten, has also been reimbursed, and is not included in that amount.

The decrease of revenue, arising from the situation of our commerce and the extraordinary expenses which have and may become necessary, must be taken into view, in making commensurate provisions for the ensuing year. And I recommend to your consideration, the propriety of insuring a sufficiency of annual revenue, at least to defray the ordinary expenses of government, and to pay the interest on the publick debt, including that on new loans which may be authorized.

I cannot close this communication without expressing my deep sense of the crisis in which you are assembled, my confidence in a wise and honourable result to your deliberations, and assurances of the faithful zeal with which my co-operating duties will be discharged; invoking, at the same time, the blessing of Heaven on our beloved country, and on all the means that may be employed, in vindicating its rights and advancing its welfare.

JAMES MADISON.

DOCUMENTS

RELATIVE TO THE BRITISH ORDERS IN COUNCIL, ACCOMPANYING THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE TO CONGRESS OF NOV. 5, 1811.

Mr. Foster to Mr. Monroe. Washington, July 2, 1811. SIR,-I have the honour to inform you that I have received the special commands of his royal highness, the prince regent, acting in the name and on the behalf of his

majesty, to make an early communication to you of the sentiments which his royal highness was pleased, on the part of his majesty, to express to Mr. Pinkney, upon the occasion of his audience of leave.

His royal highness signified to Mr. Pinkney, the deep regret with which he learnt that Mr. Pinkney conceived himself to be bound by the instructions of his government to take his departure from England.

His royal highness informed Mr. Pinkney that one of the earliest acts of his government, in the name and on the behalf of his majesty, was to appoint an envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to the government of the United States; and added, that this appointment had been made in the spirit of amity, and with a view of maintaining the subsisting relations of friendship between the two countries.

His royal highness further declared to Mr. Pinkney that he was most sincerely and anxiously desirous, on the part of his majesty, to cultivate a good understanding with the United States by every means consistent with the preservation of the maritime rights and interests of the British empire.

His royal highness particularly desired that Mr. Pinkney would communicate these declarations to the United States in the manner which might appeår best calculated to satisfy the President of his royal highness' solicitude to facilitate an amicable discussion with the government of the United States upon every point of difference which had arisen between the two governments.

I have the honour to be, &c. &c.

AUG. J. FOSTER.

Hon. James Monroe, &c.

Mr. Foster to Mr. Monroe. Washington, July 3, 1811,

SIR, I have had the honour of stating to you verbally the system of defence to which his majesty has been compelled to resort for the purpose of protecting the maritime rights and interests of his dominions, against the new description of warfare that has been adopted by his enemies. I have presented to you the grounds upon which his majesty finds himself still obliged to continue that system, and

I conceive that I shall best meet your wishes as expressed to me this morning, if, in a more formal shape, I should lay before you the whole extent of the question as it ap pears to his majesty's government to exist between Great Britain and America.

I beg leave to call your attention, sir, to the principles on which his majesty's orders in council were originally founded. The decree of Berlin was directly and expressly an act of war, by which France prohibited all nations from trade or intercourse with Great Britain, under peril of confiscation of their ships and merchandise; although France had not the means of imposing an actual blockade in any degree adequate to such a purpose. The immediate and professed object of this hostile decree was the destruction of all British commerce, through means entirely unsanctioned by the law of nations, and unauthorized by any received doctrine of legitimate blockade.

This violation of the established law of civilized nations in war would have justified Great Britain in retaliating upon the enemy, by a similar interdiction of all commerce with France, and with such other countries as might co-operate with France in her system of commercial hostility against Great Britain.

The object of Great Britain, was not, however, the destruction of trade, but its preservation under such regulations as might be compatible with her own security, at the same time that she extended an indulgence to foreign commerce, which strict principles would have entitled her to withhold. The retaliation of Great Britain was not, therefore, urged to the full extent of her right; our prohibition of French trade was not absolute, but modified, and in return for the absolute prohibition of all trade with Great Britain, we prohibited not all commerce with France, but all such commerce with France as should not be carried on through Great Britain.

It was evident that this system must prove prejudicial to neutral nations: this calamity was foreseen, and deeply regretted. But the injury to the neutral nation arose from the aggression of France, which had compelled Great Britain in her own defence to resort to adequate retaliatory measures of war. The operation on the American commerce of those precautions which the conduct of France had rendered indispensable to our security, is

therefore to be ascribed to the unwarrantable aggression of France, and not to those proceedings on the part of Great Britain, which that aggression had rendered necessary and just.

The object of our system was merely to counteract an attempt to crush the British trade. Great Britain endeavoured to permit the continent to receive as large a portion of commerce as might be practicable through Great Britain; and all her subsequent regulations, and every modification of her system by new orders or modes of granting or withholding licenses, have been calculated for the purpose of encouraging the trade of neutrals through Great Britain, whenever such encouragement might appear advantageous to the general interests of commerce, and consistent with the publick safety of the nation.

The justification of his majesty's orders in council, and the continuance of that defence, have always been rested upon the existence of the decrees of Berlin and Milan, and on the perseverance of the enemy in the system of hostility which has subverted the rights of neutral commerce on the continent; and it has always been declared on the part of his majesty's government, that whenever France should have effectually repealed the decrees of Berlin and Milan, and should have restored neutral commerce to the condition in which it stood previously to the promulgation of those decrees, we should immediately repeal our orders in council.

France has asserted that the decree of Berlin was a measure of just retaliation on her part, occasioned by our previous aggression; and the French government has insisted that our system of blockade, as it existed previously to the decree of Berlin, was a manifest violation of the received law of nations: we must, therefore, sir, refer to the articles of the Berlin decree to find the principles of our system of blockade which France considers to be new, and contrary to the law of nations.

By the fourth and eighth articles it is stated as a justification of the French decree, that Great Britain "extends to unfortified towns and commercial ports, to harbours, and to the months of rivers, those rights of blockade which, by reason and the usage of nations, are applicable quly to fortified places; and that the rights of blockade

ought to be limited to fortresses really invested by a sufficient force."

It is added in the same articles, that Great Britain "has declared places to be in a state of blockade before which she has not a single ship of war, and even places which the whole British force would be insufficient to blockade, entire coasts and a whole empire."

Neither the practice of Great Britain nor the law of nations has ever sanctioned the rule now laid down by France, that no place, excepting fortresses in a complete state of investiture, can be deemed lawfully blockaded by

sea.

If such a rule were to be admitted, it would become nearly impracticable for Great Britain to attempt the blockade of any port of the continent; and our submission to this perversion of the law of nations, while it would destroy one of the principal advantages of our naval superiority, would sacrifice the common rights and interests of all maritime states.

It was evident that the blockade of May, 1806, was the principal pretended justification of the decree of Berlin, though neither the principles on which that blockade was founded, nor its practical operation, afforded any colour for the proceedings of France.

In point of date the blockade of May, 1806, preceded the Berlin decree; but it was a just and legal blockade according to the established law of nations, because it was intended to be maintained, and was actually maintained, by an adequate force appointed to guard the whole coast described in the notification, and consequently to enforce the blockade.

Great Britain has never attempted to dispute that in the ordinary course of the law of nations, no blockade can be justifiable or valid unless it be supported by an adequate force destined to maintain it, and to expose to hazard all vessels attempting to evade its operation. The blockade of May, 1806, was notified by Mr. Secretary Fox, on this clear principle; nor was that blockade announced until he had satisfied himself, by a communication with his majes ty's board of admiralty, that the admiralty possessed the means and would employ them, of watching the whole coast from Brest to the Elbe, and of effectually enforcing the blockade.