in this branch of the General Government the power to take possession of the country, whenever it might be proper in his discretion. The President has not, therefore, violated the Constitution and usurped the war-making power, but he would have violated that provision which requires him to see that the laws are faithfully executed, if he had longer forborne to act. It is urged that he has assumed powers belonging to Congress, in undertaking to annex the portion of West Florida, between the Mississippi and the Perdido, to the Orleans Territory. But Congress, as has been shown, has already made this annexation, the limits of the Orleans Territory, as prescribed by Congress, comprehending the country in question. The President, by his proclamation, has not made law, but has merely declared to the people of West Florida what the law is. This is the office of a proclamation, and it was highly proper that the people of that Territory should be thus notified. By the act of occupying the country, the government de facto, whether of Spain or the revolutionists, ceased to exist; and the laws of the Orleans Territory, applicable to the country, by the operation and force of law attached to it. But this was a state of things which the people might not know, and which every dictate of justice and humanity therefore required should be proclaimed. I consider the bill before us merely in the light of a declaratory law.

Never could a more propitious moment present itself for the exercise of the discretionary power placed in the President, and had he failed to embrace it, he would have been criminally inattentive to the dearest interests of this country. It cannot be too often repeated, that if Cuba on the one hand, and Florida on the other, are in the possession of a foreign maritime power, the immense extent of country belonging to the United States, and watered by streams discharging themselves into the Gulf of Mexico-that is one-third, nay, more than two-thirds of the United States, comprehending Louisiana, are placed at the mercy of that power. The possession of Florida is a guarantee absolutely necessary to the enjoyment of the navigation of those streams. The gentleman from Delaware anticipates the most direful consequences from the occupation of the country. He supposes a sally from a Spanish garrison upon the American forces, and asks what is to be done? We attempt a peaceful possession of the country to which we are fairly entitled. If the wrongful occupants under the authority of Spain assail our troops, I trust they will re

trieve the lost honor of the nation in the case of the Chesapeake. Suppose an attack upon any portion of the American army within the acknowledged limits of the United States by a Spanish force? In such event there would exist but a single honorable and manly course. The gentleman conceives it ungenerous that we should at this moment, when Spain is encompassed and pressed on all sides by the immense power of her enemy, occupy West Florida. Shall we sit by passive spectators, and witness the interesting transactions of that country-transactions which tend, in the most imminent degree, to jeopard our rights, without attempting to interfere? Are you prepared to see a foreign power seize what belongs to us? I have heard in the most credible manner that, about the period when the President took his measures in relation to that country, agents of a foreign power were intriguing with the people there, to induce them to come under his dominion: but whether this be the fact or not, it cannot be doubted that, if you neglect the present auspicious moment -if you reject the proffered boon, some other nation, profiting by your errors, will seize the occasion to get a fatal footing in your southern frontier. I have no hesitation in saying, that if a parent country will not or cannot maintain its authority in a Colony adjacent to us, and there exists in it a state of misrule and disorder, menacing our peace, and if moreover such Colony, by passing into the hands of any other power, would become dangerous to the integrity of the Union, and manifestly tend to the subversion of our laws, we have a right, upon the eternal principles of self-preservation, to lay hold upon it. This principle alone, independent of any title, would warrant our occupation of West Florida. But it is not necessary to resort to it, our title being in my judgment incontestably good. We are told of the vengeance of resuscitated Spain. If Spain, under any modification of her government, choose to make war upon us, for the act under consideration, the nation, I have no doubt, will be willing to embark in such a contest. But the gentleman reminds us that Great Britain, the ally of Spain, may be obliged, by her connexion with that country, to take part with her against us, and to consider this measure of the President as justifying an appeal to arms. Sir, is the time never to arrive when we may manage our own affairs without the fear of insulting His Britannic Majesty? Is the rod of British power to be for ever suspended over our heads? Does Congress put on an embargo to shelter our rightful commerce against the piratical depredations committed upon it on the ocean-we are imme

diately warned of the indignation of offended England. Is a law of non-intercourse proposed-the whole navy of the haughty mistress of the seas is made to thunder in our ears. Does the President refuse to continue a correspondence with a minister who violates the decorum belonging to his diplomatic character, by giving and deliberately repeating an affront to the whole nation-we are instantly menaced with the chastisement which English pride will not fail to inflict. Whether we assert our rights by sea, or attempt their maintenance by land-whithersoever we turn ourselves, this phantom incessantly pursues us. Already has it had too much influence on the councils of the nation. It contributed to the repeal of the embargo that dishonorable repeal, which has so much tarnished the character of our government. Mr. President, I have before said on this floor, and now take occasion to remark, that I most sincerely desire peace and amity with England; that I even prefer an adjustment of all differences with her, before one with any other nation. But if she persists in a denial of justice to us, or if she avails herself of the occupation of West Florida to commence war upon us, I trust and hope that all hearts will unite in a bold and vigorous vindication of our rights. I do not believe, however, in the prediction that war will be the effect of the measure in question.

It is asked why, some years ago, when the interruption of the right of deposite took place at New Orleans, the government did not declare war against Spain, and how has it happened that there has been this long acquiescence in the Spanish possesion of West Florida? The answer is obvious. It consists in the genius of the nation, which is prone to peace; in that desire to arrange, by friendly negotiation, our disputes with all nations, which has constantly influenced the present and preceding administrations; and in the jealousy of armies, with which we have been inspired by the melancholy experience of free states. But a new state of things has arisen: negotiation has become hopeless. The power with whom it was to be conducted, if not annihilated, is in a situation that precludes it; and the subject matter of it is in danger of being snatched for ever from our power. Longer delay would be construed into a dereliction of our right, and would amount to treachery to ourselves. May I ask, in my turn, why certain gentlemen, now so fearful of war, were so urgent for it with Spain when she withheld the right of deposite? and still later, when in 1805 or '6 this very subject of the actual limits of

SPEECHES

OF

HENRY CLAY.

ON THE LINE OF THE PERDIDO.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, DECEMBER 25, 1810.

[THE region known as FLORIDA, though discovered by Sebastian Cabot, an Eng lish navigator, was first formally taken possession of by Ponce de Leon, a Spaniard, in behalf of the Spanish crown, and was thence deemed a possession of that crown A colony of French Protestants, who settled it in 1562, were overpowered and murdered by a Spanish force in 1565, in which year a Spanish colony was planted at St. Augustine. By the Treaty of Ryswick, in 1763, Florida was ceded to England, but restored to Spain by the Treaty of Paris, in 1783. It remained a Spanish possession down to its cession to the United States, for $5,000,000, in 1819. LOUISIANA, on the other hand-that is, the River Mississippi-was first discovered by the French, in 1688, and a settlement made by them in 1699. It was ceded to Spain in 1763, restored to France in 1800, and purchased of Bonaparte, by the United States, in 1803, for the sum of $15,000,000. And now a serious question soon arose as to the Boundary between the two Territories-Spain claiming that Florida extended to the Mississippi, embracing all the then wilderness which now forms the States of Alabama and Mississippi; while our Government claimed that Louisiana extended east to the Perdido, a small river running South into the Gulf of Mexico, about 50 miles east of Mobile, 150 east of New-Orleans and 20 west of Pensacola. President MADISON solved the dispute in 1810 by taking possession of Baton Rouge and Mobile, and extending the jurisdiction of the United States to the Perdido. This act was assailed in Congress by the Federal Members, especially by OUTERBRIDGE HORSEY, an eminent Senator from Delaware, who regarded it as an unjustifiable and offensive demonstration against Spain, then putting forth all her energies in resistance to the treacherous usurpation and overwhelming force of Bona. parte. Mr. CLAY replied in defence of Mr. Madison's course in the following Speech, demonstrating that the Perdido was the true boundary between the tw Territories, and accordingly it has since remained the western limit of Florida.]