BB.

The following is an extract from the message of President Polk, July 6, 1848, accompanying the treaty of peace:

"New Mexico and Upper California have been ceded by Mexico to the United States, and now constitute a part of our country. Embracing nearly ten degrees of latitude, lying adjacent to the Oregon Territory, and extending from the Pacific Ocean to the Rio Grande, a mean distance of nearly a thousand miles, it would be difficult to estimate the value of these possessions to the United States. They constitute of themselves a country large enough for a great empire, and their acquisition is second only in importance to that of Louisiana in 1803. Rich in mineral and agricultural resources, with a climate of great salubrity, they embrace the most important ports on the whole Pacific coast of the continent of North America. The possession of the ports of San Diego and Monterey and the Bay of San Francisco, will enable the United States to command the already valuable and rapidly increasing commerce of the Pacific. The number of our whale ships alone now employed in that sea exceeds seven hundred, requiring more than twenty thousand seamen to navigate them, while the capital invested in this particular branch of commerce is estimated at not less than forty millions of dollars. The excellent harbors of Upper California will, under our flag, afford security and repose to our commercial marine, and American mechanics will soon furnish ready means of ship-building and repair, which are now so much wanted in that distant sea.

"By the acquisition of these possessions, we are brought into immediate proximity with the west coast of America, from Cape Horn to the Russian possessions north of Oregon, with the islands of the Pacific Ocean, and by a direct voyage in steamers we will be in less than thirty days of Canton and other ports of China.

"In this vast region, whose rich resources are soon to be developed by American energy and enterprise, great must be the augmentation of our commerce, and with it new and profitable demands for mechanic labor in all its branches, and new and valuable markets for our manufactures and agricultural products."

CC.

EXTRACT FROM THE LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE
OF GENERAL CASS.

We make the following extract for the purpose of affording a good example to all partisans:

"No party, gentlemen, had ever higher motives for exertion, than has the great democratic party of the United States. With an abiding confidence in the rectitude of our principles, with an unshaken reliance upon the energy and wisdom of public opinion, and with the success which has crowned the administration of the government, when committed to its keeping, (and it has been so committed during more than three fourths of its existence,) what has been done is at once the reward of past exertion, and the motive for future, and, at the same time, a guaranty for the accomplishment of what we have to do. We cannot conceal from ourselves that there is a powerful party in the country, differing from us in regard to many of the fundamental principles of our government, and opposed to us in their practical application, which will strive as zealously as we shall to secure the ascendency of their principles, by securing the election of their candidate in the coming contest. That party is composed of our fellow-citizens, as deeply interested in the prosperity of our common country as we can be, and seeking as earnestly as we are to promote and perpetuate it. We shall soon present to the world the sublime spectacle of the election of a chief magistrste by twenty millions of people, without a single serious resistance to the laws, or the sacrifice of the life of one human being—and this, too, in the absence of all force but the moral force of our institutions; and if we should add to all this, an example of mutual respect for the motives of the contending parties, so that the contest might be carried on with that firmness and energy which accompany deep conviction, and with as little personal asperity as political divisions permit, we should do more for the great cause of human freedom throughout the world, than by any other tribute we could render to its value.

"We have a government founded by the will of all, responsible to the power of all, and administered for the good of all. The very first article in the democratic creed teaches that the people are competent to govern themselves; it is, indeed, rather an axiom than

an article of political faith. From the days of General Hamilton

to our days, the party opposed to us, — of whose principles he was the great exponent, if not the founder, — while it has changed its name, has preserved essentially its identity of character; and the doubt he entertained and taught of the capacity of man for selfgovernment, has exerted a marked influence upon its action and opinions. Here is the very starting-point of the difference between the two great parties which divide our country. All other differences are but subordinate and auxiliary to this, and may, in fact, be resolved into it. Looking with doubt upon the issue of self-government, one party is prone to think the public authority should be strengthened, and to fear any change, lest that change might weaken the necessary force of the government; while the other, strong in its convictions of the intelligence and virtue of the people, believes that original power is safer than delegated, and that the solution of the great problem of good government consists in governing with the least force, and leaving individual action as free from restraint as is compatible with the preservation of the social system, thereby securing to each all the freedom which is not essential to the wellbeing of the whole.

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As a party, we ought not to mistake the signs of the times; but should bear in mind that this is an age of progress - of advancement in all the elements of intellectual power, and in the opinions of the world. The general government should assume no powers. It should exercise none which have not been clearly granted by the parties to the federal compact. We ought to construe the Constitution strictly, according to the received and sound principles of the Jefferson school. But while rash experiments should be deprecated, if the government is stationary in its principles of action, and refuses to accommodate its measures within its constitutional sphere - cautiously, indeed, but wisely and cheerfully to the advancing sentiments and necessities of the age, it will find its moral force impaired, and the public will determine to do what the public authority itself should readily do, when the indications of popular sentiment are clear and clearly expressed."

DD.

BALTIMORE CONVENTION.

The following are the resolutions of the convention of the democratic party, adopted at Baltimore in 1848:

*

"Resolved, That the American democracy place their trust in the intelligence, the patriotism, and the discriminating justice of the American people.

"Resolved, That we regard this as a distinctive feature of our political creed, which we are proud to maintain before the world, as the great moral element in a form of government springing from and upheld by the popular will; and we contrast it with the creed and practice of federalism, under whatever name or form, which seeks to palsy the will of the constituent, and which conceives no imposture too monstrous for the popular credulity.

"Resolved, therefore, That, entertaining these views, the democratic party of this Union, through their delegates assembled in a general convention of the States, coming together in a spirit of concord, of devotion to the doctrines and faith of a free representative government, and appealing to their fellow-citizens for the rectitude of their intentions, renew and re-assert, before the American people, the declarations of principles avowed by them when, on a former occasion, in general convention, they presented their candidates for the popular suffrages:

"1. That the federal government is one of limited powers, derived solely from the Constitution, and the grants of power shown therein ought to be strictly construed by all the departments and agents of the government; and that it is inexpedient and dangerous to exercise doubtful constitutional powers.

"2. That the Constitution does not confer upon the general government the power to commence and carry on a general system of internal improvements.

"3. That the Constitution does not confer authority upon the federal government, directly or indirectly, to assume the debts of the several States, contracted for local internal improvements, or

*The resolutions adopted in 1844, and re-adopted in 1848, were written by the Hon. R. H. Gillet, the present able solicitor of the United States treasury.

other State purposes; nor would such assumption be just and expedient.

"4. That justice and sound policy forbid the federal government to foster one branch of industry to the detriment of another, or to cherish the interests of one portion to the injury of another portion of our common country; that every citizen, and every section of the country, has a right to demand and insist upon an equality of rights and privileges, and to complete and ample protection of persons and property from domestic violence or foreign aggression.

"5. That it is the duty of every branch of the government to enforce and practise the most rigid economy in conducting our public affairs, and that no more revenue ought to be raised than is required to defray the necessary expenses of the government, and for the gradual but certain extinction of the debt created by the prosecution of a just and necessary war, after peaceful relations shall have been restored.

"6. That Congress has no power to charter a national bank; that we believe such an institution one of deadly hostility to the best interests of the country, dangerous to our republican institutions and the liberties of the people, and calculated to place the business of the country within the control of a concentrated money power, and above the laws and the will of the people; and that the result of democratic legislation, in this and all other financial measures upon which issues have been made between the two political parties of the country, have demonstrated to candid and practical men of all parties, their soundness, safety, and utility in all business pursuits.

"7. That Congress has no power under the Constitution to interfere with or control the domestic institutions of the several States, and that such States are the sole and proper judges of every thing appertaining to their own affairs, not prohibited by the Constitution; that all efforts of the abolitionists or others, made to induce Congress to interfere with the question of slavery, or to take incipient steps in relation thereto, are calculated to lead to the most alarming and dangerous consequences; and that all such efforts have an inevitable tendency to diminish the happiness of the people, and endanger the stability and permanency of the Union, and ought not to be countenanced by any friend of our political institutions.

"8. That the separation of the moneys of the government from banking institutions is indispensable for the safety of the funds of the government and the rights of the people.