JAMES MONROE.

WASHINGTON, January 8, 1822.

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States: 

In pursuance of a joint resolution of the two Houses of Congress of the 3d of March, 1821, authorizing the President to cause such number of astronomical observations to be made by methods which might, in his judgment, be best adapted to insure a correct determination of the longitude of the Capitol, in the city of Washington, from Greenwich or some other known meridian in Europe, and that he cause the data, with accurate calculations on statements founded thereon, to be laid before them at their present session, I herewith transmit to Congress the report made by William Lambert, who was selected by me on the 10th of April last to perform the service required by that resolution.

As no compensation is authorized by law for the execution of the duties assigned to Mr. Lambert, it is submitted to the discretion of Congress to make the necessary provision for an adequate allowance to him and to the assistant whom he employed to aid him in his observations.

JAMES MONROE.

JANUARY 17, 1822.

To the Senate of the United States: 

I nominate the persons whose names are stated in the inclosed letter from the Secretary of War for the appointments therein respectively proposed for them.

The changes in the Army growing out of the act of the 2d of March, 1821, “to reduce and fix the military peace establishment of the United States,” are exhibited in the Official Register for the year 1822, herewith submitted for the information of the Senate.

Under the late organization of the artillery arm, with the exception of the colonel of the regiment of light artillery, there were no grades higher than lieutenant-colonel recognized.  Three of the four colonels of artillery provided for by the act of Congress of the 2d of March, 1821, were considered, therefore, as original vacancies, to be filled, as the good of the service might dictate, from the Army corps.

The Pay Department being considered as a part of the military establishment, and, within the meaning of the above-recited act, constituting one of the corps of the Army, the then Pay master-General was appointed colonel of one of the regiments.  A contrary construction, which would have limited the corps specified in the twelfth section of the act to the line of the Army, would equally have excluded all the other branches of the staff, as well that of the Pay Department, which was expressly comprehended among those to be reduced.  Such a construction did not seem to be authorized by the act, since by its general terms it was inferred to have been intended to give a power of sufficient extent to make the reduction by which so many were to be disbanded operate with as little inconvenience as possible to the parties.  Acting on these views and on the recommendation of the board of general officers, who were called in on account of their knowledge and experience to aid the Executive in so delicate a service, I thought it proper to appoint Colonel Towson to one of the new regiments of artillery, it being a corps in which he had eminently distinguished himself and acquired great knowledge and experience in the late war.