powers of the several States and of the people; to cherish with loyal fealty and devoted affection this Union, as the only sure foundation on which the hopes of civil liberty rest; to administer government with vigilant integrity and rigid economy; to cultivate peace and friendship with foreign nations, and to demand and exact equal justice from all, but to do wrong to none; to eschew intermeddling with the national policy and the domestic repose of other governments, and to repel it from our own; never to shrink from war when the rights and the honor of the country call us to arms, but to cultivate in preference the arts of peace, seek enlargement of the rights of neutrality, and elevate and liberalize the intercourse of nations; and by such just and honorable means, and such only, whilst exalting the condition of the Republic, to assure to it the legitimate influence and the benign authority of a great example amongst all the powers of Christendom.

Under the solemnity of these convictions the blessing of Almighty God is earnestly invoked to attend upon your deliberations and upon all the counsels and acts of the Government, to the end that, with common zeal and common efforts, we may, in humble submission to the divine will, cooperate for the promotion of the supreme good of these United States.

FRANKLIN PIERCE.

SPECIAL MESSAGES.

WASHINGTON, December 5, 1854.

To the Senate of the United States: 

I transmit to the Senate, for its consideration with a view to approval, a compact between the United States and the royal Government of Lew Chew, entered into at Napa on the 11th day of July last, for securing certain privileges to vessels of the United States resorting to the Lew Chew Islands.

A copy of the instructions of the Secretary of State upon the subject is also herewith transmitted.

FRANKLIN PIERCE.

WASHINGTON, December 5, 1894.

To the Senate of the United States: 

I transmit to the Senate, for its consideration with a view to ratification, a convention for regulating the right of inheriting and acquiring property, concluded in this city on the 21st day of August last between the United States and His Highness the Duke of Brunswick and Luneburg.

FRANKLIN PIERCE.

WASHINGTON, December 11, 1854.

To the Senate and House of Representatives: 

An act for the relief of the legal representatives of Samuel Prioleau, deceased, which provided for the payment of the sum of $6,928.60 to the legal representatives of said Prioleau by the proper accounting officer of the Treasury, was approved by me July 27, 1854.  It having been ascertained that the identical claim provided for in this act was liquidated and paid under the provisions of the general act of August 4, 1790, and of the special act of January 24, 1795, the First Comptroller of the Treasury declined to give effect to the law first above referred to without communicating the facts for my consideration.  This refusal I regard as fully justified by the facts upon which it was predicated.