This view of our finances, whilst it shows that due provision has been made for the expenses of the current year, shows at the same time, by the limited amount of the actual revenue and the dependence on loans, the necessity of providing more adequately for the future supplies of the Treasury.  This can be best done by a well-digested system of internal revenue in aid of existing sources, which will have the effect both of abridging the amount of necessary loans and, on that account, as well as by placing the public credit on a more satisfactory basis, of improving the terms on which loans may be obtained.  The loan of sixteen millions was not contracted for at a less interest than about 7 1/2 per cent, and, although other causes may have had an agency, it can not be doubted that, with the advantage of a more extended and less precarious revenue, a lower rate of interest might have sufficed.  A longer postponement of this advantage could not fail to have a still greater influence on future loans.

In recommending to the National Legislature this resort to additional taxes I feel great satisfaction in the assurance that our constituents, who have already displayed so much zeal and firmness in the cause of their country, will cheerfully give any other proof of their patriotism which it calls for.  Happily no people, with local and transitory exceptions never to be wholly avoided, are more able than the people of the United States to spare for the public wants a portion of their private means, whether regard be had to the ordinary profits of industry or the ordinary price of subsistence in our country compared with those in any other.  And in no case could stronger reasons be felt for yielding the requisite contributions.  By rendering the public resources certain and commensurate to the public exigencies, the constituted authorities will be able to prosecute the war the more rapidly to its proper issue; every hostile hope founded on a calculated failure of our resources will be cut off, and by adding to the evidence of bravery and skill in combats on the ocean and the land, and alacrity in supplying the treasure necessary to give them their fullest effect, and demonstrating to the world the public energy which our political institutions combine, with the personal liberty distinguishing them, the best security will be provided against future enterprises on the rights or the peace of the nation.

The contest in which the United States are engaged appeals for its support to every motive that can animate an uncorrupted and enlightened people—­to the love of country; to the pride of liberty; to an emulation of the glorious founders of their independence by a successful vindication of its violated attributes; to the gratitude and sympathy which demand security from the most degrading wrongs of a class of citizens who have proved themselves so worthy the protection of their country by their heroic zeal in its defense; and, finally, to the sacred obligation of transmitting entire to future generations that precious patrimony of national rights and independence which is held in trust by the present from the goodness of Divine Providence.