f Jeffersonville to be made at Jeffersonville.

Given under my hand the 1st day of May, 1816.

JAMES MADISON.

By the President:
JOSIAH MEIGS,
_Commissioner of the General Land Office_.

EIGHTH ANNUAL MESSAGE.

DECEMBER 3, 1816.

_Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_:

In reviewing the present state of our country, our attention can not be
withheld from the effect produced by peculiar seasons which have very
generally impaired the annual gifts of the earth and threatened scarcity
in particular districts. Such, however, is the variety of soils, of
climates, and of products within our extensive limits that the aggregate
resources for subsistence are more than sufficient for the aggregate
wants. And as far as an economy of consumption, more than usual, may be
necessary, our thankfulness is due to Providence for what is far more
than a compensation, in the remarkable health which has distinguished
the present year.

Amidst the advantages which have succeeded the peace of Europe, and that
of the United States with Great Britain, in a general invigoration of
industry among us and in the extension of our commerce, the value of
which is more and more disclosing itself to commercial nations, it is
to be regretted that a depression is experienced by particular branches
of our manufactures and by a portion of our navigation. As the first
proceeds in an essential degree from an excess of imported merchandise,
which carries a check in its own tendency, the cause in its present
extent can not be of very long duration. The evil will not, however,
be viewed by Congress without a recollection that manufacturing
establishments, if suffered to sink too low or languish too long,
may not revive after the causes shall have ceased, and that in the
vicissitudes of human affairs situations may recur in which a dependence
on foreign sources for indispensable supplies may be among the most
serious embarrassments.

The depressed state of our navigation is to be ascribed in a material
degree to its exclusion from the colonial ports of the nation most
extensively connected with us in commerce, and from the indirect
operation of that exclusion.

Previous to the late convention at London between the United States
and Great Britain the relative state of the navigation laws of the two
countries, growing out of the treaty of 1794, had given to the British
navigation a material advantage over the