ates_:

In answer to the resolutions of the House of Representatives of the 10th
instant, requesting information in relation to New Mexico and
California, I communicate herewith reports from the Secretary of State,
the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of War, and the Secretary
of the Navy, with the documents which accompany the same. These reports
and documents contain information upon the several points of inquiry
embraced by the resolutions. "The proper limits and boundaries of New
Mexico and California" are delineated on the map referred to in the late
treaty with Mexico, an authentic copy of which is herewith transmitted;
and all the additional information upon that subject, and also the most
reliable information in respect to the population of these respective
Provinces, which is in the possession of the Executive will be found in
the accompanying report of the Secretary of State.

The resolutions request information in regard to the existence of civil
governments in New Mexico and California, their "form and character," by
"whom instituted," by "what authority," and how they are "maintained and
supported."

In my message of December 22, 1846, in answer to a resolution of the
House of Representatives calling for information "in relation to the
establishment or organization of civil government in any portion of the
territory of Mexico which has or might be taken possession of by the
Army or Navy of the United States," I communicated the orders which had
been given to the officers of our Army and Navy, and stated the general
authority upon which temporary military governments had been established
over the conquered portion of Mexico then in our military occupation.

The temporary governments authorized were instituted by virtue of the
rights of war. The power to declare war against a foreign country, and
to prosecute it according to the general laws of war, as sanctioned by
civilized nations, it will not be questioned, exists under our
Constitution. When Congress has declared that war exists with a foreign
nation, "the general laws of war apply to our situation," and it becomes
the duty of the President, as the constitutional "Commander in Chief of
the Army and Navy of the United States," to prosecute it.

In prosecuting a foreign war thus duly declared by Congress, we have the
right, by "conquest and military occupation," to acquire possession of
the territories of the enemy, and, during the war, to "exe