56,738, making
an increase of service at the rate of 15 per cent and a reduction in the
expenses of more than 15 per cent.

During the past year there have been employed, under contracts with the
Post-Office Department, two ocean steamers in conveying the mails
monthly between New York and Bremen, and one, since October last,
performing semimonthly service between Charleston and Havana; and a
contract has been made for the transportation of the Pacific mails
across the Isthmus from Chagres to Panama.

Under the authority given to the Secretary of the Navy, three ocean
steamers have been constructed and sent to the Pacific, and are expected
to enter upon the mail service between Panama and Oregon and the
intermediate ports on the 1st of January next; and a fourth has been
engaged by him for the service between Havana and Chagres, so that a
regular monthly mail line will be kept up after that time between the
United States and our territories on the Pacific.

Notwithstanding this great increase in the mail service, should the
revenue continue to increase the present year as it did in the last,
there will be received near $450,000 more than the expenditures.

These considerations have satisfied the Postmaster-General that, with
certain modifications of the act of 1845, the revenue may be still
further increased and a reduction of postages made to a uniform rate of
5 cents, without an interference with the principle, which has been
constantly and properly enforced, of making that Department sustain
itself.

A well-digested cheap-postage system is the best means of diffusing
intelligence among the people, and is of so much importance in a country
so extensive as that of the United States that I recommend to your
favorable consideration the suggestions of the Postmaster-General for
its improvement.

Nothing can retard the onward progress of our country and prevent us
from assuming and maintaining the first rank among nations but a
disregard of the experience of the past and a recurrence to an unwise
public policy. We have just closed a foreign war by an honorable
peace--a war rendered necessary and unavoidable in vindication of the
national rights and honor. The present condition of the country is
similar in some respects to that which existed immediately after the
close of the war with Great Britain in 1815, and the occasion is deemed
to be a proper one to take a retrospect of the measures of public policy
which foll