ions of the ---- February instant, reports from the Secretary of
State and the Secretary of the Treasury, with accompanying documents,
relating to the relations between the United States and France. For
reasons adverted to by the Secretary of State, the resolutions of the
House have not been more fully complied with.

ANDREW JACKSON.

FEBRUARY 22, 1836.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith to Congress copies of the correspondence between the
Secretary of State and the charge d'affaires of His Britannic Majesty,
relative to the mediation of Great Britain in our disagreement with
France and to the determination of the French Government to execute the
treaty of indemnification without further delay on the application for
payment by the agent of the United States.

The grounds upon which the mediation was accepted will be found fully
developed in the correspondence. On the part of France the mediation had
been publicly accepted before the offer of it could be received here.
Whilst each of the two Governments has thus discovered a just solicitude
to resort to all honorable means of adjusting amicably the controversy
between them, it is a matter of congratulation that the mediation has
been rendered unnecessary. Under such circumstances the anticipation may
be confidently indulged that the disagreement between the United States
and France will not have produced more than a temporary estrangement.
The healing effects of time, a just consideration of the powerful
motives for a cordial good understanding between the two nations, the
strong inducements each has to respect and esteem the other, will no
doubt soon obliterate from their remembrance all traces of that
disagreement.

Of the elevated and disinterested part the Government of Great Britain
has acted and was prepared to act I have already had occasion to express
my high sense. Universal respect and the consciousness of meriting
it are with Governments as with men the just rewards of those who
faithfully exert their power to preserve peace, restore harmony, and
perpetuate good will.

I may be permitted, I trust, at this time, without a suspicion of the
most remote desire to throw off censure from the Executive or to point
it to any other department or branch of the Government, to refer to the
want of effective preparation in which our country was found at the
late crisis. From the nature of our institutions the movements of the
G