essed to the late President of the United States, which, not
having been answered by him, came to my hands on his death; and I also
transmit a copy of the answer which I have felt it to be my duty to
cause to be made to that communication.

Congress will perceive that the governor of Texas officially states
that by authority of the legislature of that State he dispatched a
special commissioner with full power and instructions to extend the
civil jurisdiction of the State over the unorganized counties of El
Paso, Worth, Presidio, and Santa Fe, situated on its northwestern
limits.

He proceeds to say that the commissioner had reported to him in an
official form that the military officers employed in the service of
the United States stationed at Santa Fe interposed adversely with
the inhabitants to the fulfillment of his object in favor of the
establishment of a separate State government east of the Rio Grande,
and within the rightful limits of the State of Texas. These four
counties, which Texas thus proposes to establish and organize as being
within her own jurisdiction, extend over the whole of the territory
east of the Rio Grande, which has heretofore been regarded as an
essential and integral part of the department of New Mexico, and
actually governed and possessed by her people until conquered and
severed from the Republic of Mexico by the American arms.

The legislature of Texas has been called together by her governor
for the purpose, as is understood, of maintaining her claim to the
territory east of the Rio Grande and of establishing over it her own
jurisdiction and her own laws by force.

These proceedings of Texas, may well arrest the attention of all
branches of the Government of the United States, and I rejoice that
they occur while the Congress is yet in session. It is, I fear, far
from being impossible that, in consequence of these proceedings of
Texas, a crisis may be brought on which shall summon the two Houses of
Congress, and still more emphatically the executive government, to an
immediate readiness for the performance of their respective duties.

By the Constitution of the United States the President is constituted
Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, and of the militia of the
several States when called into the actual service of the United
States. The Constitution declares also that he shall take care that
the laws be faithfully executed and that he shall from time to time
give to the Congr