year been in a great measure
banished from those seas, and the pirates for months past appear to have
been almost entirely swept away from the borders and the shores of the
two Spanish islands in those regions. The active, persevering, and
unremitted energy of Captain Warrington and of the officers and men
under his command on that trying and perilous service have been crowned
with signal success, and are entitled to the approbation of their
country. But experience has shown that not even a temporary suspension
or relaxation from assiduity can be indulged on that station without
reproducing piracy and murder in all their horrors; nor is it probable
that for years to come our immensely valuable commerce in those seas can
navigate in security without the steady continuance of an armed force
devoted to its protection.

It were, indeed, a vain and dangerous illusion to believe that in the
present or probable condition of human society a commerce so extensive
and so rich as ours could exist and be pursued in safety without the
continual support of a military marine--the only arm by which the power
of this Confederacy can be estimated or felt by foreign nations, and the
only standing military force which can never be dangerous to our own
liberties at home. A permanent naval peace establishment, therefore,
adapted to our present condition, and adaptable to that gigantic growth
with which the nation is advancing in its career, is among the subjects
which have already occupied the foresight of the last Congress, and
which will deserve your serious deliberations. Our Navy, commenced at an
early period of our present political organization upon a scale
commensurate with the incipient energies, the scanty resources, and the
comparative indigence of our infancy, was even then found adequate to
cope with all the powers of Barbary, save the first, and with one of the
principal maritime powers of Europe.

At a period of further advancement, but with little accession of
strength, it not only sustained with honor the most unequal of
conflicts, but covered itself and our country with unfading glory. But
it is only since the close of the late war that by the numbers and force
of the ships of which it was composed it could deserve the name of a
navy. Yet it retains nearly the same organization as when it consisted
only of five frigates. The rules and regulations by which it is governed
earnestly call for revision, and the want of a naval