result of this is still to leave the
custody of the public money without those safeguards which have been for
several years earnestly desired by the Executive, and as the remedy is
only to be found in the action of the Legislature it imposes on me the
duty of again submitting to you the propriety of passing a law providing
for the safe-keeping of the public moneys, and especially to ask that
its use for private purposes by any officers intrusted with it may be
declared to be a felony, punishable with penalties proportioned to the
magnitude of the offense.

These circumstances, added to known defects in the existing laws and
unusual derangement in the general operations of trade, have during
the last three years much increased the difficulties attendant on the
collection, keeping, and disbursement of the revenue, and called forth
corresponding exertions from those having them in charge. Happily these
have been successful beyond expectation. Vast sums have been collected
and disbursed by the several Departments with unexpected cheapness and
ease, transfers have been readily made to every part of the Union,
however distant, and defalcations have been far less than might have
been anticipated from the absence of adequate legal restraints. Since
the officers of the Treasury and Post-Office Departments were charged
with the custody of most of the public moneys received by them there
have been collected $66,000,000, and, excluding the case of the late
collector at New York, the aggregate amount of losses sustained in the
collection can not, it is believed, exceed $60,000. The defalcation
of the late collector at that city, of the extent and circumstances
of which Congress have been fully informed, ran through all the modes
of keeping the public money that have been hitherto in use, and was
distinguished by an aggravated disregard of duty that broke through
the restraints of every system, and can not, therefore, be usefully
referred to as a test of the comparative safety of either. Additional
information will also be furnished by the report of the Secretary of
the Treasury, in reply to a call made upon that officer by the House
of Representatives at the last session requiring detailed information
on the subject of defaults by public officers or agents under each
Administration from 1789 to 1837. This document will be submitted to
you in a few days. The general results (independent of the Post-Office,
which is kept separately an