Part 74

To the House of Representatives of the United States:

I communicate herewith a report of the Secretary of State, together with the accompanying papers, in compliance with the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 23d of December, 1848, requesting the President "to cause to be transmitted to the House, if compatible with the public interest, the correspondence of George W. Gordon, late, and Gorham Parks, the present, consul of the United States at Rio de Janeiro, with the Department of State on the subject of the African slave trade; also any unpublished correspondence on the same subject by the Hon. Henry A. Wise, our late minister to Brazil."

JAMES K. POLK.

WASHINGTON, March 2, 1849.

To the House of Representatives of the United States:

I communicate herewith a report of the Secretary of State, together with the accompanying papers, in compliance with the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 20th ultimo, requesting the President to communicate to that House a list of all consuls, vice-consuls, and commercial agents now in the service of the United States, their residence, distinguishing such as are citizens of the United States from such as are not, and to inform the said House whether regular returns of their fees and perquisites and the tonnage and commerce of the United States within their respective consulates or agencies have been regularly made by each, and to communicate the amount of such fees and perquisites for certain years therein specified, together with the number of vessels and amount of tonnage which entered and cleared within each of the consulates and agencies for the same period; also the number of seamen of the United States who have been provided for and sent home from each of the said consulates for the time aforesaid.

JAMES K. POLK.

WASHINGTON, March 2, 1849.

To the Senate of the United States:

I herewith transmit a communication from the Secretary of the Treasury, accompanying a report from the Solicitor of the Treasury presenting a view of the operations of that office since its organization.

JAMES K. POLK.

PROCLAMATIONS.

WASHINGTON, January 2, 1849.

To the Senators of the United States, respectively.

SIR: Objects interesting to the United States requiring that the Senate should be in session on Monday, the 5th of March next, to receive and act upon such communications as may be made to it on the part of the Executive, your attention in the Senate Chamber, in this city, on that day at 10 o'clock in the forenoon is accordingly requested.

JAMES K. POLK.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas by an act of the Congress of the United States of the 10th January, 1849, entitled "An act to extend certain privileges to the town of Whitehall, in the State of New York," the President of the United States, on the recommendation of the Secretary of the Treasury, is authorized to extend to the town of Whitehall the same privileges as are conferred on certain ports named in the seventh section of an act entitled "An act allowing drawback upon foreign merchandise exported in the original packages to Chihuahua and Santa Fe, in Mexico, and to the British North American Provinces adjoining the United States," passed 3d March, 1845, in the manner prescribed by the proviso contained in said section; and

Whereas the Secretary of the Treasury has duly recommended to me the extension of the privileges of the law aforesaid to the port of Whitehall, in the collection district of Champlain, in the State of New York:

Now, therefore, I, James K. Polk, President of the United States of America, do hereby declare and proclaim that the port of Whitehall, in the collection district of Champlain, in the State of New York, is and shall be entitled to all the privileges extended to the other ports enumerated in the seventh section of the act aforesaid from and after the date of this proclamation.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this 2d day of March, A.D. 1849, and of the Independence of the United States of America the seventy-third.

JAMES K. POLK.

By the President: JAMES BUCHANAN, Secretary of State.